Shattered China

The last few weeks have been by far the hardest weeks of my life. I have been debating on writing about it here or not, and today while taking a bath I decided it may help to write it all out Instead of keeping the pain inside.

As you know I was diagnosed with postpartum depression and anxiety and OCD. Well since then things have been a tad of a stressful mess around my house. I have read books on how to handle my anxiety and overly sensitive emotions. I have read books on how to make my marriage stronger. I have and am currently reading a book on dealing with my spirited son. You take that and add new medicine, high expectations of the changes I’ve been making, a new baby, the Husband project I was doing, and me feeling like I need to focus and change all my “flaws” as the Dr put it and you get a huge mess with non stop fighting with my husband. We have had the best marriage For 8 years and then this PPD comes and everything changes for the worst. I feel like my life is crumbling before my eyes and there’s nothing I can do to fix it, in fact I feel like all I have done is made it worse. The question is how do I stop.

I feel like a shattered piece of china that all the super glue in the world couldn’t fix. Between all the fights, things have been said that I can’t seem to let go of and he can. He seems to be able to wake up in the morning like nothing happened and I sit here in so much pain and heart broken. He asks why I can’t just let it go and I have no answer. I know that words hurt and I know fights leave cuts but I feel like these cuts aren’t ever going to heal. He told me last night that he thinks I’m no longer in love with him. That felt worse then A swift chick to the chest. I sat and cried harder then I have ever cried and he sat on the couch with no emotion in his eyes. With no love with no concern. I started to hyper ventilate and he walked away. He said he was sorry but I am still in so much pain from the lack of concern on his end. I woke up with another heavy chest from all the anxiety attacks and I have had 2 more attacks today. The physical pain in my chest hurts so bad. The emotional pain hurts even worse.

How can two people move past all the hurt and damage that has been caused. How do I forget the words that were said and the accusations and the names? How do I overlook all this? He said I should be able to because this has never happened. We have never fought like this. We have had that marriage that everyone envied so the past perfect 8 years should out weigh the bad 2 months. But how? Am I the weird one that can’t let go? I’m so afraid I am going to loose the love of my life, my best friend, my soul mate all because he can’t understand how badly I feel and that I can’t just blink away the pain like he can. :(. All I can do is pray and put on a fake smile and right now that doesn’t seem to even be enough

Locks of love

My amazing husband has been asking for several years to cut my hair short, I have very long hair. Let me tell you that I LOVEEEE my hair. Lately I have been doing the best I can to be the dream wife for my man. Well two weeks ago he mentioned again something about my hair being so Long and how much he would like it better if it were short. So yesterday while he was at work I had my mom come over and watch the boys and I chopped it all off.

I cut over 10 inches off. :-0. I was able to donate it all to locks of love for a child with cancer and no hair. It made my eyes water at how much that meant. So not only did I do something for my hubby, I changed a little girls life. They said too That not many blonds cut all their hair off so it a color hair they need for children so it made it so much more worth it.

When hubby came home he was blown away. It was all a surprise. He loves my hair and keeps telling me how much he likes it and how much it means to him that I would do something so extreme for him even though I didn’t want to. I got the sweetest text this morning from him “Thank you for everything yesterday. For cleaning the house, for dinner, and for cuttin your a hair in a way you knew I would like even though it was uncomfortable for you to do. It means a lot to me”. That made it all even more worth it. And knowing that he finds me even more attractive makes me love the change as well 🙂

Amazing date night

On Monday night we got a sitter for the boys and went out on a nostalgic date night. We went to Mario’s for dinner, which we use do do all the time when we were dating. And then we went down to the beach and walked the pier and watched the sunset. It was amazing and romantic and fun. I felt so loved and special. It was a fabulous night. I think all couples should do that. It was a great way to spend an evening doing things we did when we dated.

Change is good.

Well I happy to inform you I have given an honest effort to be less uptight and “let my hair down” and it’s working. I have been able to focus on relaxing and it’s amazing. I still have a Lobg way to go but it’s nice to have a little fun and know its ok to do so even though I have 2 small children. My husband and I are doing better then ever. We are reading The 5 Love Languages by Gary Chapman and there has been so much useful information in it. We have learned so much about each other. It makes so much sense as to why both of us didn’t have full “love tanks” as Chapman says. We both know we are loved but we have been showing each other in ways that we don’t both see eye to eye on. Chapman explains it as being in a relationship with someone who speaks only Spanish instead of English, you both may see the love in body language but may never get the right communication needed to have a strong loving and intimate relationship. I have learned that he needs to hear that I love him and hear that his hard work is appreciated and that I support his choices and want him to be happy. We have also learned that I (so far) seem like I need more quality time with his undecided attention. At the end of the book I’m hoping it will tell us how to truly find out what language we are. We have been reading 2 chapters out loud to each other every night. It’s not only been knowledgable but it’s also been great quality time.

I have also been reading a parenting book called The Spirited Child by Mary Sheedy an that has given me a whole new perspective to Bradley and some great useful tips and I’m only 45 pages into it. I’m eager to finish it to see how much I learn and how much it benefits my life

🙂

Can I really change who I am?

Since this whole depression thing has come out of the closet things have been hard in my marriage. My husband has been working overtime to make me feel special but I can’t help but feel that it’s out of obligation and that he is doing it because he has to… Crazy huh.

I noticed he was talking to a girl from the past that I believed he had a crush on and I went crazy. My jealousy took over and I couldn’t control it. He was also texting a female client from work and she had sent him pictures of herself to him… Not sexual, just some of her and her family and dog and one of just her. To me she was flirting. And despite what he says I still feel she was. I don’t think a woman would send photos of just herself to another man. Especially when he is married if she wasn’t flirting.

So when he told me this I was upset. I couldn’t help but connect the dots in my head… New girls on Facebook, this crazy client home wrecker, he wants to go to the gym, and he hasn’t been as public on Facebook about me as he use to. So in my crazy mind I connect the dots and it paints a picture that he wants to leave me.

So after lots of conversations and crying we are ok again.. I hope. He doesn’t want to leave. I’m just beyond insecure and I need to work on that. Which I will… Some how… But I was talking to my mom about it and she said something to me which lead me to write this…. And I would like to ask that you comment and tell me your opinion..

She said that if I wanted to keep him happy I needed to be the woman he fell in love with when we were 19. I need to be the carefree, fun, outgoing, up for anything, spontaneous woman… Well girl I was when we met. But I don’t know how to have fun anymore. Or how to be carefree. Or how to just 100% relax. I am so wrapped up in worrying about everything that can go wrong or that could possibly happen or who’s judging me that I don’t know how to do anything else. I’m so beyond insecure… Even more then I can explain. And I don’t know how to just be young and have a good time unless its in our room with no kids and no one I feel is judging me. And being told the only way to fix us is to change scares me. I don’t know how.

So here is the question.. Can u change yourself to be who you want to be? Can u be more like you were when your married your loved one? Can you work through your insecurities and be a “carefree teenager” again? Can I be 19 again? If so how do you juggle being happy in love and carefree and being a mom?

Why does guilt hurt so bad?

So today a few friends and I were planning on taking all the kids to the strawberry farm and go on a wagon tour and strawberry picking. I was so excited. I packed a great lunch and snacks last night. I had the car packed and ready to go. We get up kind of late this morning but still made it relatively on time. I get Landen in the Moby wrap and start to get Bradley ready. I have the back hatch of my SUV opened while I find the camera and get theist few things ready to make the walk to the entrance of the farm. Well needless to say I suck and didn’t check to see if anything was in the way and closed the back hatch and, yup you guessed it. Bradley’s hand was in the way. I had closed and locked the car on my sons hand. He screamed such a loud and painful scream. I started screaming to the other moms to help me. I couldn’t figure out how to get the door open not realizing I locked it. I finally got him out what seemed like forever later (probably only a few seconds) and picked him up. He was hysterical. I had an instant heavy heart filled with guilt and pain and tears in my eyes. I finally got him to let me see it and his knuckles were black and blue and swollen. I had packed a frozen gogurt so I gave him that to hold. He seemed ok for a little bit and said he still wanted to go to the farm. So we go. Once we pay and sit down he starts screaming again about his Hand hurting. So more guilt gets piled on for not leavin right away. So I get a refund and take my screaming toddler and screaming newborn back to the car and head to the ER.

I was close to hubby’s work so I stopped there to feed Landen and have him look at Bradley’s hand. And he says its not broken. By the time we got there he was able to move it and had stopped crying. He could squeeze daddy’s and and wiggle all his fingers. He kept saying he was hungry so I decided to get him a Wendy’s happy meal and take him home to nap.

So now here I am guilty momma in a bath praying this nasty feeling in my gut goes away. And praying his hand is ok. Ugh. The guilt alone is driving me insane. Then u add the pain knowing my boy is hurt and it’s even worse. Why is guilt so painful when your a mom?

I won’t ever close a door again without looking. 😦

New Chapter

So Since I posted my huge vent blog about how hard things are around here being a Stay at home mom to my boys… things have changed a lot. I have started (reluctantly) taking my medicine and I have started, what I call, a New Chapter in my life. I have come up with new ideas on how to parent Bradley and not loose my mind, I have also found new ways to help my marriage not fall to the back burner.

As far as Bradley goes, I am putting him in a sports program done at the city park in my complex and its for kids ages 2-4 and encourages them to kick balls and play with different sports equipment in a non competitive way. I also am taking him out to park play dates and picnics more often. I got my double stroller now so that is so much easier to do. I am getting more comfortable with leaving the house with both boys so that has also helped my stress level. I also may put him in a toddlers tumbling class on Saturdays… if I can talk my hubby into it that is. =] I have also taken a much more positive approach to my son and so far (knock on wood) it seems to be working. I haven’t yelled in several days, I have been encouraging with rewards like stickers and a little bit of TV time and its paying off. He has been using his manners much more and is actually more behaved then he was a week ago. So I am, for the first time, hopeful that it may work out.

For working on my marriage…. I have talked to him about how I feel and what I feel we are missing and that had a big impact. He has been much more attentive to the little things I felt we were missing, the random “I love yous”, random kisses or hand holds. It seemed to bring back some of the spark we were missing. We also are working on talking more. We canceled our cable so we don’t watch TV anymore. We bought a little corny Lego video game that we play together, its weird but it totally helps us bond. We talk much more while playing that then we would just watching TV. My mom over the summer wants to have both boys for a few hours every Monday night so we will have date night. I also have planned a dinner in bed night.. I haven’t done it yet but I will this week. And what I plan on doing is feeding the boys dinner and putting them to bed a pinch early and then hubby and I having a simple dinner in bed like we did when we were living on our own when we were 19. Just something small like that I think will help us laugh a little more and make things more light and fun. My only complaint is i feel I am doing all this planning and work and he is just going along for the ride instead of contributing… but whatever works right!

 

And lastly for working on myself… I found a gym I am super excited about. I am doing it with a few girls from church and I hope that will make a difference in my self image. I also got my hair done the way my hubby likes it and I got my nails done for me. I put make up on more and try and care about how I look more then just that’s good enough. I also have gone for walks and I look forward to dropping the weight. I have made better eating choices and I hope the weight comes off quickly! =]

 

So I am happy to say things are better for me! and admitting I was struggling out loud was the best thing I could have done for myself. So I encourage anyone else feeling the way I do to talk to someone. It honestly helps and you’re able to get advice and help through it. Best thing I did, hardest thing also but I don’t regret it.

Mops Bible Study…

Well we finished our MOPS bible study and I have to say it was more of just a social thing then a bible study.. which I was 100% ok with. It was light and fun and I learned the back end of the child stories which was new for me, but it was much less structured then my Malachi bible study we are doing… and to be honest I preferred it that way. It was nice to talk about the study and our lives and be able to just be more then moms for 3 hours a week. I am sad its over! =[ I met some great people that I think will become good friends. I look forward to seeing them again! 

My big boy

Yesterday we made the move to a big boy bed for Bradley. He has been trying to get out of his crib so we wanted to make the move to a bed before he got hurt. So we went to Target and let him pick out his bed and bedding. He was so happy. We went home and as a family we built the bed. He got in it right away and was asking to go night night, in his clothes and all. When Daddy said it was bath time he cried not wanting to get out of his bed. Once he got back into bed he was so excited to be a big boy. He got up only once right away and after that he went straight to sleep and stayed asleep all night. He woke up so proud.

I can’t believe my baby boy is in a toddler bed already. Boy how time flies. 🙂

Today was a good day

My boys today

So today was a much better day then I have been having. I think finally admitting how much I was struggling to my husband closest friends really made it a reality therefore forced me to seek out solutions.

After long and tearful conversations with my 2 closest friends Cinthia and Christina I have come up with a new plan. I am totally going to (attempt at least) try and give my parenting and life schedule a 180 degrees change. For now we just kind if go with the flow and have lazy days more often then not and nap and way whenever it feels right. After talking to the girls I need to set a more strict schedule with at least meal times and bed times. So that’s the first change. I also want to keep praying more and find ways to encourage Bradley to pray and to teach him what it means. Today I took deep breaths a few times and sat and prayed and I immediately felt calmer. So I want to keep that up. I also want to start waking up before the boys do so I start the morning off peacefully and enjoy a cup of coffee. This will be the hardest task for me, I am NOTTT a morning person by any means. I also want to go out on planned trips more, like picnics, or different parks to play at or even the beach some days. I also want to go on walks daily and in trying to join a new and amazing local gym called Move It Momma. I am also putting Bradley (the 2 year old) in a toddler sports class that’s once a week and also a tumbling class on Saturday that we can alternate taking him to. With all of that I’m hoping he will get out all his energy and be able to behave more since he won’t be so cooped up. I also hope it will help me since I won’t feel so stuck since ill have a plan for each day. And I think the good old sunlight will do me good.

Hubby and I also talked alot about what I need from him to get through this phase of my life and I feel we are now on the same page. He’s been amazing today and yesterday. He randomly says I love you and has showered me with kisses like he use to. He’s made me feel like a wife instead of just a mom which is a huge deal for me.

So my hopes are high that things will change. Now I just need to have the follow through.