Sleepy Mamas

Intrusive thoughts are a series of uninvited, unsavoury, unusual, unsettling thoughts which dominate all others, and can leave you feeling overwhelmed confused and frightened. They can be repetitive, violent, disturbing or even distressing. Before I knew this factual description for intrusive thoughts, I knew it simply as my bee swarm – my term for describing what I was experiencing to my husband so he could better understand, empathise and help me. Whilst it is possible to deal with a single stinging thought, a swarm of stinging thoughts rendered me overwhelmed paralysed and bruised. Over time, I learnt how to manage these swarms. Not only how to cope when one happened, but also how to find some sweetness in the end too.

A lone bee is not a dangerous or harmful thing. It flies from flower to flower minding its own business, and whilst it always has the potential to inflict pain, it doesn’t choose to because, why would it? If there is no threat there is no need to attack. Similarly, a single strange or disturbing thought poses little threat to your general psychy. It wanders about your brain quite happily, and only brings itself to your attention when you really need to be conscious of something. When bees swarm, they stop operating as single beings and start working as a team. The swarm can even begin to look like a whole new being of its own. Whether they are working on an impulse, or reacting to a threat, bees will stop wandering and start moving with purpose. Similarly, it is useful to look at why intrusive thoughts come in an aggressive barrage, because like the bees they are working as a team reacting either on impulse or as a triggered reaction. Also similarly to the bees, when single unusual thoughts group together to form a series of intrusive thoughts they take on a whole new life of their own, and very quickly our internal world begins to look as real and alive as our external one.

Working out whether my intrusive thoughts were individual bees which I could watch calmly and carefully as the flew past me, or if they were a pre-cursor to a swarm building which I would need to brace for, was helpful.

If you are living with sustained sleep deprivation, it is important to acknowledge that this alone is enough to make your thought hive unhappy. On top of this, you then have the resulting emotional side affects which accompany sleep deprivation; tearfulness, confusion, anxiety, hyperactivity, mood swings, numbness, detachment (to name a few!) This will also poke your thought hive with a large stick and understandably, upset the bees. So what can you do about it? Firstly, accept your intrusive thoughts and allow yourself to feel them with the knowledge that you are safe. The thought itself may feel incredibly dangerous but in the moment you experience it (often out of the blue) you are physically safe. Watch them calmly as they fly past. Feel the danger and the strangeness and write the thought down if it helps, but don’t be alarmed by one thought. I can say ‘it can’t hurt you in this moment’ however, if that’s not how it feels and you are being hurt in some way or notice your behaviours are different, tell someone you trust immidiately. Breathe calmly and share the thought no matter what it is. Again, let it come and watch it go. If you feel the thoughts aren’t going, but rather gathering and swarming, don’t try to watch the individual thoughts anymore, don’t fight them or be aggressive towards them, there are too many to distinguish between. Sit down somewhere, breath deeply, stay calm, cry if you need to and know that it will pass. Imagine your barrage of intrusive thoughts as a swarm in the room. Feel it, hear it, acknowledge it’s deafening and overwhelming power! Imagine yourself in the middle of it. Open a large window in your imagination, and try to send the thoughts in that direction, watching as the hive becomes distracted and disappears into the air. Practically, as you sit calmly waiting for this to pass, pick out 2 things you can smell, 5 things you can hear, 10 things you can touch and 15 things you can see. Repeat this until you begin to feel more present and calmer. Tell someone you trust what is happening. Say ‘I am feeling overwhelmed with distrurbing intrusive thoughts. Please can you help me ground myself. I need to pick out 2 things I can smell 5 things I can hear, 10 things I can feel…’

During my pregnancy and postpartum I found great comfort in reading about other women’s experiences as it helped me to feel less alone, more informed, and it gave me a way of communicating with my husband about what we were going through. What I’m about to tell you isn’t a sob story – quite the opposite. It was hard at the time but we made it through and I’m so proud! It’s one example of a near daily occurance, where I was just having a really tough time. Now I can look back, I see we made it through and I can see how we did it, and if your struggling too I hope it can provide some comfort and some help for you.

I am 7 months pregnant, it is way past my bedtime, I’ve just got off a 3 hour work call where everything that could have gone wrong, did, I’ve been muting myself between conversation breaks to dry heave into a metal mixing bowl, and when I put the phone down I burst into tears and cry uncontrollably on my husband’s shoulder for about 30 minutes. He holds me carefully, and stokes my hair until I eventually calm down. When I surface, we talk about the bees, any thoughts I can pick out and why they hurt me. I share how I’m viciously angry I am at my body for being so ill and that I feel betrayed. How I feel I can’t access my life anymore even in the simplest of ways. I share how disempowered and useless I feel and how this is terrifying and alienating like I’m in a different body. I share how constantly uncomfortable and ill I feel and how claustrophobic and anxious this makes me; how I have horrible imaginings of being in hospital or the baby getting ill too and of us getting into some kind of crisis. I talk about money worries and identity issues and how find it hard to know who I am, even who I was at times, and my husband calmly listens. I realise I am grieving for a strong and healthy body I have now lost and the confident, assured calm and happy person I once was, and feeling bewildered and frightened without them both. I am also exhausted and feeling panicked by the thought of another night of multiple wake ups to dry heave into my metal bowl. (We called it the vom gong as every time I grabbed it it would make the sound of a gong, but without the feeling of zen!) At the end of my swarm we identify that I would benefit from outside help (as these episodes have been happening a little too frequently) but we also identify the distance between my swarm of thoughts and my reality. Both places are real to me, but only one place is tangibly real.

I must pause here and state that it would be most unhelpful to tell a person with intrusive thoughts not to worry because what their thinking or feeling isn’t real, because whatever feels real is real for your mind. What I mean is, part of grounding yourself is refocusing the primitive part of your mind (responsible for assessing threat) to what is tangibly real, and providing an opportunity for your brain to reasses the physical threat level here and now. There may a saber tooth tiger level threat in your mind, but there is not a saber tooth tiger in the actual room you are sitting in.

Once I settle from the initial overwhelm of the swarm, I can begin to see that however betrayed I feel, my body doesn’t want to feel ill either, and although I feel horribly unwell, it’s creating our child, and step by step we are getting closer to meeting them. We talk about how I’m not in fact useless, but have survived at work for 3 hours when ordinarily I would have been in bed or zonked on the sofa. We focus on what I need right now to be more comfortable and realise I ought to get my pajamas on, I’m hungry and thirsty and the baby is sitting on my bladder this evening. We look at the money and see that were safe. We can’t fix the one about my identity, so we go downstairs and have a snack and watch Star Trek. And suddenly, somewhere between being in the middle of being stung by a thousand aggressive, disturbing, angry, disgusting, wild and rapid thought bees, to watching commander Riker lunging on a navigation console whilst flirting with a blue alien, the bees have drifted out the window, and we have survived another swarm. As I proof read this I realise how organised and structured that conversation sounds. It wasn’t. It was an absolute mess of tears and words and hugs. Only now can I see some of the things we did which helped, but at the time we were just two adults in a spare bedroom trying to survive the moment, seeing new parts of eachother and trying to navigate our way through. By looking back I have learnt that the sweetness comes from knowing the swarm always passes, that I am safe from those thoughts even when they hurt and overwhelm us, and I always find safety, rest and shelter in the arms of someone who loves me. Swarms are not my present reality, which when I can ground myself, is calm and safe. Much later I can look back and find more honey from realising how wonderfully creative my thoughts can be, as anxiety is the dirty side of a very beautiful imagination penny. Even if my creative mind is at this time of my life wild and weird, shocking and frightening, it’s still there and beautiful, and to give myself a break as my body is full of new hormones and, yes, you’ve guessed it, working on no sleep.

I hope you too can find sweetness somehow, not from your intrusive thoughts themselves as they will always be horrible, but once they’ve passed and when you’re able to feel calm again. Remember you must talk and share with a person you trust, and your midwife or health visitor can help too. Intrusive thoughts during pregnancy and postpartum is common and it’s vital to share your experiences. I have to explain that during both my pregnancy and postpartum experience, I was in such a bad place at times that I needed more than a hug, more than a cuddle or a hair stroke, I needed care, and my husband was the one that offered that immediate and practical support on top of the emotional support he provided. It’s an incredibly tough journey for those who live and love alongside people experiencing mental health challenges in pregnancy and postpartum, but that’s what your family and friends are there for. Looking back, I can see my husband didn’t just stand beside me and support me, he really carried me. At the time I felt so lonely, even with the support of my family and friends, but there was so much they were doing to keep me close and keep me alfloat. You just have to say, you just have to ask. Find that one person you trust and all you have to say is ‘I am in trouble, please can you help me.’ Sharing a troubling metal health concern like swarms of intrusive thoughts, is the first step to helping manage it.

You are so incredible sleepy mamas; your minds and bodies are able to endure so much. Reach out and share your painful thoughts, and remember the swarm will always pass.

Definitely go and watch some Star Trek now…