Today we got an early start to the day and drove up north (Jacob joined us for dinner after work 🧒) to spend the day at our friend’s cottage, something very familiar to us by now as we have been going there since our kids were very little.
Today’s visit came at a time when getting away from it all was critical for me as I mentioned the other day (Blog “Give Me A Break”; July 13, 2020). I have desperately needed to take a Mental Health break and a change of scenery is certainly a great benefit for your mental health.
Getting away from it all, even for the day can significantly help reduce your level of stress and calm your mind; and spending the day outdoors in the warm summer sun by the water, listening to the sound of the waves rolling by is definitely a perfect way to relax your body as well (and spending time with loved ones is just an added bonus).
Thank you @savewithstories for allowing me to share my story. Save With Stories was inspired by @jennifergarner and @amyadams during Covid-19 through the Organization @savethechildren to help ensure that the most vulnerable children and their families (in America and around the world) who have been hit hardest by the Pandemic and no longer have accessibility to breakfast and lunch school based programs or access to early learning resources can still thrive.
For the better part of six years now I have found myself wondering most days “Why is life so hard?” and over time (I’m guessing just in the last four months alone) it has probably crossed your mind many times as well. We are all human beings after all and we will all fall on hard times in our lifetime after all and we all go through our own emotional rollercoasters through different stages of our life after all; it’s what makes us human after all!
At any given moment when life becomes too hard we may need a little extra support and guidance to get us through which is when it’s most important to remember that it’s okay to rely on others for help and it’s more than okay to ask. Some days/nights when I am experiencing a particularly acute and dire episode of negative emotions (crazy amount lately) I will often allow my mind to wander to my super social supports (support can come from many different kinds of people and places). Just thinking about them and knowing that they are there for me in case I need to reach out can provide me with a level of comfort to help get me through in the moment because ignoring our negative emotions or trying to avoid facing our hard times head on will not make them go away. In fact from what I have learned over time will only create further despair and mental anguish. One of the most difficult things I’ve had to learn to accept over the last six years is that it’s all part of our journey and talking through it can really help you better understand your feelings.
I have also learned over the last couple of years that making self-care a top priority is one of necessity when life is especially hard. For me that includes writing and journaling, reading a good (self-help) book, doing a puzzle, taking a warm bubble bath, texting with a friend or going for a hike or a long walk. Since the onset of Covid-19 Rich and I have tried to prioritize taking long walks every day and exploring our neighbourhood. Until recently when the temperatures weren’t so crazy hot and humid we would go for an hour or two walk during the day but have recently moved it to the evenings. I’ve even found getting caught in the rain sometimes an added bonus!
What do you do to take care of you in hard times? What do you find works best?
If you haven’t kinda noticed by now (but I thought it seemed pretty obvious lol), I don’t tend to post pictures of myself very often and the simple truth is that when I see myself on the other side of the camera I get completely freaked out. What I see in front of me and what the rest of you may see tell two very different stories.
What I see in front of me is someone who is lost, someone who is full of fear and self-doubt, someone who has been broken for far too long, someone who is worthless or not good enough, someone who is overwhelmed 99% of the time and someone who is complete and utterly defeated right now.
My journey over the last 6 years has been hard and I tend to lose my focus a lot, probably because it’s just so easy to get side tracked along the way from your destination when someone is always looking directly at you in the mirror and seeing the ugly truth about you even if others may try and tell you it’s all just lies.
My illness prefers to believe the lies though and would much rather just accept the negative rhetoric than believe that I am worthy or capable. Ralph Waldo Emerson once said; “Life is a journey, not a destination” which is something I need to remind myself of often and now more than ever. I need to also remember that our life’s journey is filled with many days, months or even years of pictures that seem too out of focus to see beyond our struggles and heartaches but it may actually be those pictures that help us find some of our greatest destinations along the way.
We are barely 2 weeks into summer now and so far it certainly feels like it’s gearing up to be a very hot and humid one. For most of the last couple of weeks it has felt like we are living in the desert but I’m definitely not complaining one bit because I would much rather feel like I just walked through the desert carrying a camel on my back than have icicles forming on my eye lashes in the frigid cold, dead of winter any day. The thing is though that when it’s this hot and humid outside everyday it can become a bit more challenging to plan for some of our #summerofrich adventures and especially (this year) when so many of the places on this summer’s itinerary are still closed or need to be reserved in advance.
As much as I feel the necessity to plan everything (probably to a fault) I also have a very difficult time doing so in advance of the day because of my illness. Any sort of planning I do in advance will often make my head spin in a million different directions and the pressure I put on myself to ensure that my plan is perfectly executed can become extremely overwhelming especially if things don’t go as I had hoped. It can quickly and very easily turn a simple idea into me feeling like I have once again failed in the self-control department.
So today I didn’t plan, and instead Rich filled up the pool in the backyard because today felt like a perfect day to just lounge by the pool reading a good book, picking some cherries off our cherry tree, taking a quick dip to cool off and enjoy a refreshing cocktail. I’m pretty sure these are some of Rich’s favorite #summerofrich days.
It’s hard to believe that we are already 6 months in to 2020 (time sure does fly when you’re having fun!) For most of you reading this you are probably thinking, fun? What fun? Ya, ya I know, it has not been much fun at all to say the very least and over the last few days I’ve spent a great amount of time reflecting on the first half of the year (see blog yesterday: A Labour of Love) and now I am trying to figure out what my life looks like moving into the second half of the year or which direction I will go.
I have learned a lot (an awful lot) about myself, others and life in general since the New Year began and so many days in the past 6 months I have found myself going to bed thinking “Why Bother?” And as I continue to figure my journey toward personal growth I will somehow find the direction I need to go.
What direction do you want to go from here? What have you learned so far in 2020?
In mid December shortly after I did my interview on Global TV’s “The Morning Show” to discuss my children’s book “Where Did Mommy’s Smile Go? and the impact that Mental Illness can have on a family I decided that I had to take a much needed Mental Health break to regroup as it had just become too much for me (which I wrote about several times in late December and early January on my Blog).
I figured it was the perfect time to take a break right before the start of the busy holiday season and right before the start of a new cycle of upcoming events I had booked for the new year. One of the first things I wanted to do at the beginning of 2020 (after my much needed rest) was to start exploring more ways to market my book; my list I had made months earlier was only getting longer and it felt endless and mostly unattainable to me that I began a downward spiral and giving up seemed like the best option.
January hit me like a ton of bricks and literally knocked me off my feet and there I was on the first of the month stressing out that I needed to get back to my list like I had promised myself three weeks earlier and then BOOM; January 2nd the stress and overwhelm of so many things combined turned to panic and before I knew it, February was here and I had just spent close to a month in bed recuperating from a concussion caused by fainting 3 to 4 times the day after the new year began. And aside from the personal marketing I was still doing on my social media pages and Amazon account, February was no better for several other reasons and then before I knew it another month was gone and I really began feeling like giving up was truly the only option.
But there I was, heading into March and finally starting to tackle my list once again and rebook events and book talks I had to cancel because of my concussion and well at this point in time the next one hundred plus days of 2020 need no further explanation. When I decided to create my book from a poem I had written as nothing more than an ode to my children, I never really considered trying to have it published through a “Traditional” publisher. I knew that by trying to go that route could take years and I also knew that I would have to basically give up all my rights and vision to it.
I’ve had a really difficult week and a bit just now and I am feeling very defeated, worthless and sad and once again giving up feels like the only option more than ever. My book was written as a “Labour of Love” and I never set out to publish it with the intention to become a New York Times Bestseller. My best intentions were to help other families like mine feel less alone in their journey and help children understand and cope with their feelings when someone they love is suffering with Depression, which I believe I have done.
Albert Einstein once said “Strive not to be a success but rather to be of value.” which has always been my main goal since the beginning by striving to help others. With every single page (from the front cover to the back) I had a vision that was brought to life by my incredible illustrator; the bright, colourful and truly inviting illustrations represent each one of my family members and the story itself is so personal to me but recently I did speak with a “Traditional” publisher who basically wanted to take my “Labour of Love” and recreate it for what they promise to be “A New York Times Bestseller”.
Here’s the thing I told them that I will never change the integrity of my “Labour of Love” and take away from my vision or intent no matter what. This conversation set me back, I mean it set me way back, but it didn’t end there because the other day I went to look something up on my current Publisher’s website and saw that they were “temporarily closed” due to Covid-19 which I found odd but it was only upon reopening their website again that very same day that Google told me that they were now “permanently closed”. 36 years of self-publishing books, gone or more like disappeared I should say because their phone number and email addresses have both been disconnected and they still hold money and product of mine!
Is someone trying to send me a sign? And if so is it a good sign???
I’m pretty sure there are lots of people who choose to scroll past many of my posts on Social Media and lots more who have probably “unfriended” me over time because of the content I share may seem completely irrelevant to their lives or make them feel uncomfortable.
When I first started to share my story almost 4 years ago I would always fear what others would think of me when I shared many intimate details and experiences of my journey with you and to be perfectly honest, there are still many days now where the fear of being judged or shamed gets to be too much for me and I vow never to write again.
But it’s on those same days that I need to remind myself that l cannot lose my voice and especially not now when the mental wellness of so many is on a rapid decline and the rate of suicide is rapidly increasing.
I chose to share my journey, not as a way to gain attention to myself or for others to feel sorry for me but instead as a way of letting people know that they are not alone and that it’s okay to not be okay. I also began to share my journey as my way of trying to squash the stigma surrounding mental illness and bring about more awareness, education and change.
I am sharing my journey more than ever right now hoping that my story helps even just one more person scrolling by who is suffering in silence, or just one more person who needs to help a loved one who is struggling or just one more person who chooses awareness and change in their life instead of judgment and stigma then that will help even just one more person begin to feel accepted and less ashamed!
Today we set out for a #summerofrich adventure in honour of Terry Fox who passed away 39 years ago today after his courageous and well-fought battle with Cancer that he so bravely united Canadians around the world with as he ran his Marathon of Hope across Canada with a prostetic leg, never allowing anything to get in his way of raising money for Cancer Research.
Our #summerofrich adventure didn’t go as I had planned today (that is a whole other story) which left me feeling quite defeated but then I began to reflect back to that little 10 year old girl in me who still remembers the day in early July 1981 when I received a letter in the mail from my parents (while I was away at camp) telling me of Terry Fox’s death. I remember feeling a great sense of sadness (like so many other proud Canadians) upon hearing the news of his death as I had been following his remarkable and inspirational journey since the beginning.
If I have learned anything from my own journey over the last 6 years it’s that life doesn’t always go as we plan and that sometimes we may feel defeated but Terry Fox’s strength, spirit, determination, courage and bravery has taught us that it’s ok to accept defeat sometimes and that we need to learn to forgive ourselves sometimes because somethings you just cannot avoid. That reflection is what helped me to hold back many tears today as I honoured Terry Fox’s legacy, someone who still remains to be seen as one of the greatest and most prominent heroes in Canadian history as he reminds us that anything is truly possible if you try.
So tomorrow is my birthday. I’ll be turning 49 so no big milestone or anything of the sort but still it’s a birthday nonetheless and birthdays are meant to be celebrated.
Age has never been a “thing” for me and to be honest it still isn’t, not even as reality sets in that in 1 year from now I will be leaving my 40’s behind forever and entering into a whole new decade.
Yet for more than half of my birthdays in my 40’s, up to and including tomorrow, the anticipation leading up to my birthday and the actual day of have been super hard for me. For many people living with Depression, birthdays are hard enough to deal with but the thought of spending your birthday in quarantine adds a whole other layer of sadness and anxiety to the birthday blues. And what’s overwhelming me even more about my birthday this year are the extraordinary expectations that have come along with having a Covid-19 birthday celebration.
Millions and millions of people have celebrated their birthdays in quarantine already, both young and old alike and I’ve heard the same sentiments echoed from so many who have said that it was one of their best if not the BEST birthdays they’ve ever had.
Whether it’s the parades of cars driving by their home, the zoom parties, the serenades of happy birthday being heard from miles away, the bouquets of balloons and gigantic signs set out on their front lawns letting everyone in the neighborhood know that it’s your birthday, the homemade cards and giant cookiegrams being made with extra love, the presents left for them by the curb (who doesn’t love presents) and the extra meaningful and socially distant visits on their driveways have all helped turn an otherwise somber birthday into the most beautiful of days.
It sounds pretty picture perfect doesn’t it? I mean like just knowing how far your loved ones are willing to go in order to make sure that your already very memorable birthday does not go unnoticed is super awesome, right? But what if the pressure to make an otherwise somber birthday the BEST one ever is just simply too much for you to handle right now?
YouAreEnough 
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