Can You Learn to Love Yourself?

I've been off the radar for a few days trying to figure out some things. It was a good experience, and I learned a lot about myself and how to go on to live the happiest life possible.

The answer to my problem is quite easy--simply put, I need to love myself, to value myself, to see the good in myself.

The problem is, I don't.

I did get it down to that one issue, however, which is actually quite good progress for me.  It turns out that virtually all of my problems cycle back to that one problem.

All I can hear is Whitney Houston singing "The Greatest Love of All", but...well, it's just not that simple.

I am raising three amazing children (well, Emily is pretty much on her own, but she does sometimes text me in the middle of the night to ask random philosophical questions), I am loved deeply by my husband, my mother, my siblings and their spouses, and my nephews. It only follows logically that I am a pretty good mother/wife/daughter/sister/auntie, yet I can't for the life of me see why.  Or maybe it's how.

And I'm not writing this for people to throw compliments at me.  I know I am a good mother.  I know I have some talent at writing and teaching, but I know that both of these have ceased to be easy for me. I know I'm a nice and caring person.

But I don't know it, if that makes any sense.

I guess it's no secret to most people that know me in person or who reads this blog regularly or is a friend on Facebook that I have been struggling with some debilitating Postpartum Depression that ended up waking up a sleeping nightmare of a crime I thought was buried forever (a sexual assault I wrote about here and focused on the repercussions of here), so I've also been diagnosed with PTSD.

I did make a lot of progress over the past few days, though, and I'd like to share some of it in the hope that it can help any of you out there, anyone that has Postpartum Depression, PTSD, or anything else.  

There is still a stigma attached to mental illness, so I am feeling some shame as I write this.  I'm actually going to say that Postpartum Depression is hormonal and affects a large percentage of women and that, you know, I certainly didn't ask to be raped and have it all come back through PTSD. It's not like, I'm really messed up on my own.  I also have some pretty interesting purely medical stuff going on as well.

And I hate myself for writing the above paragraph because, while true, it dishonors those that suffer from bipolar disorder or depression or OCD or borderline personality disorder or whatever.  People that suffer from those are no different than those that are living with cancer or diabetes.  

Yet the stigma remains.

Anyway, I'll get off my (fairly hypocritical) soapbox now and get back to the point.

I was given a list of positive affirmations and encouraged to identify which of those were true for me.  At first, I scoffed.  I mean, we're talking "I pursue my life's purpose" and "I feel fulfilled and joyful", and my personal favorite, "I balance my self-confidence with modesty perfectly".  

Eventually, I found a couple that did resonate with me, so I read a little further and found a few more, and then I decided to make an effort to take it seriously.

I made a list of the positive affirmations that I felt were true about myself.  There were twenty-four of them, but I felt that it wasn't as cut and dried as that; in other words, many of the twenty-four had a disclaimer.  I then decided to write them in my own handwriting along with some freewriting on the topic.

I care for people.  I do, but often to my detriment.  I am extremely sensitive with minimal self-esteem, so I take things very personally.  I know I need to develop a thicker skin.  Either that or stop caring, and I think that's impossible for me.  My parents bought me a beautiful red jacket when I was a little girl of six or seven.  I gave it away to another little girl who lived in a bad part of town and who didn't have a jacket at all.  If my mother's wrath at that event didn't put a dent in the "care dial" on  my heart, I don't think anything will.  It is so hard to care about others, though, when they clearly don't care about you.

Here's another:

I deserve to succeed.  I have done so many awful things that sometimes I really don't feel this, but the truth is that everyone with pure and positive intentions deserves to succeed, and I definitely fall into that category.  This is one I need to focus more on ...

The next step was going through my freewrites and generating questions for each.  I came up with a ton of questions (I needed to get a second notepad at about this point), and then I went through those questions and came up with what I called "Katie's Essential Questions", which means areas that recurred as common themes that ran through my positive self-affirmations.

Virtually every question came back to the fact that I have very low self-esteem, minimal self-confidence, and this pervasive feeling that I am unworthy of love.

I am still wrangling with this issue as I type this (and, boy, does it feel good to use a computer...I had to write in long hand because it was how I could make it be me, but this is so much easier).  I didn't come up with an answer, although I went through my "essential questions" with my mother this afternoon and she helped me see the connection between all of my questions.

It's funny, because I am your typical ADHD person ... even my brain is disorganized.  It was very hard for me to systematically take on this task, because it seemed both stupid and overwhelming and, most of all, a supreme waste of time.  I used a notebook and a half to realize something that I already know ... that I am not the world's biggest fan of myself.

What I lost sight of, at least for a moment, was that there are twenty-four statements I now own, in my own bastardized print/cursive hybrid, that are at least in some ways true.

The one that speaks the most to me is "I am a kind, caring, and decent person". I put it on my list and know it to be true, yet the question remains ...

Can you learn to love yourself?  And, if so, how?

Stillbirths: What Nobody Wants to Talk About

When I read John Irving's The Cider House Rules, one of the lines that always stuck with me was when Wilbur Larch says, when arguing with his protege Homer Wells over the sanctity of life, "I give them what they want, an orphan or an abortion."

And really, it seems like there are three options when a child is conceived:
a) The child is born and raised by a loving family
b) The child is given up for adoption
c) The child is aborted (and I choose to add that this is almost always because the mother feels this is in the        best interest of the child)
d) The child is miscarried in early pregnancy

There is a silent e), though, that no one wants to think about, talk about, or otherwise mention. Those are the babies that are stillborn, that are either born just a little too early to survive or who have some sort of problem (I don't want to use the word deformity) that keeps the pregnancy from being viable.

With scenario a), which is obviously the best option, there is a child born, and children make most people happy.  The child is healthy and wanted and read to and tucked in at night, and it's a win/win for everybody involved.

Scenario b) is a bit stickier, as giving up a baby after carrying it for nine months would, I imagine, be tough.  I also know a couple of people very closely who were adopted as babies or young children, and it definitely plays a role in defining who you are.  With that being said, though, in most cases the child is healthy and wanted and read to and tucked in at night, and it's a win/win for everybody involved.

I will say that, when I had an accidental and unplanned pregnancy when I was seventeen, I considered giving my daughter up for adoption.  Once she started moving, though, I started to know her.  Now, I could never imagine life without having been bettered through being Emily's mother.  She is a treasure (she's the one playing the piano for her sisters here).

Scenario c) is stickier yet.  I think the idea of people running amok having abortions is frightening and disturbing.  That being said, there are times (rape and incest come to mind, or situations where a pregnant woman knows that she will be unable to care for the baby from the start) when I can see where abortions under, say, 8 weeks might be the best thing for both mother and baby.  I pontificate on this issue more here, but let me just say that it is sometimes best for both a fetus and its mother to not be born.  That sounds harsh, but I've seen enough abused kids whose parents blame their existence for all of their problems (and the damaging cloud those kids have been raised under, destroying every shred of self-esteem), enough women destroyed by family estrangement due to pregnancy, and so on.  I am not pro-abortion, I am pro-what's-best-for-everybody.

Scenario d) is quite sad, in large part because some women are prone to miscarriage, so they experience this over and over again.  I have a friend who tried for years to have a child, and she had miscarriage after miscarriage before finally carrying a baby long enough for her to survive.  I have had a miscarriage, and it is distressing, but it usually happens early enough that you haven't made big plans or bought clothes or had a baby shower or even told anybody.

Stillbirth, though, is the worst of all scenarios, in my opinion.

One day, I got a text from "Joanie", someone I am very close to.  It was very clearly an ultrasound picture, and I started jumping up and down with surprised joy.  Joanie already had a precious (and precocious) son, and while I'd speculated that she'd one day have another, this was a treat.

Joanie texted and called regularly as her pregnancy progressed, joyful tales of heartbeats on Doppler and plans for the baby, which Joanie and her husband learned was a girl.

And then one day, I got the news that the latest ultrasound showed a deformation in the baby girl's nuchal cord.  Poor Joanie, who is in the medical field, knew what that meant.  We all hoped and prayed that the next ultrasound would show better news, but instead, it was worse.  The pregnancy was not viable, and the baby would not live to term.

Joanie asked me to come be with her while she figured out if she should induce the birth or let it happen spontaneously.  I knew how serious this was because I do not fly.  My parents decided that it was easier to schlep three kids to Disney World in a station wagon than try to get me on a plane (the one time we did fly to Disney World, I evidently caused such a scene that we drove every time after).

Needless to say, I got on a plane.

When Joanie picked me up at the airport, I noticed that her hand was on her stomach.  It was caressing her stomach.  And as the weekend went on, her hand rarely left the gentle bump of her stomach.  She loved that baby, loved her dearly, and the fact that she knew the baby would  never reach viability was just terrible.  As I write this, I'm thinking about the gentle touch of a mother's hand on her baby, the being living within her, and I am crying like you cannot imagine.

Anyway, Joanie's baby was stillborn, and it was just as traumatic as you would expect.  She texted me a picture, and the baby was tiny and gray (she had died in utero before Joanie ever reached the hospital), but she was beautiful, absolutely beautiful.  In typical Joanie fashion, she noted that she had the same nose as her son.

The thing is, though, if you are visibly pregnant, you generally have a baby to show for it.  If you have an abortion, it's rare that you would show as anything more than a little fatter around the waistline, so no one would have to know.

A stillbirth, though ...

Everyone knows you are pregnant ... but then suddenly you aren't.  A lot of people, including Joanie and her husband, had bought stuff for their baby girl.  The baby's grandmothers had already gone nuts with shopping sprees.  I myself had bought at least two items (which, and this could be seen as either morbid or an honor, Gabrielle has worn.

I don't know how Joanie managed to survive the questions as her baby bump dissipated.  I know she cried a lot, that she was very sad and angry, but I do not know how she handled the issue with her colleagues (she was far enough along to have told her co-workers and superiors). I don't know what the neighbors thought, or her friends that lived close by.

I do know that I am closer to Joanie than almost anyone, and I had no idea how to handle it.  I mean, do you say, "I am so sorry!", or "What can I do to make this better?", or even "Wow, you look great, you've obviously lost some weight"?

There is no etiquette for stillbirths.  Instead the women who arguably need the most support are left with the greatest void.  I mean, sure, there's counseling, but the idea of paying someone to listen (and what are you going  to say, anyway ... "My baby died inside my womb and I'm freaking sad?") is kind of...I don't know, sterile, I guess.

I know that I talked to Joanie a lot, but I did not talk about the baby, who they named H.J., unless she broached the subject.  For a long time, this did not happen.

Then one day, Joanie had another baby.  Her son was born a couple of months before Gabrielle, and I spent some time in the hospital with her before her husband got there, and she was talking about the difference between her pregnancies with her older son and with H.J.  It hit me hard, that she had gotten to the point where she could talk about it as just any other event. I was very proud of her.

By some strange fluke that involves chlamydia (not either of us having it, but we sort of have an inside joke about it now), Joanie happened to be there when I was in labor with Gabrielle.  She was talking, again very comfortably, about the difference in the births of both of her sons and with H.J.  I should also note, in case you haven't read Gabrielle's birth story, that Joanie was the rock I leaned on when things got bad. Her strength is amazing.

The thing is, why do we avoid talking about stillbirths?  I think Joanie is an exception in that she is able to talk about H.J. in casual conversation without going to pieces.  People talk about abortions they've had, children they've given up for adoption, even early miscarriages without batting an eye; they just take this as a matter of course.

I guess I am curious about one thing.  How many people have had stillbirths that I am not aware of?  I mean, I'm sort of in Joanie's inner circle, so I know the whole story, but I wonder sometimes how many stillbirths I've been woefully unaware of?

What do you think?  Why is it that it's easier to talk about early miscarriages, children given up for adoption, children that have died young, and even abortions than stillbirths?

I would love to get your thoughts on this as I can't seem to wrap my head around it.

**This post is dedicated to H.J., a baby I love dearly and deeply and will never forget** 

Okay, Let's Talk About Breastfeeding

Although the vaccination debate tends to be one I hear a lot about as a thirtysomething mother, breastfeeding is not far behind.

Let me begin with a question ... is this a sexual picture?

I'm sure some will be appalled and think, "You put a large part of your boob online voluntarily? Are you crazy?", and that's okay, I guess.

And some will think it is a sexual picture, which is I suppose a different conversation.

As far as I'm concerned, this:

 is exactly the same as this:

Which is pretty much this:

In other words, Gabrielle is being nourished.

What the heck is the big deal?

And it IS a big deal, whether it should be or not.

The problem with breastfeeding, in my humble opinion, is that there are so many facets; it's so multi-sided in terms of what to talk about that it's hard to know where to begin.

I breastfed all three of my children, and it's been a very different experience each time.

With Addie (her real name is Emily ... I suppose we can drop the pseudonym act since we no longer share a last name), I was very much pressured by the nurses and lactation consultants to breastfeed.  I was seventeen years old, so of course I was going to go along with it.  I never really enjoyed it, though, and Emily had formula when I was at work and I would give her formula instead of nursing if we were going somewhere public.  She got her first teeth at four months, and she made me bleed, so I stopped breastfeeding.  Frankly, I was relieved.

With Belle (real name Ariel and a.k.a. Ari), I had a device I hadn't owned when Emily was a baby--namely, a breast pump.  After my maternity leave was up and I went back to work six weeks after Ari was born, I pumped breast milk for her to have at day care.  I started pumping almost immediately, I pumped on the way to work (my breast pump went into the car lighter ... I think a lot of truck drivers were kind of surprised), twice at work, and then on the drive home from work.  I nursed her at night.

I have been home with Gabrielle, due to medical complications arising from her birth, for nearly five months.  It has been an unexpected treat, to be honest, although the financial hardship is getting heavy. That, actually, is one of the reasons I'm still breastfeeding The Gab ... formula is expensive!  But really, I think the bond I have with her through nursing is strong and legitimizes a lot of studies I've read.  I actually spent a few days in the hospital in late April, and I had to pump milk for Gabby while I was there since I only got a chance to nurse her once a day.

Yeah, breastfeeding is hard.

The funny thing is, I'm not one of those hard core breastfeeding fanatics.  I don't brag about having platinum nipples because I nursed until my kid was 5 or whatever.  My attitude with both Ari and Gabby was one of, "Eh, we'll see.  If it works, we'll do it.  If it's more trouble than it's worth, well ... we know a lot of really smart people who were raised on formula."

Breastfeeding happened to work for me all three times.  I'm glad it did.  If it hadn't, I would have used formula and been equally happy.  So that's where I stand on whether or not to breastfeed.

The stigma of public breastfeeding, though ...

Man, I struggle with that one.

I grew up in New Hampshire, and when I went to college for the first time, I had an interesting epiphany.  Every time I walked by a non-Caucasian student, I'd say in my mind, "Oh, look, there's a black kid." This wasn't negative in any way, just observational ... but the very fact that I would notice the color of someone's skin because it was different than mine ... it bothered me.  It bothered me then, and it bothered me now. I like to think I'm more open-minded (and I think I am, that it's not what it sounds like).

That's how it is with women I see breastfeeding.  "Oh, that woman over there is breastfeeding."  And I am always a little bit jealous because breastfeeding in public is so hard for me.

The first problem, of course, is that I am me.  I am absolutely the clumsiest person in the world.  I was nursing Ari at the mall once, and a high school kid came over and pointed out that the blanket had shifted and my other breast, the one Ari wasn't attached to, had come out from under the blanket.  And because it is stressful for me, milk production is not as easy or plentiful, so its stressful on baby.

I have breastfed Gab while having lunch at a restaurant with my sister and in the coatroom at Ari's gymnastics class.  That's it.  I've spent more time anticipating the need and timing our ventures around her feeding schedule (or nursing her in the car, which always makes me feel a little dirty).

Anyway, Gab and I are still plugging away at breastfeeding.  I do pump, though, as well.  She gets formula through her cereal.  It seems to be a win/win situation, at least for today.

What are your thoughts on breastfeeding?  Feel free to share your stories in the comments below?  Do you think the stress the medical profession puts on mothers to nurse is worth the stress it causes?  How about the stigma of public breastfeeding?  Are you bothered by mothers breastfeeding in public? Why do you think some people have such a hangup about this? Is there anything I missed here :-)?

Gotta go ... time to nurse my baby <3 p="">