Some Honesty

So,

I made a goal to blog more forever ago, but I continually put it off because I kept envisioned my next post as something spectacular. I then continued putting off blogging because I also imagined my next post as being full of life and insight.

I wanted beauty!

I wanted uplifting and heartwarming!

I wanted awe and peace of mind, Dang it!

The thing is, my life wasn't feeling very uplifting. So I couldn't post anything.  

I even tried coming up with contrived projects or themes to post. 

This month I had this mini project (“14 Valentine’s Day themed outfits”) where, starting February 1st up till Valentine’s Day I wore red and pink ensembles covered in hearts and roses. 

While it did become something nice to focus on, my emotions refused to conform to the happy, cutie vibe I was going for. I tried so FREAKING hard to not feel the way I did and then, when nothing changed, felt like I must not be trying hard enough. Which just made me feel worse.

In my experience, this is what depression is: a spinning wheel of sadness.

I hate myself.

I logically know that I shouldn't hate myself.

Now I’m mad that I hate myself.

So. . .  

Now I hate myself even more.

I hate that I hate myself!

That’s psycho!

Obviously the logical thing would be for me to stop hating myself and to, in doing so, end the cycle. But, as it turns out, when your brain is chemically imbalanced or mentally ill (bleh, depression), you don’t make the same decisions that chemically and mentally stable brains do. Basically, you are just spinning bad choices into the depression wheel. Yeah. A spool of disasters-waiting-to-happen.

And they do.

Often.

So. Very. Often.

So, here I am. Just being honest.

I wanted to post the Valentine’s Day Outfits (and I like to think that I still will), but I found it hard to feel right about it. Mainly because I felt like a failed a couple of the mornings and woke up sad rather than the ray of love and sunshine that I was suppose to be. (How dare I).

So I started hating the whole thing. Every outfit was wrong. I was wrong. It was not the heartwarming project I wanted it to be so badly! And maybe I could have dressed it up that way somehow (which I seriously contemplated), but I would have known and I would have hated it even more for the big fat LIE it would have been.

It would have been one more:

“I’m fine.”

“I’m good.”

“I’m great!”

The first couple weeks of the semester, I called my mom from a dark room in the back of Church. I had just driven a bunch of lovely chatty ladies to the singles activity there. I only sat looking at all those people for about 2 minutes; could only listen to two or three people ask me how I was before I quickly slipped out into that dark Sunday school classroom.

I sat there crying silently.

Finally called my mom and told her the truth: everything was fine, but I didn't feel fine.

“I feel crazy”, I told her.

“I just have to tell someone, because I feel like I’m really going crazy.Everything is alright, but I don’t feel alright. I know I should, but I don’t! And that makes me feel crazy! And every time someone asks me how I feel I tell them “I’m fine”, but I’m not and I feel like I’m going crazy. I just had to tell someone, because I feel like I’m going crazy.”

My crying at this point was pitiful sobbing. 

And here I’d like to interject that I have a most wonderful and beautiful mother. She listened and told me she loved me. She just let me tell her how I felt and that really helped.

I love her so very much.

God has blessed me with her.

God has blessed me with so much.

I hate it.

This is the point where I start recognizing that I’m hitting a low, when realizing people love me and that my life is beautiful and blessed makes me feel even worse. This is the pits of despair. I should be happy. . .

So . . . do I have point?

There are times when solution come easy and times when I feel like I have rediscover my depression every day and find a new way to just deal with it. It seems that I am stuck in the latter.

I don’t really see the end; I thought it’d come quicker than this, but It hasn't.

I hold to the hope that it will.

I will try and love the days (or even small minutes) that are great.

- Try to remind myself to be sane.

“I'm gonna get out of bed every morning... breathe in and out all day long. Then, after a while I won't have to remind myself to get out of bed every morning and breathe in and out…”

- Sam, Sleepless in Seattle.

(Movies are an optional and recommended part of the healing process by the way.)

And that’s honestly where I am at right now.