Friday, September 09, 2016

I wish it were vodka



Nick found this video on an old hard drive. It is almost seven years old.

This video is small and oddly stretched, but it's not very long, and if you have ever had a newborn or suffered from depression or both at the same time, you may relate.

I watched it the first time and wanted to give myself a hug. And some antidepressants. And some sleep. I feel like these 45 seconds kind of sum up my life at that time.

Nick filmed this when Jordan was maybe two months old.

At that point, Nick worked until 9:00 or 10:00 every night. So this was taken shortly after he got home.

I was still recovering from my C-section, and our entire ground floor was under construction. Our kitchen was on the 4th floor.

Oh, and! And my dad had recently died by suicide. And my mom was doing things like smoking and watering one spot of their lawn until 4:00 AM. You couldn't blame her...but one cannot say it was helpful.

Nursing was hard, so I was nursing, pumping, and supplementing with formula. I felt like a huge failure. Also, people were all, "Sleep when the baby sleeps!"

And I was all, "But I have to wash the fucking bottles! And pump! And wash the goddamn pump! And eat! And drink water! And then he wakes up again and wants to eat!"

I had not yet been diagnosed with postpartum depression.

So I didn't know that I was deeply depressed. All I knew was that I hated my life. And I hated my husband. I fell asleep every night dreading the inevitable wake-up cries and dividing up our furniture.

Truly, I feel lucky that I was diagnosed not long after this. Nick came up to the kitchen one day to find me sobbing into the sink, washing out my breast pump.

I said, "I hate my life." And I did. I hated everything about it, so much. I was in utter despair. I saw no hope.

But not now. Thank God. Thank professionals and medication.

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