Someone must have turned the gravity up again. Cause man, this is all getting so heavy.
My mind spews out scathing narratives. I’m no good. I’m broken. My mere existence is pathetic. The blame feels good for a while. I get cynical. My internal checks and balances go haywire. I question everything. The sadness swells. The anger boils. How did I get like this? Why me? I hate it all. It’s disgusting. It’s necessary.
This past Friday, as my feet hit the floor, my heart broke. The simple act of becoming conscious and sitting up in bed hurt so much that I legit felt bad for myself and broke down. Put that in your morning routine articles.
There is no disappointment like waking up to another day of agonizing lifelessness. I screamed into my pillows, somewhat shocked a voice came out. I felt like a ghost.
After beating the living shit out of my mattress, I sullenly trotted my shell of a self out to the kitchen. As I unwillingly began the process of dragging my sorry existence by its collar through the day. That’s literally how it feels sometimes. Like I’m dragging myself through the days, just as a person drags an uncooperative dog out into the rain. Please don’t make me go. I’ll be extra good!
My ability to push was depleted after having done this for the last week or so already. I let myself feel that desperate hopelessness for a brief couple moments. The self-pity doesn’t help either. But it’s part of it. It’s part of the process that has to come.
How do I continue to push through feeling nothing at all? How do I keep choking down this cold, achey, shit sandwich being force fed to me on a spoon? “Open up big guy, how hungry are we today?”. One disdainful look in the mirror confirms with swollen pissed off eyes. “Please, sir, no more.”
I can put off the bottom for a while. I’ve gotten pretty good at propping myself up and painting a smile on my face through most it. But the bottom catches up. It always catches up. I need it to.
I know when a “bad one” is coming on. I can feel it. I can sense it. It’s like a slow fog rolling in. At first, visibility is a bit down but I’m happy because I can see where I’m going. Then the light starts to fade, but I still trust that I’ll be able to find my way. That brings me peace. After a few days of each, the dense stuff hits. Everywhere I turn looks gray and misty. I’m in it.
I know before my eyes even open in the mornings. The aches, the slooooooowness, the puffiness, the resistance. Completing any movement at all feels like collapse. My gait is different. My touch is different. I lean on everything. Not to try and look casual or cool, but because I need to. I will say the bear minimum to get out of any conversation. “Please don’t talk to me. Don’t even look at me” my shame begs. A smile and nod is the energy equivalent of a Shakesperian monologue.
My goal for each day of the bottom is to make it back underneath my blanket as smoothly and quickly as possible. That’s the only place I feel remotely okay. 65% of my energy on these days is spent simply keeping my head upright. I blink more frequently in hopes that doing so will spark any semblance of cognitive function. **Snaps fingers in front of my face** hello, anyone home? Barely. I don’t like anything. I don’t care about anything. I can’t pay attention. Nothing tastes like anything.
Having the TV on is too much. Holding up a book is too much. Staring blankly at the wall sounds somewhat appealing. But then I’ll pay attention to my thoughts. So I blast music as loud as my ear drums can take and close my eyes and just zone out. 7:30 bed times after 12 hours the night before. Maybe that’ll help? I don’t know. I’m just so. damn. exhausted.
This has been such an interesting world to live for the last 18 months. It’s definitely not like this everyday. I’m really lucky that my treatment even allows me to do any of this stuff. Seriously, I’m blessed. But, I’ve still found myself here, at the bottom, more than I would have imagined for “just taking a pill”. I know what’s causing all these problems, yet I need to keep doing that thing everyday in order to survive. I know I’ve bottomed out when I think about not taking it. I know it would help but I just can’t do it. The pill must be swallowed.
You can’t think your way out of pain. But you can certainly think your way into it. The pain is going to be there no matter what you do. It has to be.
There’s no answer to the question of, “how does one keep pushing?”, you just do it. Because you have to. You have to eat shit today for the possibility of not eating shit down the road. It’s the ultimate test in long-term thinking. Except it’s not a hypothetical. It’s real fucking life. With real life consequences. And there are no second chances.
Anyway, my point is, that yeah these bottoms suck. But what’s the alternative? And these are also the days where I feel most proud, retrospectively of course. Realizing that in the moment takes too much damn energy. And that’s the conundrum of it. Much of what keeps me propped up is my mental and emotional capacity. Sometimes, though, the physical gets so bad that I have to shut down all other energy spending functions and put all my focus on just getting through it.
The bottoms always feel like the end of a long process. After this I’ll feel really good. Then it’ll start to fade. I’ll try and hold on. But I’ll slowly lose my grip. And wind up back here again. Something about learning to surf.
One key difference this time was that I realized I was in it. It was a relief admitting this to myself. Like, dude, just let go, I got you, you’ll be alright. I let all the bad shit my mind does go and do it’s thing. I let myself feel sad, nervous and frustrated because I trusted that I would know my way out. And maybe I’m warping this in my brain, but it felt shorter. And I actually kind of liked it down here this time.
Life’s not about being all good, all the time. It’s not about being all bad, all the time either. It’s about learning how to safely feel the highs and the lows with as little self-destruction as possible. Not resisting but not agreeing. Letting it happen but not indulging. Just experiencing to the fullest extent.
***if you’re wondering what this is all about go here.***