Bricks

It's no secret, I get depressed. Have for years. Had a hell of a time over the past couple years fighting it and dealing with it. You probably get sick of reading about it on this blog. Guess what. I get sick of living it.

I was diagnosed as "clinically depressed" 9 years ago. And for 7 years, I fought that diagnosis and fought the reality of what I was facing. I fought and fought and worked and worked and took the herbal remedies and the natural solutions and the vitamins and the oils and the homeopathics and the advice and helpful suggestions wherever I could. I changed my diet, I ate this instead of that. I cut out sugar. I ate protein at every meal. I balanced my electrolytes, my iron, my vitamin C. I got vitamin b shots. I took vitamin b drops. I pounded omega 3's, 6's, and 9's. I had lavender baths. I worked on the contributing factors where I could recognize them. I read books and took walks and worked out. I exercised daily, and put more miles on my stroller walking around the small town I lived in one summer than I did on my van.  I took supplements of this and supplements of that, vitamins and minerals and calcium and got lots of sunshine and breaks from the kids and took time for me. I sought help and solutions in every way shape or form I could find them, except for the drugs that the doctors offered.  I did mental reconditioning and surrounded myself with positive reinforcing statements and affirmations posted all over my house and even inside my cupboard doors.  I prayed and I prayed and I prayed and I read and I did everything I knew how to do. For seven years.

And then, I snapped.

There were definitely a lot of contributing factors. As much as I did to try to reverse the situation and make sure that with each baby I wasn't going to have to deal with postpartum depression... in the end, real life kicks in. The icing on the cake, of course, was the new baby and all that came with him.  And while it helps to define the factors involved, the end result is what I have to deal with on a daily and consistent basis. This new me. This me post-baby-number-seven. This me post-mental breakdown.

I was forever changed.

I needed help. I knew it. I could feel myself at the edge of a cliff and knowing that if I didnt' get help soon there would be no more Rachel. There would be no more me. At the time, I was inexplicably terrified of driving, or I would have gotten in the van, drove off, and never come back. I don't kno were I would be. I have no idea. And I don't ever want to find out.

I couldn't handle the baby. I couldn't handle the kids. I couldn't deal with the stress. I was shutting down more and more and more. Like quicksand, it was surroundg me, pulling me farther in, and every effort to not surrender to it sunk me farther and farther.

My last ditch effort to have Ryan finally understand where I was at, was a miracle that at that point I could even express it to him adequately.  I knew that if I didn't get help, I would die. I knew I was cracking, splintering, and that if I didn't get help I would be in a million pieces on the floor and there would be no way to fix what was wrong. I had been bad off before, but this was nothing like I'd ever experienced.

I remember just bawling and bawling and saying over and over "I need help." It was three in the morning, I think, before he realized the extent of what I was saying. And to his credit, he got me help. He drove me to the doctor's office the next day. He filled my prescription, and held me as I went through the rollercoaster from hell that comes with getting on, and off, those drugs.

He has been amazing, and I rely on his strength and fortitude. It is no wonder I miss him so much when he is gone working.

Now, it's two years later, and I still hate the drugs.  I worked hard, and with the help of my husband, my family, and my friends, and especially with the help of beautiful priesthood blessings, I was able to get off the drugs and stay off of them. It has been 11 months since I last took my prescriptions, and I'm proud of it. But I still can't throw the rest of them out. They are expired, and I don't ever want to take them again, and yet I can't throw them away. I panic.

Partly why I panic is because of days like today. Days when I should be fine, when there is nothing "wrong", and definitely nothing to be crying about. And yet I do. Even more than crying, I sit, with a weight upon my back, like forty tons of brick pressing down on me. I curl up and tears stream down my face and my head swirls round and round.  I can't move. I can't vocalize. I don't function.

What I've found I have to do is label the bricks. Try to identify them. And visually, forcibly, remove them from my back, off my shoulders, out of my lap, and set them down. Sometimes I can set them aside. Sometimes I don't know where to put them, and I have to give them to Father in Heaven and ask Him to take care of them for me. I have to recognize if I'm carrying the bricks that belong to someone else, taking on their stress or responsibility.

Sometimes the bricks are fragile and whe I go to pick them up, the bricks in that particular pile will break apart and fall back down on me, and I have to pick each piece up carefully and set it aside gently, because those feelings are so real and so raw.

And if someone comes along and asks "how are you?" I smile cheerfully. I answer the phone as though nothing is wrong. Even if they could see the bricks, they would not recognize what I was doing. I just try to shrug and make it look like there is nothing wrong.  I'm quite good at it actually. There probably isn't anyone I came in contact with today that realized just how much I was struggling. 

At least, until Joe called. Somehow he could tell, even before he called.  Maybe he read my last post, maybe he was just prompted.  I don't know. But I hope he also knows how much it means that he did call. That he does care. That he listens to me and doesn't make me feel bad for being weighed down by my load of bricks today. That he doesn't remind me it's all just in my head. That he doesn't make me feel like I'm just wrong for how I feel.

Thank you Joe. And thank you Father, for a brother who loves me so much. And for helping me to know...

I will be okay. One brick, one day, at a time.

11:00 and All's Well!

Do you remember watching Disney's Robin Hood as a kid?  Ry's sister Barb bought it for our family when we were little and it never ceases to entertain me.  I don't know how many hundreds of times I have watched that and still love every bit of it.  Okay, so that has nothing to do with my post except for the part where the Nutsy is on guard duty and yells out "All's Well!"

Everything IS much better today.  I only got woken up three times last night by the kiddos, took another nap this morning, and another this afternoon. Sleep always helps.  And a nice conversation with my man helped too.

And I realized that it might be helpful for y'all to know really where I'm at. On a scale of 0-100, with 0 being no depression whatsoever and 100 being properly diagnosed as clinically depressed and in need of intervention.... I was at about 1,000 for 18 months after Jonnie was born and my anxiety levels were at 10,000.  Yesterday -- I was about 20. Today, I'm at a 1.  No big deal.

Today I laughed, I joked, I sang. Three songs in fact -  all with my kids. We played Boggle and listened to Carolina give her oral report on the Statue of Liberty for Family Night, after reading the prophet Joseph Smith's teachings on prayer. I played hide and seek with Jonnie and his blanket before bedtime, went shopping with Tali and Ty, and bought posterboard to make Daisy's student of the week poster with.

And,  I got a call back on an application and set up a job interview for tomorrow. Wish me luck, I might just get it.

Life is good. 

Aches and heartaches

So I wake up in the middle of the night with a mean stomach-ache. I just want to sleep. I'm so tired I can't tell you how tired. I need my sleep. But no - I have a stomach-ache, and sleep is not easily coming.

This morning, I am finally sleeping, for a while at least. The little boys stayed home from church with me, so in between sleeping, I am also feeding Jonnie his Cheerios and milk. I finally drag myself out of bed when the bowl he brought me is emptied but I still don't feel like doing anything at all. Daisy has turned on "Cheaper By The Dozen" - the old version - which I love, so I put my contacts in and curl up on the couch to watch it with her.  I love the look on his face as he holds baby #12 and his wife looks over his shoulder down at the baby.  Such a precious picture of love.

When the movie is over I spy my computer. I feel like someone hit the back of my neck with a very big stick and my whole body feels swollen, but I can lounge on the couch with my laptop right?

Really, I feel awful, and want to do nothing but go back to bed. But as awful as I feel, I feel lucky too. My sweet friend Sheila told me yesterday that her daughter's husband is facing lymphoma. Cancer is such an ugly form of torture, and having the body aches is such a minimal thing to deal with when others face such life and death illness. I look at my husband sitting on the couch and think how blessed I am that he is healthy. And happy. This year has definitely had some major life changes for us both, but especially for him. He has struggled and it has been so heartwrenching to watch him.

And lets be honest. Sometimes I've just been super angry at him for the way he has dealt (or not dealt) with certain things.

But all of that doesn't matter when I see him crawl around the floor, laughing and chasing Jonnie.  Or when he wakes me up with a kiss to tell me goodbye before he leaves for work.  And the things I get upset about become completely insignificant and outright stupid when I think how it would be to face having him ill with cancer, and staring death in the face.

He's not. I'm grateful more than I can say. And my heart aches more than my body right now for my friend Camille and her family and the reality they face. So say a prayer for Camille and Ralph, and for their family.

I'm going to snuggle up on Ry's lap right now and enjoy the time I have with him.

BTW, the photos is from a day when he was being an impromptu model for me as I scoped out decent angles at a difficult location where I'll be shooting an upcoming wedding. He didn't realize I was taking a photo just at this moment though, and I liked it. SOOC without any editing, and horrible lighting, but it's a picture of him and I love it just for that.  He's so completely supportive no matter what hair-brained idea I come up with or new adventure I start out on. Thanks Babe!

Rachel