After my father passed away four months ago, there was a small secret about my mother I recently learnt that I was the only holder of. My sister and I joked on the phone at how surprised we were at this outcome, I mean it seemed obvious that I was destined to be the first in my family to seek a psychiatrist.
When my sister told me that mum had been referred to a psychiatrist for depression, I told her that twice, before we were born, mum had attempted suicide. I don't know many details, except that it was an attempt to overdose with painkillers and that she was deeply unhappy with married life with my father in the seventies.
It's hard to see this side of mum, it's not something we're familiar with. She has always been very reserved with her feelings and she's been overall, a pretty happy person for most of the time that we've known her. Still, having known this secret, I also knew that this other side existed.
It was only as I grew older that I began to appreciate how amazing my mother is. She is one of the strongest women I've ever known. When my parents came to Australia she spoke barely any English, with no qualifications and family or friends here. Today she runs a business with a turnover of over a million dollars annually and owns two properties and two cars... she is smart, brave, determined and incredibly hard working. She also found time to be a caring and loving mother to me and my sister.
I am who I am because of my mother. My sensitivity, kindness, intelligence, humour, good looks and unerring ability to get along so well with women is the result of my closeness to my mum.
It's often made me wonder about my own relationship with depression and how I need to recognise it in myself. Strangely enough it's not something my father or sister seemed to have. I've learnt that mum's now on Lexapro for depression and Diazepam for anxiety/stress/insomnia. The pressure of running the business alone and being sued by two former employees is crushing her, I cannot imagine how hard it is for her right now without her husband of almost thirty years.
My mother and I are passionate people in nature. Try as I might, as I grew up I only learnt the futility of trying to force myself to experience life any other way... but I still try at times, like now.
Having experienced the most difficult couple of years in my life, I'm embarrassed to say that I've grown into a fearful and closed person, while I acknowledge that the things I've been through, family and otherwise have necessitated this change of attitude, this is not my natural state and it is not a life that I can keep living.
Accepting a passionate disposition is not easy. One is guaranteed to a live a life that is rich and full, but there are always downsides to feeling everything so sharply. For all the moments of joy, and secure and peaceful happiness, there have equally been as many periods of dejection, sadness, anguish and insecure doubting and paranoia.
I can only hope that at the end of it all, I will have experienced more happy times than sad ones.
To be entirely frank, there are times when the pain is almost too much. In my fearfulness I have withdrawn from the world of the living. I sit stagnant because progress would involve risk and I have far too much fear to risk anything any more. I want only to protect what little I have left, for fear I should lose that too. I desire to feel less, possibly even nothing.
I hope my friends realise though that I don't pull away out of rudeness, dislike or lack of appreciation. I love my friends so much, they have brought me so many good things that I often feel so inadequate in what I can give back to them.
But these are not issues that my friends can fix. They cannot heal the scars of bullying and abuse that shadow my every step, they cannot give me purpose or a reason to live. They cannot validate the faith I have lost in some parts of humanity, of people who have hurt me because they needed to feel bigger. They cannot alleviate the aching bitterness I try so desperately to hide with my comedic routines.
What they can, and are doing, means the world to me.
I've grown so used to doing my all to be everything I can be to everyone else, that even when I'm on my knees, I find it so hard to write something like this. I want so much to believe in my own strength, and to be a source of strength for others that I bottle it all up, showing only a select few a glance here and there. The full picture, even sometimes I won't show to myself.
You realise that life goes fast, it's hard to make the good things last
When my sister told me that mum had been referred to a psychiatrist for depression, I told her that twice, before we were born, mum had attempted suicide. I don't know many details, except that it was an attempt to overdose with painkillers and that she was deeply unhappy with married life with my father in the seventies.
It's hard to see this side of mum, it's not something we're familiar with. She has always been very reserved with her feelings and she's been overall, a pretty happy person for most of the time that we've known her. Still, having known this secret, I also knew that this other side existed.
It was only as I grew older that I began to appreciate how amazing my mother is. She is one of the strongest women I've ever known. When my parents came to Australia she spoke barely any English, with no qualifications and family or friends here. Today she runs a business with a turnover of over a million dollars annually and owns two properties and two cars... she is smart, brave, determined and incredibly hard working. She also found time to be a caring and loving mother to me and my sister.
I am who I am because of my mother. My sensitivity, kindness, intelligence, humour, good looks and unerring ability to get along so well with women is the result of my closeness to my mum.
It's often made me wonder about my own relationship with depression and how I need to recognise it in myself. Strangely enough it's not something my father or sister seemed to have. I've learnt that mum's now on Lexapro for depression and Diazepam for anxiety/stress/insomnia. The pressure of running the business alone and being sued by two former employees is crushing her, I cannot imagine how hard it is for her right now without her husband of almost thirty years.
My mother and I are passionate people in nature. Try as I might, as I grew up I only learnt the futility of trying to force myself to experience life any other way... but I still try at times, like now.
Having experienced the most difficult couple of years in my life, I'm embarrassed to say that I've grown into a fearful and closed person, while I acknowledge that the things I've been through, family and otherwise have necessitated this change of attitude, this is not my natural state and it is not a life that I can keep living.
Accepting a passionate disposition is not easy. One is guaranteed to a live a life that is rich and full, but there are always downsides to feeling everything so sharply. For all the moments of joy, and secure and peaceful happiness, there have equally been as many periods of dejection, sadness, anguish and insecure doubting and paranoia.
I can only hope that at the end of it all, I will have experienced more happy times than sad ones.
To be entirely frank, there are times when the pain is almost too much. In my fearfulness I have withdrawn from the world of the living. I sit stagnant because progress would involve risk and I have far too much fear to risk anything any more. I want only to protect what little I have left, for fear I should lose that too. I desire to feel less, possibly even nothing.
I hope my friends realise though that I don't pull away out of rudeness, dislike or lack of appreciation. I love my friends so much, they have brought me so many good things that I often feel so inadequate in what I can give back to them.
But these are not issues that my friends can fix. They cannot heal the scars of bullying and abuse that shadow my every step, they cannot give me purpose or a reason to live. They cannot validate the faith I have lost in some parts of humanity, of people who have hurt me because they needed to feel bigger. They cannot alleviate the aching bitterness I try so desperately to hide with my comedic routines.
What they can, and are doing, means the world to me.
I've grown so used to doing my all to be everything I can be to everyone else, that even when I'm on my knees, I find it so hard to write something like this. I want so much to believe in my own strength, and to be a source of strength for others that I bottle it all up, showing only a select few a glance here and there. The full picture, even sometimes I won't show to myself.
You realise that life goes fast, it's hard to make the good things last