Well, the comfort I was receiving from the hot water bottle was wonderful. Except, it was short-lived. Through no fault of its own though! That hot water bottle was / STILL IS an incredible tool in my Skills Box.
A lot has happened lately. Maybe a slight percentage has been a genuine response to trauma and/or illness, and not something I had complete control over …. but when you choose to do something, YOU are the reason it happens. So whatever happens is your fault, isn’t it?
I’ve put my body through absolute torture these past 2 weeks and its going to take a while to settle from it all. Unless you deal with it on your own personal level, absolutely no one will ever comprehend what its like to live with a brain that wants me dead.
I can’t help but feel a little jealous … I’m actually more than a little jealous, but I digress … of the ppl I hear and read about who also deal with depression, PTSD, eating disorders, BPD, dissociation, and so on who have found ways to still live productive lives and can maintain a level of stability that is acceptable in other ppl’s eyes. I’ve been dealing with this stuff for several decades … and I have yet to discover what ‘stable’ looks and feels like.
I don’t get angry very often but right now I feel absolutely PISSED – at everyone and everything. All I want is to be able to eat, drink, sleep, and socialize with other ppl the way other stable, functional human beings do every single day. It really isn’t that much to ask, is it?
I want to live … and experience things outside of survival. That’s all I want. I’ve totally got the survival part figured out. Now, I just want to live.
Ernest Hemingway once said, “In our darkest moments, we don’t need advice.”
And I agree. What we truly need is connection: a quiet presence, a gentle hug, or the smallest gesture that reminds us we’re not alone. Those simple acts of kindness may very well become the anchors that keep us grounded when life feels overwhelming.
Pain is deeply personal. Each struggle is uniquely ours to face. But even if your presence is silent, it tells me I don’t have to face this stuff alone. It’s a quiet reminder that, no matter how broken I feel, I am still worthy of human connection.
Sometimes, words aren’t necessary. Silent support speaks louder than anything else does. Love and kindness, in its purest form, has the power to help us reclaim and restore ourselves, even when we have lost sight of who we are.
I just wanted to remind you of the importance of simply being there for each other because life is hard and being alone sucks.
There is a suicide epidemic in our country.
So reach out and hug someone, if you can. Without even realizing it, you could be saving a life. Maybe even be your own.
I ventured outside today. Not because I wanted to though. The last thing I wanted to do was put a coat and boots on to go walk around in the snow. I went out because I needed to. I’ve barely moved from the couch in 3 days. This year is not off to a good start.
First, we had the first-ever earthquake here in Central Newfoundland. Very minor. But there has never been an earthquake here. Then we had a major 3-day storm. Our driveway was washed out and our roof had some damage. Thankfully it was minor. Then I ended up spending 9 hours in the ER, for dehydration.
Through all of that, I’ve been struggling just to keep breathing. CPTSD has been kicking my ass. Between the paralyzing panic attacks, nightmares, disordered eating (restricting, binging, purging), chronic pain, and insomnia every breath I take requires effort. Putting in effort takes energy, and energy is something I have very little of. Or maybe it’s just a lack of drive or willpower. Either way, I don’t have much of anything right now.
But today I managed to tap into something inside of me that gave me a little boost. I was wiping away tears as I was putting my boots on. The dogs were so excited to have mom play ball with them. They’ve really been feeling the effects of what I’m going through and that has created such a massive amount of guilt for me. I try and tell myself that I really am doing the best that I can right now but it feels so fake.
The fresh air was amazing though. The sound of the waves along the shore was incredibly comforting. I miss walking there with the dogs. Another reason I dislike winter so much. When I get cold it triggers my CRPS and sometimes I’m in pain for several days after. It’s frustrating. Especially when more than half of the year is cold here in Newfoundland. So outdoor activity is quite limited. It’s a big factor in the decline of my mental health once the fall months are upon us.
Today the cool air was welcomed. It wasn’t windy, which made it much more manageable. It was as if by breathing it in I was bringing back a little glimmer of life. It even energized me enough to later vacuum, sweep, and mop through the house.
It was discouraging though to find myself standing in the middle of the room, on 3 separate occasions, completely dissociated, and I had to check my phone to see what time it was. Everything has just been so surreal. Over the last year, 40 years of trauma decided to all come flooding back at once, at times leaving me completely incapacitated. It’s been one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to go through. I’ve shed more tears these past few months than I have my entire life.
So yeah. It’s been tough. But I guess surviving all of this is a testament to my strength? Maybe. I dunno. But I do know that growth doesn’t always look like success. Sometimes growth involves holding on when everything just feels so damn heavy. At least for me, it does.
If anyone in my life needs encouragement today, it can’t come from me because I am in need of the same thing. I just can’t blow sunshine up anyone’s ass today, Lord, so I ask that you send them whatever it is that they need, please.
If it is possible, can you also please remind me that millions of other human beings through history have lived through worse situations than me and still managed to make art, and find joy, and give hope and resist despair? Could you do that for me today?
In fact, send us all a little reminder that we can suffer and still be ok. May our faith be stronger than our fear.
And help us remember to drink some water. My body really needs some hydration.
There have been many moments lately where I have hidden in my bathroom because life has become too heavy to bear. I wonder if I will ever get the chance to just be myself again. Everything has gotten so complicated lately.
The things that are necessary to be happy are currently not present. I am exhausted, in more ways than one. But I’m still getting up and crawling my way through each day.
Sometimes I squeeze my eyes shut and block everything out to remind myself that I’m human and to breathe. I am trying to teach myself that it’s ok to take a break.
It’s also ok to indulge yourself with whatever sliver of happiness you can find that will help strengthen and recharge you. Whether you make a cup of your favorite tea and sit by the Christmas tree as you drink it, go for a walk, or throw a ball around in the backyard with your dog. If it satisfies even the smallest part of you, it’s worth the effort.
December is a hard month for a lot of ppl. Myself included. Its going to be very easy to get swept up and completely lose ourselves over the next few weeks. So from one struggling human to another …
You can do this. WE can do this! Take a breath. Then another. Drink some water and get some sleep. Then do the next thing. We will make it through December!
You can have depression and still have a strong faith.
You can have anxiety and still have a strong faith.
You can be overwhelmed with what’s happening in your life and still have a strong faith.
You can be overcome with grief and still have a strong faith.
It’s important we don’t use faith to minimize someone else’s pain or life experience. Yes, there are thorns, but that doesn’t mean my faith is any less. Faith doesn’t cure things. It won’t take away suffering and make everything all better. But it does bring strength.
So when you see someone who is struggling, don’t assume their faith is weak. Some of my lowest moments have been when my faith has been its strongest.
My story is messy, raw, and real. It’s filled with moments I wish I could erase.
BUT it’s also a story filled with resilience, finding peace in the chaos, and discovering a grace that ultimately saves me every single day of my life. My story is ugly but it’s also beautiful.
After spending the last month in hospital on a psych unit, I’m in my own home tonight. I thought often of writing about my experiences while I was there but each time I would just stare at the blank screen and think things like …
Who really wants to hear about a hospital, much less a psyc unit full of crazy ppl?
What if I’m oversharing?
What if ppl start to look at me as a crazy person now?
Someone who knows me in real life might recognize me and then everyone in town will know things about me and will never look at me the same way again.
You get the idea. So I have not written anything in a month. I’ve kept myself locked up and silenced because of shame. Well, you know what? Screw everybody! I don’t care what ppl think!
Me and Buddy
Sorry, that’s not very nice of me. I don’t mean that. I really do care what ppl think. I care too much. That’s the problem.
I need to be a little selfish and think of myself sometimes. Particularly about writing. I love to write but I’m so focused on other ppl and what they think that it prevents me from genuinely expressing myself, both in real life and online. I want to work on changing that. I want to write from my heart. I want to be genuine and honest and tell things the way I want to tell them, without shame.
I just want to relax a bit and be myself. I want to let go of the shame and judgment. I truly am my own worst enemy.
It all started when I went for my regular Ketamine infusion, which is part of my treatment for Complex Regional Pain Syndrome.
Felicia, the head nurse, asked if I was doing ok. She said I wasn’t looking like myself and that I was pale. I said I was good and that was all that was said.
I remember lying back on the stretcher while they prepped me, putting heart monitoring stickers on my chest, attaching a BP cuff to my arm, oxygen in my nose … I was shivering and could feel tears running down from the corners of my eyes but i had no emotions. It was strange because that doesn’t usually happen. They took my hand to start an IV and I heard a faint voice in my head whispering – don’t touch me.
I remember turning my head to the side and just letting myself drift away. Don’t have any more memories about the treatment than that.
Once the infusion was done they wanted to talk to David. Felicia asked him how I’ve been doing lately. David later told me that he told her I’ve been purging a lot, that I’ve been quite depressed and that he’s been worried. Apparently she told him that I’m not looking well. That I was pale, my eyes were dark, and my lips were almost grey.
I was awake, my eyes were open, but I was non-responsive. My neck and head were spasming and I was staring off with no reaction when someone spoke or touched me. So they decided to keep me an extra hour to give me more fluids and more time to let the meds wear off. David asked if they felt I had taken anything and she said no because my vitals were all good. But they did bloodwork just to be sure.
An hour later Felicia called David back in and told him that he needs to take me to the ER. Apparently I had been mumbling some things that no one could really pick out but Felicia had heard me say something about this being the end and it was almost time to die …. I don’t remember any of that. I’m just telling what I was told.
So they put me in a wheelchair and David registered me in the ER, where I sat/slumped for 9 hours. David said I kept falling to the side as if I couldn’t hold myself up. He had to ask for a pillow and blanket to put around me to secure me a bit. He said I was in a completely different world.
Then they called us in to a small room that had nothing but 2 chairs bolted to the floor. And that’s where I spent the next 26 hours. It was nothing short of brutal.
Tears are burning my eyes now as I write that. I think it’s cruel how this was handled. They took me from the OR after having a procedure done and forced me to sit up on hard seats for a total of 36 hours. I was hallucinating. I was in terrible pain and developed a migraine. Had multiple bouts of vomiting. And I started experiencing opiate withdrawal because after I took my meds Thursday morning, I wasn’t given anything until Friday night. By that time I had missed 6 doses of morphine. It was torture.
David had to leave at one point. We had taken our dogs with us that morning. So David spent the entire day going from me in the hospital to the dogs in the car. He’d switch every hour. Take them for a walk, a drink, get them a snack then settle them in the car again before coming back in with me. But they couldn’t do that all night. So around 10pm he spoke to the staff. They assured him that I would be in safe hands and would be looked after so he left to go home with the dogs. Just before he left, he brought me in Zoey’s blanket from the car because he’d been asking for a blanket for me for 2 hrs with no luck. So I just kinda dozed off, sitting up in the chair, with Zoey’s blanket over me.
At one point I started to be more alert and I was really confused. I needed to use the bathroom but there wasn’t one so I left the room and just wandered around a bit. I went to the nurse’s station and asked if there was a bathroom and he said down the hall on the right. I roamed the hospital for a while. Took the elevator a few times, and eventually made my way back to that room. I called David, upset, wanting to know what was going on. When he realized that I was still there in that room – alone, he drove back to Grand Falls again at 4am. In the meantime, while hyperventilating and being trapped in that space with the chairs bolted to the floor, I clawed/scratched/cut my neck.
David came, and he channeled his anger into fighting for me. He took me outside for some air then went and found a vending machine and got me a sandwich and water. I hadn’t had anything since 7am the previous day. Thankfully there was one nurse there on Friday that had a bit of respect and showed some compassion. She even gave me a little bit of her on personal toothpaste so I could brush my teeth. No one gave me a breakfast tray but she made sure there was one for me by lunch time. And she also contacted the necessary ppl to get my meds ordered.
Then my psychiatrist came. It was still another long painful day sitting in that chair but by Friday evening I was admitted to the psyc unit.
And I’m still here. I am much more stable than I was over 2 weeks ago but still have a ways to go. Have no idea what is going to come out of this.
Oh boy. I’m really feeling the effects of the seasons changing this year. It’s like the end of summer has brought about some sort of strange grieving process.
When the alarm on my phone starts calling me up in the morning I open my eyes and with disappointment I discover that there is no sunlight bouncing on the walls now. Daylight is only just beginning to brighten my room. Over the past few months though, I’ve been waking at this same time to fresh, natural light and through the open window I hear the birds singing their good morning songs for me. This morning I was greeted with a chill in the air, that sent a shiver from head to toe, and silence. It will be months and months before my bedroom is bright, and sunny, and … welcoming at 6:00am again.
Upon waking every morning this week, my heart rate picks up speed and nausea rises from my stomach, stopping near the back of my throat just short of overflowing it’s wretchedness into my mouth. Repeatedly I swallow in an attempt to push it back down but it refuses to fully recede. It lingers there well into the late morning, making it difficult to get my daily doses of prescription meds into my body without gagging.
This morning I switched on my therapy light lamp. Does it actually work the way it claims? I have no idea. But it can’t cause any harm. So I will continue to bring as much light to my surroundings as possible. Darkness is not my friend and as I make my way through the next weeks and months I know that there will be much more of it. One can’t fight darkness with darkness. Only light can do that. So whether it be therapy lights, candles, lamps, the fireplace, or strands of twinkling lights strung from corner to corner, I know I need to start fitting it in wherever I can.
I hate this overwhelming feeling of dread that is growing inside of me. Every day it seems to fill another crook or crevice, weighing me down just a little more than the day before. Thoughts fill my head, convincing me that I will not make it through another unbearably cold and nasty winter. That I don’t WANT to make it through … And as the day goes on things feel increasingly pointless and the desire to take an extended nap has become quite appealing.
Then evening comes. As it approaches it brings with it an almost unbearable heaviness in my chest and a sick, unsettled feeling deep in the pit of my stomach. The beautiful colors of the late evening sunsets brought such warmth and peace to my heart over the past months. But now, those same vibrant bursts of color stretching across the sky bring tension and panic to my nervous system. Tears burn my eyes as I reach to turn on the lights inside my house and I angrily brush them away. No!! Not this. Not now. There must be NO tears. My stomach twists, tightening every organ on its way up to my throat, threatening to bring vomit. I swallow, gag, and swallow some more, wishing everything that I’m feeling would just go back down to wherever the hell it came from.
And so it begins. I fear what the upcoming weeks and months have in store for me. For now, the only thing I can think to do is to pull on a hoodie, slip my feet into a pair of fuzzy socks, and give myself permission to feel hugged by their warmth. I will light a couple of candles, take a few slow deep breaths and curl up on the couch next to my husband and fur babies. And as I try to draw whatever comfort I can from their presence I will remind myself that in this moment I am OK. I won’t think about next week or next month or Halloween or Christmas. Because right now, none of that matters. This is the only moment that counts and in this very moment, I am OK.
As soon as I sit up in the morning the attack begins. The team of critics living inside my head open their ugly mouths and just let loose.
“You should go out somewhere today. You should socialize. You need to meet some people and at least pretend to be a participating member of society. You are such a baby! You can’t even handle calling someone and inviting them over for coffee!! You hate being alone … just as much as you like it. You’re impossible to please! Remember how awful the loneliness feels?!! You feel invisible. Forgotten. You’re very existence on this earth is pointless! You crave attention. You long to be part of society.
Yet as bad as it all feels you can’t get out of your own way! Grow up!!! Stop acting so foolish. You panic just thinking about allowing another person to get close to you. Fear paralyzes you when there’s a knock at your door. Ppl tell you to give them a call sometime but your hand trembles even at the thought of picking up the phone. Useless is what you are. You’re just a stupid, fat monster. No one would want to be around you anyway. Ppl are embarrassed to be seen with you. You’re deformed. Ppl stare at your shoulder and wonder why you only have one arm. Your ugliness is impossible to ignore and it’s all ppl see. You turn their stomach!! You stupid b!t@h …”
And on and on it goes.
While this is all true I did not choose this solitary lifestyle. Rather it chose me. I keep my distance from groups of people while often avoiding one-on-one interactions as well. The stress of human interactions has become something I now need to keep at a minimum because it seems as if my ability to tolerate stress and anxiety has dropped extensively.
I cannot withstand stress the way that I used to. All my life I have thrived on adrenaline and often find myself seeking out situations that will provide me with some sort of a rush but these days I find that the rush I get from the stress is a bit too much. I feel myself buckling under the heavy load that I carry around on my shoulders. I do my best and commit myself to things even though sometimes I push beyond my limits. I push and push and push until I break and fall apart.
Today though I am going to accept my limitations. I will not push myself to the point of breaking – physically or emotionally. What I have to offer today is all that I am going to give.
My in-laws are here visiting for a few days. They come 3-4 times a year and stay with us for a few days. And every time I end up falling apart behind closed doors. The pressure to be the perfect daughter-in-law gets me every single time. But I’ve had enough!
They are here in MY home and I refuse to give them the power to destroy my peace and joy. After arriving yesterday evening I prepared lasagna for them. David was at work so I was on my own. That part didn’t bother me because it was only for that evening, and then he’s off for a few days.
But I need to vent here for a minute because I’m just so … exasperated! They made a big deal about missing us and wanting to come and spend some time with us. They dropped their bags on the floor in the kitchen and sat at the table, their attention going to their cell phones. I sat and chatted with them but it would have been more entertaining had I just talked to the wall.
So I busied myself with the meal and clean-up and they got up and left the room. But not before pulling several bottles of alcohol from their bags.
By 8pm both of them were slumped over on the couch, asleep. David got home from work and just shook his head in disbelief. We know that they both have a problem with alcohol. But to drive 4 hours to visit your kids only to drink yourself into a semi-coma state within a few hours of arriving is ridiculous, in my opinion.
But I can’t take this personally anymore. Usually, I would beat up on myself by thinking that I was boring. I’d tell myself that they hate being around me and that I am so fat and ugly that they can’t stand to be in the same room as me. I’d spiral into believing that my house was not good enough. It’s too hot, too cold, not clean enough, my couch isn’t comfy, too much dog fur, the scented candle is too strong, my shower curtain is ugly, it’s too dark, too bright … and on and on and on.
No more. It has to stop! Over the years I’ve allowed my sanity to crumble every time they visit. It usually takes about a week after they’ve left for my nervous system to settle down. And I’m tired of it! This is MY home. It is my safe space and no one should have the power to ruin it for me. They will no longer cause me to become physically ill from the stress.
They are responsible for their behavior and if they decide to come here and be rude and disrespectful then that’s on them. David was looking forward to spending a few days with his mom and step-father. His mom keeps saying how she misses us but now that she’s here she shows no interest whatsoever in our lives. David was telling them something about his job and she literally interrupted him to show him a picture of a garden ornament that her friend had just bought. David looked as if she’d slapped him in the face. It broke my heart.
When we went to bed David and I were talking and agreed we can’t let this get to us. We will not allow this to pull us down. I’m done catering to them and walking on eggshells to avoid doing anything that they don’t like. I’m gonna go about things as I always do. I’m going to sit in my favorite spot. I’m going to have the temperature the way we have it every day. My dogs will play and make noise and I refuse to shush them or take their toys away. I’m not letting them turn my week upside down. I’m not going to stand in my closet to cry and I’m certainly not going to spend today in the bathroom throwing up from the anxiety like I did yesterday. Nope!
I’m not letting my peace be ripped away from me by other ppl. I work too hard to maintain my sanity on a daily basis to let you come into my space and strip it away. You can be you but I will be ME and I’m not going to end up sick from the stress of your presence in my home. Not this time.
When the majority of the world is asleep, resting their mind and body after the day’s events, I often lay awake. Staring off into the darkness, I plead with myself … please, just go to sleep. Sometimes I give in and take an hour to nap during the day. And I am working on forgiving myself for it too. I’m exhausted, after all. I’m so very exhausted.
Mental illness just sucks. I cried randomly today while hanging clothes out on the line. And I forgave myself for that as well. It just all feels like too much sometimes.
And the truth is — It is too much.
The appointments, the pills, the therapy, the special authorizations that rarely actually get approved, and the symptoms. All the symptoms that either don’t go away, or keep coming back, no matter how many things I do to try and tame them.
It is too much.
Now, I know I’m not supposed to say that. I know I’m supposed to live my life full of hope and gratitude and look for the silver linings. And yes, they do indeed exist! But oh my goodness. I’m so tired of having to fight so damn hard to find them.
I often remind myself that this is only a season. I know that every storm eventually runs out of rain. But I’ve lived this for over twenty years. Is it too much to ask to want more than just a day of sunshine here and there? In the back of my mind, I also ask myself — will you ever actually get better, Danielle? Will these symptoms ever go away?
And what lingers and nags at me, ever so strongly, is the truth I know so well in my aching heart and my dysregulated body … mental illness doesn’t go away. We manage it.
We find the silver linings in the middle of its hurricane. We talk to ppl who get it. We sleep when we have to. We take the medication and we go to the appointments. We feed our bodies to keep our strength up and we maintain hydration to keep things working as they should.
But no — it doesn’t go away.
And I don’t know if I will ever be able to accept this.
I am not gonna lie; I am not always okay. I will always tell you I’m okay, but sometimes I’m not being completely honest.
Sometimes, I just want to disappear. I want to stop living. Sometimes, I feel like I am not going to be alright. Like everything feels wrong, and I am so sad. I am really good at pretending that I am okay when I’m not.
At night, the darkness haunts me. The pain is trying to suffocate me when I close my eyes. I am just so lost right now. My smiles are fake and I feel like such a fraud. I’ve been wondering what went wrong. Why is this happening? Why am I so unhappy? Why do I feel so tired whenever I wake up?
I am so sick of this. I keep thinking that maybe someday I am going to heal. Maybe I will eventually feel whole, as opposed to broken. I will experience what its like to be happy and content. I crave wellness …
but I just can’t reach it. I don’t think its ever going to happen for me. I can’t stay like this. I don’t want to be in pain anymore. I don’t want to be sad over and over again.
I’m tired of reaching for something I want so bad but never being able to grab it.
Mental illness is so isolating. Your entire life becomes consumed with the illness, with treatment and survival. I find it so hard to be separated from other people and their joy in living. It is like a dark cloud hanging over my head all the time and I don’t want to infect anyone else with it, so I stay away .
I love seeing people happy and enjoying life but it’s like I live on an entirely different planet sometimes. Social media has become bittersweet. It provides me with a much-needed connection to other human beings, but it is also a harsh reminder of all the things I can’t do.
Being intentional about gratitude helps. It takes work. And like anything, it takes practice. The last thing you’re going to want to do when you see pictures of your peers having fun on a family vacation is to stop and be grateful. Especially when you feel like your own life is just a pile of ashes.
But I have to. I have to cling to whatever I can to be grateful for. Its mind over matter sometimes.
Identifying how I’m feeling has always been difficult for me. Although I must admit, I have come a long way in that area in recent years. In the past if you had asked me at any given point how I was feeling I wouldn’t have been able to answer you. I lacked not only the vocabulary necessary to describe the feelings but also the introspection. I had no concept whatsoever of emotions, what they were, or how they felt. I also had no idea that emotions also come with bodily sensations and could actually be felt in the body.
I have a much better understanding these days of feelings, though it’s not something that comes naturally. My first response to how I’m feeling is still the usual “I don’t know”, but I am learning how to pause and go inward. I take a moment to investigate and I can usually come up with something that somewhat describes my current emotional state.
Something else I also struggle with is identifying emotions and facial expressions in other people. I misinterpret a lot and it has led to many misunderstandings. I get insecure about not being able to pick up on emotions in other people so I observe, and I use what I see to figure out what the other person is feeling. The problem with that is that more often than not, I’m wrong. That slight shift in a facial expression does not always mean what I think it does. A raised eyebrow may make me think that the other person disapproves of something I said but that might not be the case at all. The other person may in fact be impressed, surprised, or even intrigued by what I had said.
For a long time I didn’t even know I struggled with emotions. I just thought I didn’t have very many. I’m almost always “OK” if you were to ask. It seems like that’s all I ever knew how to be. I couldn’t identify sadness, joy, excitement, contentment, and certainly not anger. I’ve spent my life so detached from myself that I had no idea these things even existed in me. Growing up I experienced a lot of unwanted emotions and as I got older they seemed to have just flattened out. I stopped feeling the varying intensities and the window of what I could actually feel grew extremely small.
So here I am, at the age of 42, realizing that I don’t know what it actually means to feel a certain way. And I have a very low tolerance for anything that takes me away from “OK”. Sitting with a feeling is a fairly new concept in my world and it’s turning out to be one of the most excruciating things I’ve ever experienced. My system jumps into high alert whenever I sense any sort of emotion inside of me. Whether my heart rate begins to speed up from excitement, fear, anticipation, lust, pain, joy, or whatever else may come up, my brain reacts in a way that propels me towards behaviors that shut it all down. I am working on this though.
A few weeks ago my therapist used the word alexithymia to describe one’s inability to identify and describe emotions. It is a word I had never heard before. I had no idea that my difficulties with emotions were something that other people out there experience as well. I thought it was just another thing I was bad at. One more thing on my never-ending list of character flaws. Something else that other people do with zero effort but requires so much work on my part. Another complexity. Another failure. Another fault.
But I’m beginning to realize that’s not the case at all! Alexithymia is a real thing that is not a character flaw! It’s not because I’m too stupid to understand emotions. It’s not because I’m an air-head, or that I’m dumb, or careless. It’s not because I’m a cold-blooded person who has no heart. It’s something that’s actually more common than I realized. So much so that it has warranted a label of its own.
So I just want to say that if you’re reading this and you find yourself relating to my experience in any way, I encourage you to do a little reading about alexithymia. It might very well help you understand why you feel (or don’t feel) the way that you do. There are a few websites in particular that I found really great at explaining it. I don’t usually post outside links here but if you are interested, feel free to ask and I will gladly share. It could open up a door to a completely new way of seeing things! Please be gentle with yourselves today. You all deserve it!
When you ride a bike, the only way to keep moving is to maintain balance. Right now, my balance has been lost. (Did I ever even have it to begin with?) I’m tired of running and always searching for an escape from my thoughts. Escaping seems to be the only way I can make things any better …
The familiar cloud of depression has enveloped me once again in recent days. This is how it usually goes. I feel decent, even hopeful, for a while, and something happens to trip me up and I fall flat on my face. I don’t just feel sad. I feel like I am dying inside. It’s like a cancer has begun to consume my brain, each thought bringing more and more destruction with it …
This morning, both mind and body feel pretty close to reaching the limit of what it can tolerate. It feels like my world is running out of oxygen. Desperation is setting in ….
We all have thoughts fluttering around in our minds, whispering the most absurd and brilliant things a human brain could be capable of. But when your mind is sick, the whispers become screams. They are noise that draws our attention away from reality. This noise leads to despair.
Often I found myself wanting to let go and yell back at the things inside my head. It seems as if its the only thing I can do –
I was buried under a pile of blankets Counting my breaths Attempting to drown out all the noise Trying to slow down my racing thoughts Praying to hold on Fighting the darkness Willing myself to get up Practicing positive self-talk Bargaining with the universe Begging the pain to just Stop.
I wondered why the clocks didn’t stop On that day. My world stopped spinning When I walked into the bathroom and found you submerged in a bathtub full of bloody water. I wondered how the rest of the world could keep going Without you here. You took a piece of me with you On that day. But I forgive you. I’d forgive you a million times over if it would bring you back to me.
Her Complex Musings 
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