Two You

Dean,

I don't remember the days before you were walking around with those bouncing blonde curls and piercing blue eyes as you are today. 

I wake up every day next to you and that’s all I know anymore.  In between some of the most precious moments of your life were the hardest in mine so I have blocked out entire segments of our lives. Mostly just from the first year. It was tough. For the most part I was just trying to keep my head above water.

When you were born I slowly lost everything that was supposed to be in my life as I started my own family. It spiraled out quickly and in one year I almost lost my life, quit my job, my parents divorced, and your dad and I separated.

I wasn’t ready for that. We were supposed to village up and raise you. And we have… in separate villages throughout town…

The year 2020 jaded me right into 2021. The days have flown by and there really isn’t a lot of time in my days to sit and think about all the turmoil or to figure out where it all went wrong.

I’m sorry for struggling to adjust to motherhood.

I’m sorry the first year of your life was spent in quarantine.

I’m sorry we were all afraid and sick and dying and going nuts.

I’m sorry you will never know a mask less world.

I’m sorry it didn’t work with your dad and me.

I’m sorry you will have to split weekends and holidays.

I’m sorry for all the other moments I know will hurt you as a result of the present.

I’m sorry you will never know the family I knew growing up.

I’m sorry for a lot of things that happened since you arrived. And I know that sounds like I’m sorry for you but that’s just not the case. Everything is just unexpected. I wouldn’t change a single fraction of the last two years, though. And I mean that. The universe works in its own way and no matter what has been lost, I have found you and there is nothing I'd risk gaining back that could cost me you. You are the light at the end of the absolute darkest days. I would live every single day again knowing you are there at the end of it.

What I want you to know and carry with you for the rest of your life is that we don’t live in the past. It has already happened. I suppose that’s why I don’t force myself to make time to consider what has unfolded around us. And while it is important to stop and reflect on moments and occurrences in our lives, we never stay there and live in it.

I want you to know I would walk through literal fucking fire for you. I will continue to journey forward for us. I will always be honest about my post-partum, my ever-spiraling mental health, my choices, and my hardships. Emotions do not make us weak. 

It was a real shit show the past two years. Mostly, anyway. There were so many hard and bad times. Down times. But those aren’t the moments worth remembering, are they? Cause we don’t live there.

The moments worth it are cuddles at the end of the long days.

The moments worth it was the glow in your eyes every time you saw or did something for the first time.

The moments worth remembering are you and my Huckleberry playing in the backyard just days before we lost the ol’ boy.

The moments when you ran to me when I would pick you up from the sitter.

The moments when you started talking back and saying things. Asking for things.

The moments when you said our names.

The moments when you reached out and I was there. 

Those are the moments worth remembering. Not all the hard times that led me there. Although I am grateful for the journey and know that it is far from over, those are not the memories I am clinging tight to. There is so much wonder in your eyes that I have no room to cling to the negative.

I don’t helicopter. I just watch you. I let you fall. I let you eat dirt. I let you eat Cheetos off the floor from the day before. I just figure as long as you are breathing and not destroying anyone or anything then we have done alright.

You are tough as nails, son. You fall and get back up on your own every single time. You shake it off and keep going. At two years old you have already learned something I’m still figuring out at 31… to get back up and keep going.

In two years where everything was falling apart you kept us all together.

You are all I will know as forever anymore. You are my greatest journey. My biggest accomplishment. My most valued treasure. My ultimate motivation. My heart and soul.

No matter what I have ever lost in this world, you remind me every single day what is still to come.  

 

“I’ll love you forever. I’ll like you for always. As long as you’re living, my baby you’ll be.”

-Mama

Beside the Pedestal

If you put it up there it will fall.

I had my entire life on a pedestal. Every part of it. Every dream of what it could and should be.

Then every aspect of life as I knew it blew up in my face in 2020.

Whether Rona happened or not, that shit was bound to crumble. Someone was going to knock the stool out from underneath me.

They say people are often disappointed by meeting their heroes. I knew my hero my whole life, though. Taught me how to be good and wholesome. Taught me all the right things. I treasured those things. I believed those things. I designed my whole life around those things.

Then one day the script flipped. He surprised us all. 

And really it’s ok now for no other reason than the fact that I get it.

Sometimes we have to sacrifice others happiness so we can have our own.  

I did the same thing when I left my husband a year ago.

I just couldn’t fight it anymore, ya know? My own happiness for someone else’s...

And it wasn’t because I didn’t love him… I just loved myself more. 

I was on the pedestal. I fell, too. 

No one should be on the pedestal. It’s unrealistic and it’s far too much pressure.

How do we manage everything? Manage being everything everyone else expects us to be? Manage being everything we expect of ourselves?

We can’t lift people so high and never expect them to fall. That includes ourselves. I believe it hurts others more when we fall than it hurts ourselves when we fumble because we become so attached to the image of who someone is or should be and forget they are just human.

“Peace begins when expectations end.”

If you have no expectations you have no anxiety or worry of what will or should be.

This is not to say don’t be excited or look forward to events, adventures or celebrations. Just look forward to them in that present moment.  Not what you hope it will be like, look like or feel like. Just for what it is.

We must abandon the expectations our worlds revolve around.

Buddha says, “the root of suffering is attachment.”

That has been the hardest message for me to comprehend until last year.

In the past attachment just meant love because to love meant to attach. Now I understand that message is referencing attachment to the idea of an object or feeling such as love, happiness or success.

In this last year, the most important lesson I learned was that I let these things happen. I allowed myself to feel small and invaluable. Replaceable even. I let my job consume me. I let my attitude slip one too many times. I let anger, confusion and chaos cloud my happiness and judgment for too long.

No person or thing can control us unless we allow it. Intentionally or not. 

The second most valuable thing I learned in this past year of divorce, separation, and downfall is that everyone has a problem. Whether or not they can relate it to yours or whether it’s even comparable, everyone has shit. Total bullshit. The difference is some people hide it and others flaunt it.

My mistakes have shaped me my entire life and I don’t intend to change that now. So, I’ll be that example. I’ll be that girl. I’ll share my insecurities, my downfalls, my sins, my burdens, and my dark thoughts. I’ll do it because someone somewhere needs to hear it. Lets normalize feelings and fucking up. 

I have been overwhelmed at the people coming to light about their mental health and general life fuckery this past year. Somebody has got to do it. Someone has to show us its not all rainbows and unicorns. Sure it can be but damn there is a lot of bullshit in between. Am I right?

We have to show each other that it is OK. OK to cry. OK to be angry. OK to be late. OK to be behind. OK to lose. OK to be afraid. Everything is really just OK.   

These next two things have gotten me a long way in life and if you bear with me they’ll tie in.  

1. weird vs. different

A very important lesson learned in high school by my favorite teacher. She said something like, “People are not weird. Different maybe, but never weird.” I don’t recall the context but that has stuck with me for about 15 years now. 

 2.   stupid v. expert

One of my best friends in college was what you would call cocky or overly confident. Often when editing for the newspaper they’d become frustrated and snap about how terrible a piece was and once I said, “Maybe they are just better at something else.” I have also applied this in life many times and share it with people often when they become frustrated in similar situations.

These are two small outlooks that can be applied in about any aspect of life -people, places, feelings, appearances. 

Do not justify your own pain and do not attempt to discredit someone else’s pain because you don’t understand it. Trauma affects everyone differently and everyone reacts differently to trauma. This is the biggest mistake we can make to a hurting being. Whether you believe it or not, in them or yourself, you never ever let them feel crazy or unheard. Never let them feel weird for feeling different...

Remember that in some situations and environments you are the expert and other times maybe you are just meant to be present.  We must remain humble and know there are people with various talents and skills and just because they don’t apply to our set of skills or talents doesn’t mean their skill is invalid. There is something for each of us out there. 

Lets practice acknowledging others pains and encouraging them. Remember that your strong friends have weaknesses. Remember that your happy friends have sadness. Never assume someone has it all together. 

I ask instead of putting your expectations on the pedestal that you just place them gently beside you. Expectations for yourself, for your life and of others. That’s where I’m starting over. Propped up right next to it. One foot bent back and one foot planted on the ground. Always planted in me. 

You need to know your life can be perfectly imperfect or imperfectly perfect. You choose. Are you on the pedestal or propped up beside it? 

Most importantly, you need to know that we are all just out here fucking up and figuring it out one day at a time. 

My burden. My sin.

I’m not here to change your minds or to sway you to one side or the other. You do not have to implement or take away a single thing from my ramblings.

I am here to tell my story. In the past it seemed to help. Of course, in the past, it was happier stories.

There are people out there with far worse stories than mine sharing and I think it is important to continue mental health awareness. Continue encouraging people to not only express their true selves and feelings but to know they are not alone in doing so.

It is especially crucial to be open for all the future mommies.

In my time of crisis, I feared reaching out. So many people in and around my life were procreating like rabbits. All this new life was blossoming and everyone was all smiles so how could I talk about the tremendous amount of heartache and loneliness I felt as a new mom?

I read all the shit… The blogs. The how-tos. The step-by-steps. All of it. I wasn’t really concerned with postpartum depression being a possibility. Pregnancy was a breeze. I was never sick. Birth was also no big deal for me. I got the epidural, napped off and on for like six hours and then four pushes later was baby.

Publishing my story and launching my “mommy” blog are happening a bit quicker than I intended, but with everything going on in the world it seemed like a good time. With hopes that it may shed light on postpartum from a less shadowed and hushed perspective.

If you do not know me personally, I should disclaim this entire post and any to follow. ***I've got a foul mouth, outlandish ideas and a lot of unpopular opinions. I’ve got a confused jumble of "far left thinking" and "far right thinking" playing pinball in my brain all day. My thoughts are not a safe place for the closed-minded. *** You have been warned.

 

So here’s my story…

I’d been self-medicating anxiety with my girl Mary Jane for so long it was no longer recreational...

So in March of 2019, I go see my doctor. He gives me a test and diagnoses me with ADD, then prescribes me Adderall. I’d gone my entire school life and years of existence without any focus or performance issues. I had a degree and a career. According to my doctor, anxiety is a large factor for adult ADD and due to the fact I had little control in my daily life now it was causing too much interference with my brain for focus. Or some shit like that…

Two months later, I found out I was pregnant. The Adderall was short lived, but the anxiety was certainly not dwindling, especially since pregnancy was on the table.

Since I couldn’t resort to self-medicating during the pregnancy, I explained my recent anxiety situation to the OB. She prescribed me Lexapro.

According to Google, Lexapro may improve your energy levels and feelings of well-being, while decreasing nervousness. Nope, not me. I think I took it for a month, maybe six weeks. I made me a zombie. I mean stupefied auto pilot zombie. At this point my anxiety was minimal and I was glowing about the little boy coming our way. So, I just set that prescription to the side...

December 30, 2019 my son was born. I was born that day, too. It was most certainly a harsher world we were born into this time. I wasn’t ready for the future that was about to happen because it wasn’t supposed to happen the way it did.

The world was blissful at home just breastfeeding and snuggling with my newborn every day and all day. Not sleeping. Just existing in a tiny bubble of baby loves and smells.

But March 2020 came and I had to go back to work.

There was some weird shit going on in the world at that time.

I went to work and picked right back up where I left off except this time I’m pumping breastmilk in between phone calls. My boss and work family were tremendous welcoming me back. I was good at my job, so it was right to be there, and I was glad to be back at it.

Three weeks later we all went home for the weekend but none of us knew then that we wouldn’t be returning the following Monday…

There she was – COVID-19! The pandemic of our fucking lifetime.

My husband and I packed up our newborn and a couple months’ worth of supplies and went to quarantine at my parent’s house on the lake in the middle of nowhere.

We are spiraling out of control at this point. I am following his lead and I am feeling like a crazy person when I go to my boss and tell him I need a week to hole up with the family. My jaw dropped when this man said, “Yeah, you should be with your family… It’s getting serious...”

My old boss was no bitch. He would laugh a conspiracy theory out of the room so WHAT THE HELL IS GOING ON?!?!?!

Anyway, I’m fine in our bubble with my family over the next week as we watch the world lose its shit on every single news channel all day long and everyone fights on social media about being locked up like Rapunzel in their towers and whether or not the virus is real despite the rising death toll across the globe. As we watched the world turn, I ordered a laptop and started preparing myself to work remote.  

At some point my bubble is busted when my manager called and said that the 3 supervisors, head paralegal and the boss man would be coming to the office Monday through Friday, 8:00 to 5:00 as usual effective tomorrow. The five of us. We were essential. The others would work remote.

I lost it…

You guys remember when this pandemic first popped off and we were “locked" in?  Your mind was going 90 to nothing and spiraling out about crazy conspiracies. But like mostly I kept picturing the M. Night Shyamalan movie “The Happening,” with my boy Marky Mark where the virus is airborne and if the wind blows just right you’re going to catch that shit and go nuts… That’s what was happening in my mind. Laugh all you want cause I am now but I wasn’t trying to walk from my front door to the car then.

At this point my husband has lost his job because of the pandemic and I was going to have to go to work since my job depended on it and now my family depended on it. Because, although the world was shut down, bills were still coming. The baby still needed diapers and all the other shit babies need. We decided I’d work and my husband would stay with baby so we didn’t risk any additional exposure.

We went back home and the next day I went into work. It was weird. Empty. But it was the busiest we have ever been. Other law firms were closing down and staying hidden so they were sending tons of business to us. Mail was still coming and going. We were taking clipboards out to clients cars on the curb to sign documents. There really weren’t any lunch breaks. We killed it, of course but it was tough. The others didn’t come back for about six weeks.

In the midst of all this, I am going in early and coming home late. I am up at 4:00 a.m. with baby and down at midnight with baby. I am trying to get in bath time and dinner time. While also trying to remember to shower and maybe feed myself. My husband and I were drifting, no details necessary if you’ve ever had a newborn. It’s exhausting. It’s a competition. It’s a drain. It’s beautiful. It’s crazy. It’s everything good. Its everything bad. We couldn’t communicate. I was drowning.

Sometime in June of 2020 I could no longer balance being Amie, being a wife, being an essential employee and mostly… I could no longer balance any of that with being a mother.

I tossed back that bottle of Lexapro I’d previously set aside. Then I tried to puke but couldn’t. Then I woke up fucked out of my mind and a cold shower wasn’t doing anything so my husband took me to the ER.

(SIDEBAR: Huge shoutout to the family friend I called to come watch baby because she is open about her mental health and I knew she would come no questions, simply understanding. This is why it is important to be open, so people know who to reach out to in their moments of need.)

Well I lost that battle… or won it depending on your perspective.

Three days in rehab without your newborn is a lifetime to consider the place you are at in life.

Cold-hearted truth: rehab was the best three days of sleep I’d had in six months, though. I got some rest. Started back over. Dusted that shit off and tried again.

I was a complete and total emotional piece of shit. I have no shame about it either. I am human. I made and birthed a human. I will never again be as weak as I was in those moments because I know I survive. Now I know my body is a portal for the soul that is my son and that is worth every moment of suffering I may have when I am alive. THAT feeling is MY burden. MY sin. MY choice. MY story to tell. MY story to share.

Now originally I was going to tie in my open confession of post-partum with the transition of motherhood into the workforce and such but that will have to wait for another blog because there is some backward ass politicking going on these days.

On September 1, 2021, the Supreme Court neglected to stop the “Heartbeat Act,” courtesy of Texas, from going into effect.

The “Heartbeat Act” forbids abortions after six weeks (whenever an ultrasound can detect a fetal “heartbeat.”)

Even though a fetus doesn’t have a heartbeat at that developmental stage…

And as many of us know heartbeats can be detected but not always viable…

It takes four weeks to even know you’ve missed your period.

I was 9 weeks before I peed on a stick. 10 weeks when I saw my primary doctor for a blood test and 15 or 16 weeks before I had my first appointment with an OB for an ultrasound.

My child was unplanned but not unwanted and any tests always came back clear so there was never a moment needed to make a harsh decision like abortion.

My story of depression and post-partum as a result of a wanted child is hardly a speck of dust for what a woman could endure were she to give birth to an unwanted child.

The “Heartbeat Act” has no exceptions for women pregnant from rape or incest.

The big kicker is the “Heartbeat Act” leaves enforcement up to us citizens and is enforced civilly instead of criminally. The act allows citizens to sue those who perform or assist with the abortion, not the woman seeking the abortion.

Who the fuck are we that we try to control that as a collective? That you would sue a medical professional for committing to their patients the duties and oaths they swore to uphold.

I’m sorry folks but I just can’t get on board with this bullshit.

I have always been pro-choice. When I was younger, before I ever had a kid, I always thought I would never be able to go through with an abortion myself because one day I may want kids and maybe because I had an abortion once, my body would punish me and not let me have one when I was ready. I believe in karma. That was just my thought process. And that was then…

Abortion is not always a decision made with hast. It is a decision that will haunt for life. I imagine the haunting exists whether you go through with the abortion or decide to go through with the pregnancy. Those what ifs always hang over our heads. What if I had done it? What if I hadn’t? That thought and that decision is to live with them for the rest of their lives.

Children make mistakes. So do adults. We are constantly evolving. Who we are today is never who we will be tomorrow or 20 years from today. It is not the collectives decision to decide my choices or mistakes for me.

Fanatical pro-lifers think they are saving lives by banning and limiting abortion access.  Which life, though? The mother’s life who has to raise a child conceived of rape? The life of the mother raising a child from incestuous conception?

The ultimate father reaction to rape is to murder the rapist. But are we not murdering the mother when we force her to carry and raise her rapist’s child?

Are we not murdering a mother when we force her to endure a pregnancy only to give birth to a dead baby?

Are we not murdering a human when we make them give birth to a child when they don’t even identify as a woman. (I had to sit on that one for awhile, too.)

I would easily say I identify as a privileged white female. My boss put me on health insurance as soon as I was pregnant. I received maternity leave. I had my own office so I could pump in privacy. I had a family and network of friends who could help at any given time.  

The CDC says 3.7 million babies are born in America each year. Of those 3.7 million how many do we think are born into privileged homes?

Instead of meeting mothers with unwanted pregnancies with protest and hate why don’t you put yourself in their shoes? Or maybe you’d like to meet them with a $500,000 check and a life supply of formula, diapers and wipes. That should ensure the child has fantastic healthcare, a grade A education, and a roof over their head. For some of their life, anyway.

Oh, we can’t do that? I guess those poor helpless moms need to figure it out on their own, huh?

These men out here planting seeds everywhere but who has to grow them?

If all I can do with my privilege is admit that it is there and share my story and let you all know this law is against every fucking woman in the country then that’s all I can do.

This is going to spiral out of control. Many states are already following suit to further prohibit and limit abortion access. South Dakota passed a protective order banning abortion medicine distribution via telemedicine not even a week after the Texas “Heartbeat Act” went into effect.  

If I turned up pregnant today I am 98.9999% sure I couldn’t go through with it. Not without a substantial amount of therapy to even consider it. I cannot risk being that unstable again at an age my son would understand.  

There are points during post-partum when you cannot see the light. There are women who may never find the light.

Today my light is having a choice.

I’m just going to close with this really classless thought now but read it a few times before you jump to how appalling it sounds.

If I want to throw myself down a flight of stairs tomorrow that is my mother fucking right! Call it murder but you’d just be murdering me and robbing my son of a mother if you forced an unwanted pregnancy. This is the shit y’all can’t see past and the shit some people won’t say out loud because society has too many opinions.

And I remind you that if I were to throw myself down a flight of stairs that that is MY sin. MY choice. MY burden. MY story to tell. MY story to share.

And today I’m sharing my story with you so you know that we all have moments of weakness. Of loneliness. Of disbelief. Of despair. Of hopelessness. Of unsureness.

And more importantly I share it to politely ask you to mind your fucking business. You have NO idea how some one feels about anything. I know my limits and my body now more than ever. I will never ever let another being tell me how I feel.  

It has been 100 years since women earned the right to vote and started entering the workforce and taking it over. We are educated now. We are powerful now. We need to remember that we are educated and powerful now. No fucking man who has never, nor could ever, birth a human dare tell me what the fuck I’m going to do with my body. Know that!!!

Below are all the articles I thought most informative throughout my writing of this blog post. :)  

https://www.cnn.com/2021/09/03/world/how-texas-abortion-law-compares-to-world-intl-cmd/index.html

https://www.texastribune.org/2021/08/31/texas-abortion-law-supreme-court/

https://www.reuters.com/legal/government/crafty-lawyering-texas-abortion-bill-withstood-scotus-challenge-greene-2021-09-05/

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/09/01/health/texas-abortion-law-facts.html