Mind Games

Things have been awfully challenging lately. Not that adversity is raining down on our family right now. In fact, things have been going fairly well. Our family is healthy, my husband is employed, I have jobs at church that I enjoy and don't stress me out, and there is rarely a reason for me to make a phone call. (Always a good thing, that lack of phone calls.)

I can name my problem in one word: depression.

It's the phantom that has dogged me for most of my life. I've blogged about it before-- remember when I wrote that I didn't even realize how good it was possible to feel about life in general until I was taking Zoloft after I had K? Well, I haven't been on anti-depressants in a long time now. First, I had to change to Wellbutrin because of the bleeding issues Zoloft caused. Then my doctor didn't want to keep writing me a new prescription for it unless I was suffering from a severe depressive episode. Since it takes a couple of weeks to fully drain out of your system (and another several weeks of taking it to work again) it became obvious I was going to have to experience major depression at least 3 or 4 times a year just to get the prescription. Since Wellbutrin wasn't working nearly as well as Zoloft anyway, I decided I was going to focus on beating depression without the drugs.

My fight went pretty well. It mostly consisted of making sure I got enough exercise and outdoor time, in addition to working hard to change my negative thought patterns. The change in my eating habits and the subsequent major weight loss were a HUGE boost in helping me conquer the depression. Other than a few minor episodes, things were going pretty well.

Then you all know what happened . . . the surprise pregnancy.

I thought I would handle it better. After all, I handled things with K better. But this time, I feel like every thing that made it easy to fight the depression has been stripped away. No exercise. My good eating habits went out the window with the nausea and then I haven't been able to get myself back on track since. I've gained about 30 lbs so far (at 23 weeks) when I've never gained more than 25 lbs the entire pregnancy with any of my other kids. It feels like I'm inhabiting the body of a stranger! Well, that's not entirely accurate. I feel like I'm inhabiting the body of the depressed, unhealthy woman I was five years ago. Then there's the lack of sunlight in my life. You'd think that during summer that wouldn't be a problem, but it's way too hot outside to just hang out. And since I've started having contractions already, the cut-out-all-unnecessary activities edict kind of shot making trips to the pool out the window. Let me tell you, this limited activity without it being official bedrest is tough. I feel guilty either way. If I vacuum the living room I wonder if I'm overdoing it (and my husband gets on my case). But if I sit around doing nothing, my negative brain constantly harps about how lazy I am-- after all, my OB didn't say I couldn't do anything.

My negative thoughts are just overwhelming these days. And I'm terrified that I will feel like this forever more. Terence says I'm being ridiculous, but the fears are real. Will I ever lose this weight again? Will I ever go back to being my active self? (It's hard to get up that early!!) Will I ever go back to having my previous level of patience with my kids? Can I possibly be a decent mom to five kids? Will I ever just feel happy again without having to argue myself into it???

I don't know the answers to those questions, but in my negative state of mind, I tend to think the worst. And looming over all this is the fear that I will have to face the real demon in a few months: postpartum depression. My OB will certainly give me a prescription for anti-depressants again if I ask. But I already know this time that I can't take (my) magic bullet version. Zoloft is out, unless I want to bleed like a fountain every time I scratch myself and have periods that last 3 weeks. And I have to wonder if the Wellbutrin worked at all, or if the mild benefit I got from it was a placebo effect. And since I don't trust it to work, I'm not likely to get a placebo effect this time.

Well, I guess that's borrowing trouble from the future. Maybe I should just not worry about it right now. Instead, I'm going to put on my happy face and do my best to live the "fake it until you make it" philosophy. So if you are wondering how I'm doing . . . I'm just fine! I promise!