Mendolonium

Somehow I lost my way.  It didn’t happen all at once, but was a slow process, like getting lost in a place you thought you knew how to navigate through.  One wrong turn, thinking “I’ll just go down this road awhile, then I will find a place to turn around.”  By the time I realized I was well and truly lost, I didn’t know how to find my way back.  And I had picked up two “passengers”; wonderful little boys who have brought me a joy more deep than any I ever known, yet demanded so much of me I could not navigate my way back.

I was lost in a job I hated; it was a boring and meaningless path – taken solely for the good pay and benefits along with a desirable seven minute commute.  I tried to ignore the job; look for another path with more interest, but the same benefits.  I thought that perhaps I could be happy by pouring my ambition and intellect into my children, my home, and my garden.  The children are more intellectually stimulating than I ever thought they could be, but they are not enough.  The house is the only true home I have ever known, but it is not enough.  The garden is flourishing, but it is not enough.  I am not my children.  I am not my home.  I am not my garden.

Ah ha, I thought!  I will work for the cause of building sustainable food systems.  I am passionate and knowledgeable about that.  But working three days a week, taking care of the children all day two days a week, and most of the day another two days a week; all the while baking bread, hanging out the laundry, starting seeds, and bringing order to the clutter – there was no time left for much of anything else.  I have managed to do a little for just myself:  exercise class, this blog, plowing through library books at one in the morning, but it is not enough.  I need to go farther than exercise class.  I want to write books, not just read them.

Somehow in my mind the choice crystallized into three options.

• Option A:  Stay in my current, easy job.  Work part-time.  Have enough time for the kids, the house, and the garden.  Work on living ever more sustainably with the goal of working less outside the home – disengaging our lives from the “machine” that is modern society.  Perhaps even “stay-home” full time some day?  Homeschool?
• Option B:  Look for a new job.  Find an interesting, meaningful, “save the world”  part-time job with the same pay, benefits, schedule, and commute as my current job.  Perfectly balance motherhood and work.  Live happily ever after.
• Option C:  Look for a new job.  Find an interesting, meaningful, “save the world” job.  Accept that such a job will be demanding and full-time.  Jeff has offered to stay home with the children.  They will be well loved and taken care of.  Make the most of our time together on the weekends.  Buy the bread.  Order more takeout.  Accept that to have an interesting, modern job I must lead a more modern, unsustainable life.

I tried option A, but after three years of trying I couldn’t do it anymore – it was partly responsible for landing me in a therapist’s office soaking in post-partum depression.  I tried option B.  Not surprisingly, technical jobs such as mine pay vastly more than jobs where one saves the world at a non-profit.  And those jobs aren’t part-time either – not unless you would like to volunteer.  I flirted with Option C:  went on a couple of interviews, contacted colleagues about new opportunities.  Jobs were offered.  Opportunities were presented and I realized that I didn’t want Option C anymore than Option A.  I cannot be myself with Option A and I cannot be the mother I love to be with Option C.  I was paralyzed.

One night a few weeks ago I couldn’t take my life for one more second and I lumbered out of the woods like a bear emerging from hibernation and made changes.  And I chose Option D:  none of the above.  I fired off a midnight email to an old colleague and asked how to get my “old” (the job I had pre-Thomas) job back.  I was happier then – traveling the country and the world, solving problems, living my own life.  “But the commute!” (1+ hour) I protested.  “But those aren’t the problems I want to solve.  I want to save the world!” I protested.  “I can’t leave my children.  I don’t want to travel.” I protested.  I decided to accept that the commute is not sustainable – but neither is depression.  I decided that I can’t think about saving the world if I am miserable in my own.  I decided that I can leave my children for a bit – brief absences will make our hearts grow fonder.  I decided to work two days a week rather than three – even while the children will be in school one day a week.  I will have one day – one blessed day to write, to research what I really want to be, to take classes.  It seems like utter decadence to do such a thing, yet I am giddy with the thought.  I will continue to bake the bread, hang the laundry, and start the seeds, but the housework will revert to a true 50/50 split between Jeff and I. It won’t be perfect, but I will begin living my life again.  I will find a way to live in the modern world while it lasts and build a sustainable future.

I walked through LAX on Tuesday morning to catch a flight to Washington, D.C.  Walking through terminal 7 to catch a United plane, something I’ve done  dozens of times, but not for the past (nearly) four years was like slipping into a comfortable pair of shoes.  It wasn’t exactly like old times; I carried a breast pump and pictures of my children with me.  I had packed a lunch with carrots I pulled out of the ground with the boys not even 24 hours before.  And I smiled.   I have found myself:  mother, wife, farmer, writer, intellectual, Gina.

Henry has a new favorite pastime, we call it dark/light.  It’s really quite simple:  we hold him up to a light switch and he turns the light on and off exclaiming “light” and “dark” in self-satisfied awe.  He is fascinated by the power to change the illumination with the flick of a finger.  When he wakes up in the morning he rolls over, points to the light fixture above our bed, and pronounces it “Dark!”.   He’s even created his own sign for dark, a sort of hand-over-his heart, pledge of allegiance style, quick salute.

Emerging from the darkness of post-postpartum depression (more accurately partum and post-postpartum depression as it plagued me my entire pregnancy) hasn’t been nearly as easy as flipping a switch.   I had a hard time sleeping last night,and not just because my soon-to-be one year old woke up to nurse every two hours like clockwork.  I tossed and turned remembering where I was one year ago; sick with anxiety over why my water had broken early, why my baby didn’t seem to be growing appropriately, why his movements had slowed down.  I really didn’t know if my baby was going to be “OK” and I was exactly where I didn’t want to be:  in the hospital, chained to monitors, with Pitocin coursing though my body.  I looked at the clock at about 1:30 this morning and thought about how exactly one year ago I was about to ask for an epidural and how badly that made me feel about myself; yet I had been in so much emotional pain for months I just couldn’t take one more minute of physical pain.  I really wasn’t ready to have a baby on that day – I  was scared of a medically induced labor in the hospital;  I still had innumerable items on my before the baby comes do-list; we hadn’t even come close to deciding on  name.  Birth , however, waits for no woman and at 6:30 in the morning on March 25th 2009 our baby boy slipped easily into the world.  He was small, but wonderfully healthy; a beautiful, calm, presence from his first moment on Earth.

While pregnant, I hadn’t been able to acknowledge my depression to anyone, not even myself.  The first few weeks and months after Henry’s birth were dark ones for me; I loved my perfect baby boy so very deeply, but was so lost, so paralyzed by sadness.  I was overwhelmed with two children, sleep deprived with the demands of a newborn, and wondering what had happened to my identity.  I could have  easily resented Henry for my depression, but I never did.  I was perfectly happy and content when I held him; usually upright against my chest with his head tucked under my chin, as was his preferred position.  He hated to be put down (still does, in fact, if he is not actively exploring something new) and carrying him around, rocking him for hours gave me purpose.  At my six week postpartum check-up I thought about Henry and told my OB that I thought I might be depressed.  It was Henry that flipped the switch giving me light and helping me to start to figure myself out.  My little Henry turned one today and it was only this week that I finally was able to say that I don’t think I am depressed anymore.  I am so very grateful that Henry is exactly the person who he is and that he was born exactly when he was.  I love him so much.  I wouldn’t be the same without him.

Today at work one of the managers very generously purchased pizza for the group.  Although I had brought and already consumed my lunch (homemade black bean soup), I am not one to turn down free pizza.  I eagerly went to check out what what cheesy delights awaited me and opened the boxes to find some sort of “meat lovers” and a “veggie lovers”.  I looked down sadly at the options.  Is there some sort of rule that once you become a grown-up you have to put all sorts of stuff on your pizza?  Whatever happened to just cheese; everybody likes cheese, right?

So here I sit, in front of my spreadsheets, picking olives and mushrooms off of my pizza.    My name is Gina and my favorite type of pizza is plain cheese.  Despite two kids and a mortgage, I am happy to find that I might not be a grown-up just yet.