November, 2020 - This Little Light

I made the decision to go Christmas tree shopping this past weekend. I love Christmas, but I am willing to respect Thanksgiving as a holiday – mostly to eat dressing and macaroni and cheese. Getting a Christmas tree just two days after Thanksgiving would easily be the earliest I have ever had a Christmas tree. My mother’s birthday is mid-December and we never liked to override her birthday with Christmas, so when we were young, we would always wait until after her birthday to get a tree. Slowly, I had wiggled my way back to this day. It was going to be a perfect day! Beautiful Virginia mountains, 55 degrees F, sunny. We couldn’t wait!

**The kids are pretending to be reindeer**

Saturday morning came! I had to work at the clinic that morning, but I was just going to grit my teeth and bare it. Working Saturdays at a vet clinic is, at best, a crap shoot. Some people can only make appointments for Saturdays due to work schedules, some wait until the fear that they will have to watch their pet suffer a 42nd day in misery if they have to wait until Monday. At this clinic, I am the only doctor working and end up being scheduled to see a patient every 15 minutes – some easy vaccine boosters, some very sick, requiring extra time and care.

This particular morning, I was swamped. Sick animals everywhere, a very sad euthanasia, and a couple of headache inducing clients. At the end of the morning, ten minutes to the finish line, when the final client called and demanded her dog be seen for a broken toe nail despite our assuring her this is an issue that could be addressed at home – I mean, would you go to urgent care for a toe nail you cut too short? So, yes, we charged an emergency fee – hoping it would keep her away, but instead she spent 10 minutes griping about the price and brought the dog anyway, complaining that it wouldn’t take very long and it shouldn’t cost that much. Looking around, everyone in the clinic was super busy giving fluids to a sick cat, taking x-rays of a limping dog, cleaning, talking to clients in the cars (because curbside), and answering phones. I still had to write up all the records for the glob of cases I saw, make sure everyone was called back who had pressing questions or were waiting on lab work, make sure prescriptions were faxed out to the appropriate pharmacies. So, that, ma’am is why the extra charge.

**A better day when puppies were actually involved – yes, that’s a young puppy**

Now, in my delightfully good mood, I will go Christmas tree shopping!

I finally arrive home, in such festive spirits that, after scarfing Thanksgiving leftovers, I sink down on the couch and contemplate whether today is, in fact, a good day to get a Christmas tree. Tony feeds into my foul mood by suggesting we wait until tomorrow. I consider the full out triple sized tantrum that would ensue if the kids found out we were not going that day and finally decide to get on with it.

**Picture of our fate I saw in my head if we said no Christmas tree today**

We load everyone into the most neglected vehicle we own – “the truck” – the heat doesn’t work, it’s been rained in, the interior is likely rotted, the check engine light is ALWAYS on, but it does the work no other vehicle can do, so we haven’t scrapped it yet. On the way to the farm, we tune into a Christmas music station and the kids all join together in singing that classic yule-time favorite “A-B-C-D…” followed by Calvin screaming “NO! OSCAR!! It’s my turn!!! ABCDE…” then, all the kids joining in a harmonious fight to scream their ABCs the loudest while yelling and hitting their siblings that’s it’s their turn.

Finally, we get “the truck” to the highway where the shuddering of the vehicle in unison with the reverberations of the busted speakers finally silenced the kids into a fearful submission as I try to ignore the angry drivers passing feverishly since I would not go above 60 in a 70mph zone. We, then, get to peacefully listen to actual Christmas music and Oscar shushes everyone when “Frosty the Snowman” comes on and then we make it to the tree farm.

Pulling into the farm, we see it is PACKED! Everyone was walking around, dressed in their holiday best; sweaters, vests, and boots, when my kids jump out of the truck in short sleeves with India taking it a step farther with a flimsy cotton pink skort – Michigan raised kids, amirite? The kids all rushed to grab the deer carcass sleds they let you use to carry your slain tree, they argue incessantly over who gets to pull the thing, then Calvin decides he’ll just sit in the sled, which greatly upsets the other two as you cannot as easily sprint carelessly, demolishing all the baby trees when you have to actually try.

India sings to every tree that it is “the one” and we finally decide on one after, much unlike his choosing a life partner, Tony decides he needs to see every single tree before we settle down. We find a cute one to settle on – it’s not the tallest one we’ve ever gotten, but it’s full, green, and cute. Tony starts with the cutting down after we all have professed that this is “the one”. He gets a few saw strokes into it when I decide to help him out by pressing the tree away from the saw to open up the “incision”. At this very moment, I realize that this is the first any of us have actually touched the tree above the trunk. At this moment, it dawns on me that we have not chosen a tree, but a cactus. I CAN. NOT. TOUCH. IT. Tony asks if he should stop cutting, but we had already damaged the tree, it just was ours now. I picked up the sled to push it and we get it cut down. Tony, wearing work gloves, gets stabbed several times through the gloves to get it loaded on the sled and we consider donating this tree and getting another. “No,” I said, “it just fits with 2020 at this point.”

We get it trimmed and loaded and drive home, welts slowly growing all over Tony’s hands and arms, he is dousing his hands in hand sanitizer to help relieve the itch. India’s allergies and asthma is being triggered, likely by the mold in the interior of “the truck”. And so, we arrive home with the precious cactus, contemplating whether or not to just drag it up and down the gravel driveway until it softens.

Decorating of the tree goes much more smoothly than it could have with a destructive 3 yr. old, only 2-3 ornaments were broken, but that’s why I had my trusty hot glue gun plugged in and ready to go. Oscar ran around the ENTIRE time, hopping on one leg, around the tree, jumping over the strand of lights plugged into the wall, all to simulate being his tyrannosaurus ornament who had lost a leg. We finished adorning the tree with all the favorites, including homemade Pokémon cut-outs, a George Harrison action figure, and a Halloween dragon skeleton. Soon Calvin also joined Oscar in skipping, and then India, and we finished the day with skipping races across the living room.

Here’s to your Christmas/Holiday season!

Dear my doctor, Human Doctor, HD

I really appreciate your devotion to figuring out my health – both physical and mental – and your taking the time to really listen to me and address my biggest concerns – “no, it’s probably not a brain tumor haha!” – even though I had already taken out an extra life insurance policy. I was even excited when you told me that you didn’t think I was on the right medication for my mental struggles and that you were optimistic that switching to a different medication would better address my issues of anxiety (perhaps a reason for the additional life insurance reaction to my headaches?). We planned to wean down the dose of my medication slowly – you know, so I didn’t die – and it would take about 3-4 weeks to get it out of my system before we could start with the new one. I walked out of the clinic enthusiastic that my perspective on life would be a little sunnier in the future.

**Oscar in Michigan – he LOVED the snow!**

Then, slowly, as my day went on, I began to realize at what point my body would be completely devoid of medication to stabilize my emotions… Election week. Good timing, HD.

My anxiety started with the birth of my second child in 2014 and has only continued to get worse through the third child and then the turmoil between friends and family over politics despite counselling, exercise, good diet. I used to picture me, dropping Oscar as an infant and then just vividly picturing his busting his head open, vividly feeling the emotions that would come with it. Picturing our trip to the hospital and how I would feel at his funeral. This extended to Tony, picturing him falling from the barn when he was feeding the animals and dying – continue with long emotional “daydreaming”.

**Fantastic weekend camping on North Manitou island**, MI

The worst was once, when I was nursing Calvin in the recliner in our home, should have been a beautiful moment between a mother and her infant in the early hours of the morning, everything was quiet and I was just loving his tiny, soft, warm body against mine when the nightmare entered my mind. I imagined how it would feel if I were living as a Jewish person in the Holocaust and was trying to hide with this baby when the Nazis were looking for people and shooting all they found hiding. What if Calvin was crying and I couldn’t get him to stop?? The long drives I would be on for farm calls would just add fuel to the fire as I was alone with my thoughts for 1.5 hours at a time.

I have grown up absolutely convinced that if I tried hard enough, used my attuned introspection and was honest with myself, that I could get to the root of the problem and address it. I also believed that I just needed to get enough exercise, eat right, and generally take care of myself and I wouldn’t need medication. I, admittedly, thought that people on medication for their mental issues were just not trying hard enough.

**My Halloween costume one year when I went as Cat Woman**

Eventually, though, despite my being able to look at my life from the outside and think “I’ve actually got it pretty good – loving husband, three healthy children, financial stability” the dark, suicidal thoughts slowly started to creep in.

Karma, am I right?

Finally, I sought out a therapist who helped me immensely, but eventually, I still required medication. I fought and fought her and myself with the idea of starting medication. I thought it was practically giving up. Rolling over, becoming lazy, and needing a crutch. I also was afraid that it would change my personality. But it didn’t. Through all of my guilt at being on this medication which increased serotonin (hormone that makes you feel right with the world) levels in my brain that was just not producing enough on it’s own, I complained to my vet mom’s group as we sometimes vent to each other, and someone commented something that changed my whole outlook on this issue.

She said, “Medication for depression/anxiety is no different than a diabetic who needs insulin to survive. A diabetic’s body just doesn’t make enough of the insulin hormone and we just don’t make enough of the serotonin. You wouldn’t judge a diabetic for using insulin because they just weren’t ‘trying hard enough'”

Sometimes, though, the medication you are put on is not quite the right one for you. So, after 3 years of being on Prozac, I’m now clean… and absolutely miserable. I cannot wait to start my new medication this weekend. This past 2 weeks has been absolute torture on my body – mentally and physically. I’m having to take the rescue anti-anxiety medication my HD prescribed on a nightly basis (don’t worry, it’s just an antihistamine). Last night, I felt like my chest was caving in, every single sudden or loud sound made me angry. I wanted to yell, I wanted to cry – for no reason. I just wanted to curl up in a ball, but was too restless for that.

**India – toddler’s reaction to asking her to smile for a picture**

So, Sunday, I start a new medication – Lexapro. Truly, I am very grateful for my doctor’s efforts. I’m sure he didn’t plan to switch my medication during this turmoil. And he couldn’t possibly know that this would also be the time that my sweet Merlin and my oldest cat, Delphi would be starting to go down hill and euthanasia would be on the table for both. I’m sure he was just excited to get me on a better medication to make me feel like a more normal person. And for that, I’ll forgive his timing =)

Please, if you even think you may need help, seek it out. Even just a therapist – even if only on Zoom or whatever – you’re not broken. People don’t talk about their issues because they are afraid of how others will see them. You could have, literally, everything going for you and can still have a hormone deficiency that causes you to think negative thoughts and even hate yourself. Don’t even start with that “back in the day” crap either – back in the day, no one talked about it, instead, they just drank themselves into oblivion, became abusive to their families, or got institutionalized.

**Me and my in-laws (Tony’s sister and her husband)**

We are a very intelligent species and are, therefore, more prone to thinking. Thinking can be great when it is aimed in the right direction, but can also be downright dangerous if it veers in the wrong direction. Therapists and medication can keep your thoughts on track. Hormones are ridiculously influential things. Don’t think you can outsmart them.

Seek help!

Month: November 2020

The 2020 Thomas Family Christmas Tree

Head Games – You’re not broken