My Darkest Days

Am I allowed to post twice in one day? Of course I am this is my blog. The blog, which I found out the other day stands for web log (thanks Brian Cressel) serves many purposes for me the 1st one being, I am a social person and love to know what is going on with everybody. My sister has made fun of me before for calling (actually searching out) Friends that I have not seen or talked to in like almost a decade just because I am always wondering how people are doing. It serves another purpose. It is an escape from my world and a look into somebody else's. The last purpose and maybe the most important for me, it is a journal and a sort of scrapbook of my life and my family's. I am no good at scrapbooking. I don't have the patience or the creativity, I do regretfully have a closet full of scrap book materials that give me an insane amount of guilt every time I look at it, thinking of the money wasted. As for the journal part, I have written maybe ten times in my entire life in one and can not read it as my handwriting is comparable to that of a chicken. I like to type, so blogging works for me. I am also kind of an open book in that I would tell anyone anything about myself which often times has gotten me into trouble, but sometimes I feel like maybe I can help someone this way and so I continue on in my crazy ways. Usually I do not have a hard time posting ridiculous pictures of myself or writing about my blonder than blond moments, but this post might be the hardest post I have ever written and is about maybe the most personal, hardest struggle I have ever had to deal with thus far in my twenty six years. I can't help but feel though that maybe there is someone who will read it that it might help and so here goes my post I have entitled, My darkest Days.
My fifth grade teacher once told my class that we would love our children far more than any one else in our lives. I didn't believe him until May 23, 2004. Mother hood is something I have looked forward to for a very long time. After three years of marriage and two miscarriages I finally had my shot at motherhood. Four years ago tomorrow, my sweet baby boy Taylor was born. 6 months after that I was dumbfounded and laughing hysterically after finding out I was pregnant again. When Taylor was 15 months old my Logan was born, two and a half weeks early weighing 9 and a half lbs. I was thrilled with my two darling boys and felt blessed and lucky to have them. There have been many surprises that have come with mother hood, but there was one surprise I hadn't counted on. My wonderful in-laws not only helped build our house for two years, but they were kind enough to let us live with them during the process. A few weeks after Logan was born the long awaited house was finally done, well mostly. We moved in and were happy to finally be on our own. I was having a hard time adjusting to Taylor and Logan and was actually getting a real good butt kickin'. Logan cried all the time, much later we fou, well my sister Erin figured out to feed him soy milk. I started to feel nervous when David would leave to work, doubting my ability to handle the boys alone. I started to loose my appetite and felt like I could never sit still ( not that I could very much given my circumstances ) Then one day David's knee swelled up and was hot to the touch. He thought he must have hurt it playing basketball or something. It got worse and he went to the instacare, two days later He was having surgery on his knee for a staff infection that we still have no idea how he got. My life that I was already struggling with became a lot harder. Thankfully Erin took Taylor up to Smith field for a week while I was left to try and deal with my sick husband. I had to give him antibiotic treatments intravenously every 8 hours for the next 3 weeks. I started having trouble falling asleep. I called the doctor and she prescribed me something to help me sleep, they helped a little. I started getting nervous at night because I was afraid I would not be able to sleep. My family was worried about me and told me I needed to go see my doctor. I knew she would suggest anti-depressants. I did not want to go on them. I thought I just needed more faith. My father in law and David gave me a blessing, but things still got worse. I actually would go some nights not sleeping at all and would sob when Dave would get up to go to work, telling him he couldn't leave me. He did take off many days, but he had a job to do. I would call him almost every day balling around 2 or 3 pm. and beg him to come home. I had panic attacks on Sunday nights knowing that he would have to leave me for work again. I was a zombie. There was not one thought that could lift my spirits. I started to have thoughts wishing I could just...disappear, I did not want to die. I just wanted to somehow disappear. I went to the doctor and she prescribed my Lexapro. She thought I had postpartum depression. I had never been an anxious person before, not like this. I finally caved in and started to take it. I felt the affects within a couple of days. The clouds that had been looming over me lifted and the sun finally came through. I was back to my old self. Over the next year I got off of Lexapro and was only taking Tylenol PM's to help me fall asleep. When Logan was about two I decided I wanted to have another baby. I got pregnant right away. I am so lucky when I am pregnant and hardly get sick. When I was about 5 months along I started having trouble sleeping again. My doctor immediately put me on a pretty high dose of Lexapro again for anxiety. It helped a little, but the farther along I became the worse the sleeping got. I started taking Ambien. It helped a lot and I was able to sleep, but then I started waking up in the middle of the night and taking more. I was overdosing myself and did not know it. My doctor told me it was anxiety and told me I would need to go and see a neurologist, but he could not get me in for a few weeks. When I was 28 weeks along I started having contractions and they would not stop. I called my doctor and she told me to come right in, but David was an hour away. I called my neighbor to come and wait with me and take care of the boys. The contractions would not stop and I got to experience my first and hopefully last rid e in an ambulance. The police officer arrived and was very calming to me and I felt I would be okay. Then about a minute after he arrived a plethora of EMT's and firemen walked into my house. I started to panic and the contractions were getting worse. One of the EMT's came to my side and told me everything would be fine and he had delivered babies before. Then he told me he needed to see if the baby was crowning. I am a very private person when it comes to things like this and have a woman doctor for this very reason. I was worried about the baby though and he checked and the baby was not crowning and so I was then on the stretcher and out the door. Dave had just pulled up and had the deer in the headlights look as my sister in law told him what was happening. They got me to the hospital and were able to stop the contractions with a shot. They were extremely busy that night and after they were sure I was going to be okay the nurse came into my room to send me home. I was dazed and knew there was some reason I could not just get up and walk out. After a minute I figured out my problem. I could not get up and walk out because I had no pants, shoes, under ware.... she hurried and got me some scrubs and I walked out with Dave to the car. My doctor told me I just needed to calm down. Some nights I slept for a few hours, some nights not at all. I prayed at night when I could not sleep. I pleaded and asked why this was happening to me and I knew he (Heavenly Father) was the only one who could help me. I always felt comforted that everything would be alright and would usually, but sometimes not right away drift into sleep for at least a few hours. My sweet husband got books from the library on Insomnia and Anxiety. He would read to me, give me massages and we set up the radio and I fell asleep listening to classical music. I was trying to calm my mind and do deep breathing techniques much like Yoga like the books said. One morning like many, my kids were watching cartoons on KBYU. As many of you moms know at 11 am the cartoons stop and for an hour or so they feature conference talks. Usually I turn the channel to another cartoon station, but I accidentally pressed the volume instead and the T.V. got really loud. I recognized the speaker as Elder Richard G. Scott. The first word I heard him say was, "ANXIETY." He immediately had my attention. His talk was called, The Supernal Gift of Prayer. I felt his talk was an answer to my prayers. He talked about how we should pray and said at one time in his life he was suffering from extreme anxiety ( that was when I tuned in) He said he would plead with the lord to help him. He said sometimes when we pray, " Heavenly Father will give us gentle promptings that require us to think, exercise faith, work, at times struggle, then act. It is a step by step process that enables us to discern inspired answers." He said seldom will you receive a complete response all at once. That it will come piece at a time, in packets, so that you will grow in capacity. As each piece is followed in faith you will be led to other portions until you have the whole answer and while sometimes it is hard not to receive the answer all at once, it results in significant personal growth. He will always hear your prayers and will invariably answer them. However his answers will seldom come while you are on your knees praying, even when you may plead for an immediate response. President David O. Mckay testified, " It is true that the answers to our prayers may not always come as direct and at the time, nor in the manner, we anticipate; but they do come, and at a time and in a manner best for the interests of him who offers the supplication." Then Elder Scott says, " Be thankful that sometimes God lets you struggle for a long time before that answer comes. Your character will grow; your faith will increase. There is a relationship between those two: the greater the faith, the stronger your character: and increased character enhances your ability to exercise faith." He goes on to say, "What god does in your life is for your eternal good." I am not sure why I had to go through this. It has been a humbling experience. I am learning how to control my anxiety and am happy to report I have been sleeping really good even though I have a 4 month old. I am sorry this post was so long. I just felt I needed to write about it.