Mommy and The Brain

Last night I heard myself say, "Why am I even here?". I was frustrated that no one was listening. 

But I'm a mom. There are at least a few million meme's out there about no one listening to Moms until they (insert "funny" emotional/physical/verbal explosion here) right? You've seen them. And moms across the world nod and smile to themselves while they click {Like}, or click a heart in solidarity of sisterhood. "I'm here for you Sister! We stand strong together in our frustration of being ignored, unappreciated and mostly invisible." 

But are we really standing together? 

Are we really supporting one another by laughing at the problem. I guess sometimes we are. Because at times we feel like all we can do is laugh, or we'll dissolve into oblivion. 

But is appreciating the problem the same as supporting? I don't know. I'm asking. 

There is a part of me that is glad the memes are there, I guess. Because yeah, I feel a little less alone knowing that I'm not the only invisible Mom out there. 

But I am the only invisible Mom in here, and it's lonely as shit.

That being said, you may notice my last blog post is dated over two years ago. Where have I been? What have I been doing?

Depends on who you ask, I guess.

But I'll give you my side. 

I've been right here. And yet, at the same time I've been very lost and afraid and not here at all.

I have anxiety, depression, and debilitating attention deficit disorder. Yes, there are funny memes about all of these as well. Depending on the day I may raise my eyebrows, smirk, click {Like} and move on, or I won't even have the energy/desire/will to do that.

I've retreated into a scary and dark place, all the while trying to smile and show up to volunteer shifts and put on a happy and strong face at school events and meetings. When I can muster the strength to emerge, its terrifying and exhausting and I come running home to hide again. 

But I'm on medication, and some days I'm OK. Some days I can handle doing the laundry, making a pot of coffee, watching the news. Other days I can't, so I must have done something wrong to cause this adverse reaction. I'm ON medication. It's supposed to work. I just have to wait another day. I'm sure it will work tomorrow. I'll feel OK tomorrow. I can do it tomorrow. I can catch up, make it all better and do it all ... tomorrow.

Two years of tomorrows have come and gone. I've lost friends, jobs, hobbies, interests, and most recently, almost our house and dog. 

If you've experienced it or studied it, anxiety and depression can have marvelous reactions to medication. There are many many kinds of medications out there, but they all require a build-up of the medication to become effective. It's not like a Tylenol where you take it and in 30-45 minutes you feel better. They don't work like that. And again, every BODY is different. What works for you may not be what works for your cousin, but what does work for your cousin could be what works for your neighbor. Finding the right medication can take years because of the amount of time needed to wait for the dosage to regulate and for your chemistry to react to it. But if it doesn't work, then you have to wean off of it in order to start another one. We're told to wait about 6 weeks to feel the full effect of a new medication. Two weeks weaning off of one that may not have worked, six more weeks waiting to see if this new one works... repeat. Again. Then again. Then maybe we feel a slight change. And we've been in the dark for so long that this glimmer of hope, this tiny spark, has allowed us to hope. There might be something here, so lets not change this one, lets ride it out a little longer. Up the dosage, make other small lifestyle changes, it may really work.

Two years of waiting for that spark to come again. It was there. It was right there. That one day I could honest to God smile at something that brought me joy. Or was it a day? Was it really a dream? Was it really there at all? Was I just so tired of not feeling good that I imagined I did in an effort to MAKE myself feel better?

My Aunt died last month. She too suffered from depression and anxiety, but she was always so full of light and a magical sparkle that when she began to slip away, I retreated from her. I stopped emailing her, stopped answering the phone when she called, and couldn't bring myself to call her  back when she left voicemails asking to talk to her "Little Carter", even though I was taller that her by the time I was 10. I kept thinking she was the light and magic that forever made everything OK, so if her light was going out, there was no way I could bear to see it, hear it, acknowledge it. She'd get better, then I could lean on her again. But she didn't get better. She got worse. She drank vodka all day, and her sweet little body just couldn't process the chemicals any longer and it shut down. Her brothers, my father and uncle, tried to grab her on the way down, but she was too tired to hold on. 

Kate Spade and Anthony Bourdain both committed suicide recently, making news headlines around the world. We again are reminded that depression, anxiety and other forms of mental illness are all around us. Fame, money, notoriety, fancy clothes, Oscars and Emmy's, and/or starring roles in movies and TV shows don't make us immune. Pictures of Robin Williams are back in the news as well.

Aunt Sister's suicide was slow and painful and not mainstream news, but it was enough for me to realize the medicine I've been waiting to kick in again and show me that spark that I saw that one day may not be the right one for me after all.

I had made a few appointments with my Dr to discuss my medications, but something would come up and I'd cancel my appointment and forget to reschedule. A few weeks before Aunt Sister died, she "missed" an appointment too. By the time she went to the Dr, it was ultimately too late. I don't know what exactly happened, but I know she went back home with what I understand to be "anti convulsion" medication, and her estranged husband was to be by her side to administer them if/when needed. There are bits and pieces of the following week that I was told, but not sure what all is real, or third party interpretation, or purely made-up. But regardless, I called my Dr, made an appointment and WENT. 

Over the past two weeks I have been weaning off of my "old" medication and this morning I started my "new" one. It will be a few weeks before I can tell if anything is better, but I can tell already that coming off of the old one has improved things already.  And I'm able to write again. I'm here, in front of my computer spilling my guts on what I think and feel.

Also within those two weeks, a friend invited me over out of the blue. "Lets go get drinks, or grab lunch, or just come over for s'mores", she said. Then she told me she'd noticed I'd been withdrawn for the past two YEARS. She hadn't thought I wanted to talk about it, so she'd left me alone, but saw something I posted on FB and realized I was ready to talk, so she jumped back in with two feet. 

WHAT?!?! I'm NOT invisible? There is someone who gives a shit?!?! What? How? When? Where? I'm so confused. I've been living in this hole, not letting anyone in, pushing everyone away, thinking no one cared or noticed I was gone, and low and behold, someone was standing there at the gate waiting for the the whole time.

I mentioned to another friend that this friend had said she'd noticed me withdrawing over the past two years, and this second friend said, "Yes! I've seen that too!" Again ... WHAT?!?! ANOTHER friend has missed me? How could this be? I was sure no one cared. Sure of it. But ... nope. They were right here the whole time. One literally Right. Next. Door. 

Wake me up when it's all over

For my unborn children, I gave up sanity and clarity along with wine and caffeine. Don't worry. After they were born and finished nursing, the caffeine and wine came back. But, I have ADHD, and was unable to take my medication during pregnancy, nursing, and trying to get pregnant. After our second (and, subsequently, last) child, I stayed at home to raise them. I was a stay at home Mom for about a year and a half. Then I went to work in a small law office part time, then went to work at a friends company. There was a Ritalin shortage nationwide, and getting my Rx's filled became almost impossible. I asked my GP, who had taken over my Rx after my diagnosis, if we could switch to something different so I could be more consistent. He felt I needed to see a psychiatrist because s/he would have more knowledge regarding what I needed.

Right about this time, we found the blood clot. The blood clot terrified me, so when I finally made the apt with the psychiatrist, I was understandably depressed, anxious, and due to new pressures at work, I was all-in-all a hot mess. My new psychiatrist put me on antidepressants because she thought I was depressed, and not ADHD. 

So here I was, almost 20 years after my initial diagnosis, being told I wasn't ADHD, I was depressed. Well, I thought, "Here we go again". I thought that, because all through out high school Drs put me on anti-depressants over and over again. Both of my parents were/are clinically depressed, so it was though that this was my "problem" too. My mother was stubborn, and with my IQ being higher than hers, and she being a Duke University graduate, she just knew I was capable of anything, and I just wasn't applying myself. She wouldn't even allow me to go through ADHD testing. It wasn't until after she passed away that I was tested and diagnosed.

For the next year I visited my new psychiatrist every 4 to 6 weeks for an update. In that time, I lost my job because my attention to detail, ability to focus or finish a project was nonexistent. I stayed on my blood thinners as treatment for the clot, and tried to manage the day-to-day. The laundry piled up at home. The dishes were only done when my husband came home. Projects were started and stopped. Rooms were half clean, half decorated, or partially rearranged. The garden and swing-set area never received mulch. Things that needed to get done were overwhelming and too much to deal with. Little things were fun for a little while, but then I was frustrated when the kids needed something and it pulled me away from what I was working on. 

Then I just got fed up. Enough is enough. I asked my psychiatrist about Ritalin again. She wouldn't put me on it or any other stimulant while I was on the blood thinners. So I asked my GP who said I would be on the thinners for at least two years.

No. No way. This is crazy. 

I hadn't made an appointment with a hematologist because I didn't want to insult my GP. I know...I know...I'm way too southern for my own good. I didn't want to appear to question him, or "go over his head". But finally I got over it and made the appointment with a hematologist. She looked at all the tests and results from the prior year, took two more tests, one was the ONLY test not performed at the hospital when I was sent to the ER with the original clot, the other was a test to see if there was an active clot anywhere in my system. Both came back negative and I was off the thinners within a week of seeing her.

Back to the psychiatrist I went. We had a longer then normal appointment so we could further discuss my ADHD symptoms, and she agreed. I'm ADHD For Sure! I was given a new medication, a derivative of Ritalin, and I took that bad boy the second I got in the car from filling my Rx. 

Within an hour I wanted to go back to her office to hug her. For the first time in several years I felt like I was back to being whole. I've described my ADHD as being in a room with only a strobe-light on. There is furniture and large balls on the floor and I have to make my way across the room. Yes, I can see, but it's not clear. In fact, it's a little scary. My meds are like turning on the overhead light. I can see everything. The room is still cluttered, but I can very easily navigate my way through quickly, efficiently, and safely.

In the past week, I have finished projects that have been half done for years. I've started more projects that are still undone. The house is (kinda) clean, the laundry is almost caught up. The dishes don't look like a mountain of torture, but are still in the sink right now. Some piles of "things" have been gone through and sorted. Things have been thrown away, organized, and discovered. I have another week on this dosage, and I'm going to tell her it's a great start. We're not quite there yet, but it's such a great start. 

For those without a brain abnormality, it's impossible to understand the feeling of "softness" that comes from getting the chemistry correct. I use the word "soft" because it's just like finally being able to relax and breathe. For years I rememberd what it was like to be able to do ten things all at once and be spectacular at them all! Then I would look around and couldn't do one thing. Couldn't do one hing AT ALL, let alone do it well. I lost my job, I lost friends, I lost myself. But then I took control and fought my way back. I'm back and I'm awake, and I sincerely hope that all the fog is over.