A kaleidoscope of fabric and nature: A summer dress, a summer day.
My knees buckling, dizzy, I fall and lay down, looking up at the bluest sky and the scattered clouds. Cumulus. Cumulus Clouds. Fluffy and white... Spinning sky.
My mind is swimming in a funny pool of colors and laughter.
I hear someone laughing.
It's me, I think.
Most of the time, I can only go into that place if I stop up my ears with sleep or music. Music. If I shut out every sound except the music, I can stop smelling, stop thinking, stop knowing... As much as I am capable of letting go.
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However! In the years since I started writing this blog, (and saying very morbid things about wanting to disappear), I did finally and truly absorb and retain the understanding that me not being here would be horribly detrimental to my children. The crazy-I'm crazy-filter coloring my thinking was shed, and I knew I would damage my children and mess them up, (maybe make them as crazy as I am right now, at a far younger age) if I... died. Holy shit and what the fuck, right? Of course!
OF COURSE!
I didn't always see the of course. Not really. I might have said I did, but I really was thinking that it would be okay if I died.
But, yeah. Holy Shit. A parent dying, particularly in tragic and unexpected circumstances fucks kids up.
It fucks them up.
Adults can't handle tragedy like that.
Innocent young children? Gosh, they would be even more fucked up by it.
I got that. I get it. I don't want to fuck up my children. So, even in my dark mind, I began to focus on the idea that I will stay here and do whatever I need to do to stay here. I was not going to be reckless with my well being... I was not going to die on purpose.
That's a big step for a crazy person.
Oh, no! Then I had to face the reality that, even if I was not dead, the way I have been existing didn't mean I was here fully. I understood if I was just existing to not die than I was doing a shitting job at living. I was not being a good mother. I don't know if I am, sometimes.
But... I am fighting one battle at a time, I have decided. I'm onto that next fight, after realizing I can't be dead, where I start to live... Because, Oh man, I know I am not in any way actually here.
I can't say I know what to do. I don't know how to be present when I feel like I'm disappearing.
I have massive depression, and right now I am not existing as any Joanna that anyone who had known me for more than 5 years.
I am a mother, yes.
I love my little baby faces and give them attention, yes.
I am a good mother, yes... Good enough.
Good enough? That bullshit-crap. Blech.
If you knew me--know everything that I was--you would know that "good enough" is the worst kind of mother I should be, by every account.
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| Tears. Lame. |
You see, my children are superior beings. I know the Joanna inside me is the mom that they deserve. I would be a superstar for them. I would overwhelm their awesomeness with my energy, and love, and enthusiasm, and love.
I'm going to stop crying about being depressed and at least believe that I can be better. Doctors, medicine, brain surgery... somethin'.
Let's be okay with that-be okay with believing.
Whew. Anyway! Yes! Stop crying into your hands like an emotional basketcase!
In my delirious and darkest moments, I know what I say: I cry and say, "I was a teacher." I cry and say, "How did this happen?" I cry and say, "I miss my grandparents." I cry and say, "I miss my mom." I cry and say, "I want to be a good mother."
As if any of my life was caused by a thing or experience I could have stopped.
As if any of my life was caused by a thing or experience I could have stopped.
I've had none of those... moments where I felt in control when I felt so very, very bad...
It's an accomplishment to feel peace in believing and hoping.
It is lovely to feel any kind of freaking peace.
It's okay to feel some peace for a few moments.
It's meditation.
It's prayer.
It's thoughtfulness.
It's healing.
And the fact that my brain can do any of that shit is wicked amazing at this point. I thought I was so far gone off the deep end, you know?
I have to confess though... I mean...
Well...
I have to say that blocking out everything with sound, with music, (stopped right up in my ears so nothing else can creep in), is the way I have to meditate at times. Yes, I'm not paying attention to my kids, or Sam, or anything, really. I'm just listening and breathing and my mind is taking a gosh darn break.
I want to stop feeling for a while, sometimes...
And that's fine.
Why do artists, over the span of humankind, write and sing songs that take us away, if they didn't mean to take us away? If they didn't mean to move us to feel then I don't understand music or art or anything at all.
I have to hide behind deafness still. I'm still a mess, really. I reconciled one truth but realized there was much more depth to it than a proclamation or a determined thought that was in my mind at a certain moment: (I'll not make myself stop being alive! Yes!) I knew I had to and have to actually be here. All of me. 100% Joanna all day, every day, all the time. I can't just lay in the bed and stare at the wall and call that an accomplishment in mommyhood. I need to be a healthy mom. I need to be Joanna.
Sigh. (Big SIGH). I don't know.
I don't know...
I just know it is nice to escape from the reality of what I need to be and should be, and not think too much... Just some times.
Some times.
Sometimes.
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