Dear Friend that I lost, not by choice but by circumstance, I still think of you every day. Some say that people come into your life only for a season, but I never thought that would be true of us. We were such good friends, and we went through so much together, but then things changed, and I changed...and maybe we just didn't understand each other anymore. Knowing that doesn't make me miss you any less.
We were single girls together for so long, we talked on the phone for hours, hung out on the weekends...we even went to movies on opening night. Then something began to happen to us. I met this guy...I fell for him hard and fast, and less than two years after I met him...we were married. That was the first adjustment in our friendship, me spending time with my single friends while being part of a couple. You were there for me through that, you were in my wedding. We had fun. My husband and I were working a lot, but we still managed to find some time to spend together. Then the first major blow hit me, when I lost my first baby. That was so devastating to me, it changed me on an epic level, to this day I am not even sure if I realize how much. I lost friends during the time that I was just trying to cope with the fall out of my grief. I realize in retrospect that no one can truly understand that kind of a loss if they haven't been through it themselves. You were there for me in that time though, even if you didn't understand, I knew that you loved me.
Then I finally did become a mom. That is when I truly started to see how different married life is from single life, and how vastly different parenthood makes it. Little people change things. I know you loved my baby girl. You liked to come and visit her. We had fun. But then Matthew came along and I was overwhelmed with the demands of dealing with a two year old and a newborn, of trying to potty train my stubborn girl, just trying to survive. And I know between when Anne came and when Matthew came I was slowly starting to drift from you. I know that there were times that you needed me and I wasn't able to be there for you like I should have been. This was not only true for you but for other friends as well. I am sorry for that. I know that you started to feel like I abandoned you. Maybe you didn't know it at first, but in the end....
When the depression hit, when it really stepped in and took over, I almost lost myself completely. Even now, FIVE years later, I still don't feel like I have gotten myself back all the way. There are pieces of who I used to be floating out there in the universe somewhere. For awhile my world shrunk into this little tiny place. I still have to retreat there sometimes. I go there to survive, and there I do just what I have to do to get by, until I am strong enough to fight again. When the depression was at its worst, and we fell away from each other, I don't think I even realized fully what had happened, what I had done to you. I don't know if I could ever really explain to you where I was at that time, how deep in the hole of rage and sadness and overwhelming emotion I was. I could only focus on my kids, my husband. They were all that there was for a while, and with help I was able to focus on myself too. I did build myself up and pull myself out of that place that I was in, but by then it was too late. I had hurt you too much and you were gone. Ironically, around the time of our final encounter, I was just on the cusp of finding my way back to my life. Maybe if I had come back sooner I could have salvaged what was broken....but I will never know.
Now my life is different. The depression isn't gone. I still really, really struggle with it sometimes. I sill have to fight. There are times I still have to retreat into my tiny place. But when I can be myself, and the cloud doesn't pull me down, my life is really good. I have an awesome husband, two amazing kids, and I have my extended family, my church family and more close friends than I have ever had in my life. Things can still be hard, I am still figuring some things out, still learning how to live with my depression, but I know the good that I have in my life. I do miss you though.
I miss having you in my life. It has been years since I have seen you, but do you know that there are times when I see something or hear something and my first impulse is to tell you about it? And then there are my kids. Anne is 7 now, Matthew will be 5 in a few weeks. Some of their favorite books are ones that you chose for them. Recently they got into the Spy Kids movies. Remember how those used to be our guilty pleasure...we saw them all in the theater? My kids watch them over and over, and it makes me think of you. My greatest victory over the last couple of months is that I have gotten them obsessed with Star Wars. We have been watching all the movies and they love them. We have lightsaber battles in the living room. I can't wait to take them to Disney, for all the cool Disney stuff, but also to see all the cool Star Wars stuff they have there now. I won't be able to go there without thinking of you either though.
You would really love my kids. It makes me sad that you aren't a part of their lives. Anne has the most amazing imagination. She can read now too. She loves books about mermaids and fairies the most, but I will find her some Star Wars books on her level soon. She is an artist. I am blown away by the stuff that she draws. You guys would have fun creating things together. She is also very spunky. She keeps me on my toes. She has this amazing pure joy for life though, it flows out of her. That joy of hers pulls me through the hard times. She is a really special girl. I wish you could know her.
Then there is my boy. He has this seriousness about him, but it is really just because he is taking everything in around him. That is how he learns, he watches and then he does. It is fascinating to watch. He loves to build stuff, mostly with his Legos, but he is really imaginative and mechanical with the stuff he comes up with. And he is so sweet and compassionate and gentle. He has a very giving soul. His first impulse is to share with someone else instead of keeping for himself. He also has this adorable goofy side that makes me laugh every day. I am sorry that you never got the chance to know him, that he never had the chance to make you laugh and to show you his dimpled smile.
I know the circumstances of our lives changed us. They took us from the place where we used to be, where we were good friends, and put us someplace else. We hurt each other. I can't blame that totally on my depression, I know that I made mistakes. I am sorry for that. My memories of you will always be fond ones. We had an amazing young adulthood together, full of many, many adventures, many good times, many laughs....and we also got each other through many hard times. We were good and true friends for awhile, and I will always be grateful for the time we had together. I don't think that I will ever stop missing you, I know I will never stop loving you. Where ever you are, I hope that your life is full of joy, full of close friends and family. I hope that you are happy, I hope that you feel loved. You are never far from my thoughts, and always in my heart.
Saturday, July 23, 2016
Friday, July 1, 2016
On the Giving Up....
It has been a long six months since my last post. My life has been the typical roller coaster that life brings, with the added kinks that battling depression brings to it. Going back on my medication has helped. It brought my anxiety under control very quickly. It has helped with the depression. I feel like it hasn't helped as much as it did before I went off it. But...that choice was made and I can't go back and make it differently now.
So many things have happened in the last six months. We took an amazing family vacation to the Caribbean, and were blessed to be able to share that with friends. It was a great week. We were totally unplugged and totally in the moment together. It was hard to come back to reality after that. Being away from everything felt so good, it was so freeing. I wish I could feel so carefree every day.
We went on our vacation the last week of April, and then May and June passed by in the blink of an eye. My kids are growing so super fast! My Anne lost her first tooth, finished First Grade, TURNED SEVEN, and had her very first dance recital. This picture was from right before she went on stage. She was SO nervous to be in front of all of those people. When she was done I asked her how it was. She told me she loved it. "Who wouldn't like being up on the stage like that Mom?" she said to me. Well, I wouldn't! I love the pluck this girl has. She faces her fears with courage and grace and always finishes smiling.
She has her own ups and downs though and we are working on that. She feels emotions so deeply and often acts on what she feels before she thinks things through. It is hard at the age of seven to recognize that point in yourself when you lose control of your behavior to your emotions. I struggle with that sometimes myself. She is destined for greatness though, my girl is, she is always full of surprises. She got an award at the end of the school year for Kindness, and honestly no grade she could receive would could make me prouder than that. Kind and Brave is what we are going for and she is well on her way.
Then there is my little guy, my Matthew. In the past two months he has finished preschool, had his kindergarten orientation, fallen totally in love with Star Wars, and scratched his cornea in a scary accident. Thankfully that healed quickly within a couple of days, but that is not an experience he or I will easily forget. It was so hard to say good-bye to our pre-school. Anne went there for two years and then Matthew started after she finished and did two years as well. It was a part of our daily lives for four years and just like that it was over, and my baby is ready for kindergarten. Wow! This picture is of him walking out of the pre-school for the last time. I cried.
All of this kids growing too fast and too many things changing has been very overwhelming for me. I feel like I am losing my babies. I know I still have lots of time with them, but I also know that time will fly by! My snuggly, baby boy is going to Kindergarten and our afternoon snuggles before school pick up time have come to an end. I already miss him and school doesn't start for two more months!
What is most overwhelming is the change in my Mom status. I have been at home on full press kid duty for seven years, with both kids in school full time, this role will change significantly. I know they will still need me and they will still be my priority. I will be there to take them to activities, make sure they do their homework, make their lunches, and be there for any illness or injury. I just don't know how to handle my time anymore. If I think too much about what I want to, or should do with my time after school starts I have to stop thinking about it, because I don't know how to proceed.
This is the part where I have given up. This depression and other life events have brought me through so many ups and downs and stops and starts I feel like I have given up on progressing forward. Now don't get me wrong, I have generally and slowly moved forward over the last five years. Things are very different now than they were in the beginning. I just feel like real change is something that is not going to happen. My view of how I should spend my days and how I actually do spend my days are very, very different. I am not a perfectionist or an idealist. I don't imagine some utopian lifestyle that is impossible to attain. I just can't set and accomplish goals for myself for the simplest of things. I can't make it to the gym on a regular basis. I stopped going last fall when Anne got really sick with strep for a week and I pretty much never went back. I never actually enjoyed going....it was much more soothing for me to spend my alone time getting things done and prepping for the holidays. The longer I stayed away the easier it became to not return. Now when I think about it I kick myself for wasting the money, because I haven't cancelled my membership, because I have to actually go to the gym to make any changes in my membership. That is a more extreme example. I have also failed miserably even at the smallest of goals I have set for myself, such as reading for a little while each day or getting in my devotional time every day. I just feel like I keep failing over and over again so I just stopped trying. It is easier for my life to stay in my comfortable little ruts, doing the same stuff every day. I actually feel better when I have busier days and I do different things, but those quickly become overwhelming and I feel like I need a "rest" day and then before I know it, back in the comfortable ruts.
I have given up on the fight to some extent. When the depression comes on and it gets bad, I don't really have the will to fight it any more. Thankfully the bad days do pass eventually. Sometimes it is one day, but it has lasted up to a full week. I can manage to a point, but I also have a breaking point where I fall apart completely. I was that way for a couple of days in June and then it passed. I am back to my status quo now, one day at a time. Sometimes I get myself out there, some days I spend most of the time on my couch. I am constantly fighting fatigue and my allergies and sometimes headaches too. So I just wonder, will my life every actually change? Will I get stronger? Will I be able to reach some of my smaller goals, and someday maybe some of the bigger ones? What am I actually going to do with myself come September? Will I get myself more involved with things or will I just dig those ruts deeper? Is there some hope for me? A better way to fight it all? I know there is very little to nothing anyone else can do for me at this point, I just wonder what I am actually capable of doing for myself. I know there are things I do right every day, and my kids are doing well and growing in kindness and love, if I fail at everything else, maybe I can accomplish the one thing that matters most. I just know that I need to do more and I fear that I can't. Right now that is just where I am, and I don't know if there is much I can do about it. Sometimes just putting it out there helps, in writing, floating in the universe...I don't know. I know that I can push past it, I can fight it, I do win sometimes, but then it always sneaks back in and I lose again. That is what makes it the hardest, at this point in the game I feel like the depression is never going to go away, it will always be a part of me. Accepting that fact has made me feel like it has won. Why should I keep fighting it back if it is never actually going to leave? It's not like this is some movie or fairy tale with a happy ending. This is real life and there is no miracle cure for this disease. The stuff that helps doesn't make it go away, so what level of fighting is actually worthwhile? What will actually be enough for me to move forward enough to make small changes here and there? Is there an answer to that, or do I just give in and live life the way it is?
So many things have happened in the last six months. We took an amazing family vacation to the Caribbean, and were blessed to be able to share that with friends. It was a great week. We were totally unplugged and totally in the moment together. It was hard to come back to reality after that. Being away from everything felt so good, it was so freeing. I wish I could feel so carefree every day.
We went on our vacation the last week of April, and then May and June passed by in the blink of an eye. My kids are growing so super fast! My Anne lost her first tooth, finished First Grade, TURNED SEVEN, and had her very first dance recital. This picture was from right before she went on stage. She was SO nervous to be in front of all of those people. When she was done I asked her how it was. She told me she loved it. "Who wouldn't like being up on the stage like that Mom?" she said to me. Well, I wouldn't! I love the pluck this girl has. She faces her fears with courage and grace and always finishes smiling.
Then there is my little guy, my Matthew. In the past two months he has finished preschool, had his kindergarten orientation, fallen totally in love with Star Wars, and scratched his cornea in a scary accident. Thankfully that healed quickly within a couple of days, but that is not an experience he or I will easily forget. It was so hard to say good-bye to our pre-school. Anne went there for two years and then Matthew started after she finished and did two years as well. It was a part of our daily lives for four years and just like that it was over, and my baby is ready for kindergarten. Wow! This picture is of him walking out of the pre-school for the last time. I cried.
What is most overwhelming is the change in my Mom status. I have been at home on full press kid duty for seven years, with both kids in school full time, this role will change significantly. I know they will still need me and they will still be my priority. I will be there to take them to activities, make sure they do their homework, make their lunches, and be there for any illness or injury. I just don't know how to handle my time anymore. If I think too much about what I want to, or should do with my time after school starts I have to stop thinking about it, because I don't know how to proceed.
This is the part where I have given up. This depression and other life events have brought me through so many ups and downs and stops and starts I feel like I have given up on progressing forward. Now don't get me wrong, I have generally and slowly moved forward over the last five years. Things are very different now than they were in the beginning. I just feel like real change is something that is not going to happen. My view of how I should spend my days and how I actually do spend my days are very, very different. I am not a perfectionist or an idealist. I don't imagine some utopian lifestyle that is impossible to attain. I just can't set and accomplish goals for myself for the simplest of things. I can't make it to the gym on a regular basis. I stopped going last fall when Anne got really sick with strep for a week and I pretty much never went back. I never actually enjoyed going....it was much more soothing for me to spend my alone time getting things done and prepping for the holidays. The longer I stayed away the easier it became to not return. Now when I think about it I kick myself for wasting the money, because I haven't cancelled my membership, because I have to actually go to the gym to make any changes in my membership. That is a more extreme example. I have also failed miserably even at the smallest of goals I have set for myself, such as reading for a little while each day or getting in my devotional time every day. I just feel like I keep failing over and over again so I just stopped trying. It is easier for my life to stay in my comfortable little ruts, doing the same stuff every day. I actually feel better when I have busier days and I do different things, but those quickly become overwhelming and I feel like I need a "rest" day and then before I know it, back in the comfortable ruts.
I have given up on the fight to some extent. When the depression comes on and it gets bad, I don't really have the will to fight it any more. Thankfully the bad days do pass eventually. Sometimes it is one day, but it has lasted up to a full week. I can manage to a point, but I also have a breaking point where I fall apart completely. I was that way for a couple of days in June and then it passed. I am back to my status quo now, one day at a time. Sometimes I get myself out there, some days I spend most of the time on my couch. I am constantly fighting fatigue and my allergies and sometimes headaches too. So I just wonder, will my life every actually change? Will I get stronger? Will I be able to reach some of my smaller goals, and someday maybe some of the bigger ones? What am I actually going to do with myself come September? Will I get myself more involved with things or will I just dig those ruts deeper? Is there some hope for me? A better way to fight it all? I know there is very little to nothing anyone else can do for me at this point, I just wonder what I am actually capable of doing for myself. I know there are things I do right every day, and my kids are doing well and growing in kindness and love, if I fail at everything else, maybe I can accomplish the one thing that matters most. I just know that I need to do more and I fear that I can't. Right now that is just where I am, and I don't know if there is much I can do about it. Sometimes just putting it out there helps, in writing, floating in the universe...I don't know. I know that I can push past it, I can fight it, I do win sometimes, but then it always sneaks back in and I lose again. That is what makes it the hardest, at this point in the game I feel like the depression is never going to go away, it will always be a part of me. Accepting that fact has made me feel like it has won. Why should I keep fighting it back if it is never actually going to leave? It's not like this is some movie or fairy tale with a happy ending. This is real life and there is no miracle cure for this disease. The stuff that helps doesn't make it go away, so what level of fighting is actually worthwhile? What will actually be enough for me to move forward enough to make small changes here and there? Is there an answer to that, or do I just give in and live life the way it is?
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