I've Given Up

That's a bad place to be as a human.

It's a worse place to be as a mom.

I can't keep going like this.

Life Sucks

Reprieve

Days like this are nice.  There was still a lot of coming and going, but when I was here I was able to focus and accomplish things.  The depression is lifting.  That is nice.  Stress is still insanely high, but that is from life as it is today.  Now stress is easier to handle than then stress.  Now stress can be placed in neat little boxes.  Now stress is orderly and can be understood.  Then stress is not filed away neat and orderly.  Then stress spills its mess onto everything at the most inconvenient times and cannot be contained.  I will be thankful for the reprieve from then stress no matter how long it lasts - a day, a week, it doesn't matter.  The break is noted and appreciated.  

Again, Still, Whatever...

Not as bad, but very overwhelmingly true.

And this no longer works.  I have completely given up on that one.  But I do recognize that tiredness makes it worse.

Suffocating

Silence slowly sucks the life out like a small leak in a beach ball.
Words are worse.
Empty ones suck it out as fast as a tornado.
Meaningful words are like a ton of blankets.  Smothering.
It doesn't matter; either way, I can't breathe.

I Want To Die

I cannot begin to express how overwhelming that thought is inside of me right now.  Usually, no matter how bad it gets, I don't express it because over the years I have learned that expressing it only serves to intensify it.  It has been more than fifteen years since it has been this bad.  It is all I can do to breathe in and breathe out.  I feel like if I don't say something I will explode.  I want to die.  And yet I know that I will do nothing about that all consuming desire.  I can't.  I live my life every day; every moment; considering the impact of my actions, thoughts and beliefs on my two children.  I can't stop that now, no matter how bad I want something.  This too shall pass.  It always does.  I feel like such a failure.  It doesn't help that my oldest is depressed.  A few months ago, I would have said suicidal, but she traded actively desiring to die for anorexia.  What exactly have I shielded my children from?  They face so many of the same struggles I did.  And I am scared out of my mind that someone I know is actually reading this blog.  The last thing I need is for someone to hover over me like I am with her.  I cant' breathe as it is.  That would only serve to make things worse.  God, please help me.

Wendy

When I was in my early 20s, I went to a day treatment facility after being released from the hospital.  Wendy was a counselor that worked there.  When she shot herself, I watched that community and her family struggle, I heard her children question what they had done wrong, I saw the lives of some of her patients who had been barely holding together completely fall apart, I listened to the other counselors question their ability to do their jobs, I heard them remind us over and over to ask for help before we got to that point. 

When my oldest was about 2 and it became obvious that she needed me, not any caregiver, but ME; I knew then that I could never kill myself because of the harm it would do to her, the same harm I had seen it do to that community a few years before.  Until that moment, I had often considered suicide.  I think if I had recognized the permanence of that commitment at the time, I wouldn't have been able to make it; but I thought I was committing to not kill myself until my children were adults.  Little did I know that they would always need me. 

It Usually Works

When I was younger and I would say that I was depressed or didn't want to live or any other such thing, Jackie would always tell me to get some sleep and we could talk the next day. She would call me bright and early in the morning and see how I was doing and I was always slightly better than the night before. After a while, I said I was tired or needed to get some rest instead of saying what I actually meant. Then I would make it a point to get some sleep.

It's not working now.

Depression

It slowly creeps in
Swirling around
the edges of my life
Barely noticeable
at first

Before I realize
what is happening
I am surrounded
by a fog
So thick
that I cannot see
anything
So heavy
that the burden
seems more
than I can bear
and then
it begins
to strangle me

I have been here before
I know the fog will lift
if only I can hold on
I even know why I am here

But none of that helps
When the fog begins
to suffocate me
When it is so dark
that I cannot see
a way out