mental health

Context

While I was still half asleep the other morning, I started to daydream about being a wife and a mother. This fantasy felt very natural and powerful. Everything was up to me. I said “yes”. I took the ring. I took someone into me and I created a baby. I grew a baby, like it was the earth and I was the sun.

As I woke up again to the reality of this body that will never be a sun, I realized that it wasn’t a child or a husband that I was craving, it was context.

I feel adrift in the most foreign and unusual way, like an alien that isn’t even welcome on its own planet. Context was the tie that unraveled from my life 6 years ago, when a series of events all unfolded at once.

First, I got sick and I never got better. Then, I found out my boyfriend had bought a ring and wanted to get married and have a baby. At the time, he was the love of my life, but after nearly 10 years, we broke up. Since I honestly thought I was dying, but there was no name for what was wrong, everything fell apart. After that, 3 of my closest friends all got pregnant within 3 weeks of each other and another got married within 6 months of that. When I found a new boyfriend, I felt like I was on solid ground again. Even if it was too soon to be dating and he was struggling with addiction, he was kind and supportive. I didn’t have to pretend not to be sick when I was with him. He just pulled me in close and held me. He was like the eye of the storm. He also represented a normalcy I couldn’t reach when I was alone. With a boyfriend, I could at least pretend that I was on the same path as my friends. When I lost him, I also lost my job and I had to move back in with my parents. And more friends got married, moved in with boyfriends, got pregnant and started school. It was at this time that the pandemic started and I got a name for what was wrong with me, but I also got sicker and had to get treatments, injections, and surgeries.

Now, I am sitting in a college cafe, trying to drift back into memories for a moment, because it was so easy to be in school. And it would be easy to start a new job, get married or start a family too. Because it puts life into context. My life has been cracked open, so I have no edges and I can just fall endlessly into space. Without context, what is a life?

Grey is not my favorite color

I have always been someone who imagined the worse case scenario. Maybe I can chalk it up to OCD, maybe I have an overactive imagination, or maybe I’m just a worrier who wants to protect myself.

Whatever it is, I could have never prepared myself for this. I imagined a lot of dark paths, but this one is grey and endless. It isn’t enough for me to stop and rest and I don’t have the option to quit. When it feels like torture to exist physically and mentally, I wish for death. Then my instincts kick in and I go back to fearing it. It’s a strange and haunting dance and I don’t want death to be my dance partner anymore.

For the optimists out there, I’m still with you. I do believe it’s always better to look on the bright side. There is no reason to give up. It serves no purpose to throw our hands up at life saying, “we will die anyway” because, well for that exact reason. We will die anyway, so what’s the point in giving up?

But for anyone who has been pummeled over and over with anything in life, it isn’t mind over matter. It isn’t about being strong enough to deal with it or about pushing through. Sometimes, grief, trauma, physical, mental, or emotional pain are too much to handle and a simple defense mechanism against the ongoing pain is to get depressed and to feel numb.

One in three people in the world is living with multiple chronic illnesses today, so I know there are people out there who understand this battle just to exist. When all the simple, mindless tasks become complicated and painful, life becomes more complicated and painful. For those with more intense physical disabilities this becomes even more true.

It is very hard to find the sun in this endless night. I know it’s still there, but I can’t see it. I can’t feel its warmth and I am losing faith that it will swing back around to greet me.