The person I want to be...

When Kevin left on his last underway I found myself having a lot of anxiety and was completely overwhelmed. I have been thinking about making an appointment to see a Psychiatrist for a while now but have just been too nervous about it I guess. I don't have a way with words. Especially when I am nervous, I stumble over my words and can never get out what I want to get out. Well this last underway made me realize that if I don't get the way I feel under control now, while Kevin is still here, then come time for deployment I am going to have a nervous breakdown or something (for real!).

So i made the call, nervously, to make the appointment.

Last night was my appointment. Sitting in the waiting room to be called back I was shaking like a leaf. There were so many things going on in my head and I kept obsessing over the question that they would ask me "So, what brings you here today, Kristen?". I was trying to figure out exactly what I was going to say, because really I just wanted to talk about EVERYTHING. I just didn't know how I would get it all out. So finally I came up with this response- "Well, we are a military family and my husband is getting ready for deployment so i've been having a lot of anxiety over that. It is stressful."

I figured I would just focus on that for now, the whole "It's stressful being a single parents most of the time" thing. I wouldn't even go into my other issues.

So, I went in, sat down....still shaking horribly. I am sure he could see the terror on my face. I wanted to shut down! I wanted to run out of there! Then he asked me what i knew he would, "So, what brings you in today, Kristen?" And I rattled off my prerehearsed response about being a stressed out military wife whose husband was about to sail off into ocean for months.

Honestly, I thought he would look at me and say something like "Um, yeah, you have 2 kids, your husband is gone, of course it is stressful. It's hard, get over it". Maybe not in so many words but something like that. I guess I just thought that I wasn't cut out to be a super mom. I don't think I am a horrible mom, but i'm nowhere near perfect (i don't think anyone is).

To my suprise, seeing this Psychiatrist was like seeing a Psychic!!!

He started asking me all of these questions...i can't even remember half of them.

"Do you pick your scabs?"
"Do you pick your nails?"
"How did you do in school growing up?"
"Do you get really frustrated when you cannot get out of the door on time?
"Do people say you talk really fast?"
"When you read a book do you have to read it more than once to understand it?"

I noticed he started asking me a lot of similar questions.

Now that I am trying to remember, I can't lol.

Anyways, my final diagnosis....ADD, OCD, and depression.

I wrote this down on my Iphone yesterday when I was playing with the kids... " Conflict between who I am and who I want to be"....

And he pretty much hit the nail on the head!! In my MIND I desperately want to be the type of mother and wife who always has dinner on the table at 6, whose kitchen isn't piled with dishes, whose laundry hasn't taken over the house. I want to be able to sit down with my kids to do an art project without thinking about a million different things that need to get done, i want to finish things I start, i want to follow through. I want everything to have a place. I strive for perfectionism but I can't accomplish anything. There are so many things to do, i don't know where to start. Or i do start, and then get sidetracked and forget what i was doing in the first place. It is extremely frustrating. I have lists all over the house that I have started but then forget about them.

So basically my ADD is battling my OCD. Crazy! Who has ever SMILED being diagnosed with something like this? Well, I smiled. I smiled because it doesn't have to be like this anymore. I smiled because maybe once I start on the ADD meds that I will actually have productive days and not sit here at the end of the day looking around the house saying "ugh, what a waste of a day!"

My stress levels are soaring because my house is a disaster, there is no schedule around here no matter how much i strive for one.....I am just overwhelmed with everything. But now I know it can be different. That is comforting.

Apparently I have had the ADD since I was a kid and was just never diagnosed. I keep wondering if I had been diagnosed how things may have been different. I was always a horrible student.

I've been taking a low dose of Zoloft for a few months now because of Postpartum Depression. So, he doubled my dosage and we are seeing how I handle that for 3 weeks. Then I will see him again and start taking another medication for ADD. I have to admit I am very excited to see how it changes my day to day life.....

Maybe then I can be the person I want to be!