Tags
anxiety, busy, depression, generalized anxiety disorder, motherhood, stress, time management, welbutrin, work
I have been off of my Welbutrin for about three months now. I started to wean myself off in June, skipping the occasional day, until I actually forgot to take it at all for a week.
Then, when we went the the states, I left the pills behind, and I haven’t touched them since.
I’ve been doing fine.
I had a happy summer, loving my husband, liking my job, training dogs, writing on Elance.
I’ve been very tired. I feel very extroverted out.
I wish that I didn’t have to juggle work AND dog training AND Elance, but I’m not willing to give up any of these. I need them.
I need the work, the dog training is my insurance for the future when we have a second kid and full time work will no longer cover daycare costs, and Elance is extra money in my pocket while building my writing credits, which is REALLY part of my long term plan.
I spend my mornings trying to shepherd Owl into his clothes and into the car, I work for 9 hours with no break, and then I pick Owl up and entertain him while PH makes dinner. By the time we get Owl to sleep it’s 9 pm and I’m exhausted.
PH wants me to take more time to myself, to hand him the baby and say “YOU deal with it, I’m out of touch for an hour” but I rarely take him up on it. First of all, because I hand him Owl and then disappear training dogs a couple times a week as it is, and second of all because I want to spend time with my husband and son.
But PH thinks all this work is adding to my anxiety.
I haven’t really noticed it (maybe fish don’t notice water, much) but PH thinks it has been worse lately. I don’t know if fall coming on is beginning to activate my SAD, but that seems hard to believe, because it’s been warm and sunny an gorgeous outside lately.
So maybe it’s just all too much.
But I’m not quite sure what to do about it. We need money, and I need to make money while building a way to make money with fewer hours in the future. So I think this is just how it is right now, and I’m not unhappy or miserable.
Just a little stressed.
That’s within normal range, right?
“I feel very tired. I feel extroverted out.”
Yeah, me too. Sometimes that’s just life with little kids. If you think you have a handle on things, have faith in yourself.
Remember though that fall / early winter can be the worst time, because you know that the whole winter still stretches ahead of you. (November is my personal worst month – I’m always at my lowest ebb in November.)
You do need to heed what your family & close friends are saying, but you also need to give yourself permission to be a little burned out and tired. You have a lot on your plate right now.
November is an evil month. Even Anne of Green Gables thinks so.
Take away all the positives from what you said, and what are you left with? You are tired. You are extroverted out. You are more anxious than usual. You are approaching winter. You are stressed. Maybe it is all a little too much. Maybe?!?! PH says YES. Remember, PH is Perfect for a reason. If he thinks all this work is adding to your anxiety, then IT IS. Also, there are different gradations of “fine.”
I have been going to a monthly support group and telling them that everything was “fine” because I felt like I was treading water without problems and handling all the extra stress that was coming my way. Then WHAM I had a major depressive episode. I got back in touch with my therapist and she said that it sounds like my feeling “fine” was just me fooling myself in a big way. Treading water and feeling fine is totally different from floating along in an inner tube and feeling fine. So now we’ve worked out different levels of “fine.” (Fine #1 is different from fine #5. That’s so I can say I’m fine, which I basically am, but also realize that I still need to do certain things to take care of myself and help myself stay away from fine #5.)
I know you know this, but you don’t have to do it all NOW. What would happen if your long term plans took a little longer? I told my therapist recently that I had so many things I felt like I had to do NOW. X by next week, Y by Christmas. She recommended giving myself a year. At least a year.
You are not unhappy or miserable. That is GREAT. But it sounds to me like you need a back up plan. Fortunately I had one when my depression hit – it happened on a Monday and I had support group that Thursday, and my husband kept me on a short leash inbetween. Then my group told me to back to therapy and to get my meds checked. Med check went fine but my therapist has really ramped up my self-care homework.
You have made some very good points. I probably am burning myself out, but I really am not sure what to do about it. I can’t just stop showing up to dog training appointments, or refuse to take on new clients.
Nor can I cut down on my actual employment, as my boss would frown on that.
PH thinks I need to insist on more “me” time, but I don’t want to take time away from him and from Owl, either, because I like them!
We need more hours in the day.
I would trust your husband when it comes to better/worse. I’ve learned it’s super easy to rationalize things in yourself, but spouses seem to get a much clearer view. My husband and I can tell instantly when the other person is having mood issues, while the moody one is still claiming everything is a perfectly justified temporary reaction.
Either way, sorry you’re so busy, but happy that at least some of it is good stuff, or stuff that’s taking you in directions you want to go.
Glad you’re taking fewer meds, that’s good news! :) Lucky for you, you haven’t had much rain to deal with during the summer time, reading some of the other posts you’ve written recently. In both the UK and Sweden, there hasn’t really been a summer at all because it’s kept on raining, which means everyone with SAD has had a very early onset this year. Mine started in August, when it normally wouldn’t start until we turn the clocks back in the end of October. :( Mum suggests lots of D-vitamin, as it seems to play a part in SAD. You need a dose of at least 1000 international units per day (“25 μg” says the bottle), but it does help.
As for working, of course you want to do well, and to have money keep coming in to be able to feed the family and pay the bills, so don’t really know what to say there. Perhaps to just try and take it easy and not take on all the little extra things you can sometimes agree to do that you really haven’t got the time or energy for but agree to in order not to disappoint someone. It’s okay to say no.
I really should be taking vitamin D. Thanks for the reminder.
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