Anniversaries

Three years ago on July 7, my third child was 'due'. Due dates are not an expiry date, people. On July 29, she was born. The whole three weeks of being post-dates was an emotional rollercoaster for me. The birth itself, was traumatic. That's not something I often admit to people outside my 'birthy' circle, because many people just don't get it.

"But at least you have a healthy baby."

Yes. Thanks for reminding me. I know that. People lose their babies, or have very sick babies/children, I know that. Two good friends of mine have lost babies at full-term in the past few years. THEY would never say this to a woman who has had a traumatic birth, because they 'get it'. My pain does not diminish yours, nor does yours diminish mine; they are separate entities and we are different people on different journeys.

'Healthy' is sometimes a misnomer, anyway. Yes, she was alive and she is certainly strong and healthy now, but there was damage caused to her and to me by her birth and I don't think that should be ignored just because we are both alive.

My two over-riding memories of that night are being helped on to the hospital trolley in the ambulance bay and lying there thinking, not again, I've failed, and of the hours I spent alone, being prepped for theatre (E2 had been born, she was in the SCBU and I was haemorrhaging), and later after I came out of theatre, entirely alone and crying because I did not have my baby in my arms.

I have discovered this week that yes, this does still bother me, three years on. Anniversaries are hard; birthdays are not always joyous occasions. I celebrate my daughter's life, but I am sad inside. I am struggling with the emotions, with feelings of failure, loss of control, and being not good enough. I am eating too much, and not exercising enough.

I write this not to scare those of you who haven't had children - I do NOT want to be one of those people who take joy in scaring mothers-to-be with horrible labour/birth stories - but to tell those of you who have had children, have experienced trauma and stuffed it down because your baby is "healthy", that you are not alone. Be angry, I find this is at least a more productive emotion than guilt and sadness. Or, like me, at least recognise what you are feeling, and allow yourself to deal with it.

Struggling

I'm tired of this up/down, up/down. I wouldn't say I'm yo-yoing but I'm definitely having a tough couple of weeks. So much so that I feel a bit of a fraud being an Ambassador on the forums, and going to Melbourne this weekend :( At the same time the social anxiety is really kicking in and I'm scared I'll fly over there and end up not leaving my hotel room.

New habits

Yesterday morning when I woke up for my run, I got an SMS that gave me a nasty shock. Don't worry, it's not bad health news for me or loved ones, it's a financial shock due to a completely idiotic mistake I made a few weeks ago. Ugh! I felt awful.

The old me would have gone back to bed and hidden under the covers, probably with as much chocolate or sweet stuff as I could scrounge up - and being the Easter weekend, that would have been a lot. It was tempting, so tempting. But I was already half-dressed.

So instead I finished getting ready, laced those shoes up, and JFDI. Took out my frustration with myself, on the pavement and the steps of Jacob's Ladder instead. 3.5km there, 6 laps down and up, 3.5km back. 1.5 hours, more than 1000 calories.

MUCH better way to deal with it, I was pretty much over it by the time I got home.

Still have the bill to pay, though, who wants to buy some Phoenix cards?!?! LOL.

Weigh-in Wednesday

No change this week.

I am disappointed but not surprised. I have fallen off the wagon a little, but you know what, I'm going to get back on. I have been doing my exercise, but eating badly.

Last week was very stressful and I didn't handle it as well as I should have. So in a way, no change is good because at least I didn't go backwards!

What's done is done; time to move on.

This week's red flag: hen's night on Saturday. I will have one or two drinks (vodka lime & soda) and be very careful with my food that day. I am going to a group training session on Sunday morning so I will need to get home at a decent time and not be drunk!

Babysteps

Today was a Bad Parenting Day. My eight-year-old is pushing all my buttons - probably a combination of being the end of school holidays, and her dad being away for the week. Oh, and I am a Mean Mum because I didn't take all three of them down to the crowded foreshore on my own, for the fireworks ...

In the past, when I've had those days, as soon as I've gotten all the children to bed I've drowned my sorrows in food. If there was no junk food I'd make some, or eat healthy food but so much of it that it wasn't healthy.

I'd like to say I resisted temptation and exercised instead, but I wasn't *that* good. I had a vodka, fresh-squeezed lime juice & soda water (ignoring the six-pack of alcoholic ginger beer that is in my fridge), and 10g of dark chocolate (I have some individually-wrapped chocolate thins). And I sat and had it slowly, and enjoyed it, and that was enough.

As the title says, babysteps.

And what am I doing up? Painfully ekeing out that March calendar for work, doing up an invoice for the article I wrote, and trying NOT to procrastinate by blogging!