An Update On My Journey...

I realized I haven’t given an update on my postpartum recovery…  I’ll admit, though, I hadn’t intended to give you an update, since I don’t like to really shine a spotlight on that whole subject, but I feel like I’m finally at a place where I can say I’m good again.  I’m (mostly) ME again.  I’ve found a lot more balance, inner peace, maybe even joy.  I’ve read about other women’s struggles with postpartum depression, or depression in general, and how so many of them are at a loss for what to do.  My heart goes out to them.  It’s a terrible hole to be stuck in…  And I realized I should probably stop keeping all this to myself and share the rest of my story, because maybe I can provide some insight and maybe even some inspiration for anyone else in this same boat…  Because nobody should have to feel the way I was feeling.  Plus, if it weren't for some of the people in my life that shared their deep dark secrets, I may not have ever been able to figure out how to get help and how to move forward.  Even though it's hard, it's important to be honest, both with ourselves and with others.  So here I go...

I left off with my post in December, explaining that I had been going to counseling, joined support groups, and learned to put my experience into perspective with things that are just out of our control, and I used Justin and the loss of his father at a young age as a reminder that we do grow stronger as people from our tragedies.

But I just wasn’t feeling stronger.  A little bit, maybe, but not enough.  Not enough to be the mother I wanted to be, or the wife I wanted to be, or the PERSON I wanted to be.  And there were so many things happening in my mind and body that seemed so out of my control.  As much as I wanted to focus on the positives, like how Harlee is healthy and alive, and how this whole experience WILL ultimately lead me to a stronger me, I just couldn’t stay focused on any of that.  I’d revert back to anger, how unfair it all is that I wanted this wonderful birthing experience and got none of it.  There was nothing beautiful about it.  And then all this mess of confusion would set in, like how other people got to have wonderful birthing experiences, or would even have c-sections and thought nothing of it.  How can anyone grow a baby for 9 months, all by themselves, and then all of a sudden not do a damn thing to bring that child into the world except lay there, get cut open, have that baby yanked out of them and taken away, and then have to deal with recovery of MAJOR SURGERY while at the same time be expected to nurture this brand new baby??  How can any of this be a good thing??  Ya know, I can honestly say I’ve come a long way in the last 17 months, but that’s still one thing that’s beyond me.  Harlee’s entrance into this world was horrible for me.  His birth day was the worst day of my life.  And it breaks my heart that I feel that way about a day that’s supposed to be special for him…  I hope that as the years progress I can look past that, but I think it’ll forever be true… Just like September 22^nd will forever be the worst day of my husband’s life – when tragedy strikes, there will forever be an anniversary.  A pang of hurt, a reminder of the grief and fear you went through, every passing year.

There are a lot of people, namely those that see their c-sections as wonderful, that don’t get why I feel the way I do, just like I don’t get why they feel the way they do.  I think part of my healing process has been accepting my feelings for what they are, negative or positive - they’re MY feelings, and I shouldn’t try to change them, because they’re who I am.  But I do need to try to outweigh the hurt and all the negative feelings with more positive ones.

It’s hard to do when your mind has taken over and, for lack of a better description, has a mind of its own.  Here I’ll tell my story of my healing, naturally.

I swear I’ve felt schizophrenic some days.  And I hid this from my counselor.  I kept having these intruding violent and gruesome visions and images come through my head as I was going about my daily activities that I swore if I told anyone about they’d have me locked up in a heartbeat.  It was that bad.  I felt scared, I felt like I was losing it, I felt like I was going off the deep end…  And I didn’t feel safe telling ANYone – not Justin, and not my counselor, even though it was her job to help with things like that… I was afraid that if I told her she’d call an asylum and have me picked up.  I’m not kidding.  It was that bad.  Then one day a friend of mine who’d had a similar experience as mine (well, probably worse actually, in my honest opinion…) and had a similar recovery process ended up telling me that SHE had had visions that scared the crap out of her too.  I was so blown away… You mean to tell me I’m not alone?  I might not get locked up if I share this with someone?  I can be okay after all?  I am eternally grateful to her for sharing this with me.  I hope you’re reading this right now, you know who you are, and I can’t thank you enough, I may not have expressed this the day you told me, but you may just have saved me from completely losing it.  I don’t know what I would have done if I let this go on any longer, suppressing it, but thank you for coming into my life that day and applying the brakes.

So, I ended up telling my counselor.  This was AFTER Harlee’s 1-year birthday.  I’d been suffering with this for a year.  I remember her staring at me, taking it all in, weighing the severity of this situation that she had no idea was this out of control.  And I remember her saying that too – “Thank you for telling me this, I wish you had said something sooner, I didn’t realize how deep your depression was…”  Like I said in the last post about all this – I wanted to hide it.  I didn’t want anyone to know how f!@#ed up I was inside, and apparently I was so enveloped by my façade that I managed to fool my counselor.  Until I finally got the balls to open up all the way to her.

Then she suggested I get on Zoloft, and she suggested it tenderly and hesitantly as she knew how adamant I am about “saying no to drugs” (I spent enough time practically screaming to her and crying about how ho.rr.i.ble. the epidural was for me and how getting it tore me to my core in self-disgust because it went against everything I ever believed in and stood for).  So her suggesting an actual pharmaceutical antidepressant kind of stopped me in my tracks…  And as that thought processed in my mind, the last remaining ounce of passion and strength I had in me, buried inside, that was clinging to hope jumped up, stamped her feet and said NO.  YOU SAY NO TO DRUGS AND YOU WILL ALWAYS SAY NO TO DRUGS.  I immediately asked her what my natural options are, stressing that pharmaceuticals are an extreme last resort for me, if ever even an option at all.  She said exercise, eat healthier, some supplements to take are St. John’s Wort and 5-HTP (a neurotransmitter), along with vitamins B (complex) and D to start with.  I jumped on all of that right away.  The 5-HTP didn’t work as well though, but St. John’s Wort sure did!  I also took Juice Plus along with avoiding bad carbs and “foods” with additives, preservatives, and other harmful chemicals (although that’s really hard to do and I didn’t do it perfectly, but someday I hope to get there).  I jogged every night pushing Harlee in his stroller.  I lost weight.  I felt GOOD again.  All done naturally and WITHOUT the aid of Zoloft, thank you very much.

Around October I wasn’t feeling a strong connection with my counselor anymore.  I felt like I was just going in to chat, not really making progress.  I didn’t reschedule with her, figuring I’d ride the current on my own and see how I did.  I had seen my naturopath in St. Louis and she regulated my St. John’s Wort dosage as well as prescribed me some homeopathics (which I shared with you in my post about homeopathy), and I could tell a huge difference from that.  But I still knew I wasn’t 100%.  The intruding visions had subsided quite a bit (thank God), but I was still feeling a strong disconnect.  I still could not accept that Harlee was my son.  It’s weird to say that out loud, and I’m sure a lot of people reading this are probably thinking I’m crazy, but I felt like I was still waiting to give birth to him.  I didn’t bring him into this world, a man with a scalpel did.  I know I carried him for 9 months, but that was only half the battle, in my head.  Bringing him out of my belly and into my arms was the other half, and I missed it all.  None of my hormones released when he was born.  None of the oxytocin to feel that love and connection I hear other mothers talk about when they first meet their babies.  I loved him, sure, but not the way I expected to.  Or wanted to.  Maybe that’s where a lot of my depression stemmed from.  This tiny human came into my life and completely turned it upside-down, and I can’t grasp the concept that he’s even MINE.  And that’s not fair.

I’m still feeling that way, but finally feeling like I’m getting somewhere.  I discovered a new therapist via divine intervention (which rekindled my long-lost belief in divine intervention) and she’s been awesome.  We were in to see Harlee’s pediatrician in November and I found her brochure in the waiting room, just shortly after I was thinking I wanted to get back into counseling again, since I wasn’t feeling like I was quite myself yet.  Turns out she’s exactly the person I need to be talking to right now.  She's incredible!  She shares my desire to avoid Western medicine, has knowledge of energy work and plans to administer it (another long-lost belief I was hoping to regain soon), and doesn’t have kids, which, in a weird way, is refreshing.  My previous counselor had been through a traumatic c-section, so she could relate to me.  Now that I’m seeing this new lady, I’m finding that it feels like I’m getting a break from dwelling so much on my trauma and instead I get to focus on the grand scheme of things and heal myself beyond the trauma, like I’m tapping into my soul or my higher self.  The light at the end of the tunnel is getting brighter!

So things really are going well.  I've been a lot happier, I've been able to focus on enjoying Harlee and his presence in my life more than focusing on HOW he came into my life, I'm actually looking forward to celebrating his second birthday this summer instead of fearing horrible memories resurfacing, and a VERY SMALL part of me has been entertaining the thought of another child.  But don't get your hopes up too high.  On a side note it's driving me CRAZY being asked by EVERYBODY when baby number two is coming along.  My answer has been, "We're building a house this summer, so that's our baby number two right now."  Which is the truth.  But only part of it.  What I would LIKE to say is, "I'm scared to death of having baby number two, I'm still struggling with accepting that I have a baby number ONE, and I'd like to have all this shit figured out before I bring another human into this world and risk sending my psyche through another train wreck!  Thanks for asking!!"  Ah, sorry, needed to get that off my chest.  But, someday, I hope I am in a better mental state.  I trust that I will be, eventually.  It would be kinda fun to have two kids, I guess...

Anyway.  That’s my update, in case you were interested.  And in case you or someone you know is battling depression, hopefully this part of my story helped with the journey, or provided some inspiration and encouragement that healing from it naturally CAN be done.