Someone asked me the other day how I remembered to update the blog regularly. My mouth flapped open, and stuck that way, as my brain tried to understand a question for which it had no frame of reference.
She was not a writer. Or rather, not the kind of writer I am — writer by requirement. Vocation, not avocation. Payment doesn’t matter; this is a lifeline, not a hobby.
Words? Are not optional for me. They are as required as water, as food, as air.
Or more germanely — as required as sleep. Go too long without either, and there goes any semblance of stability, of sanity. I might live, but I wouldn’t be able to continue my life. So, because this is how much the universe hates me, my life is structured such that more of one requires less of the other. And I don’t always get to pick which will happen. And sometimes, neither will, and there’s the conditions for a flash flood of crazy.
I am drowning.
*****
Four days ago: the words would not stop. Post after post, perfectly composed, popping into my head, long after I was done for the day. Lying in bed, begging for respite, for sleep.
Three days ago: Stay up, waiting for words, they don’t come. Shrug, go to sleep… eventually.
Two days ago, I would have asked The Man to stay home so I could write — but he was (is, forever will be I fear) on mandatory overtime, so I couldn’t, and didn’t. So I said screw the sleep, and stayed up.
And they didn’t come.
All day — driving, in appointments, in class, while parenting, parenting, parenting — neverending words, a torrent of words, a flood of words, brilliant thoughts, important points, cleverly composed. But no time to stop, no time to sit, no time to get them down.1
And later, when everyone else is in bed, when I stop, sit, wait — silence. Or nonsense.
What do you do when the two things required for sanity are denied to you? Why, go crazy, of course.
You know what’s not crazy? Heavy traffic. Crowded grocery stores. Hyper children. Chaotic playgrounds. Inconsiderate or reckless drivers. Overwhelming course loads. Racist or sexist bullcrap. (Though, if you’re like me, those all might drive you crazy.) “Traffic/the store/those kids/the playground/that driver/this semester/that new law is crazy!” is as linguistically lazy as it is offensive. I am not your metaphor. I am crazy. I am not heavy-crowded-hyper-chaotic-inconsiderate-reckless-overwhelming. Stop it.
Not a fun night-on-the-town crazy. Not a productive crazy. Not a foreshadowing-visions crazy.
Crazy like this: Twitching twitching, chest constricting. Breath coming fast or not at all. Thoughts circling: out out out no no no. Losing it because I couldn’t lose it because there’s a child in my lap and he won’t go to sleep — until I dump him on his sleeping father and run away and we both cry for an hour.
*****
This is a minor wobble, as these things go (…I hope. I think.). It seems self-indulgent to go on about it, but it’s this or even less healthy coping techniques, and I can afford a concussion even less than I can afford the night of sleep missed thusly.
I worry that I’ll lose you, my readers. “Didn’t she write that gone-crazy-back-soon post a few months ago?” Well, yeah. But this is life for me. Mostly fine. Sometimes… this. It doesn’t go away. Not ever, not completely. As tired as you, hypothetical bored reader, might be of these repeats, I promise I am a thousand times more so.
*****
Sometimes, I know where it comes from.
Sometimes it’s my circumstances.
And sometimes? It just sneaks up on me. Sleep eludes me. Words scramble into garbage. I don’t know why.
Sometimes I don’t know where it comes from, I only know it’s coming.
I feel its hot breath on my neck. My hands twitch at its groping touch. My breath is shallow, my belly tight, anticipating its presence. I am running from it — yet it is the running.
Did I cause it by trying to avoid it? Could I have breathed more, shut down the computer sooner, laid wide-eyed in the dark longer? Did I tempt it by rejecting the words offered? Was my error to think I could write in the first place, could have some success and stability?
All the answer I can bring forth now is the equivocating maybe.
*****
I don’t know if I’ll ever be “successful”. I don’t know if these mood regulation glitches, these writing/sleeping imbalances will let me do the things I long for — have I told you about my book idea? Martyrdom Not Required: Attachment Parenting for the Real World ‘Cause I’m obviously so damn skilled at this parenting-life-balancing-gig – but they are a part of my life. They always will be. As much as I hate this — and oh, right now, I do — I don’t hate my life. I can’t hate me, as much as I curse my brain at times. And so I deal.
*****
I don’t have a witty conclusion. There’s no insightful point, no cue for you to nod your head and declare “That’s so deep.” There’s just me, exhausted, face salty from sweat and tears, wrung out, done — yet knowing I have to get up in the morning, to the chirp of “Where’s my dad?” and answer “He’s at work again, little one, but I’m here with you again” alone with you again, make it through the day, no time to break down, no time to stop, no time to be and be drained and be done and have that be enough. There’s just me, thinking this will have to do — not enough writing, not enough sleep, but if I make do with this, I can get just enough sleep to make it through.
Wish me luck.
*****
- An update on Twitter, at 5:45pm: “Someone tell my brain I don’t have TIME for a panic attack now. Try next Monday evening, I think I’m open then.” ↩
When I think of something I want to write, at a time when it’s inconvenient to write, I call it in to my livejournal as a voicepost posted privately. LJ does some basic transcription on it, and I have a record of it for later, in a much shorter and more convenient form. Or, I’ll sometimes just activate the voice recorder app on my phone. I’ve found that I can, if I hold the phone mic right at my mouth, whisper very quietly (to avoid waking the fiance in the bed next to me) and still end up with a recording I can understand and transcribe myself later. It helps me, especially with the ‘getting stuff the frack out of my head so I can stop thinking about it’ part of the process.
Hel — I’ve used voice recording before, but it doesn’t work particularly well for me. I do so much right-after-I-type-the-word editing, and so cannot deal with the sound of my recorded voice, that I find it of minimal utility. LJ or Google transcribing is a new, and good, idea, and I might look into that, thank you.
I’m sorry for this, for how hard it is, and I hope you get to write and breathe and sleep soon, perhaps even all on the same day. And I will read your blog as long as you are writing it, repetition or no, crazy or no, because you are lovely and brilliant and I adore your writing.
I don’t have anything helpful to say nor am I close enough for a real life hug so inadequate interwebz *hugs* will have to suffice. I’m sorry. :(
Virtual hugs, if you want them. I hope things get better for you soon.
I love your writing – it sparks me off with ideas for things I want to write myself.
I don’t know if I’ll ever be “successful”. I don’t know if these mood regulation glitches, these writing/sleeping imbalances will let me do the things I long for…
This. This, my friend, in my experience, seems to be the anthem of our late 20s for those of us with mood/mental health issues. If nothing else, I like to think of it this way: people who write parenting books? Tend to have grown-ass kids. This is not a coincidence. As much as I feel I have to say about my experiences in a marginalized area of parenting, I have really only been at it for four years or so. By saying this I don’t mean to diminish the value of my own perspective from where I stand now, but rather to remind myself that if I have learned and grown this much in four or five years, I can barely imagine where I’ll be in another ten.
In other words, life may feel hopelessly repetitive now (and believe me, I know exactly how you feel). And we’ll probably never “escape”. All I can hope for, though, is that we’ll mellow out some as our lives go on, be more forgiving with ourselves, and continue to accept the support of those who love us during the hard times. Keep doing what you love, whenever you can. Best of luck to you.
maria — I keep trying to write the response this comment deserves, but all I can think is “but I don’t wanna wait until he’s grown!!!” Heh.
Thank you.
I’d second the voice recording of some sort. Get a google voice account and call yourself?
my husband had to work for much of my first year with my son and i remember waking up so early to his cries and feeling the day stretch ahead of us. i just knew that i could not survive another day. and my son was (is?) a terrible sleeper during that time too.
i took the day in hour increments — sometimes less. it was the only way i could get through. but i did. and you can too. a very little bit at a time.
I know that you wrote this for your needs and not mine, but THANK YOU for this post. Because you have perfectly articulated something I also struggle with, that delicate sleep/writing balance, which I’ve been having serious issues with the writing side of recently. It’s so hard to make people understand that writing *is as essential to me as breathing*, and that when I am prevented from getting my thoughts out because, say, someone else wants to use the computer to watch JibJab videos all day (I have trouble with writing longhand), I am unable to function for that entire day because I am too busy trying to keep those precious thoughts from flying away. It’s like a biological urge. It’s like peeing. I either let it out, or I spend the day in discomfort from holding it in. It’s comforting to know someone else understands that feeling.
Bonnie — Thank you for reminding me once again that I do this in part because no matter how seemingly-unique my situation, I am not alone. And neither are you.
I am lucky in that I can do long hand (and prefer it for some things), but that still requires time — not just the time to scribble those words, but the time to give in to the many more they (usually) trigger. To have that interrupted is in some ways worse than skipping it altogether for me.
This: “It’s like peeing. I either let it out, or I spend the day in discomfort from holding it in.” So much yes.
(((hugs)))
Writing required for sanity. Oh yes. And then, though, what if the writing (or rather, the responses) is one of the things that triggers the crazy? Fucksticks.
(((more hugs)))
Rosemary Cottage — Oh yes. I both love and sometimes dread feedback. It’s not that I don’t welcome disagreement (I do!), it’s just that if I’m not in a very secure space it can send me reeling sometimes. Which I usually try not to let on to, because I really don’t want to discourage honest disagreement and discourse, nor make someone hesitate or decide not to comment if it’s not all agreement, but it’s true nonetheless.
I still find it worth it, though.
And thank you.
((((((BIG hug))))))
I know what it feels like. When you survive days like that that is a success.
As a somewhat long-time lurker, let me say that to me, your posts are thought-provoking, beautifully written, penetratingly human, privilege-checking (or would that be privilege-check-causing? I’m working to excise “X is crazy!” from my lexicon, largely inspired by you), but never, ever boring. And I would not only read that book, I would buy it for everyone I know.
Wishing you hugs, strength, and balance, in whatever quantities you need…
Martyrdom Not Required: Attachment Parenting for the Real World, as written by you, would be lovely to read.
Everyone — thank you. (I have a Thing against responding to each individual comment, I don’t know why. Probably not wanting to artificially drive up comment count. Y’all knew I was crazy… But I mean this to each of you nonetheless.) Thank you for commenting, thank you for reading, thank you for the hugs, thank you for the commiseration, thank you for the suggestions, and thank you for sticking around. It really does mean so much to me, as cliched as that sounds. It’s still true.
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Yep: There’s just me, exhausted, face salty from sweat and tears, wrung out, done — yet knowing I have to get up in the morning, to the chirp of “Where’s my dad?” and answer “He’s at work again, little one, but I’m here with you again” alone with you again, make it through the day, no time to break down, no time to stop, no time to be and be drained and be done and have that be enough. There’s just me, thinking this will have to do — not enough writing, not enough sleep, but if I make do with this, I can get just enough sleep to make it through.
Took the words right out of my mouth. Can’t wait to meet you in a couple of days!
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