Yesterday I Had A Break Down

Something we all want to hear, right?

On my IG today I made a post (@MyTalesFromTheCrib) about something I have never heard of before and that is PMDD, Premenstrual Dysphoric Disorder, something that my nurse practitioner diagnosed me with. Forgive me for not going into what it is. It's too overwhelming for me and I ask you to please google it because there is just too much detail to list. It's a very extreme version of PMS which we all know of, however, PMDD is incredibly common and can even get worse as we age. There are 3 million cases diagnosed in the US alone each year, but with no one talking about it, how are you even supposed to get diagnosed? So Imagine all of the females who are suffering from PMDD in silence and have no idea why. 

Once I learned more about it I felt relief until I got home and googled it and discovered that the symptoms are all literally all of the things I have been feeling and talking about to every single healthcare practitioner since the beginning of forever which is my entire young adult to adult life. And this has never been brought us as a possibility for my entire list of symptoms ever. 

I'm sad today because I'm 44 years old and will be 45 this summer and I have been suffering from severe depression since I was 14 years old without hardly any help from the medical community despite the fact that I have always, always, ALWAYS been very vocal about it. Imagine the girls who never speak up because we're told not to? 

I'm outraged today because I have told COUNTLESS medical professionals and even therapists who largely have been women, whom I have always requested "hoping to get better help and more understanding" about having postpartum depression and feeling suicidal, feeling actual rage in the week or so before my period and I have even gone so far as to describe it like this, "I feel that there is actually something chemically wrong with me sometimes that I can't control and it makes me feel rage, violent, suicidal and extremely emotional with uncontrollable crying and then I'll start my period and feel MAGICALLY better." Which doesn't sound like normal behavior for someone to have just certain times during the month, right? This sounds like it would be considered a crisis situation to have a young mother with three beautiful children and a loving supportive husband who has a good job and they live in a house with a yard and have working automobiles and are not concerned if and how they are going to have food and shelter that week, yet this woman is wanting to kill herself, right? And I mean, actually kill myself, consumed by it and plotting out ways to do it because of how stressed and overwhelmed and depressed I was but be sure to not harm anyone in the process. I felt like ti would make everyone's lives better if I just wasn't in it anymore. I was too much of a burden. And when I said this it was always met with a head shake and a scrunched nose and a shrug, 

"I'm not sure why." 

"I have no idea." 

"I'm not familiar with anything brain and/or chemical related." 

"That sounds like you are describing PMS, which is common." 

And that was it. 

There wasn't EVER any help offered, or suggestions of solutions ever. I got shrugged off and was sometimes told, "I have felt like that too as well as other women, so...you're not alone if that makes you feel any better." 

I'm heartbroken today because I feel like I have literally lost DECADES off of my life due to feeling hopeless. I look around and I'm like, how do I have a husband with three children and two dogs in this house? When did that even happen and how did I not kill myself before any of this took place due to these extreme mood swings? I don't know how I'm alive to be honest, and that is not just me trying to "get attention" which is always, always, always without fail accompanied with someone talking about suicide. 

Attention seeking. 

I've even heard first hand teachers, school counselors of all grades, doctors and therapists say this about someone talking about suicide, especially when that someone is a young girl or a young person identifying themselves as female between the ages of 12-19. 

By the way I want to normalize something. During the time I have been writing this I will randomly just burst out in loud, uncontrollable sobs that are coming from the depths of my 14 year old soul which was the first age I thought about suicide and actually had an attempt. Following that attempt, I should add that I never received any sort of counseling whatsoever, something that I so desperately needed. The sobs were also coming from my 23 year old self who found myself stuck in an engagement and living with a fiance that I didn't love and couldn't see a future with but didn't know how to get out of it. (I did by the way. We never got married, thank God!) The sobs are coming from my 25 year old self who admitted myself into the hospital after another suicide attempt following the biggest emotional breakdown in my life up until that point. 

I want to normalize the fact that yesterday I had a breakdown and it didn't end up like it's portrayed in the media with me slashing anyone's tires or car windows with a baseball bat, or crashing a car into a storefront, or shooting up a school, or going on a screaming rampage in a store at a bunch of people. In fact, earlier in the day I had been chatting with different online mom friends of mine and was even offering a bunch of support and encouragement to them. I smiled at all of the people I met on the way to my appointment and even looked them in the eyes and said, "good morning" and chatted about our weather warming up (something we midwesterners do after a long, bitter winter.) I laughed in my appointment with my nurse practitioner. I made some jokes and even made her laugh. I also cried in there as I was opening up about some past pain and wounds that have not healed. My tears after just cracking a joke and laughing is always met with confusion. But laughter is my coping mechanism. The Sad Clown. But after any tears, I kept coming back rather quickly I might add to a place of being nice and agreeable and friendly and being overly aware of not taking up too much of her time even though I am paying for that appointment - because that's my job as a woman in society. Friendly. Agreeable. Not a burden. I also waved at several of my neighbors on my drive home as I smiled and said, "hello" out loud even though they couldn't hear me because my window was up. I made several comments to various posts on IG that were all supportive and positive and wished my fellow awesome women friends a Happy International Women's Day! A conversation with my neighbor went like this, "Hey Joe. How are you? How's Kathy?" 

Joe: We're doing pretty good. How are you guys?" 

Me: "We're great! Just enjoying this sunshine and warm weather. Happy to finally be seeing some grass!"

I literally said I was "great." 

Friendly. Agreeable. Not a burden with my thoughts or about my bad day and internal struggle and immense pain.

Not a single person I came into contact with yesterday, even people who know me would think I was going to have a breakdown at any point during the day. None of them would think that I would find myself thinking about suicide once again, crying uncontrollably, and I mean that literally as the loud, guttural sobs escaped my chest making noises I don't often make when crying, shocking even me as to where exactly they came from and why? My dog who normally couldn't pay my cries and tears a single bit of attention whatsoever was literally jamming her head into my lap at I sat at the table bent over trying to muffle the sounds even though no one was home. 

"You're being too loud." 

"Your cries are too loud." 

"It sounds weird, those crying noises. It's making me uncomfortable. That's not how human females are supposed to cry."

"It's disruptive." ...to the dogs. 

Scouty; my 3 year old lab offering me comfort. Her large yellow lab body bouncing around, tail and booty in a full wiggle making me laugh as I hugged her tightly telling her she is a, "good girl, such a good, good girl and thank you for loving me and for hugging me!" - before she abruptly disappeared wanting nothing more to do with me. She is part aloof cat after all and never really likes getting pets despite being a purebred Labrador Retriever. She never got that "friendly" memo that society expects her to be, I guess. 

The rest of the day had my curled up in a ball, wrapped in a blanket on the couch telling my kids I felt sick and letting them run amok basically. My daughter vegged out on silly videos, her welcomed laughter piercing the air. My sons out on bikes in the front yard with neighbors. Me scrolling to avoid my feelings. The second I got up about an hour or two later, I couldn't control my crying. Especially when I saw the messy kitchen that I was supposed to tackle and had every intention to before my appointment. I asked her to help, which she quickly was going to and I didn't even know where to begin. I ended up starting to cry and asked her to "go get the dudes and tell them its time to come home." And she stared at me in shock as I was just crying without any sound. I told her that I just didn't feel very good but I'll be ok. She walked out and a few seconds later I heard my husband's voice and he came up to hug me telling me that she had told him I was crying and the flood gates opened as I literally clung to him as if he were a raft in open water. I said that I just needed to lay down and I never came back down. I cried the whole way up the stairs trying my best to be silent about it. I sobbed once I was in bed, curling up in the blankets, shoving them into my mouth, to again, not be a burden to my family. I only stopped once I decided to turn on my phone and scroll IG. And like a hose, it was shut off. My body breathing heavy like a child does after crying hard. And that was my coping mechanism for no longer feeling that pain. I IG ignored it. It's still all there though. A smoking volcano. Just sleeping. Waiting.

I have no more for today as I am mentally, emotionally and physically drained and need to pick up the kids from school in 17 minutes. Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick...

Until next time,

Colleen