I had to check what day it was. My memory has been shot, lately. I don’t know why, all I can do is list concurrent factors: my flat was renovated and my boyfriend moved in; nothing is in the same place as it was; there’s empty spaces where we’re still saving to put something there; many things are still awaiting their place; the things that do have a place may yet be moved around to a better one; I don’t feel settled.
Quality sleep has escaped my nights as he tosses violently in his sleep. At least, it feels violent; it isn’t. Its 95 kilos of a six foot man rolling over and I’m jolted from my sweet slumber. I groan inwardly and go back to sleep, but the damage to my unbroken reverie has been done.
My symptoms have expanded, I’m anxious now and becoming irritable. My recollections are swiss cheese and I’m constantly unfocused. I worry I’ve lost my grasp of living in the moment and being present for the people I care about. I yawn frequently and seek to lay blame. I change my diet to fast until lunchtime, perhaps the effort of digesting the morning meal taxes my body’s ability to focus before midday.
I reflect on this recent upheaval and am confident my pointed finger will find its mark. My certainty wanes and it dawns on me this past few months is not finite. Recent chronology stretches back and back and I realize change has been the real constant for a time longer than I want to admit. I am tired.
I mope inwardly and seek comfort in old habits: salty carbs and weekday wines. The ingrained habits of my New Life™ habits seem to be limited to Good Vibes Only. I’ve been asymptomatic of the depression that controlled my youth now for 18 months, the same period of time for my greatest successes in career, finances, health and relationships.
I’ve worked hard to get myself from minus one to zero and having steered my life out of the disaster it fell into, the water has never been so calm. I feel like I’ve exceeded my own modest expectations having achieved going from zero to one and yet I am bewildered as infinity stretches out, invitingly, toward me. I’ve never stood here before and it’s beautiful.
I’m at a loss to explain what’s happening to me now. Everything is completely new, the frames of reference I know no longer apply. My ship, in a new ocean, still needs to be steered by me. Writing is my map, it always has been. Despite my neglect at this deeply important skill, writing somehow shows me where True North is. Its up to me to keep looking at the map to keep me on my right journey.
Have You Met Kim? 
“The ingrained habits of my New Life™ habits seem to be limited to Good Vibes Only.”
oh oh oh!
I relate to this so hard.
When Change slowed and made way for Being, I felt like I’d conquered Everest. Look at me having appropriate emotional responses to situations! Fuck yeah, I’m killing it!
… but then the situations stopped being pleasant ones and instead became stressful ones – sleep deprivation, monotony, the boring parts of responsibility and suddenly I was pre-diagnosis me again.
I’d mistakenly thought that I had equipped my toolbox with everything I needed to deal with negative situations. After all, I’d overcome so many of the negatives from my past, hadn’t I?
Well, yes. But it turns out that’s very different to existing through a current negative situation when it arises.
I couldn’t look at it through the lens of The Past or Recovery – It was all happening right then and there, and .. it felt really gross.
It didn’t feel nice to be angry, agitated, unmotivated and sad without the comforting factor of “it was a long time ago”. In fact, experiencing those emotions outside of a flashback was downright terrifying – PLEASE don’t let me be depressed again. I couldn’t handle it. I can’t live that way anymore.
So I just.. kind of cobbled together some new tools. I used some that had helped me process and move on from my past, and just kind of modified them for my present.
You know what my most effective tool is? A shower so hot that it numbs your skin and you no longer feel the water hitting you. Sometimes I do some simple breathing exercises, other times I talk to myself, or sing or cry… but whenever I get out and get into some fresh clothes, I feel like that dead skin has sloughed away and I’m good to start facing my shit.
You’ve gone through your metamorphosis and lived through the Exciting New Me period. Now you’re at the stage were New Me is Now Actually Just Me… but you’ve also got some big changes taking place with Nick moving in and your sanctuary being shared by someone else in a way it has never really been shared before.
But… like everything else… you’ve got the shit outta all of this and you’re going to make True North come to you if you can’t find it on your map.
I love you forever and ever amen.
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You made me laugh a bunch of times but most of all at “New Me is Now Actually Just Me”. I agree with everything you said, and one of my favourite quotes comes to mind: “Rest, but don’t Stop”.
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That’s perfect.
And like… needs to be my mantra.
I tend to stop, and rest. And not get up again.
Like, literally. I watched an entire season of Sons of Anarchy in a day, a few weeks ago.
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