Yesterday I had a long conversation with my best mate about how she freaked out about her life. About how she had hit 24 and realised that her life was passing her by.
Is this how I have been feeling since I was 24?
Is that the reason I have been so depressed?
So down on life?
So unable to see the positives?
Actually, I don't believe that for a minute (I do actually think that instead it was some sever PND which went untreated for around 16 months, but that's a whole other story).
Have I missed out on the best bits of my life by having my children so young in a society that infers that women can 'have it all'?
How many times has my confidence been knocked in the past 2 years simply be feeling so young and inexperienced? Like I have no right to be a mother? That somehow my experiences and doings are any less legitimate than those of the fellow 'motherhood'? Should I have waited and had a career first? Satisfied my individual goals instead?
I can put my PND down to a variety of factors; living somewhere which was so unsuitable then bening made to live with the FIL for 6 months, being geographically and socially isolated from friends and family, being academically smothered, being two sizes bigger than I have ever been in my life, not being able to breastfeed, traumatic birth, scary induction into motherhood which left me reeling from the shock of the reality of it all, feeling inadequate, being financially challenged, being, being, being......excuses excuses!!!
Now that I have crawled out of the pit, I am absolutely terrified of going back in again. I re-read things I have written in the last 2 years and wonder who this woman is? How did it all get on top of her? It's not as bad as some other folk's problems - how did you get so 'woe is me' about it all lady??
4 weeks today baby 2 will be born (whether he like is or not!). So today I have to make a decision.
Get control, or go down the hole.
I remember falling down the hole last time. It was a slow edging, like in a horror movie. Like being pushed into the sinking sands and swallowed up.
At one point I remember remarkingto my husband that I could feel myself clinging to the edge of the pit by my fingertips.
It's worrying for me - I am quite a vocal person, quite able to communicate my feelings and often do. I am one of those folk you can take at face value, as I don't know any other way to be.
And last time, I communicated my feelings. BUt I still ended up alone in the bottom of the pit.
It scares me because here I am, on the verge of doing again what I did last time and unable to say whether I am going to be presented with the dark void or whether I am going to avoid it.
I do feel much better than last time already.
More able, stronger, capable, legitimate.
But I am absolutely terrified that I am going to go down the hole and nobody will help me out. Just like last time.
WHat makes me reel is that there are folk who are quite close to me who have TOLD me that I had PND. That they thought I was struggling with it. And NONE of them stepped forward to say so!
Why?
16 months I fought a battle with myself with no reserve troops.
How?
People around me my mum, my husband, my sister) who found it easier not to say anything!
Rest assured, I am more vigilant. I am on my guard. I am trying my best.
Things are so much different now.
And whatever happens, I am past the stage of freak-out.
I have to be sure of that!
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