The Calm After the Storm

Well, I'm glad that's over. I made it out of my depressive episode with my wrists in tact and my sanity restored. But it has been one hell of a week.

I gave you a little insight into what I was feeling earlier this week. The inevitable backslide that I wrote about on Tuesday. The inadequacy. The self-doubt. The resentment and fear. All those individual antagonists teamed together as allied forces to take me down. No one negative was responsible for my plummet, but instead they all fed off one another to grow in power and strength. To charge in at 9:30 Friday morning to destabilize me in one pinnacle moment.

The shower. 

I should know better than to take a shower when I am feeling so low. Each time, I take a breather and think, "Oh, if I just get cleaned up, throw on some make-up, and look like I'm ok, I will be ok." Problem solved! That's not quite what happens. Ever. Instead, I get in there, I'm stuck in a small room with the white noise of the water which amplifies the thoughts the monsters are putting in my head. And I'm exposed and vulnerable to boot. So rather than thinking, "I suck at everything," the monsters take this opportunity to scream, "YOU SUCK AT YOUR JOB! BOYFRIEND WOULD BE BETTER OFF WITHOUT YOU! YOU CAN'T EVEN KEEP THE HOUSE CLEAN, FUCK UP!" Then I give up, get out of the shower, and take a passing look in the mirror to see the gargantuan figure that seems to get larger each second my self esteem gets smaller. And, in my precarious state, it's enough.

So in about 10 minutes, I've gone from melancholy to suicidal. And since I am severely lacking in the coping skills department, all I could think of to do to alleviate my pain and eliminate the risk of suicide were swallowing a couple Ambien to knock myself out until Boyfriend got home or cutting myself to show the monsters who's in charge. Maybe I am getting a little bit better at managing myself, because even in my disjointed state, I still knew that those options would only lead to more negative repercussions once I'm discovered. Which means the next 4 or 5 hours were spent in hysterical tears, trying to chase away thoughts of annihilation. 

And then, just as quickly as it started, it was over. Boyfriend came home, I had another rough couple of hours, and then, after hashing it out a bit, the monsters went back to their cave in Hell or wherever they come from. Boyfriend admitted how hard it is to deal with me. I tried to make sure he understands that this is not the last time it will happen. And we both agreed to get back into therapy. And then we ate cheese, played cards, and went back to living happily ever after.

This past week has reminded me that, yes, I do have a mental illness. It was kind of a perfect storm of forgetting my pills one day, receiving an extremely triggering letter, and the stress of starting a new job. But my monsters that come out when triggered are equivalent to someone else catching the flu when exposed to a certain virus. The virus lives on a doorknob. A person grabs that knob before the virus dies. A speck of dust tickles their nose, and BAM! Infected. 

That's what happened to me. I got sick this week. It may not be from a virus, and it cannot be treated with antibiotics, but it came from something real. It has physical implications. It deserves treatment. And that is where I need to put my focus from now on. Getting back into treatment.

But it's Saturday. So right now, I am going to focus on digesting the grilled food I just ate and prepare for a bonfire tonight. Life is good and I want to enjoy as much of it as possible. Before the monsters make me sick again.