November 2017 – tiredfromwhitstable

I am a mum to boys, anyone who has ever read my blog before will know this and every so often I go a little bit mad.

Today is one of those days, I have just had what I can only describe as a childlike tantrum at having to clear up wee from the floor around the toilet for what feels like the millionth time this week. They have a body part that allows them to aim and yet it’s like they go into the bathroom, stick on a blindfold and just have a laugh pissing fast and loose all over the place all the while thinking ‘it’s alright Mummy will clear it up’

Now as much as I have become an expert in cleaning up other peoples piss from the second the boys were born I have to be honest and say it really isn’t my favourite thing. It smells, it goes literally everywhere and leaves nasty stains. It is my most used sentence of every single day ‘WHO HAS WEED OVER THE SIDE OF THE TOILET AGAIN’ only for every single male (including my husband) to tell me it wasn’t them.

Perhaps I have developed some kind of urinary dementia and in fact it’s me soiling the bathroom floor hundreds of times a day but I actually think the chances of this being the case are about the same as me being elected as the next US president (I guess stranger things have happened!)

When I was getting ready to go out on Friday last week for the first night out in at least six months I needed to have a shower. I explained to both the boys that I would be using the one and only bathroom and if they needed the toilet they should go. No one did of course, in fact I don’t think either of them even answered me. Mid way through my shower as I was shaving my legs which I have to say had required shaving for some time Leo appeared dancing around and had a massive poo on the toilet. He then looked at me and said ‘who is going to wipe my bum?’ Now Leo my youngest is six and should really be able to do this for himself however as with many things when it comes to it he miraculously doesn’t remember how. He tried after I moaned and managed to get shit all over the bathroom floor. So, one leg smooth and silky the other looking like a yeti’s I had to get out of the shower and clear up him, the floor, myself and take a number of deep breaths. I then got back in the shower only for him to say ‘Mummy, why have you got only one hairy leg?’

I literally skipped out of the door when Karl got home but it seems strange that he doesn’t have these issues when he has the boys and I’m pretty sure he would say.

We then have the continuous arguments about doing things, things such as needing to wear pants, needing to change pants, needing to put pants in the washing basket, needing to not wipe bogies over the walls, needing to understand that it’s not appropriate to fart anywhere you fancy and many other basic rules of life and hygiene which both boys refuse to acknowledge or adhere to. Who cares about brushing teeth, being clean or wearing the same pants 21 days in a row anyway?

There is also this bizarre ritual I have to go through on a daily basis (when I’m not wiping up wee) where I have to find things the boys have lost. We do this not just at home but anywhere we go and we can lose literally anything at all. They come out of the doors at school wearing nothing but a shirt, trousers and shoes and daily I ask ‘ where is your bag/jumper/coat/lunch box/drinks bottle’ you get the drift. Only to be met by a vacant look of I have no idea and I then do the annoyed mum route March around the playground, town, school, house, car or any other place we have been.

I know I am moaning, I know I am so very lucky to have beautiful, healthy and happy children but some days I do feel like I’m going ever so slightly insane (well more insane than usual) Anyway must go, Nate needs a poo!

As many of you know and have been bored to tears by me for the majority of this year about I suffer with depression and anxiety. Always have in some way and quite probably always will. This year so far has been the hardest journey for me out of all the previous ones. So much so that this one I feel is the one that will change the way I deal with me forever.

These changes are positive and all I believe what will make me going forward be in control more of how depression and anxiety affects me and not letting it beat me again (yes I know I’ve said this a million times before!) One of my main issues was and I realise now has always been a total lack of self esteem. My inner dialogue has always been negative to the point where I have talked myself out of doing the smallest and simplest things because I have simply felt I’m not able to, would be laughed at or that as usually I am totally and utterly useless so why bother trying.

This anxiety that came out of this inner dialogue meant that I had literally stopped myself from doing things. To give totally honest examples I would plan how I would walk into and out of the school on the school run as I didn’t want to walk a way where that many people would see me and potentially not like me, what I write, how I look or who I am. Even though of course the vast majority of those people don’t know me and even if they did probably not well enough to condemn me and ostracise me and lets be honest if people don’t like me I really can’t do much about that and hiding myself away won’t change their feelings about me. It even got so bad that earlier this year I would park the car in a road quite away from school and would watch the clock until five to three then need to rush in knowing that the children would be coming out as I got there so I would avoid seeing lots of people. It got that bad! It sounds ridiculous and I’m even laughing at myself a bit writing it but that was what anxiety was doing to me.

I did the same with parking my car at work and even trips to the toilet where I would need to leave the office I worked in I would plan for times I felt would be quiet and I wouldn’t bump into people. I didn’t want to have to explain my issues to people or feel I was being judged so I tried to disappear. Of course no one can actually disappear, unless you have one of three Deathly Hallows and your last name is Potter! But I would have done anything to be able to. I was literally driving myself mad and even the slightest knock would turn me into a wreck and made me feel like I simply couldn’t go on.

I realise now that my anxiety goes hand in hand with my depression and the more down I am the more anxious I become. The issue of course as I have said so many times before was that I simply did not have the option of shutting down, I had to fight it for my children, my husband and the people I love but, most of all for me. I am a human being who has all manner of issues and experiences that have bought me to where I am today but what has gone before me does not take away from the fact that I have a future and that I like everyone else deserve to be happy. My own version of happy of course, it might not be what would make others happy but who cares, happiness is a personal choice and it really has nothing to do with anyone else. As long as those closest to me are okay and we are happy then that will do me.

Don’t get me wrong I don’t strut around with my head held high but I try to smile more (not in a creepy way I hope) and if I feel anxious about walking a certain way or doing a specific thing I have a little word with myself and ask what is the worst that could happen? The honest answer from my more peaceful mind is not a lot and if something did well you know what as a thirty four year old woman I would have to deal with it. I can’t go on over analysing everything and as the very wise Newt Scamander said, ‘worrying only makes you suffer twice’ and I believe lovely people that he is right.

I can’t pretend that depression and therefore anxiety won’t be a part of my life anymore but I have finally made peace with the fact that they are a part of who I am and I am their master not the other way around. I also will do myself no good whatsoever telling myself I am ugly, no good, worthless, stupid or that I need to prove my worth to others just so I feel validated. I can validate me and other than eating far too much cake and having a slightly unhealthy obsession with Keeping Up with the Kardashians I’m okay. My children are happy (albeit appallingly behaved the vast majority of the time) Karl and I are in the best place I think we have been in a long time, our home is messy but full of love and there is cider in the fridge.

This may seem like a strange post to write but I wanted to write it to emphasise how you can come through a crisis and although you will still need to handle the triggers you can give yourself the tools to do so. I was chatting to someone the other day and we talked about it like having an extra handbag. Like the one I always carry that has powder, deodorant, my phone, a notepad, my money, lego figures (mum to boys!) plasters and a variety of other delights I also have the invisible one that contains all the things I have learned in CBT and all the tools that I can use to get me through the day with a smile on my face and feeling okay about me.

As I have mentioned in the past my Pinterest account helps me massively in this respect and I see it as a form of therapy each and every day to scroll through positive and inspirational quotes that lift me and make me feel okay to be who I am.

This has been a hard one to write and I hope not terrible for you to read. I will continue to give updates as I find it helps me to hear about others journeys and if I can help or offer kind words to even one person then it makes it totally worth putting my story out there. Thanks for reading and if you feel the need to get in touch please do so via my contact page.