Five Minute Friday: Slow

Hey friends! It's been a while since I joined in with the folks at Five Minute Friday. If you're just joining me, know that this is a little longer than the average FMF post and that's because I don't set a timer. Yes, I know, I know. That's supposed to be the point, but I just can't do it that way. So I kinda do it my way. If you're a fast to moderately fast reader though, this should take you five minutes or so to read (so there's your five minutes). If you'd like to join up with this week's posts on the prompt word SLOW, then hop over to this week's prompt at Kate's blog and click on the linkup at the bottom of the page. Without further ado...

SLOW

It's been almost two months since the last time I posted here and I wish I could say that it's because life has been moving really fast or that I've just been so busy that I didn't have time to write, but I can't say that. Life has been, as it happens, pretty slow. The very beginning of the year, from just after New Year's to about mid-March, tends to be a wonderfully slow time of year that follows on the heels of the whirlwind of activity that comprises daily life and the many family and faith celebrations from September to December.

And friends, let me tell you, I need slow.

I have always been a fan of this time of respite and slowed down activity, but this year, it took on a new meaning for me. I didn't really realise it until this past Thursday when I was sitting in Dr. D's office and we were wrapping up our session. It had been a pretty intense session of EMDR and talking and my emotions were pretty close to the surface. I don't recall the exact thread of conversation, but somewhere in the midst of our normal wrap up talk, he commented that he thought I was on the right track with what we were working on. I agreed with him and replied that although I knew it was, it was still hard. He said "Oh yes, I know it is. I think though, part of the reason it's hard is because it feels like your progress is coming so slowly right now, but once we get through processing a lot of these memories, you'll notice that your progress speeds up and goes much faster."

You see, through the past four years I've been wishing for fast. I've been craving for time and progress and everything to just speed up and get me through this pain I feel. It hurts a lot when you're going through severe suicidal depression and PTSD. You feel like it's a nightmare that will never end and because it's so painful and so exhausting, you yearn for the passage of time (and all the normal thing that come along with it, like therapy sessions and tears and the like) to speed up so you just don't have to feel it anymore. Slow is the last thing you want and yet, time moves along like a turtle in a swimming pool of molasses.

What struck me about what Dr. D said on Thursday is that I knew the moment he said it that it was true and that I had already experienced that. Back in November, we took a pretty significant break from doing EMDR (a traumatic memory processing technique) because of the fact that I had experienced a very intense trigger around that time that needed to be worked through. Trying to work through traumatic memories on top of dealing with intense triggers can be far too much all at once, so we stopped the EMDR and to focus on helping me cope with the intense trigger. What I noticed during this break of about 2 to 2.5 months was that my progress did, in fact, speed up. I had more energy, more ability to handle day to day stresses, lessened irritability, and my sleep wasn't nearly as fraught with nightmares as it had been.

At some point in January, once the holidays had passed and things were calmer, we started doing EMDR again. Some of the things I'd seen improve stayed, while others slowed, and still others came to a halt altogether. I found myself wishing that it would speed up again and stop with all the slow movement. I got very frustrated, but kept pressing on despite it. The more frustrated I got though, the slower it seemed to go because I was avoiding some of the things I needed to do for myself to keep moving forward. I wasn't really facing the demons of my traumas and looking them full in the face. I was only really doing the bare minimum because I wanted to get to the part where things speed up again.

When Dr. D mentioned the bit about "processing a lot of these memories" I realised that I not only had experienced this, but that the slowing down that was happening was a natural part of the process. I also realised that until the last couple of weeks, I hadn't been fully embracing that slowness or the process. I can't say what changed and made it so that I began to embrace it again, but in that moment last Thursday, I realised something very fundamental about my healing journey: I need slow.

I need these times of slowness and intense therapy where I look at these things under a microscope and plunge deep into these memories. I need these times when I am pushing forward through molasses and sobbing uncontrollably as I face the traumas of my past anew. I need the slowness of these times to allow me to really find and untangle the threads which are binding my mind in a feedback loop of reliving these memories because that is painstaking, complicated work that requires patience, determination, a great deal of help from others, and a very slow perseverance. I need the slowness of only being able to do the basics of self care and resting a lot so that I don't get overloaded. I need to feel the intensity of the emotions that surface so I can learn how to cope with them and better manage them. I need slow.

So things are slow right now. Things are really intense too. The stuff my brain has been dredging up the last couple of weeks has been so intense that I've felt weak physically and needed a boost of caffeine and food immediately afterward just to be able to drive safely. It's also needed a lot of unpacking after processing, so my sessions with Dr. D have run longer and I've been seeing Pendragon at least twice a week and almost immediately after I see Dr. D each week. You'd think that it would be therapy overload and sometimes it's pretty intense too, but it's keeping me on a more even keel than I think I would be if I didn't have that extra help. The great thing about having these two professionals helping me is that they both have different perspectives and help me find different threads of connection and understanding that I might not be able to find without them. Gray helps too. We often do a little debrief when I come home and very often, things come up that later get addressed with EMDR or in talking with Pendragon or Dr. D.

With all that intensity and slowness, I know I will be glad for a time when we break from things so that progress speeds and breathing is easier, but knowing that this slowness is part of the process and that it is moving me forward is helpful. As much as this slowness is hard, it is forcing me to look at these traumatic memories full on and really feel the impact of them in a way that allows me to understand them and move past them instead of repressing them or hiding from them.

It's very hard work and it's very painful and there are days, like yesterday, when the pain is so fierce that I want everything to end -- but I know that slow doesn't have to mean running away and death by suicide. I know that all this pain and agony as I face this stuff in the slow is shaping me into a better person who is stronger, braver, and better equipped to do the work that He has planned for me as a wife, mother, mental health/suicide prevention advocate, and child of God.

The mountain is steep and the climb arduous, breath-stealing, excruciatingly painful, and interminably slow, but I know the vista that awaits me at the top will be worth it all the more for the journey.

Sunday Funday 1

I thought since a lot of the stuff I write is more serious in nature, that it might be a good idea to take a break from that on Sundays. With that in mind, I give you something I'm going to call Sunday Funday. The basic idea behind it is that I'll be sharing something lighthearted with you. It might be a fun memory from the week, an anecdote from my kids, a song that makes me smile or feel good, some fun experience I had, a neat product I like (or one I've just found), etc. You get the idea. I may not do this every Sunday and may occasionally write a serious post too, but I'll try to come up with something a bit more fluffy for Sundays :)

Before I get started, a quick shout out to my friend Tara at Praying on the Prairie because her Sunday Blessings posts are kind of the inspiration for this idea. Thanks friend!

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So for this week, I wanted to share with you something I really rarely share with anyone. It's not that it's such a big secret really, just not something I tend to talk about much because I like to talk about other stuff more. So what is it?

It's my must-have list of personal care items.

Yeah, I told you this was going to be fluffy :) These are the things that I use on a regular basis and carry with me if I'm going to be away from home overnight. I call them personal care items rather than "beauty" items because they make me feel cared for physically when I use them. I suppose I could call them self-care items too since they are part of what I do to self-care. 

****Oh, and Gray, feel free to not read any further. I know this isn't exactly your cup of tea so I don't expect you to read all of this. Love you, sweetheart!****

Yeah, I know it's a little beat-up looking. Truth be told, I think this jar was one of Gray's that I swiped.

1. Carmex lip balm -- I love this stuff. Seriously. It's one of the best things for chapped lips that I've ever found. I prefer having it in the little 0.25 oz jars and applying it with a finger, but I've used the squeeze tubes and even the regular roll-up tubes (like ChapStick) too. I always apply this at night before I go to sleep and whenever I feel like my lips are a little dry. I also use it occasionally for the odd pimple or cold sore and it helps a lot. I have been known to tuck it in my purse or pocket if I'm going to be gone from home all day.

This stuff has such a pleasant smell!

2. Olay Night Firming Cream -- This is my go-to moisturizer for night time, although I do use it during the day time if I need to (just a thinner layer). It has a great feel to it and soaks in nicely without leaving your skin feeling greasy or bogged down. I usually spread it on a bit thicker at night and I really enjoy the ritual of smoothing it into my face and neck. There's something rather soothing about feeling a good face cream dissipate into your clean skin as you rub it in. Since I'm approaching 40 and already have a few faint lines started, I'm kinda thinking maybe this will help keep those lines from deepening and slow down the emergence of new ones (it's firming and all, you know?). Whether or not that happens, it's still a nice little bedtime ritual and makes me feel good. I also use the Equate (aka Walmart) brand of this stuff too.

This is the lightest colour shade available. Thankfully, it actually works! #PalePeopleProblems

3. Covergirl BB Cream -- This is a relatively new find for me. I'd read about BB creams, but never tried one until earlier this year. It's supposed to do all these amazing things for your skin, but I can't really tell that it does or doesn't. Mostly, I love it because it's not as heavy as a standard foundation, but not as light as a tinted moisturizer. It gives really nice coverage and goes on really easily. I usually use a little square makeup sponge to apply mine, but I have used my finger tips when I was in a hurry. I like this particular one because it has an SPF 21 in it which helps protect my Super Pale skin from getting too much sun. Given my family history of skin cancer, that's something I am concerned about too.

These things are SO handy!

4. Equate Makeup Remover Cleansing Towelettes -- This is what I use to remove that BB cream and other makeup products. I buy the Equate brand of these almost exclusively, but if you can't abide a store brand, these are equivalent to the Neutrogena brand makeup remover cleansing towelettes. The reason I buy the Equate brand is because they're SO much cheaper than the name brand. Plus, you can get them in a trial size pack which is awesome for travelling. I bought one of those for my trip to Boston this summer and had enough left to use it for my Five Minute Friday retreat weekend too. My favourite thing about these is how easy they are to use and well they work. You just grab one, wipe your face with it and the makeup comes right off. They smell nice and leave your face feeling clean and soft. Plus there's no need to rinse afterward, so they're perfect for someone who is perpetually sleep and energy deprived. I just wipe my face clean, toss the wipe in the garbage, and I'm done. I sometimes use these when I'm not wearing makeup but feel like my face is grimy and needs cleaning.

These were my colours for summer this year!

5. Nail polish -- Oh friends. This is a bit of an addiction, I think. I love me some nail polish. My bestie Sif and I are kinda hard-core about it. We love to paint our nails -- fingers and toes. There's something about having freshly painted fingernails and toenails that makes me feel pretty and feminine. Given that I'm not exactly a dainty woman, this is a big deal. The two bottles in the picture are what I wore a lot this past spring and summer. I used to love reds and pinks, but in the past couple of years, I've really gravitated toward blues -- teal, aqua, royal blue, TARDIS blue, sky, navy, sparkly -- all of them. They make me feel more youthful and fun as well as a little bit sophisticated. I also find that there's something sort of calming about wearing blue nail polish too.

Those are my top five personal care products. What are some of your favourite personal care must-haves?

Five Minute Friday: Free

 Note: This post is my weekly contribution to the Five Minute Friday community that is hosted by Kate Motaung on her blog Heading Home. Click here for more information about Five Minute Friday and how you can get involved! To link up with all the other entries for today's prompt word, click here.

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Maybe you're tired of me talking about it, but that's okay. I'm good with that. It's my experience and my passion and something I think more people need to talk about. Of course, I'm talking about mental illness and mental health. For this Five Minute Friday, I want to talk about something that is related and something that REALLY needs talking about. I'm going to try to do it in 5 minutes.

Self-injury.

Yeah, it's a kind of scary thing to say aloud. I'll be honest. It's not the easiest thing to talk about with regard to my own experience. So why talk about it today, with this prompt?

Because I'm free of it.


It's something that plagued me on and off from about late middle school through my early 30s. Then I went through an intensive outpatient mental health program and using the education I gleaned from that, the coping skills I learned, and the help of my therapist Pendragon (who helped me uncover the reasons why I did it), I broke free of the stranglehold this habit had on my life.

This August will make six years of freedom from self-injury. And I'm pretty stinking proud of that.

One thing freedom from self-injury isn't: easy. It takes incredible effort and it takes vigilance. Freedom also isn't being free from thoughts and temptations to self-injure. The freedom is in resisting those thoughts and temptations. Every time you resist, you get a little bit stronger. I've had some fierce temptations. I've come very close to losing the fight with those thoughts a few times, especially in the early days.

Eventually though, I got to a place where one year became two and then three and at some point, I realised that when I'm tempted, the part of me that has become stronger with resistance says, "It's not worth it to throw all this hard work away and have to start again at square one." And the part of me that's fighting yet another temptation says, "You know? You're right." And the temptation loses and I win another victory.

I am free from self-injury. If you are struggling with it, know that there is hope for you to find freedom too. If you need a friend to encourage you along the way, email me at the link in the sidebar. I promise I'll listen and be there. You can do it! You can be free too!

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Join in the Five Minute Friday fun and link up at Kate Motaung's blog!

Five Minute Friday: Hope

Note: This post is my weekly contribution to the Five Minute Friday community that is hosted by Kate Motaung on her blog Heading Home. Click here for more information about Five Minute Friday and how you can get involved! To link up with all the other entries for today's prompt word, click here.

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I'll be honest, friends.

I don't have any fancy or uplifting words to say this week on this prompt. You see, hope is not my forte these days. It's just not in my box of things to lift me up and make me praise God. I suppose that makes me seem like a really crappy Christian. Honestly, the fact that hope is kind of in absentia makes me feel like I'm worthless as a Christian. I mean, I'm supposed to put my hope in God. Trust in Him because He is the bringer of hope and the uplifter of the hopeless.

Yeah. Just can't do it.

I can't bring myself to say the word "hope" with any kind of meaning behind it these days. My spirit and heart are wounded. They've been wounded for quite a long time. Actually, they've been wounded for two years to this day.

You see, it was on this exact date -- July 10, 2013, that I lost my hope. I was violently traumatized emotionally and the hope that used to reside deep within my spirit was wrenched away in that moment of trauma and I have been unable to find it again.

And believe me, I've tried. I have tried to find that hope.

I have looked for it in scripture, in prayer, in worship, and in the healing graces of the Sacrament of the Anointing of the Sick (which is for spiritual healing primarily and then physical/emotional healing comes as a secondary benefit) and the other sacraments. What have I found?

Nothing.
Nada.
Zip.

And worst of all -- absolute silence from God.

Because of this, I went a long time where I wouldn't even use the word hope in its more secular sense of something wished for -- aka "I'm hoping for a chocolate cake for my birthday" -- because even that left a sour taste on my tongue. I didn't want to hope for anything because hope could be stolen and destroyed and all without any warning.

I have since resumed using it in its secular sense, but still don't really use it in the spiritual sense. I also don't use it when speaking of my illness because every time I have said that I feel a sense of hope that I'm getting better, I wind up about five steps backward from where I thought I was with my recovery.

I mentioned this prompt on Facebook in small group of women who encourage one another and my comment was: "This week's prompt is HOPE. *facepalm*" One of the ladies in the group who was trying to encourage me said that despite everything that I'm going through that I am "living hope" and that all the things I do to get through each day and deal with this illness are "rooted in hope."

I appreciate the thought, but I think what I'm really doing is living obedience.

A very long time ago, when I was just a little girl of 6 years old, I gave my heart to God. I made a commitment to follow Him with my life. I didn't know what that commitment would entail at age 6, but as I got older, I began to understand that a big part of it was obedience to God's will for me. At first, I thought it was just obedience in things like who to hang out with, who to date, obeying my parents, going to church, etc. As I matured though, I came to realise that it was more than just those sort of big things, but the day to day little things too. At some point in my early adulthood, I realised that He wants my obedience in EVERYTHING.

Living obedience is not always easy in good times, but when life hits us with unexpected stresses, it can be very very hard. So how do you live obedience when you have no hope, feel abandoned by God and feel totally broken and crushed in mind, body, and spirit?

You do as my spiritual director, Fr.B, told me today. Take it one day at a time. When you cannot make yourself remain obedient, you lean on those around you who are faithful to Him to help you. You put one foot in front of the other. You breathe in and breathe out and somehow, you get to another day. 

And I'm not gonna lie. You cry a lot. Seriously, a LOT. You scream at God and beat your fists upon His feet. You cry some more. You consider often just turning your back on God altogether. More crying. You vent your spleen to someone who will listen -- be they friend, family, priest, or therapist. And you cry some more. The crying happens nearly daily when you're in this hopeless place where obedience is the anchor you are clinging to by a thread.

It sucks. It sucks a lot because when you're in this place, it feels as though you will never be doing anything but living obedience. No joy. No meaning. Nothing but monotonous obedience. I wish I could tell you that it gets better. That the hope returns and that the joy is abundant because of the struggle.

But that's not my story.

I'm still living obedience. As I wrestle with myself and my faith amidst all the day to day stresses of married life and motherhood and the overarching noonday demon of depression, I do the little things and big things that He has called me to time and again.

And I cry a lot. But that's okay. Because we have tissues. :) 

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*This was meant to be a 5-minute exercise, but once I FINALLY got started, I had a hard time stopping myself, so I'm more than a little bit over. Just pretend it was 5 minutes, okay? I won't tell if you won't! :)

Join in the Five Minute Friday fun and link up over at Kate Motaung's blog!

The Other Man

Strip courtesy of peanuts.wikia.com.

Two people that I mention on a routine basis on this blog are my husband, Gray and my therapist, Pendragon. I've talked a lot about Gray's support and our story, but I haven't really talked much about Pendragon. I know some people might think it strange to go into much detail about their therapist, but he is an important person in my life and I wanted to share some of my thoughts about him.

In the last 2.5 years, I've seen him so frequently (due to the intensity of this episode of depression) that I have jokingly referred to him as "the other man in my life." Outside of Gray, he knows me better than almost anyone on the planet. It's very rare these days that I pull something out that totally surprises him. I've gotten to know a little bit about him too as he's shared different experiences he's had with similar things to give me a new perspective or encourage me that I'm not alone in something.

More Than Medication

In 2008, I was going through a particularly severe depressive episode, complete with self-injury. It began about 11 months after the birth of our second daughter, AB, but it wasn't until about 4 months later that I finally managed to make an appointment with a psychiatrist at a large psychiatric group near our apartment. I had gone off my antidepressants when I got pregnant with our eldest daughter, M2, but never got back on them postpartum because AB was conceived so soon after M2's birth. Gray suggested I might need meds again, so I made the appointment.

At the appointment with Dr. Alt, I gave him the basic history of my illness and waited for his assessment. He asked some questions about the current episode, looked back over his notes, and finally said in his pronounced German accent, "I am going to give you a prescription, but I think you would benefit from talking to someone."

My heart sank. I wasn't expecting that.

In retrospect, given that I was cutting myself and severely depressed, it was silly to think I could get away with just taking a prescription, but I didn't feel ready to talk about stuff. He continued, "So I'd like to set you up to see someone. Do you prefer a woman or a ma--”

"A man." The answer came flying out of my mouth before he'd even finished his question. He raised his eyebrows and looked down at his notes before addressing me again.

"Are you sure? You wouldn't prefer a woman?"

I shook my head and replied, "No, I wouldn't."

He continued, "The reason I ask is that in my experience, women are usually more comfortable talking to a woman."

I shook my head more firmly. "Not me. I would prefer a man, please."

He bent his head over my patient file, scribbled something down, and looked up again. "Well, in that case, I think I have just the person for you. I think you'll like him. His name is Pendragon." He made another note, then turned to look at something else on his desk. After a few moments consultation, he asked, "would next week be okay for an appointment with him?" I nodded mutely. After a bit of writing, he stood, handed me both a piece of paper bearing my new prescription and a larger one with instructions for the front office to make that appointment with Pendragon and with that, ended the appointment and ushered me out of the office.

The First Appointment

Time has a nasty habit of speeding up when you want it to crawl and the time between my visit with Dr. Alt and my first appointment with Pendragon flew by like a gust of wind. The day arrived and suddenly I found myself sitting in the parking lot, steeling myself to go inside. I finally got myself together, went in and checked in at the front desk. I sat down to wait. It must have been a few minutes, but it seemed like I'd barely sat down when I heard a pleasant sounding male voice call, "Therese?" I looked up and saw a rather tall, very young looking man holding a file folder and looking around. I stood up and we made eye contact. He repeated my name, "Therese?" I nodded quietly. "Hi, I'm Pendragon. It's nice to meet you."

I think I muttered something like "Nice to meet you too" but I can't be totally sure. My heart pounded nervously and I felt like I was barely breathing. He motioned toward the double doors that led back to the individual offices and invited me back. As we walked, I glanced at his face again and was struck by how very young he looked. Is he even old enough to be doing this? How old is he? As these thoughts went through my head, I suddenly realised that he was about six paces ahead of me. Dang, long legs! Hold up! Wow, he's tall!

I don't recall much of that first session. I do remember being surprised that he sat across from me rather than having a desk between us. I also recall that he didn't push me for details or pressure me to tell him anything more than I wanted to tell him. As a result, I didn't mention the self-injury or suicidal thoughts. I wasn't sure how he'd take it. My experience in the past had been very negative with doctors and therapists who just didn't understand self-injury and I'd only ever admitted suicidal thoughts to one other person. I wasn't sure if I could trust him with those darkest of secrets. Despite my reticence in that first session, I did find myself warming to him. He had a kind face, a relaxed approach, and my initial impression was that he wasn't judging me. At the end, we made an appointment for two weeks later. In retrospect, he must have sensed I was in more distress than I was letting on because as I was leaving, he told me that if I needed to talk before that appointment I could call during office hours, leave him a message, and he'd call me back. It was a small thing, but it made me feel a little less alone in my struggle. I decided in that moment that I thought I liked him and that this just might work out.

These Days...

Well, six years later, he still has a baby face (for real y'all, he looks like he's barely out of college), but I have since learned that he is, in fact, older than me by about 4 years. I've also learned more about him which has strengthened my ability to relate to him, be myself, and do the work of trying to recover and make positive changes in my life. These days I don't have to gallop to keep pace with his long legs, since he is now in private practice and the walk from his waiting area to his office door is only about four steps.

Because I trust him implicitly, I also, very rarely, hold anything back. He knows me well enough now though, that he can tell if I am. He still doesn't pressure me to say things I'm not ready to say, although he has perfected the art of helping me find a place where I feel able to say those things. In fact, there have been days when the depression has lain so heavy on me that my tongue was rendered silent and I couldn't bring myself to speak at all, but somehow, bit by bit, Pendragon has managed to help me find my voice and speak many difficult things aloud.

He doesn't judge me -- ever. No matter what kind of insanity falls out of my mouth or how much I sob and use half a box of tissues at one go. He doesn't care that the moment that I come in his office I kick off my sandals, tuck one foot underneath me, and plop down on his comfy sofa with all the grace of a paraplegic hippo. His office is a place where I feel safe and able to truly be my authentic self -- stripped of masks and defenses, totally honest, raw, vulnerable, and exactly who I am with all my good, bad, and in between. I've come in his office exhausted from too little sleep, in need of a shower, wearing clothes that were dirty, half out of my head from not eating for days, and so darkly depressed that I was silent as a tomb and have found deep concern, a lot of patience, and and a determined perseverance to help me find my way to a better place through self-care, coping skills, and changes in my thinking. I never feel like I'm under some kind of judgmental scrutiny.

Despite the lack of feeling scrutinized, Pendragon is keenly observant and is able to glean an awful lot about me and the kind of week I've been having before I've said the first word. I first noticed this two years ago when I had an appointment after one of the most traumatic days of my life. I know therapists are trained to be observant, but I think he is particularly so and it's very helpful as he has used those observations to point things out to me that I wasn't even aware of previous to that moment.

Lest you think that our sessions are all gloom and doom, we do laugh. In fact, there have been several moments where both of us were shaking with laughter. It's a darn good thing too, because the nature of mental illness is that you really need that kind of pressure valve to release tension and help ground you a bit. Pendragon also encourages me in the good things in my life like my marriage, my kids, and most importantly, my faith. He is, like me, a Christian (although not Catholic) and understands the vital role my faith plays in my life and in my mental health. His encouragement of the pursuit of my faith has been especially important as I've struggled mightily over the past 2 years with feeling connected to God and wanting to remain faithful in my walk with Him.

I am immensely grateful to God for bringing Pendragon into my life. To be honest, I do not have adequate words to express my gratitude. I am thankful for his listening ear, outsider perspective, professional expertise, and immeasurable amount of compassion, gentleness, and caring with which he has helped me through many a difficult situation and some of my darkest hours.

And so with that, I will wind this up and say "Thanks be to God for His merciful gift of a compassionate healer who helps me be just pensive enough to fight and slay my dragons."

One Word for 2015

Every year, for as long as I can remember, I have made New Year's resolutions. Sometimes I've been super formal about it and done the whole "this year I resolve to....." kind of thing. Sometimes I've been more casual about it, like "I'm going to try to.....this year." Some years, I've sworn that I'm not going to resolve anything at all because it never works and then wind up resolving something anyway and only half attempting it for a few days.

This year, I'm trying something totally different. This year I'm going to join up with oneword365.com to choose a word to focus on in order to better myself this year. The idea behind this is that rather than making some specific resolution that requires a lot of effort, planning, or motivation to stick with, you choose some kind of idea that you want to incorporate into your life via this word. You can choose any word you like, but most people choose a verb or an adjective that means something to them.

Because I'm an overachiever (or more likely because I'm crazy), I've chosen not one, but two words for 2015. My two words are....

Spoons

During I did the Write 31 Days blog challenge. The series I wrote dealt with my current journey through the darkness of depression. At the end of the 31 days, I wasn't anywhere close to the end of my story -- partly because I'm still living it, but also because it's such an involved story that I only got as far as last Christmas (2013) in the allotted time. I decided a few days after the challenge finished that I want to keep writing about it. I haven't come back to it yet because I've been writing a new series, but the last couple of days have been rather difficult and it occurred to me that one of the reasons might make a good blog post on this same subject of depression.

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One of the questions that most well-meaning friends and family will ask a person who is depressed is "How are you?" Because I don't usually feel like talking much about it or don't want to get into a long and drawn out conversation about how I'm really doing, I often just say, "I'm okay" or if it's someone I don't mind talking to a little, "I'm tired." Sometimes, both of these are a bit of a fabrication. You might be asking why someone would be less than 100% truthful when a friend or family member is genuinely interested in their well-being? Well, it's usually because I'm either all out of spoons or trying to conserve them.

Day Twenty-six: Poetic Musings on Depression

Note: I have been inundated with life lately but wanted to post something related to depression to help move this series along. To that end, the following are three poems I have written at various points along this journey. They are meant to convey some of what depression feels like from the inside. They are quite dark, so if you are easily disturbed or triggered, please be cautious about reading. 

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Into Black

The darkness steals over me again
And I feel quiet in its clutches
Despair washes through my brain

Day Twenty-three (a bit late): Rating My Depression

This entry is a bit on the late side as it ought properly to have been posted on the 23rd of October, but things being what they are, it wasn't. So, here it is. I've been struggling through a bad patch of deeper depression than normal and I'm not really feeling like continuing the story at the moment, but I'm trying to write something, so here's a bit of an aside, if you will. Oh, and it's two parts, just so you know.

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For me, depression is an odd sort of creature that mutates and bends and changes from day to day. Some days, it is easier, some days more difficult, and some days are so hard that I don't want to wake up to another day. It runs the gamut. You might wonder with such a wide variety of mood how I make sense of it or see patterns in it or how Pendragon knows what to do to help me treat it or how Gray lives with me and has any sort of understanding of what is going on with me. The answer is actually quite simple.

Day Twenty-one: Owning My Anger

It is almost a month now since I have been home from Pine View and I just "graduated" from Green Tree's partial hospitalisation program about a week ago. Since I only got through two full days of the program when I began it before my stint at Pine View, they just restarted me from the beginning. To be honest, I wasn't sure I was going to be allowed to go back.

Day Eighteen: Playing the Game

I return to the ward following Gray's and the girls' visit and discover that there are snacks to be had at the nurse's station. I can't really recall when I last ate and although I'm not starving, something about the offering of juice and plain potato chips looks at least a little appealing. I take a bag of chips and a little container of juice and return to my room. As I sit down on my bed across from my roommate who is straightening her bed sheets, I realise that although I have tears still moist on my face, the need to cry has lessened. I open the chips and the juice and start to eat and drink. It isn't milk and honey from the promised land, but it isn't horrible either.

Day Ten (extra content) -- Five Minute Friday: Care

Do you eat every day?
Do you sleep enough at night?
Do you exercise regularly?
Do you exercise at all?
Do you brush your teeth?
Do you shower or bathe regularly?
Do you spend time talking with friends and family?
Do you pray or meditate?
Do you read?
Do you attend worship at a church of your choosing regularly?
Do you do stretches?

These are all questions that a therapist might ask you if he/she is trying to find out how your depression is affecting you. If there is a significant lack of activity in these things, it may be a clue that your depression is interfering with your regular life. These are basic self-care activities and while it may seem like a no-brainer that you would do these things, for someone who is depressed, these things may be almost impossible.

I have struggled with a number of these. For me, the two big ones are eating and sleeping. Because depression so profoundly affects my appetite, I have been known to go multiple days in a row without eating anything and as a result, wind up nearly passing out from low blood sugar. I had one session with Pendragon where I'd not eaten in about two days and I'm pretty sure I was darn near incoherent at times. Sleeping is another common one. For me, I do good to get about 5 hours a night but most nights it's closer to 4. I do try though and Pendragon has, at times, made it a therapy goal for me to try and focus on self-care.

Self care is very important for healing and can make a huge difference between a delirious fever sort of suicidal fog and being able to convince yourself to put one foot in front of the other and live another day.

Day Seven (extra content): A Mindful Drive Home

If you are in any way familiar with the concept of therapy, then you are also likely familiar with the concept of coping skills or tools to help you get through the challenges of your particular mental illness or life struggles. Since there have been a number of folks who have said they are reading for insight to help someone else or help themselves or just because they have experienced depression too, I thought it might be good to occasionally post some extra content that is helpful for coping or helpful in giving assistance to those you love who are dealing with mental illness. To that end, today I'm posting something on mindfulness.

Mindfulness is, in short, being really and truly present in a particular moment and noticing everything you can about it. It can be helpful for calming anxiety and getting yourself out of a dark mood by way of focusing on the present instead of the past, the future, or the flood of emotions you are feeling. It's a great way of sort of disengaging yourself from your illness, even if only for the duration of the exercise. Obviously, if you are (or someone you know is) in a crisis situation, that is not the time for this. The time for this is before you get to that point and can be a means of helping you avoid getting to that crisis point.

There are many ways of practicing mindfulness, but when I employ it, I like to write about my surroundings or what I am experiencing in a mindful way.  To that end, I am going to cut and paste something I wrote after driving home one evening this past April (2014). The back story is simple in that I had gone out to get some sandwiches and fries from a local fast food place for our family's supper and was driving home. I don't really know what possessed me to start noticing everything in such a mindful way, but I did and wrote it down later. Without further ado, here is my unedited mindful drive home.

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The smooth plastic cylindrical signal lever slips easily between my fingers and I deftly flick it down with practiced facility as I apply pressure to the brake pedal beneath my right foot to bring the car to a halt at the traffic light. The light changes red to green but I don't see it and instead move forward with the rhythm of the cars in front of me. Hand over hand, the steering wheel moves beneath my palms in a fluid motion done almost without thought and turns the car easily left across the intersection and onto the main road. The smell of the food in the bag on the seat beside me pricks at my nose and although objectively, the smell is pleasant, it does not tantalize or excite me into wanting to eat. It is simply a means to an end. I glance at the sky as the car moves beneath and around me, propelling me forward along this stretch of road I know so well. It is painted thick with clouds that hang heavy and pendulous, full of unshed raindrops and darkening the early evening sky. The sky on this late April evening would normally be almost fully light because of the shift of the earth's revolution toward the sun, but it is muted, an ashy dark grey tinged by palest blue. I look toward the south as I roll along and see the barest peek of pink near the horizon's edge, obviously the edge of the storm that is closer to clearer skies and brighter sunlight. As I drive, my speed increases a bit too much, so I lift my foot from the accelerator and coast, letting the downward incline of the road both slow me down and keep me moving forward. I feel a small swoop in my stomach, almost akin to the sensation of flying but it is mostly in my imagination and passes in a blink, further obliterated by the application of the brakes as I again come to a stop at another light. The light changes quickly and this time, I notice, the bright green of the arrows urging me to turn left seems brighter, more electric, almost as though the lights are possessed of some ability to compensate for darker skies and storms. I am through the intersection before I know it and feel the rumble of the train tracks beneath my wheels as I continue the drive home. It is only the first set of tracks I will cross as there is another yet to come. Over and over, I make the motions that move the car in the direction of home, nearly all of them without any conscious thought as they are contained quite fluently within my muscles' memory and well-worn neural pathways that need precious little to fully engage them. Outside the windows, the trees sway in a heavy wind, leaves dancing and branches waving. The colours of the trees, grass, and even flowers seems somehow less vibrant, less green, less bright, possibly indicating that spring is at an end and summer is fast approaching. Perhaps the lack of colour is a reflection of the tenebrous nature my own inner thoughts or simply the fast fading light. The second set of tracks approaches and as I cross, my mind flashes on thoughts of dark nights and even darker thoughts. The thoughts are gone in a moment, but they have succeeded in unsettling my mind. Another application of the turn signal lever and the familiar sight of our neighbourhood comes into view. Houses built when I was born, various designs and nothing the same about any of them. Some have one level, some have two, some, like our own, are a split level design. Some lawns are meticulously tended, some need mowing. There are flowers planted and shrubs here and there, but nothing consistent except the trees. Lining our street like sentinels, each house has trees in its yard - junipers, dogwoods, Bradford pears, and stately oaks reach their branches into the sky, greeting me along the final stretch of my journey. As I near our home, I see our oak tree, very old and very tall standing proudly in its place, so sturdy and determined to withstand anything. I love that tree. It is beautiful in any season and in any light. Although we have not lived here long, I already have many memories of it - our children playing beneath its branches, pictures of them in front of it on the first day of school, the beauty of a sunset filtering through its leaves, the lovely shape of it against the sky on a cold and snowy winter day. It is a beacon and a symbol of hearth and home. I park the car and get out to go inside. The warmth of the air and its humidity are ominously oppressive, almost syrup like and in the distance I hear a low rumble of thunder as I open the front door, home once again.