I have been having a tough few days. A tough few months. I guess, it's coming up to a tough year.
My new medication isn't really helping with the depression. My anxiety is fine. But, i feel low. Very low. I am afraid. Afraid that this is what it will be like forever. I try not to think about it. To let go of it.
I think a large part of it is the therapy. I guess this is the long road. It just seems so fucking unfair that in order to feel better you have to feel worse. Opening up to strangers. Telling them all your dirty little secrets. It's unsettling. Talking for an hour, then left to deal with the backlash of emotion that comes in the days following.
I know i need to take better care of myself. I need to eat better, sleep better. I should get out in the garden that is exploding in my yard. Amazing how all those flowers come back. Every year. Each day when we come home from school, as the kids pile out of the car, we stop and look at what has grown in the past twenty four hours. We stoop down to smell the blossoms. Pointing out the colours. Choosing our favourites. Eliza inspects her fairy house which sits amongst all the blossoms. She tends to it every day. Re-arranging the house and the little rock path leading up to it. Leaving them gifts. Wondering when they will leave her another note.
We have these moments. These perfect moments. All the time. I hope they will remember them.
Not the days like today where i hid in my room all day. Sleeping. Thinking. Avoiding. Blaming it on my sore throat and cough. When in truth i couldn't face the day. I couldn't face them. I want them to see me. Not the me i have become.
Last April.
This April?
Go Canucks!
Therapy day.
It's exhausting really. Trying to be truthful. But you have to trust someone to be truthful. It takes time i suppose. Right now we are in the "getting to know each other" stage of our relationship. My therapist, my case worker and me.
They sit and ask me many, many questions. Sometimes i talk for a long time. Today we talked a lot about the kids. The different demands and challenges of each of them. I could see it in their eyes though. That question you all are thinking too. "What the hell was she thinking having four kids?"
I was thinking of love. I was blinded by love. The moment each of my children were born i felt a deeper and stronger sense of the meaning of love. The kind of love that you only read about. The kind of love that makes you wake up in a panic in the middle of the night because the mere thought of something bad happening to one of them had skipped through your heart while you were sleeping. The kind of love that makes life worth living. The kind of love that you want to be constantly surrounded by.
And so we talked about my children. How my love for them overshadows everything. Pushes me to the brink of exhaustion. That love is what is driving me to such sadness, yet at the same time pushing me towards a better, stronger future.
I've been trying to sleep. I went to bed at 9 hoping for a good rest. Rest. It just will not come.
As i lay there watching parker sleep softly beside me i couldn't help but feel the terrible burden of such perfect beauty. These children of mine. I am so afraid of being a disappointment to them. I try so hard to face each day as a new day. A day that has the possibility of being better than the one before.
In 2007 i have had pneumonia, a friend killed himself, i broke my tailbone, i was hospitalized, i totaled my car. I was talking to someone about it all. She said i had angels flying around me. Keeping me safe.
I suppose that may be true. It doesn't feel like it late at night.
As i wander the house, quietly shuffling from room to room, watching my gaggle of kids sleeping quietly under the glow of little nightlights i whisper in their ears little promises. Promises of love. Of safety. Of the best i can. Sorries for boring days full of rain and no energy for puddle jumping. Sorry for short tempers. Or worse, sorry for nothing, the joy that has been sucked from me by medication and sadness.
Toby made the connection between depression and my friends suicide. He has been worried. We spent an hour after dinner sniggling in bed, taking turns tickling each others backs. Practicing our new signal for "everything's okay" – a kiss on the forehead. That's a lot to ask of a seven year old boy, but he gives me those kisses every single day now. They keep everything okay. Parker too with his hundreds of kisses smack on the lips and eliza's sly little "i love you mommy's" that come at every unexpected moment. And tristan, listening to her giggle in her bed, talking to herself about her day.
So, i guess it is okay. I am doing the best i can. I just wish it felt a little better. A little more real.
Well, ICBC (insurance corporation of BC) called today and the van is "a total write off." A third party someone or other will look at it and we go from there i guess. It's not worth much i'm guessing as it was a '98 and we all know vans are a crappy dime-a-dozen.
(If you have any ideas of what i can buy for around $8,000 that will seat all of my kids let me know.)
Before i move on i have to say that air bags, though they save lives, suck ass. I have burns from my belly button on up. A little rosy i am. Also, the police officer that came to the scene was a woman i already knew from some school stuff and she was awesome. She mentioned that the amount of time it took me to actually stop was quite long. I whispered in her ear that i was trying some new anti-depressant medication and it probably affected my reflexes a bit. You know what she did? She hugged me and said she'd never mention it again.
But. But! I have had a happy day. I am okay. Totally okay. Not a sore muscle, stiff neck. Nothing. I totaled my car and walked away healthy. Maybe i am a lucky person.
I had my very favourite babysitter in the world over today and as i went to ride my bicycle away he threw me his car keys and he even laughed when i called and told him (jokingly) that i crashed it into a pole. And another friend gave me a trail-a-bike so that i can transport all the kids around while i get all this stuff organized.
People are nice. You are nice.
I am thankful tonight.