hello to those of you out there in this world of anonymous blogging. it's been a long, long time. my daughter is now almost TWO years old, and it is so hard to believe. time is a such a thief. perhaps this time period has just kept me too busy to dwell on my mother as much. or maybe i'm really good at avoiding thinking about her.
its been almost two years since my last post and i feel as if i don't have much to offer the world in writing. i have a daily routine where I work my insane job with long hours, and cherish the hour or so each morning I get to see my child. being a working mother is the hardest thing i've ever done in my life - and i am in awe of the parents who willingly stay home each day to be a caretaker. it is all so much work, and so tiring. my daughter is just amazing. the entire world is in her eyes! she is funny, and joyful, and exuberant, and confident, and beautiful, and determined. every moment with her is better than the next, and i am in love in such a different way.
(how, oh how, could my mother abandon me?
the older i get, the more confused i get.)
the more recent development, i guess, is that i had gotten to a crippling level of anxiety. i had spent the first year of her life carefully trying to keep us all safe from covid, even though i work somewhere with high probability of exposure. in january, despite all my best efforts, she brought it home from day care. and my husband developed a heart issue a few weeks later after we both caught it. it was devastating and scary. i didn't cope very well.
it has been a crushing level of stress.
so when i had my physical this past march, i was honest with my doctor. i had gotten to the point where i couldn't focus at work. everything made me angry. i wanted to sleep all day or not at all. i wasn't enjoying my time with my family because i was so busy worrying about everything. i was crying over nothing and everything. i was, quite simply, a hot mess. even more so than i remember being in those days a million years ago when i started this blog.
and my doctor said - "girl, you don't have to struggle with this alone. let me prescribe something to help!"
maybe its the child-of-a-mentally-ill-parent thing, but i struggled to say yes. there was a brief moment where i felt... defeated. like i hadn't done enough to keep myself well. like my father, who had spent my entire childhood watching me for symptoms, had failed.
but then i remembered my daughter. and how i was acting around her some days. so i said "ok. i'll try it."
all i can say, weeks later now, is that i shouldn't have waited this long. the same thoughts come up, the same worries come up, but now they just dissipate in the rain and it doesn't feel like fight or flight. i can breathe. i can function.
so whoever, and wherever you are, speak up to your doctor about how you're feeling. i should've been the poster child for being honest with a doctor about my mental health, but i was hiding it. or lying to myself.
i wish i hadn't waited this long. don't you wait if you need help. there are so many resources out there and you aren't alone!! and i'm still here. tired, mommy-brained out, but here.
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