The Beauty of Babies

My stress level today has been quite high… an appointment with the specialist about my shoulder, followed by my grandson coming by to stay at our house for four or five days while his parents attend a wedding.

I’d been stressing not just about the appointment but also about how I was going to care for him.  He’s not really a baby any more – at 14 months, I’ve been told he’s a toddler.  Well, he is a sweet one – always has a smile for his grandma and a real showboat for anyone who will pay attention to him.  He’s also on the move, having gone from learning to walk not more than a month ago, to now running full tilt.  Lots of chasing him, scooping him up.. that sort of thing.  My shoulder has been giving me such pain, I was worried about how I would be able to pick him up.  Actually, truth be known, it’s not about being able to pick him up, it is the mounting pain I feel with the repeated picking ups.  I’m known to be a sucker for punishment and stubborn until the very end.  Really, I don’t have much choice… babe needs taking care of.. I’m it (and so is grandpa when he’s home.)

I did do one thing to try to alleviate some of the stress and worry – initially the plan was to babysit him in his home but as I was feeling so distressed, I phoned and changed the location to my house.  Easier for me, eaiser for the dogs, easier for Grandpa to help when he comes home.

So, all stress aside… and I was stressed… hurting, trying to prepare dinner, the house it hot, baby was hungry…Dinner was made and babe ate a huge plateful, surprising even me.  After fishing bits of spaghetti out from his his highchair, from the creases of his diaper and watching with amusement as the dogs snuffled for anything that hit the floor, I got him into the bathroom for a bath.  LOL… Oh Joy!  Water from one end of the bathroom to the other, but it was pure pleasure to watch him splash about, giving that laugh that only babies can give.

The best part of my night?  Bedtime… and not because it would be time for a break… nooooo….

It was watching him drift to sleep in my arms as we listened to Sarah Hickman’s “You are My Sunshine.”  His little eyes slowly started to droop, and on the third repeat of the song, I was able to pick him up, listening to his deep rhythmic breathing… looking at his innocent face, lush eyelashes, so peaceful…

And then I felt peace… and contentment… the kind that only can come when looking at something so sweet and special as a sleeping baby…

Bye for now.

Rough Counselling Appointment

Appointment number two for the week is over and the only good thing I can say about it is that I am glad it is over.  I’m emotional mush, worn out and weary.

Today’s appointment was with the counsellor.  She’s both my nemesis and my godsend.  My nemesis because she knows me so well and calls my bullshit as bullshit and my godsend because she can see through the cheery, protected front that most people get to see.  I both love and hate her for this, because I know I need it and yet there are times I wish I could just hide it.

We exchanged niceties as we always do – the weather, etc and I brought her up to speed on the usual issues – difficulties with hubby, how much I’m getting out, how my shoulder is impacting me, any other appointments I had with the psychiatrist and then we got down to brass tacks…

And then I cried…

My brass tacks?  *sigh*

Agoraphobia.  Isolation.  Withdrawal.  Avoidance.

It is getting worse and I suppose I’ve been spending a lot of time justifying the increased withdrawal…. chalking it up to it’s easier to not go out than to try to get hubby to understand why it’s important that I go out, even if he perceives my agoraphobia as “selective” (he focuses in on the things I do for fun and seems to often not recognize the things that are not … like grocery shopping, appointments.)

*sigh*

I am not going to do justice in explaining all that is going on.

I think when I get with my counsellor, because she knows me so well, I have nothing to really hide from her and it all comes pouring out.  My frustration and anger at dealing with the Agoraphobia.  How depressed I feel about many of the things that are going on around me.  My despair at the idea that my psychiatrist wants to adjust my meds and I feel that they are the only things keeping me anchored at the moment.  The grief I feel at the loss of ability to go out and do what I want when I want.  The sadness I feel over the impending resignation letter I must write for work.  The helplessness I feel in dealing with hubby’s issues and my lack of feeling like I can do anything for him at all.  The hopelessness I feel as I survey my situation with not seeing much light at the end of the tunnel.

We talked about so much and I’m ever amazed we covered as much as we did… two … well maybe three things were discussed the most…. the medication adjustment the psychiatrist wants to do, my supports (family & friends) and my need to get out.

The medication adjustment:  She was surprised to hear that I was not on anything for my anxiety aside from Ativan (which I take rarely.)  In fact, her suggestion was that I need to be on an antidepressant.  I’ve talked to the psychiatrist before about an antidepressant as I do recognize I’m depressed, but I’ve always believed that because it’s situation, there isn’t much an anti-depressant can do for me.  The counsellor said that although it might be situational, the depression still becomes a chemical thing.  So, while we both agree it might be beneficial, it is a complicated thing to try to take care of.  Firstly, the psychiatrist is away until the middle of September and secondly, we have to be so careful about which one we use so that it doesn’t affect my anxiety.  The counsellor suggested I go see my family doctor to discuss the antidepressant but I’m really not feeling up to it.  I have a good rapport with him, but don’t have the energy to try to explain why I need it nor why my psychiatrist did not prescribe it last time I saw her.  So, that being said, I’m to keep an eye on how my mood is doing… and if it gets worse (whatever that might look like!) I need to consider going to the family physician.

Supports:  Family and friends… what to do about them?  My one friend has things down to a science… she shows up with little to no notice and drags me out of the house, but generally speaking I feel very isolated from my family and my friends.  Picking up the phone to call someone is so so sooooo difficult.  When I phone my parents, it’s always a question of why I don’t phone them more often… they haven’t clued into how hard it is for me to pick up the phone – the fear of the questions they may ask, the worry about if they ask when I’m coming to visit, the pressure and hard time I get about not visiting as much as they would like.  I feel … abandoned I suppose… for many years, when push came to shove and my family needed my help, I was there, day in and day out seeing how I could help and now, it seems they don’t know how to do this for me.  I’m not angry about this; I don’t even blame them as I’m sure it’s difficult for them to try to determine how to help me but… it still causes these feelings in me.  My friends are a little better, but I still have a hard time reaching out to even them.  *sigh*

Getting out:  My instinct is to want to withdraw to reduce the anxiety I feel.  I feel I have limited resources and energy to deal with going out.  I do go out, make no mistake, but there are times where I want to close all the doors, all the windows, unplug the phone and tell the world to just go away.  The difficulties I have had with hubby’s ideas about what I go out for has sapped some of my drive to continue the fight.  But, I will admit now as the counsellor so bluntly suggested – part of that might be an excuse too.  And it is, but it’s not all excuse.  It’s a complicated mixture of so many things.  I know I have to keep going out because the further I withdraw, the harder it is to fight back.  I know I can’t give in … but honestly… there are days where that is exactly what I want to do.  But it doesn’t really matter what I want to do… it’s what I must do that counts – cannot give in, must keep fighting.  Bless the counsellor – she knows when I’m having a hard time and she wants to get me to commit to something, the best thing she can do is extract commitments out of me a bit at a time and that’s exaclty what she did … “What can you do to get out that is baby steps?” “How often can you do that?” “What time of the day will you do it?”  .. the agreement being I will walk the dogs around the block, twice a week, Mondays and Thursdays, between 8 and 9am.  And while around the block doesn’t seem far as I remember days of walking the dogs for a couple of kilometers, I have to try to be kind to myself and know this is all I can do for the moment.

*sigh*

So the last thing the counsellor did and she did it to be kind… I guess she .. I don’t totally understand it.  I mean I do, but I don’t.  Told me she was having a hard time watching me with the way things were going – the withdrawal, the agoraphobia affecting me so much – she told me she saw me as a vibrant woman… I can’t really remember what she said after that.  It broke my heart because I don’t feel that way.  I feel, and I told his this, like a big “fuck up.”  That I’m but a shell of who I used to be and that I pretty much hate my life.

Well, I won’t go on and on.  Yes, my mood is low and yes I am depressed but I will, damn it anyways, keep fighting the good fight.  There really isn’t any other choice, is there?

Bye for now.

Busy Day and Even Busier Week

It’s been a very busy day in my house… well actually, it’s been like that for a couple of days, beginning with the ever huge event of me cleaning my computer room.  The cleaning was born of necessity – I could not find my glasses.  Being the owner of three pairs, it seemed pretty silly that I could not find a single pair.  The cleaning did take much of the day due in part to my distractability and also by the grief my shoulder gave me as I completed the various tasks.  Vacuuming was by far the worst but it wasn’t the only thing that did me in yesterday.  Hubby and I also dug out the air conditioner and set that up as the weather here has been really warm and the heat at night has been keeping us awake.  He’s gotten pretty good – he knew I could not lift the air conditioner, but even simple things like holding the platform in place so hubby could screw it down caused some discomfort.  At the end of the day, left with a little pile of the “What the hell do I do with this stuf?” I realized I still hadn’t found any glasses.

This realization send me into the bedroom to begin the dung out there.  Hallelujah and praise be… I found them (two pairs) on the night table, nestled under some papers I had been reading but not gotten back to.  That marks the end of a busy and tiring day.

Today though … became another excessively busy day when hubby and I went on the hunt for new furniture for the house.  The stuff we have is functional but it is 13 years old and was bought when we were in a hurry to just ‘furnish’ the place.  It was comfortable but so bloody big … with all the kids gone from the house, we decided it was time to nice things up a bit.  We trekked back and forth between a couple of stores before finally settling on a new taupe colored leather sofa and loveseat.  The bonus purchase was a coffee table that we both spotted and fell in love with on first sight – beautiful cherry wood with slate circling the top, swirling carved legs… a must have.  After finishing up our purchases (and dealing with what had to be the most delightful and cheery saleslady) we headed over to my daughter’s for dinner.  While there, we made arrangements for the youngest daughter and her boyfriend to take ownership of the old couch, coffee table and end table.  The hitch was… they had to come to the house to help us move the old furniture out.  This began a huuuuuuge process – hubby decided to clean the area rug in the living room and I started on the cleaning of all the dust bunnies which had accumulated over time.  I’ll never understand exactly where they all come from since I regularly clean under the furniture, but they were indeed there.  But wait… there was something else there… and Oh My God… who would have guessed that one pair of my glasses had found its way under the loveseat… hehe … all three pairs of glasses now found.

On Saturday the furniture store will deliver and set up the furniture.  Yeah… amazing… hubby actually agreed to pay to have someone deliver furniture this time.  Seems my argument about my inability to pack furniture and the hassle of finding enough able bodies to move the furniture sunk in.  LOL.  I’ll have to mark that one down somewhere .. a modern miracle.

This week is going to be hell though.  I have a dentist appointment tomorrow, counsellor appointment on Wednesday and a bone doctor appointment on Thursday.  Thursday evening we go over to my daughter’s house to begin babysitting as they go out of town for the long weekend.  I’m bogged as I realize I have somehow managed to schedule so many things into one week and am looking forward to the following week for recovery time.  Usually, I try to schedule only one appointment a week because I know the anxiety and panic wears me out.  Not sure what the hell I was thinking this time around.

Well that’s it.  I guess I’m feeling pretty wired from all the activity.  The upcoming dentist appointment will probably interfere with my sleep tonight… as well as the mental gears that go as I try to figure out how all the other pieces of the week are going to fit together.  Hopefully I’ll find some way to shut my brain down and allow myself a restful sleep so I can tackle tomorrow with some calm.

Bye for now.

Some Days I Just Hate Myself

I’m experiencing a moment of self-loathing.  Well, perhaps it’s more than a moment because what I’m feeling is building slowly but surely…

A mixture of self-loathing, frustration, depression..

The cause of this horrible mixture of feelings which are building towards one hell of a panic attack?

I could just cry as I think of the simplicity of it – it’s my younger brothers’ birthdays today (they are twins) and I have been asked to go to one of their houses for cake.

You would think… or most people think that going to family’s house should be a happy, carefree event, but it isn’t for me.

I’ve been brought to tears as I think about going.  The people, even though most will be family and friends… going there… the noise… my heart pounds, my mind races…

I’m truly screwed up.

And when I think of how simple a thing this should be and how dramatically just the thought of going affects me…

I hate myself.  I hate this this called agoraphobia that affects everything I do.

I’m beyond words to express what I feel.  It’s so profound … so deeply felt … so irrational …

And it so bloody stupid…

And I hate it so much…