"Today I'm sad."
"Today I'm so sad I just want to lay in bed all day."
"Why is life so hard?"
"Why me?"
"I wish I didn't have to get up today."
Then I read a book called The Ghost in the House by Tracy Thompson. Tracy Thompson is a woman who suffers from severe depression. In her book, she quotes from a bunch of women who are mothers and have depression, and as I read the book, I sobbed with relief at reading my own feelings put into words by other people. So maybe this blog will do the same thing for someone else. Or maybe it'll go viral and make me a million dollars. Not that I am web-savvy enough to understand what "going viral" means, or how going viral would translate into cold, hard, US currency being transferred to my checking account.
First, I want to issue a disclaimer. I think this is necessary because I certainly don't want people to think that I think my feelings or behavior are reasonable, normal, or excusable. Here is a list of the things I know for a fact make me a very, very, very lucky woman:
1) I am happily married to a wonderful man who puts up with all of my nonsense without complaint, bathes the baby every night, and AT LEAST twice a day asks me in a sweet tone of voice what he can do to help me.
2) I have a healthy, sweet, eerily compliant eight-year-old daughter.
3) I have a healthy, funny 1-year-old who sleeps through the night, takes 2 naps a day, and plays by herself on the floor for minutes at a time.
4) I am about 2 months pregnant with my 3rd child, and I have gotten pregnant all 3 times without any medical intervention. (In fact, with the 1st and 3rd, in spite of poorly executed birth control methods.)
5) My husband has a good job that allows me to stay at home with my kids, go to the doctor when I need to, get pedicures every once in a while, and order pizza when I don't feel like cooking.
6) I have wonderful parents who live close enough to babysit my kids whenever I ask, and who are constantly doing things for me like coming over and building shelves in my utility room (my dad) and recovering my dining room chairs (my mom).
So I get it people. I was recently flamed to a crisp on a message board for saying I was depressed, as if people think I don't get how lucky I am. Let me say one more time, loud and clear:
I GET IT.
This is why it's called crazy, people. There is no reason at all for me to be sad. I should wake up every morning with the birds chirping around my head. But I don't. I cry myself to sleep almost every night because the next day looms before me. I cringe when I hear my kids call me because I know they need something from me. I drag myself through every day counting the minutes until I can sleep again. The list goes on and on. I know it doesn't make sense, but I don't know how to fix it.
Hence the second reason for the blog. Today I called a mental health professional that was recommended to me by my midwife. This will be maybe the 5th or 6th time I have sought help from some form of mental health professional since I was about 18. Sometimes I've been on meds, sometimes it's just therapy. The end result has always been the same. I've never been sure what works and what doesn't. I'm hoping that by keeping a detailed account of my feelings I'll be able to objectively measure whether whatever I'm trying to do is working. Hope it works, and sorry in advance for all the writhing.
* For the record, I have nothing against people with fibromyalgia. I think it was mostly that the lady in this commercial really reminded me of a controlling, prissy art teacher I had in high school.
