Constant Quest for Positivity

Whew. It's been a crazy few months. Some of you may have noticed my radio silence. I imagine those who follow my blog or twitter feed are not surprised I needed a break from social media. The break has been necessary as I work hard to be the best me I can be. However I will continue to write. Here's a tidbit of my focus as of late.

Recovery, as I have mentioned before, is a process that is not always linear, often takes steps backwards, has an indeterminate length, and requires a tremendous amount of patience. Once I began to get stronger, it also required (requires) a tremendous of work from me. 

So that, in a nutshell, is where I'm at. Facing my emotions, looking into my heart.

Taking one day at a time (sometimes one moment at a time) but trying to remember to live it, not just survive it. I am getting better and have been equipped with the tools to make the final steps. As the depression wanes, it's up to me to discover happiness again.

This means not listening when the thoughts creep in that I don't know what I'm doing, wondering what the hell I was thinking to make such a major change, thinking that I am not cut out for this. It means taking each and every one of those thoughts and turning it around.

I do know what I'm doing.

This change is a step forward.

I am cut out for this.

Reframe it.

 Accentuate the positive.

Keep on the sunnyside.

There have been times when I think of it as "fake it till you make it" but it's not really faking it. It's just grabbing hold of that little thing and holding on to it with all I've got so I can get to the other side of the darkness. 

How can I make this feel okay?

What can I do to make myself smile?

To breathe?

My runs have become my meditation. I breathe in for three steps and out for two. Three strong words are picked each day and I think them as I breathe in, breathe out and start again. A mantra. 

Strength

Love

Success

Peace 

Comfort

Home

Family

Growth

Happiness.

The words change but it fuels my run and cleanses my soul.

Each and every night, I lie in bed and list the things I'm grateful for. Often they are not about at me, but the loving friends and family I have surrounding me, the amazing people I have come in contact with, the beautiful weather I've been living in. I drift off to sleep holding these thoughts in my head instead of turning over and over the things that went wrong.

Sounds cheesy. But it's working.

The last bump I had was a doozy. I was in town, on my own, and as I hung up from a difficult phone call, I could feel the anxiety closing in, my chest tightening, my eyes glistening. 

***annnnnd breeeeeathhhheeee*

in for three, out for four
in for five, out for six.

***annnnd wallllkk**

'positive positive positive'

It'll be fine. It'll work out. It is not in your control.

Focus on what is.

I ran errands. 

One. at. a. time.

Each check mark, I stopped, reminded myself that it was a step forward, and continued to the next one.

The anxiety didn't magically disappear, but I kept it at bay. Not in a masking, ignoring, I'll have a total break down way, either. (believe me, I've been there) I was aware of it constantly. I had to stop and breathe a lot that afternoon but focusing on what I could do, what I was doing, helped me get through. I made it.

The day was good.

So We Meet Again: Reconnecting after Postpartum Depression

It’s January and my husband and I have had yet another argument. They have been coming fast in furious for several months and this has been one for the books. One that starts with snide comments from both parties, escalating to insults and accusations. One with an intermission where he swears under his breath as he picks up his phone, I stomp out of the room and cry.  One where by the end we hugging each other, apologizing for our hurtful words, emotionally and physically exhausted, feeling absolutely no relief from airing our grievances. We have figured out the problem.

We just have no idea how to fix it. 

Postpartum depression has been hell. It has messed with my husband’s world as much as it has mine.  As he put it, the day we came home with our newborn baby, I returned with a stranger. He returned with two.

Imagine it. 

You find someone to spend your life with. It isn’t always perfect, you don’t always see eye to eye, but you get each other. You decide to have a baby together. You go into it knowing it’s going to be hard work but you are ready because you’ll be doing it together.

But this mom is not your partner in crime. She looks the same, but only if you look past the slouched posture, the empty eyes, the plastic smile.  She almost sounds the same, but her intonation has been replaced with emotionless monotone. You look hard to find her in there but she just isn’t the person you entered into this with.

You discover it’s an illness and feel almost relieved. There’s a reason for this change and there is a way to recover. So you do everything in your power to make sure she can concentrate on getting better.

She can’t bring herself to cook more than ramen noodles and cup a soup…

So you do the meal planning, the grocery shopping, and the cooking.

Thinking about money practically cripples her with panic…

So you take over the budget and paying the bills.

She is too anxious to even think about leaving the house…

So you decline friends’ invitations and stay at home with her.

She needs to live moment by moment…

So you accept it and do the required planning ahead.

She needs to work through how she is feeling.

You listen to as much as you can handle before you tell her you’ll give her the space and time it takes, but that she must tell someone else.

You are heartbroken, angry, and confused. You are scared and frustrated but you can’t tell the one person you usually turn to. So you seal your feelings off and continue to work.

You continue to do.

You keep busy.

You move forward.

Then, after what seems like an eternity, she seems like herself again. Each day, a little more of her comes back. She makes jokes that make you laugh and her smiles reach her eyes.

She plans the weekend away without begging you to make the final decisions.

She gets pissed off when you plan something without consulting her. Then gets even more furious when you do it again. She wants to know about the things that you’d grown accustomed to doing alone because, for so long, she wasn’t healthy enough to handle it.

She is hurt that you come home and busy yourself on the computer, the phone, or the TV. She wonders why you are so insular.

This is about the point when the big one started. He lost it and shouted. “Because you have been shut off for more than two years.”

He wasn’t wrong. I fought back the urge to apologise and he stopped me as I began to utter “I’m sorry.” We both know it’s PPD that made me detached and anxious.

But it still sucked. For both of us. We did what we could to get through it. We weathered the storm in the best way we knew how. 

Now that I’m feeling again, I don’t want him to live as though he is on his own. Now that he sees me reaching out, he is unsure how to let down his guard.

I am finally finding the old me again but he isn’t the old him anymore. He’s been through this battle too. Only he’s been through it wide awake, without the fog of depression to fade his memories or cloud his days.

We both want to get back to being as close as we used to be but it has been tremendously hard work.

We are not there yet.

It cuts me to the core to write that.

In my heart of hearts I know it’s a testament to the strength of our relationship that has got us through this hell and not a sign of weakness that we have pieces to pick up. We have fun together and even managed it some in the midst of my depression. But in the moments when we run out of things to say to each other, the hurt comes flooding in. 

In those hard moments I remind myself how much we have been through and that healing takes time.

I know that impatience won’t speed up this process but will only cause heartache while we are working through it. I do my best to remember that we love each other, even if PPD did its damndest to rip us apart.

We are trying and we will get there.

In order to survive this illness, we had to live as individuals but we will be that strong team again.

Glimpses of Hope

Today was a good day. 

It started by me oversleeping.

My daughter managed to find a water bottle and dump in on the carpet. 

My box of ‘Frosted Wheats’ was empty and there was that not quite enough amount left in my second choice.  (my husband made me eggs on toast, though – bonus points for him!)

Little miss refused to give me a hug goodbye…first time she’s ever done that.

I missed an important deadline at work.

I didn’t start two other projects because of desparately trying to make said deadline.

Since my forgotten umbrella was at home, I got soaked on my way to lunch.

Our new (to us) car is giving us grief…just days after a service.

My husband is ill for the second time in a week.

I had to leave items in the middle of using self checkout to chase after (surprisingly speedy) daughter.

I finished a mountain of dishes, then discovered more on the table.

So, on the scale of greatness, this one wouldn’t score particularly high.  In fact, by some standards, it’s fair to say it was particularly shit.  However, to one who is in the process of recovery, today was a good day.  You see, on a bad day, just one of the above events would be enough to send me spiralling into the depths of despair.