Motherhood – The Office Black Girl

Mental Health Journey, Motherhood, Uncategorized

Therapy Journey: Surprise…I’m Depressed

June 9, 2023by The Office Black Girl1 Comment

It is a Friday night, and I am trying to milk the last of the power of my ADHD medication to push me through to type this.

Since my first post about therapy, I have had two sessions. Before my first session, my husband and I had an uncomfortable conversation about his next career move and the impact it will have on my mental health. I immediately informed him that I had started the process of going to therapy, and he sounded relieved, even proud.

I didn’t tell anyone else before my first session. I wanted to see what I was getting myself into first.

My first session was a bit of a hot mess, but that was on me. I found myself word vomiting answers that weren’t part of her questions. But at the same time, I was holding back because I was all too aware that my husband and son were within hearing distance.

To add to the hot mess, my phone was blowing up during the session (I took the video call on my phone), and I had to hang up at one point because of an Instacart drama. After that first session, she sent me a packet about dealing with depression, and it was an eye-opener.

In the two weeks that followed, I realized I have been battling with depression for a while and have downplayed it as something else. On the day of my second session, I woke up and just felt dead inside and realized that it was not uncommon for me to feel that way.

When I got to work that day, I started wondering if I needed to be on antidepressants. But I knew that would be another hurdle because my therapist doesn’t have the ability to write prescriptions and my insurance is already a bit of a headache about dealing with mental health that doesn’t involve the immediate threat of suicide.

During my second session, we discussed the causes of my depression and my spiraling episodes, as well as techniques to help deal with depression.

The biggest thing I took from the second session was the idea of “should.” She made me realize how much of a hold that idea of what I “should” be fuels my spiral. The idea that I should be further in my career, I should be a better mother/wife, I should be doing a lot of things, are expectations that I put on myself that hinder me from moving forward or even finding joy.

I have been working on the idea of letting go of “should” and replacing it with “I am doing the best that I can” or some other forgiving/positive thought. But I won’t lie, it is hard. I was raised with expectations and they are deeply rooted in me. So the idea that I am falling short of them on a daily basis feels like it is a hard thing to just give myself a pass that doesn’t feel deserved.

While I’m still not sure how I feel about therapy so far, I am anxious to continue. Maybe that is what I am overlooking….my way of thinking is what landed me in therapy. Maybe it is time to really give in to thinking a different way and therapy is definitely different.

What does therapy mean to you? Is it a space to vent, be analyzed, be comforted, or something else? Comment below because I would love to know what others think about therapy.

Mental Health Journey, Motherhood

Therapy Journey (Part One)

May 11, 2023by The Office Black Girl3 Comments

Last night, I reached a breaking point.

Google had told me that one of my oldest accounts was maxed out on storage, and I needed to clear space for storage or pay for it. That led me down the rabbit hole of old videos and pictures of my son.

My ovaries ached a little bit, looking at this little person I spent so much time with as a stay-at-home mom. And his little voice just hit me in the heart. But the longer I watched the videos, my mental state started crumbling.

Suddenly I wasn’t seeing a happy little toddler on my phone screen, but a flood of bad memories of things that happened during those years. Years of me feeling like I was failing as a young mother (thoughts I still struggle with now) while I was struggling to figure out my life.

Perspective and social media are amusing because they both can give you the false idea from the outside that everything is perfect for someone else. I look back on old memories and see comments of people reflecting positively on a happy moment in time that I shared. But I was struggling for years.

Don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t as if I never had a happy moment. I had plenty of them.

But last night made me realize that despite my growth as a woman, a mother, and a wife, I still have demons that I have only managed to quiet at times with noise. During the quiet, unexpected moments…they definitely rise against me.

Despite all of the change in practices and views on mental health, people often overlook the simple thing of cost and time that comes with taking care of your mental health. Even online therapy costs money, and spending time trying to find the right therapist causes me anxiety at the thought of spending time and money trying to find the right one before I even get help.

I finally looked into my healthcare options and started the process today to book my first session. My insurance offers options, thankfully, but they are a bit limited. I am hoping that this will be the first real step in healing the wounds I merely bandaged for years.

Today, I really hate where my desk is positioned. I have been crying as I type this, and I am exposed to my coworkers and people coming into the office. One delivery guy just made a comment about allergies…my eyes must be red (just checked, they are a little). But it is just a confirmation that I finally need to do something to heal myself because time doesn’t heal all wounds.

Have you gone to therapy? What has been your experience in tackling your mental health issues?

Mental Health Journey, Motherhood

A Needed Phone Call

Featuredby The Office Black GirlLeave a Comment

This was not my original blog post idea for today.

But it is the blog post I want to share…today.

As a black woman, I feel this constant pressure to suck shit up and handle things. But the reality is that narrative is forced upon me as a black woman that I constantly struggle with. I struggle with the idea of dropping the ball, asking for help, and even not pushing myself harder.

While this era of social media is now showing that this is a problematic idealogy, my timeline hasn’t shown me enough women still struggling to find the right balance. It seems as though my timeline is filled with black women who are doing the damn thing (which I applaud them) and others who have managed to break through that crippling ideology and voluntarily remove things from their plates.

Then there is me, stuck somewhere in the middle.

While I struggled with the guilt of not going to the gym again today, not completing my story update (I just did before I typed this post), and not pushing myself to finish my never-ending to-do list…

That all went out the window when I got an unexpected call from my son’s teacher.

My son finished the first half of the school year, failing most of his classes. As any mom will understand, failing your kid is the biggest blow (even if the failure is an imagined one). So my husband and I bit the bullet and enrolled our son in tutoring. A cost that we feel every month. But I refuse to let my kid fail because I didn’t do all that I could to help him succeed.

I feel like I am constantly bogged down as a black mother because there seems to be no room for error. Because I am raising a black son that will eventually be a black man, any of his shortcomings fall on me and are multiplied by a skewed perception. I’m not even a single mother, and I was disgusted by the remarks of Jason Whitlock in regard to single, black mothers. Like how do you even reach to make that connection?

With that being said, my son’s teacher called me and told me that she didn’t know what we were doing at home, but my son’s grades had made a dramatic improvement since they returned from Christmas break.

While it seems like such a small thing, I found myself in tears.

It is bizarre to me that someone can fix their lips to generalize black women and black mothers under some distorted, negative narrative. I know so many amazing black women (single and married) who do so much for their kids, and they do it without praise.

To those mamas, I see you.

Today, I felt seen. I have had many conversations with my son’s teacher about his grades, and it was how she delivered the news that made me realize she saw that I was trying to do my best for my kid. And it was exactly what I needed today.