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[hellosarahjay-blog]

Remember This

You know when you have an epiphany in the shower and you have to talk about it or act on it before you forget. (and when you repeat it, it doesn’t sound as good as it did when you first thought it in your head). Or when you wake up from a vivid dream but the more you try to remember it, the faster the end slips away like when Allen got sucked into the Jumanji board game. I’m only human but I wish I could hold on to those moments of rational thinking when I know whats best for me and I am comfortable with my inability to predict the future. Sometimes I’m ok with being completely fucked up and having no idea what the fuck my life is about except to take it day by day and to potentially have some amazing stories to tell before I die. In the grand scheme of things, complaining about my ex/bf-on-hold is not a big deal and a story not worth telling. A piece of time that was formative-but in a “get through it and don’t do this shit again” kind of way.  It bothers me is that I can tell myself I don’t need him or even want him, commit to it, and then want/expect him to suck me back in the way he does every time I try to leave. 

He’s needy and I need to be needed. Hours, days, and weeks are lost. Being in his arms/car/bed is what I would equate with love. I never want to leave that place. Its safe. Time doesn’t move. Nothing else matters. But then I take a step back when I get to/HAVE to be alone, and I realize time was going by. way faster than I thought it was. my life is slipping away from me like I’m in the sunken place from the movie “Get Out.” My conscious is screaming at me but I can’t hear it. The real me is falling and falling further and further away from real life. But I wasn’t hypnotized. I was weak. I forgot myself. I forgot my worth. And I took the blame for wanting things to be different. For wanting to be respected. For wanting what I deserve. 

Now that I’ve had my time away, I see it. I see what my mom meant when she said she missed ME. I was living in her house but I wasn’t me. Or when my sisters told me I could do better. What? I was lucky to be treated like a princess. I was. 

But I’m not a princess. 

I’m a fucking warrior. I’m a fucking winner. I get what I want. I fight for it. I’m a role model. I’m the fucking best. 

I don’t need someone to adore me and let me take care of them and have them take care of me. Well, yes, I want that. But what I NEED, is a teammate. One that will push me, work with me, help me up if I fall. And someone that will challenge me and have goals of their own that I can be apart of too. I shouldn’t be made to feel guilty for following my dreams. For not sitting on my ass and wishing for something instead of achieving it.

Where they do that at?

I’m done with this wak ass chapter of my life. Getting back to the good part. 

[hellosarahjay-blog]

the beginning

When I was 26, I knew happiness. 

I could see the world and life so clearly. It was simple to explain. Anyone challenging my inner peace was unsuccessful. I could not be fazed. 

When my friend and mentor died, I didn’t cry. I knew it was a sad event but death is simply a part of life and should be accepted. 

When my best friend moved to another state, I didn’t cry as she hugged me the last time in our FL apartment. I knew we would continue to communicate and travel to see each other. 

I didn’t feel much sadness when I gave away all of my belongings, sold my car, and said goodbye to everything and everyone I knew to volunteer for the Peace Corps for two years. Life was handing me adventures and I was taking them! 

When the chemicals in my brain stabilized, and the Prozac I was taking for 3 months didn’t make me act like a fucking robot, reality slapped me in the face. 

The anxiety came back, the depression came back, the self doubt was there again, making me question every life decision I made and every sentence I chose to speak out loud. Why hasn’t R called me back? Has everyone in the US forgotten about me? Are they better off? I can’t believe K had a baby while I was gone. Do all my co-volunteers hate me? Why did I say that in training today? What a fucking embarrassment. Granted, I wasn’t crying most nights and I was showering regularly. It was nice not wishing my life would just end already. But how could I get back to that place of immovable calm? I read through my journal and rewrote the keys to my happiness over and over. They were just words at that point. 

I got my first prescription for antidepressants and official diagnosis for major depressive disorder the week after I was crying incessantly in my roommates bed because being alive was too much work. No matter how many she people she listed that loved me, all the work and education I have been able to accomplish, how fun and loving I was to others, to myself, I was a pile of garbage that should be set on fire so that I didn’t stink up the rest of the house. Blood in the bathtub is what I always imagined, however. 

Thank god for that night. I am grateful she pleaded with me to call for help. I got the meds, but it took a bad mushroom trip for me to realize I was ruining my life by wallowing. Its scary to change your ways and pick yourself up out of depression, but tripping on shrooms while depressed is even scarier. Started taking the dam things at a music festival. 

I loved the robot feeling I was experiencing. I thought I was healed. My Dr. said it would take about a month for my friends to notice a change. And they will notice before I do. But nah. I was feeling goooodddd. Looking back, it was prob too much too soon but I was not complaining! My roommates dad heard about my new Dr. 

-Hey Sarah, I heard you’re depressed. I’m sorry to hear that. I didn’t know. 

-Its ok, 

-Well, why are you depressed?

-????

I had no idea what the answer was. But I shared some childhood stories, lifelong fears, and just terrible things about my life in general. He had been in Gambler’s Anonymous for 12? years or so years at that point. His advice and perspective stemmed from their program (It works if you work it!) and of course his age provided some amazing wisdom. After our 2 hour impromptu therapy session, I got up off the couch finally understanding forgiveness. I felt so light. I knew happiness for the first time in my entire life. So many years of anger and hatred had been lifted. In my journal, I made a list of what I had just learned that fixed my brain. 

In the three months of awesomeness, I resolved that my purpose in life was to share that incredible feeling. To teach forgiveness and self-love. I couldn’t contain it. It would be wrong.  

Now, I’m back to feeling actual feelings. Even though I am not at complete peace the way I was 2 years ago, I still want to share what I know. Not to be inspirational or life changing (oh god, the pressure) but to, at the very least, be relatable. Writing in my mostly empty notebooks or pages I crumple up and throw away on planes with my little plastic cups aren’t much different. This is at least a record, even if no one but me reads this. BUT, if someone happens to stumble across my blog, and just so happens to be in that little window that your antidepressant allows you to be receptive to someone else’s words, mine will be here. 

No promises. I don’t know what this will look like. But here you go. This is the beginning of a series of things.