Housekeeping

Well, I could talk about SoCal’s current heat wave but that’s not really the “weather” I was referring to. I’m talking about my internal environment – my mental well being. I’ve decided to be as open as possible because I believe it will keep me in check; keep me looking in a positive direction and away from slipping into the depths of darkness (if you’ve ever been depressed you understand that as “dramatic” as that sounds, it really is kind of how it feels – like you’re in this dark, gloomy place and can’t quite find the light to get out…)

When I first started therapy I created this “anonymous” blog where I was unbelievably raw about my feelings about myself, Dave and Tarleton. I deleted it because I didn’t want to deal with all those raw feelings once we found out that Dave would be deploying to Afghanistan in January of 2011. Let’s face it, I knew I was going to be a hot mess whether I was improving or not!

The difficulty of attaching my personal feelings to a “family blog” is that I’ve shared this with everyone we know. I don’t want people to look at me like I’m crazy, I mean, only a special few know that I am. 😉 No, seriously, I’m not looking for pity. I’m doing this more for the women out there who maybe haven’t found the strength in their journey to be open and honest and not fear more guilt and shame by doing so. Because that’s exactly what I fear as I type this: I will feel guilty, believe that everyone will think I’m a horrible mother and wife and be completely ashamed of myself…more than usual. I’m hoping that by conjuring up what strength I have found, someone else will be able to make that phone call to ask for help.

Seems simple enough, right, to ask for help. It’s really not. Not when from where you’re sitting it appears that all of your loved ones and other mom-friends seem to have all their shit together and you don’t. Not when our society seems to still believe that women should be able to figure it all out: work, motherhood, housekeeping, social life. I’ve been sitting on a referral for an appointment with a new therapist for almost two weeks out of fear of having to say out loud all of the things I’ve been holding inside for the last, oh, year since I was in any therapy at all… it’s exhausting to let out, almost as exhausting as it is to hold it in. No, that’s not true, it’s more exhausting to let it out. You know that feeling you get after a really good cry, like “man, I actually feel better now. I’m glad I watched that movie I knew would make me cry.” (Don’t know what I mean, watch My Sister’s Keeper). This doesn’t work that way, at least not for me. First, I feel worse because now I just said out loud all the things I haven’t been to a stranger, essentially. So now I’m wondering what that stranger thinks about me and deciding that they think I’m crazy and a horrible wife and mother, etc. The kicker is that I know once I find a new therapist I do feel comfortable I will start to feel better about opening up with her and dread the sessions less.

Wow, that was a lot (that I want to delete, but I’m fighting the urge) and I haven’t really talked about how I’m feeling right now. Though, you can probably guess based on the above dialogue. There have been ups and downs and that’s all part of dealing with depression. I know this, I’ve come far enough to expect it, I thought I had enough tools in my belt to fight through it, but some times I just can’t. To give you an idea of how my brain works: T’s party? Was great, right? Everyone told me so and it felt good to receive praise for something I’d put my heart and soul into. Every time someone said something looked great, was great, etc? I thought, wow, thanks, but did I do enough, really? I literally had to stop myself, look around, see happy children playing to remind myself that THAT was all that mattered – and that my brain is a little messed up.

No one is ever going to give me a compliment the same way, ever again. 😉

T seems to be going through a tough transition into his third year. There are daily fits/tantrums/full on fights – the child has started lashing out at me, AT ME!!!! The one person in his life who has been the constant. I don’t normally turn to books when I need an answer, usually I just ask around or google it, but this time around I asked a friend with a little kid know-how what books she’d recommend. At the moment I’ve started 1-2-3 Magic. I’ll let you know how it reads and if it works (if I decide to use this method). I’m having a lot of anxiety over the idea that whatever discipline methods we use now will shape our son’s personality/character forever.

Time management is still a big issue for me. My attempt to set up a daily interest blog post is to help in this; I need a set routine. While I’ve been a stay at home mom and waiting for nursing school to work out I’ve just kind of been this flexible do whatever on whatever day and unless it was a set appointment or play date there was no strong desire to stick to a “schedule” (for me, not T). Obviously with a child you have to have some sort of routine – wake up, breakfast, play, lunch, play, nap, snack, play, dinner – or something like that.

Just kind of sucks when your really awesome husband comes home from working all day and can manage to unload the dishwasher, reload the dish washer, wash whatever other dishes can’t go in the dishwasher, clean the kitchen, switch out some laundry, pick up various other things around the house ALL within about the same amount of time as it would take me to finish cleaning the kitchen. Granted, he didn’t have to stop every 10 minutes to attend to Teddy’s whatever whim/tantrum/need occurred, but the point is I’m either really lazy, or just really inefficient with time management, or just a horrible housekeeper.

So that’s the weather report: partly sunny/partly cloudy with a very serious chance of rain.