No matter how much I tell myself, ‘You’re going to be okay’, my brain tells me, ‘You are not okay’. ‘There is no escape from how you feel, how much can I fight before I give up? That weight of emptiness and sadness creeps in and devours any hope of conquering this monster.
I am so ashamed of how I feel, I can’t tell anyone. Telling someone would bring it to life and I just want to hide it. The shame cloaks me in it’s ugly coat. Why should I feel this way? Shame on me! I aught to be able to rise above it. But today it’s claws have me in it’s ugly clutches and I can’t move. I panic, I can’t breathe. The air is too thick to fill my lungs, I gasp and gasp. I remember, slow down your breathing; you can do this, you’ve done this a million times before. But today feels like I’ve experienced it for the very first time. Just as scary, just as frightening and the feeling of being all alone.
‘But you were doing so well’, you might say, really I’ve never been doing ‘so well’. I’ve been doing okay. I want to be doing ‘so well’, oh how I pray to be well again. Will that day ever come again? Some days are a little better then others, some okay, some not so okay. Today, definitely not a good day. I have to beat this, so much depends on me, no one else can do this for me; I have to do this myself and that’s the scary part. Living this life, with a broken mind. I have put so many pieces back together but some pieces just keep falling apart.
I hide, I can’t let people see the real me; they would run and never look back. They wouldn’t like this part of me; but I tell myself that it is only a part of me, it’s not who I am. There is more to me, a lot more, I have so much to offer but my sick, tormented mind tells me otherwise. The funny me, isn’t here today, I’ve gone and can’t find me. Sadness as drowned and held me under water but I have to resurface, my oxygen is running out, I’m going to drown. Kick, push, you can do this; you can resurface. Your funny self will come back. I hope.
This is just a glimpse into the life of a bad day for someone with a mental illness. So be kind to everyone you meet today because you really can’t tell from their outward appearance, what inward battles they are fighting this moment. Never judge a book by it’s cover, because the pages within can tell an whole different story.