Seasick

This post is three weeks in the making. It’s taken longer than normal, longer than any of the others. Its been a busy, hectic couple of weeks and it has taken me a while to sift through everything that has been going on superficially to be able to see whats really going on. Right at the point where I was feeling like we were in a good place and had found our feet our world went and turned upside down. Despite having a hand in turning it upside down I found myself on my head scrambling to find the right way up. Though I knew that starting part-time work and putting my youngest in daycare for a couple of days a week would be interesting, expected some challenges and an adjustment period my error may have been in also expecting that we could handle it. Two weeks in though I find myself back down in the pits of hell. Daycare started off unbelievably well. My little boy waved me off on his first day happily and told me all about his great day, complete with a social visit by the paramedics, on the way home. I was ecstatic about our great start as I too had enjoyed my day. That very night though we started our slow decent. From dinner time tantrums to night waking and night terrors to full blown monster behaviour the following day. We were thrown back into the sleep deprived, ‘constantly trying to catch up but always on the back foot’ kind of existence we had known so well and tried so hard to bury and forget.

Two weeks in and I find myself arguing with my husband about who is reacting and responding in the right way, who is giving in to the constant, unrelenting meltdowns, who is allowing the two year  old to be the boss, who is right and who is wrong. I find myself crying in despair and disbelief. How could we be all the way back here in just a couple of short weeks? Back to our worst when we had come so far and worked so hard? What on earth was I thinking rocking the boat when it had only been still for such a short time? Two weeks in and part of me wants to throw in the towel. Part of me wants to call my brand new boss and tell her I’ve made a mistake, that I can’t do this for a minute longer let alone another six weeks. I could break my contract , return my keys and curl up in a ball on the couch with my nearly three year old baby who needs me and my full attention to stay well. I could go back to taking him for bike rides and to the park and having him tucked up in bed at the right time every day without fail so that he also sleeps well at night. I could take back control of his food and make sure he is not eating anything that upsets his system so that his skin is clear and his temperament balanced.

I could do all of those things and cut my losses. A huge, screaming part of me wants to. It wants that peace and that knowing that I have it all under control. But then there’s another part of me, small and meek, attempting to speak up. That part of me is saying “hang on, don’t give up yet, keep going, one foot in front of the other, one day at a time because staying in one spot is not good for any of you even if it is a really nice, comfortable spot.” It’s telling me that I’ve come this far and I can’t give up now, I can’t stop trying to find a way to manage this problem without letting it take over our lives. It’s the part of me that knows how hard I’ve worked to find the answers, that I put the brakes on life for two years to search and learn and find those answers. Our lives can’t be all about this. This little issue is not going to be our story, it’s going to be a chapter in it and for that to be true we need to keep moving forward to continue writing the rest. We need more chapters and I need to push through this bump with the belief that having found a comfortable place for us through the chaos once, I can do it again and I can keep doing it as many times as I have to no matter what life throws at us. So it’s not that I was naive or stupid to rock the boat, the rocking was and is necessary. I was naive to think that we had reached dry land and would never experience this sea-sickness again.