Thanksgiving 2012

We had a good Thanksgiving this year. I know it's a bit cheesy but I do like to take the time to reflect on what I have to be thankful for and of course I'm thankful for the usual things (my family, Mira, our house, full-time well-paying jobs with health insurance, money in the bank, good friends etc.) but I especially had something to be thankful for this year. I have to say, it is amazing how much better I feel now. It really feels like I've gotten myself back after I'd gone away for close to 2 years. That's a long time to be living as someone you don't really recognize, or like that much, to be honest.  I've been on the Prozac for just about a month now and I feel so much happier than I have in years. I hadn't realized how bad this depression was and how deeply it had permeated every little thing about my life - and not just my life, but the lives of everyone closest to me. I have moments when I feel regretful that I let things get so bad but there's nothing to do about that now. The goal is to pick up the pieces and move on. Now that I'm doing so much better I've felt so guilty sometimes about how badly I've treated Mark. And it's not that he was doing anything wrong, I was so depressed nothing he could humanly do could ever make me happy, but I still feel bad that he's put up with so much, and then I feel so grateful that he's stuck with me through everything. I really did find a keeper! And Mira - it's so sad that I have to say this, but for the first time I'm excited to get up in the morning and play with my daughter. I can't believe I let myself suffer for so long. And no one knew. When I've told my family and friends about this whole ordeal, the response I always get is, "I had no idea." My response is, "That was kind of the idea." Obviously that mindset has to change but that's what therapy is for.

And speaking of therapy - Mark and I had a marriage counseling session a few weeks ago and I cannot believe how helpful it was. (This is me getting all clinical about this, but studies have shown that the best results occur when the patient receives a combination of medication and counseling.) The therapist we saw was excellent. We didn't say anything during our appointment that hadn't already been said, but sometimes saying those things to a nonthreatening, objective third person makes a world of difference. She was so good at validating what both Mark and I were saying so that we felt heard, and then she was able to make thoughtful suggestions to each of us on what we could do to look at things differently. Both Mark and I had some "ah ha!" moments. I talked about how I describe myself as an over-achiever. I got straight As all through college, I graduated summa cum laude with a few honor society memberships under my belt, as soon as I started working I joined all these committees and took on tons of extra projects so that I could prove to everyone how good I was. The therapist said that parenthood is commonly a challenge for people like me because in the past, if I wasn't feeling good about myself I would do more and that would make me feel better; the problem now is that doing more might not be the answer, it's more about finding a balance. This was nothing new but I'd never had it put like that to me before. It had become a vicious downward spiral. I felt bad about myself (now we know it was depression but back then we didn't know that), so to feel better about myself I did what I always did: I took on more projects at work and got more involved. I went back to work 6 weeks after Mira was born - I didn't have to from a money standpoint but I did because I was miserable. The more time I spent at work, the more guilty I felt about leaving Mira but when I was with her I wasn't happy either. And the more time I spent at work, the more Mark felt neglected and tried to get me to drop work responsibilities to be at home, but doing more work was how I was trying to cope with feeling miserable, so I felt angry and resentful that Mark wasn't being supportive of me. You can see how we were just going around and around in circles with nothing actually getting solved because the underlying problem wasn't being fixed. We were trying to cover up the symptoms without curing the real disease.

Anyway... The bottom line is that I'm feeling so much better. Talking things over with my mom and friends has been helpful too because again, people on the outside can see things that you can't when you're trapped in the middle of everything. Mark and I are going to go to at least a few more therapy sessions, and I can say now that I finally feel like my rota fortuna is on the upswing again. :)

So that's how I've been doing. The last few days Mark and I have been flattened with some debilitating respiratory virus - congestion, cough, wheezing, sinus headache, overwhelming fatigue, fevers - it's been rough. And we both got our flu shot last month so who knows what this is. And of course Mira has a little bit of a dry cough and a slightly snotty nose but otherwise she has just as much energy as ever, which seems a bit unfair because Mark and I are both sick so we can't really pick up the slack for each other. But at least she's not sick so that's good.

She's definitely starting to talk too. It's still garbled but more and more her chattering sounds like words. One of her new things to do is if she finds something she's looking for, she points at it and says excitedly, "Dey-a iiiiihhhh!" ("There it is!") So dang cute! She tries to count to 3, as you can see in this video.

A few weeks ago we had a massive snowstorm, so I bundled Mira up and took her out to explore the snow. At first she wasn't really sure what to do about the snow and did her best to avoid it, but eventually she was trying to walk in it as much as she could.

This ended up being a good action shot of her tripping - don't worry, she wasn't hurt.

She's getting in touch with her creative side too. A few days ago I took her to my sister Sara's house and Mira had such a fun time playing the piano. I think we'll have to sign her up for lessons in a few years.

She still loves to sing and show off too, especially after she watches the show The X Factor on TV, which is sort of like American Idol. She picks up on all these little nuances and gestures that I wouldn't have thought she'd notice.

She's also getting really good at drinking out of a cup without a lid. We were visiting my family and my dad poured a glass of chocolate milk, which of course Mira wanted to try. We didn't have any sippy cups at the house so we poured some chocolate milk in a plastic cup and held our breath. She did great! She spilled only a little bit when she got distracted while trying to walk and drink at the same time but otherwise she didn't spill any milk. (We had a really close call when she ran into the carpeted living room with the milk sloshing dangerously close to the rim of the cup though.) So we felt okay giving her some water in a little teacup so she could have a tea party with me today.

I just can't believe how big she's getting! She amazes me every day.

The other thing Mira is really enjoying these days is coloring. She has a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse coloring book that she scribbles in but of course she keeps trying to go for the coffee table or the floor or the walls with her crayons. Today we got a shipment of diapers in the mail (I order all my diapers from a website called diapers.com - anyone with small children really needs to check this site out, it is fantastic!) and I had a brilliant idea.

I stuck Mira in the box with all her crayons and she went to town coloring the box. Seriously one of my best ideas ever, if I do say so myself. :) I know what we're doing with all our big boxes from now on!

And of course we need some pictures of Wally. He has really attached himself to me - as soon as I come out he follows me around the house, and some nights he walks around the house yowling for me. Mark made the comment that Wally is the neediest cat he's ever met - most cats are independent and decide after awhile that they don't want attention anymore, but not Wally! He is so sweet and he is fitting in so well.

This is how Wally likes to cuddle with me.

Yes, I have so much to be thankful for! :) Hope everyone else had a great holiday as well!

Halloween 2012

As promised, here are the much anticipated pictures of Mira in her Halloween costume. Mira is currently obsessed with the TV show Mickey Mouse Clubhouse, and whenever she sees a picture of Minnie Mouse she gets really excited. So Mark and I decided that would be a great outfit for her to wear because she would recognize it and get excited about it. We also decided to be ambitious and make the costume ourselves because we didn't like the ones we were finding in the stores. Of course it ended up getting thrown together at the last second but I think it turned out super cute!

Mira was definitely excited. She could tell she was Minnie Mouse and as soon as we got her all dressed up she started twirling around in her skirt! I made the tutu/petticoat portion of the skirt and Mark sewed the polkadot overskirt and the bow. I also made the ears. Keep in mind too that most of the sewing ended up being done by hand because our sewing machine was chewing up the fabric instead of stitching it all together. I think for a last-minute hand-made costume it came out really well and it was definitely recognizable.

Luckily it was really nice warm weather on Halloween so it was great for trick-or-treating. We did get the yard all decked out again this year but I honestly never got the time to even walk around the yard and admire the work Mark had done. Which is a shame but at least lots of other people got to enjoy it and lots of little kids got scared witless. Apparently some kids got so scared they left pieces of their costumes behind in their desperate attempt to get away as fast as they could. Sounds like a success to me!

This was Mira's first year going trick-or-treating so it was really important to me that I got to take her around the neighborhood. Which meant I tried to throw together a haphazard costume at the last second too. What I was going for was "tired" but I ended up looking like that scary lady in the movie The Ring. But a few people said I looked like a housewife and lots of housewives are tired so maybe the costume didn't fall completely flat.

As far as the actual trick-or-treating went, Mira didn't quite get the idea. I've spent so much time trying to teach her that it's not socially acceptable to walk up to every single house and knock on the door that she was so confused when I tried to drag her up to everyone's front door. In fact for the first few houses I had to carry her to the front door because she refused to walk up to anyone's house! Then when the door was opened she tried to walk into everyone's house. Then she'd get a piece of candy but didn't understand that even if she put it in her candy bucket it was still hers. She screamed if I tried to put her candy in her bucket and insisted on holding it in her hand. Then when we knocked on the next door and she was offered the bowl of candy to choose from, she put her old piece of candy from the previous house in the bowl and picked up a new piece, which she then would still refuse to put in her bucket. Finally once I showed her how some neighbor girls were putting their candy in their buckets as they went house to house she started to get the idea and eventually she would put her candy in the bucket right before we rang the doorbell - close enough! We didn't end up going very far, just around the block once. Then she got tired and overwhelmed with everything and wanted to go back so I carried her home. Once I got her into bed I still had to go to work for the rest of the night. The sad fact of working in a hospital is you don't ever get nights/weekends/holidays off until you've been working for like 20 years or something and your kids aren't little and wanting you at home anymore. But luckily I was able to find a nurse who was willing to stay a few hours late for me so I did have the extra time to take Mira trick-or-treating, which was so very much appreciated. It was so worth it.

As for me... I'm a work in progress, I suppose. It's barely been a week since starting the Prozac so of course I'm still having days or portions of days when I want to crawl under the covers and cry but those moments are already starting to be less frequent. I really think getting an answer for why I've been feeling and acting so out of character has been a huge part of it. Now that we know what the problem is we know how to tackle it. Mark and I will be doing some marriage counseling too. It won't hurt and it's free through my work so why not? I think it's just going to have to be one day at a time for awhile.

And of course something else that has been helping my mood has been this silly orange kitty:

Typical cat notices we're doing something so falls asleep right on top of the project.

What? Yes, I know I'm gorgeous.

I hadn't realized how much I've missed having a lap cat until Wally came around. In fact he's been asleep on my lap the whole time I've been working on this post! It's hard to feel completely miserable with a warm furball snuggling you.

Mira of course is too busy to bother with sitting on Mommy's lap for more than a few seconds at a time. She has one speed and that's "run." I've heard her starting to use a couple new words lately, like "fish," "doggie," "kitty," "shoes," and my personal favorites, "OOOOOooooooooooo!" and "Uh oh!" She can point to her belly button, feet, head, hair, ears, eyes, nose and mouth correctly. She eats using her fork or spoon most of the time now, except when she's really hungry and then she holds the utensil in one hand and puts the food in her mouth with the other hand. The other day I tried to sit her on the toilet before a bath, just to see what would happen, and she started crying so I guess we're not ready to try potty-training yet. She's also learned how to cross her arms, which is so funny, and what's also funny and I try really hard not to laugh at it is her temper tantrums. When she starts getting frustrated about something she lays herself down on the floor and, after making sure we're paying attention to her, she whines and kicks her feet. Sometimes her reaction is to raise her right hand and smack something as hard as she can - once it was the coffee table and after doing that she looked stunned, grabbed her right hand and said, "Ow!" When she's really really upset, upset enough for crying, she buries her face in her hands, throws herself dramatically face-down on the couch and sobs as loud as she can. I swear I have no idea where she learned how to do this. I don't think there was ever much doubt but now we know for certain we have a little diva on our hands.

I promised awhile ago to post a picture of my tattoo once it had healed - here's the final product!

I absolutely love how it came out. Obviously I have a short memory for pain because I'm already trying to decide what I'd like for my next tattoo.

These next several photos are going in an album entitled "Mira's Self-Portrait Gallery." I leave you with these works of art. :)