I am triggered. My battle with postpartum anxiety occurred exactly a year ago and it took me 5 months to get to a new normal. It started with the two month quarantining of the baby (and as a result myself) to prevent us catching flu before he got vaccines. My world shrunk to the size of my living room for the second time in my life. I sought to control what I couldn't by obsessing over the baby's sleep. My husband and I were no longer allowed to say the word "overtired", because it implied we waited too long to put him to sleep, and therefore him not sleeping was our fault (and therefore controllable). Grapefruit, instead of overtired then.
Fast forward a year. I'm telling my students, I don't think we will be here to take our unit test on (irony) state & local government next week. I think to myself, if we don't take it that's ok, at least we reviewed. I met with a coworker and we discussed what we would have students do for work if we missed a few weeks, perhaps some SOL review.
Today, I've finished my first week in self-isolation with two kids under five. I feel right back where I was a year ago, but the world is a scarier place. Instead of pushing out intrusive thoughts of hypochondria, I'm trying to avoid news articles alerting me to a pandemic happening on my own street. I'm tweeting lawmakers saying, you can't possibly be giving parents false hope that we are going back to school in less than a month. Close restaurants! Close bars! Flatten the curve!
I vascillate between being afraid of the virus and afraid of the quarantine.
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Fast forward to Thursday afternoon, the 26th. I’m finally mentally getting to finishing this blog post. I spoke to a therapist who’d helped me through my PPA. I’m taking one day at a time. The kids are hard work. Having kids who are not school aged is a different level of difficult. There is no where to go or visit. My coping mechanism for PPA was getting out and doing things. We do a load of dishes every night. I started cooking dinner at 6 AM. We clean every night to reset the house for total destruction the next day.
Now we are learning to enjoy two walks a day in our neighborhood. Snacks on the stroll. Trying to figure out what they need developmentally, especially the baby. He changes significantly everyday. Am I prepared to meet his needs? Slowly starting to get better about meeting their nutritional needs, relied heavily on daycare for that previously. But what can a 15 month old do - chase bubbles? Tear paper? Run around?
I’m getting better about staying on top of things cleanliness wise - is this how neat freaks do it? They don’t relax until everything is in its place?
Oh yeah, aren’t I a teacher? Don’t I have a job?
School has been closed for the remainder of the year. No idea what actual distance learning will look like. There is a high degree of control and management over the distance learning process from my school (which should have been expected). This adds to the stress of the situation. I chose my profession because of the dynamic nature of the classroom. The idea of no standardized tests is freeing. But then we are being asked to fall lock step in line with colleagues and it’s just another area to be let down in. I think this may be done in a misguided attempt to protect students and limit our workload, but it’s hard to tell.
All of this is happening outside the actual viral crisis so many are experiencing right now. What privilege I have. And yet, if so many things are outside my control, I can only control my reaction to them. I’m only looking 1-2 weeks ahead now. Giving myself grace and space to feel all the feelings. Trying to find joy in what I can. Turning OFF the news.
And most importantly, we are all staying home. Couldn’t imagine activating my hypochondria at this point.
Be well, world.
————————-
Fast forward to Thursday afternoon, the 26th. I’m finally mentally getting to finishing this blog post. I spoke to a therapist who’d helped me through my PPA. I’m taking one day at a time. The kids are hard work. Having kids who are not school aged is a different level of difficult. There is no where to go or visit. My coping mechanism for PPA was getting out and doing things. We do a load of dishes every night. I started cooking dinner at 6 AM. We clean every night to reset the house for total destruction the next day.
Now we are learning to enjoy two walks a day in our neighborhood. Snacks on the stroll. Trying to figure out what they need developmentally, especially the baby. He changes significantly everyday. Am I prepared to meet his needs? Slowly starting to get better about meeting their nutritional needs, relied heavily on daycare for that previously. But what can a 15 month old do - chase bubbles? Tear paper? Run around?
I’m getting better about staying on top of things cleanliness wise - is this how neat freaks do it? They don’t relax until everything is in its place?
Oh yeah, aren’t I a teacher? Don’t I have a job?
School has been closed for the remainder of the year. No idea what actual distance learning will look like. There is a high degree of control and management over the distance learning process from my school (which should have been expected). This adds to the stress of the situation. I chose my profession because of the dynamic nature of the classroom. The idea of no standardized tests is freeing. But then we are being asked to fall lock step in line with colleagues and it’s just another area to be let down in. I think this may be done in a misguided attempt to protect students and limit our workload, but it’s hard to tell.
All of this is happening outside the actual viral crisis so many are experiencing right now. What privilege I have. And yet, if so many things are outside my control, I can only control my reaction to them. I’m only looking 1-2 weeks ahead now. Giving myself grace and space to feel all the feelings. Trying to find joy in what I can. Turning OFF the news.
And most importantly, we are all staying home. Couldn’t imagine activating my hypochondria at this point.
Be well, world.
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