There it is, I AM one hell of a mom, the ecards people have declared it, if it’s on the Internet then it must be true, everybody knows that. Sticky floors, messy kitchen, laundry pile, dirty oven and HAPPY kids. That was the state of our little haven when we all walked in from work and school yesterday, after the long day I had I was hoping that I will open the door and someone would have deployed an army of elf's to go clean my house, to my disappointment the house was still in the messy state I left it in the morning, and nothing quite says welcome home like everything being all over the place. *teary eyes*

The funny thing is that when I walked through the door I was actually shocked that the house was THAT dirty, I couldn't understand it. The day had kicked my ass that much that I now had dissociative amnesia. So I got in grossed out by how messy "we “ (Soprano &the girls) all are put down my bag amongst the clutter and went to the bathroom in search of strength, it must be hiding in there somewhere, cause as I stood there I was running on empty. There is something about dirt and the sound of little girls high pitched voices that just doesn’t go together, the dirtier the house is, the louder their voices seem to get in my head, at some point it felt as though the two of them were sitting on my shoulders screaming into my ears, good gosh where’s my glass of wine…

As luck would have it there’s no wine in the house, adding further insult to injury, there goes the last bit of strength that was hanging on by a thread… ahem. I felt my knees getting weaker as I walked to the kitchen to put on the kettle to make coffee for us, driving out to go get wine pretty much feels like another a chore at this point, we just want to sit down and worm out. Luckily we had leftovers from last night so I needn't worry myself with preparing dinner, there's enough for everyone to eat, and as it turns out I am not particularly hungry. I don't actually ever worry about dinner lately, unless if I want to prepare something special, Soprano usually makes dinner while I sort out everything else, WINNING. Also on the weekends that I work, I come home to a cooked meal and a glass of wine, another WIN.

The reason we are all subjected to all this torment is because I don't have a helper anymore, somewhere in between the course of us working together she thought that I was her employee, don't know when did that role reversal happen, or when the wires got crossed but quite frankly I wasn't happy with the arrangement. I won’t lie life would be a lot easier with a helper but I would rather have peace of mind and a messy home any day than a clean home that comes with a helper with a bad attitude . My OCD will just have to be strong and deal shem. I am not averse to the idea of getting a helper, I am just going to pray about it for a couple of weeks and ask God to please send me someone who will stay in their lane, can’t be constantly up in arms with someone who is supposedly helping me…so for now I just have to deal.

The house is not always in this state as my work days are flexible, actually its rarely like this, despite the fact that there’s an unruly soon to be 2yrs old and an opinionated 4 ½yr old roaming around, otherwise I would have lost my mind a long time ago. I cannot function in clutter, I need everything in its place marked, labelled and facing the right way, but since I have them and their darling father I don’t always get my way, so I find myself most of the time. As luck would have it  I don’t work Monday to Friday thank the Lord, so I am able to be home some days during the week and just sort everything out and the kids are at school, so that’s like vacation time for me.

The house was finally clean, laundry drying on the rail, kids sticky free and  already sleeping.Even though my energy levels were totally depleted and we didn’t  run the day off like we had planned, we still found some other ways to sweat it out, now that’s the kind of mess I don’t mind J, the kind of mess that makes for very HAPPY and relaxed parents, and that my friends is the true definiton of …WINNING!!!

 

WHAT DOESN’T MAKE ME STRONGER…KILLS ME RIGHT?

There is a saying that we are all familiar with which states, “that which does not kill you, makes you stronger” what happens then when “that “which is supposed to make you stronger doesn’t? What are you then left with for strength? Unfortunately for us, strength is not sold in bottles, and one doesn’t always have an oversupply of it, our wells are usually overdrawn more often than not. One finds themselves always having to reach deep within, trying to draw out more, meanwhile you are running on empty. What do you do then when you have used your supply, for the day, week, month or even year?  When you can’t “JUST BE STRONG” you cannot “DEAL” like people on social networks usually suggest? You are spent. So my question is if the things that are meant to make you stronger don’t, do they kill you instead?

I picked up a copy a newspaper sometime back and one of the articles they ran, was addressing the issue of suicide and depression amongst South Africans, the myths, misconceptions and the reality of things. There is a general assumption that suicide spikes during the festive season, which is not the case according to South African Depression and Anxiety Group; it is suicide season all year round in South Africa”. This article also stated that South Africa has one of the highest suicide rates in the world; we are ahead of US AND UK. Such reports can’t be shocking at all if we take recent news reports into consideration I our beautiful land has been turned into a blood bath; people are killed, assaulted, mutilated and raped daily. Violence has become a permanent fixture in our everyday lives.  It’s really disheartening that we live in a society where a person who is in trouble cannot say, HELP ME, I’m in trouble, I’m sinking, I DON’T KNOW WHAT TO DO.

 

This had me wondering, are we without effective coping mechanisms/skills/tools as people? And if that is the case how come these skills are not taught in school or shared like people do with recipes? Whenever I hear that someone has committed suicide I always wonder , what could have been so terrible that this person couldn’t find someone, anyone to talk to about what they are/were going through? How can someone see suicide as the only option they have to get out of whatever difficulty they are facing? Society is to blame obviously, I believe as a person you should never find yourself in a position where you believe ending your life is a solution, death is so final, there is no coming back from it, once it’s done it’s done, why then would someone see this as an alternative?  I know life is not exactly a fairy-tale a lot of times it pushes us around, I can never fully understand the psychology of suicide, but I do know that it shouldn’t be happening. The sad thing about suicide is that the pain doesn’t end soon as the person has taken their life, those that are left behind carry the pain with them every day of their lives.

We have become so selfish and centred around our own lives as people that being involved in someone else’s life and checking up on them is too much bother, people have their own troubles to get through and overcome, how then can they help you to make sense of things, when they too feel overwhelmed ? It is said that when you talk about what is troubling you, you have halved the problem, but modern society seems to say otherwise, when you share your troubles with someone, you should know that you have just broadcasted your troubles to the whole world. Social media is a tool people use to make light of issues people go through each day, we laugh about things that don’t affect us, and make those who are troubled feel bad for even having worries in the first place. As a consequence people are now forced to behave as though they still have everything under control; meanwhile they have reached their breaking point. Opening up emotionally is just too costly.

Depression can be brought on by a number of factors; not being able to cope with challenges, feeling isolated from ones immediate relations or having no sense of belonging could be one of the many reasons. People who end up committing suicide were depressed for weeks or months on end, and those that are close to them, mistook it for moodiness or attention seeking behaviour. It’s not always easy to tell the difference between possible alarming behaviour and someone having just a bad day, but when the ties are strong between people it doesn’t make it all that difficult to see when something is wrong or troubling someone, you just have to stop long enough to realize.

I know it’s not as clear cut as I am making it out to be, there are always grey areas, what I am highlighting now is that it’s not always the death of a loved one, chronic illness or witnessing a heinous crime that causes people to take their own lives, people have been known to take their lives because they were bullied at school. I am by no means making light of the psychological impact bullying has over the person that has been bullied, it is very traumatic, but the end result of being bullied shouldn’t now be suicide.

On the other hand it’s comforting to know that there are people who still seek out help outside their immediate circles by making use of the services institutions such as SADAG offer, they try again to find help. The comfort and peace of mind of reaching out to someone who doesn’t know you by name, you can bear your soul and talk about what is troubling you as it is, without feeling the need to make light of a dire situation, there are no come backs, you won’t have details of your life splashed all over social networks with no sensitivity whatsoever, whatever you share is in confidence. We all know how families tend to use what you have said to them in confidence against you, especially when there is a fall out between you and the person you confided in. Sadly most families don’t even know what depression is and they don’t understand why anyone would want to kill themselves, because of this they tend to be dismissive and unforgiving. We are expected to cope and be in control at all times, when we fall short of this we are chastised, and made to feel unworthy. The downside is that when people find themselves in desperate situations they tend to act desperately, they feel cornered and as a result end up making permanent decisions because of a temporary situation.