How I'm Built

I'm good in a crisis.  In times of extreme emotion, I have the willingness and the ability to keep people calm, to do the things that need to be done.

My problem is, once the crisis has passed, I collapse.  Emotionally and physically.  Depending on the type of crisis, it will usually be more one than the other, but I rarely emerge from a period of intensity without some sort of suffering.

Today, for instance, I have a pounding headache.  This after the beach trip followed by a weekend of Hannah being at home, which always --- ALWAYS --- includes a cataclysmic fight between her and Briton.  

All that to say this: my nervous breakdown/extreme depression, when one stops to think about it, follows a number of crises/trying times:

Dale's death/raising Briton and Hannah

Daddy's death

Mama's declining health and death

Losing my job/dire financial straits.

I go all the way back to Dale's death because, yes, he died 14 years ago, but the crisis ran through until Briton and Hannah moved out on their own.  My work of holding things together, of actively parenting them, was done.

Obviously, losing one's parents is traumatic --- I held it together until both of them were gone.

The job/money thing is too obvious to comment on.

I guess what I'm saying is, I shouldn't be surprised that I broke down.  My work in all those areas ended, for the most part.  The next intense "event" is cleaning out Mama and Daddy's house, and making a decision on exactly what is going to be done with it.  I'll fall in some way after that is done, too.