All the battles I fight

The fight never stops…the battle never ceases. Every day I wake up and I have to be prepared to conquer, to overcome. Whether it be a fight within me or fighting ignorance and stigmas from the outside world.

I fight an inner dialog about how I’m a failure, that I’m not good enough, that I’m “too much” to be loved. I fight with myself about the what ifs, the should haves.

Do you know how exhausting that is? And to do that every day?!

Anxiety is here. It’s here and it is loud. I feel like I’m already trying to juggle a million things and then something goes wrong, and now I have to deal with that too. My heart is racing, my palms are sweaty, my chest is tight, the tears are coming.

Have you ever had that feeling you get in the back of your throat when you’re trying not to cry, and then you tilt your head back to stop the tears from falling and now you try desperately to blink them away. That is me right now, I’m afraid if I start crying, I won’t stop.

But I’m exhausted…trying to keep a smile on my face, doing everything I can to decrease my anxiety daily. But sometimes it hits you and you must let it come and wait for it to go. You have to really feel it, you have to let it in, in order to heal. My anxiety is trying to tell me that I have this enormous weight on shoulders that I NEED to carry. And I need to carry it now…all of it.

My Mom always tells me that I’m the only one who knows what I can and cannot handle. But that can be so difficult because then I second guess myself, anxiety comes in tells me I’m being a baby OR anxiety comes in tells me everything imaginable will go wrong. It never ends. I’ve been struggling this week. Overwhelming anxiety, all sorts of loneliness, intrusive thoughts. It tells me I’m not strong enough or too strong. That I should be able to handle things but flip it and it tells me I’m not strong enough and whatever it is will break me. I’m also terrified of letting people down. The thought of it makes me ill. If I think I have let someone down, the guilt consumes me. (I’m working on it).

My Mom asked me the other day if I have anyone that checks in on me (besides her). And I said no, not really, not on a regular basis anyway. That’s why this illness can be so uncomfortably lonely. Who wants to open up to someone about their deepest feelings, their racing thoughts, their illness, with fear of being stigmatized? We’ve come so far in regard to talking about mental health, but so much more needs to be done when it comes to talking about mental illness. Yes, I understand it can be a scary topic. But most of the time we just want someone to listen to us. We just want to know we aren’t alone.

Yesterday, after receiving some crappy news the night before, I broke down. Sobbed for an hour. I needed to let it out, the pain, the heartache, everything. I have been holding it inside for too long. I could feel it building for about a week. It was like pieces would pile up on each other brick by brick. Everything felt so heavy. I could feel the cracks in the pieces getting bigger, pieces started to crumble. It was coming, the final hit to make everything else fall. So, I started letting the emotions and feelings I had come and then let them go. Believe me it is not an easy process. It’s completely exhausting. Mentally and physically draining. I’m still dealing with those thoughts and feelings today. Unfortunately, they don’t just go away with the start of a new day. I can’t snap my fingers and make them disappear. It is like they linger in the air around me.

I want to hide in the darkness of my room, and just feel. Whatever that may entail. I want to take care of myself. I’ve gotten to the point in this journey where I know better, healthier ways to cope. Ways to look after myself, to put myself first. And it’s a beautiful feeling to have, a nice tool in my toolbox of self-care. Because at the end of the day, I have to do this for me.

♥h.