Fear and Self Loathing in a Relationship

"It is not hard to live through a day if you can live through a moment."  -- Andre Dubus

What happens when it seems like you can't live through that moment? When your world is crashing down all around you. Most of us keep going but a few give up or check out. Although I've had my times of checking our, I'm very skilled at getting through those moments. Sometimes I fight my way to a better place and other times I just ride the wave. Yet there are the times I get so confused I get mentally dizzy from all the spinning and swirling. There are even times when I do not know why I'm dizzy and my world seems to be falling apart. I can't figure whether I should fight or ride it out. That is to say whether I have cause to feel sad and mad and I should do something about it or I have no or very little reason to be feeling that way and I just need to cry it out, eat some icecream and go to bed early.

Tonight is one of those times I can't make head nor tail of what is going on in my troubled mind.  I've found that part of healing myself is finding the wounds and tending to them.  Yet my mind seems to be so overrun with these feelings of abandonment and failure that I can't see the forest for the trees. (I'm really clichey tonight...oh well). Do I have real cause? I know that my feelings are rooted in the behavior and words of my boyfriend and my own failures these past two months and especially this past week. I can sense that there is something profound but is there also something I need to talk over with my man or is this something I need to work out myself? For a moment all my thoughts and feelings weighed down on me so much that I felt like giving up, yet only for a moment. I prefer my low points to be brief. I've had them last for days but lately they've been not as deep and not as long. I count all the blessings I can. Yet I stray...

I feel like if I talk with him and share my concerns that we might clear at least some of the fog from my mind. Isn't that one of the the problems I'm having with him, not communicating enough. But I hesitate. At first because my mind is too clouded and then because he seems troubled. I don't want to heap my issues on top of his. So at least I know one thing, that the distance that keeps growing between us is eating at me and probably us as well. Relationships are hard. Mine is entangled with my mentally f'd upness and him being an involved father of 3, working 40+ hours a week and taking night classes. We are both frustrated with our lives and with each other but if we can make it through this then we can make it through just about anything.

Two years ago I decided to leave my then boyfriend and move far away so I could get out on my own and facilitate my healing. I met my current boyfriend and it changed my plans considerably. He made everything go upside down in good and bad ways. Sometimes I feel like this is bad timing in my life but as a believer that things happen for a reason I have faith that being with him is the life lesson I need right now. Don't get me wrong if the relationship was not good I'd leave and I have before. I'm not one of those girls that throws their whole life and identity into another person. It's just that I can tell that there is something special about what I have with my current boyfriend. I think there is a very good chance that he is my life mate. It's been awhile since I had that feeling and this time it's even more grounded in my life experiences than the times before. Thanks for helping me untangle my mind a bit, my imaginary readers. My man doesn't need to share my burden tonight but I'll have that talk with him later, right now I just need to get some sleep.

Fear and a Life Well Organized

Too busy to write?  That should never be an excuse. Yet why do I use it all the time.  Priorities are a hard thing for me to handle. In general I'm a very organized person when it comes to my physical space (although sometimes it takes me a bit to organize a new space) but I am horrible at organizing my personal life and my time.  Taking the time to sit down and write things out is an accomplishment in and of itself. Even if I do get this far the follow through seems to be the main problem. I know that I have to gain/regain good habits, much like what I do with my physical organization. So why haven't I just dug in and got to it? 

Well I have a bit that is. The tangle I keep encountering is the whole laid back versus anal retentive approach to life. Both in extremes are not productive in life and can contribute to depression and other mental issues. Like all things in life finding balance in this area is the important thing. Unfortunately I'm not that great at balance. I'm good at extremes. Excessively talkative or withdrawn. I'll eat hardly anything or 'clean out the cupboard'. I have been learning balance yet when it comes to the basic approach to life I get stuck. This one area is such a huge part of my life and the only reason it vexes me is fear.

Fear is something that all of us that have mental problems know quite well. Even if I'm doing alright will X pop back up? Will they understand what X does to me? Will X get in the way of a job or relationship?  Fear prevents us from getting out and doing the things that we need to make up feel better. This is especially true of those of us with depression. In fact fear is what rules our lives and prevents us from taking the steps to better mental hygiene. What do I have to fear with this approach to life stuff though? As I said before I tend to do things in extremes. From past experiences I have learned to not trust myself.  We depressed people have trust issues. Fear and a lack of trust go hand in hand. It may be just a few things or almost everything but we fear because we can't trust and we can't trust because we fear. This is just another cycle within the large one of a depressed person's life. My goal the next few months is to work out how to break a lot of these cycles and to start to find balance in how I approach life in general. Every day I will journal, even if just a paragraph.

It's been awhile again.  Writing does help the mind. Getting things out on paper or screen can give one perspective. It also helps with organizing one's thoughts.  I get some of this from my personal journaling and poetry writing but writing on here...even when I'm not sure if anyone is watching...gives me a way to express and organize what is going on in my head in a way that other writing can not.

Just as in the beginning I still believe that even if one person (other than myself) is helped by seeing my personal struggle then I feel like I've accomplished what I set out to do.  Despite the fact this blog helps me I wouldn't of set out to do it if it wasn't for my need to reach out to others and help them.  The best thing when you are down is to know you are not alone.  To realize that other people also have these feelings, thoughts and struggles.

So for many reasons I will make this more of a priority.  For my own sake and also for whomever.  An active blog may help that person who needs it to find it and the more I write the more I may strike a chord with someone.  Just as we are all individuals we also have our own individual journeys.  I hope that at least part of my journey helps yours :)

Long and Winding Road

Been a bit since my last post.  I guess I've just been busy: trying to play catch up from all the inactivity of the past year.  I've been feeling much better lately but still have a bit of work to do. 

I recently ended the relationship I was in.  It was the best break up ever. Were actually "friends with benefits" now. I didn't think I could do it but I'm getting better with all the sex, love, relationship, etc stuff.  I'm moving a few hours away but will be around once a month.  I gotta get over my possessiveness issues.  This will be a good learning experience.  When I move to Florida in a few months things will end.  Maybe I'll see or be with him again after that but a good possibility I will not be sexually with him for awhile or ever again.  There is a guy in Florida I have a thing for and I just feel like it might turn into something.  Not sure.  But if it does then it will most likely be monogamous because he is of that mindset.  I don't know if I'm quite ready for true polyarmory but if I did venture that way it would have to be with someone who is pretty comfortable and even-minded about it.  Florida guy is not in that zone.  I've done ok lately with monogamy.  I think that either way there is still the issues that people in relationships have to deal with.  Maybe if I can get a grip on them in monogamous relationship then I will have a better grasp on them in a possible future polygamous one.  I would love to find a "forever mate"  I look at old couples and see that bond and I really really want it.  I'm not sure if Florida guy is the one but he may be a good stepping stone towards finding that life-mate.

You won't like me when I'm angry...

I have dealt with anger issues my whole life.  I am better about it than when I was younger.  Still it is a part of me that rebels against growing up.  Isn't expressing how I feel truth.  If I see a pile of shit I point it out and if it pisses me off then I point it out quite angrily.  This is especially true when people around me say the pile of shit is a bunch of roses. 

I've tried being fake.  It's tough. It makes me feel dirty.  Yet I know that sometimes you gotta smooth things over or put on the happy face for the sake of some greater good.  Doesn't mean I gotta like it.  I think we all learn to do it as a survival mechanism.  Some of us more than others.  We learn as children that the best way to please someone (adults and peers) is to act a certain way.  We all have multiple personalities or at least multiple versions of ourselves.  I remember when I was 17 I commented to a friend in a moment of honesty that I have so many masks that I'm not sure who the real me is.  I have a much better idea of who I am but I don't know how to completely and healthily integrate her into reality. 

There are parts of me that I'm ashamed of...especially my anger.  I don't know how to properly channel that anger usefully in ways that are meaningful, not hurtful and satisfactory.  Anger is only an example of the frustration I feel with myself.  It is this frustration with myself and the world around me that leads me to dark places.  Sometimes so dark I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel. 

To be continued.......

Stress Brain and the Rest of the Body

Something I thought about while driving the other day or was it watching tv or both....hmmmm.  I need sticky notes or to actually use that tape recorder in the car. It did have to do with mental stuff.  I remember it being rather poetic and insightful.  I tend to have some of my best thoughts at the most inopportune times.

Stress brain sucks!  Not to mention getting older.  I've always been flighty but could remember most things in a somewhat timely fashion.  I could possibly be trying to do too much. I have decided to scale back a little.  Yet I do need a second job.

The whole grandmother dieing hasn't helped.  I'm struggling again through the physical pain and agoraphobia that is caused by my stress.  I may just need to try to get help with one of these mental health organizations.  Whenever I have heard of these I have always thought of severe bipolar or schizophrenia or such.  I'm starting to admit how much this is affecting my life.  I really don't want to go on disability yet it may be good as a way to temporarily help to relieve the stress I'm feeling.  I can still work on disability and I can start up my business that I have been wanting to.  By the time I got things going I'll be doing better mentally I hope and can get off "assistance".  

Grandparent-less

I was blessed with 10 grandparents at birth: 6 great-grandparents and 4 grandparents.  All of them gave me love...grandparents are good at that.  They each showed their love in different ways.  I can carry the love and the lessons of their love with me for the rest of my life.  I can also pass them on.  Yet it still hurts to not have them here any more. 

I just lost my last one a few weeks ago.  Growing up she was the grandparent I disliked the most.  She didn't have much patience for us hyper kids.  As I got older we got to know each other better and I realized that even though some of us weren't her "favorites" we still received love from her in her own way.  She lived half decently long but both her parents lived a lot longer.  She was very active and strong.  Embolisms can strike down the best of us.  We all thought she would be around for another 10-20 years. 

So now I walk this world without grandparents.  Its a good thing my mother and I have been patching things up between us.  Yet...there is nothing like grandparents: especially the good ones.  It just feels so empty. 

I can't help but think how lucky my favorite grandmother didn't die last.  I dont' think I could take the double shock of her loss with the complete loss of grandparents.  I had a very very hard time with her death.  I was on meds but I was a complete mess.  I even remember wishing my grandmothers could switch places.  Not that I wanted my mother's mother dead it was just I didn't know how I was going to survive without my dad's mother.  She embodied unconditional love.  I used to spend at least a week with my dad's parents in the summer and I also look a lot like her.  Even now I am sobbing a few years later.