That Was Then, This is Now

I was hemorrhaging emotions. All the optimism I had was being pumped out of my body. Positive thoughts, energy, my ability to focus, everything that made me who I am was being drained from me.

My brain didn't work. Thoughts took what seemed like years to process. I made mistakes and made mistakes correcting the mistakes. It felt like the connections in my brain that send thoughts from one place to another were offline.

I was fine until I wasn’t. It was a slow spiral. I went from fully functional to a this in a matter of weeks. I didn't see it happening.

Was I great before? Hardly. I was tired, edgy, emotional. I was getting through and thought I could handle it. The level of stress and overwork were normal. There was no signpost indicating my current path was worse than any other time.

That was then.
 

I have allowed myself time and space to process and feel the pain, sadness, grief, the uneasy emotions. I tell others to be compassionate with themselves, to give themselves a break, to learn from their past.

I am taking my own advice. I am aboard a fast moving freight train with many twists and turns in the tracks, multiple stops and starts, emotions loaded and unloaded.

There are days when I feel completely alone, and I know that's the depression talking, as I have support around me. I cry and have breakdowns of self-control. Other days I am on top of the world, positive the worst is behind me, looking at a bright future, appearing to have my shit together.

When I write procedures, I try to be thorough and explain why things need to happen in a specific way. When I write instructions for myself, I include "Trust me, I'm from the past." It's my way of reminding myself there are reasons to the order of operations, to think through the process and it will become clear, to know I did this work before and can do it again.

Life happens. One day everything is fine, the next you're flat on your back and don't want to crawl out of bed. The thing we all have to remember is we can only control what we can control. I've never been good at that, but I'm trying.

Every hardship and setback shapes you, changes you, and will someway help you be more resilient.

I am feeling uncertain, not my usual self, and frankly sometimes downright scared. Will I be better? I put my faith in the future to guide me to where it needs to. And I leave this as a note to myself, to remind me I can do it. Trust me, I'm from the past.