It feels like I only blog when I'm going through a tough time. And maybe that's true, but this time it's a little different. I was going through a tough time, but I've come out on the other side and I want to talk about it because something kind of remarkable happened.
A lot of this blog is me talking about mental health and how Major Depressive Disorder and Generalized Anxiety Order are straight up bitches. My life is often in turmoil because of these illnesses and I write about it for two reasons. One, writing is my outlet, my passion, and even if no one reads it, it makes me feel better to have it Out There. To just say it. And two, I try to talk about what I go through so that if anybody does read it, and struggles with similar issues, maybe my experiences can help them. Show them that even though life can be shit sometimes, even when I've been at my impossibly lowest point, eventually I do come back up... one way or another. And they can, too. So the past month and a half has been one of those deep spirals into a dark place where I can hardly get out of bed, where putting a smile on my face is torture, and I just want to quit. Everything. Even life. Yes, just recently, I was plagued with thoughts of wanting to go to sleep and never wake up again. It was that bad. To others, it probably didn't seem like it. I mean, some people knew I was off, but nobody really knew how bad it was because I've spent my life perfecting an outside front that looks relatively happy and capable of dealing with pretty much anything. I don't like to let others see just how vulnerable and shattered I am on the inside. Been there, done that, it doesn’t go well for me. So, I keep it mostly bottled up, which I know isn't healthy, but it is what it is. Unlike most instances, this time I know what triggered it. I took on something new that overwhelmed and intimidated me; feelings that I've never been adept at handling well. And because I knew that failure at this new task would be very bad, causing a ripple effect through all aspects of my life, I was stressed to my limits. Some people saw this, knew what it was about, and did what they could to bolster me up. I am SO grateful to these wonderful human beings and you know who you are. I give my deepest thanks to you. Because I was so afraid of failing at this task, because I just don't accept failure in myself, I knew I had to do something to change the way I was thinking about things. It sounds easy, but anyone dealing with depression/anxiety knows how impossible it seems. I've tried talking myself out of feeling anxious more times than I can count and all it does is frustrate me because my brain is wired in such a way that logic and reasonableness can't penetrate it. You can give me a laundry list of reasons why worrying about something is useless and I'll nod and agree with you, because in reality those reasons are, well, reasonable. But it does nothing to actually affect how my brain processes the situation. Somehow, I always think I'm the exception to the rule; part of the miniscule percentage to which bad stuff happens. That sounds a little narcissistic, but depression likes to lead me into a doom and gloom mindset where I'm headed straight to the worst-case scenario. And even though the worst-case result rarely ever happens, my mind refuses to acknowledge that fact. Maybe there's a name for this type of thinking. Some weird disorder. If you know, please enlighten me. It'd be helpful to understand what I'm always fighting against. But. And this is a pretty big but. As I mentioned earlier, this time around, I managed an impressive feat... at least, impressive for me. I had a light bulb moment; a kind of self-awareness flash that floored me. And this moment of clarity? Genius thinking (haha)? It was this: nobody is going to save me. It's not possible. Only I can do that. Only I can truly beat the darkness back. Now, some of you may be thinking, "What? That's the big answer? Everybody knows that." And while that may be true, it was striking to me. Because I've spent a lot of my life waiting for doctors and therapists and family and friends to lift me up and dig me out of those dark pits. I'd flounder around in the blackness, gasping for air, struggling to just get a grip on something, anything, and I'd think there's no way I could save myself. I needed somebody to throw me a life saver, come by with a raft, get me out of there and help me survive before I drowned for good. Don't get me wrong, please. Doctors and therapists and all the loved ones I have definitely help me float. I can 100% guarantee you that if I didn't have them, I wouldn't be here today. But floating isn't the way to live life. Floating is meant as a brief respite. A chance to catch your breath before diving back in. It's not going to help you grow stronger and tougher so that the next hurdles you face don't take you out again. You have to be able to get back in the game. If you don't, if you let yourself drift along, it's all going to pass you by and you'll be left wondering where the hell all your time went. And then it'll be over. I realized I didn't want to do that. I didn't want to wait around for somebody to save me. I didn't want that. And when this realization finally sank in, I acted. When I don't want to do something or when I'm afraid of failing at something, I handle it with kid gloves. I look at it from afar, maybe shuffle around the edges of it for a while, but never really get into it, until I'm pushed in by the bigger fear of failing before I even get started. Obviously, this isn't healthy or productive. And I wanted to change this tendency of mine. So, I jumped in. I can even remember the morning when I decided. The mental pep talk, y'all... it was one of my better ones, I gotta say. I told myself that I was a unique person. Doing my own take on a kinda new thing. I didn't need to hold myself to a preconceived notion of success. I was taking the chance to create something of my own. I reached deep inside myself, found the damn courage I was hiding away inside, and jumped in feet first. And it felt really, really good. It wasn't like everything miraculously did a 180 turn and was sunshine and rainbows and magical unicorns. But, the clouds around me lessened a little bit. So, the next day, I did it again. And again. And again. Until, one day I blinked and realized I was doing this thing and I was doing it well. I had made it my own. My thing. That doing this (my way) instead of that (what I imagined perfection to be) isn’t necessarily wrong. It’s just different. And that is okay. I’ve always held myself to impossible standards and don’t ask me why because I can’t answer you. I don’t know why perfection seems to be the only acceptable trait for myself. It’s a huge trap that I continue to fall into. But here lately, I’ve made a tiny bit of progress on this front. Despite having made some mistakes on this new journey of mine, I’m still feeling good. They haven’t decimated me like maybe they would have before. I allow myself to be a little disappointed for a finite amount of time and then I tell myself to stop it, cut it out, I’m only human. And for whatever reason, it’s working. Now the clouds have lifted and I really do feel like I'm standing back in the sunshine. I'm soaking it in. Storing the peacefulness in my heart, so that I'll have it when thunderstorms inevitably roll back in. Because they will. And I'll be tested again. Thrown back down in the pit. But I think next time, when it does happen, I'll finally, finally have my own path to follow that leads me back up.
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