The thing is, that this is a part of my life which I wish I could pretend isn't there. I do not officially know what is "wrong" with me, and I often wonder how many other wives, moms, women are out there sharing my pain. For years and years, I knew there was something wrong with me - but I was afraid everyone would think I was "crazy" if I told. As a teenager, I can remember sometimes feeling what I describe as "out of my head." I never heard other people's voices talking to me, but I would hear something I can only describe as my thoughts echoing in my head. It was unpredictable... sometimes I would go months and months without feeling it, and then it would come upon me. I was petrified, and this is the first time I have ever told anyone. I was afraid that if I told anyone, I would have to go live in a mental hospital, so I just lived with it and tried my best to ignore it. I also remember high school and college classes on test days... I would study and study, cram and cram for exams, especially in college, and then I would go into the room to take the test. I would hear my thoughts echoing in my head, and then I would hear everything in the room MAGNIFIED... we're talking I could hear the other peoples' pencils scratching on the paper as they took their tests, preventing me from concentrating. Somehow I made it through okay, but mostly because as an education major, I had more projects than tests. Projects were much better for me because I could work independently, at my own pace, and get my creative juices flowing.
Speaking of "creative juices", I am starting to wonder if what I've always thought of as intensity, creativity, and inspiration when i get excited about something is acutally a sympton of a sort of mania, as in manic depression. I have never required much sleep... I have always enjoyed alone time after everyone else in the house is asleep, and I often have to acutally force myself to go to sleep. If I get busy working on something, it is not unusual for me to stay up to 3 or 4 in the morning, enjoying the quiet house and ability to express my creativity... I enjoy writing, editing pictures, creating things for our home, decorating, cleaning, painting, just making things in general. I have always thought that I just liked the ability to focus when everyone is asleep, but now I am starting to wonder if is something more. Because...
Then, there's the depression. I never really thought I had depression because I have always been the more anxious type... not wanting to be still, wanting to go places all the time, liking to be busy, especially when I was a kid, teenager, and in my twenties. But, as a mom who works full time with three children, I have noticed a change. I love my boys and husband more than life itself. To me, they are the most amazing four people in the universe. I know in my head that I am truly blessed, and anytime I take them anywhere, play with them at the house, or watch them in their activities, these are truly my happiest moments, BUT... in order to do those things, you have to get dressed and get out of bed. This is truly embarrassing, but I just can't help but think that if I am this way, there must be others who are also... On the weekends, when I don't have to get up for work, I am TRULY exhausted. Unless there is somewhere we have to be a certain time on Saturday or Sunday, I could stay in bed all day, no problem. If I get up and get showered, and we have a plan, then I am GREAT once we get going... but if that is not the case, I have very little motivation to get out of bed, EVEN THOUGH I love my children and miss them everyday and feel it in the center of my being that they are growing up so fast and I don't want to miss a minute of it. How can I not want to get out of bed, when I feel that I can almost see them getting bigger each day and I love them so much?
This is ME in a nutshell, in the outside world, I am at my best, loving my teaching job... I am a silly, energetic teacher, trying anything and everything everyday to inspire my students and help them to embrace their futures with optimism and skills to acheive their goals. I appear to have it all together... you will never see me without my makeup on and my hair fixed. On the weekends, I am the baseball, basketball, and football mom taking pictures of her boys making their every move on the field, beaming with pride, laughing and smiling. At church, I tear up singing the praise music everytime because I know I am blessed and the songs remind me of my Christian heritage and the blessings God has given me. I think of a day that I will meet all my loved ones at heavens' gates, and although there are times I doubt my faith, on Sunday mornings I feel it deep inside, that there is a God who made me and loves me. But, despite my best efforts to hide it from the world, there is another part of me, that only a few know. Only the people who have lived with me have seen the other side of me... the side I am ashamed of-- does every wife and mom have this other side... or is mine worse and a sign of a true mental illness? There are times I feel that I am just moody, and times that I feel my frustrations are truly justified, but there are also times when I know I am overreacting and not handling my frustrations in an appropriate manner, and in these times, I know I am treating my family wrong, and I just can't seem to control my temper no matter how much I want to.
about 5 years ago, my marriage came near to a crashing halt. I had a one year old, a three year old, and six year old, and my husband was about to leave. My picking fights, my mood changes, my lack of energy at home had become too much, and he was questioning everything. He admitted that he was responsible for part of the downfall, but my "moodiness and temper" were definitley a big part of it, too. It was at this point, that I finally decided to see if medication might help me. I called my gynocologist and told the nurse over the phone about my moods shifts, and how guilty I felt for lashing out at my family, and how it had been getting worse and worse, and she talked to the dr and called me in a prescription for an anti-depressant. This medicine is a miracle for me and my family. I immediately felt so much calmer... it wasn't as if I had imagined. I still cared about the things that bugged me at home, but I much more rational about them. The echoing in my head stopped, and things did not seem as earth-shattering. The nervous tick-like rolling of my neck because of the perpetual and painful tension in my shoulders and neck even seemed to subside. My husband and even 6 year old noticed within a few days that my good moods and loveable parts of of my personality were much more frequent. I have continued to take this prescription, despite gaining 25 pounds over the first year, and continuing to gain until recently when I have lost about 20 pounds. My husband said he'd rather me be a little heavier than not have the meds, which I obviously need. I don't like being overweight, so I'm working on that now, but I will attest to the miracle of an anti-depressant drug for someone who truly needs it.
So, if I am the first to tell anyone with similar symptons as me, to try an anti-depressant, and if I like myself so much better when on it, and if the anti-depressant played a large role of saving my marriage for the past 6 years, what is the problem? I wish I knew! Every once in while, I will "forget" to take my medicine... most of the time, it is just because I am a very busy mom, teacher, and wife, and often forgetful. Other times, I run out of my prescription, and it takes me four or five days to remember to call and drive to the pharmacy to pick it up. Why would I ever chance what happens to me when I go off my meds, why do I sometimes want to see if I'm okay without them when I definitley know that I am not okay without them? I truly do not understand why I let myself go without taking my pills. This past week, I ran out of my prescription. I don't know how many pills I missed here and there, or how many missed in a row, but my prescription was last filled on December 29, and my "episode" began on February 9 and worsened and became full-blown on February 12. I think I missed a couple pills here and there in January, but not many, and then I think I may have missed about 5 pills in a row before February 9-12, when my prescription ran out.
Things have not been very good at home lately between my husband and I. In November, my coaching/teaching/working on his masters' degree husband decided he needed to take on a part-time job to fund Christmas, and begin putting away a nest egg for the house we plan to build in the near future. I was never really okay with this decision, but he played the "I'm doing what's best for our family" card, and asked me please support him in this decision even though it would be really hard. I tried, and in my head I know I need to not nag him, but I just cannot stand him being gone every night of the week. Even though I truly know that the best thing is to tell him how I feel once or twice, and then just let it work itself out, I just can't seem to stop nagging him and picking fights with him. The other thing that bothers me A LOT is that he hardly ever wears his wedding ring. He hates the callous it puts on his finger, but it is a MAJOR issue with me that he doesn't wear it, and he definitley knows how I feel, but I still only see him wearing it maybe once a month. Back to the part-time job thing, with coaching and working part-time, he has been gone all but one weeknight, and has been also working from late afternoon until about 11pm on Saturdays, and all afternoon and evening on Sundays. I have tried to tell him that this is not good-him being gone so much, and that we really miss him, and that he is missing out on so much with the boys. As you can imagine, there is no time for dates, no time for going out to eat as a family, and I am very lonely with no one to share the ups and downs of raising three little ones. Every day consists basically of him coming home just to change clothes from one job and head to the next... not what I consider a quality marriage. The kids are constantly asking me when Daddy is going to be home, etc. etc. , which wears on me emotionally, and his response is always that he is doing what he feels is best and this is only for a while, but that he wants to keep working so that when we are off in the summer, he can still have this as a part-time job to build up our savings, and to please support him. Ahhhhh.... with my meds having run out, and the same conversation and fight about this over and over with nothing ever changing, it triggered something in me and I had what I am calling an "episode." All I can describe it as is that I completely "lost my mind." I took all my clothes out of the closet and dresser, and said I was leaving, I used language that I hate over and over, I told him I was going to kill myself, I put a handfull of Tylenol Pm in my mouth and then spit them out at him when he just stared at me, I threatened to go stand in the road in the middle of the night., I got a knife and poked at my wrist and hands, I left home withoout my phone and any money, and walked 6 miles down the highway hoping he would come find me, I turned over furniture and laid on the floor rocking, and much, much more. I kept saying that they would all be better off without me, and I think I truly believed it in those days. I said a lot of things in a deep, screaming voice, and I don't think I even remember it all. It was truly like I was a possessed woman. The kids were at school, thank God, so they did not see me like this. Why in the world would I let myself go off my meds if this is how I act? I have never acted this badly before... so is it the withdrawl from the medicine or my mental illness that made me act this way?
These are the questions that loom - What is wrong with me? What kind of help do I need? Am I on the right medicine? Why would God make someone who needs medicine to be "normal?" What in the world is my husband really thinking of me after I acted so horribly? Does he think that the things we truly need to work on in our marriage are not real because of my loss of grasp on reality? How can I get back to "normal" with him after he saw me act like that? How could he want to be with someone who asks like that?
So I filled my prescription, and have been back on it for 3 days, and although the issues are still there, I am much calmer and relaxed, but I am sooo ashamed. Where do I go from here? I don't ever want to put any of us through that again. Does anyone have similar experiences?