I've Fallen Into My Head & I Can't Climb Out

Surrounded by strangers, I don't recognize them, but they know me. I see their names stamped on their chests: Anger, Sadness, Guilt, Anxiety, Depression. The way out a shadowy dark ladder of sinew and tears. Apparently, I'm a regular here. 

And so tired. 

Always so tired.

Nothing to Talk About

You may notice that I post a lot and don't actually say anything. I mean, that's accurate. I use this blog as therapy sometimes. Maybe it's a reflection of what is going on in my brain (chaos) or my life (boredom). Most often, I'm just sitting here with a glass of wine, bored out of my gourd and ignoring the fact that I have homework that's waiting to be completed, but as long as I'm "busy" with something else, it can wait. I still utterly and totally dislike my job. I still absolutely and entirely dislike school. These things seem to be eternal.

I decided last year, as in 2022, that my resolution would be to learn something new monthly. January was photography. I fell off after mid-January, and while I'm still doing photography, I don't feel I really understand photography. So, January 2023 is for photography again.  

I haven't decided on February or further yet. 

I'd like to wish everyone a Happy New Year and the best this time around. This year will be better, right?

If we make it so.

 

Depression is.. (I)

I watch the clock tick by, my anxiety growing more and more with each moment closer to the end of the wasted day. It's another day passed without reprieve and another day closer to returning to entrapment. My employment is a trap, a slow moving sludge of boredom and misery that I am unable to leave until the clock says so. 

I worry and I obsess, every activity of daily living is a hassle, a burden, a chore; there are no moments of enjoyment, I don't remember what those feel like. I worry about things I shouldn't, I obsess over things I should. The black cloud hangs low, clouding my vision of brighter days.

I can't find anything to ease the misery, nothing to ease the dread. Time just ticks on.

Hypothyroidism & Insomnia

 What a weird combination. Hypothyroidism makes you tired; Synthroid gives you insomnia. 

I don't think I realized I had insomnia until about the 3rd night when I realized I had been awake in bed for four and a half hours thinking about things I hadn't thought of in years:

I got 4th place in the 6th grade spelling bee because I misspelled "reference" (referAnce). Who the fuck misspells reference? I knew the second I said it that it was wrong. My spelling bee competition, of course, ended there. The upsetting part? I was able to spell all the other words that remained in the spelling bee: albumen, ingenious, precocious, Czechoslovakia, and the winning word, tumultuous.  

I can remember every phone number I ever knew when I was a kid, grandparents, uncle/aunt, friends, mom, dad, great Granny, but I can't remember my teenage phone number. 

It's like that Facebook meme where there are a dozen windows open and there's music coming from somewhere because -

And then I realized Jefferson Airplane's White Rabbit, "remember what the dormouse said. Feed your head. Feed your head, " has been playing in the background the entire time. *I don't even remember there being a dormouse in Alice in Wonderland, but when you're on singing about LSD I guess you can make the rules. 

*PS. I looked up the dormouse and I do remember now. No, I wasn't on drugs.

How to End a Conversation Effortlessly

Talk about your mental health.

People don't realize how effective this is. A perfectly normal conversation in progress and in a perfectly fitting manner a mental health response and.. radio silence. It's true. Try it sometime. 

It's not a malicious thing from the silenced person, it's simply a convo-stopper. I haven't quite figured out why this is yet other than mental illness makes people uncomfortable.

Still.

The stigma still exists.

Let's discuss this for a moment. 

Why? Why is mental illness such an uncomfortable topic? Because you don't experience it? Presumably you don't experience amputation either. Or Ebola. Leprosy? No, not any of them.. Um, lets use autoimmune disease as an example. Ohhh. Wait. You do? That's more common, huh? 

So let's use that.

I can't see that you have an autoimmune disease. You can't see that I have a mental illness. 

I don't shun you for your intractable pain, or your fatigue, or your.. wait, what? People don't get that either? 

Bad example. 

How about the C-word?

Yeah, that probably stops conversation too. 

Do better, people. 

Caged

 All this space, all this air and freedom around me. And still I am trapped.

 

The Friendship Failure

Lately I've been seeing things on the good old interwebs here about how people should accept people for who they are and not by how they treat us.

And I call bullshit.

Is a friend really a friend that doesn't make time for you? That stands you up? That you never see or hear from but for their poor excuses? Do friends treat friends that way? And would you tolerate it if they weren't wearing the "Friend" label?

Ask yourself these questions before you accept this behavior from your friends.

And before you behave this way yourself.

You're Not the Enemy

There is nothing wrong with you.

You are not alone.

Your situation isn't better or worse than anyone else's, it's just different. And you are a different person with different strengths and weaknesses and different ways of dealing with things. You have different support systems and a different personality, different body, different thoughts. You are you, and there's nothing wrong with you. 

There is nothing wrong with taking psychiatric medications - any of them - if they help. There is no shame in supporting your body to achieve it's best, both physically and mentally. 

There's nothing wrong with you.

You are not alone.

I promise.

 

I have "Major Depressive Disorder" (MDD). I have "Generalized Anxiety Disorder" (GAD). If we want to get technical, I also have a touch of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (emphasis on obsessive) and Social Anxiety. 

I take medications and I am newly in therapy. Some days I have my shit together and some days I'm a crack shit filled dumpster fire.

"Some Days I'm Healing. Some Days I Break Again." 

I tell you this because you have no reason to be ashamed. And as alone as you may feel, you aren't.

You are not alone.

Be proud of taking care of yourself.

I'm always here if you need to talk. Post me a comment or shoot me an email (Carnal.Butterfly@gmail.com). Sometimes it's easier to talk to a stranger; sometimes, it's easier to talk to someone who's been there. 

Sometimes, we all need a little help.

 

 

 *disclaimer: this post is from personal experience and not medical advice.