Boring Girls Club

I’ve been a bad, bad girl.

Guess who’s back on their bullshit!  This girl!  That’s right, I’m a bad, bad girl!  But not THAT kind of bad girl.  No, I’ve been the boring kind.  Not the kind you see movies about.  You know the movies I’m talking about; where some beautiful starlet is wild and fun and out of control.  And she makes mental illness look sexy until the final act of her bad girl struggle where her lips are a little chapped and her eyes a little too wide and kind of scary but still what someone might call “totally bangable.”  Yeah, that wasn’t me. I had food stains on my shirt, bags under my bloodshot eyes, and I didn’t move from my couch for so long it gave me back problems.  But I don’t think that makes for an entertaining movie.

I stopped taking my medications.  No real reason, except for that I missed a doctors appointment.  I forgot to put it in my calendar and then I missed it.  I got a note, basically a written wrap on the knuckles, from my doctor reminding me that I shouldn’t do that again and, if I could, please refrain from wasting their time.  Which I totally understood and felt guilty about.  So that guilt stopped me from making another (because they’ll see my name and think “that girl!  That stupid girl who wasted our time.  Look at this bullshit, wanting another appointment”) So then I ran out of pills. Then I kept eating foods (because, hey there substitute for medication and self esteem and friendship and love) and gained weight.  And I knew that all of these things meant I should get back on medication.  But I needed to lose weight so the doctor wouldn’t talk to me about how much I needed to lose weight.  Plus, they’ll know it’s been a while and that I stopped my meds when I shouldn’t have. So yes, I’ve been the unsexiest bad girl and I need to be punished with lectures about how I’ve let people down.  I’m a disappointment, daddy.  Sternly tell me how much I’ve disappointed you.  Am I doing this right?  I don’t think I’m doing this right.

I’m actually at a point now where I feel pretty good in terms of energy and getting things done.  And I’m not letting my entire life and relationships backslide so that I have to rebuild EVERYTHING.  But I can’t sleep at night.  The obsessive thought patterns are back and I’m having trouble making them be quiet.  (Side note:  why do my obsessive thoughts have to be about the general nature of death?  Why can’t it be mathematical equations or entertaining stories or brilliant articles or something that makes use of this broken brain bullshit?  It’s always so dreadfully, existentially boring).  I wish I had a legit reason for getting to this place again.  It would be easier.  But all I have are basically excuses for not doing the things I should be doing.  What can I say?  Broken-brain bullshit happens, I guess.  I’m trying not to hate myself too much which is not an easy feat for any of us.  We’re, all of us, olympic medalling experts in the self hating endurance event.  I guess the best thing to do is take stock of how better this time was vs. the last time and look at what I did right.  I didn’t completely fall back.  A minor slide into a dungheap is better than a headlong dive.  And it isn’t hopeless.  It’s just difficult.  But what life isn’t difficult, really?  Mine, by comparison, is relatively easy.  Just a minor bout with broken-brain bullshit.

Spring is here and everything seems to be in bloom now.  I was born in the spring so I’m a creature of rebirth, I guess.  Hopefully I don’t get reborn as the same thing.  Here’s to another sloughing off of the skin.  The next bad girl will be a little better.

I still don’t think I did this right.

Into the Void

I’d been thinking about voids a lot lately.  Not a space where something is missing or gone but an endless vortex of darkness.  Having depression means circling that vortex more often than one should and fighting very hard not to get sucked in.  When you battle, you try to save yourself but you keep slipping anyway.  And you’re never far away from that vortex.  It’s always there, sometimes in the distant background where you don’t even remember why you worry about it.  Sometimes it’s right next to you, a constant reminder that you’ll never escape it.  When you lean over that vortex to peer into it’s blackness, there’s a pull.  “Fall in.  You want to.  Stop fighting.  Just fall in.”  What is it about this disease that has us fighting against the basic human instinct of survival?  

Oops, They Did It Again

Two years ago, around the same time this year, I was laid off from my job.  I had worked at the same company (albeit in several different roles) for 15 years when it happened.  I started when I was 19 and at the time I told myself it was only temporary.  Years down the line I was making decent money and had a good house and a nice car.  I lived very comfortably even if I wasn’t doing what I thought I wanted to do.  I liked the team I was with at the time;  we gelled so well and enjoyed working with each other.  I wasn’t even thinking of next steps for a career, really. 

I Wish You Love

So the holidays (or holiDAZE, amirite?  Hahahahaha, I’m sorry) are rapidly approaching and in the past I’ve been blessed (#blessed) to have this be a happy, cherished time of the year.  I’ll admit right out that I’ve never really celebrated the religious aspects.  It’s never been the big draw for me. 

Tell Me Where is Depression Bred, in the Heart or in the Head?

I was lurking around the Twitterverse a little while back and wasting time, as is my want when work is slow and dull, when I saw a post of epically dumb proportions. Dumb tweets are nothing special: there are probably more of those than there are dust mites in our beds. However, l felt compelled to respond to this one in particular because it was a statement I had heard at several points in the past.

When It’s The Worst

It’s bad when I decide to get out of the house and head to a coffee shop (any coffee shop), but when I get there I don’t talk to anyone and spend every last second feeling like every set of eyes is on me.  It doesn’t matter how many times I tell myself there’s no way that EVERYONE is looking at me.  That it’s self-centered to think that way (I’m not that important, really I’m not).  I still can’t stop feeling awkward and unusual and lonely and scared.  I pack up my backpack (if I even go into the coffee shop to begin with) and walk to my car and realize that I barely talked to three people all day (all to do with work) and that I haven’t actually touched another human being – actual, physical touch – in a week.  The next day, I go out again to try and make some kind of contact but the result is always the same (because I am always the same). And this isn’t the worst.

Turns Out I Was Just Mostly Dead

Boy, has it been a while since I’ve been on here.  I’ve been busy finding myself (turns out I was hiding in the couch cushions the whole time (I’m so sorry for that, please forgive me)).  And maybe it wasn’t that I was busy finding myself but finding my way through and maybe just a little bit afraid of all the things I wrote before.  I even thought maybe I should just delete this and start all over with another blog but screw it.  My habit of quitting things because they aren’t perfect is something I need to break. 

Tangled Up in Blue

I got a new job.  I started last week.  It’s a manager position.  That’s something to get excited about.  So why have I come home every night and gone straight to bed to sleep off a headache, or grabbed so much food that I know I’ve eaten myself a little closer to death,  or tried desperately to avoid writing this (or anything)?