Writing About PPD

10. December 2012 · 1 comment · Categories: Depression, On writing · Tags: , , ,

Even when you know your triggers and how to avoid them, sometimes they still getcha.

I got an email the other day presenting an opportunity to submit a piece of writing about my PPD experience to a parenting magazine with a vast circulation. Naturally, I am very excited by this chance to use my voice in a far-reaching arena. So I spent the weekend thinking about what I wanted to say about my personal experience. I re-read every blog post tagged with PPD, some of them multiple times. Early this morning, I finally drafted my story and then emailed it to a few trusted individuals with superb writing and/or editing skills. And then it hit me.

Reliving that time period was kind of brutal. I’ve relived it many times before, but I must not have had PMS on those days. It must not have been a gray, drizzly weekend. I must not have re-read those blog posts on days when my toddler was sobbing as I dropped him off at daycare and my car was giving me a hard time.There probably wasn’t a thousand other things on my mind at the time.

Today has been a challenge. I had to spend my lunchbreak shopping, focusing on Christmas gifts, just to get out of my own head for an hour after all that heavy stuff. I called a friend, also a PPD blogger selected for this same opportunity, and warned her not to embark on her draft unless she was in a certain mindset already. And we shared a few laughs until I felt lighter. Something about sequined headphones…

I hope I am one of the few bloggers whose story is ultimately selected to appear in print. I’ll keep you posted about that. But I am friends with some of the other bloggers selected, and let me just say this: I’ll be reading the issue with so much pride in what my friends are sharing about their experiences. I’m grateful for the chance to write mine down again, even though it was a little painful. It’s all part of growing, and like another friend texted me earlier today, “Don’t be sad. Look how far you’ve come.”

 

The Positivity Notebook

30. November 2012 · 8 comments · Categories: Anxiety, Books, Depression, favorite things, Living better, My happiness project, On writing · Tags: , , , , , ,

I began feeling pretty low mid-September. Therapy was helping, but I don’t go often enough–I could never go as often as I’d like, given how good I feel when I leave there. I needed something more, something I could carry with me throughout the hard days. I thought back to my early twenties when I was depressed, and I remembered this little leather journal I carried with me everywhere. I must have had a name for it, which I can’t recall now.

In it, I listed all the things that made me happy then (eventually the list exceeded 100). I listed things I want to do in my life. I scribbled song lyrics, quotes, and passages from books. I doodled with markers. That book went everywhere with me during those dark days. Opening it made me feel better, comforted. And, because I have always been a writer, it made me feel good to put pen to paper. Writing has always been my go-to tool for working through my emotions.

This past September, as the days grew shorter and colder and my mood changed with the weather, I decided to start another book. This time, I chose a cheap (but colorful) notebook from Target–less pressure to keep things pretty inside. I referred to it out loud one time as my “positivity notebook,” knowing my struggle to overcome my negativity and pessimism was causing, in part, my depressed mood. The name stuck, even though it isn’t very creative. But sometimes, simplicity is best.

I began writing in it within minutes of coming home from Target. Here is the first page:

Opening page of the positivity notebook

For a month, maybe slightly longer, I carried the notebook with me everywhere, and if I wasn’t feeling well enough to write things down, I’d simply flip through what I’d already written and find some solace there. There is nothing painful in the book, nothing that isn’t uplifting to me in some way. I haven’t written many of my own words inside, but rather I have relied primarily on things others have already shared. This is because I couldn’t trust myself to not write a page-long rant about whatever is bothering me, combined with my fear of someone reading my deepest thoughts.

This is part of a poem by my favorite poet, Frank O’Hara. I love it, so into the notebook it went!

By the end of October, I’d stopped carrying the notebook around with me because I was feeling much better, far less negative. I don’t know whether the positivity notebook should get all of the credit for that, but I feel that it helped me through a rough patch.

Lyrics to “No One’s Gonna Love You” by Band of Horses, which I was listening to nonstop for a while there. Not exactly positive, but beautiful.

Now I toss the notebook in my purse when I start feeling heavy again or when I suspect the day might be hard for me. And sometimes I toss it in there just because it’s never a bad thing to carry a resource full of inspiring reminders about how life can be. Sometimes I just crave the positivity notebook.

This is part of an exercise I learned in therapy that I find soothing and helpful. I wrote it down as a reminder. Don’t you just love the word “unstuck?”

I think this weekend I will dig out that little leather journal from a decade ago and reflect on the things that made me happy back then.

Do you write down things that inspire or comfort you? Or do you use Pinterest (or something else) for this? I’d love to hear about your method!

 

September (A Stream of Consciousness Post)

27. September 2012 · 8 comments · Categories: Anxiety, Depression, My happiness project, On writing, Thought-provoking Thursday · Tags: , , , , , , , ,

September has been the most emotional month of this year for me (as it seems to be most years), from highs to lows to happiness to anxiety and sadness. Transparency and authenticity are objectives I will always strive for in this space I’ve created here. But I am a private person—as much as any blogger can actually be—so I struggle with how much to say!

So I’ll start with this: It feels lately as if I’m having a kind of emotional mini-crisis, unless crisis is too strong a word for what this is (jury’s still out). I hear Bjork singing in my head today, “There’s more to life than this.” There must be more to life than looking forward to bedtime in the hope you actually sleep well that night. There must be more to life than doing the same job, day in and day out, and hoping for a decent pay increase that’s better than last year’s, because we all know money solves everything. There must be more to life than finding enjoyment in drinking a glass of wine with dinner because it helps you relax, and you really need to relax. There must be more to life than shopping, than keeping busy and distracted by chores, than list-making. There must be more to life than telling yourself that if you just make it to “X” month or day, things will get better.

I am a cynic and a pessimist, and I don’t want to be anymore. I am exhausted by my constant negative thoughts (about myself and my life, not about others). I have plenty of things for which to be grateful and insanely happy! Yes, I have had some sadness, but no more than anyone else I know (I think). Overall, there has been more to celebrate than to grieve. But I still find myself unsatisfied.

There’s a very loud voice in my head that says, “You ungrateful bitch, you don’t even have a challenging existence! Who do you think you are?! Why are you so miserable? Why can’t you just be happy?” And the voice wins, most days, and I am awash in guilt over all my “venting” and whining and general anxiety and moodiness. I worry that my friends find me annoying and pathetic. I worry, even, that my Twitter followers will unfollow me if I keep it up. I try to contain my negativity, yet somehow it spills out anyway. My biggest fear in life is abandonment (and I have years of therapy under my belt to back this up).

I know I’m probably being too hard on myself, that some of this is just human nature and I should cut myself some slack, especially since this time of year always has the potential to turn me into a slobbering mess. But the other side of the equation, for me, is that I don’t want Jax to do this to himself when he’s older. Nor do I want him to think of me as a total downer. I want to be better for him, if not first for myself.

So I’m embarking on something new this week in the realm of personal development. I’m trying to suspend my disbelief and take a friend’s advice that may help me let go of some of my negativity. I’m silencing the mockery I hear in my own head, and I’m concentrating on philosophies that seem far out but also soothing. I’m reading about how to fall in love with myself, because I don’t have a freaking clue how to do this (do you know?) but I do know, from what I’ve been reading so far, it’s apparently quite important to do. I read that good things will come to me if I can just learn how to love myself.

I need good things to come to me–so shut up, cynical self!

This morning, my day began (well before my alarm clock) with some YouTube videos my friend emailed to me. And from there, I caught up on some recent blog posts by Brene Brown. I have decided to read her books, and soon. I googled—don’t laugh—”positivity.” I revisited one of my favorite, and often forgotten, websites, Marc and Angel Hack Life. I stayed off Twitter most of the day, until I retweeted the hell out of Marc and Angel’s tweets because so many of them resonated with me.

I’m trying. It isn’t easy, but it is necessary.

Tonight I’m going to stop at a drugstore and buy a notebook. Having been a writer for 25 of my 35 years, buying a new notebook is meaningful and sometimes life-changing for me. It signifies a brand new start, and every notebook I’ve ever begun has always begun positively, full of energy and hope. And so in the spirit of a fresh start, and because there’s no denying how much I love to write and how introspective I am, I’m going to fill this new notebook with snippets of all the things I’m reading and learning–but without any pressure to make it pretty. The objective is simple–writing things down or taping them into a central location will help me remember them and keep them handy for the bad days, when I’m going to flip through the notebook and find comfort there, I hope.

Do you keep a “positivity notebook,” for lack of a better term? Or, can you recommend some uplifting, positive, personal development-but-not-in-a-cheesy-way websites or books I shouldn’t miss?

 

Blog Ennui (or, Getting Out of the Blog Blues)

24. April 2012 · 8 comments · Categories: Blogging, On writing · Tags: , , ,

Confession: I’m bored with my blog. And I can’t help but wonder, after a month of decreasing stats, whether you’re bored with it, too. And then the panic spiral begins–what should I do? Quit? Brainstorm ideas I haven’t already discussed ad nauseum? Get a fresh new look? Take a blogging break? Keep chugging along and wait for this to pass? Find a bunch of blog hops to participate in? Snag some fabulous guest bloggers?

What say you, readers (those of you who are left, anyway)? If you blog, what do you do while you’re in a funk, waiting for inspiration to hit?

Part of this, I know, is because it’s spring and I don’t want to sit inside at a computer! I want to be outside, living in the sunshine! I’m making fun memories with Jax, giving me lots of things to write about, I guess. But little time to do it. And about ZERO motivation.

Perhaps it’s time to reevaluate my blogging goals. When I started this blog in 2010, my primary goal was to give myself an outlet to vent about the aftermath (and occasionally the still-goings-on) of postpartum depression and anxiety. I wanted to find my community. And boy did I! But I feel like those PPD days are so far behind me now. And the things I used to write about frequently (breastfeeding, anxiety, lack of sleep) aren’t as much an issue in my life now. Things have changed, as things eventually do. Maybe the root of the problem is that I am meandering along with no new goal.

I do believe that blogs should be dynamic. After all, humans are, and our blogs are an extension of ourselves. I also believe that blog burnout is a positive thing. Burnout forces your hand, makes you change things up a little. I think it is even something to be proud of because it means a blogger is giving her all. If she were giving only 10%, she wouldn’t feel wiped out, right? Right.

Lately, I have not been giving my all at all! It’s been more like 50% of my usual effort. I mean, last week alone I featured two (superfantastic and awesome) guest bloggers. I think I wrote maybe one post myself. That was a first for me.

But that’s ok. It happens. It’s nothing to cry about.

I’ll keep going.

But I am curious to hear your thoughts and/or advice. I read 100+ blogs regularly. I know I’m not the ONLY blogger to experience this.

 

The Cure for Nostalgia (& Maybe a New Blog)

21. March 2012 · 9 comments · Categories: life lessons, On writing, Reading is fun · Tags: , , , , , ,

This week’s Mother’s Pride blog carnival really got me thinking about what I’m proud of about myself, and I’d like to add one more thing: I’m proud of myself for writing down so many of my thoughts and feelings throughout my life.

As I’ve mentioned (several times…sorry), I’ve been feeling rather nostalgic lately. I’ve been mourning some of the people I’ve lost touch with through the years, some of the wild and crazy times, my long hair and size 2 body….

I’ve been referring to it as suburban mom angst.

I love my family and friends and the life I have now, believe me. But for me, it is possible (and hopefully forgiveable) to also miss some of my “past” life, too.

So the other day, I busted out my box of remaining diaries and poetry notebooks and gave myself one full hour to read some of my thoughts, dated as far back as 1987, when I was 10 years old.

I had a blast. At times, I felt as if I were reading the diaries of someone not me. I cannot believe how much I’ve changed over the years. I’ve changed and changed and then changed some more. Don’t get me wrong, there are still plenty of glimmers of the girl I once was, of the thoughts I once had. For example, in these About Me books I used to love to fill out, I wrote down my likes and dislikes in 1996 and again in 2000. If I had to write those lists again, I know that many of my likes and dislikes would appear on the third list.

Those lists made me laugh out loud. This morning, I shared them on Twitter. No, I prefer not to share them here (Hi, Mom!) but I will share some of the equally funny responses I got on Twitter about my dislikes:

  • I’m with 22-year-old [James] on toilet paper, and with 19-year-old [James] on “All My Life.”
  • Haha oh I love it! Sounds like you had some major men problems. And body issues :( But the pregnant thing cracked me up!
  • I like how you disliked chores AND a dirty house.
  • i hate guys up my ass too :P
  • Hahahaha! That is a very long list..Hilarious.
  • lol! Basically as a teen u didn’t like anyone? Sounds typical. ;)

What else made me laugh out loud were all the pages of my whining and venting about drama with my girlfriends, about how the boys I dated were treating me, about having to do homework, about hangovers.

These days, my diaries are much different. Oh there is still plenty of whining, but most of it is about not being able to pee alone or having to share my makeup with my 2-year-old son or my husband watching too much tv.

Anyway, reading my diaries (and the bad poetry from my adolescence) cured my nostalgia, for the most part, because it helped me realize how I’ve romanticized the past as I grew more distant from it. Looking back at what I’d written then, it doesn’t seem like something I’d ever want to go back to, really. I had awful taste in dudes back then, and I don’t miss waiting for one to call when he said he would or calling me drunk after midnight! I had some major drama queen friends back then, too. Sure, I miss some of the awesome times I had with those people, but all I need to do is bust out my diaries and do a little reading and I feel like I’m right back there again.

The best part is, I can close the book when I want.

Some of the diary entries, poems, and lists are too funny to not share. So I’ve been toying with the idea of starting a second blog just to showcase them. There, I would post that stuff and also invite YOU to post your own rants & raves from your youth.

Whaddya think? Does that sound like something you’d read and/or contribute to?

 

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