Define Stable





"Well I guess I need to know your definition of stable" My psychiatrist said after I laughed when she told me how stable I was and how great I was doing. I go see her for 'medication management' she gives me anti depressants and anxiety medication. I started taking them a year after Dan died because I was not feeling stable.  Whats stable? uhhhh I can tell you what it's not. It's not this. It's not waking up at 3am regularly just because. It's not being on anti depressants and anxiety medication.  "Your Husband died right in front of you and you've moved twice and you are still here thats stable"  she tells me. Ya, you have a point, thats some big stuff and I am still here. I show up, I have no choice not to.

I guess to me being stable means 'having your shit together'.  I used to be the queen of 'having my shit together' of being on top of things.  I used to know about every school event, about every church event. appointments, playdates, grocery lists. I didn't even have to write them down, I could just remember.  And I could remember them all for Dan too.

I walked into Baby Girls school the other day, to the lovely ladies in the office. "I think the money to buy a year book is due? I have no idea if I already paid for it or not, can you look it up?" well were a little bit old school at our school so looking it up simply means going through the 400 already turned in forms and looking for mine. That sounded daunting. "well you could pay for it again and if it turns out you paid twice we will refund you." ya ok I guess lets do that. so I dig through my purse for the right amount of money.  "I used to me more organized I promise" I tell her. Shes new, she doesn't know my story. She doesn't know that two years ago I was in that school practically everyday volunteering. She just smiled at me.

I got a phone call today from Baby Girls psychiatrist. They wanted to know why we missed our appointment for her check up yesterday. Well apparently I forgot, even though I have it written down in my phone, Even though they text you a reminder two days before, I just completely forgot and we didn't show up. "I'm so sorry I say, I don't usually forget stuff like this, can we reschedule? Yes wed at 5 is great, thank you, again i'm so sorry I just forgot"  After I hung up the phone I remembered that I have a PTA meeting wed at 5, which I will now be missing, because I don't have my shit together.

Now I text people the night before something "uh little friends birthday party is tomorrow? Is that right? what time does it start?"  oh it was pajama day at school, sorry Baby girl we forgot. Nevermind that I read the newsletter telling me this and I was reminded the day before. Nevermind that I used to be the person that people would text and ask these questions to, I was the person that just knew. "Yes the teachers lunch is this friday, yes it's a potato bar, yes we still need cheese"  Did we even do a teacher lunch this year, we must of but I didn't do anything for it.

I told my mother in law we would come over for dinner last thursday. I texted her that afternoon. "Uh so it's my dads birthday and were all taking him out to dinner so we can't come over tonight. Sorry I forgot"  I forgot I had plans with my family for my dads birthday.  I'm turning into a giant flake. I'm turning into my biggest pet peeve.

"who gives a shit" my therapist asks me, because I continued this conversation with her. "you have had unimaginable loss, your brain is grieving, it doesn't have room to remember pajama day." Right, it doesn't have room, it is busy grieving Dan. I get that, yet it still bothers me, it's not how I used to be, I used to be on top of things. I used to remember stuff.  I told her it's not so much that it matters, in the long run of life, pajama day doesn't matter, I know that. The problem I have is that to me, my brain no longer works right, it no longer works how it should, it no longer works how it used to and that bothers me. My brain feels broken because I can't remember pajama day.

"People change" my therapist says, "you are not the person you were two years ago and you never will be again" Well thats for sure, two years ago Dan was alive. "But I don't want to change, I liked me how I was." Does this mean my brain is never going to work right again, That I am going to spend the rest of my life being frustrated at myself for not remembering things. That sucks. But I did change, Dan died, everything changed, maybe someday I will get used to it.

"Are you still blogging?" She changes the subject when she doesn't think shes going to get anywhere with me. "yup all the time, I even signed up for a writing class."  That's great she tells me. "Ya I guess, it's just that I'm not really a writer" "You are a writer" why does everyone keep telling me that? "Do you like writing?" "Well yes, It's just that two years ago, I could not have cared less, I had no desire to write at all, I wasn't interested in writing at all, It never even crossed my mind."

"People change" she said.

I wrote a book about my grief, you can read it here: Carry on Castle

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

PTSD is not for sissys

Image
Do you know what PTSD is? Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I bet you think you do.  You might say something like "ya its what people that go off to war have" true. You might say "It's when people see really terrible things" true. A few really smart people might say "ya my friend watched her beloved husband die and now she has it" very true. If you are a mental health professional you might say "ya a child who all of a sudden has a dad who dies will have it" also true.  I was telling a friend once about how life is now without Dan and she said "wow it's almost like you have PTSD or something." No not almost, we do. But what exactly is it? Well it's complicated. I can't describe it for baby girl because I am not in her mind (unfortunately) but I can try and describe it for me. I am hesitant to do so; it's not an easy thing to talk about, But if we are going on a the point of this blog is to be therapeutic for me and h
Read more

The Floor

Image
I pulled him off of our bed and onto the floor. The 911 dispatcher told me to. She said it would help him breathe. I grabbed his ankles and pulled hard on his legs. He fell to the floor with a loud thump. I gasped at the loudness of it, but he didn’t move on his own at all. He didn't shake his head and say, “Ow, what’d you pull me off the bed for?” He didn't do anything. He just laid there. She told me to lift his neck up to help him breathe. I tried, but it was hard to move him, and I didn't want to hurt him.  I put my head on his chest again and again, I couldn’t tell if he was breathing, I couldn’t tell if that was his heartbeat or mine that I heard as he laid on the floor.  “Daddy! Wrestle with me!” she would shout, as she jumped into him and they landed on the floor. It was their favorite game. She would pound him and he would exaggerate the impact, clutching his stomach and lifting his legs in the air.  “You got me good, baby girl!” he would tell her. She would grin i
Read more

Milestones in grief

Image
                                                                Dan and I around 2011 I wrote this for a writing contest about milestones. Writing about every grief milestone would take a book and I had a word limit so I couldn't do that. I tried to do the really big ones. I have not had a particularly eventful life. When I was eight, my parents moved, but they took me with them. At ten, I had a pretty bad accident, but I came out of it fine. My husband and I met at sixteen, and at nineteen, we went against all good advice and got married. I gave birth to our daughter when I was 27.   I loved our boring, normal life. We were living our happily ever after. I was a stay at home mom, Dan was finishing up grad school. Everyone says this kind of thing at funerals, but Dan really was the most amazing person I’ve ever met in my life. He wanted to save the world: the people, the animals, the ecosystem. He wanted to make the world better, and he was. I loved our little family and couldn
Read more