Haha!! Bet y’all forgot about us! NGL we kinda did too – but sometimes someone needs to share something and for any number of reasons wants to remain anonymous and we are glad to lend a space to do that sort of thing!

This topic (manic episode/mental illness) may be triggering – do what you gotta do to protect yourself. And if this resonates in an “oh dang it may be time to talk to someone about things” and you need resources, we’re happy to help!

I AM MANIC AF RIGHT NOW AND CAN’T EVEN PUNCTUATE

(In which I now have to be accountable for bitching about how people don’t openly discuss mental health)

You know me. You might know me well. You may have even seen me this week. What you probably didn’t catch was that I am in a full blown manic episode where shit is not ok. So… supervillain origin story… cool cool. I work with people dealing with life impacting mental health diagnoses every day in my personal and professional life… I have taken mental health first aid and suicide prevention training and got the regrettably ugly coffee mug to show for it. I’ve got two on the books for myself… depression and ADHD… and probably a few more that didn’t get discovered before the funding ran out 🤣.

So I had a good health insurance run for a couple years and started taking Adderall and Lexapro. Then I changed jobs last year and it got a little trickier. My piss poor executive functioning was not able to defeat the obstacles of the privatized capitalist health system this year and I found myself at a place where both my scripts lapsed without a prescriber. “Oh ho” says me… “I’ve only been on ADHD meds for 2 out of 42 years of my life… so I will just be going back to what I know.” “Ah ha” says me… “I’ve been depressed plenty of times without meds… no big 🤷🏼‍♀️”. “This is fine”

Spoiler alert: It was not fine.

A couple weeks into my cold turkey cleansing psychoactive detox I felt amazing. I had more energy than I’ve had in a decade. I felt hopeful about doing things I’ve been putting off forever. I enthusiastically threw myself into activities I had missed doing. I had days on end where I felt zero… ZERO… anxiety and overthinking. “This is uhmazing” says me. “Maybe I was over medicated… maybe I got better and just didn’t notice”

Sure I was a little impulsive. I drove faster (efficiency!), talked more (communication!), I spent money on alcohol and takeout (treat yoself!). My sex drive went into overdrive (hot!). Somewhere along the way of running up charges on my credit card and banging strangers from the internet I had a moment of lucidity… I’d like to say it was a result of my training and insight but I really think it was because a real fat dude that didn’t look a thing like his picture almost broke my bed and it pissed me off. 

So then… real reflection. Ten deep breaths. Stretch and hydrate. Eat some crackers. Google “can stopping antidepressants make you manic?”

Oh. Ohhhhhhh.

Shit.

The hardest part for me to wrap my head around is having to make the admission that being manic feels fucking good. A little scary in part, but great. And then the follow-up to that is realizing it’s a actually just a euphoric mindfuck I don’t get to safely keep. 

And here is why I’m making myself write a thing about this, but also why I’m not just straight publishing this under my name.

I have friends and family who I love and care for deeply who are also having a rough time at the moment. They have been taught, as we all have been, that the polite and expected thing to do when you are having an absolute shitshow meltdown where you have detached from reality and are hurting inside is to say “I’m fine”. “Meh”. “Shrug”. “Lol 🤣🤣🤣”. Shots Shots Shots! Because that is way more comfortable for everyone involved. I am not writing this under my name because I don’t need a spotlight shifted to me and my shenanigans where it might take attention and resources from other people who also need it right now. I AM writing this because we have to do better. If I (figuratively only, hopefully) pull my damn pants down (sorry blog!) on this one and talk about the ugly and intoxicating without shame then maybe the next time a safe and trusted person asks me or someone I care about “are you ok?” we can answer truthfully and without fear… and not face this alone.

A friend from the old days went through a rough patch a while back and he bravely chose to disclose to his social media circle that he was feeling suicidal. And he looped people in to his battle by letting us know he would post a certain word daily to let us know he woke up once again. (You know who you are, and I adore you). He spoke out publicly and opened a door for a ton of people in our circles to come out about their own issues. 

This is the way.

If I ask you how you are doing, I want you to know that if you’re having a shitty week or one hangnail away from becoming a Lifetime movie then you can say that. If you want a listener, say that. If you want problem solving, say that. If you want me to drive you to the hospital, say that.

I would rather be made uncomfortable and worried by your authenticity and truth than leave you to figure this out on your own.

I love you. Tell your story.

———————-

I’m hopefully on the way to unfucking myself. I told a couple of people that love me that I’m not quite right at the moment. I’m watching what I’m doing and making sure there is a rational reason for doing it. I’m watching for the inevitable depression crash. I’m planning on making a plan to get back on that health care train. I’ll definitely see you again. I’m accepting all hugs.

————————-

If being a creative and functioning adult suddenly blindsided by mania is a topic that resonates with you; further check out “An Unquiet Mind” by Kay Redfield Jamison, because vague memories of reading that book were my first clue as to what was happening to me

We passed the clipboard around the circle. Name, neighborhood, email, and a final, casual column: “What’s on your mind right now?”

I was late, but I didn’t even have the energy to look at answers above mine. I wrote, “exhaustion.”

Truly, the other women in our circle on Tuesday night had many more valid reasons to scribble in that column. My NICU PTSD is here but less so — my early baby is six years old and I no longer startle involuntarily at certain beeps in check-out lines. I’ve got coping strategies to avoid triggers – I Teledoc most of my own medical care to avoid hospitals, we enter on the far side of the pediatrician’s office, we rush for check-ins or head to urgent care at the first signs of illness so that we can avoid the ER at all costs (and though that’s also a sound financial approach, those aren’t the kind of costs I’m talking about).

Last weekend, my youngest son lost a battle with a paver. He fell in my parents’ yard and the jagged slate split a funny, Y-shaped hole in his lower lip. He was beside himself. Real kid pain almost inevitably places me back in the NICU, next to the plastic pod my oldest lived in for a month. I feel every bit as powerless as I was then, watching while someone pricked his heel or fed a tube down his nose for the fifth time in as many hours and he wailed — a sound that I now know was small, but at the time filled every part of me — the whistle of a freight train bearing down, down, down.

The blood was everywhere — so much blood it painted my forearm down to my elbow. I felt awful for holding him at arm’s length rushing up the deck steps to the kitchen sink, but when we made it and I placed him on the counter I was able to control myself enough to hold him. I shushed others out and calmed him. I wheedled and coaxed, the way mothers do, and eventually all three years of his gangly toddler body were sprawled in my lap with ice chips on his lip. His breath slowed. We had it. I thought, I can actually do this, I can make things better.

But I can’t avoid the news.

Every atrocity splayed out in front of us these past few weeks feels like an invitation to crumble, and the powerlessness is back in full force. Babies, children, alone without their mothers, ill, lonely, scared, in atrocious conditions, and no one is allowed to make it stop. Why aren’t we allowed to make it stop?

I have a book on the shelf in my office called “Speak Truth to Power.” It’s a coffee table thing a beloved friend gifted to me. I remember thumbing through it for the first time and feeling so incredibly inspired by the passion of those depicted in its pages. I imagined, for a long time, that my trajectory would magically shoot forward into a space where I would work actively to defend those who needed defending, that I would, as my friend believed, speak truth to power, on every exhale. Those days we stayed up late cleaning the bar, and I’d tell my friends, “forget writing. I can always write. I don’t want to write for money. I’m going to law school.” When people would ask me what type of law I wanted to study, I’d tell them, Immigration. In 2009, I had grand dreams. In 2019, I have kids.

My kids are their own grand dream, surely. I won’t say there’s nothing more magical than raising children, because it feels absurd to limit the universe in that way, but — Meyers-Briggs tells me I’m a feeler, and I’ll tell you — they are truly breathtaking. But they do make the idea of direct action and even sometimes demonstration feel decidedly more dangerous.

I donate what we can spare, which isn’t much. I make phone calls, although I’m not sure they’re doing much good. And I read, I read, I read. I read so many news reports and Op Eds and I keep reading, even though they scare me, even though they heighten that feeling of powerlessness, I keep reading because I can’t help feeling like someone owes these children that. We owe it to them to know about them. We owe it to them not to look away. When we are too afraid for our own tenuous health and safety, too fearful of losing our ability to mend our own children’s cuts or kiss their heads while they sleep, we can at least do them the service of hurting with their mothers. We can at least be here. Is it enough? It’s not enough.

Tonight I read a brilliant Op Ed in the New York Times, and here it is so that you can, too. It delves deep into both the racist rhetoric that is used to make this a thing that is actually happening in our country and the strange juxtaposition of knowing it, and having children. Ultimately, the author’s advice is this: stay enraged.

Once our circle disbanded, a good friend and I sat on the curb outside for hours, swatting moths from one another’s hair and talking about everything. Raising our children, non-profit strategy, writing, practicing advocacy in the space we know well — supporting mothers who are scared for their babies. We talked about never having enough time. We talked about exhaustion.

Staying enraged feels like a good way to stay exhausted, but it’s different, too. It also feels just a little bit powerful.

So here I am. I’m not looking away. I might not be brave enough to lock arms in front of a facility today, but I am brave enough to stay angry. You may not contend with much in the form of my body, and my voice is barely that small sound that came from my tiny premature baby — but I’ll speak.

What’s happening is wrong. And we need to say so as often as we possibly can.

 
– Find and call your representatives here.
– Freedom for Immigrants National Bond Fund
– The National Community Bail Fund Network has a directory that includes multiple bond funds.
– Find a list of shelters, defense representation and some organizations raising bond funds here.
– Together Rising is currently campaigning to support Holly Cooper, Co-director of the Immigration Law Clinic at UC Davis, in “emergency response to and long-term accountability for child imprisonment.”
– Working to alter legislation: The Young Center for Immigrant Children’s Rights

As we (you) celebrate this stupid Hallmark holiday I’d like to take a moment and reflect on the wisest advice my mother ever gave me. (To be fair, it was about the only advice she ever gave me, aside from “just ignore them” which I have managed to apply to SO many different areas of my life, and not just when people are being shitty to me.) I was 5 or 6 years old, having a mental breakdown over something that would make sense to a 5 or 6 year old me – a toy she refused to buy? Picked me up from a friend’s house even though I’d clearly stated I wanted to stay longer? No ice cream even though we were eating in an hour? Whatever the grave injustice this woman was imparting to me, we were walking briskly (she was dragging me, whinging and whining) across the street in our small New Jersey town and I was screaming (I’m sure of it) every child’s refrain: IT’S! NOT! FAAAIIIR!

And while my mother marched ahead, ignoring my shrill cries and pleas for…whatever it was that I wanted, she said to me, without even casting so much as a glance at my freckled, red, tear-stained face, “Well, life’s a bitch and then you die.”

My mother, I must explain, is not a monster. She was no Joan Crawford, railing about wire hangers; she wasn’t even as brash as Sophia Petrillo telling Dorothy what a loser she was. She just doesn’t have time for your shit. If I came home crying because kids were mean to me in school, she’d roll her eyes and tell me to ignore it. At 11, I got my period at the most inopportune time, while we were on vacation in Mexico, and my mom didn’t make a DEAL out it, she just went to the store and got me some tampons and assumed (somewhat incorrectly) that I’d figure them out (that’s another story for another time and I did figure the tampons out but like a year later.) When I told her I was pregnant at the age of 24 by a…less than stellar man, she asked, several times, if I was sure I wanted to keep it and made no bones about her disappointment in me. Mom never made me feel unloved – I got hugs and kisses and “we’re so proud!” when I did something to make them proud (fewer and fewer things as I got older BUT I DIGRESS) (and she loves her grandson!! A lot!) But she’s pragmatic and you have to respect that about a person.

While I do think there’s something to be said about parenting with kindness, I think there’s a lot more to be said about teaching kids that shit’s not gonna go their way all the time. You can’t always have that toy, everyone isn’t always going to like you, 3 million more people voted for a viable candidate and we wind up with a bloated circus peanut as the leader of the free world instead, you can’t run around a restaurant because it’s dangerous AND rude…I could go on. We aren’t saints and we’re going to lose our tempers sometimes and when you’re up to your ass in unpaid bills with burnt dinner and on the verge of getting fired, maybe it’s now that your kid learns that he or she throwing a tantrum again because you refuse to buy them a new tablet is a BAD MOVE. Yes, your child matters, but SO DO YOU and it’s not the end of the world if you can’t or simply won’t provide for their WANTS.

Recently, my child (now 11 and how in the HELL has that happened) decided to try to pull a fast one on us. He failed, spectacularly and almost hilariously, but we found out and we doled out an nearly unthinkable punishment of one month sans screen time (which, he only gets to watch tv and play video games on weekends so…) in addition to your regular, run-of-the-mill grounding. He screamed, cried, slammed doors, the whole 9 yards. We explained it was his own fault, and we ALWAYS find out the truth in the end and while he stood there blubbering, trying to extract sympathy from this stone of a heart, I continued washing the dishes and said without glancing at his red, tear-stained face, “Well, life’s a bitch and then you die.”

One week ago, while many women across the country were preparing for the number of women’s marches happening all over, a 14 year old girl in Texas watched her father get shot to death right in front of her. Minutes before this brutal murder, the girl and her father had been at a convenience store and another man started making lewd comments towards the girl. There was a small confrontation, as you might imagine there would be when a father witnesses anyone being rude to his daughter, especially when “being rude” consists of making sexually suggestive comments to her.

The man followed the father and daughter past their home, as the father did not want the man to know where they lived. After awhile, the father pulled over and confronted the man, who, I cannot emphasize enough, felt entitled enough as a man to sexually harass a child. The man then pulled out a gun and shot the father to death, while his daughter watched it all happen.

The father was an old and dear friend of my boyfriend’s. While they were teenagers, the father spent much time at my boyfriend’s family’s home. Later, he joined the Army Reserves to try to provide a decent life for his then-infant daughter. He wound up injuring his back while serving and had to leave the military. He returned home on a fixed income, walking with a cane, to care for his ailing mother and his baby daughter. He later had a son with another woman, but had sole custody of his daughter.

Women everywhere have been where this girl was, with men older than our fathers leering at us and making comments about our breasts, our pussies, our bodies, our smiles or lack thereof. Some women become victims of stalking. Others die fighting or die trying to survive. This girl was fortunate enough to have someone willing to stick his neck out and call out another man for his disgusting misdeeds. He paid the ultimate price for doing the right thing.

I cannot begin to fathom what makes men feel entitled to women. We experience violence on every level nearly every day of our lives. Maybe it’s a comment, maybe it’s a stare that lasts too long, maybe a man follows us home, maybe it’s a head slam into a brick wall and a pillow over our faces when we are trying to leave a relationship. We are nothing but property to so many men; women and girls who are “unclaimed” by a man are subject to abuse by another. That this child is 14 matters not – she doesn’t “belong” to anyone so she’s “fair game.” The fact that she’s a human being and entitled to living a life free of abuse from ALL people, not just from a pedophile doesn’t factor in I suppose.

In my 36 years on this planet, I’ve been abused, catcalled, leered at, sexually harassed, assaulted, sexually assaulted, and talked down to. In my son’s 11 years on this planet, he’s been called a “faggot” by grown men who think that his hair color of choice defines him as a man, had his decision to avoid meat when he was 4 years old questioned by grown men who think that eating meat defines you as a man, called a “pussy” by grown men who think that 11 year old boys shouldn’t fear a 200 pound Great Dane that hasn’t been trained so well, as well as listened to countless numbers of grown men tell him how “men” are “supposed” to act and emphasize that he is worthless until he can prove himself “manly.”

Feminism wants to smash the patriarchy because the patriarchy hurts all of us. Men are not allowed to be vulnerable, feminine, caring, (or if you’re my parents’ friends, vegetarians.) Those men who dare to break the mold and step out are shit on constantly by other men whose insecurities eat them from the inside. I fear that cases like this make it even harder for men to speak out when they witness abuse, harassment, or assault. I know in my heart that there are many men like this father, who, without hesitation, would step into the line of fire to stop an attack on his daughter. The problem, though, at its core, is that there is a line of fire at all. If we don’t start changing soon, this insecure, toxic masculinity will kill us all.

**If anyone would like to donate to help out the victim’s family, please contact us and we will point you in the right direction. Thanks to all who have helped already.**

I’ve also blown up my Amazon credit card with feminist/social justice books, both as a #treatyoself and to further the fight.

I think we’ve been pretty open about our feelings on this election. I spent Wednesday crying and eating my feelings. I wallowed for twenty-four hours and have been trying to process since. As a bisexual Hispanic woman and the mother of two autistic children who rely on social services – and as a person who decided in her mid-thirties to take on a bunch of debt to become a social worker – this result terrified me. I’ve never felt so uncertain about my future, and so frustrated by how to fix the world.

I’m well informed. I read widely and diversely. I am an armchair activist, flinging wokeness into the social media void! I have too much anxiety to deal with crowds and protests and lots of stranger interaction, so I do what I can from my home. I teach my children as much as I can, talk to my guy, my family, my coworkers, my friends. I pride myself on my progressivism. I voted for Hillary and encouraged everyone I know to do so as well.

None of that changes anything. We have a President-Elect who scares me. My privileged life, in the sense that I look white and straight and have been sheltered in a liberal echo chamber of awareness, has been shaken. My faith in humanity and the progress we’ve made as a country faltered on Tuesday, and that makes  me so very sad.

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