On thoughts provoked and drowning

So many wonderful posts have been written about the inaugural Aussie Bloggers Conference. You can read them here. It was an extraordinary weekend, it really was. There have been summaries, succinct and to the point, there have been blow by blow accounts, rambling and weaving, and there have been snapshots, posts that have captured a single (often hilarious or moving) moment in time. All these posts record, for all eternity, the Aussie Bloggers Conference in all its glory, for those like me who were there and those who were not.


I wanted to be among those early posts. I really did. But the demands of a Batsman very anxious upon my return, the daily slog of his early intervention program, a kinder committee meeting, a deluge of other stuff and nonsense all rolled up in a hangover just didn’t allow it to happen. More on that later.


The weekend provoked a lot of thinking for me and I remain in a neurological tussle to process and make sense of it all. Here’s the shorthand version of what it has made me think about.


• I met amazing women. Such a privilege to meet those I have long admired, read, cried and laughed with. And there was this guy, who I think is beautiful and funny.
• People are their blogs. Authentic, raw, gutsy, funny, moving.
• Why am I blogging? What it’s all for?
• What will I do about reviews and sponsored posts and the $ generally?
• Social media – tweet tweet
• Privacy – mine, my kids’, protecting all of us
• Do I really want my mum to read my blog?
• Keeping it real. Content is queen.
• Blogging as community. Extraordinary community.


Like I said, it was an extraordinary gathering. Thanks to the organisers who made it so.


So, it has taken me till now to blog about the conference. There’s a whole lot of reasons and I know I don’t need to make excuses, tell you why, justify my bloggy timetabling and all that but I think, through my insomnia last night I have got to some real stuff. I want to share it.


I haven’t blogged about the conference till now because in all truth, it made me a little bit sad, about me, about who I used to be, not so long ago.


Once upon a time, maybe a year or so ago, I would have been more confident, less anxious and fearful, more willing to let it all hang out, less worried about whether others would like me, more able to bounce around and introduce myself to people, more able to be in the centre of the action, less, way less, self conscious. It’s not so now and the conference weekend allowed me to see all that.


Truth is, once the adrenalin of the weekend faded a bit, what was there was sadness. Isolation. Fear. Overwhelm. Anxiety. All of it. Can’t really write that on a feedback sheet can you?


The last eighteen months has been tough, there’s no denying it. The Bowler’s birth and sleep depriving ways, confronting the Batsman’s diagnosis with autism and the craziness that has brought to our family life has all taken a toll. While I probably look to lots of people to be managing it all and coping with the rollercoaster ride, in reality it’s a struggle. It’s fucking hard in fact. And I am pretty damn good at saying to myself, “hey Suz, look at what that person is going through, you are ok, you’re lucky, get on with it”. I don’t let it in because that means loosening that very tight grip I have on it all. The old me, the one who was a little more carefree and a lot more fun; she has been hanging so tightly that she’s at least in part, disappeared from view.


But today, on the third day in a row of waking up feeling sad, teary and overwhelmed, I said to the Captain “I feel like I’m drowning”. Drowning in stuff that needs to be done, drowning in the pressure I feel to do all that I can for Batsman as he struggles through “autism town” and drowning under the weight of my own expectations of myself.


I walked on the treadmill at the gym this morning, with tears welling while Pat Benatar sang in my IPod about it being a cold world when you keep it all to yourself. Gawd, doesn’t that sound like a soapie episode? Does anyone cry while they are in the middle of a gym workout? Probably someone who is depressed and anxious and struggling does. And did I mention how utterly exhausted I am? All the way through my bones.


So here I am. I am putting it out there with all of you. The weekend was amazing and I am so grateful to have met so many gorgeous people. But it wasn’t all sunshine and roses for me. I want to be real about this and it’s so bloody scary to do that.


But I don’t want to drown.