death and rebirth

Even though the last two holiday seasons were tough, I think this one was the hardest for me. I feel like I’ve already talked about that a little so I won’t rehash it.

Ever since my marriage ended I’ve had to grow in many ways I’m not sure I could have while we were together. With a recent depression (most likely brought about by burn out) I’ve decided I really need to refocus.

Do you ever feel like certain people, situations, books, etc come in to your life at a certain time and they’re all pointing to a similar message/lesson? I’m kinda feeling that on many levels. One of the things I’ve decided I need to do as a result is get back in touch with my spiritual side (which for me involves some level of earth-based practice). There is such wisdom in nature, and its cycles seem to correspond with our own stages of personal growth/change. It’s a new year. Winter is a time of death leading to new life. And tonight is a full moon, the “Cold Moon”. It’s a time to focus on self-discovery.

So, happy Cold Moon everyone. I hope the coming year (and others) are full of growth and self-discovery for all of us. One of the most freeing, empowering things we can learn is to be on our own and to realize our happiness and worth doesn’t have to be defined by another. Things are hard and lonely sometimes, but every new day brings a promise of new beginnings and more beautiful things we have yet to witness. Keep going. 

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summer’s rival

I’m not sure how to start this one, so I guess I’ll be blunt and say why I’m writing this.  I need an outlet, and I want to make a very clear point about mental health.  It’s a point I feel like many of us who struggle try to make over and over again, but it’s clear to me just from what I hear working in the field that not everyone is listening.  The only people who seem to get it are the people that struggle.  But I’ll get to that in a little bit.

If you’ve been reading my blog at all then you already know a few things about me.  I’ve had a lot of relationship shit happen over the last two years, including a divorce from a very long-term relationship, a break up with a guy who’d previously been a friend, and of course, you know I deal with anxiety and depression.  Based on a recent blog post you may also know I’ve come to hate the holiday season.

I just finished working three twelve hour days in a row, all three starting with a partial first shift, going home a couple hours, then working a full second shift.  Good times.  I had a feeling I would have a meltdown at some point because my anxiety and exhaustion have both been high, and I’ve had a few small episodes of crying/sadness and a more intense episode tonight.

Here’s the thing…it’s my first holiday season not doing anything with my mom.  It’s a long story, but I’ve needed space from her.  So that’s really hit me.  It’s still weird that I’m divorced now and don’t have my former husband, or a significant other in general, to share this time of year with.  I’m working a shit ton.  I’ve been consistently working 50-60 hours a week (and an occasional 32-45 a week) for over a year.  I recently (and incredibly briefly) got involved with a guy I admittedly have had a bit of a crush on for well over a year.  It looked like it would be a thing, and then it wasn’t.  He rejected me over something that, quite honestly, I believe is incredibly shallow to reject me over.  At the very least he could have given me a chance and gotten to know me more.  But I feel like complete shit about this, I feel dirty, I feel like who I am just doesn’t matter, and I fear rejection over this in the future.  Hell, I kinda thought this day would come eventually and here it is.  So yeah.  I’m just kind of over it with getting involved with people who (also) have shit that I’m very willing to look past because we’re all human, but these individuals just don’t have the same level of dedication, understanding, or commitment.  I try to remind myself that there’s more out there, but this is kinda all I know at this point and it’s hard to have hope.

So yeah.  Thanksgiving is done, Christmas is done, now I just need to get past this new years and valentines bullshit and I’ll be golden.  I’d like to think that anyway.

Twice in the last week I’ve been really slap happy and had an episode of serious laughter over stupid shit followed by tears.  Tonight it took a pretty dark turn.  I didn’t like what I was thinking or feeling, but those thoughts and feelings didn’t just start tonight.  Anyone who knows me knows how this past summer went, they know what I was thinking and just how dark things got.  Things have been rivaling that lately.  I haven’t called for help yet.  I seriously considered it tonight but I’m tired of talking to strangers about my shit.  I know the drill and I’m tired of it.

Here’s the thing: I’m trying to learn to accept that this will always be a part of me.  I’m an individual with depression and anxiety.  I try to remind myself that this will pass, but again, I feel those familiar doubts and it’s getting harder and harder to believe myself.  I don’t want to spend my life alone, but sometimes I think I will.  I feel cursed.  And people keep telling me time and again that I need to rest or I’ll burn out.  I kinda have no other option but to work.  I have a roommate (my ex husband).  And I still work my ass off paying off debts for vet bills, and paying for Claudia’s routine meds.  And to pay my other bills.  And a day will come that these things won’t be an issue anymore, but my car is also on its way out.  It’s a substitute for the truck that took a shit, but it’s also not super reliable.  Just as life goes, there will always be something.  I can’t rest.  But I so desperately need to.

So I guess the short story is that I’m feeling incredibly hopeless and things feel beyond pointless.  I want to believe this is just my depression talking, but my thought process seems pretty damn realistic and logical for the most part.  I just don’t see an end in sight to any of this, but my own personal resources are finite.  I feel like I’m coming undone and I just don’t know what to do anymore.  I did phenomenal when I got on the Lexapro.  Everything seemed to get fucked up right around the time I got on Lamictal (for potential type 2 bipolar, which might not even be a thing for me but unsure yet), and even though I improved a bit since going off of it, I’m still not myself.  This makes me wonder how much was the Lamictal and how much was me starting to burn out.  I feel dead inside.  I just want to feel something.  I want to feel alive again.  I want to feel something other than this figurative gaping hole inside.  I feel empty, and I feel pain  I have no idea where to start but I feel like in order to get what I need I have to do something that’s just not possible: take a bunch of time and do nothing.

So this leaves me with two extreme options, both of which involve just disappearing.  One involves disappearing to somewhere else, starting over, and living an incredibly simple and communal life because I feel like that’s the only way I might make it with some sanity.

Onto my second reason for writing this.  People have this idea of what depression “should” look like.  You know what it looks like for me?  I’m sometimes quieter and isolate more.  I’m more flat.  Sometimes I cry a lot.  Sometimes I can’t move.  Sometimes  I still maintain my dry humor, I just smile less.  It looks like being slap happy and goofy, including ridiculous laughing fits like I’ve had a couple times in the last week.  It looks like me making other people laugh all the time.  I had a resident at the assisted living job yesterday tell me she likes when I take care of her because I always make her laugh.  A coworker told me I was funny and that I could do stand up.  I make people laugh all the time.  I know I’m funny.  So, does this mean I’m happy?

Absolutely not.  Quite the opposite.  In fact, I’m intensely depressed.  I have to keep moving because shit needs to get done, and I’m quite honestly afraid at this point that if I do slow down I might not get going again.  The weight of it is too much.  I’m not okay.  Me and a lot of other people that you’d think were just fantastic until you started paying closer attention, or giving us the benefit of the doubt when we say how shitty we’re doing.

It’s not looking for attention.  It’s not begging to be saved.  It’s not laziness.  It’s not an act.  It’s real.

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To two of my biggest teachers, my former loves

Thank you. Not for hurting me and breaking my heart. Not for betraying my trust, my feelings of safety, to the point that the thought of eventually pursuing something I really want triggers a variety of feelings in me: fear, anxiety, ambivalence, and others I can’t put a name to. Not for making me lose a little more faith in people and their intentions (though admittedly, my ex spouse has given me hope in their ability to grow and be better, and has given me hope in many other ways through their continued support and friendship).

Thank you for teaching me. Sure, in order to learn some lessons I have to be willing to do so. And my desire to grow and be better is in my hands. Neither of you can take credit for that. Hell, you can’t really even “take credit” for hurting me, though you can own up to it. But you were both catalysts in me growing in some of the most painful and necessary ways I had to grow. I’m learning to be better. I’m learning what to do and not do. I’m learning what I do and don’t want. I’m regaining focus. I’m becoming healthier.  I’m learning. I’m a work in progress. 

Admittedly, I’m still pretty disgusted with one of you for reasons I won’t get into at this point anymore, or in more detail. It’s pointless. All I can do is what I can do, and you did your part, good or bad. Here we are for better or worse. 

I want to be better, and I want better for myself than the pain I’ve had. I want to have hope. It’s been an incredibly painful and at times lonely journey. It’s been catching up to me pretty hardcore lately, I haven’t been in a good space. But I’m trying and I’ll keep trying. Nobody else can do it for me. One of the most important lessons you’ve both taught me is how to stand on my own whether or not I’m ready, whether or not I want to. You’ve pushed me to find an inner strength I didn’t know I had.

I’m not thankful for the pain. I wish I could have grown without it…maybe eventually I would have ended up where I should be, but it would have taken more time and maybe even more suffering, more emotional (and dare I say even spiritual) deaths.

I wish I wasn’t here in this situation with this grief I’m still carrying. And yet I feel it’s led me to where I should be, and maybe I’m right where I belong.

Thank you. 

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Growth through heartbreak

Read an old blog post and it got me thinking. I think a lot lately about my life and where it’s going. Specifically, I actually wonder where the hell it’s going. Right now I focus on getting by and working my ass off so I can stay afloat. But there’s more to life than this.

I’m not really sure how to say any of this well, but I’m going to give it a shot. I’m not thankful for the lies, the betrayal, all the things my ex spouse did that messes with me to this day. It changes your worldview completely to learn you lived a lie for so long, and to have never seen it coming. I’m not thankful for this at all. I miss my husband. I miss the predictable safety of my old life. I miss feeling loved.

What I am grateful for is what came after all of the heartbreak. I found myself.  More specifically, I found a strength in me that I didn’t know I was capable of. I started building my friendships. I started focusing on myself. I felt like I was building a life around my needs instead of putting someone else’s first, or building my life around them.

I made some questionable decisions at times. Then I got involved with my now ex-boyfriend, a friend of a few years. That one still hurts. They both do. But this one really stings because I was learning to trust another (and myself) again. And because it felt right, deep down. Completely right. And it wasn’t. And even though a part of me is still in denial about how it ended and hopes he’ll get it together, I’ve given up hope. I need to focus on finding hope in myself. I need to focus on wanting better… someone who loves me the way I need to be loved instead of treating me like a burden. Instead of making me feel used. He was good in certain ways, but ultimately he was very bad for me. That’s hard to say. I still have feelings for him, but I’m trying to kill those feelings. As if he didn’t do enough to bring that about.

I’m not grateful for the hurt he caused. It’s pretty fair to say I feel even more emotionally messed up (fearful, afraid to love, questioning if others are truly good and if they are what they seem to be, etc) since what happened with him. I know what I want, and yet I’m so afraid. 

But out of all the heartbreak I’m continuing to find myself. I’m growing my resilience. I’m finding my voice, I’m growing my confidence, I’m learning that I deserve better and it’s okay to say what I want. It’s okay to say no, and yes, and I don’t know. It’s okay to take the lead instead of going along with those I trust. It’s okay to be, and to have feelings, and to have my own needs. 

I think about my future, and things are still up in the air. But through all of the pain I’m beginning to feel more free, I’m finding clarity. I don’t have all of the answers, and I probably never will. But now the only one holding me back is me…and there’s a freedom in realizing you are your main obstacle. Not to say I didn’t love either of them, because I did. I still do. Real love never dies. But we were on different paths. I’m on my own now. I’d love to find a partner who is resilient, wise, and who wants to make life an adventure. I miss the predictability of my old life, but predictability is boring. 

I’m learning to make peace with the idea that I can miss someone very much, and the life we shared, and the dream I once believed we shared (but later found out that was also lies). But I can miss all of this and still not only recognize we weren’t right together, but that a part of me feels relieved it didn’t work. I couldn’t have grown the way I have if we were together. The same goes for my ex-spouse. We’ve both found ourselves. As for the ex-boyfriend, who knows. 

It’s hard to say these things, but this is reality. Life is full of paradoxes, and this is one of them. Without heartbreak, I’d still wonder where I was going without a clue at all. Now, though I still don’t know, at least I can say I’m on my way.

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Starting over

Today I got my garden ready.  I know, big deal…right?  Well, it kind of is for me.  If you’ve been following my blog, you know the last couple years or so have been really hard.  If you haven’t, long story short I got divorced.  It didn’t actually happen until January of this year, but it’s been a hell of a process leading up to it.  Understandably, I lost interest in a lot of things I used to love, and gardening was one of those things.  Last year I briefly made an attempt to weed my raised beds, but I gave up before too much longer.  I didn’t do anything with the garden at work that my ex and I put together.  I basically stopped caring about everything.

I recently thought that another summer would pass without my garden.  I didn’t even start seeds this year, so anything I do plant will be started late, or I’ll just have to avoid certain plants altogether.  I decided that I needed to garden though, so I spent the last few days (particularly today) weeding my raised beds.  Some had weeds damn near as tall as me.  All but one were so thick with weeds I poked around with garden tools first to make sure no snakes were hiding in them (I’ve had a few blue racers hanging around my back yard lately).  It was a hell of a project, and incredibly tiring, but I finally got it done.  I wish I’d taken “before” pictures just to show how bad it was in comparison to how fucking awesome it is now.

I feel a bit silly getting all philosophical and shit, but I feel like I’ve made so much progress I may as well get a bit philosophical.  It’s awesome to slowly start getting my life back.  Shit’s hard sometimes.  I’m not suddenly “better”.  I’m still grieving the loss of my marriage.  My ex recently moved out, making this all real.  I’m living alone for the first time in my adult life, which comes with its own set of challenges (including working through old baggage).  Things are very hard financially, to the point I may need to ask for help soon.  I’ve been avoiding that like the plague, but pretty soon I’ll have no choice.

But in spite of all that, I feel like I’m coming to life again.  It comes and goes, especially since I already deal with anxiety and depression.  And admittedly, I’m kind of hating my job right now.  There’s a lot of stress, and I hate third shift.  I start full-time somewhere else in just under a month, and it’s second shift.  Much more doable.  I’ll become even more myself pretty soon…I just have to be patient.

So, to the point.  Sometimes, life feels impossible.  There are challenges facing us, and we feel like we’ll never be able to step up the way we need to.  Maybe we fear we won’t even survive it.  That’s where I was.  I never would have expected the betrayal I went through, least of all like I could have survived it.  I never thought I could handle working full-time because of my mental health.  Hell, I hated the simple, every day weeding in a garden.  Especially because it was something I had to beg my ex to help me with (and barely got help at all).  The big things and the smaller things are possible.  I survived.  I still have a home, I have my dogs, and I’m still trying to accomplish my goals.  I went through a ton of shit all at once, while working full-time thirds, of all shifts to be working while going through stuff.  I started growing all the friendships I’d been neglecting.  I started to feel like I actually had a community.  I even found love again, and I wasn’t even looking.  A friend of a few years turned into a partner, and I couldn’t be more grateful.  So much is still hard, but a lot is going right, too.  A big part of me died when everything happened, and as my sweetie would say, I “resurrected”.

I guess what I’m trying to say is that we can survive all the things we may not see coming, everything we fear we may not survive.  We can accomplish daunting tasks, even if we do it on our own.  I know so many of us struggle for so many reasons.  All I can say is this: find that tiny little shred of hope that’s buried in you and hold onto it for dear life.  Nurture it.  Hold on even when it feels like all is lost.  As long as you have a tiny bit of hope, as long as you have your life, you have something to hold on to.  Keep moving.

I thought I’d share some pictures from today.  My best girls and my dirty hippie feet while taking a break, my chickens, a giant spider (bigger than a quarter) I found in my raised beds, a toad I found, and the end result of the work.  It still needs touching up, but it’s so much better than it was.

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learning to be strong

When I write posts like this, I tend to write on a whim.  A little forethought goes into it, but usually I just tend to get a flood of emotions or ideas that I just need to put down somewhere so I can move forward.  This is one of those moments.

I have a lot I need to do.  Who doesn’t?  It’s a neverending fact of life.  My divorce was final in January, and I have yet to take care of the quit claim deed.  I tried…the day I got divorced.  I got a lot of things done that day, but not without coming home and having a good cry first.  I was quite ambitious to be honest, given what a shitty day it was.  The quit claim deed was the one big thing I didn’t take care of, mainly because all the people I went to for guidance didn’t know how the hell to help me.  So, onward.  I have to find someone.  I have to get my taxes done.  I need to go to the Boost store and figure out how the hell to get some kind of working voicemail on my phone.  I’m likely not going to keep the two vehicles I said I’d keep, I’ll just keep the truck and give my ex my car.  His is in shambles.  Mainly through his own poor driving choices, but still.  What do I need two vehicles for?  Plus the SOS just revoked the plate on the truck because by the time they got their asses around to checking to see if it was insured, I’d already put the insurance back on my car.  Instead of dealing with the back and forth mess, I may as well only  have one vehicle to worry about.  And hope to hell nothing happens to the truck for a long, long time.  I’m broke.

“Broke” just about sums up how I feel in a lot of ways right now.  Financially, emotionally, completely fucking broke.  I did well for about half of January, most of February, and half of March.  Here I go again.  I’ve been thinking a lot lately about resilience.  As depression does to us, I find myself thinking the usual philosophical shit.  What is this life of mine?  Where is it going?  What happened to the activist I used to be, and should I join other activists again?  Will I ever be happy?  Will anything ever make sense?  Will I be okay?

I think about all of the shit I went through starting in October 2015.  I was always emotionally fragile, even before that.  Even though I’d been through some things that really did mess me up emotionally, I’d lived a relatively “simple” life.  I looked at other people and all the shit they had to deal with on a daily basis and felt like a shit for breaking so easily over so little.

Well, I learned a lot about myself starting that October when my marriage started falling apart.  I learned even more when I got another blow in December, and more yet the following March (just over a year ago) when I decided to get divorced after getting more shit dropped on me.  Never had I felt so close to going to the hospital and asking to be placed somewhere. Every day I wanted to die, and every day I was pretty sure that I would.  I thought about how I would do it, and I wasn’t sure whether or not I “had the guts” to do it.  But the fact that the thoughts were so persistent scared the hell out of me.  Somehow, I made it.  I didn’t want to go to a psych hospital for an unspecified amount of time and miss work, but most importantly (for me), I didn’t want to depend on someone else to take care of my dogs for however long until I got out.  My ex assured me he would, my mom said she would, but the dogs also helped pull me through.  Claudia is so completely dependent on me because of her health issues.  And she’s my shadow.  Willow comforts me every time I’m not well.  I didn’t know how I’d do without them around.  Working in a crisis home and knowing how the system works also made me not want to go.  I wouldn’t be too compliant with meds.  I’m a wuss when it comes to side effects, and it seems like I always experience the harshest ones right off the bat.  I don’t want to deal with a smartass psychiatrist telling me I need to stay on something that makes me feel like sleeping 12+ hours a day, or something that makes me nauseous, or something that makes me feel nothing at all.  When I’m well, and even when I’m not, I’m always moving.  I can’t have something slow me down like that.  How’s that an antidepressant when it depresses you more?  No thanks.

So, somehow I got through it.  Lots of crying, lots of writing, screaming into a pillow, crying some more, talking, and just forcing myself to keep moving.  There was a lot of forcing myself to keep moving.  I really, truly don’t know how I did it.  I talked to my mom a lot, but I was wearing her down.  It would, quite honestly, wear anyone down.  She honestly wasn’t always kind, though, in how she told me I was wearing her down.  It got to a point where, months later (this past December to be specific) I realized I had to put more space between her and I for self-preservation.  Even when I was doing well, if I had one bad day after holding myself together for a long time, I got shamed for it.  Epically shamed and made to feel like something was wrong with me.  I can’t handle that anymore.  So it was a rough year.  My two closest relationships changed, for the worst.  All of this, as well as other shifts made to accommodate the bigger changes, forced me to grow.

With all of the pain also came a lot of comfort.  I learned who my friends were.  Quite honestly, they were there all along.  I was just so wrapped up in my marriage that I didn’t have much of a life outside of it.  I realized just how bad this had gotten and worked to change it.  I became closer with a lot of my friends.  Nikki was (and continues to be) my closest friend.  Even though we don’t really hang out outside of work, she has a presence in my daily life.  We talk pretty much every day, we support each other through shit, and she really helps me feel like I’m not alone.  I’ve always admired her strength, and I continue to.  She’s always been someone who’s inspired me to push through hard times.  I’ve watched her through her struggles and thought, if she can do it, so can I.  I’ve had so many other friends step up and be here for me.  Friends who’d make time to check in with me and see if I’m okay, friends who’ll try to help me safety plan.  Friends who cheer me on and help me to remember that brighter days are ahead.  Friends who went out of their way to be around me when I wasn’t well.  One of them is now my partner.

He and I are both learning so much about ourselves, and each other, and strive to build a healthy relationship.  It’s challenging at times because we both struggle personally and we both want to support each other, even when we’re struggling.  We’re both learning a lot.  I feel awful for what a mess I’ve been lately, and for how it’s affecting him.  He’s very supportive (without being enabling) and incredibly loving.  We’re figuring some things out, and while we stumble at times, I think we’re doing pretty damn good overall.  He’s everything I’ve wanted, though he can be intimidating at times.  Not in a bad way, and not because he’s forceful in any way.  He just challenges me to be the best version of myself…partially because he actively challenges me, and partially just because of who he is.  I want to be better anyway, but being with someone like him really makes me want to be the best I can possibly be.  He deserves it.

So, I’ve had a lot of bad things happen, but also a lot of good.  Both of them can be challenging because both bad and good situations can force us to grow.  Needless to say, I’ve been pushed outside of my comfort zone in countless ways.  I’ve learned I’m stronger than I would have ever thought possible.  I’ve learned what it means to be resilient.  Sadly, I’ve been struggling to find that resilience lately.  For whatever reason I’ve been sinking into another depression, and my anxiety has been downright awful.  I’ve found myself feeling, once again, like everything is futile.  I’ve been panicking about random things that aren’t cause for panic.  I’ve been clingy and untrusting.  I’ve been angry and bitter.  I’ve been a lot of things.  I don’t know what’s going on, but it makes me so mad at myself because of how it’s affecting literally everything.  I don’t feel like myself at work, and I struggle working with people that don’t have the same work ethic as me because I’m already overwhelmed with the simplest of tasks.  My mental health is definitely taking a toll on my boyfriend, and I feel like I don’t deserve him (which he says is “nonsense”).  I feel this overwhelming desperation, helplessness, hopelessness…so many bad things.  My friends continue to be amazing and supportive.  My partner’s love and unending support is incredibly healing.  But obviously, something inside of me needs to be fixed, and only I can figure out what and how.  I’m trying.

Part of what bothers me so much lately is something that’s completely out of my control.  You know how I’m talking about resilience, and how I learned I’m stronger than I ever thought possible?  You know how I talked about previously feeling like a shit because life was decent and I still struggled?  Well, I’m dealing with some people lately who are also struggling.  Many of them have shit going on.  Technically, they all have shit going on. But for a couple, I just can’t understand how it’s all so debilitating for them.  Their current state may be the result of bad choices they made, and now they’re dealing with it.  I try to empathize, but I struggle.  Honestly, I’ve been that person who’s made bad choices and then had it really affect my mental health because I felt like an asshole.  I guess it’s hard to relate, though, because they have breathing room.  A lot of it.  Sometimes more than enough.  I don’t.  I work, all the damn time to be quite honest.  Contrary to what some particularly gutsy people have said, I don’t just “get used to” working all the time like I do.  Nobody gets used to not having the space to just fucking exist, especially when you’re dealing with mental health issues on top of it.  I’ve been working around 50 hours a week for the past month, third shift no less.  I’m trying to cut myself down to 40-45 hours a week lately, even though there will be financial consequences for that.  I truly believe, however, that there will be mental health consequences more serious than my current state if I don’t let myself breathe really soon.  I’m not well, at all.  Everything is about balance.  This is a lesson I’ve been working on learning for over a year, and Damhan and I both consider it a priority now.  I’m glad we can understand each other like this.

I’m trying to learn to check myself.  I’m trying to be patient with those who haven’t learned to develop the resilience I’ve been forced to develop.  I try to remember that I was once them.  I do really wish, though, that people realized you don’t develop resilience when you’re damn good and ready.  You have to do it when life is happening.  You have to step up and stand with those around you, help them out, and make yourself do things that are challenging.  It’s the only way to grow.  There’s such a thing as being easy on yourself when fragile so you don’t break, but there’s also something to be said for bending and stretching yourself so that useful growth can occur.  It won’t be comfortable, but it will be worth it.  I can’t teach this to anyone…it’s something they have to learn for themselves, just like I did.  All I can really do is check myself, live my life, and support others however they need to be supported and try to be a decent example of a good person.  I fall short, a lot.  But I try.

I’m trying to be patient with myself.  I’m trying not to hate myself when I inevitably fuck up.  I try to check myself and realize when I’m repeating old, toxic patterns.  I try to admit when I’m wrong and correct myself.  I’m trying not to be a burden to those around me, even though I feel like one anyway.  I so want someone to just walk with me, in my physical presence, in my daily life and help me through.  Just be present.  Sounds legit I guess, but also possibly codependent.  So I try not to be too clingy.  I tried reaching out to a few people when I was falling apart at work the other night (thankfully everyone was sleeping or I would have had to pull myself together somehow).  Nobody responded, so I texted the crisis text line.  Even that took a while for a response, partially because Boost is shit and doesn’t appear to support it.  So I sent them a facebook message and got help that way.  I felt pathetic, literally wanting to say, “help” because I didn’t know what else to say.  It was the only word that came to mind that summed up exactly how desperate I felt in that moment, but I didn’t want to seem dramatic.  So I dumped my recent worries on this dude instead and told him how hopeless I felt.  The conversation started out a little weird (he inserted his own judgment, which was not only unnecessary but a strange one) and I questioned him on it, and it quickly improved after that.  The conversation helped me get through that crisis, and then I was just numb.  Better than completely panicking and feeling like I was going to crumble.

I guess all I can say is this: we’re resilient.  More than we think.  We need to fight…and fight like hell.  Reach out, learn, grow, and push ourselves.

I know I’ve talked about a lot in this post, and it’s a little rambly (which I guess is my style these days).  Please feel free, as always, to share your experiences and lessons learned.

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Time moves ahead, life goes on

I was looking at my sweet Willow this morning (pictured below).

I’ve noticed this before, but it really stuck with me today: she’s got quite a bit of white fur coming in.  It’s probably not noticeable in the picture except what’s on her nose.  I really don’t care to be honest…I think the white fur is adorable.  It’s one of the things I find most endearing about my older dog, Claudia.  It just reminds me that my “puppy” is aging (for the record, I call both of them puppies, though Claudia gets the proper title of “old puppy”).

Willow was roughly a year old when we adopted her, and we adopted her nearly five summers ago.  It occurred to me this morning that in another 2-3 years she’ll be considered a senior.  That’s hard to wrap my head around.  She’s still very much a puppy in terms of behavior, but it’s also jolting just how quickly time moves forward and things change.

As I thought about my aging dog(s), I thought of a lot of things.  I think about how I wish I had more time to spend just living.  She cuddled with me a lot this morning, like she missed me.  I’m probably just losing my shit…she sees me every day.  But I work a lot at night, and I sleep a lot during the day.  Life has changed so much for them since my marriage fell apart, and especially since I started third shift.  Everything is different now.  I also tend to work a good 50 hours a week, mainly at my full-time job, though I pick up the occasional second shift at the part-time one.  There’s just hardly any room to breathe anymore.  So, in looking at Willow and thinking about everything that’s changed…I remember begging my ex to be cool with adopting her.  He wasn’t really on board at first, and I bribed him by saying I’d be cool with getting another cat.  It’s funny that it took another few years until that actually happened, and even then it was because I suggested it (I’m not really a cat person, in case that’s not obvious).  But we finally got another cat.  His name is Astraeus, or “Mr. A” as I call him.

Anyway, stuff.  I thought about time passing and things changing.  How different things were five years ago.  I can’t really recall the context, but I remember often saying this to my ex husband: “there’s never enough time”.  I feel like I said this a lot in the last year or so of our relationship.  I’m not sure why.  Maybe I was panicking, maybe I realized what was happening.  But I feel that sentiment a lot these days.  I feel it as I watch my dogs age and I spend so much fucking time working and sleeping.  I feel it after losing one of the biggest relationships of my life.  Though I hesitate to call it a complete loss.  Much to my surprise, my ex and I are still pretty close friends.  That said, I think back about a lot of things and how I wish I could do some things different.  Yeah, his repeated dishonesty and betrayal is what ultimately led to this, but I don’t think he’s a bad person.  I still love him as a friend and treasure the time we shared together and how we were there for each other through a lot.  As much patience and forgiveness as I showed through to the end (and even now), he had a ton of it for me throughout our relationship.  I could be very difficult sometimes, and I was lucky that he stood by me through a lot of shit.  I’ll never forget that.

So in my “busy-ness” lately, I find I haven’t been properly grieving this loss.  The loss of what was, even if I’m still lucky enough to have a close friendship.  We’d been together nearly half of my life up until now.  Even if I didn’t completely lose him, I still experienced a profound loss I never thought I would.  I want to make sure I allow myself the space to properly grieve this while not putting a stop to the rest of my life, to the point that I don’t focus on what is right now.

In terms of time, I think about my new partner.  I’ve known him for nearly four years, he used to be a coworker at my job in crisis.  I started developing feelings for him over recent months, though it’s hard to pinpoint exactly when it started.  I used to think we were quite different, him being a religious libertarian and me being a liberal atheist.  I was quite wrong about how different we are, and I’ve begun to realize that as he’d become a closer friend over the last year.  He was wise enough to keep his distance given his feelings (which were there for quite a while) and the situation I was going through.  I respect him so much for that, among other things.  I’ve always wanted to be with someone who was emotionally wise, strong, and focused on personal growth.  He wanted much the same, and it really blows my mind that what I was looking for was right in front of me all along.  I’m grateful things unfolded as they did…we’ve been together just over a month.  I wouldn’t have had it any other way, I genuinely believe it wouldn’t have worked had things unfolded differently.  I’m beyond grateful, and honestly shocked, to have found someone who’s such an amazing fit for me, especially this soon, and it was someone I already knew.  Life can be sad sometimes, but also so beautiful, in how everything happens.

I think a lot about my parents, too.  This is a hard one to write about to be honest, and I’m not going to go into great depths here.  Some who read this may choose to take offense, and I’m not trying to offend or dirty anyone’s name.  It’s something I think about every damn day, and it’s time I get it down somewhere.  I think about how my relationship with my mom has changed…especially since my marriage imploded.  I know that, much of the time, she tried to be supportive and just didn’t know how.  She wasn’t always receptive to my feedback (which was honestly just feedback, not the attack she chose to see it as).  The distance between us grew, and now she hasn’t spoken to me in nearly two months.  The last time I tried to initiate a conversation and just asked how she was, she completely blew up at me.  The last time we’d talked before I attempted to initiate this conversation was a week prior, when I was honestly a bit freaked out that she’d made a mistake with Claudia’s meds that resulted in her getting an extra dose of two heart meds and two diuretics.  The most “obnoxious” thing I said in this exchange (in my opinion, anyway) is that “Tuesday morning meds are quite different from Monday noon” (she’d given Claudia meds in her pill container for Tuesday morning instead of Monday noon).  I’d explained it pretty clearly and my mom had done noon meds for Claudia numerous times before, so I didn’t foresee what happened.  Either way, I called the vet, Claudia was fine, I just needed to watch for weakness due to a potential drop in blood pressure, and also potential dehydration.  I think my mom felt pretty bad about this mistake, but instead of completely owning it she tried to say we both messed up (not technically true, at all) and continued to lash out at me a week later when I tried to just talk with her like normal.

I love my mom, and it really, really eats at me that I don’t have the kind of relationship with her that I want to have.  I’m honestly just at a loss.  It’s so hard to constantly be walking on eggshells, and then be accused of being the one that makes somebody feel like they’re walking on eggshells (because I tell her how her words and approach make me feel).  It’s hard to feel like no matter what you do, you’ll catch hell for it.  Even attempting to move forward from the bullshit and start a simple conversation.  Nothing I do is good enough.  It never has been.  Okay, maybe that’s not true.  It’s been completely dependent on what mood she’s in.  My mom has been my biggest supporter and best friend in so many ways.  She’s also hurt me a lot.  Shit happens, and I feel like we can all move forward should we choose to be accountable and address our hurtful behavior instead of repeating it.  That’s where the trouble lies.  Things don’t change.  I feel like I’m growing, I’m becoming more assertive, and I’m establishing better boundaries.  So, because she’s not responding well to that our relationship suffers.  I make no claim to be perfect…sometimes her critiques of me are dead on.  But so often I feel like I’m just a punching bag.  I’m realizing more and more just how much that shit broke me down.  I didn’t realize until me and my ex got together just how poorly I was treated at times.  So my ex got to deal with that baggage that he had nothing to do with.  And now my boyfriend is dealing with all that old baggage, plus newer baggage.  The good news?  I’m more experienced now, more insightful, wiser.  I don’t expect perfection from anyone, I just expect someone to put in at least as much effort as I do.  That’s a big part of where things broke down with my ex (and my mom I believe…though I’m not sure she realizes what she’s doing) but I feel like my boyfriend and I are “equals” in this way.  I’m going to steal his terminology there because it simply works.

So, I think about that a lot.  The relationship I used to have with my mom, and how nonexistent that relationship has become.  I figure, what’s the point in reaching out now…get my head bitten off again just for trying?  I’m too fragile, I can’t handle being criticized anymore.  I got cut down for trying to talk with her, cut down because of how I was grieving the loss of my marriage (mainly because it wasn’t on her time table, and also it was the holidays…a hard time for anyone I’d imagine), and cut down for any other little thing.  I don’t need to be broken down any more and told all the ways I don’t measure up to some impossible standard of perfection that no one could possibly live up to.  I’m weary of it, and I’m done.  It’s been quite painful to come to the conclusion that the best thing for me to do for myself at this point, at least emotionally, is not reach out to her while I’m fragile.  If we’re to have a relationship at this point, I need to let her reach out to me.  That’s obviously not happening, and who knows if it will.  It truly breaks my heart that it’s like this.  I just need supportive people right now, not people who’s meanness makes me wish I could permanently disappear.  I have so many supportive people in my life right now…so many.  No one can take mom’s place, they never will.  But I need to guard my heart.  Advice straight from mom in other circumstances.  It’s sad I have to apply it here, too.  I know a lot of her behavior is based on her own pain and her lack of insight to what’s going on.  I truly want to be understanding.  Admittedly, it’s hard sometimes.  I’ve pointed this out to her time and again, it’s adversely impacted most of her close relationships.  If this isn’t a wake up call to her, I don’t know what will be.  I wish I knew how to handle this, and if there’s a way I could be handling it better.  It feels like a shitty situation all the way around.

I also think about my relationship with my dad.  We weren’t close when I was younger.  He wasn’t perfect, of course, because nobody is.  I wish he’d handled certain situations differently.  That said, he’s become wiser.  I know he made mistakes, but I also realize some drama was created between he and I that simply didn’t need to be.  It’s impossible to make up for lost time, though I wish we could.  We’re a lot closer now than we’ve ever been, and it freaks me out it took so long.  He’s 61 now, will be 62 later this year.  Time goes so damn fast.  He’s still a mystery to me in so many ways, and I often wish we were closer than we are now.  As we’ve gotten closer, I’ve realized I’m much more like him than I could have ever imagined.  And I’m proud of that…I respect my dad, a lot.  Sure, I don’t agree with everything he says or does, but he’s pretty damn wise and pretty awesome all the way around.

I think a lot about time these days.  When everything changes so quickly, it’s really easy to think about.  Hell, I turned 30 last summer, and I realize I’m now closer to turning 31 than I’m closer to the day I turned 30.  And where is my life, exactly?  It’s not bad, not at all.  It’s just not what I expected, either.  And I have no idea where it’s going, and there’s a part of me that’s terrified to plan anything given where that’s gotten me.  I know I shouldn’t be afraid.  I shouldn’t expect life to surprise me in bad ways, especially since I’ve been surprised in some pretty amazing ways at the same time my marriage was imploding. I suppose it’s all about what I choose to see.

I suppose I should probably stop writing for now.  This has the potential to head in a toxic direction pretty quickly if I don’t stop it.  I don’t want to be toxic, to always focus on the negative, to dwell on what was so much that I lose sight of what’s right in front of me.  No, I want to live, and live well.  To do that I have to continue learning every day.  It has been painful, and it will continue to be painful.  But it can also help me avoid a lot of pain, it can lead to something more beautiful than what I’d ever imagine.

Thank you to anyone who’s taken the time to read this mess of words.  This is a lot more than I’d planned to put out there today…serious verbal diarrhea.  It was great for me to (finally) get it out, and I hope maybe it inspired some of you as well in one way or another.

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patience and hope

Today marks one month since I got divorced.  I didn’t expect to be doing as well as I am with all of it.  I wrote a bit in my “morning pages” this afternoon about some of these things, as well as other things I’m not going to discuss here.  It’s so unexpected, and quite honestly amazing, to actually have some hope for the future.  It’s not something I’ve experienced for quite some time until lately.

I’ve found lately that the key to just about everything is patience.  That and persistence.  When this all started going down, I wanted nothing more than to die.  I wished to whatever forces might be out there and able to hear me that something would happen and I could just be put out of the misery I was experiencing.  I’ve dealt with depression my whole life, but it seemed completely hopeless when the one person I thought I could count on gave up on me and did everything he did.  But I kept going because I felt like I had to.  And I had this tiny, tiny bit of hope that maybe someday things would get better.  I wasn’t expecting it, but I wanted it to.  That’s what kept me going.  That and some absolutely beautiful, amazing people.  I’m not as alone as I thought I was.  Sometimes I still have my moments that I feel that way, but I know it’s just the depression talking.  While I’ve had some people, one in particular, that said they’d be here for me and have really put me down for experiencing what I feel, for the most part everybody else has meant it.  A couple in particular have opened my eyes to new things and helped me remember who I was underneath all the shit that I was experiencing.  They continue to help me grow into who I’ve always wanted to be.

I’ve learned things are possible that I never expected.  I never would have thought I’d see a light at the end of this.  That I could dream of a future that didn’t include him.  That I would join a spiritual community that accepts me as I am and that opens me up to new things.  That I could entertain certain perspectives.  Some things seemed impossible…to dream of a future where I could still accomplish what I wanted, a future when I could let my guard down and love again, a future where things could work out if I was just patient with myself.  Honestly, that’s what a lot of it is about.  Patience.  I refuse to beat myself up anymore because of the shame certain people, really one in particular, wants me to feel about anything I do or don’t do, say or don’t say.  We can’t live according to what someone else wants, friends.  We can try, but it’ll destroy us in the end.  And sometimes what they want for us (or rather, from us) is based on their own sickness that they refuse to come to terms with.  It’ll destroy us if we let it.  It might anyway because we realize certain things are just out of our hands.  As much as that hurts, it’s okay.  I’m far from perfect, but I’m learning we can only do what we can, and just be what we expect others to show us.  Kind and open, loving and forgiving.  Patient.  Hopeful.  We’ll slip up sometimes, it’s to be expected.  But we have to learn and keep moving forward.

We can’t live according to what society expects, either.  Well, maybe some of you can, you choose to, etc.  If that works for you, cool.  Unfortunately it doesn’t work for me.  And I’m learning to accept that, too.  It’s okay not to have it all figured out now, even if this culture says I should have had it figured out before I left high school.  I don’t have it figured out.  Especially after burying myself in all the shit I was buried under for years.  It’s okay to take the time to figure it out.  And surround myself with the right people in the process, people who share my dreams instead of just pretending to like my ex did.  People who I can learn from and who are open to learning.  People who’ve actually said they’d be that light if I couldn’t see it myself, and they’ve lived up to that.

I find myself caught up in wanting to move forward on certain things.  I find myself getting impatient, and I catch myself.  It brings me back to the al-anon meetings I started going to with my stepmom for a while there.  “Easy does it.”  Things will work out as they’re supposed to.  I just need to have patience, keep my heart and mind open to new opportunities, and be ready to step outside of my comfort zone when the time is right.  That’s another thing I’m learning…to trust my intuition on these things.  We know it when we feel it, we just need to listen to it.

This song has been on my mind a lot lately, especially the last couple days.  I’ve liked this song for as long as I can remember, but it really hits my lately.  Things are starting to make sense.  It’s beautiful.

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Patience, patterns, relationships, and burn out

I came across this tonight and it got me thinking.

I think about my failed marriage, obviously. I know I did what I could to save it. I look back at mistakes throughout the marriage and all the times he stood by me. I wonder if I was so difficult that I deserved to be lied to and hurt. I know deep down that this isn’t true. But I still wonder.

My depression is back. Sometimes it’s hard to enjoy the fleeting happiness when I know how quickly it’ll be gone, and it really didn’t take long. I know sleep deprivation doesn’t help. It was all I could do to hold myself together at work last night, I cried on and off for the first 2-3 hours of my shift. Everything just hurts so much and I can’t begin to express just how tired I am of existing anymore. The fucking shit never stops, it never goes away.

But that’s not what this was supposed to be about. This is about relationships…I use the term very broadly. I think of all the times people could say they’re fed up and walk away from me. I feel like a burden, most of the time. I feel like a failure. I feel like I’m that person that could disappear and it wouldn’t really matter. I’m invisible. Which is fine sometimes, but right now I really need somebody who understands and I feel so fucking alone. So I try to be the person for others that I wish I had. And I know I fall incredibly fucking short more than I want to. But I try.

Sometimes I fear I try too hard. I’ve noticed a disturbing pattern. When my ex and I split before we got married, I very briefly got involved with somebody who turned out to be quite controlling and thought he knew what was best for me. My ex never, ever was the abusive type throughout our relationship. It was the very end, with all the lies and dragging my emotions through the mud, learning repeatedly that everything I thought I knew was a lie, and being gaslighted repeatedly, that I realized emotional abuse was going on. It destroyed me. Not too long after we split I got involved with the wrong kind of guy and a not very ideal situation. I wasn’t thinking. He knew it. It didn’t take long for me to realize I was dealing with a textbook narcissist, but I hoped I was wrong. I wasn’t. He was emotionally and verbally abusive, but before that was all the “love bombing”. The whole situation was disorienting. I could say more but I’d rather not…this will always be one of those situations I wish I could undo.

I haven’t been romantically involved with anyone since. I’ve gotten emotionally close with a few people though. But I see a pattern. These people haven’t been verbally or emotionally abusive…not even close. I’ve just noticed I attract, and am attracted to, people that share certain qualities. These people are amazing people, though I was quite honestly disappointed with how one in particular pretty much completely cut me off once our friendship served its purpose to him. He got back with the ex and didn’t have to live with me anymore, so I basically let myself get close to somebody only to be discarded. I’ve noticed a strange pattern of narcissistic tendencies coming in and out of my life. I see that pattern, among other ones I’m seeing. (I should say, not all of the people in my life are like this…just enough to see a pattern.) Sometimes I think it’s just that people are going through shit. We all have the potential to be a slight ass when we’re going through shit. Hell, I got pissed at my ex tonight and realized shortly after that I was probably a bit harsh. 2-3 hours of sleep doesn’t help. 

But yeah. I’m trying to figure out what exactly it means to have good boundaries to protect myself emotionally. I never, ever want to be one of those selfish people that only considers my feelings, wants, etc and says to hell with others. But I’m thinking a little bit of healthy selfishness doesn’t hurt. When I’m drawn to somebody, I jump in both feet if I trust them. And that can be a problem. I walk this fine line between wanting to be guarded and wanting to connect in a real way. There are so, so few people I connect with the way I want to. And I feel like I’m even losing those connections. I don’t know. I don’t want to, but there’s only so much that’s in my hands.

Which is another struggle for me. A lot has happened personally, so obviously I want something I can hold on to. I’ve tried time and again to remind myself that what I need to hold on to is in me. And maybe somewhere outside, one of the few places I can get truly grounded.

So here’s what I’m really trying to understand. Why am I drawn to certain personalities and situations? Why do I have certain issues, like trust and confidence? Honestly, I can think of one possible explanation from my past. I won’t go into it here. I just don’t know how to sort through it all. I want to be healthier and yet I feel like I keep self-sabotaging. And I want to remember it’s okay to look out for me, too. Patience is great. All relationships need patience. I think the struggle I have is figuring out when I need more patience, and when I have so much that the other person is clearly taking advantage of me and I need to communicate my expectations and hold to them. I don’t like to give up, ever. I like to solve problems, and I’ll be damned if I’ll just give up on somebody. But I just don’t know what’s right anymore. I’m trying to figure myself out, and it’s so much more complicated than I wish it was. I’m tired in so many ways. I’m tired of hurting all the time. I’m just tired.

I’m curious if anyone has feedback on this kind of thing. I have a lot to learn.

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taking risks, the kind that help you grow

“Recovery is the process of finding the river and saying yes to its flow, rapids and all.  We startle ourselves by saying yes instead of no to opportunities.  As we begin to pry ourselves loose from our old self-concepts, we find that our new, emerging self may enjoy all sorts of bizarre adventures.” -Julia Cameron in The Artist’s Way

I’ve found myself thinking about risks a lot lately.  Risks and new adventures.  Taking chances.  Letting fear fall by the wayside.

I was talking to somebody about this yesterday.  I’ve always been afraid to take risks, and I’ve let fear rule my life.  One of my biggest fears came true, though.  I got divorced, and while it could have been much more difficult and painful, it was still hard.  My ex just decided to cut me slack throughout the divorce process because he knew how much he’d hurt me with everything he did that led to this.  He was a constant for half of my life, and now it’s over.  I’m learning how to be on my own, and I’m really starting to find my voice and my passions in a new way.  I don’t want to let fear rule my life.  It’s not that I have nothing to lose…I have my dogs, my home, my jobs…I want to keep everything in tact.  But emotionally and in terms of life experience, I have everything to gain.

This whole topic keeps showing up in my life in various ways.  It showed up again on Free Beer and Hot Wings this morning.  They played a video…of course I only heard the audio, but I looked it up on their site.  A short little one minute video from a 103 year old man shortly before he died.  It’s great.

I’ve asked before friends, and I’ll ask again.  What’s holding you back?  Is the thing that you’re afraid of really all that bad if it does come to pass?  If not, then why is it a problem?  If so, what is the likelihood it’ll actually happen?

I know there’s a certain amount of privilege involved in being able to take risks.  I want to make sure I acknowledge that.  To the best of your ability…truly your ability not just an excuse to stay stagnant…take the next step.  You can do it.  You will grow and you’ll be so glad you did it.

103 year old man gives advice before dying

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