What are you looking for?

Im often asked what my goal is, what I want…. Here’s what I want

I want to stop feeling. (Period, I could end there, but I won’t)….

Feeling sad

Feeling mad

Feeling bitter

Feeling resentful

Feeling  sorrow-filled

I want to stop feeling pity for myself

Feeling irritable

Feeling aggravated

Feeling slothlike

I want to stop FEELING.

I don’t want to feel happy because in order to feel the sweetness of happy, you have to feel the bitter sting of sad/mad etc.

Sometimes I miss the “old me”.  The me that was so anxious she was always busy, she got shit done, and baked a cake too.  Sure, she was irritable and demanding, wanted everything perfect on her time table, but she didn’t have time to “feel” anything real.

I want to be numb.  I don’t want to be sad. I don’t want to be down.  I want to feel nothing at all.  I am tired of worrying about my husband’s health.  I am tired of worrying about my kids’ schoolwork, my kids’ future, how much I am screwing them up.  Tired of worrying I will be like my mother – emotionally distant.  Or like my father bitter, angry, using my children for emotional support, emotionally abusive.

I am tired of being poor.

I am tired of being fat.

I am tired of everything hurting- especially my hip.

I am tired of my hands being so numb I can’t drive or knit, or hold a book for very long.

I want to just go to sleep…. And sleep until it all goes away…..

I just want to have a good cry sometimes, but I am afraid if I start to cry I will never stop. I look in the mirror (when I have to) and I don’t see the masterpiece that God made me, I see a sad, scared little girl.  Unloved, unwanted, ugly, fat and pitiful.

Written 2/28/1

 

 

 

Sadness that overwhelms

Some days you are just sad. Sometimes you can pinpoint what is causing you to feel sadness.  Sometimes you cant.

Today, I am sad.  So sad that my heart actually hurts. Some of the sadness I know comes from circumstances that are going on in my life. My husband is sick.  With what we still aren’t sure, it’s been going on for three years. He’s not the man I married, with energy, zest for life, positivity leaking from his every pore.  He’s tired, he’s sore, he’s angry and bitter. And now he has a severe herniated disk. We aren’t sure what this means for his job- he’s a small business owner and only employee as a mechanic. We aren’t sure what this means for his future.

Today my dad gets the 2nd part of his leg amputation.  An amputation that could have been avoided with better choices over the past 18 years.  He could have managed his diabetes better, he could have avoided diabetes in the first place. But he didn’t.

I am less than 2 months from the age he was when he was diagnosed.  I am overweight– no obese–. 4 years ago, I lost close to 100 pounds.  I was 35, I saw 39 coming and I wasn’t going to let history repeat itself for the 3rd generation. But here I am 46 days from turning 39, and 218 pounds. My fasting glucose this morning was 114. I am prediabetic. And only I can stop it. Diet and exercise.  But last year I hurt my hip, and though an MRI shows a tear in the cartilidge of my hip, and 2 doctors concur it needs fixing the surgeon who would be the one to fix it thinks the MRI was overread. I can’t work out it hurts to exist let alone pivot, lift and flex.  My hands and arms are constantly numb.  Not just when I write, type or knit, but while I eat my breakfast, while I drive, while I exist.

As a Christian I am supposed to remember all this is a refining, the process of sanctification.  That all things are working together for my good.  But I am a bad Christian.  I want this pain gone.  I want to drown the pain with food, with my medications.  I want to feel NOTHING.  I want to sleep.  Sometimes I want to go to sleep and never wake up.

I still think about hurting myself.  I still wonder if those around me would be better off without my crazy in their life. Would I be better off if my father hadn’t been in my life? If he had walked away and not let his scars from childhood scar me? Sometimes I really think that yes, I would have. Maybe I wouldn’t hate myself so much.  Maybe I would have more self worth.  Maybe I would understand God’s love for me. Maybe I would understand that it’s unconditional not dependent on a set of things that I have to do, or not do. I want to feel that peace of Him in my heart.  I want to know that it’ll all work out, that I am free.   That I am no longer a prisoner to myself, because of Him. But I don’t know how to find that. How do I let go? How do I let Him pick me up, carry me, and take my burden and pain? How?…..

No schedule to this…

I don’t know how often I will post here.  There are days I feel like I can barely breathe in and out, let alone put into words the things that I’m feeling, the things that are happening to me. 

When I was a little girl I could often be heard saying “let’s pretend”… it’s a good thing because I spend much of my life pretending.  Pretending I’m ok.  Pretending I’m not hurting.  Pretending I’m not thinking about hurting myself. Pretending I don’t feel like my family would be better off without me.  

After some talking with hubby we came to the conclusion I’ve been depressed for about three years.  Three years and I didn’t even realize it. I had been pretending so well I had faked it even to myself.  

What sort of role model am I to my children?  I’m so tired of pretending.  I’m not ok.  I’m not happy.  I’m sad. I think about hurting myself almost everyday.  I think about how much better off my children and husband would be with a mentally healthy mother and wife.

The email from my mother that I discussed last time – here’s what she said 

You were never diagnosed with hyperactivity .I was trying to restrict preservatives because I thought you were on the hyperactive side.(Bit of honey was my candy of choice for you) BUT I was never sure what you had been fed or how consistent your schedule was due to my working evenings. You were not defiant as I remember You were very sensitive and easily reasoned with however your father had little tolerance for childhood behavior as well as a lack of understanding in the need for schedules. This presented a challenge as it seemed to keep things stirred up.Mrs. R never reported any behaviors at nursery or kindergarden nor did any school teachers. (EXCEPT the one who complained you lick your lips to much).You had a tendency to hoard stuff, you did steal a lollypop at the store but other than that you were not a behavior issue. What I saw was a lack of consistent supervision and I don’t feel that some of the movies and places your father would take you was appropriate for a child.Some mental health issues are hereditary and some are parent or self inflicted.

She went on to talk about our family history with mental health issues but that’s their story to tell or not.  Suffice to say there are is a lot of history there.  

So she doesn’t think it’s “my fault”.  But I can’t help but think I’m dragging my entire family into this pit that I’m in.  At first I was trying to claw my way out – but now I’m sitting at the bottom of the pit rocking back and forth hoping I can get through the day.