I Think I Lost It

I just lost my mind. At least, I think it was me and I think it was my mind. I sat and watched a person who looked like me shaking, gasping and babbling who seemed to be losing their mind. And their body. And their dignity. I think it was me. Hard to be sure.

I think what they were having was a panic attack. I hope it was just an isolated attack. I hope it doesn't come back. Hard to be sure.

I shouted at that person that they needed to stop. They needed to pull themselves together. They had to cope. They shouldn't hurt themselves.  They shouldn't hate themselves. Their children were safe. Their home was safe.  They were safe.

I hated that person as they called their mum and their sister and upset them both. I pitied that person as they kept catching glimpses of themselves and feeling ashamed. I

tried to reassure them as they tried to calm down, but were too afraid to stop talking because when they did the world became a vacuum.

I begged that person to stop crying. I begged her to be the strong woman she once was, to be the strong mother she knew she needed to be.

Now I just feel sad I couldn't help without help. It took a tiny daughter's smiling face to drag reality back into focus. I'm still not sure that terrified, stricken person was me, but I fear that it was. I think it was the too tired, the too stressed by threats to her home, the too anxious for too long which  finally opened her up and let the swarm buzz into her brain and kidnap her.

I think I've found my mind again for now. I retraced my steps. Remembered where I was when I last saw it.  I was holding my son's hand when he was crossing the road, kissing his knocked knee, singing him to sleep. I was gently cradling my daughter's fragile head as I lowered her into her cot, shading her eyes from the sun, soothing her with a 'mamma's here'.

Next time, I hope I manage to stay by my side when the panic sets in. I hope I find the strength to comfort myself.

Wait A Second

My baby girl is an angel. She smiles all the time; she laughs all the time; she smells of love, feels soft as truffula trees and clings to me like I’m all she needs. She’s so busy doing all these things that she has no interest whatsoever in sleeping. Time has become a loop. I am once again where I was 3 years ago, obsessed with when I might lie down and shut my eyes for just 15 minutes. Please, just 15 minutes. I’m clock-watching most of the time, alert to two things - whether my daughter is ever going to zzz and whether my PND is going to return. I know this - PND is most likely after the 3rd month. Tick, tock. Next week, my daughter turns 12 weeks-old. Tick, tock.

I also know this - coping with your second child is supposed to be easier than coping with your first. I’m waiting...When does this ‘ease’ kick in? When the 'you deserve a sleeper this time around' genes are activated? When my first child decides that waking up my second isn’t actually fun? When my second child decides that reflux and colic are not such a tasteful combo?  When I figure out how in the world to juggle supper, tantrums, a screaming baby, a jealous, attention-desperate 3 year-old fond of oven-diving, the inadequacy of only 2 hands and extreme sleep dep? When? I’m waiting. Tick, tock.

But, wait a second. I’m not figuring out which knife in my kitchen drawer would be the most appropriate for arm-based artistry. I’m not lying awake in the pitch black pleading for all this is to end. I’m not weeping uncontrollably every second no one’s watching. I’m not spitting at my baby to shut the fuck up and then suffocating in the swamp of mother-guilt. I’ve got a quiet voice inside my head whispering ‘it’s just a phase’ and ‘you got through it before’. I’ve got voices outside my head reassuring ‘we are here for you’. I’ve got a little 3 year-old who cuddles me when he catches me crying.Tick, tock. Tick, tock. 

Wait a second, perhaps I’m not actually afraid of every second of my Second. Perhaps everything will actually be OK.

A Reminder

I’m sorry I’ve been absent from blog world for a while - long enough, in fact to have almost built a baby. I’m now 31 weeks pregnant and whilst constructing fingernails, eyelashes etc out of After Eights and tinned rice pudding, I’ve composed many blog entries in my brain. I’ve just decided not to write them because all of them were dismally dark. I started to worry that this blog would make people more depressed rather than helping them with their depression. I also started to worry that it was becoming one huge whinge...and also that people who know me and read it would find it eye-rollingly self-pitying. So, I’ve kept quiet. I’m not sure I should’ve. I think I should have just written it all down..because now it’s all piling up inside my head and keeps splurging out in inappropriate places and on inappropriate people - the extremely alpha builders who are decapitating my house, for example (for it is important to undergo extremely invasive and stressful home renovations when pregnant, as we all know).

Anyway, I’ve been feeling mostly crap  - I’m still utterly shitting it about having a new baby and the impending insomnia and insanity; I’ve been losing my vision about 3 times per week, sometimes more due to pregnancy migraine (more on that in another post, hopefully); my arse has transformed into a vineyard; my back is re-shaping itself into a ‘c’ shape to remind me which body-part is responsible for all this; my relationship has gone deaf and can only communicate through shouting and my son now has the rage and strength of the Hulk. I limited my whinging to a paragraph. Not too bad.

It’s this last thing that I wanted to focus on - what’s happened to my little boy. He’s always been very energetic, pretty shouty and half-vampire as per previous posts, but now I can’t even find a way of writing about his behaviour in anything but a negative way. There’s just nothing really funny about it. Pretty-much incessantly he shouts, hits, bites, pinches with a look of glee and fervour that’s frightening. He does it to strangers, friends and family. His usual expression is teeth bared and brow furrowed. Over the Christmas period his greeting to anyone within earshot was ‘I don’t like you - you’re not getting any presents’. He won’t do anything anyone says, won’t let me speak unless it’s to him, won’t get dressed, won’t pee in a potty or toilet now, won’t and won’t. It’s becoming harder and harder to leave the house, not only because I can’t wrestle him out of it, but because he’s very hard for our friends to want to be around and I’m too hormonal to be strong enough to deal with the looks from insulted/bitch-slapped strangers. The other day he bitch-slapped almost every tourist in Trafalgar Square. Yes, I know we’ve all wanted to do it, but it was still an impossible situation. It’s all getting painfully lonely.

He still has moments of tenderness and brilliance - He’s adopted a new phrase, ‘Mum, I love you so much, even when you fart’, tells the best jokes and gives better cuddles than anyone, but he’s 20% ahhh and 80% grrr. Yes, I know there are external factors influencing his behaviour - my pregnancy, my fractious relationship with my partner, my short-temperedness, his shouty nursery, but I reckon I’ve actually been pretty good at holding it all in at the moment, so it CAN’T just be me. So what is it? 

I spend most of my time wondering where my boy has gone. I have no idea what to do. He’s seen a Child Psychologist, who’s main focus has become trying to sort out external factors...but I wonder if there’s something innate here. I think I must seek some more help, just not sure what kind.

In fact, the thing which has helped me the most is a passage in a book by Maggie O’Farrell  called The Hand That First Held Mine. It made me weep and hold my son until he scratched his way out of my grip. It reminded me that, although in the darkest hours I’ve sometimes wished it away, I would never want to lose what I have, even if I often think I don’t actually like my son and am petrified of meeting my daughter.  I’m sorry if it spoils the book for you, but I really think it’s worth sharing, so here it is...

So this is how it ends. As the waves thrust her under, she could think only of Theo. They heaved her up and heaved her under and every now and again she could struggle to the surface, she could make the waters part so she could take a breath, but she knew, she knew it couldn’t be long and she wanted to say, please. She wanted to say, no. She wanted to say, I have a son, there is a child, this cannot happen because you know that no one will ever love them like you do. You know that no one will look after them like you do. You know that it’s an impossibility, it’s unthinkable that you could be taken away, that you will have to leave them behind.

She knew, though, that she could not see him again. She would not be helping him cut up his dinner tonight. She would not be folding the kite or airing his damp clothes or running him a bath at bedtime or taking his pyjamas out from under the pillow. She would not be rescuing his cat from the floor in the middle of the night. She would not be able to wait for him at the gate at the end of his first day at school. Or guide his hand as he learnt to shape the letters of his name, the name she’d given him. Or hold the seat of his bicycle without stabilisers. She would not be nursing him through chicken pox and measles, it would not be her measuring out the medicine or shaking down the thermometer. She would not be there to show him how to look left, then right, then left again or to tie his own shoelaces or brush his teeth or manage the zip on his coat or pair his socks after a wash or to use a telephone or to spread butter on bread, or what to do if he got lost in a shop, or how to pour milk into a cup or catch a bus home. She would not see him grown as tall as her and then taller. She would not be there when someone first broke his heart or when he first drove a car or when he went alone out into the world or when he saw, for the first time, what he would do, how he would live and with whom and where. She would not be there to knock the sand out of his shoes when he came off the beach. She would not see him again.

She fought like a crazed thing. She fought to live, she fought to come back. She always wanted to tell him this, in some way. She tried. She would like to say to him, Theo, I tried. I fought because I didn’t see how I could leave you. But I lost. 

What she would have given to win? She could not say.

£25m to Fight Ante and Post Natal Depression

Depression in pregnancy warning

Depression can happen during pregnancy too

More than a third of women who become depressed during their pregnancy have suicidal thoughts, suggests a snapshot survey carried out by the Royal College of Midwives and Netmums.

The poll of 260 mothers with antenatal depression found they were at greater risk of worsening mental health problems then women with postnatal depression.

Only 22% sought help from their GP.

Experts say women with the condition need more support.

The Department of Health has announced that £25m will be made available to improve maternity facilities for mothers and babies, and an NHS information service for parents is to include videos on how to spot signs of postnatal depression.

'Greater risk'

Antenatal depression, which occurs during pregnancy, is less known and talked about than postnatal depression, which happens after the birth of a baby.

This small survey suggests that those who suffer from depression during pregnancy are at greater risk of worsening mental health problems than those who have postnatal depression alone.

About 56% of those surveyed had problems during their first pregnancy but almost 66% said they had problems during their second. According to the survey, 80% of women with depression in pregnancy also went on to have postnatal depression. Just over half of the women said their illness had affected their relationship with their baby and 38% said they had problems bonding with their baby. Only 30% were warned about antenatal depression by midwives and most of the women said it took a few months before they realised that they had a problem.

Just 22% sought medical help from their GP at that point - perhaps because only one in three women were aware of the possibility of becoming depressed during pregnancy. Just 27% reported being asked how they felt emotionally during their pregnancy.

Cathy Warwick, chief executive of the Royal College of Midwives, said the survey showed an urgent need to identify and help women with antenatal and postnatal depression.

"If we can identify women as early as possible then we could prevent them declining into much more serious mental health problems."

'Be open'

Sally Russell, co-founder of Netmums, said depression and anxiety could make life very difficult for parents with a new baby.

"Midwives can do a lot to help and reassure, so they should be open with mothers and fathers-to-be about the condition and trained to spot the signs.

"Those suffering often don't know who to talk to, so it's essential they know they can be open and honest about how they are feeling with midwives."

Health Minister Dr Dan Poulter, who announced the £25m fund to improve maternity services, said hospitals would be able to bid for en suite facilities, rooms where fathers can stay overnight or facilities like birthing pools.

"A new arrival in the family is a joyous time but can present challenges for mums and families, particularly new families. I want to help women and their partners as much as possible," he said.

The NHS Information Service for Parents is available to every new parent to sign up to if their chid is under six months old. From next year it will support parents with babies and young children up to 18 months old.

Dr Poulter added: "Women with postnatal depression need care and support, not stigma. That's why early diagnosis for this traumatic condition and support for parents is so important."

Article from BBC Online

Things That Go 'Bump'....

Oh God. There’s something in my room. I can sense it. The darkness is hiding it, but I know it’s there. I can feel it’s there. Oh God, it’s not just in my room - it’s in my BED. Please go away; please go away. Leave me alone. Stay calm. Stay calm. If I don’t look at it; it’ll disappear. It won’t exist. Oh God, what IS it? It’s not just in my bed; it’s on TOP of me. Oh GOD, it’s INSIDE me. It’s IN MY BODY. Get OUT! Get OUT!

I’m not sure that my attitude to my bump is entirely healthy at the moment. I haven’t properly looked at it; I haven’t touched it; I don’t want to. I feel invaded and infected. Whatever is inside my bump has turned up uninvited and I’m disgusted by its presence.  I wake up in the night and feel sick about it. When other people get all coo-ey, I want to thump them. When my husband-to-be wants to  touch it, I want to thump him too.

I am in denial. I’m still not sure how this pregnancy happened (yes, I know the biology) - I’m used to planning things; surprises are normally accompanied by panic. I thought I could decide when was the ‘right time’...if there ever was actually going to be one.

I know that these thoughts and emotions indicate that things are a bit squiffy in my mental department right now. Unsurprisingly, my therapist picked this up immediately, when I referred to my bump as ‘it’ and couldn’t quite say the words ‘baby’ or ‘he’ or ‘she’. So, for homework, he’s given me a ‘simple’ task - I have to ‘love my bump’. I have to ‘make friends with my bump’. I have to ‘rub oil into my bump’. I have to listen to these instructions without wanting to thump my therapist in his man bumps. Luckily, I managed to reply ‘please don’t make me rub oil into my bump - you’ll be making me do bloody hypnobirthing next’. Sorry, those who swear by hypnobirthing, but do you honestly believe a ‘painfree birth’ is anything other than a never-given-birth delusion? Are you utterly mental? You’d need a helluvabucketwadge, that’s all I can say.

There is, of course, another explanation for all this. I haven’t had my 20 week scan, yet. Perhaps I’m refusing to bond until I know everything is OK? Perhaps I’m being entirely sane and sensible? Perhaps this is actually quite ‘normal’? Having a mini-being inside your belly who still at this point has the genetic potential be a whole host of organisms which aren’t entirely human is quite freaky, anyway, isn’t it? People keep asking ‘ does your son understand what’s going on?’; I keep replying ‘ do I? Do you?’. No-one truly understands it. It’s one of the bloody weirdest things in the world.

But, anyway, my therapist knows what he’s talking about. He steered me through the storms of my first bout of PND and I have to trust him not to be distracted somewhere off the coast of Italy this time around. So, I must make like a somewhat niche lap dancer and oil myself up good and proper. Before I get into bed, I must look in the mirror, accept my bump and love it via an over-priced bottle of almond oil. At least if that monster creeps into my bedroom again tonight, I’ll be able to slither through its claws before it can do any real damage.

All Duffed Up and Nowhere to Go

So, it turns out it was bloody lucky I didn't drink the aforementioned shit-load of cocktails as I've discovered I was actually 7 weeks pregnant at the time. Unexpectedly, unintentionally pregnant. Having wrestled with whether I should have another child given how difficult I've found having my first, my body, or rather SOMEONE's body (withdrawal method is supposed to involve WITHDRAWAL) seems to have made the decision for me. The 12 week scan confirmed it wasn't just a hairball...and now I'm heading into my 16th week.

I've been tempted to write about this before now - I know it's been months since my last post, but I've been feeling too ashamed of my negative emotions to express them publicly. When 3 pregnancy tests all determinedly displayed their double blue lines, my reaction wasn't joy, it was panic. All I felt was fear. I cried until I finally called a friend just to hear someone I trusted say 'it'll be alright'.  I feel guilty now writing this. I know people who have been battling to conceive for a long time - I hate myself for not feeling more grateful. I feel I don't deserve this baby.

Conflicting with this is an immediate surge of 'now you're jinxing it - there'll be something wrong with him/her'. Those fierce claws of animal protectiveness are instinctively drawn. Already, I know I'll do all I can to make sure this baby is happy and healthy. My worry is that my all won't be enough, that I won't be as strong as I need to be, that I'll fail. I know I should be figuring out how to fight the possible PND and the insanity that descends with the sleepless nights, just as I've proclaimed I would in my previous posts. I'm just not there, yet. I'm all a bit lost, a bit happy-sad, a bit duffed up. 16 weeks ago I was almost in control of where I was going and now someone else is..and they're not divulging directions. I'm not really sure where I am, anymore.  Hopefully I will be soon. 

Voice of Reason, Please Shut Up

Cocktails are nice, aren’t they? How I’ve missed my flavoursome friends. I’ve been blanking them since I had my son (two years ago!) and ironically acquired the enviable skill of seriously impressive hangovers along with the ability to clear up someone else's puke using just one hand. This weekend, however, I dipped my toe in that refreshing pool of cocktail bliss...but,I didn’t dive right in. I stopped myself before getting in over my head. I stayed at the water’s edge. My extremely wonderful, oldest friend, though, dive-bombed her way in and swam submerged lengths with her eyes open as if she could somehow extract oxygen from Cosmopolitans. In the past, I’ve tried to help this friend out by reminding her how she sometimes regrets getting massively drunk. I’ve held her hair a few times using my new-found coping-with-puke skills.  This morning, she just sent me this text ‘My poor head! It all went downhill after you left. You were my voice of reason! What a silly idea to drink more and more cocktails. Silly. Silly.’ 

Do you know what? I wish I’d gone and drunk a shit-load of cocktails too rather than heading home after a few glasses of wine. I wish I was more able to throw caution to the wind and switch off that sensible voice in my head - the voice always calculating the odds, working out the worst-case scenario. I’ve always had a problem with control. Yes, I have definitely lost myself on several occasions and enjoyed it A LOT, thank you very much, but I find it hard to stop the anxiety and worry long enough to stop angsting and worrying rather than just laughing and enjoying. It’s definitely got worse since being a mum. Predictable, I know - It’s not just me I’m responsible for now and all that. But sometimes I so wish I could drown out my Voice of Reason.  

I think this voice is a big part of the problem for mums.  I reckon that the issue’s often not about being irrational and emotional - it’s about being too rational and emotional. When you are doing all you can. When you’re carrying out the instructions declared as being transformative in all those baby books. When you’re trying and thinking and analysing and battling...and still your child won’t sleep through the night, or won’t eat their food, or won’t breastfeed or won’t stop trying to sample anyone within biting distance...THAT’s when Motherexia (see previous post) is at her strongest and THAT’s when reason can be anything but your friend. 

When it comes to mothering, I reckon sometimes it is best to stick your fingers in your ears and tra la la until your Voice of Reason buggers off. Kids aren’t rational. What they do isn’t rational. Resigning yourself to the fact that sometimes stuff is simply out of control and makes no sense whatsoever is often the best sanity saver there is. I say, embrace your Voice of Treason! Rebel against what SHOULD work. ‘Should’ is a very dangerous word. Should, schmood. Throw Gina Ford against a wall. Give that quest to be a Good Mother (whatever that is) a rest. Leave it all up to chance for a change.  It’s bloody hard, but killing yourself trying to change or ‘heal’ stuff can be exhausting and pointless. Sometimes there really is no reason your child is doing or not doing something. It’s nothing you’ve done wrong. Nothing that’s wrong with them. Sometimes they just spontaneously sleep all night, acquire a taste for broccoli rather than blood, or favour chatting over screaming ‘poo, shit, poo-poo, shit-shit’ in public. Sometimes Voice of Reason just needs to shut the f*ck up. Your kids mostly refuse to listen to it...and maybe sometimes you should too.

P.S. I am currently having to read this post to myself hourly as my son has just developed a taste for head-butting. Must take own advice. Must take own advice.