Birds of a Feather

February 20, 2011 by ·

In my late 20s, I spent several days crammed in a van with my parents and three (adult) siblings driving halfway across Canada – from BC to Manitoba – for my grandmother’s memorial service. When I tell you this is the type of experience I wish for my son, you’ll think, “That’s it. This chick is definitely crazy.”

I’d say you have to understand my family to get it, but you don’t. We’re like any number of other families out there – we drive each other crazy at times. Sometimes we’re in touch a lot and other times I can’t remember when I last saw my brother. We compare ourselves and find fun and comfort in our similarities. We contrast ourselves and joke that our youngest sister is adopted. We are there for each other – always, unfailingly, without question.

So when all the logistical hurdles have been tackled and it turns out the most logical – and least frighteningly expensive – option for getting us all to the service is to drive there, in a van, together, none of us balks. It will be nothing less than an adventure.

Picture a van with miles and miles to go on the Trans-Canada. Each of us likes to be prepared for any eventuality (we get it from our mother) and this means none of us packs light. The van is crammed. Full of people, full of bags, full of cameras and things to do and music to listen to. And somewhere, beneath all of the people and all of their stuff, is an urn.

This suddenly occurs to me.

“Mom, where’s Grandma?”

“Under the seat.”

Silence.

I knew she had to be with us. She has to get there somehow. But I didn’t actually stop to think about the implications. I have a brief, “Oh my God. Mom!!” moment but it quickly passes. Of course she’s with us. It couldn’t be otherwise. I do briefly wonder if Grandma thinks we’re all crazy but realize she knows us well enough to know. We totally are. And I know she’s glad this is how this trip has turned out to be.

We drive.

We’re six people who are very similar and very different all at the same time, and between swim meets and family trips we’ve spent a lot of time in vehicles together. I know how this could go. I know how it would have gone in the past. I cross my fingers no one asks my middle sister where she wants to eat. (Kidding, Michelle! I know we’re long past the days where we’d all choose somewhere and you wouldn’t want to go and would have a fit about it.) (She’s going to kill me for this.)

We drive.

We were smart enough to get a van with a DVD player, so we watch movies.

We drive.

When movies get boring, we turn on the music. We have very, ahem, different tastes in music, and that same middle sister usually wins for having taste that’s agreeable to most of us. So we pop in her disc of tunes.

We drive.

We’ve left BC behind. We’ve left Alberta behind. We’re long past the ocean, which all of us love. We can no longer see the towering Rockies, to which all of us return repeatedly because there’s something there that draws us back. (Two of us live there now, and I won’t be at all surprised if we all end up back there again.) We’re now in Saskatchewan. It’s pretty, but flat. Nothing but miles and miles of highway in front of us.

The music plays and we drive on.

None of us is particularly shy about singing along, and over the last couple of days there have been various voices joining in for a chorus here, a verse there.

One track ends, and another begins. And suddenly we’re all belting out the same song.

“Movin’ right along in search of good times and good news,
With good friends, you can’t lose,
This could become a habit.”

The Muppets. Does anyone else have a family who would have a Muppets song on a road trip mix? This is totally normal for my family. And it’s totally normal that we’d all be singing along.

“Movin’ right along,
Foot-loose and fancy free.
Getting there is half the fun; come share it with me.”

Driving and singing. There’s nothing really that stands out about this, except that this is how my family is and I’m grateful for it. Then comes the moment.

“Movin’ right along.
Hey LA, where’ve you gone?
Send someone to fetch us, we’re in Saskatchewan!”

Peals of laughter. My mom is laughing so hard she’s crying. Of course my magical sister would have this song on her mix. Of course we’d hear this song, this line, while we’re driving along the highway in Saskatchewan. All six (seven?) of us, in a place none of us has visited often – some of us never before and never since. A place we’ve never all been together.

“Movin’ right along.
We’re truly birds of a feather,
We’re in this together and we know where we’re going.”

I want this for my son. I want him to have a family he can laugh with and cry with and drive a thousand miles with. I want him to have shared experiences that pop up at just the right moment, that make him laugh and cry at the same time, and that define his family in ways it’s hard for outsiders to understand. I want him – no matter the circumstance – to know that we’re in this together and we know where we’re going.

—–

This is another post in response to The Red Dress Club’s memoir prompts. This week’s assignment was to choose a memory, recall it in detail and then investigate what this memory means. I had a hard time choosing a memory and when I first started working with this one I wasn’t sure where it was going. But of course the meaning was there all along.

Post dedicated to my awesome family, which includes my husband who, while he wasn’t there for this, fits right in to the craziness. Birds of a feather, indeed.

Filed Under: Postpartum depression · Tagged With: , ,

Preschool Postcard

February 19, 2011 by ·

[With thanks to Jill from Hagler Happenings for the opportunity to rant through her Postcards from the Effinghamptons blog hop.]

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Filed Under: Postpartum depression · Tagged With:

What’s in a Name?

February 13, 2011 by ·

This blog had a bit of a rebirth last night. When I first carved out a space for myself here I gave no thought to what it would be called. This is unusual for me, because normally I think about these things. But I was ready to write so carried on regardless.

With those first thoughts on the page, an identity formed. An identity that needed a name.

But what to call it?

I thought about it for a bit. Kept a mental list of words and criteria and  definitely-nots. Then one night I tweeted about this conundrum. I had intended to send this tweet out to the Twittersphere and then go to bed while waiting to see where it led me, but then someone responded. It was Kris from Pretty All True. For those who don’t know her let me just say that when Kris offers to help think of a name, you don’t turn off your computer and go to sleep.

In an attempt to make a long story short, the process basically went like this:

Kris had been listening to the Magnolia soundtrack and suggested some song names from that that seemed to fit.

I liked her suggestions.

In looking at the list, another song title jumped out at me: “Goodbye, Stranger” by Supertramp.

It stuck in my head even after I played around with some other names.

A week or so went by and, on a lazy Saturday afternoon, I started thinking about a name again.

I went back to the messages from Kris.

I went back to “Goodbye, Stranger.”

I suggested it to my husband.

He pointed out that the song is about a one-night stand (or recovering from drug addiction, depending on who you believe).

I paused.

True to form, he came back with another – better – suggestion.

And thus, “Farewell, Stranger” was born.

The name suits me for a number of reasons. In telling this story, I’m saying goodbye to a version of myself that I didn’t know and didn’t understand. I think that’s what jumped out at me with the Supertramp song. But whether I care about the one-night stand connection or not (and I’m not sure I really do) “fare well” works better, because this is about getting better – my wish for myself and my attempt to finally make it happen.

It’s also about taking off my mask and – slowly – letting people see past the person I’ve pretended to be.

And, without trying to be too corny, it’s about opening myself up to the community of people I’ve found here and seeing their experiences instead of only seeing my own.

So farewell, stranger and welcome to whatever comes next.

Filed Under: Postpartum depression · Tagged With: , ,

Bright Lights

February 10, 2011 by ·

I could never have imagined I’d end up on antidepressants. I certainly wouldn’t have imagined it happening like this.

The doctor’s office is bright the way doctor’s offices are. Fluorescent lights burn overhead, hiding nothing. I’m waiting.

It was the second time I’d initiated this conversation. For someone who was extraordinarily resistant to the idea of medication as an answer to my problem, this seems odd to me now.

Now, waiting, I am dreading the conversation. What if she says, “You don’t need medication.” This is my last resort. If I don’t try it, if it doesn’t work, I’m in real trouble.

That was not at all my point of view the first time medication was suggested to me. That time it was by the counsellor I was seeing, the one who figured out my problem long before I was willing to consider it. I didn’t listen to her.

From the examination room, I can hear sounds in the hall. Doctor’s office sounds. People coming and going. The receptionist on the phone just outside the door. I’d had to tell her why I needed the appointment. “I need to talk to someone about anti-depressants,” I’d confessed. She, who I’ve known for a while, who loves my son and always talks about how happy he is, didn’t treat me any differently when I came in. As I sit here in this brightly lit room, I wonder what she’s thinking.

The second time was at one of my son’s well baby visits. At the “anything else?” point in the conversation, I broached the topic with the doctor – a locum I had never seen before and probably wouldn’t see again. During that conversation, I was tentative, exploring: “I’m not feeling like I’m doing very well,” I offered while inside thinking, “I’m feeling awful, actually, but I don’t know if that’s normal. I’m sort of afraid it is.” Made it sound as though it was the usual sort of stuff: “But, you know, he really doesn’t sleep that much. How much not sleeping is normal, anyway?!”

Different sounds now. Appointment-finishing sounds. Thank-yous and goodbyes. I figure that means I’m next, and the butterflies return full force. This is a different doctor – one I’ve never seen before – and I’ve heard rumours that she doesn’t have a great bedside manner. I jiggle my foot the way I do when I’m nervous or distracted and wait for the door to open.

I don’t blame either of those people for the outcomes of the first conversations. They could have pushed, I suppose, or probed further. But in order for the outcome to have been different I’d have had to be willing to listen. To be honest about how not okay I was.

The door opens and she comes in. Any fantasy I had about a dignified conversation rapidly disappears as I break down in tears upon the telling of my story. I’m not a dignified crier, but in this moment I don’t even worry about the blotches on my face or the fact that I need to blow my nose. I’m just focused on finding something that will help because if I don’t I know I’m going to lose my family. She gives me her usual “I don’t usually turn to anti-depressants as the first solution” speech but it’s just part of the routine. She knows I need them. I know I need them.

That night, I look at the bottle of little pills. It feels significant what I’m about to do. It is significant.

I pop one in my mouth and wash it down with some water. Then the whole world shifted.

—

This post is in response to a prompt from The Red Dress Club, which is to
write a piece that begins with, “I could never have imagined” and ends with,
“Then the whole world shifted.”

Filed Under: Postpartum depression, Writing · Tagged With: , ,

Window

February 8, 2011 by ·

It’s funny the way the brain works. Usually when I think back to some of my worst moments when Connor was small and I wasn’t coping I think, “Yeah, that was awful. It was so hard.”

But you know what? That doesn’t even begin to sum it up.

This blog is a little over a month old. Only that. I’ve shared a lot, even some of the moments that would seem as though they would fall into the “worst” category. But they don’t. The worst moments are much, much worse.

I’ve recently been re-introduced to Catherine Connors, aka Her Bad Mother. Catherine’s son, Jasper, is about a month older than my Connor. I was reading her blog quite regularly after Connor was born, and distinctly remember her posts from when Jasper was around six months old and didn’t tend to sleep much. But for reasons I no longer remember (but that probably have something to do with wanting to be a “good” mother and play with my son more instead of spending so much time reading various things online) I stopped reading her blog shortly after that. The irony in that? It was right after that when the sleep deprivation got to me. Right after that when I lost my mind.

So what’s the point of telling you this? Tonight I read a post of Catherine’s – a post called The Monster in the Closet. Go ahead. Read it. Even if you only read the quoted section and the paragraph after. It’s important.

It’s important because remove the specific details – night, bed, nursing – and that’s my story.

We’re heading into really honest territory here, people. What she has described (“I didn’t have an urge to drop the baby. I had an urge to throw him“) – what she admitted in that post that she didn’t admit in her original post about that night – that’s my story.

I’ll admit something else: I only just realized that – the extent to which that’s true for me as well. The implications of that being my experience. I’ve only just realized it right now. Tonight.

You’re probably wondering how that’s possible. I don’t know. It doesn’t matter.

I’ve read the books and the websites. I’ve heard the stories. One of the symptoms of acute postpartum depression is this same fleeting urge to do something like that. To hurt your baby. Except that I haven’t felt as though any of the other descriptions or stories I’ve read really reflect my experience. I interpret these stories as being about anxiety – worry that you might hurt your baby. And for me it wasn’t anxiety. It was that flash of anger – of rage – that Catherine describes. Except for me it happened more than once.

In those moments, I didn’t want to throw myself out the window. I wanted to throw him out the window. And I said this on several occasions. Voiced it aloud. I remember one day in particular that’s burned in my brain. I can’t remember what came before or what came after, but in that moment Connor was refusing to nap. He just cried and cried and cried. Nothing I did helped, and I couldn’t take it. I needed a break.

In that moment, I reached out to a friend. Crying. Sobbing. “I want to throw him out the window,” I said. I called her because I needed to talk to someone sane who could say, “I know. I understand how you feel.” I think she thought I was kidding. I think I thought I was kidding.

But I wasn’t.

We’ve referenced this conversation a few times since, she and I. Recently she’s admitted it worried her.

In writing this down, it doesn’t worry me, because I wouldn’t have thrown him out the window. I didn’t throw him out the window. Or anything of the sort.

It also doesn’t make me feel ashamed. Oh sure, I wonder what my mother is going to think when she reads this. I wonder if my husband knows I felt like this. That this – this horrible experience – is what my worst was actually like. But I’m not ashamed.

This surprises me, frankly – the fact that I’m not ashamed to admit this and to write about it here where the world can see. But the whole point of sharing my story – the bits and pieces of it, in whatever order they come – is to say this: my experience — and Catherine’s experience, and the experiences of countless other women — is way more common than you’d think. I didn’t realize this, even when it was happening to me. But I realize it now. And it has to be okay to say, “Yes, that was my experience.” And, “This is how I got through it.” And, “It’s okay, you’re not alone.”

In writing this down, what I do feel is overwhelmed. I think my brain needs to process this some more, and think about what it means. And in thinking about that I will no doubt unearth other stories from the recesses of my brain. And I’ll tell those stories too.

When I started writing this post, I looked up at the line at the top of my blog. “Finding the words to tell my story about being a mom and struggling with postpartum depression.” When I started writing this post, I had no words. Only tears. It’s overwhelming to think about this as having been my experience. And not to have realized it. It took me way longer than one night to ask for help.

But in writing this down, the words have come and the tears have gone away. For now.

Filed Under: Postpartum depression · Tagged With: , , ,
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