It is 9:30am and I've just finished all the dishes. We're talking a full kitchen of dirty dishes from the last 4 days. Pots of crusted-on oatmeal, wooden spatulas that have to be scrapped, dishwasher emptied and restocked and running. And the last thing I knew, it was 8:30am.
Anger may be undesirable for most things but it sure does make for a clean kitchen. Good thing I had such big load, otherwise I'd be currently matching socks in the middle of the bedroom floor. And that doesn't really take enough physical activity to process anger.
And boy was I angry. Mixed with being sad, once the anger subsided.
We were trying to get dressed for school. And said little person needed to poo. And that took a while. And that was fine. But as soon as that was over, little A wanted to play at the sink, instead of wash her hands, and I said "no." And all hell broke loose.
One attempt by me to put underpants on a kicking, flailing screaming child. Two time outs from me. (And for me, let's be honest those things are for parents almost more than for kids). And then M had to step in, because A just wasn't going to calm for me at that point. Insert my first pang of "shit how do single parents do this because I'm scared of who I'd be if I didn't have back-up." And then the second pang, the one that turns all this in on me - that I can't handle even one kid. I can't get one kid dressed and out the door in the morning. She's screaming for her pacifier, and I'm so ready to take a blowtorch to the thing that keep getting lost in her bed and waking us up, and commented on by people across the world. Americans included...Hertz rental car van driver, you so did not help by commenting - after a 10 hour flight and jet lag and an extra bag scan for the apples that we ate on the plan, and exhaustion and worry about getting a bum luggage trolley to move as car seat kept falling off the pile - that your grandson gave up his pacifier at 2 years old. It may be a month and a half late, but, bite me.
And so I retreat to the kitchen. I'm in tears, sobbing, trying to keep the boogers at bay so I can just see a pan or pot. I feel deep down inside so unfit to handle this, wanting to just become an authoritarian and get rid of this kid's spirit, turn her into someone who listens when I say no. And there is no way I can see myself to justifying another child at this moment, I who have lost it. I who can't even think about tomorrow morning and how that is going to be, much less the next 18 years. I'm so disheartened by these moments, and the fact that I have all of this time, like with the first time we tried to get pregnant, to keep thinking about whether or not it is a good idea. I have time to reconsider constantly.
In the end, M and A were finally ready to go to school, 20 minutes late, with a pacifier in her mouth (that I said yes to, while dreaming of dropping it into liquid nitrogen and smashing it with a hammer), and I was still upset. And sad. And somewhat angry. About a lot of things. I managed to get it together enough to go give a little, quiet goodbye kiss on her cheek, and to M. I managed to not do it with a passive aggressive bent. I didn't manage - I let myself not manage - a bright cheery "bye, have fun, see you later!" I went back to the kitchen quickly because the tears were coming again, and for the moment, I'd decided she might get more upset about me crying.
From the hallway, just as the door was closing, she said "I'm sorry, Mama." I came out of the kitchen because I hadn't heard what the words were, and she said it again. "I'm sorry." I hadn't asked for that apology. I don't try to force her (after the first month we started time-outs) anymore to apologize. I let that one go a while ago in some moment of trust that it would eventually work out okay. And this morning, it did. She apologized because, I think, she felt there was something unresolved. And it allowed me to wish her a good day. And that kind of feels authentic, that I didn't force myself to be cheery when I really wasn't, and that it happened out of the blue, and that I wasn't trying to engineer it. And it really did make things better.
And yet, I was left sad. Still furiously scrubbing the pots, going to get another tissue, and feeling the weight of parenting on my shoulders this morning. Feeling so unfit for this job, so undone by this morning, and not sure how I will make it. Followed by the reminder that I've even been considering a second child and feeling so silly for that. I guess it is going to be a bit of a sad morning. And I'd like to be okay with that, and not let it take over the whole day.
Oh, hey, I should go email in my US presidential election ballot now.
Showing posts with label anger. Show all posts
Showing posts with label anger. Show all posts
Thursday, October 25, 2012
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
You're only going to take that insulin for a few months, though, right?
Goodbye, 2010. Don't let that door hit you on the way out. Really, no need to come over ever again.
I started anti-depressants a few weeks before baby A's first birthday, and the celebration with helium-balloons, good friends, family Skyping in, and cake (which she held firmly in her death-grip) was fun. Life is settling down. I'm settling down.
How strange it is to hear your baby "crying at you" at 7am in the morning, and try your hardest to stay calm, not take it personally, and not break down in tears, and then, an hour after starting the medication (my body does at least this well...no side-effects), hearing her "just cry." It isn't "at" my, it isn't personal, I'm not struggling, I'm calm. Not getting any more sleep than before the medication, I realized just how much of my energy I had been funneling into JUST...KEEPING...IT...TOGETHER. Not falling apart, not crying when she did, not getting angry. If this isn't a chemical reaction (as opposed to the misconception of depression as emotional weakness), I don't know what is.
Honestly, I wish I'd gotten on the meds earlier. I feel like myself again, whatever that means. Granted, the question in my head now is, which "me" am "I"? Am I the depressed me or the not depressed me? Which me will I be as a result of anti-depressants, and which me will I be when I find some combination of sleep, taking care of myself, work and family that helps me be the mom and wife and adult I want to be? Maybe I'll be a bit less creative, but also have less of a brain that can't stop spinning. Maybe I'll be calmer and not cry as much, even at sad things. Maybe I'll be less emotionally embroiled with my kid and my husband and that will actually be a good thing.
I guess the meds/no-meds question, about who is the "real" me, is not much different than which is the real diabetic, the one on insulin who feels better or the one who isn't taking it and feel worse. They are both "me." Yet, when it comes to drugs that affect the brain we tend to think they are more fundamentally and detrimentally altering of some innate self. Already, I've gotten at least 4 different comments from 4 different people, about how soon I'll get of the meds. That is almost the first thing they've asked when I mention the anti-depressants. Not about how I feel now, but cautionary, "well, but you won't stay on them too long, right?"
Or else, what? Where does this instinct come from? You wouldn't say that to the diabetic. I guess there is still a strong sense of mental illness as different, temporary, and of medications as anti-true-self somehow.
In any case, I'm on meds, and I feel better. I feel calmer, and not like a tiny boat in a huge ocean storm, scared of capsizing every day. I'm not really angry much anymore. I don't cry much until something is really moving or sentimental. A plate of slightly overcooked pancakes, for instance, won't bring out the tears. And in the aftermath of how hard the last year has been, and how much I was afraid of being a monster who yelled at her baby and sometimes picked her up roughly or put her down and pouted (FINE! don't go to sleep! See if I care! Go play by yourself), I think I have a new outlook on domestic abuse.
I never thought I'd empathize with this category, but honestly, if it were for lack of trying, I don't think there would be even half the child and spousal abuse going on that there is. Forget my number, my main point is, I've felt angry, I've acted out against a baby who wasn't at fault, and I've then gone on to feel like a monster, guilty, ashamed, horrified, promising myself I wouldn't do it again. I tried more sleep, more me-time, eating better, getting more rest, putting notes all over the bathroom about trust and anger and reconnection, no caffeine, herbal teas for relaxing, herbal medications for relaxing, therapy (lots and lots of it, all useful in the long run, but none fixing the problem), and a bunch of other stuff. Just like the first time I was majorly depressed, it didn't help. Not enough. Which is why I'm medication. Because it wasn't a lack of trying. By the time I took the first pill, I'd tried and tried and tried, with my body, my mind, peer pressure, therapy, and everything else I could find. When I try, I REALLY try.
It is a bit like a turkey temperature button I once had that required the turkey come out of the oven 10 min. BEFORE the thing popped. Once I've come to a doctor for anti-depressants, I'm overdue for them. I've already been trying too hard to fix it. I don't come in soon enough.
And I think other people with anger issues that manifest against their loved ones are also trying hard. Don't get me wrong, I still think each one of us has the responsibility to do whatever possible to resolve the issues, be it chemical or other intervention. If I had hurt baby A, I would have been responsible. But the depression and things leading up to it were not my fault. And since nothing else worked in my case, I think it was my responsibility to start anti-depressants. But I no longer think of domestic abuse situations as confined to those who just don't try hard enough, or don't care. I think of them as people who sometimes have huge barriers in their way to their acting like they would like to. And unfortunately the ways over and around those barriers are sometimes the things that friends and family find unacceptable or disappointing (going to counseling, taking anti-depressants, choosing a calmer life and job, etc).
Even one of the therapists I've talked to in the last year displayed a surprising misunderstanding of this situation when she asked me "Can you promise me you won't hurt baby A?" Um, no. That is my point, why I'm sitting in your office, and intent on getting some medication. IT ISN'T FOR LACK OF TRYING!!! If I could promise you, I'd have promised myself long ago, and I'm a much harsher judge of myself than anyone else could be.
So, things have calmed down. M and I lit a candle the night after baby A's party and burned little note paper pieces in it. They were filled with the hardest things we went through last year that were most definitely not going to happen this year...being in painful labor, problems with breastfeeding, not knowing when the colic would end, not knowing when she'd stop waking 10 times a night, and so on. We started over. And so far, with Christmas and New Year's and travel and all, things have been good.
I started anti-depressants a few weeks before baby A's first birthday, and the celebration with helium-balloons, good friends, family Skyping in, and cake (which she held firmly in her death-grip) was fun. Life is settling down. I'm settling down.
How strange it is to hear your baby "crying at you" at 7am in the morning, and try your hardest to stay calm, not take it personally, and not break down in tears, and then, an hour after starting the medication (my body does at least this well...no side-effects), hearing her "just cry." It isn't "at" my, it isn't personal, I'm not struggling, I'm calm. Not getting any more sleep than before the medication, I realized just how much of my energy I had been funneling into JUST...KEEPING...IT...TOGETHER. Not falling apart, not crying when she did, not getting angry. If this isn't a chemical reaction (as opposed to the misconception of depression as emotional weakness), I don't know what is.
Honestly, I wish I'd gotten on the meds earlier. I feel like myself again, whatever that means. Granted, the question in my head now is, which "me" am "I"? Am I the depressed me or the not depressed me? Which me will I be as a result of anti-depressants, and which me will I be when I find some combination of sleep, taking care of myself, work and family that helps me be the mom and wife and adult I want to be? Maybe I'll be a bit less creative, but also have less of a brain that can't stop spinning. Maybe I'll be calmer and not cry as much, even at sad things. Maybe I'll be less emotionally embroiled with my kid and my husband and that will actually be a good thing.
I guess the meds/no-meds question, about who is the "real" me, is not much different than which is the real diabetic, the one on insulin who feels better or the one who isn't taking it and feel worse. They are both "me." Yet, when it comes to drugs that affect the brain we tend to think they are more fundamentally and detrimentally altering of some innate self. Already, I've gotten at least 4 different comments from 4 different people, about how soon I'll get of the meds. That is almost the first thing they've asked when I mention the anti-depressants. Not about how I feel now, but cautionary, "well, but you won't stay on them too long, right?"
Or else, what? Where does this instinct come from? You wouldn't say that to the diabetic. I guess there is still a strong sense of mental illness as different, temporary, and of medications as anti-true-self somehow.
In any case, I'm on meds, and I feel better. I feel calmer, and not like a tiny boat in a huge ocean storm, scared of capsizing every day. I'm not really angry much anymore. I don't cry much until something is really moving or sentimental. A plate of slightly overcooked pancakes, for instance, won't bring out the tears. And in the aftermath of how hard the last year has been, and how much I was afraid of being a monster who yelled at her baby and sometimes picked her up roughly or put her down and pouted (FINE! don't go to sleep! See if I care! Go play by yourself), I think I have a new outlook on domestic abuse.
I never thought I'd empathize with this category, but honestly, if it were for lack of trying, I don't think there would be even half the child and spousal abuse going on that there is. Forget my number, my main point is, I've felt angry, I've acted out against a baby who wasn't at fault, and I've then gone on to feel like a monster, guilty, ashamed, horrified, promising myself I wouldn't do it again. I tried more sleep, more me-time, eating better, getting more rest, putting notes all over the bathroom about trust and anger and reconnection, no caffeine, herbal teas for relaxing, herbal medications for relaxing, therapy (lots and lots of it, all useful in the long run, but none fixing the problem), and a bunch of other stuff. Just like the first time I was majorly depressed, it didn't help. Not enough. Which is why I'm medication. Because it wasn't a lack of trying. By the time I took the first pill, I'd tried and tried and tried, with my body, my mind, peer pressure, therapy, and everything else I could find. When I try, I REALLY try.
It is a bit like a turkey temperature button I once had that required the turkey come out of the oven 10 min. BEFORE the thing popped. Once I've come to a doctor for anti-depressants, I'm overdue for them. I've already been trying too hard to fix it. I don't come in soon enough.
And I think other people with anger issues that manifest against their loved ones are also trying hard. Don't get me wrong, I still think each one of us has the responsibility to do whatever possible to resolve the issues, be it chemical or other intervention. If I had hurt baby A, I would have been responsible. But the depression and things leading up to it were not my fault. And since nothing else worked in my case, I think it was my responsibility to start anti-depressants. But I no longer think of domestic abuse situations as confined to those who just don't try hard enough, or don't care. I think of them as people who sometimes have huge barriers in their way to their acting like they would like to. And unfortunately the ways over and around those barriers are sometimes the things that friends and family find unacceptable or disappointing (going to counseling, taking anti-depressants, choosing a calmer life and job, etc).
Even one of the therapists I've talked to in the last year displayed a surprising misunderstanding of this situation when she asked me "Can you promise me you won't hurt baby A?" Um, no. That is my point, why I'm sitting in your office, and intent on getting some medication. IT ISN'T FOR LACK OF TRYING!!! If I could promise you, I'd have promised myself long ago, and I'm a much harsher judge of myself than anyone else could be.
So, things have calmed down. M and I lit a candle the night after baby A's party and burned little note paper pieces in it. They were filled with the hardest things we went through last year that were most definitely not going to happen this year...being in painful labor, problems with breastfeeding, not knowing when the colic would end, not knowing when she'd stop waking 10 times a night, and so on. We started over. And so far, with Christmas and New Year's and travel and all, things have been good.
Wednesday, September 22, 2010
Always 10 steps ahead
I fast forward a lot. I extrapolate, two, five, ten steps ahead of here and now.
Sometimes it is helpful, with a hint of side-show freaky. Like when I have 6 different
errands all in my head, mapped out (usually within a few seconds) based on not having to make left turns in a car. Or the order in which to do 10 things before boarding a train, to minimize how long it will take.
I do this with some sort of "when it is all done, then I can relax" notion in my head, I think. And unless I am alone, and not responsible for anyone else but me, and in a sealed room with no phone,...it works just like that. As soon as another person or the outside world, or heck, even a flu virus, get wind of this thinking, they all rush in and ruin my perfect little world where I get that International Foods coffee moment at the end of all the effort.
And this has been causing me a lot of grief with parenting. Even knowing that the crappy fake but sweet and easy coffee moments don't happen, the 10 steps ahead stuff gets me into trouble. Like this evening.
Baby A had what I might actually call her first tantrum when she woke up from a late, much needed nap that had been really hard to get her to take in the first place. Let's just say, he didn't wake up in a good mental space. One of those, inhale sharply, pop up on all fours immediately wakings she does so often that would have benefited greatly from me popping up and rocking her back to sleep for another 5 minutes even.
Well, I didn't do that this time, because it is hard to tell, and it was late in the day, and if she slept too long then what happened to her being hungry and me needing to give her that medicated bath for her horrible rash that isn't getting better, and I didn't want to bathe her after a meal because what if she threw up in the bath and I had to start over and I'm already tired, and she doesn't feel good, and M is out of town and I should try to keep her to a schedule because I don't want her to freak out too much and make bedtime even worse for her which will make me upset and I'm on my own with this and I get angry sometimes and I so don't want to be that way tonight and....
So I was going to talk about the screaming in the bath and my decision matrix failing me at that point, but apparently my issues with the fast forward are quite adequately covered by the 5 minutes before the bath.
The more I go down this path (and I'm a long distance runner where this stuff is concerned), the worse place I get to in terms of being flexible. And being flexible seems to me to be one of the best skills to cultivate for myself with baby A. And then I'm right back in this nasty power struggle place, where I'm fighting some "good fight" to keep the baby seated in the tub even though she's tired and upset and nothing is calming down. It really bites me in the ass, this tendency. A lot right now.
And as with many other mental habits, it was really useful at some point in my life, in another situation. To get a bagillion things done in a day. Okay, it was at least helpful toward that goal. The goal itself was a bit messed up. But it is so completely un-useful, to the point of being harmful to my connecting with my kid and noticing what she needs and letting myself do that. And it is faulty reasoning, because I have NO IDEA what this kid will do next, and I'm still learning, and she's changing all the time. My intuition can be totally wrong in these situations.
So I'm trying my best to keep reminding myself to just fix the situation in the moment, without all the what-ifs and but-thens. To trust baby A instead of my fears of some dystopian, Nanny 911 family. It is amazing how quickly I can get from a screaming child in a tub to visions of a future sociopath I raised who is being hunted by the Law & Order police. Why I go to those places in my mind, I'm not totally sure. Probably something to do with the "evil all around you just waiting to tempt you, bait you, pull you down" messages I learned as a child.
Anyway, that's my "work" right now. To stop jumping out of the moment. To just stay put, and do the best things to calm down the current situation in front of me. And I find it extremely hard. Surprisingly hard, given how useful it would be to stop jumping ahead like that. Bow to your sensei.
Sometimes it is helpful, with a hint of side-show freaky. Like when I have 6 different
errands all in my head, mapped out (usually within a few seconds) based on not having to make left turns in a car. Or the order in which to do 10 things before boarding a train, to minimize how long it will take.
I do this with some sort of "when it is all done, then I can relax" notion in my head, I think. And unless I am alone, and not responsible for anyone else but me, and in a sealed room with no phone,...it works just like that. As soon as another person or the outside world, or heck, even a flu virus, get wind of this thinking, they all rush in and ruin my perfect little world where I get that International Foods coffee moment at the end of all the effort.
And this has been causing me a lot of grief with parenting. Even knowing that the crappy fake but sweet and easy coffee moments don't happen, the 10 steps ahead stuff gets me into trouble. Like this evening.
Baby A had what I might actually call her first tantrum when she woke up from a late, much needed nap that had been really hard to get her to take in the first place. Let's just say, he didn't wake up in a good mental space. One of those, inhale sharply, pop up on all fours immediately wakings she does so often that would have benefited greatly from me popping up and rocking her back to sleep for another 5 minutes even.
Well, I didn't do that this time, because it is hard to tell, and it was late in the day, and if she slept too long then what happened to her being hungry and me needing to give her that medicated bath for her horrible rash that isn't getting better, and I didn't want to bathe her after a meal because what if she threw up in the bath and I had to start over and I'm already tired, and she doesn't feel good, and M is out of town and I should try to keep her to a schedule because I don't want her to freak out too much and make bedtime even worse for her which will make me upset and I'm on my own with this and I get angry sometimes and I so don't want to be that way tonight and....
So I was going to talk about the screaming in the bath and my decision matrix failing me at that point, but apparently my issues with the fast forward are quite adequately covered by the 5 minutes before the bath.
The more I go down this path (and I'm a long distance runner where this stuff is concerned), the worse place I get to in terms of being flexible. And being flexible seems to me to be one of the best skills to cultivate for myself with baby A. And then I'm right back in this nasty power struggle place, where I'm fighting some "good fight" to keep the baby seated in the tub even though she's tired and upset and nothing is calming down. It really bites me in the ass, this tendency. A lot right now.
And as with many other mental habits, it was really useful at some point in my life, in another situation. To get a bagillion things done in a day. Okay, it was at least helpful toward that goal. The goal itself was a bit messed up. But it is so completely un-useful, to the point of being harmful to my connecting with my kid and noticing what she needs and letting myself do that. And it is faulty reasoning, because I have NO IDEA what this kid will do next, and I'm still learning, and she's changing all the time. My intuition can be totally wrong in these situations.
So I'm trying my best to keep reminding myself to just fix the situation in the moment, without all the what-ifs and but-thens. To trust baby A instead of my fears of some dystopian, Nanny 911 family. It is amazing how quickly I can get from a screaming child in a tub to visions of a future sociopath I raised who is being hunted by the Law & Order police. Why I go to those places in my mind, I'm not totally sure. Probably something to do with the "evil all around you just waiting to tempt you, bait you, pull you down" messages I learned as a child.
Anyway, that's my "work" right now. To stop jumping out of the moment. To just stay put, and do the best things to calm down the current situation in front of me. And I find it extremely hard. Surprisingly hard, given how useful it would be to stop jumping ahead like that. Bow to your sensei.
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