"Ok. It's time for me to unload. The last several months have been increasingly difficult for me. For what seems like no good reason, which then makes whatever I'm dealing with worse because it's something I try to put down as trivial eating up my life.
I've been feeling nagged to write about it because, well, that was the ENTIRE point of starting this blog. Self therapy and connection. Honesty. All that well intended crap. But I didn't want this turning into my online pubescent and angsty diary. But screw it.
Today I lost Bella. For easily almost 5 minutes in a swarm of school age children at the pumpkin patch. I frantically ran around screaming for her and I couldn't help but run every worst case scenario through my head. That's the way I've learned to deal with anxiety - I think of the worst case scenario and figure out how to handle that. I run every awful thing through my head in those minutes. Another mom found her in the hay bale maze. When I finally laid eyes on her again, her face was blank, eyes wide and brimmed with tears. She knew something serious had just happened and I think the realization that she was completely surrounded, alone, by strangers had set in. I embraced her and kept my voice calm for all of 4 seconds. Then I wept.
My failure to compose myself set off the domino emotional collapse I've tried to keep standing."
The emotional collapse was the fear and sometimes realizations that I can't live up to the mother I try so hard to be.
And that's another topic entirely that I'm having to slowly pick apart. Because these moments where I feel like I fail as a mother bring bouts of depression and self doubting that prove very difficult to get over. And I've found that these bouts are so intense and last so long because I've ended up in a place where I put all of my self worth into motherhood. Everything that I used to use to help keep my own identity I pushed aside for what I thought was the time being so that I could focus entirely on my child. The time being became semi permanent and those little things I used to keep so close slipped away so easily. Things like singing, painting, exploring and writing. Especially writing. I used to write about everything so easily. Not to say my singing, painting or writing were any good, but these things are what kept me feeling most like myself and I was proud of the things I had done because I could easily and successfully express myself.
I've trekked through so many things life has thrown at me within the last few years that required some sort of expression or even adequate words and am always met with nothing. So then I give up.
I started this blog to try to slowly curb this problem. But, as you can see, I ended up giving up on this for a short while. I'm uncomfortable with a blog where I'm so whiny and talk about myself incessantly.
But two weeks ago, I'm not sure why, but I decided I was done wallowing in self pity about it. I was done letting these bouts keep happening and lasting longer and longer. And doing it alone, especially. If I want to write again, I better sit my ass down and write. And if I want someone to recognize it I better share it. And if I want to pick up painting again then I better be a big girl and find the time to do it. If I want to sing again, then I shouldn't wait around for Palmer to nag me into recording something with him. (Again, this is not to say I'm even good at any of these things).
SO
Here's what I'm hoping:
- My being even slightly proactive may start earning me some self worth.
- Having self worth spread around into different outlets will improve my stupid life long self confidence problem.
- My having a higher self confidence level will allow me to accept the times that fail me in motherhood, because DUH. Do I REALLY need to go into detail about the times when parenthood is difficult. No question mark on the last sentence because that's not even a question.
- This will also allow me to celebrate the wins and pat myself on the back more. When someone says I did a great job figuring out how Bella ticks and learns to develop her token system. And her potty chart. And my stern belief in giving options rather than just saying "no"; to not brush it all away with a "No, it's not me, it's that Bella's smart" or "I just lucked out". To maybe someday say and believe, "Yeah, you know what, I did kick butt with that. I didn't even need Pinterest to help me."
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This one entry was initially going to unload everything borderline incoherently but for just diving into this whole bloggy, writing thing again, I'll save those for other entries. Here's to good intentions.
