Showing posts with label Depression. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Depression. Show all posts

Monday, April 11, 2022

Time Marches on…and on….

My life has brought about many changes over the last several years. I’ve hesitated on continuing my journey on here, because the thing that defined me before is not where I’m at now. So many things have occurred I’m not even sure where to begin. I guess I should start with the admission that I’m not a homemaker anymore. I mean, I have a home, and I’m still a wife and mom, but as for that being my sole occupation… …well, somehow it’s moved over to being one of the things I juggle in a different way. 

I started a part-time job in 2018. It was just a way to bring in some extra money but led to so many other opportunities. I enjoyed the time away from home, getting to explore the working me and the new way of interacting with the world. The same month I started work, I enrolled in college. For the first year, I worked part-time, went to school full-time and tried to maintain my family relationships. It wasn’t always easy, but I felt like I could take on the world and I was learning so much about myself. Over the next year, I progressed to a point at work where I was offered a full-time leadership position and also earned scholarships in school. For a time I did full-time at both work and school. We moved out of our home to a new city half an hour away, and while it was challenging, somehow I seemed to be doing it. 

I promoted up to another leadership position within a few months, and while it was harder to keep up in school with those hours, I continued to make it work. My family was so supportive, but I did start to see some struggles in adjusting to this new life, not only with my changes in roles, but also in where they fit in this new place we moved to. I questioned whether or not I should keep going but they assured me I should continue and while I felt guilty picking to do something for myself for the first time in my life, I also felt empowered and thrived on the new knowledge I gained with each new course I took at school and role I moved into at work. 

I was again promoted at work, but this new role meant more hours each week, and I found that I had to make a choice in letting something go. My children were not doing well with the isolation that came with COVID-19, and my family, despite all its shared space together was becoming more distant emotionally from each other. My younger kids once thrived in our old neighborhood and spent most their days outdoors playing. Here they can’t seem to settle in—and have dealt with bullying and social isolation. My older teens have pretty much followed the stereotypical stuff I knew would present some challenges, but added in so much more I definitely wasn’t equipped for in this social media/digital age. 

I cut school to half-time for a year, then accepted another promotion at work—work has become an outlet for me and has kept me from losing my mind through all these failures at home. In an effort to spend more time with my family though, I opted to let school go entirely and didn’t sign up this year. I made this choice right before things became even more difficult in my family.

The isolation and disconnectedness from the community through all of this wasn’t something I was prepared for. Depression has claimed my whole household. My support system isn’t next door anymore—and keeping up on my work and school loads and keeping everyone connected proved to be too much.

My adult children struggled to find healthy relationships and settled into ones that were abusive and degrading. My teens struggled with major depression and started making the choices I’d tried so hard to steer them away from. Our vacation fund went to hospital/doctors/therapy. This is life now. The mental toll these things have had on our family—as we tried to be there for each other, love one another through the pain of all that’s tearing us apart—is one that we still can’t pay. It’s not one thing after another. It’s all things at once.

This year started with me having to run across the country to rescue a child from an escalating abusive situation, only to have things get worse before we got home for a struggling teenager at home that resulted in a hospital stay, then more bad decisions from the child rescued, the pulling back of the oldest teen and deterioration of what was once a close and loving relationship, —I’ve continued to pray, to advise, to love unconditionally and to attempt to guide—but none of it seems to make a difference. I feel like I’ve failed in my most important duty. 

I don’t know what to do from here. I’ve given up school. I’ve cut back from many of the extra hours I was doing at work. But nothing is getting better. It’s so overwhelming and I’m so powerless. Mentally, I’m lower than I’ve ever been in my life. At work, I can fix the problems put in front of me. It’s a challenge, but one that isn’t impossible. There I feel like I make a difference. At home,  all I can do is watch as everything falls apart because children seem hellbent on learning everything in the most painful ways possible. So many ways things are going wrong, and I have no ideas on how to fix them without completely losing my identity by once again becoming what everyone seems to need from me. 

Life is hard. No matter what I say, what I do, where I am, it doesn’t seem to make a difference. But I keep trying. I’m unsure how to figure this one out…

Tuesday, June 27, 2017

That moment you realize you know nothing at all

This post is a long time coming. It's been one I've been thinking about, but wasn't quite sure how much to share. I'm a pretty private person. Funny, right? I have a blog here, I've shared so much already, but when it comes to the details of my immediate family, I always struggle with what I'm okay with sharing, and what they're okay with me sharing. I've said I want to help people, but really, I'm struggling in finding my own way, so what help can I really be?

Have I mentioned parenting is hard? I have children ranging in age from 19 down to 4. With six kids, you'd think I'd be a pro by now. You'd be wrong. I have no idea what the heck I'm doing here! And the stress! Who knew that I'd lay in bed at night and over-analyze every single detail of every choice I'm making with each kid, and how that may have shaped them to become who they are and influence what they're choosing to do now?

I remember a day--and please don't judge me too harshly if you already know better (I was pretty blissfully ignorant back then)--when I was talking to a friend about raising kids, and how I took the job so seriously because literally who they became was based on how I raised them. Then I went on to say that if my kids grew up making wrong choices which made their lives a mess, that it would be my fault for not teaching them the right things. This ideal on the surface may seem sound to some, as it did to me then, but it really is flawed. I've been learning this the hard way, repeatedly. It's so much more than that.

Kids have their own minds, their own spirits, their own way of making sense of things and their own free will. Sure, we as parents can influence some of that, but we're far from the only influence, especially in this day and age. We don't have control of all they see, hear, think, or believe. We can try to limit certain things, and push others, but really, we have no control over so many other factors in the world. None. At all.

One of my children, who was once so hopeful, so inspired and inspiring, has taken those extra things and viewed the world in such a dark, meaningless way. As a consequence of several choices made, starting a few years ago with small ones and going on from there, he is no longer sure what he should believe, think or feel about anything. I see the struggle in the daily choices, the consequences of the bad ones, the hopelessness and that lost feeling that increases day by day. And no matter what I say, no matter what I do, no matter how I pray, I can't seem to break through and change what's happening. I'm watching my child struggle to even find purpose, meaning and love for life. It's agonizing. I can't fix it.

I've spent more nights than I care to remember, getting up in the middle of the night to make sure he's still breathing. I've cried more tears and begged and bargained with God to the point of being physically ill. I've spent moments almost crippled by fear of saying/doing/or even thinking the wrong things and making it all worse. A month ago, I spent a few hours talking my child down from a building. Literally. What am I doing?!

And without meaning to, or wanting to, I fear what people would think of me if they knew how much I really am struggling here. Many of those who know anything of what's going on, I'm sure think we must've done something wrong. We must've failed our child in some way. God knows I find myself thinking this very thing. I just don't know.

I find myself wondering how much of this hopelessness stems from choices he made, and how much comes from the genetic predisposition he was given for depression? Depression is real. It is ugly. It is terrifying. It lacks in sense and it is obstinate.

Looking from the outside, I see someone smart in all the ways I wished I were. I see talent. I see a beautiful heart. I see so many possibilities. I try to encourage, to guide, to advise. It does nothing. Because all he sees in the mirror is someone worthless. A "dumb ass", to quote him exactly.  Hearing that pierced my being in ways I can't begin to describe.

And I'm fighting against the world here. The world says whether or not you have worth, and our children believe that determination. The world says there's no harm in sharing everything you've got if you want to find out who you really are and if you've got potential, and then it tears you down with those very intimate details you shared. It tells you that the things which bind you with another person are no big deal and can and should be explored with whomever, whenever. All this so it can tear you down when you eventually don't measure up to impossible and changing standards.

And who am I to compete? I'm just me. I thought my voice would count because it's been there longest. I thought my opinion would count more because it's the most informed, and it comes from a good place. But it appears this isn't the case. How do I get through that louder, more prominent voice and say that YOU are the one who determines YOUR own future? YOU decide who YOU are. And God is the only important judge to measure yourself by, and He's always willing to forgive and guide you to make changes.

So what do I do? I wake up everyday, I keep trying to break through that dark cloud, I keep reading, researching and trying to learn more. I keep putting resources out in front of him. But ultimately, it's up to him, and all I can do is pray.