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| My mom and me when I was a baby |
I was raised not to ask for help. Raised by a warrior woman single mother who would not have dreamed of going to therapy, asking for a meal or doing anything that might give any indication to the outside world that things weren't perfect.
And for over 30 years, I believed that this was the way to live my life.
When my mother died suddenly after a car accident my junior year of high school, I didn't ask for help. I went back to school the following Monday, graduated Valedictorian and got a full scholarship to UC Berkeley.
After my husband and I (who had only been married four months at the time) took in and eventually adopted two twin teenage girls from my middle school, I didn't ask for help. We just said yes and figured we would figure it out.
After we found out we were pregnant with our son, during the adoption process, while I was working full time and pursuing my doctoral studies part time, I didn't ask for help. I just kept working hard and plowing through each new task, adjusting both the married life and parenting teenagers at the same time.
During the pregnancy and once Nate, our son, was born, when both our daughters were having adjustment issues to the new baby, I was going through a hard recovery from delivering him and was struggling with missing my own mother, I didn't ask for help. In fact, I sent my husband back to work the next day and hobbled around the house trying to take care of myself and my son while still physically and emotionally exhausted. (Thank God a few friends stepped in with meals and support during that time, but I certainly wouldn't have dreamed of asking!)
When one of my daughters began showing signs of a serious mental health issue, I didn't ask for help. I did a ton of research on her diagnosis and took on counseling her in every spare minute I had when I wasn't working or going to school. When she developed major impulsivity issues, I didn't ask for help. I decided I would just take on more work to support her or more loans. I gave and gave and gave, but I never asked for help.
And then, I almost died.
Five years ago, when everything in my world came to a head, I was 84 lbs. I couldn't sleep well, was constantly on the phone trying to do everything I could to help my daughter, made a monthly trip to the ER for horrible stomach pains with no explainable cause (we thought taking out my gall bladder would help, but that made the trips every other month instead of every month), was working 5 jobs in total and was slowly disappearing. I couldn't think clearly except for the thought that I was going to just go to sleep one night and never wake up. Sometimes, I even hoped for that. I couldn't enjoy anything in my life. I would cry on the sidewalk outside my house, alone and exhausted. I kept telling my husband, "There's something wrong. I'm going to die. I don't know what it is but I just can't keep living this way. There's something really wrong."
Finally, I called for help, and was admitted to an Eating Disorder inpatient treatment program. I didn't exactly fit the textbook criteria for having anorexia, but my weight was so low, I needed weight stabilization combined with emotional support, to get myself back to a place where I could function again. I spent 10 days in the hospital, followed by 6 weeks of intensive treatment, before scaling back to regular therapy and nutritional counseling for the next 3.5 years. During that time, I lost one of my part-time jobs, cut out several others, had a parent of one of my middle school students file a complaint against me for "taking time off" when clearly I couldn't be that sick because I was on social media, and struggled to learn about the concept of physical and emotional self-care. I had spent my life taking care of others and ignoring my own needs, so much so that I was literally wasting away.
That was a turning point for me. While it has not been easy, I have fought back over the last 5 years, to regain stability and joy in my life. I finished my doctorate, found an amazing academic position doing the work that I love, established a new community, joined my son's school PTA executive board, set boundaries on my relationship with my daughter, worked hard to establish an incredibly strong relationship with my other daughter, and just last week, gave birth to a beautiful, baby girl. All of this, while maintaining my weight and relative sanity, supporting others and following my passion.
We named our daughter Johana, which means "God is gracious." And, God has been incredibly gracious to me through this journey. But, I have also learned that self-care does not come naturally to me and sometimes I need to let others pick up the slack where I just can't.
Yesterday, I set up a meal train. It's a service that allows for people to contribute meals after major life events. This was an incredible breakthrough for me. Not only did I ask for help, but I did so to promote my well-being and that of my family through food, something that I so recently struggled with. Although most of the response was neutral or positive, I've received some criticism saying that it "looks bad to ask for food" from others, like I'm begging, or that it's just not right. That criticism has hurt me a lot.
But, what I've had to remember is the promise I made to baby Johana as I was rocking her to sleep 2 nights ago, while still recovering from her delivery. I whispered to her that I would try my best to be there for her if/when she became a mommy because I knew how hard it was to be without my own mommy during this time. And if fulfilling on that promise means asking for help then I'll take looking bad and being my own type of woman warrior for myself and my family.
