- A rainy day, to keep the Southern California drought away
- A roof over our head to keep away the rain
- Baking Thanksgiving dishes with my kids (oh, I can’t wait to eat this sweet potato casserole tomorrow!)
- Snuggles with Pippa and Julian
- A husband who understands that sometimes I just need some alone time after the kids go to bed
- Our new fish swimming around our new aquarium
- Warm fuzzy socks
- Lavender hand lotion
- The dishwasher which has done overtime today
- And lastly, I am grateful for gratitude, because the simple act of thinking about my blessings always makes my heart soar.
Monthly Archives: November 2019
Coming Soon: Adventures With My Forties
I turned forty years old last January. A few months later, an idea bubbled to the surface of my conscious: I should start a podcast about being a woman in my forties.
No! I thought. I don’t have time! Besides, I had just ended my first podcast, Adventures with Postpartum Depression, and it felt like I would be betraying my first show if I launched a new one so quickly.
But the idea would not leave me alone. There were a lot of things I wanted to talk about that did not feel appropriate for Adventures with Postpartum Depression. I created that show to help women in the darkness of a maternal mental illness. But now, as my experience with postpartum depression becomes a hazier memory, I want to talk about the things that are currently helping me feel like my best self, but these are not topics I would necessarily want to discuss with a postpartum other.
For example, I recently quit soda and in the past month, I feel healthier. My skin has a little extra glow and when I wake up in the morning, I have more energy. But if I am talking to a woman who has a maternal mood disorder, I’m not going to tell her to quit soda! That mom needs to hear about very, very different things – things I discussed already on my first podcast. I
So I am starting a new podcast to share all the things, like quitting soda, that I am doing to feel like my best self. The show is called Adventures with my Forties because I want to consciously and intentionally this stage of my life. I have already recorded the first four episodes and once I take care of a few logistics, the show will be ready to go. Woot woot!
I am excited for this new adventure!
What Are Your Values?
I assumed I knew what my values were, but when the subject came up in therapy recently, I froze. Values? Huh. What the bleep are my values?
For the next few days, I thought, Oh fuck, I’m forty years old and I don’t know what my values are. Sure, I can rattle off a few big important words like “love” and “joy” but seriously, what the eff are my values???
I started journaling about my values, convinced it would take me years to sort this out. But after a month of work, I am feeling better. I have a better understanding of what my values actually are. Or, more accurately, I subconsciously knew what many of my values were, but I had not yet taken the time to think and classify them as such. It feels good to have done that work.
In no particular order, here is my current list of values:
- Being healthy and fit. For me, “being healthy” includes physical, emotional, psychological and spiritual health.
- Paying attention and being curious.
- Living my life consciously and intentionally.
- Being authentic.
- Answering my inner divine call.
- Doing the work! By “work,” I mean the work that I must do in order to be my best self.
- Doing my best, whatever that means at any given moment.
- Being compassionate and merciful with others and myself.
- Going slow and with the flow. (Though I am still figuring out when I want to go with the flow, and when I need to be conscious and intentional about directing the flow of my life.)
- Being connected to others.
- Embracing change and uncertainty.
- Being impeccable with my word.
I do not think these are all of my values. Now that I am curious about my values (see Value #2), I expect I’ll keep adding values to the list. Also, as I accumulate life experiences, I’ll have more wisdom to draw upon, and that wisdom will shed further light on what I do and do not value.
I am also far from living my values my perfectly. (Value #1, ahem, needs considerable work.) But now that I have a better handle on my values, I have noticed in my journaling that when I feel uncomfortable, it is often because my actions are not in line with my values. Hopefully by knowing my values, I can get better at consciously and intentionally (Value #3!) living in line with them.
But always, I try to remember Value #8: being compassionate and merciful with others and myself. I am going to make mistakes. Lots and lots of messy mistakes. When I make a mistake and life in discord with my values, I hope I can be compassionate and merciful with myself, take a deep breath, and keep trying to do my best (Value #7).
Remeron Weaning, Take 4
I have had such a long, epic relationship with Remeron, generic for the anti-anxiety medication Mirtazipane, that I had to look through old blog entries to reconstruct my timeline. I am about to wean off it again and could not for the life of me remember if this would be the third or fourth attempt.
It’s the fourth.
I am going to blatantly plagiarize my blog post from April 2019 to reconstruct my timeline:
- I started taking Remeron in July 2013 when I was first diagnosed with postpartum depression. I took it at bedtime and it definitely helped me sleep. I wrote all about it in my memoir, Adventures with Postpartum Depression.
- My first psychiatrist yanked me off Remeron and Zoloft in February 2015 when I learned I was pregnant with my second child.
- When Julian was born in November 2015, I started taking Zoloft again. My new psychiatrist and I decided that I could wait on the Remeron.
- Three months after Julian was born, I started experiencing increased anxiety and insomnia. I tried to tough it out then realized I was being a martyr for no good reason. I called my psychiatrist and we decided to (1) bump my dose of Zoloft from 100 mg to 150 and (2) put me back on 15 mg of Remeron at bedtime.
- I took Remeron for a year or so and then my psychiatrist and I decided I was ready to wean off Zoloft and Remeron.
- I weaned off Remeron and was off it for several months but then, early 2017, when I made some dietary changes (quitting sugar, reducing carbs), I noticed a surge in anxiety at bedtime. Along with the anxiety came insomnia.
- I realized that I had been numbing some unaddressed anxiety with food, so I went back on Remeron for the rest of 2017. I did a lot of journaling to work through the anxiety and food issues.
- About six or seven months ago, in Fall 2018, I started weaning off Remeron for the third time. By the end of 2018, I was sleeping beautifully sans mirtazipane and assumed I did not need the drug anymore.
Whew. So that brings us through December 2018 and what I thought was the end of my relationship with Remeron. But my old friend insomnia returned in mid-January 2019. It took me about two months to realize I had insomnia. Let me recap:
- First, my shoulder went out on January 13, 2019 the day after I turned 40. The timing felt like a cosmic joke. I started having trouble getting enough sleep. I blamed my sleep issues on my shoulder pain.
- Then I had a cold. I took Tylenol PM and Nyquil and got enough sleep.
- Shoulder pain and insomnia continued. When the cold was over, I blamed the latter on the former.
- Shoulder pain was brought under control, but I was still having trouble getting enough sleep. I would fall asleep easily enough but wake up and stay awake for hours and hours. Some nights, I’d be up from 2-5 a.m. Some nights, I was just up until it was time to start my day.
- I decided I needed to wean off caffeine. I always sleep better when I’m off caffeine.
- Another cold. More Nyquil.
- Finally, by mid-March 2019 I was fully off caffeine.
- But still, I was not getting enough sleep.
- I realized I needed to go back on Remeron.
I have been back on Remeron since mid-March 2019, and though I have only been taking it for seven months, I feel ready to wean again. A couple months ago, I started taking a magnesium supplement called Calm at bedtime. My primary physician recommended I take it when I told her that I fall asleep fine but have trouble getting back to sleep if I wake up during the night. Apparently, for a woman, this type of sleep issue can be related to a magnesium deficiency. An hour before bedtime, I stir a quarter teaspoon of the powder supplement into an ounce or two of hot water. I drink it like its tea, and I have noticed a remarkable improvement in my quality of sleep since adding the supplement to my bedtime routine.
So. Deep breath. It is time for me to wean off Remeron for the fourth time. We shall see what happens this time around. As I have told myself before, I will take the medications I need to take in order to feel like my best self, stigma be damned. But I do not want to take medications if I can make lifestyle changes to manage my symptoms.
I feel like I am at the beginning of a transformation. I quit soda. I started hot yoga. And I found the Calm supplement. Maybe this time I will wean myself off Remeron and stay off it for more than few months. Who knows? This might be the last time I ever wean off Remeron.
Here’s the weaning plan:
- I alternate between a full dose of 7.5 mg and a half dose of 3.75 for two weeks.
- Then, I’ll take the half dose every night for two weeks.
- Then I’ll take a half dose every other night for two weeks. On the off nights, I will just take the Calm supplement. (I will take the Calm supplement every night regardless.)
- Then. I’m done.
We shall see what happens next! I have not scheduled a follow-up appointment with my psychiatrist. She suggested we leave it open and I can get in touch with her if I feel the need. I love her faith and trust in my ability to monitor my health. I love that I trust myself to do this as well!
p.s. I drafted this post on Halloween, an hour after my appointment with my psychiatrist. This is being posted a bit later though because hey, Halloween + Mom Life.