I would love to be gushing with inspirational material for this installment but it really does feel like the weather is matching my mood of late. I know, like winter, it is just a season in my life, and eventually, the seeds I sow today, I will reap ... but it's hard to see the bright side right now. And I think that's ok. I think it's unhealthy to constantly feel like you should be happier - because its part of the human experience. Ignoring it would be unhealthy and there would be a wealth of knowledge and lessons I'd be missing out on by not acknowledging and honoring my feelings and experience right now.
Toxic positivity is real. And It's so damaging. People don't like it when their friends and loved ones are struggling. The instinct to fix or change them is overwhelming because let's face it, watching a friend or loved one struggle is fucking uncomfortable. I hear so much "speak positivity into your life," and "you manifest your future," and so many similar sentiments that are well-meaning, but honestly leave me wanting to hide under the blanket. It leaves me feeling guilt-stricken because I cannot make everything out of nothing. What do you build with if you have no generational wealth or if every time you've built anything for yourself, it has been stolen from you?
In the last year, I have lost everything material that I have spent my life building, and have completely lost my financial independence. THANK GOD for Hive and THANK GOD for @zakludick, my beautiful children and my wonderful friends @jasperdick who remind me constantly that somehow, I am still worthwhile.
So, what causes this impossible standard I've set for myself? Or that I think other people expect me to live up to? And why do I feel like I am falling horribly short? @zakludick and I have been trying to analyze this and why I am being so hard on myself or that I am incapable of just letting well-meaning but destructive advice slide off me like water off a ducks back... and it goes back... waaaay back
There's a voice in my head that says you were born poor, so you will die poor.
We grew up below the railway, below the breadline with violence and trauma. I have been operating in survival mode since I was a tiny child. And no matter how safe I am, I can't switch it off.
I got my first job when I was 11 to help my mother buy milk and bread and was financially independent by the time I was 15.
I have worked some of the hardest jobs with awful hours for my whole life, but I built something.
It broke me when my poor previous romantic choices almost destroyed that entirely for me, but every time I fell, I managed to get up and put it back together.
And then, in the last year and a half I have just suffered so many hits that it doesn't seem to matter how many holes I plug, the ship is sinking. Well, it's more like a rickety rowboat at this stage.
And the water is starting to look good. And that is scary.
I am frightened of my mindset. I am frightened of how the tiniest rejection or failure derails me. Or the threat of the smallest conflict makes me completely unravel. I feel unsafe in my own skin.
And God knows I'm trying.
I auditioned for a narration spot with the company I'm writing for this week. It took so much preparation and guts, and I received the news today that I didn't make it. It doesn't mean I can't try again, but it really took so much out of me... it took all my bravery to try. To dare greatly. My audio equipment just didn't pass the test. I failed when I so badly needed a win.
I am constantly requesting books to work on, but there seems to be such a shortage of projects and I have suddenly gone from being overwhelmed with books to getting nothing but rejection after rejection. It was only after speaking to my friend and fellow writer today that I realized it is summertime in the US. That means no one is working. Hence the shortage of work and the overwhelming competition. 'Tis just a season, and it won't always be like this.
This coupled with the three other insurance and tax battles I've been fighting since July last year - which has been a bureaucratic nightmare all around. Never getting the same call center agent twice, escalations with no management feedback, and most importantly, no payout from the services I invested in.
Right now, I am just praying for a miracle.
I don't have the emotional resilience I need to weather this storm. I am medicated but that medication costs money. It is inexplicably awful to feel guilty about medical care. The mental health facilities our government provides are abominable. I am dealing with a permanent physical disability with absolutely no follow-through on the emotional or physical therapeutical support that I was promised.
There is a NGO center that I have been making as much use of as I can, but they rely on graduates coming in and out. They also only offer 8 sessions at a time which means everything ends just as I start opening up and I have to wonder if it's helping me or making me worse. Not to say I am ungrateful, not by any means. And no, It doesn't mean I didn't recognize when certain therapists broke the rules and gave me extra sessions. And yes, I have taken with me some excellent exercises that I use to talk myself off the ledge when I'm in full panic mode, but it's not enough.
Yesterday, my therapist handed me a flyer for a trauma therapist. "It's an investment," she says... after I spent the last few weeks telling her how much I am struggling financially. How can I invest in anything if I can't hold down a job? And it's not that she doesn't mean well, she just cannot
Like so many friends and family
see what is practical from their place of privilege.
And every morning, I wake up and wonder where I am going to get the emotional and physical energy to fight the bureaucracy and my physical pain and every day I try. But some days I just can't. And I get to that point where I so desperately need to rest, but I can't rest because I'm fighting for my life. I've found distractions but they only last so long before I wake up in cold sweats, or the episode ends or my hands get tired....
Thank GOD though, I am not fighting alone. But I need permission to just live this season for what it is... and I need to pray that I make it out the other end.
