Defining the perfect mother

There is a woman that exists, though no one has ever found her or met her. Mothers everywhere strive to be her. They follow her examples, strive to achieve all this woman accomplishes. We measure our own successes & failures against the precedent of this infamous idol of perfection.

The Perfect Mum.

Last week I wrote a post My foray with postnatal depression & one common thread kept repeating itself from almost everyone who messaged, commented or spoke with me. 

I wanted to be the perfect mum.

So I pose the question here, what makes a perfect mum?

Is it the mum who stays home to raise her children - or is it the mum who returns to work to build a better future for her children?

Is it the mum who spends hours in the kitchen cooking every meal from bare scratch, with organic everything - or is it the mum who cooks quick nutritious meals in fifteen minutes flat?

Is it the mum who home schools her children - or the mum who drops her children off to school every weekday?

Is it the mum who bounced back to her former pre-baby svelte self - or is it the mum who still has her pregnancy weight five years on?

Is it the mum who breastfeeds her toddler - or the mum who lovingly gazes at her baby while he drinks formula from a bottle?  

Is it the mum who puts her own dreams & aspirations on hold as she dedicates her whole self to raising her children - or the mum who regularly takes time away from her children to do things by herself that make her happy?

Is it the mum who keeps her house clean & tidy what seems every minute of every day - or the mum who has a sink full of dishes & a thick layer of dust coating most surfaces?

Is it the mum with the perfect hair style & immaculately applied make up - or the mum with a hastily tied pony tail & baby vomit on her shoulder. In public.

Is it the mum who regularly sits down to do craft time with her children - or the mum who has an aversion to all things glitter & paint?

Is it the mum who always looks calm & serene - or the mum with the deep frown lines & stressed look upon her face?

Is it the mum who feeds & rocks her eleven month old baby to sleep - or the mum who follows a controlled crying routine?

I could go on. The helicopter parent, the attached parent, the free range parent, the authoritarian parent. All these labels confirm there is no perfect, ideal way to parent. At the end of the day every child, every baby, every tweenager & teenager need the same bone deep conviction - they are loved without reserve. Everything always comes back to that - a soul deep, universe wide love. 

So this perfect mum, this mythical creature that debilitates us, as she inspires us to reach further. I've never met her. 

I see her though. I recognise her, in every mum I know. 

Every mum I see holding her back straight as she pushes her screaming, tantrum throwing toddler through the shop.

I see her as she puts jars of baby food & cans of formula in her trolley. 

I see her in the mum who home schools her children. 

I see her on my way to school when she's driving to work. 

I see her in the mums taking their child to playgroup. 

I recognise her in the lone woman sitting quietly in a cafe.

I see her when she's pushing her child on the swings, kicking the ball at the park, building sandcastles at the beach. 

I see her when she's trying to reason with a defiant three year old, creating boundaries with a freedom seeking twelve year old, grasping for more patience with a sulky eight year old.

I spot her in waiting rooms when she is trying to stop her children from jumping on the chairs.

I see her doing the best she can, as she can, in that moment.

My definition a perfect mum - it's every one of us. 

My foray with Post Natal Depression.

{Ben three hours new}

Out with the placenta, in with the Dolly Parton boobs. When your hormones change, flood in, it may catch you. I'm not talking the endorphins, they're the happy hormones. No, the despair, the dread, the frustration, the lonliness. Thoughts of what have I done?

Other times the little black cloud rolls in slowly. One little grey wisp at a time. Sneaky. Harder to notice, unobservant to the gradual changes. After all becoming a mother (for the first time or the eighth time) comes with a suitcase of upheaval. When life is already trying to find it's new axis, the seemingly smaller problems fly under the rated. In the beginning the little thoughts don't rate on the priority scale. 

Post Natal Depression.

This week is Antenatal & Postnatal Depression Week. Statistics show 1 in 7 women are diagnosed with Post Natal Depression. I believe the numbers are greater than that. How many women just keep going, even when they know their real self is hiding somewhere. Lost in all the mist.

That was me.

After Ben was born, & I've written about Ben's first year before, it was so far from how I imagined life would be. Our baby was not the happy, content little boy I imagined during pregnancy.

{A very familiar sight}

He cried. He was so hard to get to sleep. He screamed. When he did sleep, he didn't sleep for long at all.

There was already so many changes during that time - leaving full time work to stay home full time, Doug changed employment which also meant a change in working hours from a flexible shift roster to a Monday to Friday working week, plus work was now further away too. He left earlier & was home later. All of a sudden I was home by myself with Ben from 6am to 6pm. Add in Ben's aversion to sleeping & constant crying, I became an ideal candidate for PND.

Initially I tried to convince everyone around me that I was fine. I was coping & happy. It was easy to know all the right things to say to the community health nurse when she would ask how I was, how my moods were. The new mothers survey - occasionally I felt a little sad [tick box] but over all I was happy [tick box] at least that was what my manipulated answers indicated. I was still convincing myself that I was fine, I wasn't ready to think that I wasn't coping. To admit failure. I didn't open up to anyone about how I was really feeling. Not to myself, not to Doug, which is silly but true. That is what post natal depression did - it changed me. I fought internally against myself all the time. Every thought became a battle. Sometimes I would be desperate for help, for someone to really see the conflict inside my mind. But when asked how I really was, the mask came on. I was my own worst enemy.

I felt bad that Ben cried. A lot. Doug didn't do well with all the crying too, & after spending a long day at work & then driving home in peak hour traffic, I wanted to have it all together for Doug once he was home. Instead of a hot dinner, I had to pass over a screaming baby, because I just needed half an hour without grasping for ways to calm our baby. Again, silly but true. It changed my normal rational thoughts into something else altogether.
It was me who really wanted to start our family, my maternal clock was chiming loudly, while Doug was happy wait another few years, so when life wasn't perfect, I took all the problems on myself. Thinking I was the one who signed up for this, not Doug. My thinking was skewed (screwed). I felt guilty, accountable, for everything that was wrong with our baby, though none of it was my fault. This was the depression, the little dark voice telling me I had made my bed, now I had to lay in it. 

Slowly I began to lose myself. The way I was feeling, I thought it was just a new mum thing.

When I thought of post natal depression images of women not being able to get out of bed came to mind. Constantly crying. Ignoring their baby or wanting as little as possible to do with him. Failing to bond. Crouched in a corner or against a wall. Shutting out the world & everyone in it.

I didn't have problems getting out of bed each day. I didn't cry without good reason or desperation. I loved Ben & interacted with him (though at times it was with a forced smile. A happy mask because I didn't want to scar our child with buried memories of an expressionless Mum gently shaking a rattle in front of him) I only sat against a wall when I was listening to Ben cry while taking a break from trying to rock him to sleep. I went to our local mothers group. We went for walks & family dinners.

I didn't have post natal depression - according to my thoughts of what post natal depression looked like.

But I did.

I knew I did, but I was in denial. I thought it would go away as Ben got older, got easier.

Maybe it would have, maybe not. I honestly can't say if I could have continued on the way I was feeling, without reaching for help.

My GP was great, we started a treatment plan for Ben's reflux, which was quite severe & a root cause for many issues we were having. I started taking anti depressants, along with regular visits to track & document my depression & Ben's reflux. I was advised that there may not be any noticeable differences for up to three weeks, so when within four days of commencing anti depressant medication I felt great, coinciding with Ben being a little more settled than usual as we got a handle on his reflux, I thought to myself 'Ha, I don't have depression, it's just when Ben has a bad day, it's hard. It's not me after all.'

Without seeking medical advice first, I stopped taking the anti depressants. Two days later I crashed emotionally. I was back to how I felt two weeks earlier. Flat, unenthusiastic, sad, at times desperate. For what I can't specify. Perhaps desperate to feel like 'me' again. Desperate not to feel useless when our baby cried & I couldn't calm him. Desperate not to be stuck how I was feeling.

While I was back in my grey mist, Ben was still more settled & sleeping a lot easier. So it wasn't Ben. It was me as well. That was the moment I accepted I did have post natal depression.

Immediately I started taking the medication again & when we went back to the GP a few days later I told him everything that had happened. It was a relief, to find 'me' again. All those martyr thoughts evaporated, if Ben was crying I knew it wasn't because it was something I was or was not doing, I didn't get so tangled up in obsessing over nap times. I let go of the happy mask I was clinging to as a life line & let every one in. After four or five months, with Ben's reflux as good as it was going to get without invasive treatment, I slowly weaned off the anti depressants. 

{In the post birth bliss, before the getting lost in the grey mist of depression}

That was ten years ago. The emotions I felt during those horrible months still haunt me, settle over me like a heavy cloak when I think back to those heavy months. My heart beat picks up, the dread in my chest returns, the itchy nose that preludes the tears. The feeling of precariously teetering on an emotional ledge. It wasn't until I was out the fog of depression that I could clearly see exactly how bad I really was, how much I had ignored the little warning signs & over looked all the persistent, small negative thoughts. 

After that hellish & displacing experience I swore that if & when we had another baby I would would never go back to that lost version of myself again. I would seek help the moment I thought it was more than the 'three day blues' or lasted longer than a week.

In the weeks & months after Rianan was born both Doug & I kept a very observant eye on how I was feeling, how I reacted, how present I felt, & also following the births of Jack, Blake, Will & Clay. Thankfully it was a one off, because while at times I have felt sad in the post natal months, it was never anything close to that depressed fog that slowly absorbed who I was.

If you think that maybe, just maybe, you don't feel like who you are, if there are some dark clouds hanging around that can't be shaken off, or wonder that maybe you might have antenatal or post natal depression - please speak to someone.
Your doctor, your husband, partner, friend, mum, community health nurse, strangers on a parenting forum, anyone.

Because that grey fog, it really, really sucks.

Places to reach out for help

http://www.panda.org.au/vic-pnd-directory

http://www.blackdoginstitute.org.au/public/depression/inpregnancypostnatal/resourceslinksreading.cfm

http://www.beyondblue.org.au/resources/for-me/pregnancy-and-early-parenthood

http://www.beatbabyblues.com.au/links.aspx



**This is just my side of our story with post natal depression. I haven't touched on how my depression affected Doug. How much he took on & tried to help, even when I wouldn't let him. That's another post for another day.

Monsters

I have monsters in my house. In the form of two little boys, specifically Blake & Will.

I have no idea what happened last night, for once I was actually asleep for most of it, what I do know is that the four year old & three year old who went to bed last night are not the same two that have woken up this morning. One minute they are thick as thieves together, then literally the next minute their alliance has turned & it's a no holds barred contest to see who can annoy the other the most. Then when they aren't terrorizing each other, they are terrorizing me.

Getting ready this morning & they became two little tornadoes. Just remembering now makes me want to pull my hair out all over again. It all started innocently enough chasing each other around the large dining area with their blankets, seeing who can step on the others blanket while keeping their own safe from the fast feet of each other. Next thing Will bursts into tears, screams out a blood curdling war cry & tries to snatch up all of Blake's blanket in his pudgy little arms & run off with it. Of course he forgot to hold on to his own blanket during all this, unintentionally leaving it abandoned on the floor as he took his ill thought out revenge. Blake seeing his own blanket high tailing it down the hall way, scoops up Will's & proceeds to tease Will even further by flapping around all two meters of fleecy warmth as best as his skinny arms can. Similar to a matador taunting a bull with a red flag. Torn between wanting to deposit Blake's blanket somewhere obscure at the other end of the house, likely behind the door of Clay's unoccupied bedroom where everything gets hidden by Will, & wanting to rescue his own blankie sent Will into a fast declining tail spin. Seeing Blake with his still banana-fied hands all over Will's blanket was just too much for his newly graduated three year old self.  At this point I had to abandon the sandwich making & recess packing I was in the middle of to intervene before minion war five thousand & nine broke out.

A temporary truce was called, blankets were restored to their rightful owner & attentions were thoroughly absorbed in a perfectly timed episode of Peppa Pig. For all of five minutes. I heard the closing tunes of the sanity saving cartoon & prayed that they had calmed down enough to remain absorbed in whatever was coming up next on ABC Kids so I could finish getting the older three organised for school & Clay changed out of his Bonds body suit & soggy nappy. No dice. Within ten seconds of Peppa Pig disappearing from our TV screen the monsters were at it again, this time as a team. Their target: Clay's overflowing wooden basket of toys. The aim: to stimulate an environment akin to a hail storm of squeaky, chiming, rattling, crinkly infant toys. Status: mission accomplished. Though I did have my own success in ensuring that they tidied up their mess, if with my ever present supervision. (I know from many previous events that the moment I was to turn my back was the moment they would turn their actions from putting toys back into the basket to throwing them at each other.) At least this time the house was filled with giggles instead of cries.

We got through the rest of the morning with more hi-jinks on a lower scale. I knew then it is going to be one of those days. One where I go from one room to the other trying to keep on top of their interpretation of fun, or trying to keep them from each other. These days don't happen all the time, but they do happen. At least now I've experienced enough of these days & now know not to swim against the tide, rather freestyle along side it as best I can until the rip has passed & I can get us all back to shore & into bed.

All was well until the drive home from a morning visit to a McDonald's playground, which was a success - they got to run, Clay got to watch their antics & I gratefully had my caffeine hot & in peace. Again it never lasts long on days like this, in fact it lasted until the drive home. Blake & Will sit next to each other in the third row in the car, just to help set the mental image. Cue torment. Will kept looking at Blake. Yep, this was enough to turn Blake into a devastated bucket of salty tears. Blake retaliated with his own form of torment by informing Will that they would not be watching 'Wreck it Ralph' (the current movie on continuous loop) once we got home. The world was ending as Will knew it. At this point I informed the both of them that there would be no movies or TV when we got home, instead they could ride their bikes outside while I organize their lunch. The result was double devastation, entirely expected. Like I mentioned above, nothing ever lasts long on a topsy-turvy day & their dual devastation was no exception. Tears were forgotten the moment 'the buggie song' as Blake calls it, or officially known as 'Blackout' (by some female singer) came on the radio. Thank god for small & often easily distracted attention spans.

We arrived home with no further outbursts or brotherly torment. I'll take that as another win for the day. It's all about the small mercies.

Lunch has been eaten, with many giggles & supervision, milk has been drunk & two little bodies have been tucked into bed for a nap.

I have low expectations for the remaining daylight hours. My to do list has been drastically edited. No longer will I be washing windows, sweeping outside & folding washing (I am both over joyed & distressed over this, because I know the folding pile isn't going any where but up). Instead my tasks for the day include this blog, my lunch, then hopefully an hour of reading before Will comes back from the land of nod (I had typed 'comes back to consciousness' there, but it sounded bad, really bad. Like he had been put intentionally into a state of unconsciousness, which I assure you was not the case. Hence the edit) Then all that will remain of my desired achievements to announce today a success is to collect the three older minions from school, keep everyone alive & safe from Blake & Will, cook dinner, organize baths & showers, then bedtimes.

I can do this.

Forty winks torture

My encephalon (thank you Thesaurus) is refusing to make any consistent effort today so I'm just gonna launch straight into it.

Mr. Sandman, can you please ensure you have our address on your list tonight. The kids need you. Though if you could keep well clear of myself that would be much appreciated. I don't need any help falling asleep. In fact quite the opposite after last nights efforts from the younger four minions. Most nights see us catching a few decent hours of shut eye & it has been a while, maybe three weeks, since the minions have chosen involuntary insomnia as their weapon of choice. The day following an all nighter when you are thirty is nothing close to the perky bounce back when you are twenty. Today I am hurting.

Last night was a shocker. Within the first hour of crawling my weary derriere in to bed the little beasts had me up six times. I didn't bother keeping score after that. I also didn't keep count of the times that my head remained glued to my pillow & Doug got up in my place. It's a well known fact keeping someone awake for extraordinary lengths of time is a form of torture. I thoroughly concur with this statement. Waking someone within minutes of them falling into a decent state of slumber is inhumane. Based on personal experience, three minutes is the peak time to wake the sleeping person to reach optimum levels of brutal,cold blooded torment. 

Blake kicked it off with a nightmare. Then Jack woke up & needed a drink. Then Blake was cold. Jack got me out of bed again because he tripped over his blanket going to the toilet. Will was next with his headbanging. In the middle of the night to lull himself back to sleep he will rock on all fours hitting his head repeatedly against the wall or the bed head while humming to himself. It is noisy, & a little disturbing. After waking Will enough to settle back to sleep normally without bashing his head against the wall, I dared to hope that this was the end of the night waking & could now try to achieve a state of REM very very soon. Nope. Blake was up again & wanting to sleep in our bed. Knowing, based on previous nights, that if this were to occur my quality of sleep would be right down there with the quantity I was (not) getting. With Blake tucked back into bed & on my way back down the long cold hallway I stopped to check all the other minions - with the hope of preempting any further wake ups.

Crawling back in bed, finally warming up & beginning to drift into a state of blissful oblivion, Clay wakes. Kill me now. I lay there for what felt like ten minutes, but was likely only one minute, listening to his grunts & whinges before giving up all pretense of hope & got out of bed to feed the ravenous little cherub.

Now 2am & I'm positive I can now get four solid hours Z time in before the alarms start their invasive racket.

Negative. Blake comes running down the hallway & into our room. By this stage I'm a desperate woman & regretting those extra hours of reading time back at 10pm. I throw in the towel & open up the bed covers for Blake to crawl into. At this point I'll take even just the illusion of sleep, to keep my eyes closed but my level of conscious firmly in place, & be grateful for it. There's little choice with a miniature sleeping body right next to me, breathing in my face & dribbling on my hair.

The wee hours of the morning finally saw me achieve my first cycle of rapid eye movement. 

4am & I was up again to take a blissfully sleeping Blake back to his own bed.

5am kicks off with Doug's alarms.

6am greets me with the sounds of Blake & Will awake, already starting their day down in the lounge room. Somehow they have synced their internal body clock with Giggle & Hoot.

If you see me today & notice that I look exactly as I feel, do not say anything. 

I feel tired, I feel exhausted, I feel haggard. You have been warned that I am feeling a little stabby. I'm doing my best to rein it in, given I have little people surrounding me & their bedtime isn't approaching for another four hours (& counting). 

However if you wish to bless me with a super soaker size of pure caffeine you are more than welcome too. 

It's not easy being green

The third wheel.

Stuck in the middle.

Jack.

Our courageous, sensitive, funny, empathetic, insecure third child.

Poor Jack endures both metaphors. Not only is he the third child, he is also a middle child. 

As a toddler & still the youngest of three, Jack was always keeping me on my toes as he tried to, no scratch that, as he kept up with Ben. Anything you can do, I can do better. Hanging upside down on the curved monkey bars, sure but I can do it on the highest bar. Climb up a tree, sure but I will climb higher & to the flimsiest limb. Go out chest height at the beach with a body board, no problem. The fact that Jack stood a good fifteen centimeters shorter than Ben was no deterrent either. We always thought that Jack would be the first of our minions to break a bone, based on his fearless & can do personality.

He has the nickname of 'incredible Jack-Jack', based on the character in the movie 'The Incredibles'. A seemingly quiet little baby who is full of mischief & love for his family (see the Jack-Jack links)

But somewhere along the way all this bravado & confidence began to cover up a tangle of self-doubt & insecurity. Around the age of four & a half, & perhaps when his bladder problems (Jack has a low capacity & over active bladder) became more apparent, we noticed the anxiety masked behind the over confidence, the loudness & attention grabbing antics. The seeking of approval that was more than just wanting attention or praise, but searching for validation of self worth & reassurance that he was awesome just as he is. 

Every time I glimpsed that sad, haunting look in his eyes, only for a second but still there none the less, made me feel like I had failed him. It isn't every day that his doubts about himself shine through, often he is a happy little boy, but they are there often enough. He still has a lack of self esteem & self worth that we are trying to help him with. To show him with more than words how much we love him. Especially the times when he is feeling his worst & says "Everyone in this family hates me." 

God it hurts to write that. To know that our son feels this way. 

I look back & wonder what could I have done differently that would take away the looks of hesitancy & self doubt from his eyes. That would give him the reassurance that he is loved & cherished. Adored & admired by his siblings.

It is easy to get lost in the mix in a large family, to be glanced over or have your voice brushed aside & unheard. But I thought that we were doing a pretty alright job in giving each of our children our attention, both divided & undivided. We always acknowledge them when they are talking, give them little moments of affection - whether it be a cuddle on the couch together, or just a hand caressing the top of their head as they walk past. I make time each day for some one on one time & conversation, whether it be three minutes, thirty minutes or on the odd occasion three hours. I thought I had been attentive to their moods & responsive to the little signs of body language that show they're upset about something. I thought we were on the right path to raising happy & confident young people. But I've missed a step & coming up short for our incredible Jack-Jack. 

Jack truly is an incredible little boy. He is funny, he is adventurous, he is so sweet & affectionate. He is caring & empathetic, he is gentle & patient, especially with Blake, Will & Clay. He is helpful, he is clever & creative. He is an individual who is full of life, full of energy his legs need to burn & his mind needs to run. In his moments of self doubt he forgets all this. He doesn't hear all seven of us in his corner, cheering him on. For that moment all he hears is that disheartening voice in his own head that makes him feel like the whole world is against him & that he isn't any good.  

It's so distressing to hear words like pathetic & no good coming out of your child's mouth when they are expressing how they are feeling. It rings great big giant alarm bells on my Mothering radar. The current default Mothering when any negative talk is uttered is to immediately hug him tight & tell him that he absolutely is not any of those things. That he is awesome, he is great at soccer, that he is so much fun for Blake & Will to play with. That he is good at learning to read & can draw some amazing pictures. To remind him of everything good & wonderful, incredible & amazing about himself. To color in all those empty words with so much love they disappear.

He is only six years old, seven in a few more months time. We need to make sure his cup is full & over flowing with self assurance & self confidence before the big wide world of adulthood comes knocking on his door. I want him to know without a doubt that he is a great person - even when that pesky irritating voice in his head is talking mean. To know that he isn't bad or worthless or any other horrible feeling that's churning in his chest. I want his adolescent years to be filled with good memories & fun mischief with friends, not depression & dark thoughts, or following the wrong crowd because he doesn't have the self-worth or the confidence to step away. To not be a sheep but to feel an equal among his peers.

Ever feel like you're just floundering about in the dark, looking for that light switch that will suddenly illuminate everything? Yeah, I'm looking for that light switch. I want to make all the right words, all the right actions, all the right responses shine so bright, that I don't make any more missteps. That we can give a guaranteed magic fix for our incredible Jack-Jack.

Because he really is incredible, flaws & all.