March, 2018. Twenty six years young.
The rug just got swept out from under me. Actually it’s more like some Cosmic Power’s Cosmic Child got bored and decided to pick up the Planet that is my Life and shake it a thousand times, flip it upside down, shake it some more and then throw me down, back hand style like a bowling ball. I still don’t feel like I’ve landed but what gets thrown must eventually crash (and burn), right?
Dramatic.
Accurate. Vague. This is me writing. This is your brain on me.
I think I’ve been doing what I’ve been doing for too long. I thought I’d be immune to this mythical idea of ‘burnout’ all the grownups warned me about. I started being a Professional Hero/Friend four years ago. I really did used to love it.
But that isn’t what the Cosmic Shaking was. I mean there is overlap. But this isn’t going to be a post about details or why I can’t stop crying. This isn’t a post mordum about my career as a Support Worker/Doormat.
I don’t know what it’s about. I don’t know what the point of anything is! I just know if I didn’t have my outlet of kicking the crap and punching the shit out of Thai pads I very well may have unleashed my physical rage on some humans. So I guess that’s good. So thank you to you, you know who you are. You’ve provided my saving grace. Thank you for making me less of a real life murderer.
What do you do when a spoiled celestial child is shaking your life around and everything hurts and nothing makes sense and you have no concept of what the truth is anymore.
What do you do when you genuinely think everyone is full of shit.
What do you do? Do you drink a bottle of wine every night and convince yourself it’s just cause your sad right now and Dammit, You’re 27, you can do whatever you want?
Do you look for opportunities to tell people to fuck off or that you are the queen of not caring and then back peddle because you scared them and came off too strong (is there any other way to come off)
Do you still talk to the person you tell other people you aren’t talking to anymore?
I have no patience for myself.
What do you do when it’s already been two months since The Shaking but you still have sea legs and everyone says, time time time it just takes time, and you’re like yeah but I miss me, when will I come back, where did I go…
I’ve had so many hands to hold
Handing me tea
Holding my own when there were not words to say when a familiar sad song came on and we didn’t have volume control
Lending me smokes
Lighting said smokes
Wrapping around my neck and not letting go until I was breathing properly
Playing guitars and pianos and saying, sing with me, c’mon, it’s okay
Holding my hair back while I got intimate with some porcelain because I overdid it again
Do I need to finally accept that I made my bed
and now I have to sleep in it?
Alone?
Perhaps more painful than the detox itself is the knowledge that you will get to the other side and one day it will not hurt this much but you need to suffer thru it- there is no short cut, no getting around it. No fast forward, no skipping the ads. No closing your eyes. Every minute passes like a decade and you cannot speed it up.
Live thru this and you won’t look back.
The knowledge of the necessity of the suffering on top of the actual suffering- it’s enough to make your head explode.
Detoxing attention- it may as well be chemical. Coming down off Someone.
The haunting realizations of just how many blank empty voids there are, where all of this attention and time and talk used to be.
The loud lack of communication that used to be a given. Everyday on the daily.
The, who am I without this person? Who did I used to be, how did I fill my days? Was I that co-dependant or is this just normal? What is everybody else doing? Why is everybody else smiling?
Praying that my head explodes…
But that instant high from every *ding*, every red message symbol, every phantom phone vibration — as pathetic as it feels to admit, maybe that’s not helping. Floods me with dopamine, bandaids the hurt and serves as synthetic attention. Even if it’s just my mom reminding me that Jesus loves me.
Right from the get go I said, I will not self destruct. I will not self destruct. Like a mantra would help me have some illusion of control. I kept saying it, knowing that I probably still would. I’ve been okay. Self destruction is relative. My relatives are self destructive.
My days are getting better. Less panic ridden. I don’t want to burn my life down. I like what I’ve built and I don’t want to play with matches.
I will live thru this. This is the dark before the dawn. The sun will rise.
And one day I’ll come back to me. Not all at once and not when I expect it. But life has a way about it. I will come back, breathing deeply and standing straight with my shoulders back. I’ll come back. I promise.
I will live through this and I won’t look back.
Originally published at natwiarda.ca.
