Meltdown

It started out as a fairly typical morning. Getting myself ready for a day in the office, making breakfast for everyone else, packing lunches and drinking my coffee as I rushed around doing it all. I'd been doing this same routine since forever it seemed. Some days I went to work and some days I didn't but the rest was a constant.

This particular day 5 years ago I was a bit more pushed for time than usual. Our 5 year old had started his day with the sads, needing more cuddles and TLC to get him ready for school. As a result I was late, rushing around and feeling very anxious. My son was eating his breakfast quietly and my husband was setting up his laptop so he could check out the overnight football news while eating breakfast and drinking his coffee, all prepared by me.

WAIT JUST A MINUTE! He was sitting, eating, drinking and reading football news while I tore around doing everything? That was the moment when something inside me broke.

I've never been one to swear or yell or be confrontational in any way at all. I always kept it all inside, locked away. But finally years of anger, frustration, sadness and disappointment broke through the wall I had carefully constructed to hold it all in.

The cupboard door slammed, I rounded on my husband and I started yelling. "I am not your flipping slave!!" Okay that's not the word I used but you get the idea. My rant went on and on for maybe 20 minutes, the pain pushing me to let it all out. Every last bit. And when it was over I sunk to the floor totally spent, feeling empty and lost and very alone. Even now, years later, I can see the look of horror on my son's face at what he'd just witnessed.

My emotional breakdown in 2008 heralded the start of a roller coaster ride of doctors, psychologists, psychiatrists and medications and culminated in the almost total destruction of my marriage and my family. That's another post or five right there.

I am writing this post to set the scene for what came after. To give you a peek into how bad things were so that when you see how wonderful my life, my marriage, my family, my world is now you will believe me when I tell you that it is NEVER too late to change and/or repair your relationships, your health or your life.

I am living proof of that.