Blogs are supposed to be shiny, happy places full of adorable pictures and regaling their readers with tales of excursions and amusing moments. This will not be that sort of blog entry.

When I took the blog private, I had hoped I would be able to speak more candidly. And yet, I have been terrified to write this post because it renders me completely vulnerable and reveals the ugly behind the facade of happiness.

I have started and then erased this post so many times I've lost count. I don't know where or how to begin, and I don't know what response I could possibly receive. Or even want to receive. Really, I just need to vent.

I am in a bad place. Holding things together with rubber bands and string. Yarn and glue and tape and whatever other scraps of normalcy I can muster. I see each day as a challenge. A mountain to climb with no hope of ever seeing the views from the summit. Each time I maneuver my way through a treacherous path, another obstacle jumps out in front of me. I don't have the energy to keep going, and yet I must. Because there are people who depend on me. People who had absolutely no say in the matter of ending up with me as their mother.

Things began to unravel when my mother died. My father, whom I've never exactly been close with (because it's hard to forge a connection with a person who uses you as the physical and emotional receptacle for all of their anger at the universe) lost the last remnants of soul and humanity when my mom died. My sister began acting out (as teenagers with no structure and deep grief will). My aunt and her children (who my mother supported both financially and emotionally) went AWOL, descending into their own personal dramas. My sole source of support through my mother's death and the subsequent loss of my entire family has been Jon. That's a whole lot of burden for him to bear.

What is hardest is that my children, through no fault of their own, are stuck with me as their mother. I try to do the right things, make the right choices, not damage them too much as we go about our days. But the fact of the matter is that when I'm having an especially bad day, they have nowhere else to turn. No respite from the storms of my anger, my emotional unavailability, or my inability to feel empathy when they can't stop arguing over a favourite toy. Lately they don't even have Jon to act as a buffer or offer an alternative perspective. I'm trying my hardest to hold down the fort until these tests are over. He doesn't need any more stress. But it's all so much harder than I ever could have anticipated.

It is hard for me to see images or hear stories of perfection, because I am so, so far from that. I have the best of intentions, but cannot find the ability to follow through. I am full of ideas, and cannot take action. It is hard for me to be around happy people because I feel so incredibly disconnected. It is hard for me to share in others' joy. I don't want to feel this way. It's so incredibly selfish, and I am not proud to admit that I feel this way. But I do.

I have been seeing a therapist for the past year, and while it's been helpful and good and extremely cathartic, it doesn't change the fact that I am alone in this. That I have no support aside from my husband.  That I miss my mother more than I could ever put into words. That each mundane task is a reminder that she's not here to make folding laundry more fun, meet us at a museum, or take the twins back to school shopping. That there is nobody nearby who might be able to watch the kids for a night without requiring a paycheck.

I never intended this to be an airing of dirty laundry, but I have nowhere else to put all of this, and I need for it to not be inside of me anymore. I feel such a heavy guilt for even complaining when so many in this world have it much, much worse than I do. But if I'm being honest, this is where I am right now. I have been fighting and clawing and trying to force myself out of this funk, but each time I begin to see improvement, something happens that pushes me right back down. I am exhausted.

Still, I am holding on to a small hope. Hope that maybe things will get better. But mostly that my children will be too young to remember that their mother spends way too many days exhausted and unable to emotionally engage. That some days, simply getting out of bed to provide the most basic care is all that she can muster. I hope that they will remember the fun times. And most of all, I hope that this unshakable cloud of despair isn't shading their childhood too terribly.