Grief Stages 4 & 5 - Depression & Acceptance

I used to be so cool. I never had a lot of friends but the friends I did have were SO much fun! I went to tons of concerts, rock concerts mostly: Stone Temple Pilots, Bush, No Doubt, Dave Matthews Band, Rusted Root, Sponge, Feetwood Mac, Steve Miller Band, Jethro Tull, Lollapalooza, OzzFest, etc. I used to drink Jose Quervo 1800 on the rocks. I used to go to biker bars or dance clubs (depending on my mood) and drink many a man under the table and then have my way with him. I used to do all kinds of safe, fun, illegal street drugs. (That sounds weird doesn't it? What I mean is no heroin, cocaine, ecstasy.) I used to take ephedrine three times a night to stay out and party. I loved my life. Then came Gwen.

Even after we had Gwen I tried desperately to hang onto my coolness. I obviously had to back off a little from the crazy lifestyle I was leading prior to marriage and kids. But I drove a sweet little Mazda 6 5-speed Sport, we had people over for parties, I wore nice, dressy, hip clothes from Lane Bryant to work and wore cute, fun, hip clothes from Lane Bryant on the weekends. I upgraded my cell phone (something I've never really been a fan of), to one that was state-of-the-art cool. We still had money to spend and the freedom to go shopping at malls or out to dinner, even though 98% of the time we chose to bring Gwen with us. Then came the triplets.

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I had to trade in my zippy little zoom-zoom for a mini-van ( though I insisted it had to be black because a white, robin's egg blue, or tan colored mini-van was just too much old-lady for me to handle). We have to clip coupons and shop at Wal-Mart. We have to wait for sales and bargain hunt. We never go out as a family - ever - anywhere. I don't shower unless I have to leave the house, I barely remember to brush my teeth, the kids and I sit around in pj's all day and night, stained with various strained foods and spit-up and snot. Sometimes I make a real dinner, if I am lucky and find the extra time (or have a Red Bull at 3 o'clock) and the rest of the time my poor malnourished daughter eats mac & cheese, sandwiches, or pasta for supper, all alone because mom and dad are too busy bathing/wrangling/cleaning up after/feeding/cursing at the babies. I have come to hate my life, resent my children (who don't deserve that; hence, all the psycho therapy), long for my "Glory Days", and have become very depressed.

Our house is small, only 1,400 sq. ft. of livable space, including the finished basement and Gwen's attic bedroom. Because it's so small we live "creatively." Instead of having a real main-floor living room, we use our 3-season sunroom/porch from April - November and opt to have a family dining room instead of another first floor living area space. Because our porch is only 12x12, it's not heated, and we are coming to the season where we will have to abandon it, we have started packing up and getting ready to move into the basement, where our other living room is. When we bought our house 5 years ago the living room downstairs had a wood stove, which we had to get rid of for insurance purposes, so almost two years ago we spent the money and had the entire thing re-carpeted (with a much lighter shade non-shag) and covered up the floor that the stove was on to give us more usable space. When the triplets were born we had to find a place for them to sleep so we consolidated and moved our den into the downstairs basement (one filing cabinet, a computer desk and a PC are all that remain from our den). Our basement living room, with its luxurious new carpet, has become our "where the hell are we going to put this?!" catch-all. We were envisioning 4 wild children, running amok in the wiring, power strips, behind the bar, etc. and it was giving both of us a good deal of anxiety. In my depressed state of mind I was not looking forward to moving to the dark, dank basement, and all I could think about was how I could fashion a safe-enough laundry-basket-dumb-waiter-pulley-system so that I wouldn't have to scale the stairs 60 times a day while lugging 20 pound porkers.

Enter the Little Tikes Mission Design Wood Storage Center! I got two of these expensive, solid-wood toy chests in order to give us more storage for all our kids' crap, and let's face it, with 4 little kids you will always have too much. Yesterday I decided to take matters into my own hands and organize and clean the downstairs living room - two perfected skills I had just about lost after March. It was quite the undertaking, but while Tony watched the kids I managed to get it done. I worked from 9 am until 9 pm, putting the toy chests together, organizing the toys, and cleaning the dead spider carcases out of all the nooks and crannies of the room. Just cleaning, and organizing, gave me a sense of accomplishment I had been craving for months. And as sad as that is, what's even worse is that I excited and elated. I feel like a totally different person now (although that could be chalked up to all the therapy and Lexapro). Now that my life consists of whining, crying, fighting, feeding, chasing, and a whole shitload of toys, I guess I have to change my perspective and try to see the bright side of things. I will never be a promiscuous 21 year old party/groupie girl ever again. I have graduated, not spiraled into darkness. It may have taken me a while, longer than most, but I have found the 5th stage of grievance after losing my old self... acceptance. From now on I'm going to try to make the best of my situation, no matter how mundane, non-inspiring, or non-intellectual it may be. I am a 32-year old, mini-van driving, toy chest loving, kid herding, boo-boo kissing, stair climbing, occasional-concert-goer, kick ass mom of 4! FUCK YEAH!!!

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To make a long, pointless story even longer, and because my mom isn't coming over until Wednesday, and I am just dying to show someone my big project and how great it came out, I decided to post pictures. At least I can share with my friends! : ) Here is the giant wood stove we had removed (this was taken when we looked at the house, before we signed on it):

And here is our living room, after we removed the wood stove, but before we had kids:

So finally, we come to the end result. Here are the pictures after I finished last night: