Finding Solid Ground

It’s wild seeing how much I had to dig up of myself. It’s as if I spent years just standing in sinking sand of others’ ideals and opinions of me.

I wasn’t a sponge since it wasn’t a case of willingly and openly absorbing all of those expectations, more like that sinking impending doom. It didn’t feel right, it was gradual at first and the further in I got the more panicked I became. The more I fought, the more futile it was made to feel until I came to accept it.

I won’t just lie down, but I’ll stop fighting it cause this is life now and at some point it’ll consume me. Might as well enjoy the view.

People would meet me here, but it was normal so there wasn’t a need to pull me out. I mean I had accepted where I was.

I see now, how much I was affected, how much I was truly waiting on a lifeline. A sign that somehow I’d be free of all this weight pulling me under, but I stopped looking, cause it obviously didn’t exist.

It was after having my firstborn that I realized I wasn’t ready to stay as I was, but how? I was already too far. That desperation hit hard and although I wanted out, I saw no way.

Postpartum, though at the time I didn’t realize was taking a toll. I didn’t know I had it, cause I loved my kid and didn’t think of harming him, but the overwhelming feel of failure and unworthiness I felt I was to him had me physically withering away.

Could anyone see me? I’m just overthinking it? I wasn’t hiding under a rock. I was out and was ‘me’. I was advised on many occasions how ‘blessed’ and ‘lucky’ I was to bounce back.

20 lbs underweight withering…

I’m okay…

Bawling in the shower…

I need to get over myself…

Such an amazing kid…

I’m the issue

I’m grateful to Charlene for throwing me a lifeline! For that simple suggestion opened my eyes to the fact that there truly was more. The emphasis on how ‘I’ was doing. Not my baby, but me? I was allowed to feel something other than pure bliss? Something foreign. There was more to life than remaining in the environment I was in.

The physical move made space for my mental growth. I was on unfamiliar ground and was free to get my Ms. Frizzle on.

Make mistakes and get messy.

Learn and grow. Away from the ideals that would constantly reel me back to neutral, I was able to just be. I finally was on stable ground to create boundaries. I was finally able to have a safe space.

Within a year, my weight had returned, and the negative thoughts had quieted. In no way was everything easy, but I was finally standing!

It took 6 years and another pregnancy to realize I had experienced postpartum depression because I didn’t feel I looked like the extreme examples I was used to seeing.

If you feel off but not sure, do yourself a favour and speak to someone! Even more so someone operating from outside your immediate surroundings. They may be the lifeline you need to get you out of that sunken place.