I’ve tasted hopelessness. I know what heartache is…I’ve lived through brokenness…but all that matters is that I matter to you

(Colton Dixon – All That Matters)

 

It is super easy to see lots of problems in my life…but this evening I have also felt a lot of gratitude. People have reached out to me and made me feel like I mattered. Being around people is super helpful for me. I don’t necessarily need to talk, in fact sometimes I can’t talk, but presence is such a huge gift to me. Presence is so healing.

 

I can be annoyed that my car turned into like a sauna because my dress and other articles of clothing that couldn’t go in the dryer were laid out in the car…in addition to the moisture left over from Friday afternoon, or I can be thankful that I have clean laundry.

 

I can be frustrated that it was about to start raining again so I couldn’t air out my car long enough to really get the insane humidity to go away, or I can be thankful I recognized in time that the rain was about to come down really hard and got the doors closed and myself inside before I was soaked.

 

I can berate myself for not having the ability to ask anyone if I can sit with them this evening, or I can be thankful that the majority of the time now that isn’t a problem and recognize that once there are fewer things adding to my overwhelm, I will probably quickly regain consistency in that skill.

 

I can be disappointed in myself that I almost cried in church in front of people, or I can be super grateful that I pushed it away before it happened…even if it was probably noticeable to the people I was talking with that I was a lot less okay than my words said I was.

 

I can be annoyed that it is raining while I am trying to move in, or I can be thankful for the fact that a cart was available that allowed me to get all my stuff to my room in only a couple quick trips which meant I ended up a lot less soaked than when I got home yesterday…yesterday’s shoes have had plenty of paper towels in them and still are soaked and now that I packed them in a plastic bag in my car all day kinda stink…

 

I can be frustrated that being the first person to move into my room means there is no one to help me raise the height of my bed before putting the sheets on and no one to talk me down when I am getting really frustrated because bed-making is not one of my skills, or I can be happy that I get to pick which bed I want and that at least for this first night I’ll get to use my music to fall asleep and can sleep with the light on if I want to…lol…apparently the outlets in this room aren’t shaped right for my nightlight. It does work on battery, but it seems easier to just leave the lights on and call it a day…Probably I should unpack…but I think Imma just go to bed and do that tomorrow…and I gotta do more applying…and try to figure out how to back up my computer…

 

Good lyrics of the day:

I should follow the word but I guess I’d rather be murdered. Excuse me I mean martyred ’cause I’m killin’ myself. My sin conceived a baby, and we gon’ name her death. Breath taken. She takes my breath away. Replaces it with poison. (Killa – Lecrae)

You’ll stand through the pain, you won’t drown, and one day what’s lost can be found

(Stand in the Rain – Superchic[k])

 

So…things you can learn from me instead of for yourself: don’t wait to go home until there is under an hour before your usual bedtime when you are running on around 20 minutes of sleep. On the positive side, the worst I did was mostly run a red light…I mean, it stayed yellow like 90% of the time I was in the intersection…and I didn’t run into or even almost run into any of the other big iron things on the road, so I mean the whole point of having rules is to provide a structure that keeps us safe, so even my lack of following that one particular rule of the road didn’t jeopardize the intent of the rule…not that that makes it okay in any sense of the word.

 

In my defense, I really did intend to leave earlier. My goal was to be away from school and to eat dinner and to avoid sitting FORever in traffic and to definitely not be home when everyone else was eating dinner since I already said I wasn’t planning on being home for dinner. I told myself that I could leave when I finished another piece of bread or I could trade that for finishing the goldfish crackers…except I didn’t wanna, because technically I already did eat dinner. I had an egg and a slice of bread and a cup of apple juice and some skittles…except even though the package might say a slice is a serving, pretty sure the average adult shouldn’t be eating a single slice of bread as the carb group for dinner especially after taking a long walk earlier in the day. So I decided the second piece was mandatory too, but whiney brain wasn’t having it. But then I looked at the time and realized I had to get my butt into the car and get home…but on the positive side I did manage to get that piece of bread in my mouth before I put on my pajamas and went to bed. All is well that ends well.

 

While I was sitting in my happy place, one of my friends came to talk to me and that meant a lot to me. She is so awesome. Anyway, she asked me how my week was going, and I think I probably had my deer in the headlights selective mutism face on because she started supplying me words (also appreciated because clearly I was too exhausted both emotionally and physically to make coherent conversation). The words were “it’s hard to say.” Which is true on so many levels. First because quite literally I couldn’t get words out. Second because I was at that moment in time numb. Third, because I am lousy at decisions. Fourth, because I am ALWAYS okay, especially when I’m not. Fifth, because I don’t want to be a downer, and I don’t want to be a liar, but a lot of this week was really frustrating because even though some of last week I started finally being able to go numb, this week hasn’t been as successful. Likely that is largely because of the huge stressor of attempting to actually apply for jobs, but either way, it isn’t fun to be crying in the middle of class and crying in front of people, and feeling the pain so acutely and deeply for so much of every day. It’s hard.

 

Sometimes when everything is so hard, tiny ant-sized problems seem like giant Tyrannosaurus Rex-sized problems…case in point: I finished eating and was getting ready for bed. I turned off the lights and was really confused when my room wasn’t illuminated with my nightlight (I usually keep my nightlight on the light activated setting so when the sensor doesn’t sense enough light it starts glowing to create the appropriate amount of light). I turn the lights back on and discover that my night light is not plugged into the wall. This sparks a search for my nightlight. Is it on the floor next to the outlet? No. Is it in my bag? No, I know it was forgotten today and I double checked and it is not there. Did I leave it in the kitchen or bathroom this morning? Well, it is not there now…and eventually after checking everywhere I could think to check I had to admit that the nightlight was definitely missing and I wasn’t staying up any later looking for it…and I’d been doing a good job all day not crying, and that is what set off the angry frustrated tears. It shouldn’t be a big deal. When I’m asleep my eyes are closed to it doesn’t matter if the room is light, and my room right now is small enough that I can certainly find the light switch easily and the room is all mine when I’m sleeping so I know nothing will be on the floor in my way (although that is not a guarantee at home). But that nightlight was like my security blanket. I got it for my birthday and I love it. And my world was crashing apart because of a nightlight. I am way too old to be getting anywhere close to that upset over a nightlight.

 

That was a time when being numb would have been helpful and created a more normative response. There was one occasion on Wednesday though when it would have been nice to be not numb for just a few minutes. My team won second place in trivia, and it was nothing to me. Part of that is that winning or losing has never been a huge thing for me, but I still should have been a little excited for a few minutes. Instead it was just one more situation to pretend my way through. I really enjoyed the night, and I really needed to be there, but it would have been awesome to have just a few minutes of excitement.

 

I also found a calculator online for helping you figure out how to eat to be the weight you want to be when you want to be it. That was a bit of a downer…so, I decided by graduation was a good time to be at my goal weight. The calculator popped up a warning that it couldn’t do that because that wasn’t a safe amount of weight change in two weeks. Even once it pushed me into a third week (because that is the shortest time it would let me choose) it wanted me to eat over 2800 calories every day! I’m not very good at calories so I don’t really know how much that is, but I know that a “typical” diet is 2000 calories, so I have a pretty good idea that 2800 calories is a LOT…and that was without anything more than just the light activity of daily life…it’s not like I said there was any chance of me exercising. On the positive side, my wrist is now big enough again that I can wear bracelets without worrying about them falling off and getting lost. I might lose my head if it weren’t attached, but that’s why God created us with necks 🙂

 

And when it rains it pours. I was so busy freaking out about my nightlight that I forgot that I ate the skittles from my car for dinner when I didn’t *want* mini oreos for dinner…which means there aren’t any skittles in my car for if I need them today…Hey, on the positive side, at least I showed up at school with lunch, water bottle, phone, computer, and all the things I can think of right now that I might absolutely need…not that that means I didn’t forget something that I am not thinking of right now…And there weren’t any garbage or portapotty trucks on the road today…lol…like the newer superchick song, we take life 5 minutes at a time.

 

More awesome lyrics:

“Drowning out the sound of her sorrows, she’s finding it hard to exist. She keeps running into herself, hoping to find somebody else. She keeps running into herself hoping to find somebody better.” (Pennyless – Plumb)

The best laid plans can go upside down if that’s lady luck’s intent

 

(Accidents Happen – Thomas and Friends)

 

Things don’t always go how they go inside my head.

 

I was going to do a video with a teacher…instead I got pulled into a meeting about background checks and discovered that it is finally going to be a lot less expensive for students now than it has been for me. Then I got pulled into helping with looking through preceptor of the year awards.

 

I got out of my last event of the day super early and I had the great idea that I would go swing on a swingset….umm…yeah…it was thunderstorming and I didn’t get very far on my way to my car before I realized swinging in a thunderstorm was a Very Bad Idea.

 

So instead I decided to go find someone to talk to…except everyone was busy…

 

It is easy to forget me…especially when I never made it known I needed anything…

 

But some things do go right. Sometimes God answers prayer with yes. There was a garbage truck that happened to turn onto the road in front of me. Oh c**p oh c**p oh c**p are the last words coming out of my mouth before trying to hold my breath as long as possible…then I forced myself to breathe while thinking about if there was anywhere I could get some bleach and clean myself and all my things. And I was frustrated because clearly if I can barely touch the steering wheel while I drive because everything is contaminated then eating is going to be super difficult…so I did the only thing left to do. I prayed my heart out the rest of the way to school…usually I’m also singing myself songs (usually inside my head…), but not today, and shortly after getting to school I was actually doing okay again!! Maybe I don’t have a job and I’m still alive because I’m not a good enough Christian.

 

I’ve been listening to the book “In the Water they can’t see you cry.” As a former swimmer and loving the title SO much, it was totally worth the fact that it was like 10 hours long. Amanda Beard was the topic of my french paper in seventh grade. I was a little disappointed at first because the book wasn’t like I thought it would be, but it actually is pretty good. It is so familiar that I feel like I’ve read it before in like actual words, but I’m pretty sure based on the publication date that I haven’t read it before…I suppose there is probably a good chance that the majority of the story I read from the Splash magazines a little at a time. I read those things religiously cover to cover until they stopped coming. Anyway, I am so glad I read the book this week. It was something I could totally connect with. Someone else who had very similar problems to my own and experienced it similarly…and she got through it and ended up with a BABY!! Mostly it was just me having someone to commiserate with who wasn’t going to be overwhelmed or anything seeing as how it was only a person on a recording, but there were tiny bits of hope that if she could do it maybe I could too.

 

Sometimes life is frustrating. I wanted to go to yoga today. I had lab until 6:30, so even worst case scenario I’d make it to the second half. Then the teacher for the class I had before lab said unless I wanted to be in class that I might as well leave because there wasn’t going to be anything useful for me in class. I took that invitation and left. I probably should have done something useful with my life, but instead I went on a walk…a five-mile walk. Yeah…that was stupid. And that is why I am unable to go to yoga. I don’t think it is safe for me to be there. Either it will be slow stretching yoga in which case I will be tempted to pretend I am totally able to do what everyone else seemingly can and intentionally do things that will leave me in physical pain to drown some of the emotional pain, or it will be some type of fitness yoga that will similarly be bad for me because I really shouldn’t be doing anything that is going to burn extra calories when I am trying to gain weight…especially seeing as how I am already having trouble with my dinner today. I was super efficient in lab moving people around and grading papers and alphabetizing at top speed so that I’d have plenty of time and I was pretty proud of myself for finishing at 5pm. But then I realized that it wasn’t a good idea to go to yoga. But I also couldn’t go home. I already said I wasn’t going to be home for dinner and it is always awkward when I say that then show up at home…especially because a lot of times dinner when I’m not there is fish and so people feel bad that I can’t eat with them, because that is one of the things they are aware that I do not eat. Besides, I had enough food for two meals in my lunch box and extra snacks in my car. So I started getting dinner ready, but I didn’t really want to eat it. So I went to my happy place so that I wouldn’t be tempted to show up to show up at yoga. Now I am trying really hard to finish dinner. It is frustrating, because I feel like I should be over this by now. But I’m still struggling. How long does this last? I’m tired of holding on.

 

Umm yeah…so we’ll just end with some good lyrics:

“When does a scar become a tattoo? When does the sky turn back to blue? When will this heart that’s broken and bleeding beat again? When do I stop feeling this burn? When will it stop? When will I learn?…I’m right here, standing in the pouring rain; tick tock hours all feel the same.” (Say your name – Plumb)

Hold on tight a little longer

(Hard Life – NEEDTOBREATHE)

I feel like I’ve been holding on forever. I was holding on for graduation and then graduation lost most of its thrill when my dreams died. The light at the end of the tunnel burned out and there wasn’t even a train to replace it and keep me company in the darkness of the empty tunnel. No one wants me and no one will. Now I’m holding on just trying to find my way through the pain that tries to drown me every day. It’s hard. I wake up every day having to face another day of failure. I am not enough. I will never be enough. I can’t. It hurts.

I can’t do anything right.

I keep getting emails about the pharmacy weight loss challenge. It rubs salt in the wounds. They are the reason I already lost too much weight because they didn’t want me. I am trying so hard to gain weight, not lose it, and I am failing at it. Yesterday I freaked out because I hadn’t gained any weight since Saturday…in fact I’d lost half a pound. Fail. So I did what any person with only about half a brain functioning secondary to emotional pain; I continued with my general plan except I also had about 40 chicken nuggets and filled my cup three times with lemonade for lunch. My stomach hurt so good after eating all that. But it didn’t do anything. I weighed the same this morning as I did yesterday. I think this is why the experts say that you shouldn’t weigh yourself more than once a week. Fail. I can’t do anything right.

I always fail. Yesterday I cried in front of people again. Fail. Why can’t I stay numb at the right times? Fail.

I can’t parallel park to save my life. I tried really hard this morning and gave up. Then I almost forgot where I was going and figuring it out any more minutes later probably would have ended me up at church wondering why I was there. Not that I wouldn’t far prefer to be there rather than school, but that’s not where I was supposed to be.

Where am I supposed to be? No one wants me. I just want to be alone…well, alone but with friends. And I can’t. I haven’t ever lived in a shared space except in a hotel, and it always leads to high stress levels…and now I’ve been assigned to a group of three in one room with three more people sharing the adjoining room…definitely no space to be alone in a room full of people I barely know. I do at least recognize the names of the people I am with though…so at least I’m not living with strangers. I also don’t know how long I can live there. I hate change and I hate unknowns.

There’s this song I like called all you do is whine. Some lyrics are “All you do is whine, no matter what. It’s your bedtime lights out doors shut…we’ll do it again you’re up. You don’t stay down…you’re up down up down.” Except I’ve been doing it “All you do is fail, no matter what.” It feels a lot more true that way. I can’t I can’t I can’t. When does this end?

Is it so wrong to be who we are? ‘Cause all that she’s done is fail…If you’re still there hang on

(Nice Naïve and Beautiful – Plumb)

Just a few random thoughts…

Lesson learned: there are parts of what I consider remnants left over from OCD that are actually serving me well and do not need to be eliminated. So there are places that for a reason I really can’t identify don’t feel clean even if they have recently been cleaned by me. Because of that I usually wash my hands after touching those areas. It isn’t a huge hindrance or anything – the vast majority of the time even if I couldn’t immediately wash my hands it wouldn’t be the end of the world or anything. I could move on with my day. So this morning I touched the bathroom counter and decided I should be a big girl and not wash my hands…especially because I was going to take a shower in like 5 minutes anyway. Well, I’m not sure if the cat touches that surface but even if the cat didn’t, people who touch the cat touch the surface. I got distracted doing something else and forgot about wanting to wash my hands. Then I touched my face and a few minutes later when my eyes were itchy I learned a valuable lesson…apparently allergies are for real and what I thought was immature excessive hand washing was actually protecting me…oops…

Some things are less protective though…OCD doesn’t make sense. I have no problem picking up and eating the cheerio I found on the floor of my car this morning, but I saw a portapotty truck and even 15 minutes and 5 miles removed from the situation I still was internally yelling at myself to stop being a baby because I still wanted to hold my breath to protect myself from the germs. Yep, I am WAY phobic sometimes of portapotties still…It is moderately okay to be a baby and hold my breath for the first two minutes while I am getting away. It is not okay to not grow up and realize it isn’t a big deal when you are 5 miles away from the offense.

So I took this survey on the internet a few days ago. It was labelled as supposed to help you find a job, so I thought I would put in my interests and it would give me links to jobs…haha…yeah…a few questions in it became very apparent that was not what this was for, but I figured I was far enough in I’d just see what happened. As it turns out, it was an MBTI. I got the same thing that I got in high school. ISFJ, but this one gave percents. That was cool, because it really explained why I felt like it was only like 47-64% accurate in high school (I don’t remember the exact percent, but I do clearly recall taking the entire paragraph description the stupid system spit out and underlining or crossing out each phrase and then counting and dividing to determine the percent accuracy…then getting frustrated that the multiple choice for percent didn’t get very close to the answer I had figured out…yes, I do realize they just wanted you to assess a general sense of yes this is me or no this is not me, but I am not a forest person. I am a trees person. I think this survey did a good job nailing down the introvert/extravert domain. Internally I am extraverted. I require contact with people. But on the outside you might not be able to tell that because while sometimes I am overflowing with bubbly energy, there are also times I need to be WITH, but don’t need to talk. I just need to BE. That is why I really needed the place I studied years ago – I could have WITH all day, but could go an entire day with minimal words leaving my mouth.

LOL, plastic bags, not just for holding things anymore (good because the bag is a little bit ripped). Also for protecting the blanket and sheets from the salsa spill that would definitely happen if there weren’t a plastic bag to catch spills. It might have taken around 90 minutes to finish this for lunch on Sunday, but I did it. (And yes, I do spend much of my time every day on my bed…yes I know that is bad sleep hygiene…ask me if I care).

I have done my best but still I miss the mark

(unedited as being in survival mode for over a month now means minimal time for non-necessities and I already wasted too much time writing the post in the first place)

(Come Rest – Lindsey McCaul)

That lyric pretty much sums up how I feel about life. I do my best but all I do is fail.

I attended resident prep series classes.

I read two books about getting residencies.

I read the residency prep workbook.

I went to midyear.

I attended the residency showcase.

I applied to an insane number of jobs with well-researched personalized letters of intent.

I prepared for and completed a zillion interviews.

And I didn’t get a residency.

I did all the applying and interviewing stuff again.

And I didn’t get a residency.

I tried again.

I still don’t have a residency.

I try to force feed myself every day, but until this week my weight just kept dropping. I couldn’t keep up with the calories I was burning.

Now I’m eating but the things I am best at eating are skittles, cake, goldfish crackers, noodles, cookies, donuts…and so I continue to supplement with at least two multivitamins every day. On the positive side, I now rock at swallowing meds (at least the ones the size of the multivitamin anyway), but it doesn’t feel like enough. Sure, today’s lunch (which was 90% of yesterday’s lunch) had a reasonable number of calories and hit the fruit/veg and carbohydrate groups, and building off a breakfast with protein counted in my books as a real meal, I am already overwhelmed thinking about my next meals. Eating isn’t as big of a challenge as it was, but it definitely isn’t easy. If I had the funds to have someone assigned to ordering me dominos every day I think I could do it, but remember how this girl doesn’t have a job…yeah…daily pizza isn’t practical. Besides, where do you go to hire someone to order you daily pizza? The process of ordering and obtaining pizza is way too overwhelming at this point for me to be able to do that myself…it might not even have to be pizza…basically anything that is finger food is the most likely to be consumed if there isn’t a social factor to eating.

And you know how I don’t have a job? Well, that means I should probably apply for a job, right? Yeah, easier said than done. Every time I try the pain intensifies and I decide to do it later. I finally had to give in Sunday morning and just do it. It is currently past 5pm. The sleeves of my Despicable Me t-shirt are soaked in tears. I have one application submitted. TBH, the only option that sounds good at this point is death. It doesn’t seem like there is any way to fix this situation and make it okay. And that is another failure. I am not supposed to want to be dead. Clarification to keep me out of trouble: I have no intention of doing anything to end my life. I want to be dead, but I don’t want to kill myself. That would just mess more things up. I can’t do anything right. But I do like that real job applications don’t cost $40 each plus $150 for the privilege of applying at all…

And I’m pretty much the worst friend ever even though my best friend says that’s not true.

I don’t want to be a Debbie Downer…so let’s see, on the positive side, I think I am going to get an A on this rotation. Pretty sure it is basically a gift, because it sounds like my preceptor read my self-evaluations where I was honest about how I know my work kinda isn’t so good given the lack of sleep and other situations surrounding this rotation…but at least that is one less thing to worry about. Now if only there were some way to get breaks inserted into my day without seeming ungrateful or lazy or something…’cause I almost peed my pants on Friday because I had to be ready for my first thing by 7:30am and didn’t get any opportunities for even a 5 minute breather until like 2pm. Also positive: I did get to leave by 5pm on Friday which was awesome because I was starting to get frustrated with my work and the stuff I was doing is stuff that can only be done at school and there is no defined amount I have to get done so the time I leave does not impact my work load.

I might drive a million miles but I know who my friends are.

(Unbroken – Stephanie Pauline)

 

I love this song. And it is very true. I know who my friends are and am SOOOOO thankful for them.

 

If you hate numbers talk then don’t read this paragraph. I’ve gained 8 pounds since Easter. That is an awesome thing. I still have 7 more to go to reach the weight on my driver’s license, but 8 pounds in a week is a lot…and possibly not the safest way to gain weight, but whatever, I didn’t exactly lose it safely either…I think what worked is that throughout the week I had contact every day with people who really care about me. And I mean, those last 7 pounds would still put me net negative 5-10 pounds from when this all started, but I am okay with that. Although the number on my driver’s license was a completely random number because they had us filling out the paperwork in school in 10^th grade and I hadn’t a clue what I weighed so I made it up, and then when I renewed my license I subtracted 15 pounds because the weight I had originally selected was nowhere close to what I actually weighed…but anyway, that number has become my goal. I gained plenty of weight spending lots of time at the buffet in South Dakota, so staying a little net negative is not a problem. I am a stress eater…and a boredom eater…and maybe just an eater in general…so I have no concerns about whether the rest of the weight that I want back will be back. It’s a matter of when, not if. Remember that I am a girl who had no problem putting away half of a dominos large 8-topping pizza in one sitting. Sure, I am still struggling with meals sometimes right now when the grief catches up with me (okay fine, a raspberry and a single bite of chicken is not an appropriate dinner even if the chicken is breaded), but the times that I am eating far make up for it…and I will definitely admit that eating WITH people continues to make my meals a lot more successful, but even alone I might be eating junk, but most meals I am eating something and most meals at least part of that something has nutritional value (umm, hashtag today’s dinner was a cookie sandwich, skittles, and ice cream…I totally did pack an awesome and nutritious breakfast, lunch, and dinner, but I only ate the breakfast).

 

I finally have reached the point where I am able to be numb maybe 80% of the time and only feel the hurt 20% of the time. Sure, that means I still cry sometimes and still have a hard time with things, but it is so much better than the initial 99-100% of the time struggling I was living at before. I haven’t gotten to the 99-100% numb stage yet, and I don’t think I’ve ever come to a point where it was really a choice when the emotions will be turned on vs turned off, but I will definitely take what I can get at this point. If I can hang out painting all day and feel okay, that is awesome. I love not crying and not using inordinate amounts of energy that I really don’t have to hold in tears. I don’t need to feel excited if it also means I am not using up all my energy pretending everything is awesome nor am I crying uncontrollably when asked about graduation and placement. Some people say that going numb is bad, but I am not one of those people right now. I would rather have both pain and excitement muted than to feel nearly constant overwhelming pain. Does that mean that sometimes as the emotions get turned back on I am surprised when years later I still am upset about something I thought I was totally over…ummm…okay fine, yes indeed it does, but I am still totally thankful for the longer stretches of time that I didn’t have to feel it. I am also thankful that I am finally averaging 5-6 hours of sleep a night. It still isn’t quite enough, but it is so much better than the three I was getting. I will survive. This is awful, and there really isn’t any way that it can be fixed, and I almost cried in church today, but at least physically things are better. If things are better physically I am going to be okay. I don’t have a job. I have plenty of other problems, but physically I am doing SO much better.

 

“‘Cause when life gets shipped from here to there…”

Yep, totally story of my life right now. It is crazy to think about how many beds I have slept in this year and how many different states I have been in. I am a girl who lives for the status quo, and have definitely had to learn the art of constant change. Umm…yeah…of location a zillion times and of losing the constant of my dreams and my wonderful job.

 

“Some things are too heavy for even friends to lift.”

Sometimes I feel like I am too much. I don’t think my friends will want to deal with me. And so I isolate. And feel lonely. But my friends have shown me that they are willing to help me and hold me together when I am falling apart. My friends have each done way more than their share to serve me and I appreciate them so much.

 

Mostly unrelated side note: I’m not sure if my phone only saves messages for a certain period of time or if I somehow managed to accidentally delete one of my messages, but I definitely had a whiney scream-fest at my phone for a couple minutes this morning when the message I wanted to hear wasn’t there…

There are days when I’m okay

(Courage – Superchic[k])

Okay, so maybe not days, maybe only moments…and maybe only okay by my standards of still having a heart pumping oxygenated blood around my body, but there are some good reasons to be proud.

At like the middle of the night (which is actually more like early this morning) when I was using up the last 7% of my phone battery life without texting people in the middle of the night because that is rude to wake people up in case they have their ringtone turned on (not that I don’t forget sometimes…sincere apologies to those I have texted while sleeping), I found this really awesome article on the internet of things to say to answer how are you…

1. I’m awesome from the ankles down (not true of me though…my right ankle is sore…like always happens when I’m stressed out ever since I fell on it in ninth grade and didn’t tell anyone even though it was bruised for over 3 months)
2. I didn’t read my name in the obituaries today, so I figure I’m not too bad. (yep, it is important to read the obituaries when you get a chance to make sure you didn’t die and nobody told you).
3. Good, but I’ll get over it (kinda true…I pretty much always answer with good, fine, or okay, regardless of what is actually going on…but eventually the mask will wear off, probably when I’m alone, and I won’t be okay anymore)
4. I hear good things, but you should never trust rumors (Lol…which reminds me that I love being a Christian because Christians care about each other, but I don’t like the gossip disguised as a prayer request).
5. My lawyer says I don’t have to answer that question!! (I don’t have a lawyer, but if I did, I would love to use this and see what people say).

I am so proud of me!! If I weren’t in class constantly yesterday I would have been giving myself so many high fives!!

First instead of the Dominos I was expecting, there was Panda Express. I am not a fan of change. Eating is already hard, so changing the food I am going to have to try to get in my mouth can be challenging. That could very easily have pushed me into the absolutely not category of eating…which would have been a problem since all there is in my lunchbox is candy, a hot chocolate mix packet, and an egg. (Yeah, I know, that still isn’t an appropriate dinner…but this week is stressful enough without worrying about nutrition. I finally am at least usually moderately interested in candy now, so right now I’m working on calories this week and next week will go back to nutrition that doesn’t rely on multivitamins).

Then everyone agreed I should go first because I was presenting. And everyone was watching me and encouraging me to take more. God did good in this circumstance by making me a people pleaser. I ended up with a full plate of Panda Express and the whole thing was eaten. If I had been with friends or in some other socially appropriate situation, I would have been so thrilled I would have been making my excited gestures and maybe happy-screaming. Yep, this girl who has been struggling to get through half a snack pack of crackers and a teeny container of peanut butter for dinner Monday night ate an entire plate of Panda Express!! So proud!!

And I finished my whole entire water bottle by 2pm!! And by the end of the day I’d had probably almost 5 cups of water! Words seem insufficient to describe the pride that I have for myself about that. Way back when this started I decided that the rules were 2 cups of fluids every day, and if I am being honest, I try really hard to meet the rules I set for myself, but they aren’t as important to me as the rules that other people make, so I didn’t necessarily always hit the 2 cup mark…in fact I can think of at least one day I barely hit the 2 ounce mark…

I am so proud!!

Although I was proud a little too soon about getting six hours of sleep…I was back down to three last night…but on the positive side, the sleep part of the time was more restful than it has been and I didn’t get up this morning feeling immediately like it was time to go back to bed, so there’s that.

Also, I would totally be an ambulance chaser if that were a real job. Today I saw a firetruck and an ambulance. They were a block away from where I was. I really really wanted to go see what was up. I didn’t primarily because if I drove over there I might get lost because I don’t have directions from some random corner to school…but I did try really hard to see what was going on as I turned left and almost forgot for too long that driving requires facing forward…lol…I couldn’t see anything because it was too far away…that was kinda sad…except I am smart enough to recognize that crowd control is kinda important in emergencies so it would not have been appreciated if any extra people stopped to gawk…

Also, I have awesome friends. Part of me says to be safe it is better to keep other people out, but the other part of me says that it is not good for girl to be alone. My friends are like my oxygen mask. I hold my breath counting down the minutes until the flow is turned on to let me breathe again. I am an extremely introverted extravert. I need people, I just don’t know how to find them.

Take one breath and then take another

(Mallary Hope – Now)

I’ve been checking every day for the past almost 4 weeks on Spotify for the song Now by Mallary Hope. I couldn’t find it on youtube, on Mallary’s website, or anywhere else on the internet. The only place I could find it was the radio which obviously means I couldn’t choose when I wanted to listen. Finally today it showed up on Spotify. When I first heard it in the car (while already crying) on March 25 I stared screaming at the radio that no, God isn’t there. I wasn’t ready to hear those truths, but somehow my soul knew that I needed this song and I kept searching for it. Now I believe again, and the song is even more meaningful as I am ready to admit that God does care. It is becoming a beacon of hope. Maybe someday it’ll be okay. Maybe someday it won’t hurt so much.

Last night, I listened to the audiobook of “Please be Patient, I’m Grieving” by Gary Roe. While I didn’t agree with every single thing (and that’s okay), there was a lot of it that was really validating. I feel so alone. I sense that the biggest thing I need is someone to just be there. You don’t need the perfect thing to say or have some tangible action to perform to serve me. I don’t need your words, I need you. I see people feel uncomfortable around me and I see my relationships change. I connect to the frustration of being asked what I need and having no idea. I understand that grief lasts longer than sympathy. I so agree that thinking is hard and I am deeply tired and it doesn’t feel like this will ever end. I don’t want to be a burden.

On the more positive side, I am starting to be able to remember the deep open wounds of some of my past hurts. Eventually they faded. Not completely away, and definitely not quickly, but over the course of the years the pain became less acute, less sharp, less overwhelming. I have to believe that someday the same will be true of this. Someday the pain will not be a constant companion stabbing me all day and night, never really leaving me alone.

Even though inside I’m such a mess

(Invisible – Skylar Grey)

I work so hard to put on my brave face every day, but it is so exhausting. With people I feel safe with I, usually fortunately, but in this case unfortunately, no longer am frozen enough that I can necessarily keep the tears from coming, but with strangers around, I can usually be pretty successful. I suppose that happens after lots of practice. “Only when no one is watching, can we really fall apart.” (Stained Glass Masquerade) I do fairly well in front of people, then I have alone time and I crash and burn. But I am thankful for the ability to put on the mask and pretend the world isn’t falling apart beneath my feet. The ability to most of the time be able to show up and at least LOOK like everything is fine is such a blessing.

And there is now a lot to be joyful about. No, I don’t have a job. And that hurts a LOT. But last night I got almost 6 hours of sleep. It might still not be enough, but it is SO much better than the 0 to 3 I was getting. And I’ve already finished breakfast. There might have been cheerios spilled all over the floor and table when I was done, but an entire serving’s worth of cheerios also made it to my mouth, so that is a success. And last night skittles started sounding good again, so maybe things will get at least a little easier. It was really hard when even things like skittles and jolly ranchers didn’t sound good. I’m willing to sacrifice a little nutrition to get the calories in right now since I know I need them, but when even candy doesn’t sound good it starts feeling impossible. I’ve been fighting for over 4 weeks now, so I’ll take whatever breakthrough I can find.

Sometimes the success is that I bleached a spot on the floor under the table but I didn’t bleach the whole house or even the whole floor and I didn’t bleach any part of myself…just going to say that I will definitely never own the kind of pet that can throw up if I ever have a pet of my own. Even when I am doing fine, it absolutely terrifies me cleaning up cat vomit…and not going to lie, the biggest reason I never leave my room in the dark without my nightlight is not to avoid running into things and being loud. It is in case there is cat vomit on the floor, because touching it would be like the worst thing ever. (moderate exaggeration). Yep, the reason I asked for a nightlight was partially a germ thing…but now I have the most amazing nightlight like ever…so…you should be jealous…but not really because that’s a sin.

Someone was talking about people being emotional burn victims. I don’t remember the context of the comment, like what kind of people are emotional burn victims, but I had to admit that it made a lot of sense with where I am right now. I saw on facebook a quote “when a door closes, open it again, that’s how doors work.” Previously that would have just made me comment verbally to myself but not in writing “you just don’t get it” and then I would have moved on. This morning I read it and I wanted to drop kick my computer and scream that the door is too heavy and it is locked and I don’t have the key and I am too tired. I can’t. I am way too old to throw a temper tantrum like that, so obviously I didn’t actually do it, but yeah, not an age appropriate response.

Okay…and the fact that I started getting frustrated with people asking me to let them know what I need…Like I’m kinda busy putting my energy into getting food and water in my mouth. I ain’t got the energy to spare to figure out what I need. I could say I need a job, but we both know you can’t give that to me.

And…apparently I met someone at church this weekend. Hashtag fail at life. I haven’t got a clue who it is.