Childcare may be a good source of help for Moms with Postpartum Depression

I received a question from a mom regarding whether or not she should put her child in daycare, "Maybe not all day", she stated, "But part time" because of postpartum depression that she is struggling with. She has a 4 yr old daughter who she is having trouble with and a 2 yr old daughter. She stated that the 4 yr acts up really bad whenever she has her bad days with ppd and it's very hard for her to deal with her child and the ppd. The 2 yr doesn't give her problems, she's a really calm child who is good about sitting and playing by herself or watching tv or looking at a book. The 5 yr old is the one that's very active. I completely understand her plight and was thinking back to when I was struggling with ppd. I know that a lot of mothers struggle with guilt when it comes to working and leaving their child behind with a babysitter or daycare instead of staying home with the baby so I know there has to be even more guilt for a mother who is not working and is considering putting her child in daycare just so she can have some time to herself, especially on those really bad days where she has to struggle with lack of energy/fatigue and dealing with ppd. I say that when it comes to your health and wellness, as a mom you need to do what is best for you and your family. And if that means asking for help from friends and family or even placing your child in a daycare center, I think it's best to get the help that you need so that you can get well. Don't think of it as neglecting your child, think of it as accepting support (whether this support comes from a friend/family member or daycare) because you have a medical condition that is limiting your ability to care for your child the way you need to and would like to. It's no different than if you had a physical condition or illness that would limit your ability to care for your child, you wouldn't feel as guilty about it in this case, so you shouldn't with ppd. Don't allow other people's opinion of you and your abilities as a mother make you feel incompetent or guilty. Remind them that ppd is a real illness and educate them about it. This is about you and your family. In order to care for your family you need to be at your best to be able to take care of them. Don't try to be supermom and take on more than you can handle. If you don't have friends and family to help out with babysitting and watching your child then daycare would be the next option.

After thinking back to the time when I went through ppd I realized that during that time while I worked a full-time job this actually helped me in a lot of ways. It gave me a reason and motivation to get up out of bed each morning (forced me to get up and get moving) and working is really kind of like a vacation if you want to call it that. A lot of women say this. I've even had one of my coworkers a few years back to tell me that she decided to work just to get a break from her kids. This is not something I would advise unless you have some type of disability or illness (like ppd) but I found out after having a conversation with her during lunch one day that she had experienced postpartum depression too. She had two boys. We spent time everyday during our lunch hour walking and talking and even prayed during this time. But work can be sort of getaway time, even though you're at work. My job was an office job where I sat down all day in front of a computer. I worked because we needed the dual income. Although I always desired to work from home and was allowed that opportunity when my daughter turned 4, there were many benefits to working in an office that provided a boost for me when she was a baby, the time that I was experiencing ppd. Getting to see my coworkers everyday and connect with other adults was one of them. And the extra money that I earned allowed me to be able to buy little extra things that my kids needed. It was a chance for me to get out of the house and not be isolated. It gave me a sense of accomplishment as well. A lot of mothers isolate themselves and this only contributes to depression. You need to either join a support group, become active at a local church, volunteer, or even working part-time or full-time helps a lot. It helps to keep you connected and keeps you going. So don't allow guilt to keep you from getting the help and support you need to recover from ppd. Do what's best for you and your family!






~Here's to Your Health!~
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Emotional Health and Wellness: "What is that in Your Hand?"....."Refocusing the Lens of your Mind"

I have stated before that thoughts create emotion. Emotions are energy in motion. Without this energy, we wouldn't move, we wouldn't act or take action. We would be lifeless. Emotions are required to help propel us into action and they are either positive or negative. When that energy is negative (stemming from negative thoughts), we find ourselves not knowing what to do with it. Sure we know what to do with positive energy or emotions. When we feel love we express it, we want to share it. When we feel joy we express that as well. We don't bottle up joy and love. But when we feel a negative emotion like anger we tend to bottle it up inside, we don't know how to express it. Those who bottle up anger either fear expressing anger in a destructive way or have been conditioned to believe that anger is wrong. As you allow this emotion to stay bottled up, it becomes stagnant and turns into other things like animosity, resentment, and bitterness if we don't eventually release it. So the way to eliminate negative emotions is to eliminate negative thoughts because thoughts create emotions. What you think about produces your feelings about certain things or yourself. When you think negatively about yourself, you will feel negative about yourself which will keep you stuck in life.

Some days you can have all the confidence in the world but other days you struggle with flaws and insecurities. I love the way God uses people who are not exactly qualified. As someone who was raised in a religious environment of do's and don'ts, I use to have somewhat of a problem with seeing people who I thought didn't "fit the bill" enjoy being rich, enjoying prosperity, and doing things that I felt that only the "qualified" was supposed to be able to do. This belief originated not only from a spirit of religion, but also the surroundings that I was raised in. Where I come from you had to have sometimes not just one degree but a Master's or Phd or 2 degrees and some type of certification lol (exaggeration, somewhat..) to go along with it in order to even be considered for a job. This is a great thing to have but what about those who don't have that? You end up feeling unqualified, unworthy, and inferior to everyone else who does.

For many years I would hear messages preached about Moses and other prophets in the bible who God called and chose to lead the people or to be a messenger. And how these particular individuals had flaws, weaknesses, fears and insecurities which caused them to feel that they were not qualified for the job and just not good enough. God asked Moses "What is that in your hand?" (Exodus 4:2) My mother would tell for years after pursuing this degree and that degree that I already had enough skills, qualifications, and talents to do whatever it was that I wanted to do. But for some reason I always got tripped up in this area and it caused me for many years to be stuck. Insecurities will keep you from going after those things in your life that you ARE qualified for. Some things don't have to be certified on paper, God has already written it in your blueprint and given the seal of approval. You are already designed for greatness!

There were a couple of situations where I experienced getting passed over for a job promotion to someone who I knew wasn't as qualified as I was and I even witnessed my husband getting passed over for a job promotion as well. And it wasn't until I moved to a new city ten years ago, with a different culture and different way of doing things (different mindset) that I began to experience a little bit of freedom from that perfectionism syndrome. I noticed that there were a lot of jobs where you only needed a high school diploma.  I also experienced being under supervisors who did not have any type of degree. This is when I began to stop focusing on what I didn't have, and started focusing on what I did have. These two life experiences taught me how to use what I already have and work it to my advantage. It helped me to refocus the lens of my mind.

It's very difficult at times for us as human beings to look at what we already have; the gifts, talents, and skills that God has already given us. We have a tendency to naturally look at what is wrong, and have to force ourselves to look at what is right and good. We naturally look at the things that we don't have that we desire in life, and most of the time fail to consider the blessing that have already been bestowed upon us. Problems so easily get magnified in our mind. I guess it's because we are automatically prone to operate in survival mode, and when a problem arises, instinctively that's what we focus on the most. My grandmother use to sing a song in church all the time when I was growing up "Count your blessings, name them one by one". This song was a good way to get people who attended the church service to leave their problems behind them and focus on the good things in their life. To mentally usher them (as an usher would lead you to your seat) into the presence of God and forget about the cares of this life.

We use to have a saying back in the day "Work it!" That saying basically meant take what you've got and use it! The essence of finding true confidence in yourself is not necessarily eliminating all fear, getting rid of your flaws, or perfecting oneself, it's the ability to refocus. To minimize the negative and maximize the positive. That's the real secret to staying in a place of confidence that allows you to move forward. This is the essence of feeling the fear and doing it anyway. Courage is the opposite of fear, just as negative is the opposite of positive.  The one that you decide to focus on is what determines your ability to move forward. When we focus so much on ourselves, our insecurities, our weaknesses, our flaws, it overshadows the good stuff. It literally places those positives into a place where you can't see them. Whatever you focus on overshadows or casts a shadow on those things surrounding it. When you focus on the positive, the negatives are out of your mind's sight. It's not that they don't exist, you can still have flaws, still have weaknesses, but it's when you don't focus on them that you move them out of the light and into the shadows. Light is an energy source, and either you are giving energy to the positives or you are giving energy to the negatives. It's kind of like this quote:

Subtracting negative not only applies to getting rid of baggage, it can also apply to faults about ourselves that we continually maximize, that keep us in a state of fear, in a state of procrastination, and in a state of immobility. Just keep us stuck! Stuck in neverland unable to move forward in life. How does subtracting a negative create a positive? In algebra, there's a scale that is displayed to demonstrate how negative and positive integers work.

Think of it like this. In looking at the number line imagine yourself zooming in on the negative number to the left of the zero, zero being the baseline or point of reference. The more you zoom in on the negative number, the more you place the positive number in a shadow, you can't see them, they don't stand out. Your lens only has the ability to focus in on one area at a time. If you were to focus or zoom in on the positive number you would minimize the negative numbers. Now try subtracting in your mind the negative numbers one at time on the left side of the number line. Mentally picture that as you subtract each number, the right side (positives) start to come in a little closer to view while the negative ones dissapear. It's almost as if they are moving out of the shadows into the light. This is how it works with our mental picture of ourselves. The mind is like a computer, it's always processing information, and that which we focus on becomes magnified. So why not practice magnifying the good stuff and minimizing the bad. That's not to say that you should sweep your flaws under the rug and not work on them. No, there's always room to grow. That's only to say that you should work on strengthening them, but not make them so big that they overshadow everything else. It's kind of like the way a a software program, for example an antivirus program, works in the background. You can still work on your computer while your antivirus quietly operates in the background to get rid of the negative stuff. The program is being minimized. 

Do you think about past failures too much? Do you have fearful thoughts about the future? Whenever you find yourself focusing on your failures and flaws recall God's question: "What is that in your hand?"

~Here's to Your Health!~

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