socks can do amazing things...

It is thought that knitting first appeared somewhere in the Middle East.  In my house it appeared when my mom got sick.  We weren’t expecting terminal illness, no one ever does, but it happens.  Over the course of the nine weeks before her illness took her life, I learned every technique in knitting that I could.  I knit feverishly.  I filled two large bins with beautiful colors of wool in all different weights(this means the thickness of the yarn).  I even learned to spin and dye my own wool.  The only aspect I didn’t dive into was raising my own sheep, and that’s only because we don’t have the room. 

Luckily, even though I am left handed, there is no difference in knitting.  One always knits the same way other than which hand holds the working yarn.  My first project was a Christmas stocking.  I took on fancy stitches like cables and double knitting.  Watching videos online, I learned how to knit socks, sweaters, hats, mittens - you name it, I figured it out.  I knit presents, I knit selfish.  I learned to knit with the largest to the tiniest of needles and in the end, I gained a skill that has strengthened my coping skill-set.

This need to make things has served me well.  I was a potter for 18 years of my life.  I like to create.  It feeds my soul, but it also helps me deal with the ups and down of life with PTSD.  Hobbies can be a wonderful outlet when times are hard.  They occupy the mind so our days aren’t spent dwelling and rolling over all the horrible possibilities.  Through knitting I’ve taught myself to not worry about what I cannot change.  I can’t cure my husband’s PTSD, I couldn’t cure my mother's cancer.  I won’t be able to find a magic remedy on the internet.  I can educate myself, but I can’t fix everything.

I can however fix a stitch.  So in knitting, I give myself the ability to fix what I can.  Being able to fix something helps because many times I feel like I’m failing my husband in not finding that magic cure like I thought at the beginning I could.  I can however knit a pair of socks that fit like a dream and some days, that’s good enough.

deep breath...

I am having a bad day and I am allowed to say it.  This person is causing me stress, and that person is causing me stress, and I am allowed to call them out.  I am going to cry, and I am allowed to shed those tears without fear that I am causing anyone else distress.  I do not need to swallow them to save others.  Others need to realize I am not made of Teflon and everything does not slide off me without leaving a mark.  

So, I am going to take a moment to shut down everything everyone else needs from me and consider my own needs.

I am having a bad day, and it is okay to be human.

what I need...

I always know when it’s coming.  He usually starts with being restless and uninterested in anything.  That’s how I know it’s coming. 

Depression.

For me, the depression has been one of the hardest symptoms of my husband’s PTSD.  I can take the anger.  He never directs it my way, or if he does it’s minimal and fades quickly into an apology.  I can take the sleepless nights and distance.  I can even take the flashbacks as scary as they are sometimes.  But the depression is exhausting especially when I’m not feeling up to being a caregiver. 

Today is that day.  I’m just not up to it.

And I’m tired.  My back is out; my head is pounding.  My youngest is sick as a dog and my oldest is about to experience one of those life events you remember always.  But depression rules the day.

When he came to me last night, I was cranky.  Lying there in bed, I couldn’t find compassion under the pain radiating down my leg.  I can’t always be there can I?  I need to be human.  I need whine.  I need to hurt.  I need to lean.

He’s crushed when he realizes I’ve made it through another difficult patch without him because he couldn’t see past the fog of his depression.  In bed with the covers pulled tight around his head, he’s not awake when I hobble in to check on him.  I know he won’t want to sleep away the day, so I wake him.  Again.  And again.

But I feel my jaw tighten.  I’m tired.  I love him, but I’m so tired.  I can’t let myself get to that ragged edge, the one he hangs at so much of the time, because if I’m there, we’ll both topple over.

Deep breath.  I have to make it to the gym more often than not so my back isn’t so easily swayed by an errant twist.  I have to remember my headaches aren’t permanent, take a damned aspirin, and stop being stubborn. My youngest just has a summer cold. It will pass.  And my oldest, well he’s now engaged and happily going about his life.  I didn’t miss a thing.  This is what I wanted; to be needed.  I was so unnecessary for such a long time, this is what I need, and after all every one of us should be so lucky to understand what we need.