Hey guys! I want to write about not giving up hope today, but first I’d like to check in. Are you having a rough day…or maybe a rough week? Let me give you hug, goodness knows I need one too! I’m having a glass of wine with this right now cause it does feel good to unwind a bit!
I’m back in school and it’s been a loooong time since I’ve been taking classes. Frankly I’m terrified! I’m connected to the access centre after a written argument against their ethics due to their initial response to my submission. It’s all worked out now though and I have a great person working with me. What a relief right?
Eh… if you’ve read anything from me you’ll know that I’m an anxious, self-hating thing riding a rollercoaster of moods. Anybody else deal with this? We could get shirts I suppose? All kidding aside….I feel so very doomed. I have bad memories of CEGEP but at least I can do it online. I’m only taking 3 courses and yet I’m already overwhelmed and not sure if I’ll survive quantitative methods and my high level French class that I shouldn’t even be in.
Just when I think I’m handling things and take good notes I turn around and forget everything! I also usually wake up from terrible dreams that reveal my stress, feeling of being attacked and helpless on top of my nightmares about suicide attempts …I hate it. I talked to Sarah the other night and it was all really great until I broke down, started crying and screaming which led to me hitting things. Like. cement table. Yes. Brilliant idea…but that’s me. Oh and to be safe from Covid even though we distanced and wore masks, I washed my hands and FACE with alcohol! Mmhm. More brilliance but in all fairness I had descended into…a drunk crisis mode? (Crisis mode is what I call it when things get so bad that they’re dangerous/paralyzing /unbearable.)
I could go on…like how I haven’t spoken with my psychologist in a month and a half because of her vacation, but I’m hanging on though. Things are much better than they were. I hope you’re hanging in there too! After all this ranting (I’m sorry), my goal is to post more happy photos for all of us! In times like these we surely need as much happy we can get.
Photo by James Wheeler on Pexels.com
I urge you to keep going against all odds – no matter how hopeless you may feel. I learned something important for myself that transcends traditional definition; one can say that they feel hopeless, but one should never say that they have no hope. Feeling hopeless can mean that you have less hope than you used to feel, but being void of hope implies that hope does not ‘spring eternal’.
I was angry at that quote too; that “hope springs eternal”. What do they know, right? We’re the ones in the deep end struggling to breathe despite the weight that drags us under. It’s indescribable…believe me I know. I’ve tried and I still do. Writing is a part of what keeps me alive and yet it will always fall short. My new belief though is that hope may not be “eternal in our breast”, as the saying goes, but perhaps the well of hope itself will never run dry. Perhaps it is forever open to us all to drink from.
Drink from it…please…and share it with others. You never know what will happen just around the corner. Everyone says this and I often discounted it, but no longer. I met Piko, one of the miracles of my life, after my first serious suicide attempt. I got engaged to my incredible boyfriend right in the middle of starving myself and self-harming. We found Mia on the side of the road after being hospitalized for my anorexia and then the intubation after my major OD. My point is that you never know what will happen next, but if you do something irreversible, you’ll never find out. I would have missed all that and way more. I would have missed the laughs that eventually came back, the hugs, the pride of publishing my book which now tells me…Hey. I survived. Now that feeling, it’s worth waiting for. No, it’s worth working towards!
Now I know you’re probably thinking something along the lines of “maybe others will find that ‘out of sight’ happiness, but I won’t. I’m too far gone. There’s no hope for me and I’m so lost that there’s no way out. All that’s ahead is more pain.” Let me just say, I COMPLETELY understand. If I’m not overstepping, I think we’ve pretty much all had that thought or something similar! Many of us have or are contemplating some form of letting go. I think you know what I mean. But stop! Because you deserve a spot in TOMORROW. Tomorrow feels like another day of pain, but it can also be an opportunity for you to change something! Even the smallest thing. Reach out to someone…even if you don’t have a good current support system. People DO understand. Not everyone, but many do and they can help! Pick up the phone. Make a free appointment. Read online. Do something…anything, but give up!
