11/14/2014

So...I'm actually going to do this.  Blogging.  I've seen people do it, I've read about it, I have friends that do it...so let's try it out.  I'm sure there will be typo's and grammatical errors because I already know that I have a lot to say and I'm not going to want to proof read it when I'm done.

I imagine it will read more like I'm talking out loud to myself so if whoever reads this can imagine it that way, it will probably come across better.  But, all said, I'm not writing for anyone else.  I'm writing because I don't have a large enough piece of paper in front of me that will hold all of the thoughts that have been flying around in my head lately.

Me?  I'm 31, I have a daughter, 2 dogs, I'm a single, stay at home mom, and I have a  good life.  Really, I do.  I live in a great neighborhood, I have amazing friends and family, I have hobbies that keep me busy, I'm in shape and have finally gotten to a place in my life where I love my body and I actually think I look good.  So how did I get to this point where I'm sitting here blogging?  Question of the day.  No, that's probably going to be the question of my life.  A friend told me yesterday that I shouldn't ask myself that.  I should just look forward and see where I want to be.  Valid point, well received, I'll try that.  As soon as I'm able to.

You see, I'm fighting a battle.  I think I described it today to a friend perfectly.  My battle is a giant tsunami that crashed in on my world unexpectedly in the last few days actually.  Well, if I'm being honest, I've probably been trying to deal with it for awhile but yesterday, I OWNED IT.  I owned the fact that I feel like every second of everyday I'm in a huge mass of water and I'm trying to get to the top but something or someone is pulling on my legs.  I'm fighting to keep my head above water.  I have depression.  Wow.  I've said it over and over in my head in the last 2 days and yet, it looks very...not correct...written out.  Just to see it there...I feel like it's staring at me and pops out on the paper as if it's highlighted and in bold and yet...it's not.  Well, I still own it.  It's mine.  And I'm going to deal with it, face it, and send it packing.  But first, how did I get here?

I'm 31...I have a good life...
This was the first thought that crossed my mind yesterday morning as I lay crumpled in a heap, unshowered, wrenching over my toilet, with a sharp object in my hand and bits of blood coming from my left arm.  As I panicked and called for help I knew I didn't want to be there.  I KNEW I had to face what I was feeling because I absolutely didn't want my good life to end.

You know, just weeks ago I had a Facebook discussion about suicide with some friends.  I've never thoroughly thought about all the reasons someone would have to end their own life.  I've never thought it was a selfish act though - I've always taken the view that it's a cry for help.  The person just wants the world to hear them.  Yesterday, I learned first hand why someone might want to take themselves out of the world.  And guess what?  There were no thoughts of what my family or friends might feel.  NONE.  Selfish?  Maybe.  But I can promise you that the ONLY thought going through my head was this:  "Just make the pain that my heart feels stop.  I don't want to be hurt anymore, I don't want to feel like there's a hole in my chest, I want to stop crying and feeling sad all the time.  Just make the pain STOP".

Physical pain is a funny thing (and by funny I don't mean haha, I mean ironic).  I hate needles.  I despise getting my blood drawn and getting shots and all of that.  But I have 11 tattoos.  And I love them.  And I will continue to get them.  My latest one is in Shakespeare's handwriting and is on my ribcage.  It says "...And though she be but little, she is fierce".  I stand by that.  I am fierce.  As a good friend reminded me the other day "I'm good enough.  I'm smart enough.  And doggon it.  People like me".  True story.  Anyway, back to what I was saying about physical pain.  The needles, the tattoos...and sharp objects used to harm oneself.  Physical pain is funny.  You can be so aware of it at some points in your life and at other points, you're aware of it but you don't care.  THAT is how I felt yesterday.  I knew it was there and that it was hurting me but I didn't care.  It overtook whatever emotional pain I had in my heart and got rid of it for those few minutes and that's all that mattered.  Today I looked at what I had done, and I couldn't fully remember doing it.  I remember hopelessness and pain.

So again...how did I get here?  One word:  Break-up.  Seems pretty simple.  Mostly harmless.  Most people break up with whoever they've been dating, cry, maybe indulge in ice-cream...you know the stereotypical breakup.  And they move on.  They go about their daily lives and they start the dating process all over again.

I broke up with my boyfriend of almost 2 years the evening of September 28th via phone (he was away at school for a few months).  I didn't give him any warning so I know he was shocked, hurt, etc.  The thing is, I didn't mean to hurt him.  I thought if we took a break, took some time apart, maybe he would realize that he loved me.  I knew I loved him from the second week that I knew him.  Crazy right?  He would say so (he said I was crazy a lot over the years come to think of it).  So, almost 2 years into a relationship, I JUST wanted to hear the words "I love you".  I wanted to be introduced to family, invited home when he went to visit for the holidays, added to his Facebook page as a friend, have him post pictures of the many places we traveled to together...I wanted him to SHOW that he was happy with me because he didn't do those things.  Not everyone processes love the same way, I understand that.  Some people don't like PDA, some people tell all their friends everything, etc. etc.  I'm the type that loves affection.  If I'm with you and I'm happy, I want the world to know.  I want everyone to know that you're mine, that I'm proud of you, and hands off because I'm with you.  I'm NOT perfect.  I'm jealous, I'm insecure, I need to know you love me and think I'm beautiful.  Welcome to reality and being human I guess.  But, I am a good girlfriend.  I will listen to you, offer advice, defend you, comfort you, and generally bend over backwards for you.  I fall in love hard and I fall in love fast.  I expect loyalty, I expect you not to cheat physically or emotionally (this means texting and messaging female friends and flirting with them "harmlessly" or inappropriately if you don't understand what I mean by 'emotionally') and I give too many chances when you screw up.  I'm not perfect but I'm loyal.  I've never cheated on anyone that I'm with, I don't flirt with my guy friends, I tell people when I'm in a relationship, I will willingly introduce you to every single one of my guy friends, and I tell you when I've talked to them, and I try really hard not to do anything "sketchy".  

The thing is, I do screw up and I do end up doing sketchy things because I, like most everyone, have been hurt at some point in time in past relationships.  My fault is that I carry that pain and my trust issues to my next relationship and as hard as I try, I always seem to have trust issues.  I check text messages and I look at whatever photos you've liked or commented on online without asking.  Okay...so, if you don't have anything to hide, you also shouldn't care and by the way, here's my phone.  Feel free to look at that whenever you want because I'm not hiding anything.  So, after bumps in our relationship, trust issues, and countless arguments about why I couldn't be added as a friend to a Facebook page, my insecurities won out.  I didn't trust my boyfriend and I KNEW two things.  I KNEW he wasn't in love with me (I was just terrified to bring it up) and I KNEW we weren't going to make it for the long haul (despite conversations about having a future together).  After an argument on the 28th about something stupid I ended up asking the dreaded question..."are you even in love with me?"  ... Silence ... "Really?  Do you want to have that conversation right now?!"  Well, okay...so I backed down, hung up, got upset, waited a few hours...and called back.  "Yes, actually.  Yes, I do want to have that conversation.  It needs to be had.  Are you in love with me".  I got my answer.  If I didn't want to break-up, I shouldn't have asked.  Because once someone admits to not being in love with you and telling you that they've tried to love you for a long time but nothing has changed for them...that's IT.  You can't really go back from that.  You can't just blow that off.  So that was it.  I ended it, I hung up sobbing and I surely didn't sleep that night.

Fast forward a few weeks, a few phone conversations, COUNTLESS text messages on my part that ranged from "I'm so sorry" and "I miss you" to "I just don't understand why you won't talk to me!" and "What the hell is your problem?!".  I can't pinpoint when the dreaded "D" word hit me...maybe it was a slow progression from that night that I ended things.  But I do know that I did start to feel "crazy".  Frantically checking Facebook "likes" and comments, trying to figure out if he was seeing someone, worrying myself sick about what he was doing, and God forbid, the times he did answer me, worrying myself that HE wasn't doing okay...the fact that he said he did miss me and what did that mean?  Or the fact that he was sick...was there anyone to take care of him?!  Listen...you KNOW when something isn't right...you can FEEL it in your gut.  You have intuition for a reason.  For God's sake...USE IT.  I'm mostly saying this so that I can remember it myself.  My texts, my calls, my pleas for him to just show me for one second that he cared for me went unanswered for a few weeks.  I called 6 or 7 times in a row because I knew he would answer then.  Yesterday...I think I called 5 or 6. I wanted to hear his voice one last time before I knew I made it known that I needed help.  I thought maybe he would care enough to answer the phone if he heard my desperation on voicemail.  He did...20 some odd minutes later when it was too late.  I didn't answer and you know what?  He left a voicemail.  The last few words were "well, you didn't pick up but I tried".  The same words were left on a voicemail the day before that after I'd sent him an email a day prior asking him to please answer some questions I had because it would help me to move on if I had closure about why certain things happened and if I knew he was seeing someone else, why he was ignoring me, etc.  He called AFTER I freaked out via text message and after I found out he had met someone new a couple weeks earlier.

Let me go on record to say that if you don't want information, don't look for it.  I don't REALLY want to know that the person that I'm in love with is seeing someone or has met someone new.  I'm automatically going to assume the worst when after years of having no social media accounts, one suddenly was made with a goofy profile picture (from a person that NEVER takes selfies) and only has one random female that I've never heard of under the list of people that are associated with.  Duh.  So yeah, I shouldn't have been digging around.  I should have been concentrating on ME and MY LIFE.  But...that did it.  It broke me.  It explained why I was being ignored.  And I couldn't handle it because...I'm still in love with him.  I miss him.  I don't know why.  Everyone that's holding me up right now sees it.  At certain moments during the day, I see it.  But I have to fight like hell to see it.  Because here's what I see:  I see the goofy guy that tickled me at night before we would fall asleep.  I see my travel buddy and my concert buddy.  I see the guy that I told EVERYTHING to.  The person that could make me laugh when I was feeling really down.  The list goes on...

The list goes on even know I also KNOW that I felt like I couldn't be myself in this relationship.  I couldn't be the colorful, bright, slightly oddball person that I've ALWAYS been.  The person that likes tattoos, likes to dye my hair fun colors, and who has a stupidly expensive obsession with insane printed leggings and dresses.  I felt like being just a stay at home mom wasn't good enough because he had an important college degree and was working on a big career and knew "important" people that were stereotypically successful.  And yet...I love him.  I'm jealous that he's made a new "friend" in the last couple weeks and I consistently imagine her taking my place with him and doing the same things that we did that were special.  I can't listen to our songs, I can't go to the places we went to, ...even driving through a city tonight where we visited and had a great time HURTS.  There's a huge hole in my heart and more than a few times a day I feel rejected and not good enough.  I ask myself why I got tattoos and why I can't have long brown hair and dress conservatively because that's his type.  I scold myself for missing him but here's the thing...I don't WANT to be sitting here writing this.  I don't WANT to miss him, I don't WANT to cry at the drop of a hat, and I WANT to move on.  But right now, I literally CAN'T.  I have a few very close friends that have carried me through the last couple of days.  From morning until evening and even now...at 11pm they're waiting for me to text them to tell them that I'm okay...that I'm alive and I'm going to make through the night.

It's going to take awhile to get back to myself.  I've found a haven in the gym...I have a love/hate relationship with running and I do it three times a week until I can't do it anymore.  Twice a week a run a mile before having a personal training session that exhausts me.  Exercising shuts my brain off for awhile.  I'm also taking classes to be a personal trainer so I look forward to that once a week.
The nights are always the hardest.  Things quiet down and my brain starts up.

Yesterday was easily the hardest day of my life and today wasn't great but it was better than yesterday.  I played two songs constantly on repeat today.  Kelly Clarkson's "People Like us" and Mary Lambert's "Secrets".  The first I feel was written for me at this moment.  The second because I want the world to know what the "D" word feels like.  I NEVER in a million years thought I'd be here and would have to face this.  It's the type of thing you hear about over and over in your life and you don't actually give it thought until it's staring you in the face screaming at you.  And unless you're actually dealing with it, you can't even begin to imagine how that person feels or what they're thinking.  After all, on the outside, they're 31 and they have a good life...

For now, I've decided to update this as much as I can.  Probably everyday to start with and I'm sure as things progress it'll drift off.  But it will never be forgotten.  I do want to include the things that made me happy today as well as the "moments" I had.  It's good to see that most of the time, the good outweighs the bad.  And after that, I'm going to text the people that are making sure I'm alive and I'm going to try to get some desperately needed sleep.

**For anyone that wants to know, I AM getting professional help beginning next week as well...I have an amazing mother that knows wonderful counselors that specialize in women's trauma and loss**


Things that made me happy today:
1) The snuggles from my 2 adorable dogs when I woke up.  The love that they give me everyday without fail makes me happy.

2) The fact that when I woke up, I had 2 text messages asking how I was feeling (genuinely asking...not just like you ask someone in passing at the grocery store...these people care and they're okay with hearing me ramble about my feelings).

3) I got to pick my daughter up early from school today because we are running a 5K together tomorrow and I love how excited she is to spend time with me

4) I made an adorable little girl grin from ear to ear today because she was on the back of a school bus and was trying to get people to wave at her.  So I waved.

5) Room service at our hotel.  I love food.  I always have.  End of story.

6)  The fact that I'm writing all of this down.  I wasn't going to but I really just have way too many thoughts spinning around in my mind to not put them down somewhere.

Things that made me upset today:
1) Seeing a gift that my ex gave me on my counter and not knowing whether to take it down or leave it up because I consistently use it.  I didn't cry but I did get a very harsh punched in the chest feeling.

2) My physical therapist asked me what I was doing this weekend and when I told her I was traveling to the city for the 5K she asked if I was seeing my ex.  I cried.  Right in the middle of the room, broke down.

3) I just MISSED him.  A lot.  And I wondered if he cares or thinks about me or wonders what I'm doing...About 30 minutes after the PT incident I was in a grocery store parking lot in my car and I broke down again, sobbing.

4) On our drive into the city I started seeing places that we ALWAYS went together and started thinking about the things I could never really find anybody to do with me that would be the same...so I cried again.

5) Tonight after my daughter went to bed everything was very quiet.  I felt lonely so I DIDN'T cry...I instead took a hot bath with amazing eucalyptus bath salts and curled up with a good book while I thought about starting a blog...