The battle against myself

I didn’t sleep last night. Tossed and turned, watched episode after episode, numbed my mind on social media, never quite achieving the goal of slumber I so desperately desired. I suppose this is my new normal. Or perhaps it is time that I really acknowledge the level of anxiety and depression that at times can be all consuming. I have been debating my future with social media. Shall I stay or shall I go? It is an addiction like all the others, and I have realized that lately it is not serving the purpose it once was. Once upon a time, I used social media to see what the rest of the world was doing to feel like I was connecting with people from my past now I am searching, I am searching for any glimmer of hope that still remains and it is truly more painful than helpful and I need to decide if I want to subject myself to the daily torture, the wonder, the assumptions, all the things that keep me up at night. I know that it will require the same commitment it takes to break a common addiction so until I am ready it won’t suit me, but I am getting there because it is time to let go.

I feel emotionally and physically deprived. My heart and my body are not getting the nurturing that they need to get through each day. I am able to recharge with my children, but I am missing emotional and physical connection and it has been hard to supplement that for myself. My healing has been a means to an end with a twist of continued improvement because you can’t ever really stop focusing on your healing. If you take your eye off the prize, you miss the best parts. The parts where you have healthy relationships with the people you love or allow yourself the opportunity to connect with others and develop healthy relationships. I sat up last night and I had to consider what I was feeling and why and more importantly what triggered it. The trigger was social media the feeling was utter sadness because I realized I didn’t really know someone I thought I knew. I have put myself in a bit of a holding pattern. Waiting for something to happen that I know never will and last night I realized that it’s what’s keeping me from truly accepting what is. Hope is the name of that feeling and I am fooling myself to think that having hope will change anything. It has been crippling to have hope, it has been utterly debilitating at times. It is a constant reminder that I am emotionally depleted of anything good. And it’s time to sort that out.

I have been thinking about internal struggles that we create for ourselves. During certain times in our lives, we are faced with all types of struggles some that are conflicting even, and we end up losing the ability to hold space for ourselves and others. We end up being faced with two competing ideas and eventually we have to pick one. The mind can’t handle conflict without settling on one side of the coin or the other. How we get there is dependent I suppose on the experience each gives us or the more prevalent the feelings are with one over the other. Either way we create narratives for ourselves and if they conflict, we always choose one no matter whether it truly serves us or not. So, the more I unpacked this last night, I realized that I am currently dealing with two internal struggles one that is hopeful and one that knows that hope isn’t serving a healthy purpose. I told my therapist last week that I felt as if I can just work through these feelings, I will have a clearer perspective on my next steps. The where do I go from here now steps. What I realized last night is that I can’t choose one over the other. There is no narrative that helps me move one direction or the other that I will feel good about, that is authentic to how I am feeling. The only choice I am left with is holding space for myself and allowing the conflict to work itself out.

Perhaps I even need to adjust what I am hopeful for because what I do know is that I am setting myself up for failure each time I think that just by being hopeful will result in something magical happening. I guess what I realized is that I stand alone in my feelings. I stand alone in my experience, and I stand alone in how I am grieving. That I must accept where I am, to be able to find the strength to take the next steps forward. That no matter what I hope for, I am the only one that can really fulfil my needs. That it is ok to seek that hope outside of myself. To look for signs that any connection is left where there is none. It's accepting what is even if it is incredibly painful. This blog vacillates between self-deprecation and self-actualization. It is starting to transform daily from lack of awareness to complete awareness of myself and my behaviors. And the more I reveal about myself, good, bad, or indifferent the more healing I am creating. I am on the precipice of revealing my most vulnerable story. And it is not one from my past. It is not one that shaped my life but rather one that changed my future forever. It is the story of love, sadness, destruction, and rebirth. Perhaps that is what this has been all about to get to the reason that I started this blog in the first place. To share with anyone listening how it all began.

I began a year and a half ago. I took some awful turns, did some awful things, made some tremendously impactful decisions but the whole story matters if I am ever going to be able to let go and move on. That time will come, but for today, I am sad, I am sitting in my choices, I am remembering the good, the magical, the reason behind it all. I hope tonight I can sleep but if I can’t I know that this too shall pass and eventually, I WILL soothe myself to sleep.