Anniversaries. There’s good ones and then there are bad ones. Everyone loves happy anniversaries, they look forward to it every year, but what about the bad ones? The ones when you lost someone you love or when a relationship ended, you lost all of your belongings in a fire, etc. Those bad anniversaries no one likes to talk about and those are one of the ways when depression can slip in.
I have problems with anniversaries, I disappear from the planet certain times of the year for days, weeks at a time. I don’t want to be bothered with phone calls from people and sometimes I don’t even want to work. I just want to suffer in silence. I know that it isn’t healthy, but honestly I don’t care.
I focus on the negative times in my life a lot because, there has been more bad, horribly, shitty times than good or great ones. I never spoke about it tho, I just let everything stay bottled up inside of me. I built a dam to protect me from dealing with my issues, but every “anniversary” depression, anxiety, PTSD and panic attacks kicks in.
sigh
I hate the new year. I hate January and February. I hate August. Yes, HATE. Albeit a strong word, but I hate those months. Those months were/are the worst months ever for me. There are other crappy months, but those months I have no choice to hate them as they stick out more than anything. When we celebrate the new year I’m not happy, I think about it being almost “that time”, the anniversary of when something so horrible happened to me that my life has forever been changed and not for the better.
This is when my anxiety creeps in. No wait, my anxiety kicks the door in like ATF, it hits me HARD. When it hits I am paralyzed with fear, I am traumatized, I relive these days over and over again and I wish that they would stop, but it never does. I try and not think about it, but there’s this uneasy feeling in my stomach, this sadness no matter what I’m doing and then it dawns on me what day it is.
February 2nd marked the 8th anniversary of my son’s passing. January 24th is the day I went in the hospital at 8.5 months pregnant with my husband and was told that our son was “dead” and that I had to deliver him. It was dejavu all over again. Why? The reason I hate August. August 5, 2004 was the first time I experienced losing a child. I was told that my child, that I carried for 6.5 months had “no viable heartbeat, your baby is dead.” and they were sorry for my loss.
Ever heard of an outer body experience? They happen. When I was being told this, my husband held my hand and I disappeared. I was watching a movie. I had lost our son and I had to deliver our son. I had to deliver a dead baby. I went through 3 days of excrutiating labor to deliver a child that had died days ago. During that whole time I was still above watching this all go down. Then I was asked afterwards if I wanted an autopsy done, followed by the state of NJ requires that you bury any fetus older than 20 weeks. So here I am, being asked about an autopsy and being handed burial information when back at our house there was a baby room waiting to be completed.
My odds are amazing because 2 years later it happened again. 8 days before my birthday. On my birthday I was planning yet another funeral for another dead child that came from me. You are never supposed to bury your child. Never. Let alone TWICE. I have relived those days for years and here it is almost a decade later and I am terrified of the month of August. 8 years and I hate January and February, I hate my birthday.
They tell you it gets easier as time goes by, but that’s just a crock of shit. To create a life and to never see this life form cry, smile, play with their tiny fingers and for them to open their eyes and see you. Their mother. No, it doesn’t get easier. Anniversaries SUCK.
I have tried every version imagineable to produce a better outcome. I want to know why? Why ME? What did I do in my life to deserve this? Why does God hate me? Feeling like a complete failure never gets easier.To not be able to bring life into this world, the one thing a woman was built for…replenish the earth. To feel like you are the epitome of death. You are the definition of death.
To want to join your children in the afterlife just so you can see them and be with them, be a mother to them. You crave death just so you can be with them. That pain is what I deal with every January, February and August. My feelings of depression I struggle with every single day, but it kicks into overdrive during those times. So, I hide. I take refuge, I sulk, I cry, I drink (used to), damn near anything that could take away the pain.
I know that nothing can change the fact that I lost my sons and buried them in the Garden of Angels section at the Fairlawn cemetary, but I go there and I talk to them. It helps a little, no I’m lying it doesn’t help at all. While I’m talking to my sons I’m surrounded by other parents who have lost their children. That have had to bury their children and I wonder how are they holding up. Therapy helps but it doesn’t erase those words “no longer viable your baby is dead”, it doesn’t stop me from replaying the whole scene in my head. BUT therapy does help me realize that me wanting to join them is not a sensible decision. That I must push through everything that has happened in my life and to LIVE rather than exist.
I have many mental illnesses because of these traumas and others I’ve experienced through this life of mine. These feelings unfortunately, will never end, but I just want to get to a place where I can handle it better than I have been.
Baby steps as my therapist would say.
“Baby steps…”
I have several mental illnesses: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, dysthymic depression, ADHD, PMDD, anxiety, paranoia and slight agoraphobia. I’m a therapy advocate and I go faithfully twice a week and am on medication. That was one of the hardest, yet best steps that I could have ever taken in life. Picking up the phone and saying “I need help.” We all need help, some of us a little more than others. Therapy can save your life, it definitely saved mine.
Vixen is the proud owner and Dean of http://www.vixenvarsity.com a lifestyle blog in a university setting. She covers everything from entertainment to culinary arts and shares her mental illness stories. Her work can also be found on BallerAlert.com. Vixen is a therapy advocate and a stigma fighter, especially for the African American community. She has helped some people towards their own therapy journey and she will continue to do so. Vixen is a comic book geek, Wonder Woman addict and a Jets fan. You can follow Vixen on twitter http://www.twitter.com/MizCaramelVixen and reach out to her via email Dean@VixenVarsity.com
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