Project Reconnect 2012

I decided NOT to do a list of New Year resolutions for 2012. Instead I have created project for myself…Project Reconnect 2012. I decided that this year I would try my hardest to reconnect with others. Over the past year between my depression and beginning my own business I have lost touch…lost touch with friends and family. But most importantly I’ve lost touch with myself.

This year will be about reconnecting with old friends. Trying to mend fences that were broke down from my lack of attention. Friendships only work when there are two people to work on them…and I have been lacking in my attention. I am not close to my family and over the years my friendships have helped to fill that void for me. But battling depression has made this difficult. It is like I have been a bear in hibernation…instead of me just crawling away to sleep though a season, I have been away for almost a year. I have hidden out and when I do have energy I have given all of that energy to my new business.

But I need more than just a business to make me feel whole. I need confidants. I need people that trust me and that I can trust. I need girlfriends that I can get silly and drunk with. I need friends that accept me as who I am and love me. But I need to reconnect and put more effort into it if I expect to be able to get any of these things back into my life. 

(I have also been lucky to have a few girlfriends that have stuck with me along the way...the deep dark way that is depression. And I am thankful for them. More than words can even begin to express...without their love, support and friendship I could not have made it through the past year. To you gals I love you more than you could ever know. Thank you for being there for me to cry on your shoulders and thank you for helping to pick me up when I fall.)

I also need to reconnect with myself. I need to take more of an active role in living my life. I need to work on me. I will do better at putting myself together more. Taking more pride in my appearance…I truly believe that looking good will help me to feel good about myself. Over the past few weeks I have worked on cleaning out my closet and getting rid of my grubby, slouchy, lounge around clothes. I found myself wearing them day in and day out…and because I was wearing them it was so much easier to just stay at home and lounge around. I didn’t want to go out looking like I rolled out of bed, so it was just another excuse to just stay home and hibernate.

I need to cook more meals at home. Not because I am setting a goal of loosing weight, but because I LOVE to cook at home. It’s something that makes me so very happy. I love creating new dishes to share with friends and neighbors. I love creating delicious sweets that I can bring to work. It is a way to get me back to being me. But I also think that cooking more meals at home will also be a great way to get some much-needed family time. Time for my husband, son and I to sit down together, break bread and talk. Talk and decompress from the day’s stresses. And we can reconnect.

I also will be reading more. I love to read. I love to learn. And I have missed it. I love getting lost in a novel…connecting with characters, letting my imagination get away from me. It is something that I long to do again and I will. But as I said I also love to learn and I will be reading books on things that I want to learn how to do or how to do better.

And I also will take more time to blog and reconnect with my blogging friends. Because I have learned that blog friends are real. Some of the only people that I have managed to not loose over the last year were some amazing blog friends. My girls Laura and Branson have been wonderful about checking in on me and keeping up on what’s going on. And I truly appreciate them for that. But I also want to reconnect with some of the other wonderful women that I have “met” online that I let slide on by because I wasn’t present enough.

But I am back. I will be baking and posting recipes. I will be talking more about my life, my family, my job…my hopes and dreams. And sharing photos along the way. I also will be better about visiting other bloggers and commenting instead of just lurking on their blogs. Its time for me to start joining in on the conversations and stop just standing in the corner observing everyone.

But blogging for me is also a wonderful creative outlet. I LOVE writing and for me blogging is almost like keeping a journal. It’s a way for me to get out what I am feel and thinking and share it with others. It is a way for me to get back to myself…the myself that I love. The one that is happy and outgoing. The me that is fun and loving. And I miss that part of myself. So in 2012 I will be working on reconnecting both with my friends but also with myself.

So here’s to 2012!! And the start of Project Reconnect…

#8 - Thankfulness Challenge

#8 - I am thankful for my friends who aren't afraid of depression

I am so very lucky to have such wonderful friends. They are really there for me when I am down. They make me laugh. And the memories that we make are just amazing!! 

I have been having a very hard time lately dealing with depression and three of these friends have been so wonderful, supporting and really, really there for me. They call me to check up on me. They help me to laugh and to see the beauty of what surrounds me. And what I appreciate the most from is them not being afraid of depression but for helping me to tackle it head on. Thank you so much Sarah, Suzie and MaryAnn...I am so thankful that you are there to hold my hand while I climb this mountain back to my old self. I can't tell you how much your caring and support means to me! Hugs to you girls!! Great big bear hugs!

That sneaky thing called depression

You may have noticed that I haven't been blogging as much lately. I log on, post a little fluff & I disappear again, and for that I am sorry. But I have been feeling overwhelmed by things in my life and I could feel myself slipping down that very slippery slope called depression.

Anyone that has been there understands how quickly all can go downhill. Or how slowly it can creep up on you. Depression can be extremely quiet and sneaky...and that is how it is for me. The last time that I went down this road it was a combination of postpartum and an unstable marriage. It was easy to diagnose...I was constantly crying, sad, exhausted, detached. I knew I needed help and I got it. I went to weekly counseling sessions and became friends with Zoloft. It took about a year to get my head on straight and wean myself off the pills, but I did it and I felt stronger and more in touch with myself than ever before.

But this time the depression snuck up on me. It was something that started small and over the course of six months became so big it consumed me. It started off with a little trouble sleeping, that eventually morphed into only sleeping two to three hours each night. A little nagging feeling of hopelessness that became feeling detached from everything because of the hopelessness that engulfed my entire being. A little emotional teary-ness became an overwhelming sadness that kept me from crying becuase I wasn't sure if I could stop.

The change from the small feelings to the big overwhelming ones didn't happen overnight. They grew in such a minuscule way that I didn't even notice what was happening. I've been through a lot of things lately...my son not feeling well, my husband's Crohns disease rearing it's ugly head, my father being diagnosed with prostate cancer and my step-mom having heart failure and subsequent heart surgery. These things just kept hitting me one after the other.

I didn't even notice the depression until earlier this week when I felt like I couldn't even function anymore. My sleep exhaustion had me almost delirious, my sadness finally engulfed me and I felt like the tears would never stop. And , finally I drove home imagining how much easier things would be if I wasn't around.

That last feeling was the one that scared me the most...it was the one that made me realize how much I had to lose if I didn't get myself some help. I saw my doctor and went back on anti-depressants. I have weekly appointments set up with my lifesaver of a therapist. And I admitted that I need help. I told my husband and a few close friends that I can't do it all alone and I some support to help me fix me.

I'm trying to heal. It will take some time, but I will eventually be back to "me."