Friday, September 2, 2011

Burnt out

Moving country is a one of the big stressful things you can do in your life, it's up there with getting divorced and losing a loved one. Before we left California I was running around like a headless chicken trying to get in as much as possible (that is therapies). Just to list them, 2 times Feldenkrais a week, 1 times osteopath a week (all the way down in San Diego), NAET allergy elimination, we had started this in December after a very good friend convinced us that this would be very good for Annabelle to help her get rid of her allergies and help her absorb her nutrients better we did over 20 sessions with Dr Devi the founder of NAET. We were doing ABR 3-4 manual hours a day and 10-12 machine hours, HBOT 1 hour dive every week day up until 2 days before we left California. We had more blood and urine tests done through the environmental specialist doctor and had a consultation over the phone a week before we left CA. Its quite a list of therapies we squeezed in before we left CA.

We then moved to England and I was given the task of remodeling our new home. Then we discovered mould in the house this devastated me it felt like the mould had followed us from California and we couldn't get away from it! I know mellow dramatic! We eventually got through that moved into our new home, and then I get the email from Blue balloon that they had a cancellation and would we like to come do an intensive therapy week with Simona di Marchi well this is what we thought would help Annabelle the most,and the following week Annabelle and I were on a plane to Toronto Canada.

We did the CME intensive therapy course in Canada (details will follow I promise). Just Annabelle and I went my husband stayed back in England and looked after Matthew our son,took him to school etc. But I felt like I was losing it and not just my brain which I incidentally lost having my first child. But I kept having panic attacks, losing things like my passport/hotel room keys then finding them after huge a panic attack, heart racing brain fuzzy, I was not in a good way. The best I could do was try to keep it together until Annabelle and I got home.

We got home and I now know how it feels to be truly burnt out, I'd been burning the candle at both ends as they would say. They always say when you fly you need to put your face mask on before you put on your child's, look after yourself first otherwise you are going to be no good to anybody else! Well that's what I was doing I was free falling out of the sky my plane was about crash and I hadn't even put my face mask on! I was too busy looking after everybody else.

Well I've taken 4 months off I feel like I checked out of the hotel crazy that I'd been staying in. The place that was filled with therapies and doctors! I decided that I needed me time to get back some of me so that I would have something to give again. I started to do something that I'd forgotten that I loved to do before we moved to California, gardening! It is my escape place, the place where I don't think about Annabelle or therapies or doctors or mould or anything really, just digging in the dirt.

It's amazing really life does go on even if you don't have full control over everything. And sometimes if you loosen your grip on things that you have in your control they actually have a chance to flourish on their own and find their own way through.

Go ahead and create some time for yourself especially if you are a parent of a special child.

2 comments:

  1. Good for you. Happy to hear you are feeling better, mama!

    ReplyDelete
  2. O.M.G, Oh I'm so sorry for not messaging you before. I was thinking that they non blog update was because you were busy enjoying your first Summer back.

    I so know what you mean, I think it's so different if you move country as a single person or a couple, but to move country as a family is a whole new ball game and in someways is higher than death as you are alive still! lol!

    We had so much stuff happen to us since we moved 3 years ago and when you get over taking it personally... we had known criminals let out of prison early in the uk to only during their sentence time commit a multi million pound fraud in our home that they "rented", (didn't pay a penny) in fact they trashed our loved home and devalued it as afterwards the neighbourhood gossiped about the going on's in our home for months after etc.... We had death of a parent and a double recession!

    Amongst lots of other things that happened, this year I had a throat tumor which was luckily benign...

    Anyway, my point being is that even if you move country as a family, if everyone is able bodied it's different again from if you have a special one to look after.

    It's been 3 years and I don't feel 100% organized and get that swimming feeling too. My ABR hours dropped off as a result so I ended up taking most of the Summer off as I needed to recover physically from the operation. OK Oatie isn't where he would have been if I kept up my hours but ...

    I just love how you sum things up, and I so agree, it's so important to take time for yourself. I love cake decorating and I love sewing, skating, swimming and running. (I did love gardening in the UK, but here the season is short lol!)

    When Oatie is at Pre-school, It's right across from the leisure centre and I go there and swim and run and then pick him up,... i do feel a bit bad on occasion that I am not catching up on the chores.... but then at the same time, like you said, things carry on...

    My daughter and older son still asks after Matthew each time we got for an ABR treatment, our friend Matthew there?

    If you ever want to chat, even if it's just to rant or offload you can send me an email, I'm there for you,

    Love your friend,

    Mel
    xxx

    ReplyDelete