Hiding in Plain Sight

Know how life bumbles along and bumbles along, and things like politics and clean laundry and a dog-hair-free floor seem to matter until all of a sudden something cataclysmic happens and the world just stops and the only thing that matters is that the person you love keeps breathing?  Yeah, it has been that kind of week.

For the most part, I haven't talked about it.  But then, that is the problem, isn't it?  There is this hidden illness that nobody talks about but so many confront every day.  This disease that kills and maims and reduces life to misery and is very, very real.  It's been a part of my life since I met my husband, much as he and I both tried to sweep it under the rug.  And it became very, very real to us both a week ago last Thursday.

Depression.  For so long, I just didn't understand.  Perhaps I still don't.   But until people open up and talk about it like they do any other disease (diabetes, cancer, heart failure) wonderful people like my husband will go without help, not understanding themselves, and not understood by those who love them most. 

We tried.  For years, we tried.  I asked Julio to get help.  I begged him to talk to someone other than me.  "Choose happiness", I'd say.  "Home is where you are", I'd blabber.

But I completely missed the point. 

He could no more choose happiness than a patient with leukemia can just tell all those blasts where to go.

After a few years, he finally relented and sought help.  Only, the help he got wasn't enough.  The meds were working, but none of us; not his doctors, not me, not even himself took it seriously enough.  We didn't talk about it outside our family.  We kept it hidden, attempted to deal with its ramifications all by ourselves. 

Until we couldn't.  

We can't not talk about it anymore.  We can't keep it between us, and take the medications as prescribed.  They aren't enough.  We're fighting, but the disease is fighting back.  

September 19th at 10:30 pm, I thought it had won.  It tried to take his life, and so very nearly succeeded.  

But we prevailed.  Life and love and luck and medicine came through.  His life was saved thanks to the ICU and ventilators.  And now, we're talking about it.  Too many people suffer, too many families hide in shame, pretending everything is okay, that no disease clouds their lives.  It is time to bring this very real disease, with its very real life-threatening complications out of hiding so that it can be vanquished and controlled.  

Julio wants to live.  He wants to get better.  He does not want this disease to permeate our lives, tear us apart, isolate us from those we love.  He's fighting back, and I'm alongside of him.  We're not doing it alone.  We can't.

Happy Birthday, Honey

Mi corazon,

It has been seven years since we first celebrated your birthday together over a pitcher of beer in MacWen's. That feels like a life-time ago, yet only yesterday.

You had fewer gray hairs, then, though you've always been distinguished. I was barely a woman, and definitely not the same person as I am today. Had we known then where we'd be now, would we have looked at each other differently that night? I remember the feel of your hand in mine; so new and still trembling. I remember feeling so, so lucky to be allowed to hug you, to be the girl to kiss the birthday boy.

Remember that first camping trip we took for your birthday that weekend? The botched tent, the cold night, the tuna and crackers? I've never been so grateful for duct tape, I'll tell you that. The laguna and las cascadas and the paramo, all so perfect.

We've grown and changed as individuals. We've grown and changed as a couple, learning about real love, deep sadness, true happiness.

Seven years later, I'm so incredibly blessed to be the wife that hugs you, the woman to kiss the birthday man.

Happy Birthday, mi vida. I'm ready to celebrate one more year with a bottle of wine and a lot of love,

For always,
tu indiecita

Perhaps Progress?

I'm knocking on wood and keeping my lips sealed, but perhaps there is progresss in the you-know-what?



Remember being about 5 years old and thinking the the days couldn't go any slower, that your birthday would never get here, that Christmas was years away, and you totally didn't believe your mom when she told you that someday, life would go by much faster?

Yeah, well, I believe my mom now.
How in the hell is it Friday already? I haven't done even the bare minimum on my to-do list this week, and it is already time to start it again. We have company coming tonight (who might beat me home) and the sheets on the guest bed need changing, the floors need vacuuming, there is a laundry back-up, and both bathrooms need cleaning. Boo. Can't time just slow down a little bit? I mean, not so I get to enjoy the infancy of my daughter or spend hours laughing with my spouse, or to use time to figure out how to fix health care or world peace or something. No, just so I can get housework done. Priorities, people.

I have been taking time for me, or at least attempting. This is hard in a world where Monday seems to come right after Wednesday, when July feels like Christmas is just around the corner (and seriously, it is! and there is so much to do!) I have successfully managed to take at least half an hour a day for myself, to work out for myself 6 days this week. That is a milestone. It is liberating to be able to walk without singing "Itsy Bitsy Spider" while doing the motions and pushing a stroller trying to entertain an increasingly fussy infant who is done with the walk before I am (picture that on a busy street, passing lots of people. entertaining, it is not). Sometimes, I even have thoughts of my own. Or at least time for my brain to relax.

Why, then, do I feel selfish if Sofia has woken up already when it is time for my walk? Because I do. And most times, I take her, and I want to take her. I wish I had the luxury of needing to get away from her, but I don't. The hours I'm at work are away from her as I have to be. That's probably why we haven't really gotten a babysitter or had a date (we HAVE had a date. three times. In one year). Any minute of home time not spent with my daughter is a waste of precious, precious time.

So, I'm back to begging the universe for just one more day a week. Couldn't the Earth turn just a little slower? Give me one more day for to be with my daughter?
Or vacuum. Dog hair doesn't clean itself, you know.

Sleep

or rather, the lack there of, for me, my husband, and most notably, Sofia. Boy, are you going to be tired of hearing about sleep.

We go from having one great night to one horrible night. Last night falls in the horrible category. She was up, literally, every half an hour. Wanting to nurse. No, insisting to nurse. Loudly. In that cry that makes me want to move mountains to be by her side. Or make it go away, anyway. I acquiesced the first three or four times (really, who's counting) but finally at 3 am, I refused. I held her, I cuddled, I hushed, I gave her her pacifier. I told her it wasn't time to nurse, it was time to sleep, and to my immense surprise, she laid her head on my shoulder and fell asleep. So, I put her in her crib.
You would have thought I was trying to kill her, the noise she made. So I said goodnight and forced myself out the door. Hubby (dear, dear hubby) wakes up. He goes to her room. He brings her to me, asking if she had nursed.
Me: "YES!"
Him: when? It's 3 am already.
Sofia: RRRRROARRRR
Me: at 2:freaking30!
So, he takes her and I hear crying, and I cringe in my bed, forcing myself not to go nurse her. Then, she gets quiet, and eventually I fall asleep.
And then, the dream. I'm on a walk. Across the country. With my sisters. Suddenly, I realize that I left Sofia at home, alone, upstairs. I start running. And running. And not only do I have to run, but I'm being chased. And I have to dodge my predators and get through all these traps. Finally, I almost reach home, and see Sofia coming toward me. Only she isn't whole--something happened to her legs and her body. I had failed her.
Think my subconscious is telling me something?
So, I just don't know what to do. She is ONE.YEAR.OLD. That is plenty old enough not to nurse at night, plenty old enough to sleep all night long. But, I don't want to deny her if she is actually in need. What if she's getting sick and just wants mom? What if her teeth hurt? What if she's missing me and just wants to be reassured? Do I keep up nursing? Do I put my foot down?
All I know is, I get another cup of coffee. at 2pm.

Irony

So, the day I dare speak the words "she slept through the night" we get a night with a one-year-old waking every hour. Bah. I will never utter praise for her sleeping habits again, lest I jinx them. She woke up bright-eyed and bushy tailed. Julio and me? Not so much. Thank goodness it is Friday.
Think work would mind if I just took a short snooze?

Bitter

Sofia has always been a waker. As is, not a sleep-through-the-nighter. She's over one year old now, and consistently waking twice a night. To nurse, always to nurse. Imagine my surprise and glee when I heard the first cries at 6:20 am this morning. That would be one entire night of sleep for me; uninterrupted for 7 hours. Heaven.
So, we nursed, as usual, and she fell back asleep, as usual. I got up, cleaned up the kitchen from last night (yes, we are lazy at times), made the morning pot o' joe, and did my workout.
Afterwards, I poured myself a mug and relaxed in the livingroom with my husband, listening to the radio news, and rolling our eyes at the debacle of the RNC.
Perfect beginning to the day.

If Sofia wakes talking and happy, she's ready for the day. If she wakes in tears, she is ready for a nap. So, when I heard her crying at just past 8, I braced myself. She immediately wanted to nurse, so we snuggled in on the couch. Then, she spotted it.
The mug.
She pulled off, pointing and groping toward the coffee table. I relented, and gave her a sip.
All smiles.
My girl, she needs her morning cuppa, as well. Breast milk, well, that just doesn't cut it. The sweet, nourishing mama love holds nothing over the bitter taste of morning.

Positivity

I've been fresh out of ideas about anything, lately. Life keeps coming full-speed and thinking about anything other than what's for dinner, what errands need running before getting home and playing on the floor with puzzles and books with a certain 1 year old has been pushed to the side. So, when I found a challenge at Zoot's I thought I'd play along.

In the midst of all the polarity and politics and general crankiness, what makes you happy? What caused a laugh or a smile or a feeling of contentedness?

1. My dog eating flies. We had the screen door open this weekend, and it is a hoot to watch my lab hunt flies. Seriously funny.

2. My little girl walking across the livingroom, then divebombing into my arms in a fit of glee.

3. Trying to salsa with my husband in the kitchen. Except that the music was technically merengue.

4. Having morning coffee on the new chairs on my deck.

5. The fact that I have worked out every day this week.

6. Barak Obama (you know I had to be a little political)

7. Rocking my sweaty, sleepy, cuddly baby to sleep.

8. Raspberry jello

9. The thought of seeing not only my parents and sister this weekend, but also some very dear friends.

10. Choosing to be happy.