Motherhood, Madness, God and Me

Tomorrow is a new day, Full of new promises, When you rush through the day, Tomorrow is always there to say, Don't worry tomorrow it can be done, Tomorrow we can try again. Tomorrow's exciting promise, Every morning when you wake. A bit more time to finish today. More time to play They say Don't leave till tomorrow, Why you can do today. Sometimes tomorrow seems the same. Tomorrow is so different from today. No joy before you settle down, Tomorrow you'll still feel like you'll drown. What if tomorrow never came? What if today was the end. Would you regret the things you put off? Would you ponder if that phonecall, That text, that knock on the door, Shouldn't have been tomorrow's chore? Would you beg for another tomorrow? Would you mourn your yesterday. Today someone needs you. That phone call can't wait. A chat, a cuddle, a hand to hold, Responding may mean more than gold. So don't put it off, don't delay. Someone...

In my meeting today, still looking for any positive, Susanna reassured me that I am still the good person I used to be. The good mother. We spoke about how I have everything I wanted. My dream of having children. How I loved them being babies. How I enjoyed them. How now I don't. I can't. We spoke about how I have written to my children. How I want them to remember me as a good, kind person and not who I am now. What I put in my letters, I said, was because I never want them to feel how I do. I spoke about how I try to "counsel" myself and say I am good enough, and good enough is fine, and my kids are fine and will grow up fine. I am sick and I can't do what I used to and that's OK. It's OK not to enjoy parenting. It's hard and kids are annoying at times. That's OK. But I don't believe it. It doesn't sound truth for me. Fake it till you make it. Parent yourself how you parented your babies. Say to yourself all those things you write ...

Why do you love me? What is it in me? Why do you love me,? What is it you see? Why do you love me? So not let me leave? What have I given you? That might make you grieve? Do you remember The times that we smiled? Is it those times that, Our laughter was wild? Is it because I, Showed my love to you? Is it because of, The things that I do? What are these things that, One day you will share, Things I have done and The ways I have cared? Is it your memory? Which may fade, But it is the things, On which friendship is made? Why if you love me? Do I feel so alone? If I am so loved, Is it with pain I groan? Why is it silent, When for help I ask? Why is loving me, Such a huge task? If loving me is hard? So hard as you say, Do you prevent me, From escaping this way? Why when your words, Show you find me a chore, Do you walk far away, To be friends no more. Why when you say, You love me still? My heart remains broken, Now too broken to fill. The whisper...

I saw a meme on Facebook today. It said "you need to love me a little louder today" Sometimes, when you hate yourself. When you cannot think of any nice thing about you. When you cannot find a single lovable thing about you. You need to be told. Of course, others love isn't going to fix your self esteem in the long term. Good therapy will eventually, slowly, restore faith in yourself, or give it for the first time. That is very important. Long term change and improvement will come from knowing yourself and being comfortable with who you are and that you have an intrinsic worth not based on other's opinion. However, this doesn't happen overnight. It takes months, years even. A little "loud" love might just be enough of a plaster to stop somebody bleeding out. To do this work, the person needs to be alive and have enough hope that love is possible. If someone breaks a leg, for a while they need driving around. It's not forever. Time, treatment in ...

I know I am loved. I often can't see why. I know my children love me. I don't think they could quantify why though, I perhaps wonder if it's just that they have been trained to love me, it's expected that small children love their mothers. I know my husband loves me. I wonder if it's still the love for a wife, or it's that he is my best friend, or it's a dutiful love. He married me and now he's stuck here. There are others I know care. I know I have friends who care. Again I wonder if it's a duty thing again. It's been implied that church members love me sacrificially. They are required to love me. Although some obviously do that more than others. I have some wonderful professionals looking after me, as well as some who, well, are not so great.  Again, some you can see do care. They care how I have cared and had fondness for some of my clients. They care, but they are paid to. Today was a bit of an eye opener. I said that I didn't want t...

I love call the midwife. It joins together call my loves babies, motherhood, nursing, faith and history. I love it. I've just caught up on last nights episode. A couple of series ago they dealt with a Ruth and Naomi relationship. An older and younger friend. Drawn together by situation (working together) but a deeper fondness occurring over time until you realise they are inseparable. They are true, if unlikely friends, Last week Phyllis offered to nurse a flu stricken Barbara to give Barbara's sweet husband a break. It wasn't flu. Barbara had meningitis and septicaemia. This week it looked like Barbara may pull through, although there was grief as she realised her lifelong dream of being a midwife, her career and vocation would be ripped away from her due to loosing feeling in her fingers. Yeah, a little close to home. My circulation in my fingers remains in tact but the scars left from the past year are almost certainly going to have an impact on the only career ...

We aren't a soppy romantic couple. We don't do big displays of affection or sloppy Facebook posts. We tease others who do. We both know declaring we are the love of each others' lives, wind beneath our wings, that we are so in love and so happy is false. We do love each other. We show our love by still being together. By occasionally offering to make a cup of tea, or an affectionate meeting of feet in the bed. It's a look across the room when we realise how cool yet weird our kids have turned out. It's laughing when one of us farts during sex. It's holding the fort at home whilst your wife is in hospital. It's managing alone when life just feels too much for your husband. It's apologising for being grumpy. It's taking the bins out and cleaning the toilet. It's pretending not to be annoyed that the other one didn't hoover today, or that one of you has spent our limited resources on a motorbike. It's making hard decisions about huge ...