One Year Ago
One year ago, I died and went to hell.
I had lost the ability to feel anything other than anger and hatred toward myself, and I couldn’t sleep. Everywhere I went was covered in a thick layer of fog. I could never tell if I was dreaming or actually there. I spent the majority of my days sitting on the couch watching Julie play while cringing at the fact that a new baby was attached to my boob constantly.
Memories of April’s first few months of life are dim because I simply wasn’t present.
My midwife explained to James a couple months later that I was “Tamra from a distance”. I could see and hear him and the kids, but I couldn’t reach them. I needed psychiatric treatment last November in a bad way, but James and I failed to recognize the signs of postpartum depression so severe that it was bordering psychosis. Most women suffering from that kind of mental illness cry and can barely function. That wasn’t me, though. I couldn’t cry, even though I longed to, and I robotically followed the motions of daily life. From the outside, I was just an exhausted new mom, maybe a little down. I put on a good fake smile. Denial.
Acting became a part of daily life. I showered and brushed my hair every time we left the house or a family member stopped by. I didn’t know I was depressed, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to let anyone know that I had a feeling something wasn’t right. Too proud, just like the family that raised me.
I can’t remember last November. I have no recollection of celebrating the holidays or what I bought everyone for Christmas. Did I get anyone gifts? Did I even get my own kids something from St. Nicholas? Maybe someone pulled out a camera with proof that I was breathing through that time, but it sure wasn’t me.
Every day I thought about killing myself. I tried to leave James and the kids a couple of times. Packed a backpack, struggled to find my keys, and blankly told my husband I was going somewhere. He didn’t really try to stop me- he didn’t know what the hell was going through my head, and he didn’t want to admit that his wife really had lost her mind. Denial.
I don’t remember not leaving or how many times the vision of driving to the beach, walking towards the waves, and never stopping or looking back crossed my manic thoughts.
What I do remember was the panic exploding in my chest while I struggled to find the patience to deal with a screaming, crying newborn. Sitting on the bathroom floor with a sharp blade for God-only-knows-how-long wondering idly if I would be able to feel the cool metal against my wrist, or if I was already so dead that it’d be just another hazy moment, dulled by the hell that I had surrendered to. The emptiness that sex filled me with. My hatred for that shell of a human that stared vacantly at me in the mirror.
The fact that I am sitting at my kitchen table next to an open window filled with blue skies and sunlight in the gorgeous city of Seattle, Washington a year later is proof to me that there simply MUST be a God, He/She MUST love me, and for whatever reason… my life MUST be worth living.
I believe that now.
A year ago, I couldn’t.
