I love Stream of Consciousness Sunday. It starts me on my writing path for Sunday... usually Sundays are days I prefer to spend a restful day with my children, laced with writing and creating art.
I had a couple breakthroughs in this very short five minutes.
Stream of consciousness works. I hope you'll join in at AllThingsFadra.com
Motherhood is a precious gift. I tried for years to have babies. Three years before Marlena, who was stillborn. It was fifteen months after to have Katherine, her younger sister who was born Christmas Day. I believe that was a gift from God and her elder sister, especially since I found out I was pregnant Mother’s Day weekend. Emma, another couple years – if you add the time spent trying for a miscarried baby.
Samuel was my anomaly: one afternoon of sex = my only son.
Go figure. He really wanted to be born, I suppose. He was meant to be born.
I started on this theme when I discovered two related and depressing facts. Please read on, though, because it might have something to do with you or it might make you want to read poetry.
Just stay with me.
I discovered this morning that Sara Teasdale and Sylvia Plath committed suicide within two weeks of each other in the winter of 1963. Sylvia Plath’s Son, Nicholas Hughes, was born in 1962, like me, and committed suicide in 2009.
I am working on an art project: actually creating a body of work, that centers on the horrible loss of women artists and writers due to mental illness AND the women who pulled through and continue to serve those of us who also have depression or bipolar disorder and in many cases, are also mothers.
The other day I dropped Emma off at school and on the way we were both crying. I sat at a corner, about to turn, and broke the law to call a friend and try to calm down. I left a message something like this, “I feel so guilty about my genes. Emma is Depressed, like I am, and Samuel has Autism, which also flows through my veins. How did I do this to my children? I am a horrible mother… I don’t deserve them.”
Maybe I was meant to be infertile so I wouldn’t pass this stuff along to unsuspecting embryos.
And then I look up and read the work of some of the women with Mental Illness. Somehow their legacy, even the ones who committed suicide, inspires me.
Strange, I know, yet I also feel important.
Motherhood (and mental illness? Could it be?) is a precious gift.
This was my 5 minute Stream of Consciousness Sunday post. It’s five minutes of your time and a brain dump. Want to try it? Here are the rules…
- Set a timer and write for 5 minutes only.
- Write an intro to the post if you want but don’t edit the post. No proofreading or spellchecking. This is writing in the raw.
- Publish it somewhere. Anywhere. The back door to your blog if you want. But make it accessible.
- Add the Stream of Consciousness Sunday badge to your post.
- Link up your post below.
- Visit your fellow bloggers and show some love.
Now…
1. Grab the button
(it’s over in the sidebar at AllThingsFadra.com)
2. Write your post.
3. Link up here.
Follow me on Twitter: @JulieJordanScot
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© 2011
Julie Jordan Scott
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