Free-falling into existence

Wow. I’m super proud of myself for taking the leap. Scariest shit I've ever done.

Took me more than a decade to build the courage to put my work out there. For a long time, I was in a dark place thinking that there would be so much judgment and criticism for the way I see the world.

I didn't have an ounce of faith in myself and my ability to express my emotions “normally” (If you’ve read my blog ‘normal’ you’ll relate to what I mean) just wasn't in my wheelhouse.

So every few months I would psych myself up to just share something/anything with someone other than a close friend or family member. Telling myself ‘ok this is it, today I’m going to do it. Today is the day I get myself out of this fucking hole’ and every single time I believed I would…

So I would have this undeniable period of clarity where my perspective (more on this subject in my blog perspective) of things would change for a short while and I would feel good about life but eventually, sadness seeps in like spilled black ink across white paper.

And the most despairing part was that that fucking darkness creeping back in would overwhelm me, making it feel like the walls were closing in. I'd get flustered and it would for a few minutes feel like I was drowning, struggling to catch my breath, feeling like every gasp for air was suffocating me more and more...

A few days would pass and I would be on auto-pilot because there would be no sense of hope, no motivation to get anything on paper worth letting someone else read. Just feeling like an absolute ‘failure’ (or what I believed failure to be at the time). So if I couldn't build the courage to share my work (the only thing that makes me feel like there is light in the darkness) with one person, nevermind the world, what hope was there that I would ever survive this horror show in my head.

For an extremely long time, I felt trapped inside my head. Like the worst Catch 22 situation over and over and over again. Because I knew what I was doing was self-destructive and the only person that could help me was the person I didn't recognize in the mirror.

So waking up in the morning was the hardest part of my day. EVERY.SINGLE.DAY.

The weight I carried with me that was so unbearable most days, would make me cry out of anger and frustration at myself because I knew the answer, the way out, the road to happiness, and yet there I was trapped by myself, within my mind, fighting a reflection I didn't recognize to be able to free myself. I was stuck in this endless loop of self-sabotage and destruction.

The only way I could function on a version of ‘normal’ that was recognizable to the world was to write about the feelings and thoughts that were consuming me every second of every day.

It got to a point where I would write to survive my anxiety, to survive the next breath I needed to take knowing that breath would be filled with poisonous self-doubt.

The day I realized just how deep I’ve dug this damn hole was when I paged through my notebook and read something I wrote days earlier and it broke me. I broke down crying asking myself “how do I save her”.

What was worse, as I knew I needed to save her, I knew how but that voice in my head reminding me I’m just a scared little girl got louder. So for a long time I ‘failed’ her. She was stuck there and I watched her suffer every time I looked in the mirror with tears welling up my eyes...

I couldn't bear seeing her in the mirror, knowing I could help but I was too chicken shit to face what I needed to, to save her. So I did the only thing I knew how to do…

I stopped talking about how I felt, I stopped writing, I existed without living, I kept getting sick not knowing why until I was so emotionally exhausted from the constant digging I was doing mentally. I was debilitated and numb.

I gave up…

The catch 22 loops kept spinning and spinning and spinning. I smiled through it, pretending to be ok most days but mainly just existing because I “had” to.

For years my husband, close friends, and family tried their utmost to help but I became so blinded by my self-destruction that I could barely acknowledge all the love they were showing me and wanting nothing more than to help me out of this hole. I kept everyone at arm's length so they wouldn't be tainted by the darkness that followed me around.

Until just over a month ago, I was getting ready for an outing and wanted to get my hair done. (Since lockdown, there had been no reason for me to be presentable because I worked from home) but I decided to get my hair done, nothing fancy and I came home like it was any other day.

I walked into my son's room and asked him “Do I look pretty now that my hair is blown out and he says, not realizing how much weight his words would carry and that it would be the words that would give me the courage to fight again. He says' “mommy it doesn't matter how your hair looks you’re always beautiful” I said “aww baby thank you” and walked away. Thinking it was so adorable of him and sharing the precious moment with friends and family on WhatsApp.

Though the words keep replaying in my head, the pure honesty of that moment we shared. And it got me thinking...It doesn't matter, it just doesn't matter because if I kept allowing this darkness to consume me what would it matter If I smiled tomorrow. It doesn't matter if I just survive the pain and I know I’ll wake up feeling the same in the morning.

And like a truckload of bricks, it hit me. What if life gets harder for him and he loses hope as I did.

What would it matter then that I JUST existed and all this time I wasted fighting my self-doubt knowing I was the only one that could get myself out of this hole.

And as hard as it has been to wake up every morning since then, I decide every day when I open my eyes. Today I’m going to fight not only to survive but today I’m going to muster all the strength I have to beat the shit out of this self-destruction and self-sabotage.

Now...I go to bed exhausted and wake up ready to fight. I’m not saying that voice won't creep in from time to time but when it does, acknowledge it and keep fighting.

I understand now that it's ok to take the leap of faith in yourself because it doesn't matter what the world thinks of you. If YOU think the worst of yourself nothing else will matter.

What matters more than anything in this world is how you keep fighting because you’re beautiful no matter how your hair looks.