We went to Tresillian today. Mainly for Little L’s sleep. Lately she hasn’t slept past the first sleep cycle during the day, and wakes frequently at night. But talking to healthcare professionals always has a way of bringing up sneaky little emotions you never knew were lurking just below the surface.

By chance the weather was awful in Sydney, so my tradie hubby had the day off and volunteered to come with. 10 minutes into the day I saw the look of regret in his face. Don’t get me wrong, he is all for anything that will help
Little L sleep for longer but my husband is the silent, stoic type who runs for his man cave at the first sight of tears. Once the questions about both family’s history of physical and mental health were done came the questions about life
events and anything that is contributing to, in my case, anxiety. As I rattled off thing after thing, I could see the nurse doing her very best not to raise her eyebrows.

As we settled Little L into her room for the day she helped us with the tiniest things we never knew would contribute to her shorter sleeps. Then we walked out and waited at the door for the protest to start. Sure enough, we hear her, 30 seconds later. I say something to the nurse, I cant remember exactly what but was met with the reply, “you seem very,very anxious, no offence. No offence. OK it’s not exactly offensive, but the sleep deprived, anxiety ridden mother that’s just well… there aren’t words. Only tears and “I’m sorry’s” from me.

The day gets progressively worse, or more progressive, depending on which way you look at it. I spend half an hour patting Little L through her awakening in her sleep cycle with no luck. We get her up and watch some DVD’s on
settling. All in all these DVD’s are fantastic, although I’m not sure how practical.

Towards the end of the day I go and have a chat to the residential social worker/psychologist on recommendation of my nurse. Here, I use up the last bit of energy in my emotional reserves. We talk about my relationships, my family, the baby, my birth experience, my miscarriage and my anxiety. My hubby also had a chat to her too. I am also booked in to see her two more times, possible more should I need it. And I probably will, because as the day wore on, I realised I may just have Post Natal Depression. This was a pretty hard pill to swallow at first but it’s not like I hadn’t entertained the idea that I might. I can still go about my day, but that doesn’t mean that I can cope wonderfully all of the time. There have been times where I have been at the end of my rope and locked myself in the laundry for 15 minutes at a time.

To any mums who are dealing with, or have experienced PND or anxiety, I know how you feel now and I send much love and good vibes your way. 

Today I was pretty close to hitting rock bottom. But the good thing is that the only real way from here is up.  

CC

I love telling this story. It’s the story about how I found out I was pregnant. Maybe to some, it’s just another story but I’ll love telling it for the rest of my life. 

Friday, 20 January 2012. Work is back in full swing after the Christmas break and all executives are back on deck. 3 shopping centre projects are in the pipeline, two with open dates in October. One word: punishing My boss is busy re-allocating work and calls me in to a meeting room. “You’re my most experienced Lease Administrator, so I’m giving you Wollongong”. I leave the room, mad that my current project is being taken off me and I’m being loaded with all this additional work. Everyone feels the same way. My friend and colleague comes to my desk and says, “I’m going to the DJ’s food court, going to go and smash a cheesecake”. Ooooh. Cheesecake sounds good. Cheesecake. Yes. I get distracted and forget all about the cheesecake until she says to me an hour later, “I know why I wanted it so bad, I just got my period a week early”. Another chimes in, “Me too, Oh my god it’s early”, then another. Domino effect. I sit quietly and ponder. I don’t feel crampy? In my all female team of 13 we are all in sync. 

Exhausted from the week from hell, I pack my desk up at 5pm and leave the office. I catch the bus up to my local Woolies and bottle-o and get myself a nice bottle of champagne and go into the supermarket to get some dinner. Browsing the health and beauty isle, I casually pick up a box of First Response pregnancy tests. Then I put it back. Then I pick it up again. No, better get a 3 pack. I’m not pregnant. I get home and put the Champagne in the freezer to chill
and go to the toilet. One line, negative; two, positive. Nothing yet. Look at it about 10 times in two minutes. Still nothing. I wipe away a little tear and do a few things around the house and then take out my champagne from the freezer. Then I remember  I haven’t put the test in the bin. I look at the thing again and the faintest little pink line is staring back at me. I chuck it in the bin and don’t think about it anymore. But I don’t drink my champagne. 

I tell my husband who goes and buys a different brand of test and I do it again the next day. Pregnant. 1-2 weeks. We can’t believe it - happy and scared as hell. 

Still grieving the loss of a pregnancy that ended less than 3 months beforehand, we don’t really know what to say or do
we look at each other and stare. Then we hold each other for a long time. 

I make the decision to tell my boss on Monday. She tells me a secret, she’s pregnant too! They happily take me off the project assigned to me 3 days earlier and give me back my old one, far less stress. “We want a serene environment for your little embryo”. My throat is closing up. Can’t cry, the meeting room hasn’t got walls, only floor to ceiling windows. 

I’m the emotional mum. My little girl, my little rainbow baby, our most beautiful creation was born on 2 October 2012. You may think that ‘emotional’ means I cry at the drop of a hat. Well, actually I do sometimes. But emotion is so much more than that. Everything I do, I put my heart and soul into. I just turned 26 yesterday and by today’s standards that’s still quite young to be a mother. I would like to say I’m pretty mature for someone my age and I always
have been, even at 14. My life experiences have shaped me this way. 

I’m blunt and honest. You’ll probably see that through my blog. But I hope that you can glean something from what I write. 

Here’s to all the mums who are emotional. That's all of us.

 CC