The Trip

Hot Damn.
Going on one week paxil-free now and as expected its been quite a trip. Contrary to my expectations, though, it hasn't just been a week of hell. There have been some bright spots along the way intermingled with mind-warping weirdness.

Here are a few highlights:

Saturday morning was glorious here in Portland. Bright blue sky, amazing foliage and the perfect amount of fall chill in the air. I took myself out on a walk up one of my favorite trails nearby. I used to walk this trail every day before we had kids. Me and the dogs, or me and Dan and the dogs. I walked it a lot with Minna too, when she was little enough to ride in the carrier, but since then the visits have been few and far between. As I was walking I tried to calm my head and take in the scenery. For a while I was doing OK, feeling kinda foggy, but not too bad. And then the voices started. Actually, one voice. My voice. My voice from about 5 years ago. I can't really explain this without sounding even loonier than I actually am, but suffice to say that hearing me talking to me but knowing that the me that was talking to the me that was listening was somehow dredged up from my memories of years past gave me chills.

Saturday afternoon I needed a little alone time to chill out, so I headed to the studio to distract my brain with some TV. I flipped around and ended up on the cooking channel half-way into an episode of "Down Home With the Neelys". A few minutes later, I was sobbing, bawling, gasping for air. Totally overwrought by the loving banter between Pat and Gina Neely. She looooooooves the way he chops shallots- you better recognize! and he has never met a woman who makes better shramps. It was all too fucking much for my faulty wires to handle. Ridiculous.

By Saturday evening, I was feeling good. So good I decided it would be a great idea to pack up the family and head to The Old (or is it Ye Olde?) Spaghetti Factory. What the what? If you know me, you know that I think the Spag Factory is where good dining goes to die. Normally I consider the Spag Factory to the be restaurant equivalent of public pools. Ew. But on this night, I was seeing nothing but positives. Its cheap (and we broke), Pasta! (one of the few things both kids will eat without a fight), and trashy (both kids were in dirty sweats and slippers and I had no intention of changing them before heading out). When I put this suggestion to Dan, he paused and said....Spaghetti Factory? Huh. You must be trippin'. But he knew better than to stand in the way of my big idea, so off we went.
The SF did not disappoint. It is trashtastic. People fucking everywhere. Amazing that a place so humongous, yet shitty, was teeming with people willing to suck it up for the 30-40 minute wait just to get some-o-dat Manager's Special in their face. We got our beeper and headed up to the "Kids Korner" to wait. Any time the C in Corner is replaced with a K, you know you are in for a treat. The Kids Korner consisted of, literally, a korner filled with video games. The one in the back was our kids' favorite. For 50 cents a mechanical crane type device moved back and forth with accompanying sound effects that evoked images of a dinosaur trying to push out a hard poo. At some point it stopped and scooped up about 2 cents worth of crappy candy and dropped it in the chute. "A winner every time" the sign said. Fifty cents for a crappy pack of smarties? Winner!
I had no quarters so the kids stood with their little noses pressed up against the glass tank for about 20 minutes watching other kids "play" the game. Eventually, their tactic paid off and each one of them received a candy donation from another parent (who was probably cursing me for being so goddamn cheap). Free fun size Skittles and Nerds. Winner!
The food was crap, but the kids were really really good and we actually had a pretty relaxing meal. Of course about 30 minutes after we got home I had to puke over the railing off our front deck. The Old Spaghetti Factory, where the food is cheap and the bulimia is free.

Paxilated

Things are getting wormy around here.

I'm in the final throes of a long wean off Paxil, the SSRI I started when Kelan was an infant. Even with the very gradual step-down in dosage over the course of the past 5 months, taking that final step off the good-times train is a motherfucker.

There is the nausea and the headaches and the sweating and the chills.
There is the crying and the irritability and the mood swings and the anxiety.
There's the "holy shit I'm losing my fucking mind" factor, generally attributed to the hallucinations, both visual and aural. I've heard Kelan calling for me when I knew for a fact he was not home and I've seen faces, scary faces, in the walls.
There is the crushing self-doubt. The inability to deal with sensory input and the loss of social skills. I struggle to look people in the eye, and if I do, it is pretty likely that I will say something totally lame because I feel like my brain is not attached to my body when I'm trying to come up with polite conversation.

My personal favorite are the "brain zaps" (this is the technical term), which are essentially electrical shocks going through the brain. I can feel them and I can hear them. Its the brain's way of saying "whatthefuckisgoingon" while trying to adjust to the change in neurotransmitter levels brought upon by the wean. They are related to seizures, but not considered dangerous in and of themselves.

The best way to quit this bitch is to couple the withdrawal with a full intestinal and liver cleanse. So I've given up coffee, sugar, ibuprofen and booze (minus an occasional glass of vino, because 'holy shit I'm losing my fucking mind') and am taking handfuls of nasty-ass herbs many times a day.

All this to try and get my groove back. Hope it works. It has to. Otherwise, hook me up with some fuzzy slippers and shuffle me off to the nut house because I'm pretty sure this is what it feels like to be insane.

I am Balloon Animals, I am Cat Gut

When I close my eyes and try to put words to the feelings I am feeling this is what comes up:

I am cat gut. Strung out and stretched thin.
Invisible objects hurtle toward me.
Some strike. Sending vibrations that start deep in my belly rising like electricity to my heart and brain.
Some sail through the gaps. I can't seem to swing to meet them.
Tension and absence.

I am balloon animals. Silly, frivolous, garish.
Wear me on your head. You like me. I make you happy.
Put me down and move on. I slowly leak and disappear.
Pathetic latex exoskeleton.
Insubstantial glee.

All the things

I'm finding myself with a bit of a split persona these days. Sometimes I'm giddily happy with the choices I've made and the life I'm living, while other times I'm sick with doubt and mournful of opportunities lost.
Do I smell the stank of a mid-life crisis wafting my way? Is this kind of reflection and dissonance going to lead me straight to the plastic surgeon/BMW dealership/Tahiti?
All the things I am and all the things I am not are playing air hockey in my head and heart. Back and forth, whoosh. crack. goal.
These years have been tough. These mothering years. Mothering mothering Smothering. Across from where I sit are two gallery quality images of the most gorgeous children you will ever meet. Deep eyes. Electric smiles. These images in my house are like a monument to the work I do each day. I don't hang the bullshit on the wall. The stubborn battles over shoes and waffles that threaten to strip me of my last shreds of sanity and patience on the daily. I keep that noise backstage as best I can.
What if someone else fought those battles? What if I were off designing plus-size swimwear, creating neotenous ceramic figurines coveted by mid-western housewives, raising grass-fed beef and selling it over the internet? Whatever it was, you know it would be rad. Different. Special. Right? Otherwise, what would be the point of these fantasies of all the things that could be, but are not? I'm not going to get myself in a spiral of self-doubt over your average work alternative, because the only possible alternative to the life I live is one that reeks with excellence, no? This is the shit that is crazy making. To on some fundamental level believe that I am better than what I live.
The accumulations of a life. A degree that is concomitantly obscure and timely, a marriage that has both deep roots and shaky limbs, two children that are my face in the world. Dan once told me that the reason they shine so brightly is because they are me. They are all the things I am not AND all the things I am.
When the dust settles, I'll have to see what is left and go from there.

you say hoohoo, i say vagina

We are very open about our bodies in our family. The kids love to be naked and while the adults don't generally strip down and dance around the living room with glee, we definitely don't hide our bodies from our kids. The words penis and vagina hold no more or less significance than the words head or elbow, because we don't play the shame game when it comes to anatomy or bodily functions.

Kelan has the sensibilities of your average 2 year old boy. Being naked is a source of joy and even has its own dance, the "nah nah boo boo". He knows the word penis and thinks butts are funny, but that is about as far as his interest in physiology goes. Minna, on the other hand, is full of questions about how bodies work. We talk about the nervous system, the digestive system, eyesight, muscles and bones, and yes, how babies are made. One night when we were chatting in her bed, she asked about how babies get into mamas. She settled back into her pillow and sucked her thumb while I told the story. Daddies have sperm, and mamas have eggs. The sperm and the egg have to connect to make a baby. The Daddies sperm travels from inside his body and comes out through his penis. Minna had to stop sucking her thumb at this point because her mouth was agape, and then said...."what the????" in the most incredulous tone. She had the same reaction when I told her that the Daddies penis had to enter the mama through her vagina.

The weird thing is not so much that she reacted the way she did, but that she's never ever commented with disbelief about any other topic we've discussed. She's been told the physics of how airplanes fly and all about how volcanoes work, which to me are way more fucking incredible than ejaculation, without even a hint of awe. So why, when it comes to talking about penises, vaginae, and sex is she weirded out?

If I had told her that babies are delivered by giant birds that wear delivery man hats I think she would have bought it, full on. Was my honesty, my need to keep it real, the wrong approach for a pre-school brain? Was she picking up on signs of discomfort I was unknowingly portraying? I don't know.

We'll keep dancing naked and answering questions honestly up in here, but I'll be mindful of the fact that the subject of sex carries with it cultural baggage that even a four year old can perceive. What the....???

Fun Mom

I've got almost 4 years of mamahood under my belt and with that has come a bit of knowledge of self-as-parent, and gawdamn, I am a fun mom. I'm a regular party with a purse. I'm the mom who rents the double decker firetruck shopping cart at the mall and sprints down the aisleways making siren noises as I swerve to avoid collisions with regular stroller pushing moms and my kids scream "faster, faster". A couple of weeks ago at a 5 year old birthday party, I was the only mom to go down the water slide while Minna cheered me on. I'm the mom who takes my kids on naked walks (them, not me, I'm not THAT much fun) through the neighborhood and do not give a fuck what the neighbors think. I'm the mom who always says yes to the free cookies at the grocery store, lets the kids paint my face AND doesn't wash it off before going out in public.

I guess being the fun mom goes along with my general philosophy of not taking oneself too seriously. That has got to be one of my biggest pet peeves ever (that and pushing the seasons). I often find my self thinking "lighten up bitches" in regards to other parents whilst in group situations. I'm often the only mom (dads tend to have different funness thresholds) actually willing to get wet at the fountain park. I usually end up soaked by the end cuz I would spend all my energy trying to avoid getting splashed otherwise, and what is fun about that? Once, I actually saw a mom who was standing at the edge of the water area get super pissed after getting splashed by a kid at play. She huffed and puffed, grabbed her son and left in a hurry. Her cunty disposition and her fear of water had me scanning the skies for flying monkeys.

Being a fun mom is not all about the kids, either. It can definitely be used for selfish purposes. Example, if the kids want to play restaurant I can stretch the length of time they will be occupado by at least 50% if I let them use real food. So, I hook them up with crackers, raisins, apples, popcorn, pitchers of water, and let them have at it. They get a really fun experience, and I get 20 minutes of peace to dick around on the internet or whathaveyou. Of course, I'll pay for that bit of funness later when I have to fish raisins out from behind the bed, and vacuum crushed crackers from the carpet (decidedly not fun), but being able to loosen up enough to let them cause that kind of a mess buys me time when I need it most. Also, letting the good times roll can diffuse a tense situation or switch the trajectory of a whinefest with relative ease. Instead of getting sucked into the bad vibes that often accompany the pre-dinner hour, I put on some fun dance music and we all bust a movay. The kids love it because they get to get naked and jump around on the couch, and I love it because it gives me proper justification for popping open that bottle of wine. Hey, its a party, woot woot! and I'm reeaaallly fun with a buzz on!
I am grateful to the kids for letting me stretch my fun boundaries with them, and I hope they will thank me for being the only mom at the playground in the princess cape and wig at least once before they deem me totally embarrassing.

Weaner

Northern elephant seal(Mirounga angustirostris)females nurse their young for about 30 days. During this time the young quadruple their birth weight and the mothers fast, unable to leave their young to return to the sea to feed. By the end of the month, the "weaners" are robust and ready to begin their independent lives, while the females are depleted and starving. So much so that the even though they will have mated about 24 days after giving birth, the fertilized egg will not implant in the wall of the uterus for about four months... a rare phenomenon called "giving the poor bitches a break"...or technically speaking "delayed implantation". After 30 days, at risk of death, the females must leave their young, weaning them abruptly by desertion.

Any mother who has nursed a baby can feel a bit of sisterhood with the elephant seal ladies. The proud, satisfying feeling of being the fount of life...knowing that each ounce gained is an ounce transferred directly from our own resources. The deep and powerful connection experienced when we can satisfy our babies' most primal needs with the unbuttoning of a blouse. The warmth of the suckling infant connected to us once again as they were in the womb. The feeling of being trapped, and of being sucked dry as the little one drinks greedily of our time, our space, our person.

At some point the time comes for every mother-offspring dyad to end the nursing relationship. For some of us the need to do this presents itself with urgency, as if we risk death by starvation if we don't soon return to the sea. For others, it is a lengthy dialogue that requires thorough processing. Sometimes, its the baby that calls it quits, leaving these mothers vacillating between feeling wounded and relieved. Regardless of the nature of the transition, weaning marks a notable shift in the mother-child dynamic, and causes psychological and biological flux.

I'm presently weaning my 20 month old son. He is our last child. He is the last baby that will settle into the rhythmic suckling which, at its best stirred powerful feelings of euphoria, and at its worst stoked the embers of resentment. I can't desert him and head out to sea, so we are going through the transition together. I'm torn. Ready to know the freedom of not being needed quite so much and afraid of becoming irrelevant. I'm moody and irritable due to the crashing levels of prolactin, and the sore boobs that I have to hand milk in the shower. Why deal with feeling so freaked out and bovine when I know exactly how to easily remedy both symptoms? He asks me to nurse. I pause. I tell him mama's milk is going away because he is getting SO big. He asks to just "try it". I pause. I tell him no. He cries for a moment or two and then he is on to the next amusement. A couple of well-timed lollipops and he glides through the usual nursing times with very little drama. Me, I need something a little stronger. I'm mourning the end of the essential maternal connection with my children. Drying up the flow of love that can be tasted and can fill an empty little belly. Marking the end of my tenure as an actively reproductive woman. No wonder I'm a little bitchy.

Mostly I wish I could bottle the milky smell of his breath after nursing. Oh, how it gives me an almost giddy feeling of well-being that I will sorely miss.

Thanks for the 38 months of active duty, boobs. You did an amazing job.