burnout

Let's talk mommy burnout for a moment. Let's talk depression.

In a really low moment 2 days ago I locked myself away in my room and cried after just totally dropping the ball in a difficult moment with my kids. Faris came home---because I called him home because I was totally lost and crushed and because my good sense had flown out the window. I hit the mommy burnout wall. Hard. Like while I was running one direction looking the other direction. SMACK.

While locked in my room I did the second most pathetic thing I could have done (the first being buy a plane ticket for home. Just one plane ticket for home). I googled "isolated stay at home mom breaking point depression". *Ahem*.

Isolated Stay At Home Mom Breaking Point Depression

The google search returned an article from a blog called "The Honest Mommy", and I really think the article saved me. It was like a little reality check, and a divine intervention. I encourage you to read it right away. It is well written and to the point.

Holy crap if I have to make one more dinner that my kids refuse to eat...if I have to close the blinds to pretend it's dark outside and miss one more beautiful sunset...if I have to hear the song "Hello Everybody so glad to see you!" one more time instead of Fugazi "Waiting Room"...if I have to spend one more day listening to my own voice say things like, "No feeding your sister beads" or "Please don't lick the wall" or "NO SITTING ON FACES!" or "Put your underwear back on please so we can get in the car and go to the moon" I really will lose my mind.

But is it burn out or is it depression? My friend L reminds me that there are good solid reasons behind the way I am feeling. The article reminded me that my mood does indeed respond to "cheering up" and my head space improves considerably when I get a chance to either get out of the house by myself or have a good yoga practice. Sometimes just a phone call from a friend and a good cup of coffee are all it takes to do me a world of good.

But I have had a lot happen in the last year and a half. Looking back, I don't wonder at all how it has come to this moment of me calling Faris home from work and locking myself away to cry and reach out to the internet (!!!) for help (because basically everyone I know is sleeping in another time zone when my world falls apart in this time zone).

Here is a brief synopsis:

#1 The birth of a second child.

#2

Mourning the loss of my exclusive relationship with my first child. Being unable to say goodbye or let go is a special difficulty for me. I mourned this loss preemptively, and I mourned it after my second child was born. It was hard to talk about this pain, since everyone wanted to know how much joy I was feeling and also because the immediate thought is that it effected how much love I felt for my new baby. All I can tell you is that Laila had GERD, and everything that came after is a blur of sleep dep and painful realities where there should have been honeymoons and cooing and falling in love as a family. But we made it through and I love Laila with a love that is so deep and wide I cannot begin to explain it. And thank god for my midwife (JULIA BOWER) who truly saw me in this moment of pain, and who really heard me as no one else could and who gave me good advice, good homeopathy (pulsatilla of course), and lots of loving but firm support.

#3

Baby with intense reflux (GERD) who screamed day and night for 11 months straight and who never got comfortable enough to be cuddled or even rest her head on me for more than 5 seconds. And who I wanted to love and hold and cherish so badly that my very skin and hands and bones actually ached for her. But she was in too much pain to let us have any moments of stillness.

#4

Suddenly selling the home that I adored and that I gave birth to my 2 children in. I left part of my heart in that house as maybe most people do when they leave their first real home. Then moving with GERD 4 month old and stunned 2 year old in tow, to a house we disliked. Then being forced out of that house after 6 months by the landlord wanting to move "home" (SURPRISE!), a move to another house for 8 weeks (thank GOD for my friend Eileen), and then moving to a foreign land---exciting? YES. But there are also some other adjectives that apply.

#5

Seeing daily the occupation in Palestine. This cannot be summed up in this blog post. It's too huge.

#6

Isolation. What is the sound of one hand clapping? I bet it is about as useful and empty as the sound of one adult talking--to 2 small children and herself all day long, every day, for 5 months now with very little exception.

I didn't know how hard any of this would be when I signed up for the job of SAHM. The following lyrics have been in my head a lot these last 5 months: "Nobody ever asked me if I thought I could be everything to someone."