Emotions are a tricky
thing.
A little over three
years ago I felt okay. I was still struggling with a bipolar diagnosis and
finding my own unique degree of “normal”… but I felt like overall, I was
starting to get things together. Life was busy and I was keeping up – full time
job, four busy kids, the entire family moving every direction with activities,
and a marriage that needed work but that was dedicated. It wasn’t perfect, but
I did feel like I was starting to get a handle on things – that if I worked a
little harder, and pushed through the rough times a little stronger, than it
would be okay… I would conquer the madness.
Even though I knew it
was stressful and a struggle to move, I never would have imagined that just a
few short months after moving I would find myself in one of the darkest places
that I had ever been – in essence the start of a roller coaster of a recovery
journey. The emotions that floated around my head had always been extreme, but
as I began to travel a new road, research my illness’s, and take off the many
masks that I had always worn; I found that I no longer knew how to handle
anything – let alone the emotions that ran rampant through my brain,
fluctuating with little warning, sending me down twisting paths that always
felt like they were trying to trip me up.
Three years ago I
posted on Facebook, trying to make my life seem exciting and good – showing off
our new home that we were settling into and bragging about the beauty of living
in the country; I was trying to make it seem like an adventure that I fully
intended to not only participate in, but to enjoy. And yet just yesterday, I
found myself curled up in the corner – struggling to breathe as I battled
emotions so intense that I felt like I had been propelled right back to the
beginning of my journey. As I fought through my emotions and worked through the
steps that I have learned to bring myself back to the present I grew
overwhelmed – upset, frustrated, and confused – over both how far I have come,
and how far I have left to go.
Just yesterday, I
found myself wondering if it was worth it… if I would ever be the vision of “normal”
that I have spent years aiming to be.
And then I was okay
again. My mood bounced back up. I smiled… I cuddled… I played with my kids… I
felt hope and motivation. I felt good – even if it was only for a brief few
minutes before the chaos resumed inside my head.
And throughout the day
I used up my strength – my inner monologues and my conscience fighting amongst
itself. I used up my patience and my own understanding – I used up my own pool
of excess emotion to propel myself through dinner, through conversation, and through
the evening with the family. By the time that bedtime arrived, my head hurt and
my brain would not shut down. Things people said – the way that I reacted – the
things that I did and felt and said and saw… it all replayed on repeat. My
emotions swirled back up and as the exhaustion settled in, I wasn’t sure that I
could bother to repeat the steps and the process to calm myself down and think
rationally.
And the worst part is –
sometimes I question it all.
Nights like tonight,
where I can’t sleep and my brain works non-stop, I wonder if it’s worth it to
keep moving forward on this spiralling pathway that I’ve chosen. I want
healing. I want recovery. I want to be able to say that I did it… I conquered
those thoughts… those ideas… those reactions. I want to be able to say that I
have no more darkness in me, and that medications and therapy and a lot of work
has helped to restore my brain to some semblance of “normal”. I know that
tomorrow I will mask it again and I know that I will pretend that I am okay as
I work through more of my “stuff”. I will smile and make nice, I will
socialise, I will bring up normalcy and stigma, and I will talk about fighting
and winning against mental health.
But the truth is;
emotions are not easy – and fixing chemical imbalances and learned behaviours
and reactions, is more difficult than anyone will ever admit to.
Because the truth is
hard to admit.
It is never easy to
say that you are struggling and that you feel like a failure.
It is never easy to
say “I’m not okay” or “I’m suicidal today”. Stigma is everywhere – in the
world, in our friends, in our homes, and in our family. Our loved ones become
numb to our pain or our confusion – our constantly heightened sense of emotion and
our inability to deal with life in an appropriate way. Compassion fatigue
allows those who we trust with our baggage to become desensitised – to possibly
say the right things but without meaning, or to simply ignore our struggles and
our victories.
And so we return to
the places we came from – hiding the truth and masking our journey with quotes
and inspirational sayings. We pretend that although it may be tough – that we
are fighters and that the worst of the journey is over, just a few small
hurdles left to clear.
My emotions are not
okay. My own emotions might never be fully okay or one hundred percent
manageable.
After years of working
on controlling them, on doing recovery work, and on researching therapies that
can help me process and see things differently – I can honestly say that some
days I feel worse, being aware of and in a position where I am expected to be
able to redirect those emotions, and process things in a more acceptable
manner.
A little less than
three years ago, I tried to jump off of a waterfall and my life was saved by
two police officers who pulled me to safety as I let go over the ledge. I was
confused and unable to handle my emotional state – I was depressed and while it
was an intentional act, I was also unaware of the depth of my own state of mind,
and the way that my brain processed things differently. I wish I could say that
being in that place, was the worst day that I have experienced.
But the truth is, it
wasn’t.
Some days are utterly
unbearable and there are many days where taking my life still seems like an
appealing option… a better option than living in this constant fear, pain, and
chaos.
But then I remember
the good days. I remember the small victories that I am the only one who has
noticed – the way that I didn’t go to bed one night feeling like there had been
a massive war inside my head… or the way that I controlled myself in an
overwhelming situation… or the time I set a date for myself to make a decision,
and then I let it pass by. There are victories every day. There are reminders
and support systems and people who might not ever “get it”, but who are there.
There are the days that I force myself to talk about it – the good and the bad –
the victories and the struggles, so that other people might not feel alone any
more… or so that someone else might see the battle that I face. There are the
days where I say I will not give up – and there are the days where I cannot do
much more than sit and pretend to be okay. There are days where compassion
fatigue and struggles of their own prevent my friends and family from checking
in or from being able to help when I ask… and then there are the days where
they are there – a touch, a hug, a tea, a friendly “hello”, and I hadn’t even
thought that they noticed.
Three years ago I had
no idea what I was doing. I was simply trying to survive in the best way that I
knew how – with no knowledge, no true support, and no ability to identify what
was really going on in my head.
Today – I still feel
the same way a lot of the time. But emotions are tricky, the mind
can be a
complicated maze to navigate, and recovery is never a straight pathway. So
today – while I don’t understand, and while I have chosen to stop trying to
navigate my head for a while, I will talk about it. I will share a bit of the
chaos – I will share a bit of my life. And sometimes, sharing a small glimpse
into someone else’s head, is the very best thing that you can do.
