Oh Hi, I’m Alive

So I’m not dead or anything, in case you were wondering. I gather that my sudden and inexplicable absence from both the blog and facebook and <insert guilt here> my failure to respond to emails and even 99% of text messages has some people worried. I’m not gonna lie, I kinda felt equal parts excruciatingly guilty and oddly comforted when the Anchoress called my husband at his office to make sure I was okay, since before that I was pretty sure that I could disappear from the face of the internet forever and everyone would be like

Of course I realize that’s a direct result of my overblown martyr complex, compounded by having the emotional stability of a 14 year old OneDirection fan, but also I have some depression/anxiety issues which I despise talking about. The only thing worse than hating yourself and feeling really sorry for yourself about it is when other people for sorry for you, too. Then you get to hate yourself all over again for being so pathetic. It’s super fun.

Anyway, when I got into a bit of a funk after Easter I chose not to go down that road again. Instead, I made the mature decision to ignore the creeping depression, then deny it, then drink whiskey on the couch by myself every night while watching Firefly.

For obvious reasons I chose not to blog about my adventure into the chorus of a Pogues song, but since nothing else seemed worth writing about, I just stopped writing. I tried to sit down a few times and make sense of things, but every time I read my words back to myself I thought, “Jeez, Calah, you are a such a gorram moron. Seriously, no one wants to read this shit. Get over yourself and stop pretending that anyone cares about your stupid opinions or how much of a crap mother you are.” And then instead of getting over myself, I had a good, long pity party for one.

Needless to say, it got old fast. Well, to be honest, getting up at 6:30 every morning with a wicked hangover and being snappy and short with my kids got old fast. It just made me feel even more guilty, which  made me hate myself even more, which led to even more whiskey nights…etc. You get the picture.

(This is not a fun way to live, by the way. In case you’re ever under the impression that your uncle Joe gets smashed every night because he just really likes to party, let me disabuse you of that notion. No one likes to get smashed every night.)

Anyway, it took me a few weeks to pull myself out of the booze-and-self-pity-spiral. The depression remained, as did the lack of desire to write anything or talk to anyone, or ever sign into facebook again. Without the alcohol to numb me, though, this state of affairs really sucked.

The Ogre would talk about going back to therapy, or back on antidepressants, or anything and everything he could think of. At first I would reject it all, much like a petulant 4-year-old rejects broccoli, then stomp to our room, slam the door, and cry myself to sleep under the covers. But gradually I just started shrugging noncommittally while staring out the window, which was a really bad sign. Finally one day he bought me a copy of Love in the Ruins, took the kids to Naples, and gave me strict orders to “read, and do nothing else. Do not cry. Do not sleep. Do not watch TV. Read.”

It was really sunny that day, so I dragged a chair outside and squinted up at Walker Percy while the Florida sun beat down on me. 2 hours, 76 pages, and one sunburn later, I went inside and stood in the middle of the kitchen for a while, disoriented by the unfamiliar sensation of peace and contentment.

Right, I thought. Reading brings me joy. Sunshine brings me joy. I forgot.

So every day after that, I dragged a chair outside and sat for an hour while the kids played in the water hose. Sometimes I read, sometimes I took pictures of them, sometimes I just closed my eyes and listened to them laugh – and fight.

I started thinking of other ways to generate peace. Exercising, obviously. I went back to running and doing yoga. Confession and Mass, but alone or with 1 or 2 kids, max – so the Ogre and I started splitting up to go to Mass. I couldn’t bring myself to confront the issue of writing, but eventually I had to face the fact that although chocolate makes me happy, it doesn’t bring me peace, especially when I’m eating all of it. Ditto for cookies, popcorn, fried chicken, and all the other crap I’d been eating while I was too depressed to cook regularly. I faced it, but didn’t quite get around to changing it. Then one day, I randomly asked my friend Mary if she wanted to do something dreadful, and to my shock and horror, she agreed. Worse, she wanted to start right away, and only let me wheedle my way into a few days’ delay.

So I girded my loins and started a Whole 30, 19 days ago. (Don’t worry, I’ll write more about that later. Probably way too much more.)  I still have mixed feelings about it, mostly because I have manifestly not experienced a miraculous cessation of depression and have actually gained weight, but it has definitely helped bring me back to the land of the living. Or, well, it’s gotten me to the point where I actually almost want to blog and only feel a medium amount of fear at the prospect, instead of having a paradoxical reaction of overwhelming apathy and crushing terror at the thought of my blog.

But really, two important things happened to get me to type these words. Someone in Ave actually told me how much my blog had meant to them — like it had actually helped them with a difficult issue in their life, not like it had “helped them understand what a true heretic looks like” — and this was such an unparalleled experience that I started crying on the grammar school playground and thought, “jeez, maybe I’m really not just a foul-mouthed blight on the face of the Catholic blogosphere. I mean I am that, but maybe I’m also something else too.”

Then Lizzie and Joanne sent me flowers and Margaret sent me a card, and I remembered that I have so many friends online, and I miss them, but I also owe it to them to not remain silent and distant in the face of obvious love and concern.

So, I’m not remaining silent. For now. My husband told me yesterday that self-knowledge is a rare thing, and it’s not pathetic to know one’s limits and express them. I’m really sure about certain limits, like how I should never drink whiskey again and how I can’t watch Arrow right now because I want to avoid brooding in my entertainment choices, but I’m not so sure about writing. I don’t know what to do about this blog at all, actually. I’ve played around with the idea of starting a new one, or just taking an extended hiatus, but big decisions should never be made without chocolate, so I won’t have an answer for at least 11 more days.

For now at least I just wanted to say hi, that I missed y’all, and that I’m so grateful for your prayers.

And also that I learned how to sew buttons on while I was not blogging, so there.