Today I cried. It was unexpected and sudden, but luckily I had a shoulder I could lean on. I needed that shoulder. I needed someone to hold me, to comfort me and someone to listen to me.
They say if you share a worry, it divides in two, therefore making the worry smaller. I don’t think that happened, but it was important nevertheless for me to say it out loud, to share it. Because what I know to be true, is that a worry in your head doubles, triples and quadruples. Every now and then I get lost in my head, in my worries and that is when my amazing other half usually says to me: “What is it? Tell me what is in your head.”
I have these walls, that need to be broken down. I do need to tell someone what is going on – what is in my head. I get these bursts of feelings and these messy thoughts and I don’t know if I’ll ever get to the core of them, but I do know this:
Life is black and white. My life is full of black and white. I have had it rough. I have had these extremely depressing black moments, where all the joy is sucked out of me – for a moment. But then again I have all this white. I am so lucky and privileged for being able to be where I am and do what I do. I shouldn’t complain. I have it good. I have so many moments where all I feel is joy, where everything is possible. But it’s not about picking either one of these – it’s both.
And it’s not about reasoning either. Anxiety or depression doesn’t reason.
I guess I’m balancing somewhere, where you can’t balance. I’m having this negativity and anxiety and I’m screaming at myself: stop it! You’ve gone through this once. You’ve survived it already. You’ve survived it.
And I think that is where I stumble. You see, well, it’s not that simple.
You just have to take life as it comes.
Even those dark moments.
I still mean it when I say that you can do a full recovery (from depression). But that doesn’t mean you’ll never have those painful feelings again.
I felt very inspired after watching Yoga Maris’ Netflix documentary. In that film Maris, anorexia survivor, speaks about recovery. She says that life with mental illness will never be perfect, but it will be good.
And while I kind of agree, I still think my life is better now than it was. I don’t know what perfect is, so I don’t think I’m even trying to get there. A good life. That sounds perfect, to be honest. And maybe it is. Even with the black moments. Even though it feels so difficult at times. It’s difficult to have that black, to let it be.
They are just moments and feelings and they pass, but they know how to grab me. And suddenly I’m lost.
And I always wonder – where does it come from? Am I a depressed soul, that just gets these moments? Am I just melancholic? Is some form of depression and anxiety and sadness just programmed into my core? Do other people feel like this?
Anxiety – it doesn’t make sense. I guess that’s the recovery part. Learning how to deal with those dark lingering moments. Or how to suffer through them.
I guess what I’m really saying is that I don’t always know. I know just enough so that I speak up and acknowledge what is happening, but I don’t know what to do. I just cry ugly cry and hope it doesn’t the last the whole day, or week.
Saying it out loud is scarier than I thought. I feel a lump in my throat, even though I woke up to a white day. It’s hard to explain anxiety. I wish I could end this text with pure winning and some explosion of happiness. But that’s not what this text is all about. Because I’m still a work in progress. Perhaps will be for the rest of my life?
And that’s okay.
Photos – Mia / Beauty Highlights
