Mortal Combat [A Reflection of Growth in 2011]

We have made it to Ft Leavenworth and are settled in to our temporary digs as we get ready to celebrate the new year. I am grateful for the wonderful blessings of 2011 and look forward to what lies ahead. It has been a true blessing watching my son grow into a healthy, happy toddler. I have also had the pleasure of watching my husband grow as a true servant leader during his time in Command in this past year. I feel like I just sat back and watched with amazement as my little family grew in leaps and bounds in 2011. I am so proud of them! Growth is an amazing blessing, but selfishly, I am glad that we are all moving into the next phase of uninterrupted family time, peaceful sleep, and the calm waters of lakes :)

And what of my own reflections of growth in 2011?

• I learned that I am not invincible (I have to re-learn this one every year, so God just keeps it on the list).
• I am never going to be perfect.
• I am definitely not strong :)
• I seem to have learned the most valuable lesson of all from a children's song:

"We are weak, but He is strong."

Back in July, I reached a point where I almost called my doc to request medication. The scariest thing about this experience was that for the first time in my life, I could not "shake it off" by going for runs. Exercise was not the cure-all I always knew it to be.

As a new mom, your brain is wired for not getting sleep to a point, but if you can't fall back asleep after being woken up, or if you are having a lot of anxiety or feeling sad all of the time 8 months after giving birth, like I was, it could be that something else is going on. I hesitate to use the word post-partum depression, which is a serious condition and also no joke. I am not a doctor, but I think that sometimes it is possible to just be "off". Our systems can become imbalanced for a lot of reasons. Those of us with higher-than-usual levels of hyperactivity can especially attest to this anyway, baby or none :)

 

I went in for a physical, and everything was fine, if not off-the-charts. Vitamin D, hemoglobin, and electrolytes as well as thyroid function were all A+++. I was told by my doctor that "my vitamin D levels were almost unheard of" they were so good. I decided that instead of asking her about medication that I would talk to the people in my life that I trusted most and tell them what I had been feeling, to both prep them and myself for the possibility that I might need help, and to just bounce stuff off of them. If my mom or husband or BFF had said, "yeah, you seriously need Prozac," I would have called. What I got was, "really?" "huh." "really?" In any case, I started to research some other alternatives to medication and causes of my anxiety and that suffocating feeling of sadness known as depression.

I was thankful to have both my husband and my journal to fall back on during this time because what I realized is that the number one cause of my anxiety was that I needed to just let go a little. Realizing that I am not [my idea of] perfect. I am not my Mom. My house will never be perfectly cleaned or smell like yummy things baking 100% of the time despite having a million kids. I am not my BFF. My son is not in an accredited preschool learning 15 languages while I am well on my way of becoming the CEO of some major company and running marations. I am not an early childhood education specialist/kindergarten teacher.

I am just me. little h won't know how to eat with a spoon by himself at 13 months old, and he'll probably have a warmed bottle of milk before bed until he's 20 :) But he'll know the miracles of a watershed and the smell of rain and a lot of silly songs. He will know what leaves taste like and probably slugs and what a spider web covered in morning dew looks like. He'll know the sound of silence and the roughness of tree bark and the stickiness of applesauce spilled all over the front of him because he ate it in his car seat, on the way home from somewhere.

I would like to end this by saying that in no way am I anti-medication (in general) for those who really need it. I just happen to believe that most of us really don't and the side effects of ALL medication, be it pain or anti-anxiety or high blood pressure, terrifies me beyond belief. I hope this post reflects the fact that I heavily weighed this option.

The only way for me to let go is to be outside, in nature. It is the only place I am ever really and truly relaxed. Going for a run or a walk just wasn't enough of being outside. It is not how I am wired. Going back outside meant that I was not getting as much writing done, but I was able to let go of that by just trusting in the fact that if God wants me to write and get these stories out of my head, he'll give the time to me.

Nature is where I am happy, and as it turns out, it is where little h is happiest, too :)

May you all enjoy the calm waters of lakes in 2012. Happiest New Year.