Spoons

The "Spoons" Metaphor or "Spoon Theory"

Recently, a darling young woman-friend said to me, "I can't.  I don't have enough spoons."  (She lives with depression.)

At my puzzled look she told me with delight about the helpful "meme" that is spreading through the collective conversation.  It all began with Christine Miserandino's attempt to explain to a friend what it is like to live with invisible illness---about the tough decisions one has to make every day with one's limited energy.

The concreteness of the spoon imagery has managed to effectively illustrate what invisibly ill people have been saying for years:  Those who live with illness have far fewer resources than the healthy.

Being judged for low functioning or being guilted into more activity is NOT helpful.  Even still I struggle to remember that I often have fewer spoons in a day than regular people do.  I don't need outside help in feeling like I am not doing enough or producing enough.  I manage to feel shitty all by myself. (It is part of being depressed).  Patience and compassion are needed, not more shaming and shoulds,

When I think in terms of my "spoons," however, I tend to get practical and pragmatic, rather than getting bogged down in shame.  I am hearing the metaphor of the spoons increasingly in the conversations around me now too, which makes my heart glad for all the other good people I know who live with invisible illness. (Illnesses such as lupus, multiple sclerosis, depression, anxiety disorder, and a so many more.)

It is too easy to judge others, and too frequently unjust.  The simple act of trying to explain or defend oneself  from others' judgments and "advice" and attempts to "fix" takes even more spoons from an already meager supply.

The world already is overly short on compassion and respect.  How about we hand around more of that and less of suspicion and judgment and ill-informed assumptions?

Let's start handing out free spoons.  A kind word; a smile; a helping hand; an anonymous act of kindness: these are the things that help everyone.  It is so much easier to give a spoon than take one.  Why are we so quick to assume that someone who is short on spoons deserves to be so?

Please, take excellent care of yourself if you are short on spoons!  Please accept help with grace, not shame!  And many thanks to all those blessed enough to have spoons to share, who share them.

"Love one another as I have loved you."

Find the original spoon theory story by Christine Miserandino here.

Holidays After Trauma

First let me say that trauma is a continuum.  Part of me doesn't feel legitimate naming myself as someone recovering from trauma, but enough friends and therapists have independently named me so, that I am accepting that.

Today is the Sunday of Canadian Thanksgiving weekend.  In the past I would have been planning or deep in the middle of cooking a big family dinner, complete with gorgeous autumn decorations and turkey.  I would have enjoyed finding as many chairs as possible and getting creative with table arranging so everyone had a place.  The older I get, the more this sort of ritual is meaningful to me it seems, and the more precious my family is to me.

My "broken" family.

Today I slept in and awoke with a headache (no, not an "Oktoberfest headache," the regular kind) and perimenopausal hot flashes, and discouragement.  I thought I would be content this weekend because my girls all have their partners' family meals to go to, and my son seems just content to be home and spending time with me, and later his dad.  I have plenty to keep me busy, including a backlog of graduate school reading, cleaning, and ironing.

Duh.  I'm still a classic codependent, eh?  "So long as everyone else is happy, I am happy."  I didn't have a sweet clue as to what *I* actually wanted or needed.  It didn't even occur to me that I might not be okay.

So, today I am inordinately sad (who gets to say what "ordinately" sad is?) that I am not doing a traditional  meal with my kids, going on a walk in the autumn colours, and generally enjoying my family.  Today looks like it will be a day of releasing more pent up sadness and loss and grief.

Yay.

It's okay.  There is no statue of limitations on grief, no matter how much our culture (including me!) is uncomfortable with prolonged sadness.  If "just being with and accepting" the sadness is what needs to happen today, so be it.
God knows, I am not alone.
 
It's NORMAL to feel more deeply during holidays.  It is NORMAL for the contrast between what is and "what should have been" to ache most intensely right now.

So I will cry some, write some, pray some, and be very gentle with myself today, and this too, shall pass.

In solidarity with everyone for whom holidays, for now, seem to be more painful than joyful:
You are not wrong.
You are not alone.
You can make it through.

Alison