Tag: depression

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Holiday Nervosa

Why do the holidays always make me think of the whys and why nots of the metaphorical bombs I drop or would drop in the middle of the family tree amongst gasps and stares, the “Who knew?” on everyone’s lips…

It’s not that I have grenades to lob, necessarily, only that they wouldn’t understand, would see my words as the ramblings of the blackest sheep, the one we thought we knew, that we never knew at all.

After all, they made up their minds long ago, who they were, who I am, and these minds will never change. Some can never change, it would mean the giving up of all they once knew, and not gonna go there, no way, no how.

So, what’s better, lob the bomb and watch the shrapnel fly? Or allow them to keep on going on with their false notion of who I am, of what it is. Is it worth it in the end? Probably not. Likely not. Nothing good to come of it, nothing at all. Simply the satisfaction of being me, of watching the chips fall, of confirming their judgment and lack of understanding. It is what it is. It has always been thus.

Far better to just go on being me, a me so different from them as to defy all of their imaginations. Perhaps my time is better spent trying to understand why I even want them to understand. Why such a need to be felt and understood? Who cares? I mean really. Just my own neurosis acting up again. Pat it back down until the next holiday. Pack it away again, stuff it in a stocking.

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Ready to Say Goodbye to 2020

Blog Post: December 18, 2020

I’ve so much going on inside that it has made me almost entirely immobilized. Distracted, weepy, and needing desperately to write and word vomit it all out, to process.

Sigh.

This sucky bad no-good year. The virus and all that that entails, the extreme polarization in our world and our country. People pitted against each other, vitriol and hatred, bigotry, hate. Since I “zoomed out” or became more awake and aware of the world around me, (not sure how to refer to it) it’s been rough. I feel a lot like a small protected toddler who has been coddled and sheltered, opening her door and seeing nothing but hate, strife, war, blood, disease, death. I’ve begun to see the world for what it is, not just through a narrow, limited lens. I suppose this is a kind of awakening.

I cannot but miss the feeling of comfort and shelter I used to feel, even while at the same time, understanding how false it really always was. Though I know there is no going back (the world or me, myself) I do find myself looking for comfort, for peace. For that feeling that “all is right with the world” and I don’t have a ton of hope of things getting back to that. I suppose this is what one could call my “new normal”.

I don’t think I could even call it depression, but that would be an easy label to throw on it.

My father is not doing well. I’ve been processing a lot of old emotions and feelings from my childhood. Digging up bones. Processing old wounds. Feeling profound sadness and nostalgia and melancholy. This on top of everything else, well… it’s a lot.

But also, there are small good things. I can feel myself beginning to heal in some areas, and maybe just plain hardening and putting up walls, boundaries and defenses in other ways. Metaphorical scabs forming. Whatever it takes, I guess.

In the end, we are all human, we all find our ways to cope and get by. Writing and art journaling are my saving graces. If I didn’t have some way of getting things out, I’d surely go mad.

Going to get to see family at Christmas and we have all been isolating and being even more super careful than normal in preparation for it, but I need it. We will just walk the beach and chat and will avoid public places. I’ve always been a person that values quality of life, not just quantity, so, though it increases our risk a little bit, we have each determined it is a risk we are willing to take. After Christmas, I will be right back to locking myself down except for that which is necessary, (doc visits and the like.)

In the end (by this time in our pandemic) I have gotten back around to my first feelings on it… If and when I die, I will die. Not so worried about myself but don’t ever want to feel responsible for anyone else dying. Going to be careful and going to do what I need to do. Keep living.

Each month when I look over the calendar, I look at appointments or things coming up and say, “I just have to live through that.” Next thing that comes up, “Okay, just gotta live through that.” One day at a time, one outing at a time. And I do feel like (because of my isolated lifestyle especially), I am relatively low-risk.

My health issues are concerning, and may make me feel like a higher risk person, but over-all, I feel good about my chances of making it through the pandemic. I think sometimes it’s more about just getting through each day and its emotional and mental challenges, not getting too bored, or feeling too isolated, or too wigged out or full of anxiety. It’s hard for me to think beyond next week, beyond Christmas. I take one day at a time and that’s the only way I get by.

In times of stress and trouble in the past, I would always say to myself, “This too shall pass,” and remind myself that things can and will be good again. I try to tell myself that now, but I’m not saying it with a lot of conviction. I think there will be good times again, but I remain worried for the world at large. I think we humans have a lot coming up in our future. I hope to hell we’re ready for it.

But I am damned glad to say good-bye to this year. Maybe, just maybe, 2021 will prove to be better.

Cheers. Happy Christmas. Merry Holidays… I hope you get through, too.

Peace Out

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Broken-winged Butterfly

Today I am a broken-winged butterfly.

Right now I am dealing with five separate and highly annoying health issues, none of which I believe to be life-threatening, but all causing my life to be high-maintenance. When the summer and the onslaught of issues started (last month it was five but not the same five as this month, so it’s been a rough summer) I did my cocoon thing. When I get sick I tend to hold up in my bed for days. It’s my cocoon.

After the last several days I felt myself beginning to spiral towards depression (again). Health issues always take me there when I begin to feel overwhelmed.

But this morning was different. I chose different. I decided that today I would get out of bed and choose to behave as if life was okay. I got up and did my hair and got clean and dressed as if I were “normal.” As if I were going to go out in to the world of normal and be normal. And then I began to think, so, what if this IS my new normal?

Since being diagnosed with RA (an auto-immune disease) I have had a TON of trouble with my immune system not functioning well. I’ve changed my diet SEVERAL times before getting to a place where I feel I am eating the best I can for me and my body and to be able to maintain it for the rest of my life. I listen to my body.

One dramatic change, for example, was NOT eating sugar. I’ve had to give it up to a 90% degree. Some weeks it probably is more like 99% but sugar hides in everything and so is hard to escape entirely. I don’t do cakes and cookies and stuff, anything empty white sugar, because if I do, I immediately hurt. I have cut it from my life. (Sometimes during the holiday season I will try and make a no-low sugar alternative dessert, but for the most part, that is just gone from my life.) And this is just one example of many changes I won’t bore you with.

My body takes two to three times longer to heal when I get sick. It just does. So there’s that. I am becoming a germaphobe.

So, back to today and my current five issues. I decided I was going to live one day at a time, living as though I would have to deal with these issues for the rest of my life. Would I get up and take care of them and get on with it? Or would I give up and give in??? It was an “in your face” moment for me. (Thanks, Universe.)

All I can say is that for today I left my cocoon, and I took flight, broken-wings and all. My flight path was altered a bit. I flew in crazy swirly curly lines and slapped into things once or twice, but I’m flying.

One day at a time.

Thanks for listening friends and fellow butterflies!! (Keep flapping those wings!)

 

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Mindfulness and Choice

It seems to me, (and I’ve only myself and my own experiences  to go by), that any time I feel down or blue or depressed, its roots, (when I find the energy to dig them up), are in something that someone else did or said and the way I reacted to that event or conversation.  The roots are in how I was made to feel.

So when I pick at that thread, I must realize that I have given away my power in some way, to another. After all, I am not responsible for what others do or say, but I am responsible for how I react to it. So, if I give over my power by allowing others to control how I feel, then I’ve brought about my own depression, in a sense.

In the depressed moment, I am (consciously or subconsciously) choosing to focus on something negative that has taken place and the feelings I’ve attached to it.

So how do I stop this? The first step is realizing what is happening. There is some word or event that is stuck inside me, and I’m focusing on it.

I’m not sure I have yet discovered the answer in total, but I am feeling some relief by simply replacing negative thoughts (or memories) with positive ones. I’m making it a point to replay positive things others have said to me, positive truths I know about myself, over and over, to sort of replace the negative thoughts and feelings.

I know in my head that I am not a sum total of what others think of me or even of my experiences; at least, I don’t have to be. If messages are going to replay themselves inside my head/mind, then I should be the one to get to choose what messages those are.

So today I am practicing mindful choice; the choice to hear (on repeat) those things I choose to hear.

I’m sure I’m not nearly the first person to have such a realization, but coming to understand things myself, (rather than reading it elsewhere), seems to be key to my personal growth and understanding.

Today I am choosing to hear that I am loved, cherished, befriended, wanted. I am replacing the old with the new, the bad with the good.

And I feel good about it.