The PND’s gone. Disappeared. Skedaddled. And good
riddance to him! I don’t know what happened; I was at my lowest, desperate for
relief, looking into medication options, wondering why no one had stepped in to
remove my children from my care when I was so clearly doing a terrible job of looking
after them, and then, one day, I was me again – no need for a way out, no need
for meds, no need for DOCS. The discouraging mantra (Ican’tdothisIcan’tdothisIcan’tdothis) that had been playing relentlessly in my brain stopped. It was as quick and as surprising as that.
I’ve been enjoying having me back since then, although
I’m still feeling cautious, like I could switch back just as suddenly at any
moment (though that fear is subsiding with every passing week). In the middle
of stressful or exhausting or sad situations now I watch myself and say, “Look
at you, coping with this!” knowing
that only a few months ago I couldn’t have, and I feel proud and excited and free.
All of me laughs when I laugh now. I no longer panic when people ask how I’m
going. It’s awesome.
The most obvious then-now comparison is my reaction to
Katy Perry’s Roar. There was an
afternoon earlier this year when I listened to the lyrics and felt the exact
opposite of everything she was singing: I was zero rather than hero, I was not
a fighter, nor was I lion-like. I was down, and getting up sounded like far too
much effort. I was weary and weak and I’d probably never amount to anything and
I’d be miserable for the rest of my life. I turned the song up, closed the
blind so that my neighbours wouldn’t see me, dropped my head into my hands, and
sobbed.
Not too long ago I put the song on again, and that
time it stirred up all the empowered, do-some-martial-arts-moves feelings it’s
meant to. I cried then, too, but only because it was such a clear example of
how much my head had changed since the last listen.
Also, late last year when I first wrote this post, I
ended the first paragraph with “Alan continued to pursue his dreams, and I gave
mine up.” It was with some effort that I forced myself to change it to “and I
put mine on hold” a few months later when I put it up on my blog, but even then
I didn’t fully believe myself. Life felt full enough just helping Alan, Mo and
Hazel do their thing; it felt like there was no space left for me to even think
about what my thing might be, let alone do it.
But I had enough mental energy to see this wasn’t a
healthy way of thinking and most certainly wouldn’t be a healthy way to plan my
future, so I forced myself to test Parkinson’s Law (“work expands so as to fill
the time available for its completion”) to see if everything else of everyone
else’s could shrink if I jammed some study into the mix and it turns out it could. And I love studying. I
remember that now. Especially theology. And hopefully psychology, too: once this
class is over and I graduate, I’m planning (with some apprehension but also a good
dose of yayness) to apply for a Grad Dip in Psychology, and (assuming they want
me) finally start the process of becoming better equipped at one of my
favourite pastimes (psychoanalysing everyone). (My other favourite pastime is using
brackets.)
I’ve no idea where that’ll end me up, but I’ll work that out when I
get closer to needing to; for now it’s just nice to have a path ahead, a direction
to travel in, and to know that this time it’s my dreams I’m following, and that it’s possible for our family to dream-chase
alongside one another. It’ll be hard work, I know, but I think I’ll be okay (because I am a champion,
and you’re gonna hear me roar).
The other day I found myself thinking about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and,
though I’ve known about the show for over 20 years and can still remember and sing
a worrying amount of the theme song, for the first time ever I noticed every
single word in the title. The show is about turtles.
Ninja turtles. Mutant ninja turtles. Teenage mutant ninja turtles.
No matter where I put the emphasis, I simply cannot understand what about the show appealed to the younger version of me who watched it religiously.
Hello. I’ve been doing nothing much this week besides
willing time to pass (4 hours until Alan gets home. 2 and a half hours until
Alan gets home. 17 minutes until Alan gets home, etc.) and reading books. I’m
still feeling terrible, and have taken more painkillers over the last 5 days
than I took in all of the preceding 12 months combined; I kind of expected the
antibiotics to charge in (chanting “WE ARE AGAINST LIFE”) and indiscriminately
murder all the ‘biotics’ they came across in my head, but so far they seem to
just be laying low and planning their strategy. All that’s been killed so far
is my desire to get out of bed and take care of anyone besides myself.
I read a stupid number of books when Moses was a baby. This year I’ve read far less, partly
because I’m studying, partly because I have a preschooler as well as a baby,
and partly because after some analysis I’ve concluded that I seem to watch TV
rather than reading when I’m depressed, and it’s only since the depression’s
lifted (a couple of months ago; I’ll write about that soon) that I’ve had any desire
to plow through novels again. Being sick has also helped; there’s something
about reading a novel that makes me feel like I’m being kind and comforty to myself.
So I read Me Before
You by Jojo Moyes on Monday (Alan took time off work to look after Hazel so
that I could spend the day in bed), which I quite enjoyed (7.9/10). The writing
reminded me of Jodi Picoult’s, which may not be a helpful thing to say since I’ve
only read one Picoult novel and that was three years ago (how do you pronounce
her surname? Is it French [pi-koo] or not [pi-kolt]? I’m sure I could google
this but I’m sleepy and my face hurts and therefore I won’t). I keep thinking
about the things that vaguely irritated me about Me Before You, rather than the fact that I was hooked while reading
it and desperate to know how it ended. It was good. I liked it.
And then I read What
Alice Forgot by Liane Moriarty over the rest of the week (which I counted
as the spread-across-four-days extra sick day the doctor prescribed that I’d have had if
I was not a mother and didn’t have to rely on someone else taking leave from
their work in order for me to be able to take leave from my work) and I LOVED it (9.7/10).
I borrowed this one after Sarah Bessey said it was one of her “favourite novels to recommend to women in the tired thirties” with her. I’m choosing to ignore
how sad it is that I related to this description and instead be thankful for the
fact that it led me to such an enjoyable book.
The story’s about a woman named Alice who wakes up from a
concussion believing she’s 29, happily married, and pregnant, when actually that
was her 10 years ago and her life has changed dramatically since then. It’s
mostly told from Alice’s perspective, but there are letters written by her
sister Elisabeth and blog posts from her grandmother that pop up throughout the
book too. Elisabeth is going through IVF and writes about infertility and
childlessness in a way that made me cry more than once. I really liked this book. Like, wow.
I found the characters relatable and lovable,
and I didn’t want to put the book down; I read it as I made toast and I read it as I
peed and I read it as I walked from one end of our apartment to the other to
find socks. And it’s Australian! Which is always a pleasant surprise. I start
all novels assuming they’ll be American, and I get terribly excited when
something comes up that makes me realise it’s set in a context I know far more
about (JOHN HOWARD?! He was MY Prime Minister!!!!!). Me Before You is set in the UK, which was also a surprise that
required some brain readjustments before I could continue with the story. I highly recommend What
Alice Forgot, even if you’re not tired or in your thirties.
I’ve been planning to write a big update on everything,
seeing as I’ve just passed my 300th post and was wanting to follow the tradition I’d started, but I’ll wait until I’m taking fewer drugs and feeling less grumpy and
lethargic. Until then, I’ll be sneakily reading more of Liane Moriarty’s
novels (I’ve just placed holds on three of them at my library), and whinging a
lot about my head.
