Help.

I think my least favorite compliment is to be told I'm strong. I'm not strong at all, I'm just stubborn. If I don't go to the grocery store, or pay the bills, or teach myself to do taxes, or push myself to keep going when I just want to stop and cry, nothing gets done at my house.

I'm the only adult. I have a kid and two cats counting on me. I'm not strong at all. I often wish I never was, like in Its a Wonderful Life. I don't think I have it in me to hurt myself. But I wish I never existed. I wish that everyone I know, or ever knew, would go on living their lives as if they never met me.

I'm depressed. Its not just the break up, it's everything. It's work, and my ex, and my kid, and my friends, and my parents, and my finances, and my ever growing to-do list.

I get up and show up and through sheer force of will, I keep raising a kid and going to work. No one else thinks anything of it. But it's so fucking hard. I don't want to do any of this. I want to lay in my bed and cry and sleep. I want someone to notice that I'm at a breaking point, they don't have to fix me, just acknowledge me, hug me, sit with me for a minute.

It had been months since I had an anxiety attack. Yesterday I had two.
I keep myself physically busy, but my brain never stops. Sometimes I wish I were just a bit dumber so that my brain would focus on one task at a time. I can be watching tv or reading or working, and doing fine and absorbing that, and at the same time, my brain is overclocking itself.

My sleep is all fucked up. I needed pills to get me to sleep. Then I could get to sleep easily enough on my own but could never get enough. Two sleep studies later, I'm slapped with a sleep apnea diagnosis and handed a CPAP machine which all but guarantees I'll never have sex again. I finally got used to the stupid darth vader mask and sleep with it for most of the night, but now I'm back to not being able to sleep. My brain sits there replaying conversations, playing out worst case scenarios, pointing out my every flaw. Do you know why I'm able to be so funny and give a minimal amount of fucks what anyone thinks of me? Because nothing anyone can say to me is half as mean as what I think about myself.

My brain will be the death of me.

Deep Breath

We broke up.
He didn't love me enough to try to work on things or fight for us. I knew we were up and down. I was willing to try and to change and to do whatever. He said didn't think things could ever get better. He said that, right after he told me that he's not going anywhere, right after he said that he would be miserable without me.

I'm going to be ok. I cried while I talked with him, but I don't have any more tears. I don't really feel a  whole lot right now. If it was so easy for him to let me go, I'm not going to twist myself in knots over it.

The part that really sucks is that I introduced Jack to all my family, to my friends, to my kid. He fucking met my ex-husband. Jack did Christmas with us, cookies, and Santa, and presents and the whole thing. I was a damn good girlfriend. I hate this for my kid. I hate that they got along so well. I hate that the kid is going to ask about Jack and I don't know how to explain to this innocent, sweet, tender hearted child, that his friend is never coming back to race trucks with him.

Winter Repeats

I wrote something a week before Christmas, getting all my ranting frustrations out. I thought that would be enough of a release but it wasn't. I plucked up my courage and had a conversation with Jack about the state of our relationship.

It went fine. He said the right things, he always says the right things. We had 3 good days over Christmas. And now it's back to how it is. He has some stuff going on, and its not my place to talk about it, so I won't. But how much slack am I required to give.

Something always comes up. There is always some new reason why he acts the way he does. I'm tired of talking about it. He'll say all the right things. I'll feel like a bitch for even making us have a conversation. Things will be good. And then back next week I'll be right back here again.

I don't know how to get out of this rut. And what's worse is that I don't think I can.

A New Project

I need something to do. The kid is with his dad half the time. Jack doesn't have a job but I don't see him any more than I did before. I have some free time on my hands and I need to fill it or I'll get into trouble. Books and TV aren't holding my interest, and while I could and should go to the gym, I'm going to be honest and say that's not going to happen.

I need a hobby. But I feel broke as shit and nothing sounds interesting. And its too freaking cold to take up something outdoorsy. (Everyone else in the Pacific Northwest has an outdoorsy hobby). I kind of want a part time job. Something I could do on the side. Not retail because the hours suck and they always schedule you for inconvenient times.

There is a MLM I'm considering. I buy the products anyway and could do it, but it seems so pyramid-y. I'm doing some research and finding that I wouldn't need to sign other people up, in theory I could turn a profit just selling the product, not creating a team or downline or whatever you want to call it.

Extra money would be nice. The kid is only going to get more expensive as he grows. I need to make sure that I won't lose money because I can't really afford that. I'm planning to talk it over with my dad because he's extremely smart and level headed. I know from watching my friends sell shit on Facebook that this looks like a dumb idea, and I keep talking myself out of it, but there is this tantalizing chance that I could actually make a buck. So I keep reading and calulating and thining and debating.

The Grinch

I am trying like hell to get in the Christmas spirit. The tree went up right after Thanksgiving. we visited Santa, we made cookies, we decorated the house, a gingerbread house, watched all the classics, Christmas music round the clock. I'm just going through the motions for the kid. He's old enough to get it and be excited. I want him to have a good Christmas and set the foundation for fun traditions.

If I'm honest with myself, every holiday since his dad and I split up has been like this. I just don't give a shit. I go through the motions and do what I need to so that the kid has a good time. There is no feeling behind it for me. I don't need any gifts. I don't care if I wake up to an empty stocking. Usually 4th of July is my favorite holiday but John, alcohol, and my drunk mouth ruined that this year too.

I don't think this is depression? I take my meds, I go to work, everyone is happy and healthy and there is food in the house. I do all the things I'm supposed to do or "like" to do. It's like I've lost my sense of taste, you keep eating to survive, but you don't really care what  you eat. You eat so you'll keep living but you derive no pleasure from it.

I used to easily read 40 books a year. I think I've read 5 this year, maybe 10 last year. I just can't get into anything. I've been listening to podcasts and watching the news more, reading more articles online, so I haven't let my brain completely atrophy. The DVR fills up with the shows I've asked it to tape and used to greedily devour. I just don't care anymore. And I thought, ok maybe this show got boring or that show lost good characters. But has that happened to every show I used to like? Maybe it's just me. I used to love hockey, I haven't watched a game once this season.

I wake up, I go to work, I parent (with varying degrees of success), I go to sleep. Repeat.
I make time for friends. I maintain a relationship. I run errands. I have conversations. I turn the tv on but don't absorb what they say. I am hollow.

I don't think I'm depressed. I'm not really sad. Nothing is wrong with me, my life is as fine as it ever is, little bumps here and there.
I've never been suicidal, but I've periods of life where I didn't want to exist anymore. It's a weird concept for some people to get. I don't want to harm myself. I just wish I never was. I think about not existing, if somehow I disappeared, but it had no impact on my parents or kid or anyone else.

But I don't even feel like that right now. I feel like I'm in a body snatchers movie or something. I see my life unfolding in front of me, I'm sitting in the driver's seat but I can't or won't grip the steering wheel. I guess the most fitting word is ennui. I don't know how to shake it.

Friday

We had plans. All week, we were going to spend Friday together. We were going to lay in bed and just talk and laugh like we used to. I said I'd make dinner and brownies, he said that sounded good. But then work came up. Work always comes up. It happens. I said to work on it. So he did. I said that eventually he would have to sleep and could I sleep next to him. He said yes. I drove over.

On the way, I rehearsed a little speech, asking if we could go back to earlier in the week, before things got complicated. If we could just pick up being happy where we left off.

But when I arrived, he would barely look at me. Barely speak to me. We lay in bed in awkward silence. He was mad. I apologized. I cried. I hadn't meant to spoil his evening of work. I hadn't meant he had to go to bed right then. I just wanted to carve out some little portion of the Friday we meant to have. Some small sign of affection that I didn't have to fish for. But instead I made him mad. I couldn't bare it anymore. Laying in his bed, feeling waves of hostility washing off of him and on to me. My breath, catching in my lungs as I tried and failed to keep myself from falling to pieces.

I got up and gathered my things. I wasn't trying to make a dramatic exit, or a point. But I couldn't lie there and apologize over and over and over. I wasn't going to be able to make it right. I wasn't going to get a good night kiss or a stroke of the hair. I wouldn't be able to sleep there next to him, feeling out of place and burdensome.

So I went home.

He does most anything I ask him too. But I don't want to be the only one asking to spend time together. I don't want to have to initiate contact each time. I'm so tired of feeling like I'm chasing him, begging him for attention, struggling to be loved. I'm just so overwhelmingly sad.

Crushed

Imagine: that feeling when you are guarded but trying to unfurl your layers of armor so you can actually enjoy the safety and happiness that are in your world right now.

And then you fuck something up. You peek behind the curtain and know things you can never un-know. Cruel words that curl up and befriend all the self hatred that Tom unleashed into your brain. Knowing that the bad, horrible, selfish, broken parts of you, not only does your love see them, but he agrees with your horrible assessment of yourself.

And your timing makes it worse.  And it sets off a chain reaction in your Love. And knowing that makes you feel lower. The more he talks and explains, the lower you feel. Until you wish you could dissolve into nothingness. You wish you never were.

And you cry and you talk and things are salvaged. And he wants to move forward, stronger and better. And you want to run. You want to ghost. You want to warp yourself up in layers and layers of armor. You wonder why you keep making idiotic attempts to unwrap your dark, shriveled heart and give it to someone. Your unworthy, selfish, unreasonable heart. That no one will want.

Tom said a lot of insulting things. And all of them were so far from the mark as to be laughable. But one. He got one barb that cut so fucking deep. The words imprinted on your brain. I could be senile, not knowing the days of the week, but I'll remember his parting shot.

And though he didn't mean to be hurtful, my Love said words that are seared into the brain. Words that dovetail nicely with the poison Tom dripped in my ear. And you aren't mad at your Love, and you're fairly certain he isn't mad at you. But you're hurt and feel like such a wretch that you don't know if you can continue the relationship, because you're the worst person, with ridiculous wants and needs, a bottomless pit of need and dissatisfaction. Because you love him and he broke your heart. Again.