Yes you read that right. I really really didn't. I felt like I was just surviving. Getting up every day and just going through the mechanics.
The only emotions I would ever really feel were anger, frustration, defensiveness and sadness. Overwhelming sadness. I have spent the last god knows how many months feeling very sad, like I was grieving but didn't know for what.
I was grey. An automatron. I was depressed.
To be honest I think it's safe to say that I still am. But I've called it. I've recognised it. I am living with it instead of simply not living because I felt like i didn't know how anymore. On Monday last week I finally cracked. In an alcohol driven tantrum I broke down and told my partner how awful and low I felt. How i didn't feel alive. How I didn't feel worthy of being with him, how I didn't feel worthy of anything. How I'd thought about just not being around anymore. I threw my diary on the table and demanded that he read it so that he understood how I felt (he didn't btw!).
He held me, he told me that he didn't understand what it felt like, or why I thought I was broken, but that he loves me and that he would do whatever he could to make me feel better, to feel alive again.
That night I cracked open. It was painful and exhausting and draining but I am glad that it happened.
It was a relief to finally tell someone how I felt. It is a relief to know that he is there standing by me. It was a relief to finally own up and say out loud that things need to change. Some people suffer from severe depression and I am lucky that I am not one of those. I have a mind that errs toward melancholy though and cutting myself off from everyone, not getting any exercise, being unable to cope with stress at work, constantly comparing myself to others on social media and blogs and eating badly were destined to lead me to a dark, difficult place.
Again, I will say that I am lucky, I am one of those people that can live a relatively balanced, happy life as long as I make the effort to look after myself. And I hadn't been, for a really long time.
Since Monday I have been taking baby steps.
No alcohol. More sleep. Eating fruit & vegetables (the fruit is actually a big deal for me). Less instagram.
Reading up on things that I'm interested in (crystals, food and nutrition, tarot, shamanism) and reading things that are interesting (
MindBodyGreen, fairy books, art blogs).
I've had baths rather than showers. I've watched endless murder mysteries.
I've broken out my sketch books, my pencils, my watercolour and acrylic paints.
I even attended a
chakra cleanse yoga workshop which was absolutely incredible, a couple of times I almost cried with the release that took place. Amazing.
This morning I woke up early, hours before Tom and A, and inspired by an artist I've recently come across,
Julia Dolowicz, I decided to draw a portrait of myself that's the me I wish to be, the me I am becoming. A drawing of my inner me I guess, I like her. I like me too, I just need to remember that.
I feel alive again, playing with my colouring in pencils and reading fairy stories like a kid. What my soul needs.
It's a struggle but i don't want to take my life for granted any more.
Surely the point of living is to really live?
