Graves

 Going to visit my father-in-law's grave is a special thing we do. My husband's mother and sisters meet us at our house and it's nearly an hour's drive from there. We get better and better at finding his gravestone every time. We've learned to recognize that it's about two rows up and to the left of that gnarled tree. My kids love to run free and have learned not to step on the gravestones. The rest of us sit by his grave and talk about all the things we love about this kind, gentle, quiet, playful man who slipped out of our lives after a decade long battle with Parkinson's disease.

While my husband and his sisters wandered off to join the kids this particular afternoon, my mother-in-law and I worked with a flat-edged tool to remove any dirt from the letters of his name. When our task was finished, we started making our way over to the rest of the family. The name on one of the gravestones stopped me in my tracks, however. It was a good friend of mine from growing up. I had heard he had died and had never been able to gather enough information to know what had happened. My memories of him were pleasant, happy, fun. He told me once in high school that you could avoid brain freeze by grabbing your neck with both of your hands after you drank something cold.

So here he was, my old friend, just a dozen yards from my father-in-law, in his final resting place. It was so strange and unnerving to know he was gone from life at just 30. But I wasn't sure which of us was better off. Death seemed to promise a release from the mental anguish, the heavy emotions that I spent my days fighting off only for them to return a few days, a couple weeks later. I spent nearly every moment of every day fighting to be the kind of wife, the kind of mom, the kind of friend and individual that it was so important to me to be. And every day, despite my most determined efforts, she was slipping farther and farther away. I was so tired. I craved rest.

I had probably indulged these thoughts for less than a minute when I realized they would be classified as suicidal. Wow, I thought, taking a mental step back. I never thought I'd be here again. Life and I had done so many wonderful things together since I had battled thoughts of suicide at 20. I was a little less alarmed than the first time I was exposed to them, because I could classify them, see them for what they were. But, wow. Wow. So it's gotten that bad now, has it?

Thinking back a few weeks, though, I remembered saying something really alarming to Danilo. I started calling what happens to me when I am overwhelmed by mental anguish "a storm in my brain." One afternoon, we were driving and I was trying to explain what it felt like to him. "Even though I know better, I feel like no one cares about me. Like I matter to no one. You could line a whole room of people up that told me otherwise, but I wouldn't be able to process it. This is why people kill themselves!"

I determined that yes, these experiences were enough to say that suicidal thoughts was a symptom I was currently dealing with. I'd done it before. I hoped I would make it out on the other side this time. Even though I thought all my strength was gone, I was going to have to dig down deep and find some more. 


Next Chapter: Hope
    

Emotional Midget

My mom has this cousin named Dan. Before we go any further, I need you to know that I belong to the type of family where you know your mom's cousins quite well. They are like bonus aunts and uncles and their kids are bonus cousins. And when you're little, they teach you important things at family picnics, like how to mislead people into thinking they have a stain on their shirt and then to knick them in the nose when they look down to check.

Dan married the truly lovely Shauna early enough in my childhood that I don't ever remember her not being there. Their growing family began with twin boys and all the fun and rough-housing you imagine that would entail. They were blessed in the years that followed with Jessica, Jaide, and Jaicee.

Visiting through the years, the boy influence prevailed. I remember one summer one of the twins running in the house stunned, noticeably shaken as he confessed to his dad that he'd been going fast enough on the 4-wheeler to overturn it. His dad sternly emphasized how lucky he was to be alive.

We were visiting a few years ago after the twins had grown and were out of the house. Feigning his disgust in a classically hysterical Dan manner, he talked about what living in a house full of women had done to him now that he was surrounded by only daughters.

"There's barely any of me left," he said. "They have reduced me to an emotional midget." He winked as he pulled one of his daughters close and kissed her on the cheek.  

  ******

 

One day she finally grasped that

unexpected things were always

going to happen in life.

And with that she realized

the only control she had was

how she chose to handle them.

So she made the decision to

survive using courage, humor and

grace. She was the queen of her

own life and the choice was

hers.

-Lupytha Hermin

I remember the day I discovered this quote. My friend Amber had posted it on her Facebook wall. It was a breath of invigorating air. I had never read something that rang so true to who I wanted to be. I remembered seeing a print option on my smart phone whenever a picture was displayed, and so I used it this time. I was pleasantly amused to find the quote lying there waiting for me when I got to the printer. I knew where I wanted it to go. 

Unloading the dishwasher was something I could expect to do at least every other day if not every single day. And this quote would hang on the inside of the cabinet door where the plates were stored, so that every time I was loading plates back into the cupboard I could remember and hopefully become that kind of woman.

I loved that quote.

******

  

I wrote to a friend, "I can be fine one day and in utter complete despair the next. It's nice in that I do come up for air, but I feel like I have been programmed, as optimistic as I try to be, to know I won't be able to maintain it, to know it will only be a matter of time til I end up in that pit again. So I try to prepare, and write myself nice letters to strengthen my faith and cheer me up when I go down there. But without fail, it is hell down there. I lose my confidence. I lose everything that holds me together, no nice song or picture or quote or even scripture has ever worked to encourage me when I am down there. When I am down there, it doesn't matter how many times I have come back up, I am certain that I will never come back up again."

These words swirled through my mind at the end of another day I had survived by trudging along.  My energies were focused on my next goal, an emptied dishwasher. I opened the cupboard door, ready to shovel clean plates in, and knew what was hanging on the other side. 

I hated that quote. 

It was everything I wanted to be. Everything I tried to be every moment of every day. But I did not handle the difficulties of life with courage, humor, and grace. Minor inconveniences crushed me. It hung there on the cabinet door, mocking me.

I was an emotional midget.


Next Chapter: Graves

Kitchen

It had something to do with dinner the next day.

A minor argument concerning something like what time the family was coming over to eat. The type of discussion couples should be able to toss back and forth with ease.

Ease was not a concept I comprehended these days. Everything was so hard.

"Forget about feeding people tomorrow. You may have to institutionalize me tonight," I screamed into his shoulder, punching it over and over. Not in anger, but in desperation. I noticed my little girl standing in the hallway watching.

I wasn't ashamed, I wasn't embarrassed, I was in the fight of my life and I was giving it all I had. If I never came out of the deep, let her know at least that much. That I gave it the fight of my life.

Pausing outside her room a few minutes later, I heard my husband talking to my little girl. "Mommy's feeling overwhelmed right now. Do you know what that means? A lot of things have upset her lately and she's trying to figure it all out. Not you, you didn't do anything wrong. But that's why she was so upset. That's why she was talking that way. But we're going to help her and love her and she's going to be okay."

Even in my vale of sorrow, I recognized how grateful I was for this moment. That my husband thought to speak to my little girl. Sure it was humbling to hear myself being talked about in this way, but I felt gratitude for his providing stability that I could not in that moment.

*****

This experience has provided me a foundation to talk to my little girl about the presence of depression in my life ever since. 

When she wants to know what a therapist is, why I'm visiting one. What that medicine is that I take every day.

"Well, when most people get sad, they get normal sad. But did you know your mind and your feelings can also get sick? What would make a person feel a little sad sometimes makes Mom feel much bigger than normal sad. Kind of like you saw that night in the kitchen. And the medicine and talking with the therapist is how I take care of myself so I don't get really, really, really sad, or to help me when I do. And everything that we're talking about here? It's called depression."


Next Chapter: Emotional Midget

Church Parking Lot

It was a Wednesday night. It should have been a happy one, too. But I was alone in my car sobbing into the steering wheel.

I had kissed my husband and kids goodbye that night with the hopes of having a truly fun women's night at the church. Oh how I had struggled lately just to meet the tasks of day to day life without unraveling. Sitting around with women I had gone to church with for the last five years sounded like a nice diversion. I loved them and they loved me. Of that I was sure.

Determined to get what I hoped to out of the evening, I sat down at a table with women of varied ages. What I didn't realize was I had lived in the neighborhood far less time than any of them. And the conversation involved stories about neighbors who had since moved away, stories about things that had happened before I lived here. When they would discuss someone I did know, it became obvious that I did not know them enough, because no I did not know that her mother worked at the bakery with so and so's mother back in the 70s and 80s.

I had genuinely tried to interject, ask questions seven or eight times and still felt entirely disconnected from the conversation. My comments on the yummy eclairs or darling cookies went practically unnoticed. For 35 minutes I remained silent and decided the fact that my seat had been at this table this night didn't matter to anybody sitting there. The familiar process of unraveling began again. Without saying goodbye, I quietly pushed in my chair and went out to the dark car.

I cried, and I cried, and I cried.

What in the world is wrong with me? I thought.

I knew I was being overly sensitive. Incredibly childish.

No one was being malicious, they just had a lot to reminisce about. On a normal day, I could have just sat back and listened, picked up a little more knowledge about the history of the area I now called home. Or if I really wanted to be a part of a conversation, I could have gotten up and moved to a new table.

If it had been intentional, and that group of women truly were on a mission to ignore me all night, I thought how I awesome it would have been if my inner response had been, that's okay! Your loss!

But instead, here I was spilling tears all over my lap and interior of my car.

I had a hard time believing I mattered to anyone. What a strange, awful thought.

But it consumed me for the next several days.

I want to provide a disclaimer here because of how much I love the women I go to church with. This story is meant more to illustrate my depressed state of mind.


Next Chapter: Kitchen

Simplicity

My story is literally laid out in front of me, each chapter represented by a sticky note. I move them around and try to decide which order I could place them in that would be the most meaningful.

All of the sudden, I am shy.

This story is fairly quiet. There is no obvious climax. There is no running away. There are no encounters with the police.

And then I realize how beautifully appropriate that is. Sometimes mental illness is loud and terrifying. But in many, many cases, it is quiet and terrifying. The chapters all lined up on my kitchen table represent thousands of moments of intense desperation. A fierce longing for the emotional distress to ease, the mental anguish to let up.

Some might scoff at the simplicity, expecting a more interesting story.

I am also certain that those who have been there that will find pieces of themselves in the chapters. They will know they aren't the only ones who have visited or even found themselves  confined in those dark corners of their minds.

Those who haven't been there but come and read carefully, seeking to better understand a loved one's struggle will find meaning here.

The one thing that inspires my writing even more than the therapeuticness of putting all of this into words is that I feel I have hope to offer. And I hope most will have that to take away.

So I move forward, because all of those scenarios are okay with me.



Next Chapter: Church Parking Lot

Meatballs

Tears had blazed three or four different trails down her face as she continued to scream, "I HATE MEATBALLS!"

This was not normal behavior for my sweet girl. This was desperation.

The funny thing is, she doesn't really hate meatballs. But you tend to speak irrationally when you feel your ability to control your world is slipping through your fingers.

I could hear the hum of the engine telling me the bus was nearly here, so I plucked her out of the car, placed her two feet on the asphalt, and began pulling her toward the bus stop. "I promise it's going to be all right. I promise you're going to be just fine. You need to give this a try."

Aware that the kids at the bus stop could hear her now, she forcefully brought my ear within listening distance of her mouth. I could feel the tension in her hand as she whispered through gritted teeth, "Momma, please. Take me home. I hate meatballs."

Bus brakes screeched as its doors smacked open, inviting everyone who was going to school to climb aboard. I squeezed her back as she hugged my leg, making our way to the bus doors. Reaching them, she let go of her grasp, and as she took the first step, I said, "If all you do is drink the milk, just give this a try. I love you."

*****

Hopping back into the car, I found myself so grateful for the neighbors who had warned me that first grade was going to be an adjustment. How do you prepare a six-year-old for a seven hour school day when they're used to going for three?

So we'd talked about how she'd be eating lunch at school and we went to the grocery store and picked up a bunch of juice pouches and grapes and for the first time loaded the freezer with Gogurts. I prepared her a sandwich every morning and dropped a couple of Oreos in her lunchbox.

A week in, first grade was turning out to be a really wonderful situation except for two glitches: the long days were rocking little girl's world, making her much more moody at home than usual. And she was sick of the scenario inside her lunch box. I felt for her as she watched me spread the jam on her bread the fifth day that week. She missed the range of choices lunch at home with a microwave provided.  I knew one of these problems would best be remedied with love, patience, and consistency. The other would take creativity and another trip to the grocery store. I was only able to provide one of those this particular morning, seeing how we had a bus to catch. 

But then I realized we had one more option. "Hey sweetie, you can have school lunch. Do you know how school lunch works? Does your teacher ask the kids each morning if they are having home lunch or school lunch?"

She nodded her sleepy head. "And when you go into the lunch room, do you know where the kids with school lunch are supposed to go?"

She nodded again. 

A few clicks on the school website told me that today's special was meatballs in marinara sauce. "They're having meatballs today. You like meatballs!"

And I thought that was that.

*****

In the car on the way to the bus stop, she zipped her backpack open.

"Mom... where's my lunch?"

"Sweetie, that whole conversation we had. You're having school lunch today. Meatballs, remember?"

"I said I know how it works. I didn't say I would have it today!" And the tears that have been residing so very close to the surface lately started to pour.

I swear we had reached an agreement on school lunch fifteen minutes ago. I had a feeling there would be many more such moments in this stage of school-age motherhood.

Her voice that has been escalating in volume much faster these days was already screaming when she opened her mouth and cried, "Take me back home! Please! Make me another lunch! Momma, I HATE MEATBALLS!"

I considered the four minute window from the time we leave the house til the bus comes. "There's no time sweetie...".

"Then take me to school after you make my lunch. Please, Momma! PLEASE MOMMA! PLEASE!"

I conferred with myself for a moment, and my momma gut knew so passionately what needed to happen that day.

I did not need her to remember the day Momma rushed home and whipped up a lunch and drove her the long way to school. Although I had considered it for a few seconds.

No, this morning I realized I needed more than anything in this moment for little girl to know that her world could feel like it was careening out of her control and that she would be able to survive it. She would be able to navigate it and come out on the other side successfully. Even if it was just an elementary school lunch room.

So while it may seem silly, after putting her on the bus I came home and said a little prayer for her, that the adults in the lunch room might be aware of this little girl who might need to be guided her first time through the lunch line. Then I completed the ten minute process of opening a lunch account and making a deposit in it so she would have no trouble getting it paid for.

It occurred to me that I loved her so much, I didn't care that she didn't know about all the little ways that I was making sure that her lunchroom experience would work out okay.

One more time, being a momma was teaching me how my Heavenly Father feels about us. Because on so many occasions navigating this world, I had felt like my little girl. 

"So it is with you, every time you are convinced that your world is careening out of your control.  I have already prepared the way."

*****

The bus pulled up at the end of that day. I tried not to appear to anxious on the outside, but I couldn't wait to hear how it had gone.

She climbed in the car. "Lunch was horrendous," she reported.

Oh no.

"I went through the line, I got a milk just like you said I could, and the lunch lady made me go back and get food."

Relived, I laughed. "Well how dare she. Of course she did."

Wednesday

It doesn't matter that there are over 85,000 full-time LDS missionaries serving in the world, or that the Missionary Training Center pumps them out by the thousands every week.

When we met on Tuesday night to see my brother set apart as a missionary, and then for breakfast on Wednesday morning to say goodbye, Heavenly Father poured His love out on our family. My heart was so full.

And when I saw this picture of my brother saying goodbye to my momma for the last time for two years, it became tenderly apparent what a sacred thing it was that my parents had just done. They had carefully loved, taught, and cared for their son for the last 18 and a half years, and then gone and offered Him up to the Lord.

I couldn't help but think of Hannah from the Old Testament and how she lovingly brought her son to the temple after carefully preparing him to serve God.

Something in my heart told me that this moment was no less significant to Him.