life is but a dream
if a person doesn’t get treatment for a problem and it eventually more or less goes away on its own, does that mean that the problem possibly never really existed?
i’ve had all sorts of “issues” in my life and because i never sought professional help for any of them, i wonder if maybe i made them bigger in my head than they really were. what a mind-blowing concept.
this came up the other day when a work friend asked me about postpartum depression. my memories of life immediately postpartum are extremely fuzzy. i remember being tired and little sad, but mostly it’s all a blur. i remember dealing with mastitis (twice) and i remember the feel of cloth diapers. so i said yes, i thought so, but it wasn’t too bad. “you didn’t have to go to the hospital or anything, right?” she asked. “it must have been pretty mild.” then i was reading one of my daily blog reads and there was something about being hospitalized for this very thing. because one day my fog just lifted without medication or any other intervention, i reasoned, i must have never really been depressed.
i was later startled by cam’s reaction. he was worried about me, he insisted. he didn’t think i’d do harm to myself or the baby, but he was really worried. huh? why didn’t you do anything, say anything? so then again, i have to wonder… maybe you knew that it wasn’t the fabled postpartum depression. maybe i was just in a funk because… oh, just because.
i’m aghast at the possibilities of this. all of that garbage i’ve lived though in my past, was that entirely my own making? all of it… did it just live in my head? am i nothing more than an emotional hypochondriac?
staggering.