Happy Ebenezer Thanksgiving

I love Christie's Thanksgiving post. You've just got to read it: Dedicated to God. She's broken and mended, heart-breakingly honest and victoriously joyful.

I also have a very  belated Thanksgiving post.

During our Ebenezer celebration day (see Raising Ebenezer), we took some pictures. It was all about remembering and commemorating how far God has brought us. I thought I'd post a few of these, so that you too, can see and celebrate. I can take no credit for any of this--it is all God. To some of you, these pictures will seem insignificant, though perhaps very cute. But these everyday scenes represent tremendous freedom for us. Thanks be to God!

Jem and I made a carrot cake together. All the carrots, grated and oozing bright juice:

A few months ago, I would have been horrified if someone even brought a carrot, or any other vegetable for that matter, into our house. And baking, with eggs? Forget it! But Jem and I actually baked our carrot cake without arguing about the spread of germs around the kitchen.

Then, we took our baby girl to the park. 

Now, if you can possibly imagine, there was a time when sitting down on anything in public would have been a huge inner struggle for me, never mind enjoying a public playground. The first time we finally brought lily to a park, I took along baby wipes and wiped out the baby swing several times, then wouldn't let Jem throw the wipes in a nearby garbage can for fear he'd somehow accidentally touch the garbage. 

(This picture is actually from last month, when the weather was warmer. Forgot our camera the most recent time, but we take her to parks often now. She loves the swings.)

Here is our little lily, enjoying a swing, quite public and quite un-wiped: 

pure enjoyment

We wanted to have a picnic lunch outside, but the neighbours were burning something or other and the smoke was a bit unpleasant. So, we picnicked on the living room floor. Notice please the lack of picnic blanket,

the food directly on the floor...

and even, the baby directly on the floor!

And yes, that's my baby, eating her cheerios off the carpet!

Once the smoke outside cleared, we took a woven grass mat my parents brought back from Africa, and sat out on the grass to enjoy one of the last warm-ish fall days. Little lily loves being outside. 

I don't know how clean the mat was. But I figured the germs would be dry and dead along with the grass. ;-)

...

While we were sitting outside, I did some drawing. I've been enjoying pencil sketching in the last few months. I don't have a lot of time for it with a baby to take care of! But when I do get the time I've found that drawing is like getting outside for a breath of fresh summer air. I breathe freedom and clear thoughts during the hours spent drawing. The obsessive thoughts leave me alone for a little while.

As part of my ERP (Exposure Response Prevention. I'll write more about that in future posts), I've tried drawing feared objects or situations. It takes quite a lot of self-control to sit and stare at something that seems really scary, in fairly close proximity to it, or even to handle it enough to set up an interesting composition. I've found that it does eventually help to lower my anxiety around that specific object or scenario. So, here I decided to draw my dad's gardening shoes and paraphernalia:

Once my parents came home, we got ready for a date, and left lily with two very pleased grandparents.

On the drive into town, the sun was setting and the sky was magnificent. The sunset wasn't just behind us to the east, but in front and all around us as well. The whole sky was blazing hot pink. This picture is really pitiful, but I had to try!

No way to do that sunset justice through photography

Jem took me to the best restaurant in Moose Jaw, and we had their special--crab legs dipped in hot butter. Wow.

See?!  I can eat with my fingers now! Sea food, no less! And I even used their public washroom to wash my buttery, fishy hands afterward.

Jem gave me a beautiful gift that evening. Here's a picture of it! One of the most beautiful things I have. It matches my engagement ring! He told me it is to remind me always that God is our Ebenezer.

Here I wear my Ebenezer!

Note my hand is quite smooth! Just as a point of comparison, here's a picture of my hands at one of my worst points, all swollen, red, raw and cracked from too much scrubbing (the picture really doesn't show how very bad they were):

So there you have it--our Ebenezer celebration. Some of you who have suffered through a mental illness, or any illness for that matter, may recognize the need to celebrate the small, and big, advances. I believe this is a very good thing to do, that as children of God, we ought to celebrate often and lavishly His work in our lives.

Thanksgiving is here, and what a perfect time to do just that.

Thanks be to God!

Dedicated to God

Okay, so Thanksgiving was a couple weeks ago now, but this was tucked away in the drafts, not quite finished until now.
 
Happy Thanksgiving!

We're heading home after a wonderful Thanksgiving weekend with both sides of our family. It's not very often that in-law families spend much time together (at least that's the case with our family). Typically we see my family or A.'s family, but not both at the same time. But this Thanksgiving  was kind of special. We decided to dedicate our daughter in the presence of both sides of our family at my mother-in-law's house. We even managed to get almost everyone there either physically or by Skype and Facetime.

We had a lovely meal prepared by my wonderful mother-in-law and were able to visit and catch-up a little bit with both sides of the family. Then we had a little brief ceremony (N. was mighty cranky, of course), led by my dad, to dedicate our daughter. I also wrote this little letter to her:

Dearest N.,
   Our sweet girl, our joy, our pleasantness. We are so blessed to have you in our life. It seems so appropriate that we should dedicate your life to God on a day dedicated to thanksgiving. We thank God everyday for your bright smile, tinkling laughter and huge, wonderful personality. You have, on more than one occasion been a bright light on a dreary day. I pray that as you grow God will use you, and all of your wonderful little personality for his glory.
   Dear N., understand that we will make mistakes: We will expect too much and notice too little. But, I pray that with God's help we might be able to show you his unending, never-stopping, never-giving up, always and forever Love and that you will know that love and show it to others.
   Over your crib reads part of this verse from Ephesians 3: 14-18

"For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being,  so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. "

This truly is our prayer for you. We believe that, as you understand and truly grasp God's love, his goodness and grace, his joy and peace will flow out of you. You just won't be able to stop it. May God bless you, our sweet little girl.

 This weekend was important for another reason, too: It was a bit of a milestone for me. At my lowest I remember thinking about this weekend and desperately wanting to be able to be there to dedicate her life to God. I didn't think I would be able to make it any longer, though, and so I had made a plan to end my life that weekend. It was morbidly ironic, and I recognized that, but I just doubted my strength to make it through. But the weekend came and went with hardly a thought about death. So I have much for which to be thankful; my daughter, my husband, our family, my life - spared but for the grace and sustenance of our Lord - and so much more...

Christie

Raising Ebenezer

The other day, my husband Jem and I had a celebration. We have much to celebrate: walks outside, fall leaves, haircuts, hollow tree trunks, playgrounds, music, picnics, carpet, grass, garden tools, shoes, grapes, carrot cake, sea food, finger food, a fancy restaurant, grape tomatoes, the library, cuddles on the couch... all things that just a few months ago, OCD had not allowed me to enjoy or do.

We called it our Ebenezer celebration day. You know the old hymn, "Come Thou Fount." The second verse begins with:

"Here I raise my Ebenezer.
Hither by thy help I've come;
And I hope by thy good pleasure
Safely to arrive at home."

Tucked back in 1 Samuel, there is a story of a battle between the Israelites and the Philistines. It was not an absolute victory. It was not to be their final battle with their enemies. But it was significant, and Samuel needed to commemorate it. He set up a rock, a monument, and called it, "Ebenezer," which means "Rock of Help." "So far," he said, "God has helped us" (see 1 Samuel 7:12b). It would stand as a lasting memorial of God's power to help, and evidence that He would help again.

Ebenezer--Rock of Help. I have arrived. I do still fee like I'm still in the battle, like Israel with the Philistines, and I fear fresh outbreak of war each day,...

Yet, God has subdued my enemies. They hold no power over me. Niether the fear, nor the anguish of anxiety, nor the fear of fear is victor. Christ is Victor, and with Him, so am I.

"Looking deeply at our royal lineage, we see that we are of the highest royal line.... We need rush nowhere else to get it. We mainly need to attentively relax and dissolve the amnesia that obscures our true identity" (Tilden H. Edwards, quoted in Benson and Benson, 1989, p. 69).

It takes courage to attentively relax in the midst of what I still experience as a raging battle. It means I let down my guard a bit. It means I celebrate partial advance, and risk being embarrassed later by apparent defeat, retreat. But if I don't celebrate, if I don't commemorate, I miss the grace along the way. I miss the process by which God makes me who I am created to be.

So child of God, don't forget who you are. You are not your fear. He brought this pain into your life to make you "more than conqueror" (Romans 8:37). Embrace the pain--it is your enemy's weapon turned against himself. Pain, the enemy's sharp sword, glittering, raised by Christ in your conquering hand. God raising you up in victory.

Here I raise my Ebenezer. "So far, God has helped me."

J

IT'S ME, NOT OCD

Hi, it's J here. This is my first post for this blog, and I'm really excited about doing this project with my sister. When she asked me to join her in this blog venture, I felt so honored, and so loved. A philosophy professor of mine used to say that "love is a collaborative art project". I am getting to experience that truth-metaphor in so many dimensions with Christie.

I've been thinking a lot about what I should say in my first post. Where do I start? I could start with the birth of my baby, my little lily. I could start with my vow to protect her. I could start with my debt to my husband's tenderness, and firmness. I could start with the sushi we had three days after lily was born that caused me so much anguish. I could start long before her birth, with the paralysis of fear, the panic attacks, the guilt and depression. I could start with the scary stomach bug picked up overseas, being pregnant and frightened and burning up with fever in a foreign country, with no reliable doctor around that I knew of, no pharmacy, no midwife, and no husband. I could start with the false pregnancies and false hopes and false starts. I could start with the possible miscarriage. I could even start over a decade ago, with an eating disorder and long bout with depression. I could start with an uprooted and uncertain childhood.

But no matter where I start, no matter how far back I go, I won't be able to explain how I got where I am, who I am or why, because I am a lot more than the sum of my characteristics and experiences.

I had to discover the depth and complexity of identity in order to get over an eating disorder. I had to realize that I had been looking for my identity in the sum of past experience. I'd always been "the skinny girl," so I had to keep on being it, and be perfect at it: the perfect skinny, which in my mind was a particular number on the scale. I had to realize that was not my identity. I could not be "the skinny girl" any longer, not if I wanted to be the joyful fellowshiper with God I knew I was meant to be.

Perinatal depression, anxiety and OCD were like a bottomless vortex, sucking me in whole. Every aspect of my life and identity narrowed to one swirling point of fear. I am struggling to the surface slowly now, and it's still scary, often agonizingly so. Along with all the pain and fear and questions, there is a dark, confusing undercurrent--the question: "Who will I become now?" I don't know who I am anymore. I'm not the brave, adventurous missionary-type I thought I was--I wanted to be. I'm not the fun-loving, totally cool mom I dreamt of being. I'm not the spicy, spunky wife.

I can't help but wonder, am I a germophobe? Am I a neat freak? Am I OCD?

And I know the answer is the same as it was when the battle was with an eating disorder: NO! That is the illness, the tormentor, the enemy. I must not and will not be branded by it. OCD is not me.

So perhaps, I must again find out who I am NOT in order to find out better who I am--"some glimpse, some revelation, some wisdom, some authority to tell [me my] right name and [my] true destination."*

I'm like Jacob, wrestling and struggling to be blessed by my true name (Gen 32:24-31). The struggle bent and re-shaped his life forever, and it will do the same to me. He became "Israel"--"God-wrestler," limping through life, forever marked and reminded of that night, night of striving, fruitlessly pouring out strength, fruitful only in the final defeat.

Thinking about the story of Jacob in Gen 32, and about my struggles lately, I wrote this prayer in my journal:

"O Lord, You have touched me and thrown my life out of joint. Bless me now, Lord! Bless me by my true name, my true meaning. What do I mean, Lord? Please begin to tell me now, as the sun rises slowly. And not just who I am, but who are You? Who do I wrestle with? What will You do to me? What mark will You leave on me, unmistakably Yours, to forever brand me, forever identify me only in relation to You."

*Emily Griffin, quoted in Disciplines for the Inner Life, by Bob Benson, Sr. and Michael W. Benson, p. 24. (I've been going through this devotional book lately. It is mainly a compilation of readings from well known, and not so well known, Christian writers. I will likely make reference to it in other blog posts). 

Headaches, hospital, and hope

So I thought I should give a bit of an overview of my stay in the hospital, and then I should be able to move on to newer and (hopefully) better things. I'm sorry if it seems jumbled, there's lot to talk about, but I'll try to make it short-ish.

Like I mentioned before, I got a headache the week I was hospitalized. I really do believe that this was one of the major stresses that made staying at home impossible. I've had these headaches since I was little. They tend to come when the weather is changing (spring and fall) and last for several weeks. They aren't continuous, but rather I'll get 8 or more a day that last for 30 minutes to several hours with headache-less breaks in between. Previous to baby N. I would hole myself away for the worst of my headache days and function at a low, but manageable level. Doctors always told me they were "stress" headaches - because school starts in the fall, so I must be stressed, and exams are in the spring, another stressor. I've known for a long time that they can't possibly be stress headaches, but try telling that to a doctor. Luckily for me there was a family medicine resident working with my psychiatrist who seemed to take a particular interest in my case. He spent two hours with me gathering my history and symptoms. After doing a bit of research, he suggested trying Indomethacin, a powerful non-steroidal anti-inflammatory (NSAID) kind of like ibuprofen. I was skeptical, to be honest. I'd tried ibuprofen, usually to no avail, and I'd also had Toradol (another NSAID) during my time in the hospital that also did very little to help my headache. But with the first dose of Indomethacin I noticed a significant improvement in my headache. I woke up a few times that night, thinking to myself "Hey! I don't have a headache! That's kind of awesome!" The next morning I found the resident and thanked him wholeheartedly for this wonder drug. Later he told me he didn't think it would work. He told me he was trying to rule out some really rare headache types that respond particularly well to Indomethacin. He made a provisional diagnosis of Paroxysmal Hemicrania. I never imagined getting such a good treatment, let alone a diagnosis, but honestly I don't really care what they call it, so long as I can function at home.

Getting my headaches treated was wonderful, but there were other things that helped greatly during that time. For one thing, my mom came to help out while I was in the hospital. A. had to be working so it was so nice to know that my baby was being well taken care of by someone I trusted while I was away. And she was amazing. N. loves her grandma, and by the end of the week would reach for her, even if I was in the room (that hurts a little, Babe!). My mom would bring N. to me twice a day to nurse and visit and did an amazing job of making me feel loved and cared for and a little less guilty.

N. was a little light in my day. I looked forward to seeing her, which was a nice feeling. Often, in the evenings I would still get anxious, I would dread going home and I would feel like taking care of her by myself would always be impossible. But I loved those visits with her. She would smile and laugh and play with me and bring me such joy and pleasantness to bleak and difficult days.

They let me set up N.'s playpen in my room at the hospital. She didn't particularly like being cooped up, but it was so nice to have her around.

A. was also wonderful. Even though he was working for the majority of my hospitalization, he visited me as often as he could, made me laugh and held me while I cried. I couldn't have done it without him. I wonder what the nurses thought of our family's dynamics, though, because whenever A. was around my mom and baby weren't, and whenever they were at the hospital, A. wasn't. Trust me, we all get along great - it was just a bit of a a scheduling nightmare.

I talked to my siblings and my dad a lot during that time. They prayed for me and read to me and distracted me when I was at the edge of anxiety or bored out of my mind.  I also got texts, well-wishes and prayers from all of my in-laws. I'm so blessed to have married into such a wonderful family. They were all so encouraging and hopeful. A friend who had also suffered through PPD came to visit me, and my best friend called from Oxford to see how I was doing. Being at the hospital was so hard, but I was also so encouraged by everyone around me.

There's so much more I could talk about: Specific things people said or did that were helpful, things that I learned about myself, verses that were particularly encouraging, and ways I learned to help manage my depression. So I will continue to try to put these in writing, as I have time. For now though, I think my baby might be waking up from her nap.

Ambivalence

In order to be admitted to a hospital as a formal patient, two physicians need to fill out and sign an Admission Certificate (Form 1). Typically the first is the emergency room physician and the second is a psychiatrist (that isn't always the case, but is how it worked for me). The ER physician's certificate was quick and not overly specific. The psychiatrist's certificate, on the other hand, read like this:

On the following facts observed by me: Postpartum depression for several months, no apparent trigger but has been feeling like harming herself and her child. Some ambivalence about hospitalization with risk of harm on discharge.

 On the following facts communicated to me by others: History of depression, becoming worse, now with thoughts of killing herself and harming her 8/12 baby. Describes dissociative episodes. Does not feel safe leaving the hospital.

Two words stuck out to me as I read this Certificate in the days that followed: Ambivalence and dissociative. I'll talk about the idea of dissociative episodes at another time, but for this blog post I want to focus on the word "Ambivalence."

I would like you to understand that the word ambivalence epitomizes my struggle with PPD. It is my ambivalence towards every part of my life that makes this depression so incredibly hard, confusing, and frightening.

Let me give you some examples:

- Life: This is what came crashing down on me that Friday night. I don't want to die. I didn't want to die. Believe it or not, I would much rather live. But that night, and many others before it, I also did not want to keep living. Living was too hard. Living requires motivation, concentration, energy, will. I just didn't have any of those things in that moment. Death seemed like the only answer to a series of questions about the point of fighting to stay alive. I do want to live. I want to see my daughter grown. I want to have many more "I love you" moments with all of those people most important to me. It's just that all of that fades so far away when depression pulls so deep.

-Being a mother to my baby: I love my daughter. Please, please understand that. I want what is best for her. I beg God for protection over her every night. And every night I sneak into her room to watch her sleep. So often, though, I have wished I didn't have to be her mother. Sometimes I wish she didn't exist. Not that she would die, not that I would go back in time, knowing what I know now and choose not to have her. No, simply that she would never have been. I am certain I am a terrible mother. I am certain I am making terrible mistakes. And she exhausts me. I barely make it through some days holding on to her bed-time like a beacon to the time I will have to myself, only to have her stay awake far beyond her usual routine. And I crumble. I don't want to do this. I just want to disappear. I don't want to be a mom. But please believe me when I say I love her with my whole broken heart.

- The way to heal: It's possible those observant readers have already picked up on this one. In this post I mentioned my psychologist encouraged me by giving me specific things I could do to help speed up my recovery, but in this post I wrote about how comforting it is to know that the depression isn't my fault, that there isn't anything I could have done to prevent it and that I will eventually heal. I've found this example of ambivalence in my life as a new mother time and time again. Someone will offer some (not-so-helpful-and-not-so-asked-for) advice and I get so frustrated because don't they know this isn't my fault? And in the next moment I'm trying to find one strategy or another to fix my depression. I think that I do need both: There are things that I can do, but I also need to be patient as I heal.

- Hospital vs. Home: This is the ambivalence the psychiatrist was talking about. I mentioned in my last post that I did not want to go to the hospital. I begged and pleaded and stalled and stalled before finally letting my husband take me. By the time morning came nothing had changed. I still wanted to go home. But I remember as nurses, social workers and doctors did their rounds that morning, they all talked about discharge... and I cringed. I didn't want to stay, but I couldn't imagine going home and I felt like they weren't listening to me. My husband came to the hospital to let N. nurse and I remember crying because nobody was taking me seriously. Then the psychiatrist came in and decided to hospitalize me. He told me he was going to admit me as a formal patient and I cried again. I didn't want to be there but I still didn't want to go home, either.

There are other examples, but I think that this gives a pretty good picture of what I mean by living ambivalently. Honestly, I don't really understand how I can feel so strongly in opposite ways. It really is confusing to want two things that cannot possibly exist together. It is frightening to want something that flies in the face of everything I have ever valued and everything I truly care about. And it is hard to go through such conflicting emotions, trying to sort them out in a mind that can barely comprehend those things known to be true. It's getting easier, though. I'm enjoying being at home (most of the time), I'm beginning to find the balance between patience and action, and I rarely think about death, or about blotting out my daughter from my life.

Yet another breaking point.

I haven't written in a while for two reasons. First, our computer died, making writing anything a little bit difficult (I didn't much feel like writing out a blog post on my iPhone). Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, I was hospitalized for all of last week. I wrote a lot in my journal last week and so I'll share bits of what I wrote for the next little while. Please be aware if you do suffer from PPD or other forms of depression that this post may have some triggers that you may want to avoid.

September 22, 2013

I have been hospitalized as a formal patient. So the police will come looking for me if I try to leave. How awkward. We had a bit of drama Friday night that led to this visit to this hospital. I'm not sure what all contributed to it, but I know that I was stressed about packing and getting everything ready for the trip to Saskatchewan.

A. and I had decided earlier that week that I should go to visit my parents in Saskatchewan so that I could get a little extra TLC. I was having really bad headaches all week and, consequently, wasn't coping very well.

I was making up a packing list and a to do list before leaving and realizing that I had a lot to do. I was already getting anxious before this and it just made it worse. A. put my Clonazepam bottle in front of me, indicating I should take some, but I ignored him (to be honest that action erked me a little). A little while later, as my anxiety continued to mount, he got me a glass of water and put a Clonazepam in my hand (interestingly, that action didn't erk me) and I took it but I guess it was too late. I started to feel really agitated. I felt like I needed to get out of the house. It was such a strong urge - I just wanted to run. I remember repeating to myself "I have to go somewhere... go somewhere... I just need to go. Somewhere. Somewhere." And I just walked. I felt totally out of control. Unable to concentrate on anything but walking. Somewhere. About a block later I realized that A. had followed me. But I still couldn't stop. I was driven. 

Please, please, stop reading here if there is any chance a foray into my hopeless, depressed psyche could hurt you in any way.

I wound up near a pond in our neighborhood and I thought I might able to drown myself. The water would be cold, my clothes heavy, and I didn't have the desire to fight it. Maybe I could force myself to dive, then breathe... maybe it would be over soon. The street lights were dancing in the water's reflection and it looked really peaceful. So peaceful. "I'd like to be that peaceful," I thought. And I walked towards the water.

But A. was there and he figured it out. I remember saying "You should go back to be with N., I'll be fine. I promise, I'll be fine..." In a minute I'll be fine. 

But he wouldn't leave me and then he said "I'm taking you to the hospital." 

And I flipped "No, no, no. I promise I won't hurt myself, I won't kill myself. It's a pact for safety. If I say I won't, I won't. I promise, I promise." And I really did mean it.

A. wouldn't relent. He let me sit with him and cry. He let me take a shower. He let me pack up a small bag with a toothbrush, change of underwear, a picture of N. He put my Bible in my bag. I stalled and stalled and asked "is there any way I can convince you to let me stay?"

And then he said the thing that changed my mind: "We've had too many close calls. What's it going to take before you let me take you? I'm the one who will have to tell our baby what happened to her mommy. And when she asks me why I didn't take you to the hospital, what am I supposed to say to her?" And I thought about my baby grown, but still young, wanting her mom and blaming her dad for not taking better care of me. And I knew that would be wrong. I knew he was right and doing everything right. So, finally, I relented. We woke our sleeping baby came to the hospital and I was admitted in the morning to unit 34. It sucks. And it's painful. I miss my baby. I miss my husband. I'm bored and I'm scared.

Don't worry. It gets better.