29 and alive af

On Saturday February 22, I turn 29. I haven’t historically been a huge “birthday person,” but this is going to be a big one. Not only will it be the last year of my 20s, but I wasn’t even sure I would make it to 29, so I’m fairly excited it’s happening.

My 20s were a hard fucking decade. I think that phenomenon is pretty common for people in general. During my 20s, I: survived sexual assault, married my partner, earned 2 degrees, got my first big girl job, bought and renovated a house, was inducted into three academic honors societies, won an award for educational excellence from the MEA, got diagnosed with anxiety, and depression, and PTSD, and ADHD, and endometriosis. I traveled the world, became an aunt twice over, helped my sister through a divorce, stood as a bridesmaid a million times, got at least 25 tattoos (I’ve honestly lost count), made friends, lost friends, survived suicide, fell in love with New Orleans jazz, started a blog, and came out as bisexual.

I’ve been so low I didn’t think I would make it out. I’ve had adventures. I’ve accomplished goals. I’ve coped with failure, death, and pain.

Those were my 20s. Doubtlessly the most formative decade of the three I’ve been alive.

And standing here, looking down the barrel of my last year of my 20s, it is difficult how to adequately express the extent of my happiness that I am still alive.

The knowledge and understanding that I almost committed suiced in October has weighed on my mind in interesting ways over the last four-ish months. Considering I had no plans to wake up on October 30, 2019, I could have never predicted the ways that fact would ultimately bring an end to many chapters of my life, and a beginning to many others.

What I can no longer do is…

Look, I made a suicide plan and scheduled a time to follow-through on it. We have a detached garage, and I therefore knew my Subaru and I could poison myself with carbon monoxide without harming my dog and cats in the process. But, on the day I was planning on doing it, I went to the hospital instead. And here I am.

I consider this event a “mental breakdown” in the very purest sense of the term. I survived my 20s by gathering up all of my symptoms from PTSD, anxiety, and depression, all of my endometriosis pain, all of my emotional needs, and shoving them deep into a well in the pit of my stomach. Within me lies a Mariana Trench packed with the ghosts of my past I refused to acknowledge. And it totally worked. I had everyone convinced that I was “normal.” Better than normal, actually. Ask my bosses and/or teachers from this time period and they would describe me as high achieving, exceeding expectations.

But as I tried to keep them captive, those ghosts fused together like the Power Rangers once they transform into that robot thing. They became stronger, angrier. A demonic beast that ate me alive and almost killed me.

And now that I’ve fought that demon, and won, I can’t lock it back up anymore. Like, I literally can’t. My brain has literally lost the ability to perform that function. I think about mental health every single day. I talk about mental health every single day. I have to. My near-suicide didn’t kill me, but it did kill my ability to suppress. I have completely lost my ability to pretend. I can no longer “fake it til I make it.”

This means I acknowledge and work through every thought distortion, every distressing emotion, and every trigger as it comes. This is exhausting. Some days it feels like all I am capable of is surviving. It also means that there are lots of things I was able to do well before, that I can’t do at all anymore.

For instance, I can’t commit to plans. I hate myself for it, but I’ve bailed kind of a lot lately. I usually make plans with someone ahead of time, and will spend the intervening days fully committed to going. But if something triggers me on the day of said plans, I bail. I have to. Because I learned the hard way that, if I don’t put my mental health first, it could kill me.

I also can’t take control in chaotic situations. Honestly, most large crowds give me anxiety right now. But, if I don’t have to be in control, if I don’t have to be the one that makes sure everyone gets home safely and nothing gets lost, I can relax. On the other hand, if I am given any kind of responsibility in chaotic situations, I completely shut down. This has made doing my job almost impossible. I don’t know how many of you have spent time in middle school lately, but it’s a pretty chaotic place. Teachers constantly need to be on guard and in control or everything will fall apart. Everything often falls apart anyway, even if we teachers think we are in control. And I cannot handle it anymore. Luckily, my coworkers and administration have been incredibly supportive. But still, every day is an uphill climb. Every morning I start back at the bottom of the hill.

What I can do now that I couldn’t before…

I can be honest. I can be the most honest version of myself possible now. This is momentous for me. I no longer have the energy to try to “get” people to like me, or impress anyone, so I don’t anymore. Obviously, I still have low self esteem. It will take much longer than four-ish months for me to topple that mountain. That being said, I no longer let it change my behavior. I no longer let my low self esteem stop me from asserting exactly what I want and need.

And I can assert myself now. My long history of perfectionism made it impossible for me to ask for help. Both in and outside of my school career, I limped my way through many things I could have made easier for myself if I would have just asked. Then, asking for help literally saved my life. I was self-aware enough to realize what I was going through was an emergency, and I reached out to a coworker who took me to the hospital. More than anything else in my life, this event made me realize it is OK to ask for help. I would love to say that asking for help is easy for me now, but that would be a lie. Still, I can ask for help now, and that is a triumph. I can assert my existence and validate my own needs. I can lean on the people in my life who have been desperate for me to do so in the face of my lifetime of fierce independence.

Finally, I can talk about and work through my emotions, rather than letting them conquer me. That demonic beast of suppressed needs that almost killed me in October? I calmed it. I gave it the validation it so desperately needed. I gave it a home in my life, and my heart, and my brain.

I shake hands with the symptoms of my PTSD, and my anxiety, and my depression. I acknowledge their existence. I acknowledge their importance. And I allow myself to walk away.

I ask myself what I’m feeling regularly. I allow myself the time to define my emotions. I am compassionate with myself. I utilize my skills and my support system to fulfill the needs of my emotions. And I put them to bed.

Then, there’s grief…

I don’t know about anyone else, but I was never told that humans can experience grief for many types of loss; only one of which is the death of a loved-one. I have cycled through many different and unexpected iterations of the five stages of grief over and over again since October.

I’ve had to grieve my former, “perfect,” self. As I mentioned above, my ability to exceed everyone’s expectations was fueled by my ability to suppress all of my trauma, emotions, and needs. Therefore, my inability to suppress those things has resulted in a considerable drop in performance. I can no longer do the things I once did, to the standard to which I once did them. And this is really difficult for me to handle.

Releasing myself from needing to be perfect has not taken away my feelings of failure every time I fall short. I relied on my former perfection to prove my self worth to the world. I derived self esteem from my productivity. I am currently in a time of life where self esteem and feelings of worth are running in short supply. Additionally, I no longer have my perfect performance to draw from. I therefore am experiencing an intense loss.

A loss of identity (as the “best” at whatever I’m doing). A loss of confidence in whether or not I’m still meeting expectations. A loss of confidence in how my bosses and colleagues feel about me.

Furthermore, I am daily coming to new understandings of the roots and consequences of my mental health. I have a lifetime’s worth of connections being forged in my brain as I truly analyze my emotions for the first time. These connections often result in epiphanies, often that knock me on my ass.

I’ll give you an example: while talking to my partner about something unrelated the other day, it hit me that I have spent the last decade of our relationship truly believing that I was unworthy of his love. I literally believed that I had nothing to offer a partner. I believed that, in order to keep his love, I had to prove myself worthy over and over again. I lived my life in an intense state of anxiety that, at any moment, I was under threat of losing the love of my life once he realized I couldn’t maintain the standard of domestic excellence that I was pretending I could.

That’s fucking depressing.

My self esteem was so low, I wasted an entire decade of life refusing to allow myself to feel loved, when I had an overabundance of love available to me.

Please tell me I don’t have to illustrate for you what I lost in this scenario.

Happy Birthday to Me

My point is that my 29th birthday is a big deal to me. This year, I will shamelessly celebrate myself to the fullest. I will be loud, outrageous, and silly. I will overdress for the bar I’m going to.

And everywhere I go, I will let everyone know that it’s my birthday.

Because it is not just a birthday.

It is more than an anniversary of the year I was born.

It is a symbol of the hellfire I walked through.

It is a trophy forged out of the ashes of my old life, and reborn in the phoenix of my new.

And in the Middle of the Chaos, a Love Story [pt I]

I started work again on Monday. And just like that, it feels like I never left. It was a good week, an uneventful week. Even with that being so, my feet are swollen and sore, my knees are killing me from being on my feet all day. I’m exhausted, I’m breaking out, and I’m realizing how difficult it is to take care of yourself when you are a teacher. Most of all though, I hate what it’s done to my relationships.

I’m the kind of person that will do what it takes to do my job well. Unfortunately, teaching is the kind of job with an infinite to-do list. If you’re like me, and you have to be perfect, there will be an unending list of demands to keep you busy and distant from everyone in your life but your students.

My initial concept for this blog post was a detailed assessment of the aspects of being a teacher that makes this the reality. But I quickly got bored. As shocking as the details are (or should be) to everyone else, they are the mundane reality of my day to day. Instead, I ended up daydreaming about my husband.

You see, on Sunday before I went back to work, my husband admitted to me he had anxiety over me going back to work. He was anxious because he felt like he was losing me. Since I would be going back to work. And he had gotten used to having me around.

I have to admit, this crushed me. And it’s all my fault. I started reflecting on my and my husbands relationship, and really realizing how much my mental health and my job has had an impact on it.

I realized how much I had put my husband through.

I realized how badly I needed to make changes, so my work life could no longer suck the life force out of my physical, mental, and relational health.

So on that note, I will be following up tomorrow with a poetic narration of my own reflections in this vein that ended up in a love story of epic proportions.

And as it goes for everything else, I’m kind of starting to lean into this theme of freeing myself from the mold of how I thought my life should go. So who knows…

Force of Nature

Look into my eyes.

Is there fire there? Do you see how the spark has returned?

I let my spark go out. It got put out.

Years ago.

When the kindling that once resided at my core was dampened by the dark void that swallowed it as I looked deeply into my own eyes reflected in a mirror over a dirty bathroom sink during one of the worst moments of my life.

But it’s back, I can feel it.

It started at the base of my pelvis. And caught. Traveling up my spinal column, flooding my senses with a sense of assuredness. Gusto. Moxie.

And others can see it too.

“You have that spark in your eye.”
“I love when you give me that fiery stare.”

“You look beautiful, full of energy.”

Look into my eyes.

Is there fire there?

Strength

A redwood.

Tall.

Steady.

Thousands of years old.

With stabilizing roots stretching down, extending their plump, life-gathering tendrils towards the molten core of

Me.

You.

Everything.

A volcano.

Fierce.

Willful.

The force of which cannot be stopped. Cannot be tempered by any man.

It bursts forth with the power of an exploding star.

And then, as its grit settles softly into the nooks and crannies of existence, it whispers:

“You are strong.”

Darkness

I was halfway through writing a post about why the capitalist consumerism of Christmas bums me out when I stopped mid-sentence and burst out laughing. Oh my god I thought, I am so morbid.

I immediately thought about a conversation I recently had with my sister.

I am a writer. I have been a writer since I started crafting my own letters and narrating my own stories to picture books in kindergarten. That being said, I’ve never shared my writing with anyone. I have a bachelor’s in history. I’ve written history. I’m getting a masters in curriculum and instruction; I’ve written curriculum. But my personal writing, the contents of my brain, and my heart, and my soul; I’ve never shared that.

And now I am. With this blog. This is my first taste of uncensored sharing of the deepest part of my brain, and my heart, and my soul. And it scares me. And I know people are reading it. Not that many people, but still, people. But I am getting zero feedback. Not negative, not positive, just none.

Well, that’s not completely fair, nor true I guess. There have been a few who have reached out and thanked me, told me they’re proud of me, and told me to keep it up. I appreciate that feedback so much! Knowing I have support at all has been key to keeping me going.

But I’ve not gotten any specific feedback. No critiques, no comments about how certain things made people feel, or how they may have been changed because of what they read, or how they connected to something I said. And that makes me hella anxious.

I don’t know how people are actually reacting to my writing.

When I voiced my concerns to my sister, her answer was so simple I had to mull it over for a few days before I was able to accept it as true. Basically, she said there is nothing wrong with my writing. It is honest, it is unflinching, it is dark. And people have a difficult time processing through the kind of feelings this writing makes them feel.

I knew she was right. It made sense. My darkness has been present my entire life. I remember my mom freaked out when I was in preschool because I said my favorite color was black and she thought I was depressed (I don’t really remember if I was yet, but hey).

The reality is, I’ve always been drawn to thinking really deeply, realistically, and morbidly about things. I’ve always been drawn to dark colors, late-night discussions, cemeteries, and the quiet solitude of large bodies of water at night. My curiosity is ignited by decaying buildings, bones, skulls, fungus. I relish the intellectual challenge of true crime, against the background of the crimes themselves.

It probably isn’t a coincidence that I’m also terrified of most of the things I just named.

I have no idea where that morbidity comes from. Maybe it is just my depression manifesting in my personality. Maybe I am just a pessimist. Either way, I’ve slowly come to realize how my darkness can make others uncomfortable. My sister is right, darkness scares people. Darkness brings up feelings people usually try to avoid. Sure, I have set my own darkness free and am glorying in the freedom I feel because of it. But a lot of people are perfectly happy suppressing their darkness and keeping it positive.

I guess it makes sense the masses wouldn’t want to consistently have to confront something they fear so much.

I realize that, just because I’m ready to talk about this stuff, that doesn’t mean everyone is.

I guess I hope that one day, we will progress as a people to regard the darkness with less fear. For, why should darkness be so scary? Why are we so terrified of the unknown? Why do we literarily apply the color black to evil things, “the dark side?”

In the meantime, dear readers, I realize the emotional rollercoaster I’ve taken you on. I thank those of you who have returned to more than one of my posts. I will work on sharing more of my triumphant feelings associated with my mental health journey to lighten the tone a little (at least more so than I am now). And I promise I won’t ruin your holiday with a rant about my critical analysis of the Christmas season.

All I ask in return is that you allow yourself to spend more time with your darkness. Ride the wave of that uncomfortable feeling, let it all out, and see where it takes you. Allow yourself some time to really process through an intense emotion, and see what you find out about yourself in the process.

Love & Happiness to you all.

An Insomniac’s Requiem

I have struggled with insomnia as long as I’ve struggled with depression. Puberty hit and my brain became my worst enemy. High school and undergrad for me were a stream of foggy mornings after spending nights staring at my alarm clock, doing the mental math to figure out how much sleep I could get if my brain would just shut off. I operated for decades on 2-4 hours of sleep if I was lucky. I had a small collection of friends who were fellow insomniacs. We would stay up all night texting, attempting to chase away the darkness consuming our overtired brains. There were many nights I didn’t sleep at all.

Since starting medication to manage my depression in December 2018, it seemed I finally had my insomnia under control. Balancing out my mood resulted in 8-10 hours of sleep nightly. I fell in love with sleep. I learned what it felt like to conduct my days well-rested. I became a nap enthusiast. I even slept in on the weekends. I forgot what it felt like to wander the house like a ghost, listening to the sounds of the blissful sleep gracing everyone else with its presence.

Since this newest, and rather more intense, depressive episode, my relationship with sleep continues to shift. Since the beginning of October I had been over-sleeping. I came home from work and immediately would fall asleep on the couch, only to wake one more time to eat dinner. I would put my head down on my desk and sleep during my prep hours at work. On weekends I wouldn’t even get out of bed. Although I realize this isn’t the healthiest relationship with sleep, I would take it any day over insomnia. I was enjoying my oversleeping. Relishing in my blanket nests I built in various places around my house. Finding comfort in the blissful oblivion of my subconscious mind. That is, until last Friday.

Last Friday, insomnia came rushing back to me like your least favorite ex that you keep bumping into when you’re at Target and it’s been 3 days since you’ve washed your hair. And I’m realizing for the first time the connection between my insomnia and my depression.

My insomnia and my depression feed each other. They’re best friends. Business partners. Lovers. As I lay here frustrated at a time of night I would so much rather not see, my brain careens down a darkening path that makes me feel sad, chaotic, and out of my own control.

Thoughts I’ve been trying to avoid stream across my mind and multiply. I feel alone. I feel sad. I feel hopeless. I feel disconnected. I feel empty. I hate my brain. I hate myself. I feel annoyed that I’m here, awake, having these thoughts when I could be sleeping. When I should be sleeping. I just want to fucking sleep.