Clench my teeth brief sensation of pain
Wait for it to come it takes a second
Bringing with it relief here it comes
Pain flows out trickling down my arm
In little red rivulets so warm and wet I have no problems
That cheery little poem is mine. Oh, it’s from many years ago. Back when I was still living with my parents, in fact. That last line? Is total crap. Yes, the blood brought relief of some feelings, but the guilt and anxiety that was left every time I looked at the scars….yeah, sometimes even THAT was enough of a trigger.
I’ve been pretty up-front about dealing with Postpartum Depression, Generalized Anxiety Disorder and major depressive disorder.
But, to add to the list of things that I don’t talk about, I’m also a cutter.
The urge to give in is there. It’s not my first reaction to bad news, anymore, but when I’m at my lowest, or most anxious, I still want to.
There are certain movies that I couldn’t watch all the way through for a long time, like Thirteen or Girl, Interrupted because they make me want to cut myself.
This is a big step for me. Other than my parents, one or two friends from way back then, and my husband and now half-the-freaking-internet, no one knows this. Come to think of it, I don’t know if I bother to tell my therapists. Yes, I know. I’m a horrible patient.
After I decided to stop, which wasn’t until I was pregnant with my first, AND it was totally selfish at first; too many doctor’s exams that required getting naked. I kept waiting to outgrow the feelings. You know, the way I outgrew angsty poetry, and emo-ish music? But I’m still waiting.
I’ve been suffering, silently, for going on eight months…I guess. And, I’ve needed and wanted to write about it. But, I’ve been afraid. Mostly, I’ve been afraid of the emotions that come flooding back to me when I think, talk, or picture the experiences that led up to this day.
Actually, I don’t know when it started. But, I finally said something last week to Mr. B and my Momma.
This suffering stems from an accident, on July 19, that involved my 7-year-old son.
Bubs was in a golf cart accident with his grandfather. The 800-pound cart, fell on a 45-pound baby and drug him on concrete for quite a distance. Bubs was air-cared to the local Children’s Hospital. And I, well I was 39 weeks pregnant. And, I fell when I saw him. Literally.
I fell because my son, my first born, and my best friend was trapped. Under a machine. He was covered in blood from “road rash” and he was broken. everywhere. He suffered with a dislocated hip, broken femur, butterfly fractured femur, crush-fracture of his foot, dislocated toes, puncture wounds and road rash all over his body and a removed quadriceps muscle. When I stood from falling, there he was, screaming for help and frantically searching for his mommy. And my heart couldn’t take it. It was broken.
In that instant, I was changed. Forever. I can’t forget the pain of driving to the scene. The soul crushing fear that flooded through my body the way I imagine Hurricane Katrina taking over New Orleans – engulfing your body with no hope or relief in sight. The fear and pain took me to a place that had not existed prior to this accident. And now I can’t seem to find my way out of it.
I still remember the scene like it was a dream. There were people rushing all around me, ambulances screaming to the scene, a helicopter circling overhead, paramedics asking questions…about him…and about me, paramedics taking blood pressure, police officers begging me to go to the hospital. I was swarmed but still felt invisible. All I wanted to do was go back in time. Just 20 minutes earlier. To make this moment disappear. All I could think about was this “never happening” and how it “couldn’t be happening” to us.
I am ashamed to admit…but, I didn’t care about the baby inside of me in that moment. Because the boy who had my heart first was seriously hurt. More serious than I even knew or wanted to know in that moment. More serious than anyone was willing to “tell the pregnant mom.” It was hard for me to consider the unborn child. I “knew” right where she was and I “knew” she was okay. All I knew was I heard words like “internal bleeding”, “head trauma,” “internal damage” and “spinal cord injuries” being thrown around…regarding my baby. MY baby. It was as if I was having an out-of-body experience.
I still remember the paramedic who took me to the hospital. His attempts at consoling me, while my son flew overhead, were heroic. He was kind and gentle and was a true professional. There are no words that can describe these moments. No words created by man that can put your thoughts and fears on paper to describe the instant you think you may lose your child. It’s a pain like I’ve never known. A pain that was sharp and reckless and it had no concern for me or the perfect family I had built.
And now, it has been replaced with fear.
As I sat in the hospital waiting room, waiting for his six hour surgery to be complete, and cried. I cried for my unborn baby, who would be born into a world interrupted. I cried for me. Because I was afraid and exhausted and broken-hearted. But mostly, I cried for my baby boy. Because I didn’t know what the future held anymore. 10 hours prior, I knew. And now my world was crashing in around me. I couldn’t breath.
See, Bubs and I started on this journey alone. Mr. B was our answered prayer that came four years later. For four years it was just us…and nothing will ever match those four years for our small family. Nothing will ever match the bond we built. He is my best friend. My confidant. My companion.
I am suffering silently with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I am struggling every.single.day with constant fear and irrational thoughts. I become overwhelmed with illusions, memories and possibilities…which all hold me back from living. These fears consume everything I do. Everything I let my family do. And, they consume every thought I have. I catch myself living in a world of “what-ifs” rather than just living and loving life. (Loving the life that God so graciously spared last summer.)
And, even with Bubs upstairs sleeping in his bed. Even if we made it through 12 weeks in a wheel chair and two weeks in a walker and one week of God-fearin’, earth rattling pain and torture…I still can’t shake the memory.
I still live in fear of losing someone. And not just Bubs now… Mr. B, Bubette, my mom, dad, step-dad, cousins, aunts…it is growing. And, for that reason, I have decided to talk to someone who knows more about this than I do. A professional….which makes me feel like a nut job.
Because prior to July 19, I lived in a beautiful world where horrible things happen “to other people.” and now…well, I can’t help but think that those horrible things “could happen to me.”
Adult Children of Addicts are at a far greater risk to develop addiction to substance abuse.
This is the story of three brave men:
My father was the son of an alcoholic. He had a brother and 3 sisters who all would partake in the ocassional alcoholic beverage but never let it interfere with the normal every day functions of their lives. My father, on the other hand carried on the family tradition/trait/ illness, or whatever you wish to call it. He was not an abusive drunk, although I do remember he and his best friend trashing our house fighting each other when I was a pre-teen. He was very much involved in my life and that of my brother and sister, but he was still an alcoholic.
As years passed, his drinking became more and more severe. It wasn’t until my teen years that I really started paying attention and noticing that he was consuming a case or so of beer by himself, everyday, along with as much as a pint of liquor. He became more pissed off at the world and everything about it. The world was out to get him and so was everyone on the planet. It was getting to the point where nothing we did was right.
After graduating high school, it was time to marry my high school sweetheart. A day I had dreamt of for a long time. I was never one for dating and the whole girlfriend issue, but this girl was for me and I was so looking forward to that special night and our first dance as husband and wife. In the middle of the most special dance of my life, my father interrupted and said, “why don’t you play something we all like?” Our wedding song was “All Of My Love” by Led Zeppelin.
I was stunned, flabbergasted, ashamed, and yet I let it slide.
I vowed my entire life that I would not be like him, and to that I stayed pretty true. Sure, I had the occasional drink as a teenager. Yes, I got drunk from time to time but never really cared enough for it to become a regular thing. Never would I be like him. I would not put my children through that, even if he was not mean, it was not a childhood I would not want any kid to have to live. Little did I realize at the time that I was just like him.
Although I was not a drinker, I had no problem smoking pot, tripping on acid and mescaline, doing ‘shrooms, or just about any mind-altering substance that I could get my hands on. But hey, I was not a drunk.
It wasn’t until my mid twenties, deep into a cocaine free basing addiction that my wonderful wife, the high school sweetheart, told me ”I don’t know what you are doing, but you either quit or I leave.”
Wow, a brick in the face that one was.
I finally looked at myself in the mirror, literally, and saw a pasty grey skinned man, skinny and sick looking he was just one step away from death or an institution.
I quit. I vowed to myself and my wife that I would never touch the stuff again. I spent several years going to narcotics anonymous, sometimes 2 or 3 times a day and I am proud to say I am free, clean, and sober. I am a fairly healthy 45 year old man still married to my high school sweet heart, and I have 3 wonderful sons and 2 grandsons.
I have felt their joys and sorrows. I have seen their smiles and frowns. I have been there for them. And I was there to help my oldest son through his addiction.
He chose to follow me and go the drug route. I have always been open with my children about drugs hoping that it would steer them away since I was speaking from personal experience; not quoting something I read in a book. He saw it like, hey you’re still alive, it couldn’t have been THAT bad.
On his 17th birthday, I did something that even I could not believe.
On the way home from picking him up at school one evening, he was so wasted that he was actually hallucinating in my car, asking me questions about how we were going to get the car through all those trees, and what were we going to do when we got to the end of the road where it turns red. I was so scared for him; it was time for another search of his room. I found pot growing in his closet, for the second time, so I figured I had no choice. I turned in my own son and he spent his 17th birthday in the county jail, and several others months following. It opened his eyes a bit. He stumbled a few times since but is now a wonderful 21 year old man with 2 sons.
One night, not to long ago, he finally told me that he hated me for quite a while for turning him in, but he then said he could not thank me enough for what he did and that he loved me.
I am constantly worried about him. Will the stress of the children lead him back to the drugs? Will he make it through as I have? Will any of his children follow the familiar path?
One good thing that has come of my sons addiction is that his younger brothers want absolutely nothing to do with any of it. So for now I just let him, and his brothers know, that I will always be there for them, and that life might not always be wonderful but it could always be worse.
And of course, I must thank my wonderful wife.
She stayed with me.
She saw the problems and instead of bailing out she stuck by my side.
She spent several weeks with very little sleep as my mind and body fought each other she was there to calm me.
Last year, Stand Up to Cancer asked me if i remembered what i was doing on september 11th, 2001. I did. I still do. This is what i wrote:
su2c asked on twitter if we remembered what we were doing eight years ago on September 11th, 2001. we were living in manhattan. i was on my way to work. the streets were filled with frantic police officers. it was horribly loud, as manhattan so reliably is, but you could feel an eerie silence beginning to settle over the city.
there was a mass exodus on foot. people fled the city via every bridge possible. the subways and trains weren’t in service. grand central was locked down because of the bomb threat. our building was locked down, too. a cell phone signal near impossible to come by.
nuggetdaddy was working in new jersey then and i was finally able to get a hold of him. we decided i would take the first train out of the city and he would pick me up wherever we could both get to. i made it on the first train out of grand central. it was sweltering. the train filled with an acrid stench. most passengers were covered in a heavy white dust; most in more than their fair share of blood.
it didn’t matter where the train was going, people just got on in hopes of making it out of the city. the train stopped at every single station en route. it took forever.
nuggetdaddy picked me up at the fleetwood stop and we decided to try to drive back into the city. we had pets and friends to check on. family and friends desperate to hear our voices. we were finally able to make it back in over some tiny bridge in the bronx.
by now the city was silent. there were no planes in the air, no people on the streets. when we woke up the next morning the wind had changed direction. the stench was unbearable. we stayed in the apartment all weekend, happy to be alive and at home with the pets and dr. roommate.
so, stand up to cancer, there’s your answer.
and speaking of stand up to cancer, did you watch the telecast last night? did you donate? did you help find a cure? did you save lives? did you stand up to cancer?
July 19, 2009 will always be an important date in our families personal history book. To most this day passes without a second glance, but to us, today will always be the day God saved our son.
The emotional roller coaster of this day has not even come full-circle, the accident happened at 7PM. And yet, before 9AM I have felt joy, peace, fear, sadness, anxiety, hope, reassurance and love.
And, I’ve told Satan to go to Hell.
Because today, friends, is about celebrating life & all that it has to offer.
The fear and anxiety that Satan is calling me to feel will not overpower the joy and celebration of this day. There are many forts to build and pools to swim, trees to climb, and playgrounds to discover. We do not have time to waste on worry.
There is too much life to be lived.
Last night, as Bubs slept, I crept into his room and I knelt down beside his bed. There, I gently stroked his chest and legs & I prayed and cried and thanked the Lord.
I thanked Him for:
his strong frame that held the heavy weight of that 800 pound golf cart
his wherewithal to hold that beautiful head up as the cart drug him along the concrete earth
his tiny bones that may have bent and broke but held it all together, somehow
for the neighbors who rushed to help my family in those moments before the paramedics arrived
for the paramedics who worked swiftly and kindly with my little fragile son
for the pilot that drove the helicopter carefully and without haste
the doctor’s that worked through the night to repair his tattered, broken body
for the nurses that healed my family as much as they healed Bubs during his time in Children’s Hospital
for the gift of medicine, that allowed our sleepless son to rest, and be relieved of pain, long enough to heal his bones and build up his energy to fight again the next day.
And then I thanked him for our gift of friendship. My, how we’ve been blessed. The old saying is true, you really don’t know who your friends are, until you need them. And Lord, when we needed friends, you showed us in overwhelming numbers. You gave us an emergency room full of love and prayer. You filled the waiting room for countless hours while we waited for the doctors to tell us the surgery was complete. You sent visitors and toys and prayers and hugs.
You sent tiny angels Lord, and we have seen Your face.
I will never forget the faces as I entered that emergency room. Their concern and worry wrinkled over their knitted brows. Most of them looked like they had been praying for hours, deep in communication with their Lord. Some of their eyes fell as they saw me wheeled through the room – they didn’t want me to see them crying. They are a force to be reckoned with – those prayer warriors.
I will never forget looking around as they rushed me back to my son. I have relived those moments 365 times since then… The faces of friends who came from far and away – I saw you all. The faces of people who love my little family & the little boy behind the wounds.
I am forever indebted to them.
And I am fine with that.
In my hour of need, Lord, you gave me friendship. I am honored to say that I learned to give from the best. I am honored to call them friends.
There were times when my heavy heart and tired pregnant body didn’t think it had any more fight in it – and in those times I remember the people I love carrying me. I remember friends calling and emailing & praying. I remember physically feeling those prayers working.
I have seen the face of God.
I call them friends.
And, I believe in prayer. And, I am blessed because of it.
Today, I will celebrate. I will go to a pizzeria and order a movie. I will buy “grey ice cream” (Oreo) and I will top it with chocolate sauce. I will watch him blow out candles and I will play with his hair until he falls asleep.
Anyone who has been through IVF or any type of infertility treatments can vouch for how isolating it is. The time period where I spent all of my energy and focus on trying to conceive were the most lonely times of my life. Sure, yes, you’re with a partner, but as only woman knows, creating life is entirely a maternal thing.
I could sit here and tell you my story, which would take all day. And believe me, I LOVE to talk. But to spare you, I’ll give you the short version.:
I went through approximately 6 1/2 years of infertility, on and off. It killed my first marriage, and with my second marriage, it definitely took its toll, but we had our limits. Our last attempt was a Frozen Embryo Transfer (or FET for you newbs or n00bs if you prefer leet speak). We both decided, for our mental health and our marriage, that this was it. If it didn’t work, we were going to become the crazy animal people in our neighborhood. There probably would have been weird things like ferrets and tegus.
But it worked. And we were…shocked. That’s the thing about fertility treatments, when they actually work, you feel like you pulled off a bank heist.
Cut to four years later, and we now have two healthy children, one, who was a big old natural surprise. We call her the Matlock baby. Because we joke that we had ten minutes before Matlock started, and well, you get the rest.
But my point to this is, that going through it, I felt…depression doesn’t even begin to cover it. The first time around, I felt as if I had this blanket of sadness wrapped around me, that I couldn’t take off. Ever. The second time around, I found solace in the internet. It wasn’t so taboo! I had people I could talk to. Blogs I could read. But it taught me two things:
One, you are not alone. Not by a long shot.
Approximately 7.5 [million] women are affected by infertility.
Two, use your voice. Educate.
I feel no embarrassment or shame in telling people that we had a hard time conceiving, or that my son was conceived via In-Vitro Fertilization. Was I ashamed that my body failed me? Yes, for a while, but it wasn’t my fault. So I tell people. I talk about it, and 70-80% of the time, someone will chime in, “ME TOO!” It opens doors. It helps us to find others like us. And it also helps to educate people that don’t understand what its like. When we were going through treatment, a good friend of mine was so interested in the process. She would watch me inject medication. She would ask questions. Some people will always be ignorant, but by and large, people are just uneducated about the topic.
su2c asked on twitter if we remembered what we were doing eight years ago on September 11th, 2001. we were living in manhattan. i was on my way to work. the streets were filled with frantic police officers. it was horribly loud, as manhattan so reliably is, but you could feel an eerie silence beginning to settle over the city.
