Encouraged by Complexity

I’ve been trying to write about how I felt after I read a New Yorker article about Madeleine L’Engle. 

I’ve been trying to tell you how encouraged I am by her complexity and imperfection.  How something in me responds when I think a person could be rejoiced over and treasured and loved by strangers as well as by those who are close to her when she was evidentally far from perfect.

I’ve been second guessing all of that because it’s really scary that someone who has so much insight about the ideal of marriage and family and life and faith could have struggled so much with all of the above, and could have been so desperate to live in denial of some really harsh realities in the lives of her family members.

I guess what it boils down to is that as I read more about Madeleine L’Engle, herself, I find that I’m challenged in the same way I am after reading her novels and books:  I’m challenged to accept the complexity of humanity as a whole and of the individuals in my life.  I’m challenged to embrace and accept the complexity…  to not to turn away from it…  to not judge it or be repulsed by it, but to look for how God’s transforming love is at work there.

So that’s what Madeleine L’Engle teaches me.  I think I’ll keep reading.

This is me acknowledging, but not apologizing for, the fact that it’s been a very long time since I’ve updated here. 

I’m just not feeling the blog thing lately.  I’m just not.

I do, however, find it somewhat hilarious that someone landed here by searching for ‘kinky euphemisms…’

With that, I shall recede back into  bloggy oblivion once more.

The Notebook

Sometimes I still cry.

While we were cleaning out the ‘we don’t know where to put it so we’ll just put it in this extra room’ room that needs to become the ’sparish’ room, I came upon a couple of notebooks.

The first one had some journaling, some grocery lists, some C doodling.  I tore out a few pages to keep.  The rest went to the recycle pile.

The second one took my breath away.

The first page began with a list of meds in my Mom’s handwriting.  Underneath that, a new and separate thought, were the words, “rapidly fatal.”  On another page there were the words “adenocarcinoma,” and “lymph nodes.”  There were words like, “Insurance Company,” and “MRI.”

In handwriting that goes back and forth between my mother’s and my father’s–often on the same page–I found the book that accompanied them to appointments.  That asked their questions.  That voiced their fears.  The book they carried with them after Mom was diagnosed with Lung Cancer.

There are test names and drug names and bold-faced facts that standing alone would elicit no emotion. 

And then there are the words that show me chinks in the armor that I rarely saw.  That maybe I was too scared to even look hard on. 

It was the fear.

“How do I manage the pain which is so bad now? (already….  at diagnosis)”

“Will I be paralyzed from this?”

“What can I expect?”

There are stark scribblings like “9-24 months.”  (We had 8 almost to the day when all was said and done). 

I wonder how alone my Mom felt in those fears.  I know I was just trying to be ‘the bearer of hope,’ and say only things my Mom could grab onto and hold with all her might.  But sometimes when you do that you deny a person their need to speak the truth about their feelings.  About their fears.  Which are real from the start.  I hope Mom didn’t feel too alone in her darkness and I stood desperately hoping to shine some light.  I hope that she knew she wasn’t alone in her fears.  I hope I did a better job than I remember of listening.

But what killed me in this notebook–what brought the tears pricking and overflowing and bewildering my husband who was sorting a few feet away–was what I read two pages later.

In Dad’s handwriting:  “Carolyn Helen, 8 lb. 1 oz.  20 1/2 in,” and the name of the hospital in which she was born and the number of days we’d be staying.  It was an empty page all by itself surrounded by all of this fear and pain and starkness.  It WAS the hope that I DID provide for them to hang onto.  It was the joy in the starkness.  Remembering that superimposed joy and starkness was overwhelming.  Remembering that year of newness and joy and pain and loss and the hugeness of it all, took my breath away.

The notebook also has the notes I scribbled after I called the Red Cross to let Husband know that Hospice thought she had two or three days at best.   Those notes were a lifeline of hope that I held onto.  They represented precious time I took away from being at my Mom’s side to tell my husband what was going on and to shoot a flare that might bring him home.  It did.  Mom held on, waited, lingered until Husband was by my side.  He came in late a day later.  She heard me say, “I love you Mom, Goodnight” and him say, “See you tomorrow Carol,” and a few hours she was gone.   Such few words in that little notebook bookmarking moments and hours that I’ll never forget.

Further on, the notebook has notes of homes for rent that I scouted out that spring after staying with Dad during deployment when C and I went back to Washington for Husband’s coming home. 

It has scribblings I left for a babysitter during those six months as I tried to regain my footing. 

It has a years worth of experience and emotion and pain and joy all within a few pages of one another. 

And I cried.  And I held the notebook like it was something alive and real.  Like it was a link to those days and a way to hold my Mom’s hand again.

I thought about that year and the hugeness of all we lived through.  I didn’t minimize it or rush it away.  I sat there with it for a moment and remembered what it was like to have a baby.  Nurse my Mom.  Lose my  Mom.  Say goodbye to Husband as he left on deployment.  And live through the subsequent months of grief and aloneness while trying to piece back together the life I’d return to in another state.

It made me remember when I learned to take things a day at a time and to look only at “what is” and “what’s next.”

It made me miss my Mom and relive those days.

Sometimes I still cry.

Extravagance

One of the words that keeps coming at me over and again in this current season for me is “Extravagance.”  I feel absolutely surrounded by glorious extravagance.  Like I’m swimming in it.  We’re starting to settle into our new home.  I keep thinking there is no reason in the world that we should be in a house like this.  This house is special.  We couldn’t afford a home like this in a place like this in a million years.  This simply must be grace.

 

But it goes further than that.  Soon after we moved in here I started trying to get back into my walking/jogging routine.  I discovered that just up the road from  us is ‘the country’–the kind of country that reminds me of home.  Farms, and trees, and flowering plants, hills and fields.  It smells so good in those spots:  like dirt and flowers and baby leaves. 

Then I set out one day to see how close I could get to the water.  We could see it from our house….  But how close was it really?  And if there was access to it was it all in restricted ‘military base’ places? 

Imagine my surprise when I found 1/4 mile from our home, a ‘backroad’ beaten with potholes, that takes you to the beach.  So we’ve spent some time exploring there…  We took a ridiculously long beach walk two weekends ago, and while doing so we crossed paths with three otters.  We’ve lived here almost five years.  I’ve wanted to see a sea otter for five years…  Husband said he saw one the first week he was up here.  I’d stopped believing they really were here.  And then we saw three.  They played in the water, and then came up on the beach right in front of us, sunned themselves, played, noticed us and headed back out to sea where they continued to give us a show of playing and peeking back at us for at least 25 minutes.  Since then I’ve seen another otter in a completely different spot, and seen our family of three again while walking along ‘our beach’  another day.  Sea otters are my thing.  I’ve loved them since I first saw them in a trip to Alaska with my parents.  In my mind there is no other explanation for being inundated with sea otters lately except that God is, for whatever reason, saying I love you…  wooing me witih gifts he knows I find better than jewels…  showing me his extravagantly good heart.

I could go on and on about a park that I discovered in the town C goes to preschool in with sweeping views of the islands; about the 13 deer that I saw there  yesterday just milling about as I walked by with a stroller; about the way the sun has played on the mountains; about the storms blowing over the water, swirling around and then giving way to blue sky and sunshine.  I can go on and on, but it can all be summed up in one word:

Extravagance. 

Maybe two: 

Extravagant grace. 

Or another two:

Extravagant love.

 

There is no reason I should be so blessed.  I could sing deyenus (It would have been enoughs) for all time for the blessings we’ve been given besides any of these…  This kind of extravagance makes me nervous, makes me wonder if a downturn is coming…  If this is a season of beauty because I will need to store it up for a season of pain.  I have never done well with extravagance.  I feel awkward and unworthy and nervous around it.  But I am trying to remember that right now is what is most important.  That bad things WILL happen at some point, because it’s a simple fact that ’in this world we will have trouble.’   I try to be mindful that worrying about them steals the joy of this extravagance.  I want to stay present.  I want to soak it in.  I want to breathe it all in, and store it up and cherish it.

Extravagance.

Why Support the MOTHERS act?

• Because postpartum depression is THE most common complication of childbirth. 
• PPD affects approximately half a million women per year in the US.
• 10-15% of women who give birth will experience a postpartum mood disorder
• Postpartum mood disorders negatively affect mothers AND children
• Postpartum depression is frequently unreported and under diagnosed. 
• Postpartum mood disorders are TREATABLE

Need more reasons?

• Because no woman should suffer the sadness, guilt, and anxiety that postpartum mood disorders bring
• Because children need mommies who are able to care for them
• Because being a parent should be a joyful experience
• Because chances are someone you know will experience postpartum depression

You can even read the bill yourself! 

Please support the Melanie Blocker Stokes MOTHERs act.  How can you do that? 

Again, it’s easy! 

Go to the DBSA and sign the petition.

E-mail Susan Stone at susanstonelcsw@aol.com and put your name on the state-by-state list of people who endorse this bill–be sure to include your name and state.

Call and write your senator or Congressperson

Write about the Melanie Blocker Stokes MOTHERS Act in your blog.

Call or e-mail every one of your organization’s members today and tell them to get up and get to work for goodness sake.

Join Postpartum Support International as it works to create more and better services and education for the women who suffer.

More Goodies:

Sharing the Journey–A fellow PPD survivor, PSI coordinator, and PPD Advocate who is heading up this week’s movement to blog for the MOTHERS Act

An interview with Mary Jo Cody

Susan Stone’s Perinatal Pro

Senator Menendez’s enorsement

One more edit to add:  I just got done calling a good 3/4 of the H.E.L.P. Senate Committee (including getting yelled at by a very annoyed but official sounding somebody when I fat-fingered a number…  *sigh*).  I’m a girl who wets her pants when she gets pulled over by a policeman, and gets sweaty palms just driving by them. I’m afraid of important people.  If I can call a few Senators, I know you can!

Because Information Empowers, The MOTHERS Act, and my story

I’ve started several posts about the Mother’s Act today.  I’ve spent some time reading things that those who oppose it have written, including one of the articles which comes dangerously close to libel against the fantastic Katherine Stone.  That’s a line I didn’t expect to see crossed, and it saddens me that it was.

What rattled me almost as much today were assertions that were made essentially suggesting that postpartum depression is not a real medical problem, and that the difficulties women may face during the postpartum period could only come from Western Medicine’s mishandling of pregnancy, labor, and birth.  In light of that, I thought I’d share a bit more of my story. 

With both of my  daughters we faced the real possibility that my husband would be gone during their births  So….  I sought out a doula each time.  I wanted someone WITH me.  Along the way I learned a bit about doulas…  I learned about how they decreased the rate of C-sections significantly, about how they often help Mom’s find ways to endure the pain of childbirth without using epidurals or other medications.  And you can’t learn about doula’s without learning a bit about the ‘natural childbirth movement.’ 

When my second daughter was born, I did most of my laboring at home.  Our doula was fantastic.  She kept me calm and focused.  I spent most of the labor on an exercise ball or curled up on my own couch.  I took showers to deal with the pain, and to stay relaxed.  We actually ended up planning our trip to the hospital around the opening of the military base’s gate that was closest to us.  I arrived still minimally dilated, VERY quickly transitioned from 2 cm to 10 cm, pushed for a reasonable amount of time and held my baby girl in my arms just two hours after getting to the hospital (with a total laboring time of 10 hours–I have to get my full credit!).  I didn’t get an epidural, or any other form of pain relief.  My labor went as close to going ‘as planned’ a labor possibly can. 

But as I said in an earlier post, it felt different from the start.  I felt panicky with my baby in my arms.  When I got home, I found the only time I felt really ok was when I was snuggling my tiny miracle and she was content.  Months went by and I attributed my feeling ‘off’ to the anniversary of the death of my mother, to my  husband’s deployment, and to countless other things only to find when life ’settled down’ that I still didn’t feel right.

It took weeks of me looking online for people with stories like mine before I got the courage to call for an appointment.  I didn’t have the symptoms I expected to have for a diagnosis of Postpartum Depression.  I felt sad, but I didnt’ cry all the time.  I was irritable and angry too often.  My default setting for life was more negative than positive.  But mostly all I could say was that I felt off.  I wrote more about how I felt in this post.

I was lucky to see a compassionate doctor who was aware of depression and postpartum depression.  When I went to the doctor, I expected to have to convince HIM I had a problem.  Instead he listened to my symptoms and my conclusions and spent the next half-hour or so helping me to understand WHY I was feeling that way, and explaining the avenues of treatment available.  I left knowing that I had a REAL problem and that HOPE was available.  I wasn’t always going to feel like this, and the fact that I did feel like I did WASN’T MY FAULT.

I write all of this for two reasons:  1)  Because I had a pretty minimally medically invasive labor and delivery.  I was in no way, shape, or form a “victim of Western medicine.” (the fact that Western Medicine, while it can be flawed, can also be a life-saving Godsend is really for another post.  In the meantime, go read what Liz at Mother is Not For Wimps says about CesareanAwareness Month).  Yet even with this non-medicated, “natural,” doula-assisted birth, I STILL experienced Postpartum Depression.  I STILL felt off.  2)  Had it not been for me becoming informed little by little, and then having the luck of seeing a physician who both had a clue and gave a damn, I wouldn’t have known I had a problem or believed there was hope to deal with the problem.   For me, information was power.  Denying the problem left me hopeless.  But, armed with the knowledge that I had a REAL physiological condition that could be TREATED a variety of ways left me empowered.  And gave me the chance to dig out of the ‘offness.’

 

The MOTHERS Act was written for women like me.  It was written so that women who might not think they fit the mold for a problem like postpartum depression can become informed, and ultimately empowered.  It was written to bring awareness to health care providers so that a greater number of them will have a clue and give a damn.  It wasn’t written to drug women into mindless zombies or so that health care providers could dupe women into taking drugs they don’t need to pad the pockets of the evil entity known as “Big Pharma.”

Education is Power.  Even more, Education EMPOWERS.  That’s why I support the Mother’s Act.  That’s why I encourage you to speak louder than the opposition.  How can you do that?  Stealing from the, now infamous, Katherine Stone: 

Here are ways to take action:

• Go to the DBSA and sign the petition.
• E-mail Susan Stone at susanstonelcsw@aol.com and put your name on the state-by-state list of people who endorse this bill.
• Call and write your senator or Congressperson
• Write about the Melanie Blocker Stokes MOTHERS Act in your blog.
• Call or e-mail every one of your organization’s members today and tell them to get up and get to work for goodness sake.
• Join Postpartum Support International as it works to create more and better services and education for the women who suffer.

All is well

I haven’t blogged in ages.  The move in to our new house took out our Internet for almost three weeks and since then I’ve signed in and started typing and just haven’t had anything to say.  I’ve been trying to be more balanced about my time online and have had some really sweet time with God…  But I don’t have much to say here. 

All is well here.  Very well. 

I’ll be back when I have sometime to say.

Turn on the Lights

Somehow or another, this is the first time I’ve seen this video which was put together for Postpartum Support International.  It’s beautiful…  To see all these Dad’s and family members coax Mom’s out of the darkness of postpartum mood disorders.  I’m lucky that my own husband cared that much.

But the other thought I had as I watched this video was this:  I am *SO* glad for the opportunity to be a coordinator for military families with PSI.  Because so often, when a military spouse goes through postpartum depression, she goes through it alone.  So often it happens when the person who would normally be the primary source of support and help is thousands of miles away and in harms way.  The photos that are taken so often for military spouses in this position aren’t of Daddies doing the work and forging on while Mommy heals, but of Mommies marching on and trudging through and doing the best that they can with little help and less sleep.  They are one handed photos taken in self-portrait mode with forced half-hearted smiles…  Or photos taken of baby with an extra found piece of energy because you know your husband needs to see his little  baby.

And when you’re in that position, as I was because of a deployment and detachments,  you still desperately NEED someone to coax you out of the darkness.  You still NEED someone to care, and to say you’re not alone in this.  Sometimes you just NEED somebody to hold the baby because for so many days it’s been just you. 

I’m so glad that PSI is dedicated to ‘turning on the lights’ for women in this position, and so grateful to be a part of that.  And I hope that women facing postpartum depression while their spouses are deployed, or even with a spouse who *is* home, but facing a postpartum mood disorder along with the extra challenges the military throws at you… along with female service members with new babies who find themselves dealing with PPMDs in their own lonely situations know that THEY aren’t alone, even though our lifestyle can so easily make us feel that way.

How I Found My Primal Dreamy Rocky Feelings

Not too long ago I was sitting in the living room of a friend’s house, watching her snuggle her two year old son.  “I love you SO much,” she said over and over again.  Later that evening, she looked at me and with a dreamy quality to her voice she asked me, “Did you know it could be like this?  Did you know you could love someone SO much?!”

I was surprised by my answer, “Yeah…  I mean, I guess I did….”  I was surprised by the lack of feelings in my voice.  My thought process was logical.  Cold.  I loved people very deeply before I was a mother.  I loved my parents.  My husband.  I *did* expect to love my children as I do….

Cold logic though?  When it came to thinking of how I felt about my babies? 

I came home and I wondered and I stewed and I obsessed for days.  Was it possible that I didn’t love my kids like other Mom’s did?  Had my bout with Postpartum Depression permanently damaged the relationship I had with my kids?  Could I never get that bond back?  Was I just unfeeling?  Callous?  Was I missing something basic to my nature as a woman and as a mother?  I thought over a billion scenarios and knew that I too had the mama bear instinct.  But where was this primal rocking, this dreamy voice quality?  Why was I not in the same sort of maternal bliss that my friend was in? 

What was I doing wrong? 

 

Tonight, at bedtime C was chatty and stalling.  She looked at me and said, “Mama…  When I get bigger…  Who will I marry?” 

“Who do you think you’ll marry?”

“Maybe Daddy…. ” 

Long deep breaths, another turn.  More stalling.  “Mama…  When I’m bigger….  I wanna be a doctor.”

Instant heart-rush.  Agonizing ache.  “Mama, when I’m bigger…  when I’m married…  when I’m a grown-up?”  Where was this coming from?  Where had my baby gone?  When had she shifted into this big-girl stage of development?  When did she start thinking her own thoughts and stopped parroting what I told her about the world?  Where was the pudgy-armed two year old that I drug back to bed 57 times in one night only to have her stay up screaming for another hour reducing me to a nub of exhaustion?  Where did this wide-eyed thoughtful little girl come from…

And then after that one started snoring, the other one:  Not quite two, but very language proficient trying her best to sing along to her lullabies, “Flowers in the sunshine, Boats upon the lake…  Sleep my little baby, I’ll see you when you wake.”  Or in her version:  “Flowwwwrsshine….  BOOOO…  see you wake…” in the dreamiest little girl voice.    She insists that I sit with her until she’s so rock asleep that she doesn’t know I’m sneaking away.  Any little movement away from her elicits the tiniest, but completely unignorable, “Mama.”  I freeze in my steps and resume shushing.

I’m leaving these girls for four and a half days the day after tomorrow.  When I made the arrangements and bought the plane tickets all I could think of was freedom.  My turn.  I’ve sat through how many phone calls with my husband in port or on detachment?  He calls from Greece, or Spain, or even Dubai.  His time on the boat is far from glamorous, but his time off most certainly IS, at least sometimes.   He would tell me of the amazing things he saw–cathedrals, and mountains, and historical relics, or even just…  you know…  really cool restaurants that don’t feature high chairs and oyster crackers to keep screaming at bay…  He would tell me about these places and I would murmur back excitedly with all the convincingness I could muster and look around at my surroundings.  Here I was, up to my ankles in diapers…  while he was, kid-free seeing the wonders of the world.  But then…  this was my lot.

Tonight I can hardly stand it:  this thought of leaving in two days.    I’ve gone from excitement about my ‘freedom’ to agonizging over the thought of missing out on these precious moments and thoughts for even a few days.  For a week now I’ve been trying to chase away anxiety.  I’m  not worried about leaving them with my husband.  He’s a capable guy.  He pretends to be overwhelmed by them, but they’ll find their way through.  But me missing them.  How can I enjoy anything 2000 miles away and missing them?  The thought of them missing me, is equally troubling.  I have said for so long that I was the constant when Daddy left.  What will they think if Mommy goes too?  And even worse–what if they DON’T miss me?  What if I come home and they’re mad at me?  Or they only want Daddy? 

Silly, irrational thoughts that all Mommy’s think at one time or another in one form or another.  It’s nothing new.  Daddy will do fine.  They will do fine.  It will be good for them.  It will be a time to make special Daddy-daughter memories.  It will be a time for Daddy to gain confidence and find out that he CAN handle them on his own.  And it WILL be a time for me to relax and have some fun outside the realm of Mommydom.  (Have I mentioned that the thought of a plane ride with no one on my lap makes me monosyllabic with glee?)

But I see tonight–savoring every moment of the silken moonlight, relishing the words of the lullabies we sing and truly not minding bedtime taking over an hour before they both slip into calm, long, sleepy breath-patterns—that I *do* love these two tiny beings with every fiber of me.  The feelings don’t always bubble up naturally….  I’ve had long nights and days and weeks and months of being THE parent of two busy little girls.  I’ve had my share of Mommy burn-out.

Still, those deep, primal, dreamy, breathy, rocking feelings…  That bubbling up of spontaneous unstoppable “I love yous.”  That feeling of unimaginable love that my friend expressed…  I DO have it too.  It’s there.  When the burn-out feelings reign I don’t locate them as easily, but in the quiet of the night, snuggling up next to their soft, glorious little bodies, I find it again. 

I love you girls so much…  SO MUCH. 

I really, really do.

Thinking in Bullets is Just Easier

• I should be cleaning for company.  Our friend, Todd, is coming over this evening.  He and his wife moved to Colorado right before Christmas and we’ve missed them terribly.  I’ve got the spaghetti sauce in the crock-pot and the double chocolate chip cookies made for him, so I’m taking a break. 
• My oldest turned 4 yesterday and she really is such a big girl.  I’m so proud of how grown up she is.  She’s still my little firecracker, and she still keeps me on my toes plenty but her loving heart and enthusiasm about the world around her get my attention more and more these days–Cornstarch incidents not withstanding (and…  those are being instigated by the little one more and more frequently too!)
• We move into the new home in a little over a week.  We’re so excited.  Packing is coming slow…  But we’ve begun working on deep clean items.  I’m most anxious about getting the house clean and ready for our move out inspection.  I can’t wait to settle in there, and I can’t wait to wake up to an amazing view every morning.
• I’m taking my first solo flight since before kids this week to go to my SIL’s.  She invited me to attend the Hearts at Homeconference and I am SO pumped.  I’m so JUST taking a carry on.   And on the plane I am going to READ and SLEEP and enjoy sitting there without ANYONE on my lap.  And I will put my own drink on the tray-table in front of me and not worry about any little fingers or toes or elbows or heads spilling it.  And I will not have to apologize repeatedly to the passengers around me for the wiggliness and noise of myself or any of my party.  And the window shade will stay in one position for a good portion of the flight, along with my tray table and the arms of the seat.  Oh, I’m looking forward to the conference too!  Really!
• Even so I am apprehensive about leaving my babies.  What if they cry?  What if I cry?  What if they decide they like Daddy more than me when I’m gone?  What if I miss them so much I don’t have any fun? 
• The randomness of C leaning out to talk to Daddy in the yard and yelling, “Daddy, ‘member!  Don’t eat any grass!” makes my laugh.
• Little Sister parroting  the grass advice  is equally funny.  
• Ok.  Off to tidy the house, and perhaps get some packing done.  Maybe.  Possibly.  Or maybe it can just wait til I get back from my trip….