Define "Improvement"

     I am the most pathetic mom ever.  Children are going to read about me in their history books as the most ridiculous mother who ever mothered, and shake their heads in pity for me.

This is how I look now when I put LO down for a nap.

     "But teacher," one little girl will ask hopefully, "Didn't she ever bathe at all."
     "Not for days and days, Sarah. And she only buttoned up her pants if she went grocery shopping, but even then she unbuttoned as soon as she got back in the car.  It was a very sad and sorry state of affairs."
     Sigh.  I don't know how other woman do it.  I read their very clean and proper parenting blogs about their beautiful children of whom they take gorgeous sunlit photos, wherein they wax poetic about how to grow your own kale for baby food, and how refurbish an old dresser so that it can be used as a credenza.  I'll bet they have never discussed with their husbands the possibility of training a pack of dogs to raise a baby.
     Truthfully though, things aren't that bad (not that things not being bad actually changes any of my aforementioned behaviors, it just means I feel better about them).  Thanks to Ferber, LO is sleeping in five hour chunks, which is a massive improvement from two weeks ago when she was waking us up every 20 minutes.  The first night she cried for an hour at least three times during the night, but she was actually kind of doing that before Ferber, so that isn't that bad.  No, the hardest part of Ferber is definitely the heart wrenching guilt.  I still have to wear noise dampeners to put her down for a nap, even though she only cries for about five minutes.  It is really hard not just run into her bedroom and hold her to my chest.  When she is awake I am always searching her face for signs of resentment.  Poor little girl.  I know it is silly, but I can't help feel like this is ultimately going to affect which nursing home I end up in.
     I am also working through a medication change right now, which stinks.  My friend Kaitlin just had her book published (which has me in it and totally makes me famous. You should totally buy it right now!  Buy it!  Buy it!) about how antidepressants are a solution, but not in the way one might hope.  For example, when LO wasn't sleeping, I was getting super depressed and I had to raise my Cymbalta.  Unfortunately, the Cymbalta makes it really hard for me to sleep.  Now that LO is sleeping, I am not.  So they added risperidone, which definitely helps my mood, but makes me gain weight like it is my job- so not that good for my mood from a a certain perspective.
     Oh, and it sometimes makes me feel like I am going to throw up.  That doesn't really help my mood either.
     All in all, things are getting a little better.  Medications are tricky and you just have to keep working at it I guess.
Or find a very reliable pack of dogs.
   

Where's Claire Huxtable when you need her?

Recently Kelly Kapowski has been giving me a lot of parenting advice.
     Like tonight, we are on the first night of implementing the Ferber method with LO, and Kelly is all "I don't know; she's just a baby.  You've come this far without getting more than two consecutive hours of sleep.  you can go a few more months.  She's just a scared, and wants to be with you."
     And then Jesse chimes in, "She needs to learn to fall asleep by herself.  This is important for both of you!  Be a strong, responsible parent"
     Don't give me that look.
     Oh, like you don't have nineties heartthrob giving you parenting advice.
     You know what I have to say to that?  Liar: that's what I have to say to that, because everybody has the cast of Saved by The Bell in their head, and don't even try to deny it.  Well, maybe not the entire cast of Saved by the Bell, but that's not the point.  The point is that everybody has those little archetypes that they measure themselves against running through their head.  The shoulder angel metaphor didn't come from no where.
     Fine, you may think I am just sleep deprived now, but sooner or later, you are going to realize that the one voice in your head that is telling you to pack a lunch is really Mrs. Cunningham from Happy Days, and you'll be all like, OOOOHHHHH.....

     Anyway, whenever Kelly becomes the dominant voice in my head, I start thinking I need a boost of confidence.  For being head cheerleader at Bayside, Kelly was not really all that self assured.

Oh my God, I watch too much television.

     Anyway, it seems to me that a major component of depression is self doubt; well, it is a major component of   my personality, and I have always chalked it up to depression, so let's just go with that.  For example, I just spent about eight minutes, reading and rereading that last sentence because I couldn't be sure that self doubt was a symptom of depression.  I ended up looking it up.  It is.
     Or with this Ferber thing.  It's a method of teaching your baby to sleep without your help but allowing them to cry themselves to sleep at night and only checking on them at gradually increasing intervals.  It's hard to implement for any parent, but we are completely at the end of our rope.  LO hasn't been sleeping for more than three hours consecutively since December. My depression has come back, my husband has started sleeping on the couch, and I am a zombie during the day.  I know letting her learn to sleep on her own is best for both of us, but I haven't been able to commit to anything, because I am constantly seeking reassurance.  I have read five different books on sleep, seen three different specialists for help, (all who tell me she is perfectly healthy and I don't "need to worry".  Super helpful.), I have read forums, and asked friends, but I keep second guessing, and postponing my decision util I am "sure" about what to do.
     Meanwhile, there is a very high likelihood that I may fall asleep at the wheel and drive us both off a cliff.
     Or just send her "perfectly healthy" little butt to a Russian orphanage for sleep training.
     I've got to start listening to myself more, because honestly, I know her better than any one.  I gotta pull myself together and go with what I believe is best without second guessing myself all the time.  Of course, I don't know how to do that exactly.....

Back in the Matrix

So, yeah... I guess I have been pretty depressed lately.  It's hard to get perspective when you are in the middle of it, but just from reading those last few blog posts...whew!  I totally went emo for a while there didn't I?  The funny thing is, I am not sure that I feel any of it is untrue, I just feel more okay about it.  Do you ever get that?  Adjust your meds, and then suddenly you feel more okay about stuff?  I still have the same opinion of my situation, but just I just kind of feel alright about it.  As in, "This sucks, and I'm okay with that".

Meds are like that.   I have a bi-polar friend who resists medication because when he is unmedicated he sees "the real world".  He's right of course. There is actually such a thing as a "positive illusion" that affects "normal" people more than those with depression.  In other words, "normal" people kinda live in a happy little Matrix-world, and people with depression are all the people outside the Matrix who wear really bland colors and have to eat that gross food, and know that humanity is imprisoned by robots.
Only we're not the cool people outside the Matrix who can bend it to our will and stuff; I think those are the manic depressives.  It's no wonder we're depressed really.
Anyway, in that movie, as in actual life, I never understood why people wanted to live outside the Matrix.  Maybe on medication I don't live in the "real world", but so what?  Yes, inside the Matrix you are living an illusion and robots are sucking your...life source or something... but are illusions really that bad?  In the Matrix there is good food, and television, and carpeting.  Yes, it has its problems, but at least we aren't constantly being hunted by giant octopus-shaped killing machines.
In my friend's case, I think he just doesn't want to give up the sexy dance parties.

Baby: Queen of the Night

     I do not even know.  This kid thing man; the benefits are seriously debatable.  I love my daughter; she is amazing and cute and awesome: but the mom thing, possibly not my gig.  First of all, it is HARD.  Like hella hard.  Harder than anything I could have imagined doing in a way I could have never imagined it.  Now, apparently my child is not a piece of cake: she has reflux, so partially-digested milk regularly jettisons out of her mouth like a lawn sprinkler. She is six months and wakes up every two hours, when a lot of babies sleep through the night at 3 months.  She doesn't nap for longer than 20 minutes.  She doesn't cry as much as some babies, but she definitely cries and, MOTHEROFGOD, when this child cries it is as though she is summoning demons of darkness.

 And I am so tired.

     Before having a baby I was already kind of pathologically tired.  I have, on more than one occasion, fallen asleep while talking to someone... in person.  Not even kidding.  I used to have to pull over to the side of the road during the hour and a half drive to and from college because I would literally pinching myself to stay awake.  And its not as though I am don't sleep if given the opportunity.  I could easily sleep any span from 5-17 hours a day, and still need a nap.  So, generally speaking, I am very used to being in need of sleep.  That is kind of the space I live: Sleepyville.  I am the mayor.  Naturally therefore, my child is Wakey Wakerstein from Fussy-facelandia.  As result, I stumble through my life, confused, cranky and covered in grime, like a zombie from Night of the Living Dead that accidentally ended up on the Muppet Babies.

     Being so tired is trying on any one's mental faculties, but having depression and no sleep is just killer.   I would not say I am suicidal, but dark thoughts have definitely come back in full force.   There have been times when I believed that LO would be better off without me.  I often feel trapped, like she is a shackle that I have placed upon myself that will imprison me the rest of my life.

     I don't understand: I don't understand how moms do it.  How have we survived as a species?  How was it that the first mom did not just leave her screeching, gooey parasites by the side of the road?  Where does the strength to carry on come from? 

From her I suppose.  Because she is cute, and funny and she needs me.  Plus, you know, God forbid she beckon her demons.