So I failed NaBloPoMo, after acing the last two. I just couldn't do it. Things are too chaotic right now, trying to finish school and not go completely crazy in the process, along with a general disinterest in recycling any of the stuff that's cycling through my head on a daily basis. Suffice to say that this has not been a season of peace, which doesn't bode well considering my general usual lack of same during the holiday season.
My heart is not yet unbroken it seems. I am frustrated and sad. I've been crying more than I like to admit and beyond that more than I just like to do. I've been having some problems with the things that typically cause me problems, or at least that have for the past ten years. I am an up-and-down sort of girl, with a desire to be more up, and it's frustrating that I can't seem to manage it for the long haul.
I'm not ashamed of admitting the biochemical short straw I drew. It's nothing I sought out and nothing I foster because I like it or I'm proud of it. Reams of better pages have been written about depression stating the case that it's a beast, that it's unmanageable, that it can make you feel like your one relatively insignificant human existence is the nexus of suffering that no other person has ever experienced or could relate to. I'm completely unmedicated now and not in a place to afford the time or money for therapy. I've tried the drugs and they intermittently worked and didn't, and I finally found that I wasn't that much better with them so I wasn't sure what I was trying to prove. I've been to exactly one out of five helpful therapists in my life this summer who is just too expensive for me but she gave me some tools that still help. I'm making it day by day with the effort it takes to examine negative thinking and flip it around, with mostly good choices that keep me in the company of people who have a good influence on me. I know the environmental and situational things that need to and in some cases will change very soon. It's just a matter of moving through the present moment and reminding myself in general to appreciate it except when I just can't.
I got into a bad place this week because I allowed someone who has always pulled too much weight with me to get into my head again. I suffered another short bout of imagined communion that is so, so embarrassing, always, in the aftermath - even if only I know about it. I don't really understand why this keeps happening because beyond sad it's just stupid.
I got together with a friend who has really been a godsend for listening and also talking to me about this for an obscenely long time, and I told him that in spite of my "everything happens for a reason" training I felt that this situation had had absolutely no redeeming value in my life, that I didn't feel grateful for it at all and just wished that it had never happened. I felt that I had already known and experienced the strength that It was supposed to bring me in the long run because of other things I'd experienced. Except for the fear that never entering into this relationship may have been that flapping of butterfly wings that caused an earthquake 15,000 miles away or maybe just would have meant I'd have been in the path of an oncoming car and died instead, I'm completely not grateful for it and wish beyond wishing that it had never happened. I can't imagine any purpose or any value that it has could outweigh the ridiculous amount of pain and suffering it's continued to cause for absolutely no reason at all.
My friend thought that was sad and quite frankly it is, but it's also what I know and believe to be true in this moment for me. It sucks. I don't recommend it. Here, have a beer.
See, I already knew to welcome love and be giving. I already knew to appreciate what I had, and I had already been rejected enough in my life that it just seemed cruel to have it happen on that insane level. I was ready to love someone for the long haul. I was ready to be there. And now I'm not. Now I have so little trust, so little belief in that experience for myself. It's the most significant and at the same time most glaring truth that I've gathered from the past couple of months of soul-searching. I've been told it's the wrong perspective to have. I say I can't help what I know. I say that as open as I am to life experience, which I have been for a long time and continue to be, I don't expect it to happen to me. And yes, I wish I'd turned a different corner (JUST where that's concerned. I'm glad I walked in the door of the place where I was, because it gave me other people who make my life so much better. I just wish I'd stayed away from particular departments.)
I've also been in this super-stressful daily work situation for a while now, and it's coming to a close so I'm hoping that will have a positive effect on my generally horrible state of mind. I'm also trying, really trying, not to close down socially which is what I have the urge to do lately but I know that's a guaranteed trip to the bad place. And I'm trying to be smart. To that end, I'm on the verge of booking a trip to Savannah for just after classes finally end, and I'll be spending Thanksgiving in San Diego. Other than that, I honestly have no idea where I'm going. For a long time I thought that would be freeing but for the most part it's time to reel it in a little. I don't ever want to be complacent, I don't ever want to be in a place where I'm bored with my life or thinking "this is all there is and ever will be," but I'm identifying a sense of needing to land, of needing to feel anchored with something at my center that I haven't had in a long time. It's been wearing me down progressively since I came back to Maryland in 1999, and almost ten years is long enough.
With all of the guidebooks and templates and rules of the road that exist, I wish sometimes they existed for the bigger stuff. And also that every time I wrote stuff like this I didn't feel the need to apologize for it, because if I don't have this space to store it I wouldn't have anything to look back on later when things are better and go, yeah - that time, I'm glad that time's over now.
(For instance, me a year ago - that time's over now too.)
My heart is not yet unbroken it seems. I am frustrated and sad. I've been crying more than I like to admit and beyond that more than I just like to do. I've been having some problems with the things that typically cause me problems, or at least that have for the past ten years. I am an up-and-down sort of girl, with a desire to be more up, and it's frustrating that I can't seem to manage it for the long haul.
I'm not ashamed of admitting the biochemical short straw I drew. It's nothing I sought out and nothing I foster because I like it or I'm proud of it. Reams of better pages have been written about depression stating the case that it's a beast, that it's unmanageable, that it can make you feel like your one relatively insignificant human existence is the nexus of suffering that no other person has ever experienced or could relate to. I'm completely unmedicated now and not in a place to afford the time or money for therapy. I've tried the drugs and they intermittently worked and didn't, and I finally found that I wasn't that much better with them so I wasn't sure what I was trying to prove. I've been to exactly one out of five helpful therapists in my life this summer who is just too expensive for me but she gave me some tools that still help. I'm making it day by day with the effort it takes to examine negative thinking and flip it around, with mostly good choices that keep me in the company of people who have a good influence on me. I know the environmental and situational things that need to and in some cases will change very soon. It's just a matter of moving through the present moment and reminding myself in general to appreciate it except when I just can't.
I got into a bad place this week because I allowed someone who has always pulled too much weight with me to get into my head again. I suffered another short bout of imagined communion that is so, so embarrassing, always, in the aftermath - even if only I know about it. I don't really understand why this keeps happening because beyond sad it's just stupid.
I got together with a friend who has really been a godsend for listening and also talking to me about this for an obscenely long time, and I told him that in spite of my "everything happens for a reason" training I felt that this situation had had absolutely no redeeming value in my life, that I didn't feel grateful for it at all and just wished that it had never happened. I felt that I had already known and experienced the strength that It was supposed to bring me in the long run because of other things I'd experienced. Except for the fear that never entering into this relationship may have been that flapping of butterfly wings that caused an earthquake 15,000 miles away or maybe just would have meant I'd have been in the path of an oncoming car and died instead, I'm completely not grateful for it and wish beyond wishing that it had never happened. I can't imagine any purpose or any value that it has could outweigh the ridiculous amount of pain and suffering it's continued to cause for absolutely no reason at all.
My friend thought that was sad and quite frankly it is, but it's also what I know and believe to be true in this moment for me. It sucks. I don't recommend it. Here, have a beer.
See, I already knew to welcome love and be giving. I already knew to appreciate what I had, and I had already been rejected enough in my life that it just seemed cruel to have it happen on that insane level. I was ready to love someone for the long haul. I was ready to be there. And now I'm not. Now I have so little trust, so little belief in that experience for myself. It's the most significant and at the same time most glaring truth that I've gathered from the past couple of months of soul-searching. I've been told it's the wrong perspective to have. I say I can't help what I know. I say that as open as I am to life experience, which I have been for a long time and continue to be, I don't expect it to happen to me. And yes, I wish I'd turned a different corner (JUST where that's concerned. I'm glad I walked in the door of the place where I was, because it gave me other people who make my life so much better. I just wish I'd stayed away from particular departments.)
I've also been in this super-stressful daily work situation for a while now, and it's coming to a close so I'm hoping that will have a positive effect on my generally horrible state of mind. I'm also trying, really trying, not to close down socially which is what I have the urge to do lately but I know that's a guaranteed trip to the bad place. And I'm trying to be smart. To that end, I'm on the verge of booking a trip to Savannah for just after classes finally end, and I'll be spending Thanksgiving in San Diego. Other than that, I honestly have no idea where I'm going. For a long time I thought that would be freeing but for the most part it's time to reel it in a little. I don't ever want to be complacent, I don't ever want to be in a place where I'm bored with my life or thinking "this is all there is and ever will be," but I'm identifying a sense of needing to land, of needing to feel anchored with something at my center that I haven't had in a long time. It's been wearing me down progressively since I came back to Maryland in 1999, and almost ten years is long enough.
With all of the guidebooks and templates and rules of the road that exist, I wish sometimes they existed for the bigger stuff. And also that every time I wrote stuff like this I didn't feel the need to apologize for it, because if I don't have this space to store it I wouldn't have anything to look back on later when things are better and go, yeah - that time, I'm glad that time's over now.
(For instance, me a year ago - that time's over now too.)
Some blog visitors can write really deep and meaningful comments. I'm not those visitors.
All I can say is hang in there and don't feel like you have to appreciate every moment, even if you feel it sucks. Sometimes things suck and it's okay to say "sweet merciful CRAP it sucks to be me this week."
I also like your scarf in the year-ago picture. :)
Posted by: Kimberly | November 16, 2008 at 12:35 AM
Thanks, Kimberly. It's feeling better today...this is all so DAILY. Yuck!
(Deep and meaningful to me = giving a damn enough to comment at all, so thanks.)
Posted by: laurie | November 16, 2008 at 02:07 AM
Why apologize? There is aboslutely no need. The writing tells a lot about being human.
Posted by: Linnea | November 16, 2008 at 11:09 AM
Oh, how I hear you. I have the Beast, too. It sounds as if you are doing all the right things in order to keep on keeping on, which is really all any of us can do. I'll be thinking about you.
Posted by: Grace | November 17, 2008 at 01:04 PM
It's the getting through the day that matters--using the new tools you've gotten, letting go of the negativity that doesn't need to be there. Hang in there, you're almost there.
Posted by: joannamary | November 17, 2008 at 11:47 PM
I'm not sure if this is helpful, but I know just how you feel, and when I'm trying to be more up than down I try to remember (which can get hard when you're in that place) that it's never down forever. Everything is temporary. Not in a bad way, but in a good way. The down won't last, it's not forever. It's finite.
The other thing I've gotten better about doing things that help keep me steady/up (also like you, no money for treatment, and don't want mood drugs) like getting enough B6, exercise, and other little diet/chemical balancing ways. It's easy to be harsh on yourself when you're in those dark places, so be merciful. Give yourself what you need. And if you need to put your thoughts here, you go ahead, and know you could even be helping someone else who might think they're the only person who goes through this.
Posted by: mia | November 18, 2008 at 10:40 AM
Thank you, lovely ladies.
Grace, hard to believe we've only met once. :)
Joanna - thank you, I know it's not easy for you now so I appreciate you taking the time to read my words.
Mia - I am trying so hard but in that place where the motivation to exercise is...well, it's like wakling through concrete to make myself do it. Things should change in a month and I'll be better able to do it again. So important now. I've never taken extra B6. And it's funny, I was thinking in the car this morning that of all the things I am to myself, "harsh" tops the list.
And really, for a long time I didn't write honest here because I was afraid of who would read it and it turns out that when I do it's always the better option. Thanks...I'm going to try to keep it up.
Posted by: laurie | November 18, 2008 at 06:00 PM