post partum follow up

here's a fun picture of me that just shows how behind the times i am , as i am literally the last person on the planet to get snapchat, hahaha

so i wanted to write again to follow up on the post part anxiety post i wrote awhile back.  it has been an interesting last two months.  at first, after the doctor told me my options, i really wanted to try to work through it without meds.  i had a plan to exercise, meditate, practice mindfulness, pray consistently, talk to people, have play dates, etc.  i worked out for about 2.5 weeks and i did meditate and practice mindfulness when i could.  i was very consistent with prayer.  i did feel a little better, my mood lifted a bit, although i still felt lots of anxiety.  i noticed that exercise really helped just in general with my mood.  but the thing that sucks, and this is probably part of the problem, is that when you are a stay at home parent with no kind of alternative childcare, you don't really have that much free time in which to spend on yourself to do things like meditate (imagine trying to do a guided meditation while the kids are napping and then inevitably almost every time one of them wakes up screaming or crying and jolts you out of your super peaceful floating sensation), or exercise (imagine exercising using T25 and you are super sweaty and your toddler keeps climbing all over you or under you when you are trying to do burpees or your infant wakes up crying from her nap and you have to go nurse her while sweat drips down your chest), or any number of activities that are supposed to help with anxiety, while still trying to be present with your children and get stuff done around the house.  it is not easy.  and so, after taking z to his 3 year old doctor appointment with our family doctor, she asked me how i was doing, i confessed i hadn't tried the meds yet because i was trying to do all the other things, and that it wasn't going that well because i just didn't have enough time.  and she said that was fine, but that if i decide to take the medication, that doesn't mean i failed.  that's what it is there for, and sometimes we need help temporarily.  so, after that and after chatting with some other mamas that have taken or are still taking the same anxiety med, i decided to give it a try.  and it has been a month so far, which is the amount of time it takes for the med to reach it's full level in the body and is working fully.  there were a few side effects that initially were present but that went away after my body got used to the med.  so anyway, i'm at that point now where it is fully working.  and i did feel relief very quickly from the chest crushing anxiety.  like, literally it felt as if my chest was released from a vice.  i no longer have panic attacks when i think about going to an event with my kiddos, or the strange panic i felt most evenings, or the certainty that i felt about something terrible and tragic happening to one or all of us.  i still feel pretty irritable and short-tempered a lot of the time, but i think that must just be my nature, haha.  actually, i think being sleep deprived plays a major role in this.  on the days that i am really tired, i just have no patience, and on the days i have slept a little more i feel a little more able to parent.  i still am spending time praying and i'd like to make more time to meditate and exercise.  i'm hoping that when z goes to preschool i will have a little more time to do that.  it's hard to find time to do everything; raise the kids, maintain the house, make meals, take the kids on playdates, keep up with the damn laundry.  i feel like those things take up most of my day.  and that is because i choose for it to be that way, i understand.  the kids have a pretty good routine and i try to stick to that as much as possible so that they feel anchored and they know what to expect.  the weeknights are pretty hectic with dinner, baths, bedtime, and usually after the kids go to sleep i'm so tired usually that i have no energy to get anything done on my to-do list.  and the weekends are full; chores, whatever birthday parties or activities are going on, grocery shopping, projects, laundry, study circles, Bahai children's classes, etc.  i feel like right now, i just need to be cool with the fact that i don't have the opportunity to have a lot of free time, and take advantage of the spare minutes here and there that i do get.  like hubs will relieve me of bedtime duties with z on the days that ava goes to sleep easily at night, so that i can have some free time in the evening and i appreciate that so much.  and i'm sure i can ask my folks to take z more often on the weekend days, they love spending time with him.  but in general, i feel like i need to really enjoy the time that i do get, and relish the activities that i am involved in.  for instance, the weekly study circle that i facilitate; i usually feel so uplifted afterwards due to the spiritual nature of the content we are discussing.  and so i need to really use that time as a source of fuel to my energy tank, haha.  i guess what i'm saying is that there are small opportunities in the day and week that i can use better to get re-energized, to feel like i've had some time to do something i want to do for myself, to feel like i have had a little free time, to feel like i am doing something besides being with the kids 20 hours a day (which is meritorious in itself, i know, and i want to write about that in another post), to feel like i have some piece of my identity back, and i can do this if i change my attitude about it, and i do this sometimes but want to do this all the time.

today, i was playing with ava and thinking, "man, she is already 9 months old i can't believe how quickly the time went, i wish i would have savored more the time when she was 3 months, 6 months etc, but just didn't have the time or couldn't be completely focused on just her".  i know this time is but a fraction in their and my lives and at moments i am already missing and longing for their infant-hood.  so i'm trying to be conscience of that on the daily and really appreciate the moments during the day and in the middle of the night (haha) with them at this age.  and that helps.

soon z will be in preschool and i will have a little bit of time with just ava.  that will be nice.  and hopefully i can use that time to exercise, or offer service to the community, or work on projects.  i will mix it up.  i'm pretty excited about it.

but anyway, the anxiety is better, i'm still working on it, and i'm still working on not being grumpy.  i'm still working on finding time for myself.  basically, i'm still a major work in progress, hahaha!  but this is life!  and i'm thankful for it!  there are so many things i want to do and work on still!

and i want to thank everyone that commented or sent me messages or called me, about my previous post about anxiety.  i really appreciated the understanding, the positive comments, the advice, and the personal stories.  it makes me feel like i do have a village.  and that i'm not going insane, that other people struggle with this as well.  and that raising kids, being attentive and spending time, teaching, giving of yourself as a parent over and over and over is just hard and exhausting and at times frustrating, and everyone else no matter if they work out of the home or stay at home with the kids, are experiencing the same challenges.

so, thank you!