Little Crazies

 

Boy, have I been off center this week.  I don't know if it was the holiday, or my hormones, or the doozy of a fight (argument? misunderstanding?  No--fight!) that Eric and I had at the beginning of the week, but I have been weepy and tired all week.  Addie's been going around singing, to the tune of "I'm a Little Teapot":

I'm a little turkey

My name  is Ted

Here are my feathers

Here is my head

Gobble gobble gobble

Is what I say

Quick!  Run! 

It's Thanksgiving Day.

I can't seem to get this out of my head, turning it over and over in my mind.  It makes me laugh to hear Addie croon, "I'm a little turkey."  Because she is.  But then, I wonder, how strange that she's learning this song in preschool.  I mean, here's Ted, a cute singing turkey, who is then freaking out and running for his life.  I go over this again and again, cycling between amusement and despair.  Over this silly little song.  This sort of obsessive thinking about something trivial usually signals a bout of depression is about to hit.  And, sure enough, this week has left me feeling doused and kooky.

Is it hormones?  My hair has been falling out in small fistfuls.  I remember this happening after I had Addie, too.  Your hair gets crazy-thick during pregnancy and then about four months after the baby is born it skedaddles by the handful.  And I'm getting a bunch of zits, craving panfuls of brownies, and having a whole lot of difficult concentrating.  Next will be the bacne and the water retention.  Then the period comes back.  Which I will be oh-so-grateful to see.  Because--even though my kids are the most amazing thing to ever happen to me, other than Eric--the thought of another pregnancy right now makes me want to jump into the Grand Canyon.  Which has necessitated a bunch of other discussions around here regarding what's to be done to make sure I don't get pregnant again.  EVER.  You get the picture.

Just writing all this down is bringing everything into focus.  Of course it's hormones!  Here: 

We got a Christmas tree today, and Eric put it up and I decorated it while Addie was napping.  When she woke up we all came downstairs, speaking in hushed tones about the surprise, and when she saw it, totally awed by its presence in our living room, I just started bawling.  Like, over-the-top bawling.

Eric videotaped the whole thing--Addie caressing each ornament and whispering in the smallest magic voice, "It's Christmas!  It's Christmas!  Mama, is it Christmas?" and me in the background, weeping.  Then running to cram a brownie into my mouth.  Then weeping some more. 

Somehow, her utter awe at that moment felt like the biggest success of my life, as if everything I have ever done led up to that moment.  Every choice I've ever made somehow culminated in this most beautiful child having a moment full of magic and excitement and awe in front of a tree I had decorated with ornaments from my childhood.

Ten minutes later, I was yelling at her not to break the ornaments, of course, while also trying to cram a boob into screaming Nolie's mouth.  Because, though it was a magical moment, and I don't want to take away from that, it was also saturated with the return of my non-pregnancy, non-postpartum hormones.  These little chemicals have colored all of my interactions this week, and they have made me into an unreliable kookfest of joy and irritation all rolled into one brightly colored Christmas ball.  That may be breaking a little.

Example 1:  There is STILL blood in my urine (there has been since I first got pregnant with Nolie, almost a year ago), which means another round of trips to a kidney specialist, and more probes in uncomfortable places, no doubt.  I find this out on Wednesday and of course leap to the conclusion that I am dying, and have to take to my bed and cry for an hour, like some Victorian hysteric.  I decide I'm just not going to worry about it until a doctor friend of mine--who calls herself a "minimizer" when it comes to other people's symptoms--tells me I need to have it checked out.  More hysterical crying.

Example 2:  We go to drive around neighborhoods in Golden on Thursday morning because we're finally getting serious about moving.  The whole thing freaks me out so much that I come home and pack up half the house.  Because discomfort = must act!  Now!  Even though we probably won't list for another five months.  Manic, manic.

Example 3:  And then, after two very lovely Thanksgiving dinners at different friends' houses, I drink too much and get boisterous and obnoxious at my friends' party, which I always regret the next day (no need to bring up a certain Thanksgiving at a certain family member's house a few years back, at which I may have drunk too much and shared too much information about my wild-ass college years with my in-laws, to the horror of my husband.  I still cringe.  I still blush.)

Maybe it sounds like I'm trying to shirk personal responsibility.  Maybe I am.  But maybe I'm also a little crazy right now as the chemicals flow back into (or out of?  I don't understand the biology) my body.  This would probably be a good time to have some patience with myself.  I hope others will, too.