Depression? Naw, I'm just crazy.

Sometimes, at the end of a tiring day, I will sigh to my husband, "I am so depressed!" He will tell me I'm just tired, not dismissively, just matter-of-factly. And you know, he is right. I don't think it actually is depression that I'm feeling when I say that. It's just that depression is such a common concept in today's world, especially for women, that when you're not at the top of your game, even for a short time, you can run the risk of wallowing and over-diagnosing. I recently came across bits about women's depression—real depression—in my web wanderings and in Ariel Gore's "The Mother Trip: Hip Mama's Guide to Staying Sane in the Chaos of Motherhood" and had the opportunity to ponder my part in this while pedaling away on the stationary bike at the gym this morning. I came to the conclusion that I probably have not been depressed in the true sense of the word in a long time (perhaps not even at my lowest points). I never felt like totally giving up. I never felt like I couldn't get out of bed. I always had a little fight left in me. I think I just get tired, restless and anxious and none of it is ever that serious compared to some of the things I read that some people go through. Serious chemical stuff, serious reactions to realities far worse than even the worst I've had to deal with.

I did have quite a meltdown mid January, though. It was the night of Barack Obama's inauguration. Should have been all happy. The start of something new and wonderful. Instead, for me, it was the end of a long weekend in which my husband was home with us two extra days, kind of throwing me out of whack, messing with the schedule me and my kid usually keep. I don't remember details of what was bothering me anymore. Probably it had something to do with him not helping enough around the house, me feeling like I was doing too much, and that whole mess. Having him home with two extra days off for MLK day and the inauguration while I still had to work (running my own business, taking care of the house, the baby, etc.) and having it all in my face kind of wore me down. When I'm alone, it just doesn't bother me as much. At the end of the day, I had alot of trouble getting the child to go to sleep and I just wanted to get her to sleep and have some down time to myself. But instead it was a huge struggle. I cursed the fact that I'd set this up for myself—extreme attachment, nursing her to sleep, making it my job to put her to sleep, even if my husband was willing to help. (When my head is clear and I am well-rested I am firmly committed to and happy with these decisions.) I just wanted to be alone. The whole toxic mixture ended up with me yelling wildly at both my child and my husband, throwing a glass in the kitchen (baby was safely in her room) and hitting myself in the face repeatedly because I wanted to punish myself for the former two things. OK. So maybe that sounds kind of serious. Sounds like a break down.

I called a few friends that I was supposed to have over at my house the next day and canceled. I was forced to tell them the truth because I couldn't come up with any legitimate excuses. I really couldn't bear to be around moms and their kids after I had so badly failed as a mom the night before. I would feel so fake smiling at them and their babies, serving cookies and tea like I was a happy little homemaker. I didn't want to have them over to commiserate, either. I am really not big on commiseration. I don't like dishing about husbands and how rotten they are. I don't even really think mine is so rotten. We just have different approaches to some things. So, I canceled and decided to go get therapy.

I was really serious about the therapy this time. Well, as serious as someone like me can be. I'd tried it a couple times before. Once, when I was in Chicago in my late teens with an abusive husband. The therapist was late for our first appointment. I left. It was insulting. I don't really tolerate lateness from people who I am paying. I tried again in Georgetown when I was living with my Jewish financier boyfriend. She was OK, but between my first and second appointment with her I negotiated a 15K raise for myself and suddenly my problems were all over with (for the time being). I then tried a group thing a few years later. No good. So I tried again this time, but driving 30 minutes each way, paying a $30 co-pay each time, and having to go when my husband was around to watch our kid didn't seem like the most fun use of free time I had to squeeze so much to get. I'm glad it never worked out for me. I just don't think I am a therapy person.

I am from a lower middle class blue collar family. We don't do therapy. We do beer. Seriously, though, last summer I had started taking the herbal supplement valerian after talking with one of my friends about anxiety and her taking anti-anxiety meds. I somehow learned that valerian, which is more commonly used to help people sleep, is also helpful for anxiety. I think I do have a bit of anxiety issues (as do so many women of my ilk, it seems). The valerian really helped. Somewhere along the line between last summer and inauguration day, though, I dropped off the valerian. I decided to start again after my meltdown, and it again has helped alot.

The valerian in combination with alot of reading, writing and getting in touch with my feelings has made things pretty OK since my meltdown. (I always exercise regularly anyway, so that was nothing new to add to the mix.) I feel like I can't really complain or claim depression because the things I read other women go through seem so much more serious and deep than my issues and I genuinely feel so much for them. I have no real problems. I have a healthy, easy kid, no money troubles, an overall decent husband. I should not complain! I can easily identify why I get upset if I stop for a minute and process it. I can trace bad bits from my past and childhood that linger to sometimes taint my now peaceful life. And so its just a matter of managing my emotions and my responses to things. Not letting myself get too tired. Asking for help when I need it (from my husband, because there really is nobody else around to help me). Taking work-work in stride. (I actually tend to get more "depressed" when I have less work, oddly enough.) Knowing that good enough is good enough. Reveling in my beautiful daughter. Facing the fact that toddlers are wild and woolly and not meant to be controlled, and laughing it off instead of stressing out. And making sure to take that valerian!

I remember in my 20s, some snobby dude in my circle of friends telling me I wasn't smart enough or deep enough to be depressed. At the time, I was slightly insulted but brushed it off and went up for round two at the Chinese buffet. Now I believe that I am smart enough to transcend depression and deep enough to understand that the richness of blessings I have in my life would make it an embarrassment for me to claim depression. Maybe I am a little crazy, but I'm not depressed!

Supporting a child's dreams—one small step at a time

It's 8:15 am and already we've had a dance party, built a railroad, ate some waffles and did yoga (albeit all on "toddler time"—about 10 minutes each). I got a little work-work done, too. I seriously don't know how it all happens, but that's the magic of living with a toddler.

As I was making coffee this morning and getting our waffles warmed up (Daddy had made them for us earlier before leaving for work), my little A was yelling out "Boot! Boot!" She was trying to put on some boots. We weren't going anywhere yet. It's not boot weather. But, she wanted those boots on. She's at a stage where she can kind of do it herself, but not quite, and so I heard her getting really frustrated the way she does. She let out the little angry scream-growl. "Boot! Boot!" She cried. So I went over and helped her get them on. Then she did a little dance. Mission accomplished.

It then occurred to me that we can help our kids achieve their "dreams" no matter how small, just by being around and helping them out a little. It doesn't have to be a big deal and it doesn't have to make sense. It especially doesn't have to make sense when they are toddlers. She really wanted those boots on and it made her happy to have them on. I only hope I can approach helping her achieve bigger things later in life with the simplicity of putting on some boots. And I hope I can be a support to what she wants, rather than imposing what I want.

Even the animals want to be near their babies!

I am still looking for the trailer that appears on one of my kid's videos for a late edition of the Dumbo movie that shows happier scenes of mama and baby elephant together. We always take a minute to watch the trailer and cuddle and I sing it to her. (I haven't been able to get her interested in watching the entire Dumbo movie yet.)

This clip here is so touching—it shows mama longing for her baby.

A flimsy case against breast-feeding

Just out this month in The Atlantic, The Case Against Breast-Feeding attempts to dismantle the science supporting the health benefits of breast-feeding, seemingly in an effort to justify some women's ambivalence. I want to be mad and get snarky, but I just can't. The author seems so angst-ridden and the article so all-over-the-map in it's structure, I just feel sorry for her. As I am always compelled to do, I will say that I think people should do what they need to do to make their lives work and if that means feeding the baby formula, then fine. I also don't want to make those women who want to breastfeed but for whatever reason cannot feel bad. That said, the "case" made by journalist Hanna Rosin—that breast-feeding may not be worth the dent it puts in women's freedom—is both weak and dangerous, if anybody takes it seriously.

I can agree with some of Rosin's observations, but not with the spirit of the article or her conclusions. Yes, people can chose what they want to chose for their lives, however, mis-information driven by malcontent such as that of Rosin's does nothing to elevate the way our society values children, families, and humanity itself. When you make a case against something so natural and so basic to humanity, the very feeding of our babies in the way we were meant to feed them, it seems to me you are throwing in your vote with the capital-driven, work-and-productivity-above-all-else camp. You are saying that things women inherently do are not as valuable as industry. You are devaluing women. How is this real feminism? Women should not have to match men in order to be respected.

Rosin breast-feeds. Dutifully. She doesn't really like it so much, though. She says, "It is a serious time commitment that pretty much guarantees that you will not work in any meaningful way." Well, that's a huge assumption. I breast-feed on-demand and have made a significant financial contribution (30-35 percent) to my household for the past 21 months. I don't think my clients would say my work is not meaningful. Women make it work and should be applauded for their creativity and tenacity—especially those who have to deal with pumping. Women should be supported in their efforts to care for their children, not told that this care is not all that important, and therefore can be cast aside so they can get down to the real work of turning the wheels of industry.

Rosin claims the science supporting the benefits of breastfeeding is inconclusive, noting the dearth of randomized, controlled trials (RCTs). She seems unaware of the growing call among nutrition scientists to look beyond RCTs for evaluating nutrient benefits. Because poor nutrition can't ethically be controlled for—researchers can't deprive a group of study participants something good for them—the RCT is probably not the ideal model for nutrition research. Realistically, we have to rely heavily on epidemological data, that is, studies that track what people do over time and tease out similarities in an attempt to link habits to outcomes. Many of our public health initiatives, in fact, are based on epidemiological evidence, such as the message that fruits and vegetables are good for you, seen in the "5-a-day" campaign, or even the venerable food pyramid itself. Rosin, after presenting her interpretation of the body of scientific evidence, or lack thereof, on the benefits of breast-feeding, says, "Breast-feeding does not belong in the realm of facts and hard numbers; it is much too intimate and elemental." I'd have to agree with that, so why include all the analysis of the journal studies?

I will admit I am not all that interested in the science behind breast-feeding. To me, the fact that my body makes milk and my baby wants to drink it tells me that it's right. It feels good. It's cozy. It just makes sense. Yes, it's often a challenge for a new mom to get started. Yes, sometimes I am just not in the mood to have my now-toddler climbing on me and grabbing for "milkies". But, it's my calling right now. It was since my daughter's birth and it will be until we both decide it's time to move on. (I'm hoping that will be some time between age two and three.)

Rosin's interpretation of the science doesn't really wash for me. It seems like she had this idea in her head—let's discount the benefits of breast-feeding because it's a pain and it ties women down, yeah, that's a new idea—and she went and dug into the journals to support her predetermined notion.

Rosin is one mixed-up woman and I wish she could just let go. She says of breastfeeding, "It contains all of my awe about motherhood, and also my ambivalence. Right now, even part-time, it’s a strain. But I also know that this is probably my last chance to feel warm baby skin up against mine, and one day I will miss it." She is letting this thing she knows she will miss slip through her fingers because of her joyless brand of feminism.

She asks that we weigh the benefits of breast-feeding against all those things a woman must give up in order to do so. "Given what we know so far, it seems reasonable to put breast-feeding’s health benefits on the plus side of the ledger and other things—modesty, independence, career, sanity—on the minus side, and then tally them up and make a decision. "

For me, there's no decision. I just always thought I'd breastfeed, although I never gave it a whole lot of thought. I was surprised in my child birth class that such a big deal was made about breastfeeding, almost to ensure we new moms would do it. I think that's good, from a public health perspective, but to me, it was just assumed that a woman would breastfeed unless she just simply couldn't for very serious reasons. I know now I was a little out of the loop in terms of the difficulty some women have and the politics of it all.

I guess different women process these things differently—modesty, independence, career, sanity—because I just don't have issues with any of these. (Each could easily be the subject of a longer post!) Maybe because I am uninhibited, or because I have small breasts, or both, modesty is not a concern of mine when it comes to breast-feeding. I'll do it any time, anywhere. It's natural, it's me, it's my kid and it's my right. I don't lament any lack of independence, either. The way I see it, certainly the first year of my child's life, and now well into the second, it's kind of my job to put her first, and so, yeah, maybe I can't take off and be away from her for hours at a time. Maybe I'm not supposed to at this point in our lives. Career? I opted out of the office day-to-day in order to stay home with my daughter during her baby years. Other women, who I admire immensely, make it work by pumping (another issue worthy of much discussion). And as far as sanity goes, it's over-rated.

Commenters to the NY Times Motherlode blog had some really good posts...

More of my thoughts on breast-feeding...

A traditional mom?

I found out the other day that I am a traditional mom. How can a 21st century, independent communications consultant who is basically online on and off 16 hours a day be a traditional mom? Read on!

In "How She Really Does It", by Wendy Sachs (mentioned in my previous post), it talks about the guilt women have whether they need to go to work or choose to go to work and be away from their babies.

"In cultures where babies are always burrowed onto their mother's bosoms, moms are never made to feel guilty about leaving their kids behind to go to work because mother and child are literally connected at the hip...

...for centuries it has not been practical for mother and child to be attached all day long, every day...

In the United State, the combination of a rigid non-family focused workplace, children spaced close together, and a lack of familial support stresses perhaps our most intense primordial affiliation—the mother-child bond."

And here's where it gets really interesting, when Sachs cites anthropologist Helen Fisher who explains:

"Fifteen thousand years ago, you would never have two children under four years old. We were not built to have children so close together. For millions of years, the natural spacing was four years apart; the same thing is true in gorillas and chimpanzees and even greater in orangutans...The reason that the four-year birth spacing was maintained was because if you nurse a baby on demand, several times an hour, and sleep with a baby at night who keeps nursing, and combine that with a great deal of exercise and low body fat, you wouldn't conceive until you've really slowed down on the nursing. So a woman was only dealing with one child at a time, and the mother carried that child on her back while she did the gathering of vegetables; that's what she was expected to do. She left the older kids in camp in multi-age playgroups in an extremely secure, social environment with all of her relatives and friends. So there was no anxiety about daycare, and there was no anxiety about leaving the baby because she never left the baby since she was nursing around the clock. So she could do all of her basic jobs simultaneously and comfortably.

What we're lacking today is about fifteen other people around us to help care for the babies. We don't have the other adults, friends, relatives, other children, we have none of that. And women today often have more than one child under four years old, so no wonder we're suffering!"

So, we are talking Paleolithic-traditional here, not June Cleaver-traditional. I love the cave-mama characteristics I can benefit from. OK, so maybe I don't have extremely low body fat, but I did (and still do, though to a lesser extent) nurse around the clock and co-sleep. Basically, I have my little one around me all day while I am at home on the computer, aside from our daily trip to the gym, errands and outings (where she is mostly still right there with me). I still haven't had a regular period and my daughter is 20 months old, so old-school biology is working for me, for sure. (Interestingly, the prehistoric paradigm is also used in the popular book "Happiest Toddler on the Block", where author Harvey Karp, M.D., takes kids from being chimps to Neanderthals to little cavemen.)

I guess maybe biologically, we humans are still programmed to work a certain way that hasn't caught up with our technological advancement. Still, as evidenced by the way I managed caring for my baby (and now toddler) while working remotely over the Internet, technology can be a huge boon when it comes to staying close to our babies.

Let's call the whole thing off

It dawned on me today that I want to officially drop out of any discourse involving "Mommy Wars"...that debate between stay-at-home moms and go-to-work moms and anyone else with an opinion to spout off. I never really wanted to be in such a war, or on one side or another anyway, but just in case there was any confusion, here are my latest thoughts.

I recently read "How She Really Does It" by Wendy Sachs, where Sachs talks with a number of professional women about how they juggle motherhood with work. I enjoyed the book immensely—maybe for the wrong reasons. To be honest, it made me feel so lucky and it made me realize how easy I have it, being a work-at-home mom to one lovely daughter. Now, it's not always easy to be home all day with a toddler and try to get 3-5 hours of office work in as well...but, it beats having to feel guilty about leaving her—which I would. It beats having to worry about her all day. It beats being pissed off that I can't see her cute smiling face and hear her laugh whenever I want.

With my work, I do have deadlines, but for my day-to-day schedule, I can often work when I can, if my daughter is playing independently, work while she naps, or when my husband gets home from work and watches her. Or, I can always put off work til late night when she is in bed and my husband's in bed, too. My preferred time slot, other than naps, of 9-ish p.m. to 12 a.m. I just don't need that much sleep. I realize that this situation is somewhat unusual and I'd love to find a way to talk about it more and maybe encourage others to explore how they could set up a similar situation if they were interested, but I'm not sure of the best venue (continued blogging, book, gatherings?) or the finer points and details of my message.

I intend to either work more hours developing my own business or go back to a full time office job when my daughter is older—school age. But, the infant and toddler years at home are really special to me personally. That's more of a personal choice that makes me happy than anything I want to politicize or lord over anyone else.

Reading about the lives of other women made me feel like not arguing anymore—if I ever did. I don't know, I think I was just expressing an opinion, but now, somehow I want to soften it. The book made me feel compassionate. Whether or not these working women feel sad about leaving their young kids, I feel sad for them because of how *I* would have felt. But that's more about me than about them or anyone's kids. Even if they make a shitload more money than I do. I have enough. I feel like I don't need to judge or comment on anyone else's life choices. But, I can celebrate my own.

Bitchy Buddhist Mom

It happened in the frozen food aisle at Whole Foods. This woman was poring over some veggie burger packaging. I gave her a little time. She was standing there in the freezer doorway. Reading. I’m waiting. I’m holding my thirty-pound toddler in one arm, wanting to carry on with my quick blitz through to grab a few things. I scope it out. She is short. I am tall. I say “excuse me” and slink over toward the case, reaching up over her head. I grab my Amy’s Cheddar Burger box and she turns, finally ready to move out of the doorway. We touch. I quickly back away. “I’m so sorry.” I say, out of habit, politely, pleasantly. I’m not really so sorry.

“Couldn’t you have just waited?” She yaps.

“I said I was sorry. I said ‘excuse me’ and you just kept standing there.”

“I was going to move. You should have waited. You have that baby in your arms.”

“Look, I apologized. I am a kind person and I don’t need the lecture. I said I was sorry, for, uh, touching you. God forbid people touch each other.”

“I am kind too. I am a kindergarten teacher. You should have waited. You have that baby…”

She seemed to be implying that I had put my child in harm’s way by taking a chance at bumping into her, by reaching over her. She clearly had no idea what kind of people we were, me and my little bruiser. Being grazed by a five-foot-two woman would not cause me to drop my child. If I faltered, my little one would cling to me anyway. Was she kidding me? I was not impressed by her saying she was a teacher, either. In fact, I was turned off. It underscored her being overly…something. Fussy? Authoritarian? Protective? Preachy? There was something about her. She was little, like I said. Not unattractive. My mother’s age. She wore a snug fitting North Face ski jacket and had a wanna-be hip satchel bag, patchworky purple. She had nice wire frame glasses. She looked like someone who thought they were earthy, cool, crunchy, conscious. The fact that we were arguing in Whole Foods over veggie burgers made the exchange even more ridiculous. I, in my black on black workout gear would have looked New-York-tough or otherwise scary, were it not for the little one in my arms with her hot pink pants and flower-appliquéd winter jacket. I was half a foot taller than her so maybe I was scary. She seemed intent on making me feel like I was an unfit mother for risking my kid’s life and limb by reaching over to get the veggie burgers and get the heck out of the store in a timely manner.

“Good lord!” I huffed and went on my way. There was no “winning” this. She was clearly the moral superior in her own mind and I, after all, had committed my transgression because I was in a hurry, so why would I want to be further delayed like this?

I felt that nervous, shaky feeling I get whenever I have confrontations with strangers. (Yes, it has happened enough that I have a feeling that I know and recall.) I had to go to a different line than her because I did not want to be close to her. I wanted to keep shopping and kill time so we wouldn’t even have to be up at the checkouts at the same time, but, again, I didn’t want to waste any more time. I was in a hurry. So we both checked out.

I was burning a little inside. I still thought she was kind of a nut, but I wanted the upper hand. It is twisted, I know, but I wanted the upper hand of being the “good” person. I wanted to show her something. Maybe that you shouldn’t bark at people in a store. Maybe that it’s alright if people gently bump into one another. I don’t know. Additionally, I did sincerely not want to have this person running around the world with negativity related to me. So, I called out to her when we were exiting the store.

“Hey there,” I said. “I just want to say again, sorry.” She stopped and seemed a little bewildered, but got over it quickly. “This is a small community and you might be my kid’s teacher or something someday. I don’t want there to be any negativity.”

She looked at me a little strangely when I mentioned the possibility of her being my kid’s teacher one day, then spoke. “Oh, there’s no negativity. It’s not like that. I’m sorry too. Honestly, my first thought was just the baby.”

Again with the baby! Whatever. It turned out the reason for her initial reaction to my mention of her being my kid’s teacher was because she is a special ed teacher. Oh. Maybe that’s why she was so, uhm, sensitive to the potential of me dropping my kid or something, too? Worried I’d drop the kid and she’d hit her head and end up slow? I guess it could happen. I went on to learn she had taught at UCLA, too, writes children’s books and has a son who is a doctor. Somehow, everyone who has a son or daughter who is a doctor always manages to work this into the conversation within the first few minutes of meeting them!

She kept babbling on and on. I lost track. At this point, I had completely blown my goal of getting in and out of that store. My kid was squirming in my arms, I had to adjust the grocery bad and her weight. I just wanted to get out of there. I put the child down and was very careful to make sure she didn’t dash out into the parking lot or anything. I could sense this woman was worried about that too and felt like she almost thought I shouldn’t have put the child down.

“Well, you better go home.” She turned to my daughter. “I know if I was your mama, I’d want to just kiss you all day!” She said pleasantly enough, but still somehow seemingly trying to nudge a little bit about what kind of mom she was and what kind of mom I was. Why wasn’t I, at that moment, sitting there showering my baby with kisses? She then added, “You’re a good mom. You go home with that little one.”

OK. I will. Please do let me go now! I am not really one of those women with strong doubts about if I am a good mom. I mean, in moments of weakness or tiredness, I feel like I could have done better. I could have been more patient or whatever. But, ultimately, so far I am doing alright. I stay home with the child. I play with her. I read to her. We do art. We cook. We have dance parties. I breastfeed, still. I co-sleep. I try to give her a lot of latitude. Sometimes I’ve yelled, sometimes spanked a butt (this I regret), but I always feel guilty and pledge to do better. I am just a normal, good mom. She doesn’t know the half of it. I don’t need her approval!

“Yeah, we’re going to head home. Again, just wanted to say sorry because I don’t want to run into you in the neighborhood someday and have you be like, there’s that bitchy woman!” Was there really a neighborhood here in the Northern Virginia suburbs. Maybe I just wanted there to be.

“Oh no,” she said. “I wouldn’t think that.” She reached over and tugged my girl’s winter jacket down over her belly, which was a tiny bit exposed, as the jacket had ridden up. “Cover her up now, it is so cold out here!” She warned, walking off into the forty degree day. And we left, me and my little chick, to be the tough yet tender bitches that we are.