I took Zoloft and Remeron after the births of both my children to combat postpartum depression, anxiety and insomnia. At the time of the first lockdown last March, I was no longer taking either medication. For the first couple of months of pandemic life, I coasted on my mental health reserves. But at the beginning of summer, I got crushed by a major wave of anxiety. I couldn’t sleep and adrenaline pounded through my body basically nonstop.
Once I again, I found myself feeling grateful that I had had postpartum depression. Thanks to PPD, I already had a psychiatrist. Thanks to PPD, I was able to recognize my adrenalin and insomnia for what they were: a mental health crisis. And thanks to PPD, my psychiatrist and I knew exactly what medications would work for me.
I started taking Remeron again last June. That helped for a couple of weeks, until it didn’t. On July 3, it was time to recall Zoloft from inactive duty. The Zoloft quickly calmed my nervous system. My anxiety subsided. I felt like myself again.
But despite the difficulties and emotional turbulence, my mental health is in tip-top shape. Now, that’s not all about the Zoloft. I’m making a concerted effort to do the things that boost my mental health. I’m meditating, journaling, writing a novel, getting outside, gardening, cooking, exercising, connecting with friends and family, laughing, having fun with my kids, ranting to Nathan, praying, listening to happy music, listening to soothing music, knitting, crocheting, punch needling, decluttering, and I could keep going but you get the point. I am hustling to stay mentally healthy during this pandemic. I can’t simply pop some Zoloft and then ignore my mental health.
But as of March 2021, Zoloft is essential to my wellbeing. You know how in sci-fi stories the spaceships can put up invisible protective shields against enemy attacks? Those shields are never infallible, but they take a lot of abuse to give the heroes a chance to figure out a way to escape and save the universe. Zoloft has been my sci-fi protective shield during the pandemic.
I had a phone session with my psychiatrist this morning. We agreed that even though I’m doing great, now is not the time to consider weaning off my medications. There is too much stress and uncertainty in the world. I need my sci-fi invisible protective shield thingee.
Thank you, Zoloft, for keeping my mental health in tip-top shape during these epic times. Shields up. There’s plenty of uncertainty on the horizon.
I started 2021 with a lot of goals of projects, knowing that at least a few would fall by the wayside. That’s part of my process. I like to take on more projects than I can possibly handle to see which ones actually stick.
I did a January report already if you are interested in that sort of nerdiness. Now it is time to take a look at what happened with my goals and projects in the second month of 2021:
Quitting Soda: I abstained from soda until February 25. Then on February 26, I could not do it anymore. God, I missed soda. And god, have you noticed that there’s a pandemic? And as I write this, my daughter is STILL distance learning. Our district has not bothered to set a return date. It seems like everyone else has gone back. Am I whining? Maybe a little. But sometimes, when surviving a pandemic and endless distance learning, a woman just needs some goddamn soda. Even if it is caffeine-free.
They both won.
Blog Every Weekday: Done! Sometimes it takes a real effort to carve out the time for blogging, but I’m always glad when I do.
Finish the Room Novel I Started November 2020: I finished the first round of revisions last week! I’m very happy with how this book is shaping up. When will I be done revising? No freaking clue. Today I am going to start reading the latest draft and figure out my next steps. Wish me luck!
Learn French: J’aime apprendre le francais. I practiced French on Duolingo every day in February! Waouh!
Tap dance: I didn’t tap dance. At all. Maybe March is my month!
Roller skate: Pippa broke her nose in late January and could not roller skate. So there was no way I was going to roller skate. That would just be cruel.
Play the piano: Didn’t happen. I love playing the piano but it’s just not as necessary to my happiness as writing, walking and crafting.
Post on Instagram Daily: I forgot to post one day. Oops.
Walk An Average of 12,000 Steps in 2021: My February daily average was 11,932 which was EXCELLENT because I tripped and tweaked my ankle on February 5. My ankle actually recovered pretty quickly. My 2021 average is now 12,403 – a little lower than it was at the end of January, but I’ll take it.
Do A Weekly Tarot Reading: Did this. Still loving it. I love doing it on Sunday mornings.
Read 100 Books For Myself: I read nine books for myself in February. Well, I read/listened to eight books by myself and the ninth book was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, which I read to Pippa. However, Deathly Hallows counts because it is something I would have read on my own.
Do 25 “Big” Craft Projects: I finished three more punch needle projects, all for the 100 Days Project.
Try 100 New Recipes: I tried sixteen new recipes in February! I really ought to write a roundup of my favorite recipes this year…
Go Down 100 Slides: Well, with Pippa’s broken nose, playgrounds were off limits. I can hopefully whiz down a slide soon!
50 Different Places: I went to nine “different” places. There were some new-to-me places, including: a tiny public garden that I passed while dropping off Valentine treats at friends’ homes; the art studio where Pippa recently started lessons; and a ton of furniture stores (I was on a chair hunt). Then I revisited some old favorites, including the aquarium, that we were not allowed to visit thanks to the pandemic.
French Braid My Hair 100 Times: I did this exactly zero times. But I really want to learn! I just have to get over how awkward I feel trying to French braid my hair and do it already.
Exercise: I stretched every day but one in February. I started listening to audiobooks while stretching to maximize the enjoyment factor. I only did strength training three times. I fell out of the habit after hurting my ankle. Time to get back into this habit! Also, I only did cardio three times. Again #ankle. I keep testing my ankle every few days and although walking is fine, cardio just feels a bit too intense. Soon! I don’t want to reinjure myself.
Meditation: Using the Calm App, I meditated 26 times in February.
Journaling: I journaled 26 times in February.
Noom: I’m still using the Noom app and loving it more and more every day. I read the Noom articles 26 days in February. I’m starting to see a theme…
Activity Book: I worked on my next activity book on one day, the day after I finished my second draft of my room mom novel. I will not seriously dive into that book until I send my room mom novel to an editor. Or my kids go to school full time. Whichever happens first!
Geography: I studied Geography every day! I’m getting a better handle on the Oceanic nations.
Podcasting: I recorded two new episodes in February! I’m back! It feels so good to be podcasting!
Gardening: I ordered another raised bed. The kids and I watered and weeded the vegetables and herbs we had already planted. March will be big. We’ll start planting veggies for summer!
Decluttering: I made HUGE headway here. There was a huge toy disaster in the guest bedroom. The kids helped me clean that up AND voluntarily got rid of several bags of toys. Then I whipped most of our kitchen cupboards back into shape. I still have one big cupboard to conquer, and the junk drawer, but the kitchen feels so much better. It’s easy to find spices! And snacks! And everything!
Photo Albums: I did nothing. Nutter butter. I feel like I’m be able to tackle this after I finish decluttering.
Monthly Family Photo: We got a really shitty family photo when we visited Jurassic Quest but hey, it counts!
Newsletter: Another month without sending my newsletter. Oh well. I’m doing my best, folks. #pandemic
Balloon Animals: I keep forgetting to do this. Once I get started, I know it will be hilarious.
The biggest change in February was I succumbed to the siren call of soda. But I’m not going to beat myself up for that. Soda is my vice. As far as vices go, it’s not that terrible. Maybe one day I’ll quit soda for good. Maybe not. I’ll figure it out!
My son Julian is currently in his last year of preschool. He has been going in person all year, and though it is unlike any other preschool year, it has been wonderful. He is learning and playing and making friends and just generally having a grand old time.
But what about kindergarten?
He is already enrolled for kindergarten at his big sister’s public school. At the beginning of the pandemic, I thought, At least this will all be over by the time Julian starts kindergarten.
A few months passed. Pippa started distance learning in the fall. The district was talking about starting hybrid in October. And I thought, At least this will be over by the time Julian starts kindergarten.
October came and went. Distance learning plodded on. Then January arrived and still, we did not have a start date. I thought, At least hybrid will have started by the time Julian starts kindergarten!
Then the District released some information about the updated model for hybrid school in Pasadena. We were originally told last summer that hybrid would look like this: everyone on their computers for an hour on Monday; then your child goes to school with their cohort on either Tuesday/Wednesday or Thursday/Friday. They would have the other days off, presumably to do some schoolwork at home.
But the District has adjusted the hybrid plans. Apparently now the kids will go in person two days and do distance learning from home on their Chromebooks the other days. It sounds like the children will be mostly working on their computers on the days they actually go to school.
All this is hypothetical. The Pasadena Board of Education met yesterday. And though they had the time to watch presentations about “creative wellbeing” and women’s history month, they did not take the time to vote on the plan to reopen schools. They listened to the presentation from the District. And then, they didn’t vote and left the kids in limbo. Again.
My second grader is doing fine, no thanks to the Pasadena Board of Education. She is doing well thanks to her pod and the afternoon classes she is taking at some local botanical gardens. If hybrid ever freaking starts in Pasadena, we will give it a try. I suspect she will adapt and even thrive.
But Julian? My five year old? Who starts kindergarten in August?
Yeah, he can’t do distance learning for kindergarten. I know my son, and I know he will wilt and fade and suffer. Kindergarten is about playing and socializing. That does not happen on a computer. Sure, the kinders practice writing letters and do some math, but I can do that with Julian at home.
I ordered a couple of kindergarten workbooks this morning as a sort of insurance policy. If the distance learning shit show continues, it looks like I’ll become intimately familiar with home schooling. I can find Julian some afternoon classes and organize play groups. Other families will be home schooling as well.
I don’t know what kindergarten is going to look like for my son, but I know we will figure it out. It will be an adventure.
Missed Part 1 of this series? It’s right HERE. p.s. Your butt looks really cute today.
As I was saying yesterday, through journaling and therapy, I identified twenty-ish personal values. But after reading Dare to Lead by Brené Brown, I wanted to whittle that list down to two core values. I doubted I could actually do that, but I would at least give it the old college try.
Brown lists over a hundred different values and challenges the reader to choose two core values. If you have the actual book, it’s on page 188. If you don’t have the book, it’s right HERE on Brown’s website.
Yesterday, I went through the list and highlighted the values that jumped out at me:
Adventure
Authenticity
Belonging
Connection
Courage
Creativity
Curiosity
Faith
Family
Intuition
Learning
I was really surprised when I saw “adventure” on the list. I had never thought of it as a value. Sure, it’s in the name of my memoir and podcasts, but could it be my value?
I decided that “adventure” was too fun to be a core value. My values were “authenticity” and “curiosity.” I wrote that it my journal.
It did not feel right.
I looked at the list again.
Damn, my eyes kept straying toward the word “adventure.” I wrote the word “adventure” in my journal. That felt good. That felt right. I wrote the word “curiosity” again. That felt good, but not nearly as right as “adventure.” I wrote the words “adventure” and “curiosity” in my journal several more times before I could no longer deny it.
I am a very curious lady. I love my curiosity. My curiosity is one of my super powers.
But it’s not my core value.
My core values are adventure and authenticity, and writing that in a blog post feels so. effing. good. I feel like I have come home to myself. I still value my curiosity but I see that it’s a secondary value that drives my authenticity and adventure. Curiosity drives me toward being my most authentic self and prompts me to seek adventure.
The same goes for a lot of other values that I hold near and dear to my heart. Compassion? I have to be compassionate in order to be my authentic self. Courage? I have to be courageous in order to seek adventure. Intuition? Intuition is the dynamo powering my authentic, adventurous spirit.
I thought that identifying two core values would diminish my sense of self. It has, in fact, done the opposite. I know myself better now than I ever have before.
Last week I listened to the audibook of Dare to Lead by Brené Brown. The second part of the book is called Living Into Our Values and it changed my attitude about values.
I love values. I have journaled extensively about my values. I’ve talked about values with my therapist many times. I’ve probably blogged about my values here (but I don’t have the time to dig through old posts now) (please god, will distance learning ever end?) After several months of work, I identified my list of twenty-ish values. Hooray! I knew all a person could possibly know about her values.
Brown lists over one hundred possible values that a person might hold and then leaves blanks for the reader to fill in if their values are not listed. Ooh, I though, while walking to Starbucks. Maybe I can pick up some new values for my list! But there was a catch. According to Brown:
The task is to pick the two [values] that you hold most important. I know this is tough, because almost everyone we’ve done this work with (including me) wants to pick somewhere between ten and fifteen. I can soften the blow by suggesting that you start by circling those fifteen. But you can’t stop until you’re down to two core values.
Dare to Lead, pg. 187.
What the eff? Two core values? Preposterous! Maybe that works for Brown, but I have way more than two core values. But I kept listening:
[T]he research participants who demonstrated the most willingness to rumble with vulnerability and practice courage tethered their behavior to one or two values, not ten. This makes sense for a couple of reasons. First, I see it the same way that I see Jim Collins’s mandate ‘If you have more than three priorities, you have no priorities.’ At some point, if everything on the list is important, than nothing is truly a driver for you. It’s just a gauzy list of feel-good words.
Second, I’ve taken more than ten thousand people through this work, and when people are willing to stay with the process long enough to whittle their big list down to two, they always come to the same conclusion that I did with my own values process: My two core values are where all of the ‘second tier’ circles values are tested.
Id. at 187-89.
Oh. That actually makes a lot of sense. I kept listening and thinking and started to see that having twenty values is counterproductive. If I’m having a tough conversation or dealing with a tricky issue, it’s hard to think through twenty-ish values. I’m bound to forget something and will abandon the process before I’m even halfway done. I did all this work to identify my twenty-ish values … and now I hardly ever think about them because twenty-ish is just too overwhelming.
I decided to do the work and whittle my big list down to two. I’ll write more about that tomorrow. Right now, I have to go chop some veggies for the chicken curry I’m making for dinner!
This time last year, I don’t believe I had ever heard the phrase “pandemic fatigue.” Now it’s in headlines everywhere I look and I feel it in the marrow of my bones.
Pandemics are exhausting.
Before the pandemic, Nathan was not a napper. Now he almost never misses his afternoon siesta. I have gone from needing eight hours of sleep and bouncing out of bed at 6 a.m. to needing nine hours of sleep and still feeling weary when 7 a.m. comes around.
I am in the midst of a slump. Last week, I had lots of vibrant sparkling energy. But then Saturday morning, I woke up feeling utterly exhausted. Now it’s Monday and I still feel drained.
When I had postpartum depression, I often experienced a fatigue that felt as if gravity was pulling extra hard on my bones and muscles. Fatigue is now one of my depression red flags. I have been on high alert since Saturday morning and trying to ascertain whether I am in the depression zone of fatigue. After a mental health inventory, I have concluded that I am not. My mental health is chugging along merrily. My exhaustion comes from a very understandable case of pandemic fatigue.
The difference between “pandemic fatigue” and “depression fatigue” is important, so I’m going to try to be a little more precise with my experience.
When I had postpartum depression, I lost my zest for life. It was not so much that I felt too tired to do things; it was that I completely forgot about all the things I enjoy doing. I was listless, dull and apathetic. I forced myself to smile and laugh. I was disengaged from life. I was disengaged from myself.
Right now, I am tired but I have not lost my zest for life. On Saturday, I sat on the couch and looked through a bunch of library cookbooks, plotting all the recipes I want to try. Then I listened to audiobooks and worked on a punch needle project. On Sunday, despite my exhaustion, I still went out and bought a new armchair because our trusty old armchair is about to turn into a pile of ash. I am tired, but I still want to do things.
And here’s the big difference between pandemic fatigue and depression fatigue: I am writing. When I was depressed, I forgot that writing is my divine call. But I have not stopped writing during this pandemic. So long as I am writing, I know that I am not depressed.
I am just very, very, very tired of this effing pandemic.
I hate to quote a book that I have not read yet, but I just have to share something today. Here is the quote:
We are not here to fit in, be well balanced, or provide exempla for others. We are here to be eccentric, different, perhaps strange, perhaps merely to add our small piece, our little clunky, chunky selves, to the great mosaic of being. As the gods intended, we are here to become more and more ourselves.
James Hollis, What Matters Most: Living A More Considered Life.
I was listening to Dare to Lead by Brene Brown on my morning walk today when she read this quote and I immediately stopped walking and googled the quote so I could take a picture and save it. Then I added Hollis’ book to my Want To Read list on Goodreads.
I add more books to my Want To Read list than I can ever read. But damn, I have to read something by James Hollis immediately if not sooner. The word “eccentric” is really resonating with me today!
I am a total amateur when it comes to feelings. Most of my life, I have done my best to suppress my feelings. I buried my feelings with food. I am working now to build a healthier relationship with my feelings. I’m not exactly sure what that will look like. I’m an amateur here! But I am ready and excited to do this work.
I started using the Noom app last February to develop a healthier relationship with food. The Noom app has a lot of excellent lessons about feelings. I have learned a lot.
Wanting to dive even deeper into my feelings work, I recently listened to the audiobook for Permission to Feel by Marc Brackett. I learned a lot and will probably eventually read the hardback version that I bought last summer. (Alas, these days, I just don’t have the time or bandwidth for actual reading. Thank god for audiobooks!)
This is what I have learned so far about feelings and beliefs:
I am not alone in being a feelings amateur. Humans are feelings machines that think, but alas, most of us have been taught to devalue our feelings.
My feelings are not automatically good or bad.
My feelings are messengers with calls to action.
My feelings alert me to my beliefs.
I don’t want to label my feelings, but I’m happy to label my beliefs. As I pay attention to my feelings, I am learning that I have a lot of toxic beliefs.
I intend to do a lot more writing and talking about my toxic beliefs. I went to Catholic school for twelve years and I can’t tell you how many times we learned about Eve eating the apple from the Tree of Knowledge. Women have been blamed for the sins of humanity for thousands of years. It’s bullshit, but it’s going to take some hard work to eradicate that shit from my subconscious.
I do not want to go through life weighed down by beliefs that I did not consciously choose. My feelings are an awesome tool to help me find the beliefs I do not want to keep.
I have been suppressing my feelings for so long, I do it automatically. I have to work at actually noticing my feelings before I suppress them. This will take time and patience. It’s going to be messy and awkward. But this is work I want to do.
Pippa has been in a pod with two boys from her second grade class since the beginning of the school year. We meet at one family’s host because they have the perfect setup: a lanai, which is half-room, half-porch, and a babysitter who supervises the kids. This means I do not have to hover over Pippa for every minute of distance learning, which has been a godsend to us both.
At the end of Thanksgiving week, we learned that someone connected to Julian’s preschool class had tested positive for Covid-19. Out of an abundance of caution, pod went on hiatus for the rest of 2020.
In January, Pasadena had a Covid-19 surge. Our pod hosts were not comfortable bringing back pod — which I totally get and respect — so for the month of January, Pippa was stuck at home with her boring parents for distance learning.
It was soul-crushing for all parties involved, but I was most concerned about Pippa. My girl loves to be around other kids and day after day, she watched her brother skip off to preschool while she booted up her Chromebook. One morning, she told me, “I wish I wasn’t alive.”
Our hosts were still not ready to restart pod, but I knew Pippa had reached her breaking point. I asked the other pod mom, Hey, do you want to bring your son here next week for mini-pod? She enthusiastically accepted. (And she would have hosted herself, but she lives with her parents, and her mom has some health issues.)
For two days last week, we hosted bi-pod. On Wednesday, Pippa’s friend arrived and they were immediately bouncing off the walls with energy. Within seconds, Pippa’s inner light was brighter than ever. On Thursday, her friend came again for our class Valentine’s Day celebrations and they played Bingo and opened cards together. My heart was very, very full.
Then our host family announced they were ready to resume pod. HALLELUJAH! Yesterday, after a restorative four-day weekend, Pippa returned to pod. The kids picked up right where they had been last November in their elaborate make believe game they have been playing since August. My daughter is happy again.
Pippa still can’t wait to return to school, but for now, her pod is giving her mental health a very necessary boost. I am going to do everything in my powers throughout this ordeal to keep her connected with kids her age.
