So, Ethan has decided that 6:30 is his favorite wake-up time. Well, sometimes it is 6:00 or 7:00 or even 5:30 or 7:15, but I would say on average, it is 6:30. The problem is, I do not wake up until 8:00 or 8:30. Maybe I open my eyes and walk around before then, but my mind and soul is protesting with every fiber of its being. We have now explained to Jacob what the word "grumpy" means - it has become sadly relevant to his daily life.
The worst is that Ethan doesn't act rested and chipper - just wide awake and mad. So I get to listen to him scream while I battle against everything in me telling me that I should be asleep. I have tried putting him to bed earlier, later, anything I can think to try, and we still end up awake at 6:30 am and neither of us happy.
I wonder how I can reset my circadian rhythms. I mean, surely I can train myself to be awake at 6:30, right? I would need to be asleep by 10:30, which is basically impossible in our home, but then it would work, right? However, all through high school, trying to get up at 6:30 or 7, my body never got used to it - it was always painful. So I worry that I am genetically programmed to not wake up early.
On another topic, I have called the landlord about Ethan's room smelling like cats. They are going to come pull up the carpet and put primer on the cement. The carpet in the entire apartment was cleaned before we moved in, so they don't think it could be the carpet itself. And now Heath informs me, "I have never smelled cats in that room!" Maybe it is my sleep deprivation causing me to smell imaginary cat odor...
I truly need a day of rest. We have missed out because of using weekends to work on our house to get it on the market. (And who knows how much longer we will continue to miss out before it is ready?)
Tuesday, August 30, 2005
Monday, August 22, 2005
s-t-r-e-t-c-h-e-d
Today I logged back onto my blog after a long hiatus in order to make sure it was suitable for reading by people who actually know me. :-S Some of our friends have blogs now, and I could post comments using my blogger name, except I wasn't sure I wanted to until I checked it over. I decided, I guess it is ok.
Today and yesterday have been awful, terrible, days I want to forget and never live through again. We just moved, 2 weeks ago Saturday, and so there is all the normal craziness, must-get-done-or-the-world-will-fall-apart things. But then I have 2 small children set on defying me and making my head explode. No, really. I mean, Jacob actually said, "I'm going to ______" whatever I had just asked him not to do, in a sing-song, elementary school teasing voice. I said, "Well you better not or you will get in trouble." He says, "YOU'LL get in trouble." It would be funny if it wasn't so infuriating. Meanwhile Ethan pooped on the floor this morning and his room smells inexplicably like cats. (The floor-poop incident didn't happen in his room if that is what you are thinking....) They are also both determined to remove every rubber piece off of every door stopper in the apartment, and store them in their mouths until discovered (we didn't have these in our previous home). Then, our new bank wanted to hold the funds from Heath's first paycheck in our account for 5 days before we could access them. Hello, bills?
Come back tomorrow, everything will be better then. Right? We honestly have been having a good time in our new city, until this recent personality transformation in our children. I know that God wants us here, and He will help us through it all. We're being stretched, but stretched isn't always bad, you know? (feels terrible awful today, but hopefully I will be happy in the long run when I learn to clean poop off the floor with a smile) Meanwhile my only goal in life is to find a babysitter so we can have date nights (or even just 5 minutes away from our children).
Today and yesterday have been awful, terrible, days I want to forget and never live through again. We just moved, 2 weeks ago Saturday, and so there is all the normal craziness, must-get-done-or-the-world-will-fall-apart things. But then I have 2 small children set on defying me and making my head explode. No, really. I mean, Jacob actually said, "I'm going to ______" whatever I had just asked him not to do, in a sing-song, elementary school teasing voice. I said, "Well you better not or you will get in trouble." He says, "YOU'LL get in trouble." It would be funny if it wasn't so infuriating. Meanwhile Ethan pooped on the floor this morning and his room smells inexplicably like cats. (The floor-poop incident didn't happen in his room if that is what you are thinking....) They are also both determined to remove every rubber piece off of every door stopper in the apartment, and store them in their mouths until discovered (we didn't have these in our previous home). Then, our new bank wanted to hold the funds from Heath's first paycheck in our account for 5 days before we could access them. Hello, bills?
Come back tomorrow, everything will be better then. Right? We honestly have been having a good time in our new city, until this recent personality transformation in our children. I know that God wants us here, and He will help us through it all. We're being stretched, but stretched isn't always bad, you know? (feels terrible awful today, but hopefully I will be happy in the long run when I learn to clean poop off the floor with a smile) Meanwhile my only goal in life is to find a babysitter so we can have date nights (or even just 5 minutes away from our children).
Monday, January 03, 2005
wallowing
Remember what I was saying about being a bad housekeeper? Well, the worst of it is the fights with my husband about it. As if I don't already feel badly enough about it.
We used to have these fights frequently until, I guess, he decided to give up. But the issue still comes up occassionally. In this instance, we had been out to our friends brand NEW bigger-than-ours house. Which was spotlessly clean and immaculately decorated with all new goods. Never mind that we were invited and therefore, I'm sure, lady of the house was cleaning furiously (in fact she told me all through her Christmas break she has been putting in dawn-to-dusk cleaning and decorating days). Still, my house gets compared to hers. Why can't he compare my house on the days we have had huge parties that we spent hours preparing for? No, he compares my everyday noones-gonna-see-it house to hers. How insulting.
The worst of it was, I felt like I had actually done an extraordinary amount of cleaning over the weekend. Dishes, a couple of loads of laundry, the bathroom, vacuumed a couple of rooms, put away ALL the toys into Jacob's room. But no, it did not look even close to the "other" house. Because, for one thing, we have 2 kids, and she has none. And we have a buildup of clutter to attack, not packed away in moving boxes to be tackled one at a time, but spread over most of the house. And, I guess, most of all, I just am not a good housekeeper - not motivated, not concerned.
So, this morning, I am torn between cleaning like a mad-woman to prove that I am worth something as a wife and mother and person, or wallowing in shame and doing nothing. Right now I am choosing wallowing.
We used to have these fights frequently until, I guess, he decided to give up. But the issue still comes up occassionally. In this instance, we had been out to our friends brand NEW bigger-than-ours house. Which was spotlessly clean and immaculately decorated with all new goods. Never mind that we were invited and therefore, I'm sure, lady of the house was cleaning furiously (in fact she told me all through her Christmas break she has been putting in dawn-to-dusk cleaning and decorating days). Still, my house gets compared to hers. Why can't he compare my house on the days we have had huge parties that we spent hours preparing for? No, he compares my everyday noones-gonna-see-it house to hers. How insulting.
The worst of it was, I felt like I had actually done an extraordinary amount of cleaning over the weekend. Dishes, a couple of loads of laundry, the bathroom, vacuumed a couple of rooms, put away ALL the toys into Jacob's room. But no, it did not look even close to the "other" house. Because, for one thing, we have 2 kids, and she has none. And we have a buildup of clutter to attack, not packed away in moving boxes to be tackled one at a time, but spread over most of the house. And, I guess, most of all, I just am not a good housekeeper - not motivated, not concerned.
So, this morning, I am torn between cleaning like a mad-woman to prove that I am worth something as a wife and mother and person, or wallowing in shame and doing nothing. Right now I am choosing wallowing.
Wednesday, December 29, 2004
temper tantrums
I have never seen someone throw such temper tantrums as my son, Jacob. Well, except for maybe me. Granted, I have not been around many kids day in and day out. But, whenever I did get a glimpse of a temper tantrum, I would always think, "I am never going to let my kids behave like that!" Maybe I was so vehement about it because it was actually a demonstration of feelings I myself still struggle with. And now I am faced with them in a very concrete way in my son.
I know, I know, "Kids need rules and boundaries; they need to know who is the boss." But that is so very hard. It doesn't seem right to purposefully inflict pain on my children in order to get them to do the right thing. I know that they don't yet have internal control (do I, either?), and they need the external control to help them make the right decisions (maybe this is what I need, too?). I know they don't really want to disobey but sometimes without repercussions it is beyond them to make the right choices. Their natural curiosity makes them test limits and push farther and farther until they hit a brick wall (literally or figuratively). Yet, it seems there should be a more sophisticated, more subtle way to help them make the right choices and be their external conscience until they develop an internal one. Ultimately, I want them to learn to turn the other cheek. But in teaching non-violence, do I want to sacrifice my children learning that they are not the center of the world, learning to respect authority, learning that there are rules that must be followed?
I remember as a child thinking, "why do they have the right to tell me what to do?!? why do my desires and thoughts and opinions deserve less consideration than theirs?" And that is how we treat children, you know. We have such a double standard, in which an adult who is offended or has a request or opinion is listened to and accomodated as much as constraints will allow, but a child with a request is often dismissed without explanation or even trying to accomodate. That is why I do try to actually listen to my children and give them an explanation for the judgments I hand down, and I try to accomodate when I can, asking myself "Is there some way we can both get what we want and need in this situation?" Just like I would with an adult. However, ultimately, maybe we adults need to take a cue from what we are trying to teach our children, and be less defensive of having our desires and thoughts and opinions considered as much as anyone else's. We all need to learn to be less selfish, along with being more considerate toward both adults and children.
Anyway, back to spanking. Although it seems like there should be a better way, I don't think there is any way around it. If Jacob insists on getting out of bed over and over when he needs to sleep, then other than getting him to stay by spanking him, I could literally hold him down in his bed. But then, inevitably, Ethan would start crying for a bottle or something. I suppose if I only had one child, maybe I could employ these other methods. But then, what about when I leave and he gets up again? Do I continue to go into his room and hold him in bed to fall asleep? It seems the only workable solution is convincing him of the merits of staying in bed of his own will. And so far, only spanking has done that. He's not exactly to reasoning age. Maybe it would work to say he could have a treat when he gets up or that he will get something taken away if he doesn't stay in bed, but so far those sort of punishments/rewards have not had much effect. If he wants something, he wants it NOW - 2 hours from now are irrelevant.
So, I keep doing it - for big issues anyway, like staying in bed for naps and nighttime and not hitting, that sort of thing. But I still think if he wasn't my child and it hadn't happened gradually, I would be horrified at the level of disrespect he shows toward me - shouting "no" at me (shouting at me at all, in fact), running away from me when I try to change his diaper or clothes, throwing screaming kicking fits when I tell him he can't have something. I sometimes think, if I am going to spank, maybe I need to deal with his attitude with spanking, too.
And then there is the issue of pottying, which he is determined to have his way with as well... but that is another topic for another day. :-)
I know, I know, "Kids need rules and boundaries; they need to know who is the boss." But that is so very hard. It doesn't seem right to purposefully inflict pain on my children in order to get them to do the right thing. I know that they don't yet have internal control (do I, either?), and they need the external control to help them make the right decisions (maybe this is what I need, too?). I know they don't really want to disobey but sometimes without repercussions it is beyond them to make the right choices. Their natural curiosity makes them test limits and push farther and farther until they hit a brick wall (literally or figuratively). Yet, it seems there should be a more sophisticated, more subtle way to help them make the right choices and be their external conscience until they develop an internal one. Ultimately, I want them to learn to turn the other cheek. But in teaching non-violence, do I want to sacrifice my children learning that they are not the center of the world, learning to respect authority, learning that there are rules that must be followed?
I remember as a child thinking, "why do they have the right to tell me what to do?!? why do my desires and thoughts and opinions deserve less consideration than theirs?" And that is how we treat children, you know. We have such a double standard, in which an adult who is offended or has a request or opinion is listened to and accomodated as much as constraints will allow, but a child with a request is often dismissed without explanation or even trying to accomodate. That is why I do try to actually listen to my children and give them an explanation for the judgments I hand down, and I try to accomodate when I can, asking myself "Is there some way we can both get what we want and need in this situation?" Just like I would with an adult. However, ultimately, maybe we adults need to take a cue from what we are trying to teach our children, and be less defensive of having our desires and thoughts and opinions considered as much as anyone else's. We all need to learn to be less selfish, along with being more considerate toward both adults and children.
Anyway, back to spanking. Although it seems like there should be a better way, I don't think there is any way around it. If Jacob insists on getting out of bed over and over when he needs to sleep, then other than getting him to stay by spanking him, I could literally hold him down in his bed. But then, inevitably, Ethan would start crying for a bottle or something. I suppose if I only had one child, maybe I could employ these other methods. But then, what about when I leave and he gets up again? Do I continue to go into his room and hold him in bed to fall asleep? It seems the only workable solution is convincing him of the merits of staying in bed of his own will. And so far, only spanking has done that. He's not exactly to reasoning age. Maybe it would work to say he could have a treat when he gets up or that he will get something taken away if he doesn't stay in bed, but so far those sort of punishments/rewards have not had much effect. If he wants something, he wants it NOW - 2 hours from now are irrelevant.
So, I keep doing it - for big issues anyway, like staying in bed for naps and nighttime and not hitting, that sort of thing. But I still think if he wasn't my child and it hadn't happened gradually, I would be horrified at the level of disrespect he shows toward me - shouting "no" at me (shouting at me at all, in fact), running away from me when I try to change his diaper or clothes, throwing screaming kicking fits when I tell him he can't have something. I sometimes think, if I am going to spank, maybe I need to deal with his attitude with spanking, too.
And then there is the issue of pottying, which he is determined to have his way with as well... but that is another topic for another day. :-)
Tuesday, December 28, 2004
housekeeping
I stink at housekeeping. No, really. It's hard to imagine I could be good at it with how little effort I put in.
I think about my Grandma, who washed clothes and dishes by hand and ironed everything, swept and waxed her hardwood floor, and mopped on her hands and knees. I have a dishwasher, washing machine, and vacuum for my fully carpeted house. But do I use them? No, I sit here on my butt for most of the day. Well, not really. I do spend quite a bit of time changing diapers, filling sippy cups and making bottles, feeding us all, separating the boys, discipling Jacob, helping with toys etc etc. But somehow it seems that I should be able to do all that and still keep a spotless house. Right?
Do you think there were bad housekeepers in our Grandmother's generation? If not, what did they do with their kids all day? Did they learn not to interfere while Mommy does dishes or laundry? Because if I open the dishwasher (or refridgerator for that matter) my kids are right there reeking havoc. I spend as much time keeping them out of the way as I do with the actual chore.
Actually, I think I could keep up with the basics if it weren't for all the junk everywhere. Could people please stop sending me mail and giving me more things to find places for?! No, really, I do appreciate the Christmas gifts we received, but life would be much simpler without any more mail. Ever.
I think about my Grandma, who washed clothes and dishes by hand and ironed everything, swept and waxed her hardwood floor, and mopped on her hands and knees. I have a dishwasher, washing machine, and vacuum for my fully carpeted house. But do I use them? No, I sit here on my butt for most of the day. Well, not really. I do spend quite a bit of time changing diapers, filling sippy cups and making bottles, feeding us all, separating the boys, discipling Jacob, helping with toys etc etc. But somehow it seems that I should be able to do all that and still keep a spotless house. Right?
Do you think there were bad housekeepers in our Grandmother's generation? If not, what did they do with their kids all day? Did they learn not to interfere while Mommy does dishes or laundry? Because if I open the dishwasher (or refridgerator for that matter) my kids are right there reeking havoc. I spend as much time keeping them out of the way as I do with the actual chore.
Actually, I think I could keep up with the basics if it weren't for all the junk everywhere. Could people please stop sending me mail and giving me more things to find places for?! No, really, I do appreciate the Christmas gifts we received, but life would be much simpler without any more mail. Ever.
Monday, December 27, 2004
staying home
I am constantly reassessing my decisions regarding my children. It seems to me the most tricky is my decision to stay home with them. This is such a touchy subject. I can't really talk about it openly because so many friends choose not to or feel they can't stay home. So the only PC thing to say is, "It was the right decision for my family." But really, if I am going to stay home, shouldn't I do it because I believe it is generally the best choice? Honestly, though, I think about this often myself and wonder.
Will my kids be glad I stayed home with them, or will they wish I had worked and saved for their college?
Will my kids be glad I stayed home with them, or will they wish I had worked and saved for their college?
introduction
I suppose I should start by introducing myself. I am 27 years old, living in Kansas, spending my days mostly at home with my two sons, Jacob, who is 2.5, and Ethan, who is 11 months. My husband, Heath, does web page design for a business which he owns with his dad and another man. Heath and I met at Manhattan Christian College where we were both studying Bible/Cross-cultural Ministry. We plan to go to the mission field someday, but for the moment we are blessed to live near many family members and friends who we get to see on a weekly basis. My kids are getting to be raised by their extended family as well as their parents, and I love that. :-)
We like to go out to eat and to movies, although we have had to curb these activites with the arrival of children and a more limited budget. ;-) We try to save those activities for date nights now. We watch some TV, like Star Trek, The Apprentice, 24, Smallville, Scrubs, Joey, Simpsons (maybe that seems like a strange mix to some but it makes sense to us :-)), and sometimes news and late-night shows. We both like to read, but who has the time now? Obviously, we both spend quite a bit of time on the internet - Heath job requires it, and it is the only "entertainment" I can really manage while watching the kids. We don't drink or smoke (or very rarely at least ;-), but we don't exercise either, so I guess it balances out health-wise. In summary, I guess we just spend most of our time talking and hanging out with each other, our family and friends, and like I said taking in a few TV shows, movies, and books. Oh, and Heath plays xbox. :-P
We like to go out to eat and to movies, although we have had to curb these activites with the arrival of children and a more limited budget. ;-) We try to save those activities for date nights now. We watch some TV, like Star Trek, The Apprentice, 24, Smallville, Scrubs, Joey, Simpsons (maybe that seems like a strange mix to some but it makes sense to us :-)), and sometimes news and late-night shows. We both like to read, but who has the time now? Obviously, we both spend quite a bit of time on the internet - Heath job requires it, and it is the only "entertainment" I can really manage while watching the kids. We don't drink or smoke (or very rarely at least ;-), but we don't exercise either, so I guess it balances out health-wise. In summary, I guess we just spend most of our time talking and hanging out with each other, our family and friends, and like I said taking in a few TV shows, movies, and books. Oh, and Heath plays xbox. :-P
Tuesday, May 06, 2003
re: treatment-resistant depression
**This post was actually written 5/6/13, but I dated it 5/6/03 so it would be at the very back of all my blog posts, rather than mixed in with the rest of my feed. I wanted to be able to link to it from another blog I wrote 5/6/13, without having it stand out as its own post.
I have tried eight different medicines for depression over the last 13 years, one of which had no response, and three which had a good response initially, but "pooped out" (yes, that is actually a term used in the clinical literature) after several years. I have also tried being off medicine and substituting exercise, meditation and other spiritual practices, and cognitive behavioral therapy in an attempt to live without medication and its inherent side effects. My last bout of wanting to go off medication ended in me finally concurring with my therapist and my meds lady that I will just have to be on psych meds for the foreseeable future. It's possible that someday when the kids are grown, there will be some period of time when I have little stress and lots of space in my life to compensate and manage my depressive/anxious tendencies without pharmaceuticals. But at present, me trying to cope with the symptoms of my depression/anxiety without meds required a higher price than I was willing to pay, in terms of my family's well-being and my own level of functioning.
One of the things they do in treatment-resistant depression is they combine and augment meds. Certain meds for depression have been shown to work better for treatment-resistant individuals if they are combined with another depression med or even some other psych med that is not otherwise used for depression, such as lithium. So, when Zoloft pooped out on me after several years, I switched to Effexor, which worked well for a while; and when it wasn't working well enough anymore, even after raising the dosage, we added Wellbutrin. When we had maxed out the Effexor dosage, and it seemed to stop working all together, I tried dropping it and taking Wellbutrin by itself for a while. It was somewhat effective, but not completely, so eventually we added Prozac. This worked splendidly for half a year or so, but after the mess that was Samuel's first semester of Kindergarten, the constant stress seemed to "break" the effectiveness of my meds, and I needed some kind of adjustment again. This lead to the latest adjustment, in which I have been taking methylphenidate, which seems to work really well, and leads me to ponder whether I have ADHD myself, or if it just works because of how it augments my existing depression meds.
This whole process is kind of scary, because there is a part of me that thinks, "What if we run out of meds to try? What if they all stop working eventually?" This fear was probably part of what drove me try to find a way to live meds-free and to resist trying new meds for so long after dropping Effexor. Apparently, you can cycle back to an old medicine after a long break and sometimes it will work again, and we can try this if I do run out of new medicines to try. However, scientists are always tweaking the medicines we have into new formulations and inventing new ones, so it's possible I will never run out of things to try, or that I will eventually hit on one that never poops out.
Some of you may think I'm sharing too much; that this should be more personal than I'm making it. I did that for a lot of years, and I think I'm done with that approach. I've come to understand and accept that there is obviously something legitimately different about my brain chemisty, and it's okay to acknowledge and want to treat that. In fact, it's a lot healthier for me and my family to accept it in a matter of fact way and to seek effective treatment. This was hard for me to accept for a long time, so I hope that by being open about my own experience, maybe I can help others escape from shame and seek the treatment they need.
I have tried eight different medicines for depression over the last 13 years, one of which had no response, and three which had a good response initially, but "pooped out" (yes, that is actually a term used in the clinical literature) after several years. I have also tried being off medicine and substituting exercise, meditation and other spiritual practices, and cognitive behavioral therapy in an attempt to live without medication and its inherent side effects. My last bout of wanting to go off medication ended in me finally concurring with my therapist and my meds lady that I will just have to be on psych meds for the foreseeable future. It's possible that someday when the kids are grown, there will be some period of time when I have little stress and lots of space in my life to compensate and manage my depressive/anxious tendencies without pharmaceuticals. But at present, me trying to cope with the symptoms of my depression/anxiety without meds required a higher price than I was willing to pay, in terms of my family's well-being and my own level of functioning.
One of the things they do in treatment-resistant depression is they combine and augment meds. Certain meds for depression have been shown to work better for treatment-resistant individuals if they are combined with another depression med or even some other psych med that is not otherwise used for depression, such as lithium. So, when Zoloft pooped out on me after several years, I switched to Effexor, which worked well for a while; and when it wasn't working well enough anymore, even after raising the dosage, we added Wellbutrin. When we had maxed out the Effexor dosage, and it seemed to stop working all together, I tried dropping it and taking Wellbutrin by itself for a while. It was somewhat effective, but not completely, so eventually we added Prozac. This worked splendidly for half a year or so, but after the mess that was Samuel's first semester of Kindergarten, the constant stress seemed to "break" the effectiveness of my meds, and I needed some kind of adjustment again. This lead to the latest adjustment, in which I have been taking methylphenidate, which seems to work really well, and leads me to ponder whether I have ADHD myself, or if it just works because of how it augments my existing depression meds.
This whole process is kind of scary, because there is a part of me that thinks, "What if we run out of meds to try? What if they all stop working eventually?" This fear was probably part of what drove me try to find a way to live meds-free and to resist trying new meds for so long after dropping Effexor. Apparently, you can cycle back to an old medicine after a long break and sometimes it will work again, and we can try this if I do run out of new medicines to try. However, scientists are always tweaking the medicines we have into new formulations and inventing new ones, so it's possible I will never run out of things to try, or that I will eventually hit on one that never poops out.
Some of you may think I'm sharing too much; that this should be more personal than I'm making it. I did that for a lot of years, and I think I'm done with that approach. I've come to understand and accept that there is obviously something legitimately different about my brain chemisty, and it's okay to acknowledge and want to treat that. In fact, it's a lot healthier for me and my family to accept it in a matter of fact way and to seek effective treatment. This was hard for me to accept for a long time, so I hope that by being open about my own experience, maybe I can help others escape from shame and seek the treatment they need.
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