“Your
distress about life might mean you have been living for the wrong
reason, not that you have no reason for living.” -Tom O'Connor
So,
I just spent another night at the hospital with my grandmother. Her
health is steadily declining and I see a lot of visits there in my
future. Though, I guess it's just a part of life both for her and the
family.
Hospitals
always make me pensive. There is little to do in the ICU waiting room
besides think. I tend to think about where my life is going, and what
it would be like if I was the one in the room essentially a
mechanically assisted breath away from death. So I thought, I'd write
it all down and share with you.
I
don't see myself having the large family like Granny does. I don't
think children are in my future nor do I even see a local group of
people surrounding me. I always picture myself completely and totally
alone. No kids, no loved ones... just me. But who knows, I can't even
picture what my tomorrow will be like.
I
have been in the process of forcing change. Small things right now.
Well... I say small things but they're actually huge for me.
I'm
no longer self-medicating, so I'm dealing with everything that comes
with being a recovering addict. Some of the things I expected. I
fully expected the judgement from both sides of the coin. Those who
find out how bad I had gotten and judge me for that. Those who use
still and knew clearly how much I was in, and that judge me for not
being able to control my life and still take. Some things I didn't
expect at all, it never occurred to me that people would accuse me of
using again when I worked so damn hard to stop. I never expected the
temptations or triggers to last this long. I didn't expect the
physical toll it took on me.
I'm
learning how to deal with my depression again. I'm realizing how much
the drug addiction actually masked the symptoms of depression. So
something I thought I had a handle on came back and bit me hard. To
other people it looks like I'm getting worse. I'm not really. My
downs are just a little deeper than they were when I was fucked up
out of my head. Since I feel like I'm deeper in the hole it takes me
a bit longer to climb out. It definitely doesn't help when I feel
like I'm disappointing everyone when I do hit the down days. At the
same time... the downs don't happen nearly as often as they use to.
Still... it's frustrating. (I'll save the rant about how hard it is
to actually get help that you need for depression and how fucking
much the medication costs when you don't have insurance that covers
it.)
While
those two things definitely fall under the category of being
healthier I'm working on the general health. I'm working out at home,
walking the neighborhood often, and dieting. Since I've started I've
gone from a size 32 down to a 26. That's definitely progress.
Sometimes, I almost like that progress when I look at myself. Mostly,
I see it as not changed at all. I did something the other night that
I never do. I took a picture. The full body shot; head to toe. And, I
sent it to two people. I don't think they'll ever understand what a
battle that was for me. I mean I could explain it to one of them and
she might come extremely close to understanding but not quite. It
made me feel horrible. Neither of them said anything bad. They
wouldn't at all. But, I keep going back and looking at those pictures
and seeing how bad they look. I want to take it back. I want to erase
the image from their mind. Because that's not me. I mean it clearly
is me... but it's the work in progress. It's not how I feel when I
think of myself. It's not what I want to be. It's just something that
I'm stuck with till the next visible change happens. It just... like
I said something I want to take back. Of course, it doesn't help when
one is someone I like, because I feel that kills any possible chance
of them returning interest. Granted, when the other is one of my best
friends I don't want that to change their view of me either; even
when I logically know it won't.
Clearly,
something I need to work on is my view of myself. I need to figure
out where my worth actually lies. I need to set bigger goals; to
decide what I want from the rest of my life. Of course, like everyone
else I want to be loved and love in return. I also want to be happy.
I want to feel like I'm not disappointing everyone constantly
(because I think I do), and to figure out what I actually excel at.
I guess most of all I want to say “I'm fine.” or “I mean, I'm
good with however it turns out.” and really mean it. But, that's
not enough. I need to figure out the long term wants and needs.
I
suppose progress is good though. Even when it doesn't feel like it.
Until
next time, maybe I'll like myself a little more.
Autumn
