Thursday, January 14, 2010

I Am Truly & Really Okay

I am a dark poet meaning during times when I am not feeling well or feeling down, the black oozy junk that lives deep inside of us all comes out in writings. It helps me to get out what many times I can't say verbally (I know, it is hard to believe). I am worn down and tired, but I will persevere, I always do! So please, do not worry about me I will get over this hump even if I have to drag myself over it!

**This is me, today, this morning how I felt. If you are bothered even the slightest by other people dark and gloomy moods, please, do not read this!**

I am beginning to spiral into depression, down, down into a dark pit and I am doing my best to hang on and not fall in.

I feel closed in, like I am suffocating feeling the problems endured are all my fault and yet, I know they are not it is just circumstances that can't be controlled and I am trying to hold onto that last shining glimmer of hope.

What will happen if that last thread of hope goes away? Will I go with it? Will I vanish into the air like dust settling after a desert storm? Will my life have been for nothing? Will anyone remember that I was once here in this place of broken dreams?

I have been here before, in this darkness and I have been terrified to move, to terrified to do anything but get on my knees and pray for a minute of peace and a glimpse of a smile from anyone which would tell me I am still alive! Yes, I have been the one carried when the footsteps were left behind.

I have scratched the ground in the past for aluminum cans, searched the couch and car for elusive coins that seem so plentiful when you have no need for them and I, have used them for good. I have used them for food, milk and gas.

I have sat for hours in the darkness of quiet meditation and prayed that my faith is as strong as God believes it is, I am very fragile during these times. I am afraid if I am not careful, I will shatter like glass shedding splintered tears.

I remember working! I remember going from nothing to something to over abundance or to much! I dug my heels in back then, I kept my nose to the grindstone sometimes working twenty and thirty hours of overtime as you are now & I was so proud of that paycheck back then, when making more was important!

The truth is, the more I made, the worse I felt because then, I was expected to work those hours to do this, buy that, go here, spend, spend more, spend, spend, spend! There was never enough things!

WooHoo! Finally, I was making more money than I had ever dreamed possible for a girl from Yonkers - but this was a dream come true that came with a high price, my happiness, your happiness. Where did the promised happiness go? It was always just over the next horizon, elusive and just out of reach. That is what happens when you confuse money with happiness.

Now...now, I do not fit in anymore out in the world, so I stay close to my cocoon where it is warm and I have the love of those that love me not for what I give them, but just because they love me and it soothes the pain and makes the dark less frightening!

I am free in so many ways now. Free to be home at night where I belong. Free to spend time with family on week-ends to explore rain swollen rivers & summers to lay in the warm sand of the beach & to relax! I am free to be to my grandchildren what I couldn't be to my children - HOME!

In my freedom, I am also a prisoner and a slave. I am a slave to my body as it loudly and violently rebells against what it perceives are the injustices it has endured and it jerks me awake squeezing & tossing me around violently as the back spasms wrack my body and all I can do is cry out!

My hand and my head shake. Can you see it or is just me? When I discuss it with anyone, they tell me it is just my bodies way of healing. Time heals all wounds or in my case it may wound all it touches!

Prisoner to the debt I brought with us in our new home...incurred when I could not find full - time work, foolishly believing I would have another job quickly and we would be happy in our new home.

Prisoner to the sharp blow of words as they whip across my heart and tear out tiny pieces of me until there is nothing but a hole in my heart! Yes, words sting! Your words, their words and they sting as if they were real blows. I try to remember if I stung you the same way with those blows when I was the one carrying the load...when I paid the bills, the house payments, the taxes, utilities and groceries. Did I bruise you the same way? If so, I am sorry!

You could escape then and you can escape now. For me, I cannot. I take comfort in the small things, being able to make something with my hands that others will enjoy. Yes, as you say, I make things and give them away for nothing. Nothing to you, but joy for me! I cannot escape, there is to much weight pressing me to stay in and not go out!

I want to be more than a paycheck! I have always wanted to be more than that, but now, I feel I am no more than a missed paycheck and yet, others make it with less. I want to help build a bridge out of the depths of our debt. I am fully aware it was my dream that has put us where we are. Is it my struggle alone to get us out?

I want you to know that I may or may not ever get better. I will hold tightly to you on some days and let you go on others. I may smile or I may even cry. I don't know what each day will bring but I will still do my best to be your partner for the rest of my life and I will still dream of happily ever after.

What I do know is the darkness is closing in and no matter what, I will not now or ever let it win!



5 comments:

Linda said...

What a blessing to be able to channel those dark times into moments of clarifying creativity. I suffer from depression as well and understand when the cycle is beginning. I've learned to use that time. It appears that you have as well. Hugs to you, friend.

Quiltingranny said...

If I sat around and let it consume me, it would, so I write and have written what I call dark poetry. Usually when I am done I feel at least a bit better!

~Niki~ said...

I feel for your my dear. I have suffered from this horrible monster for many years, most of my life, due to a not so great past (crap). I feel like I have NO excuse for it and I'm a whiney baby most days, that's why I don't post most times about it. yes I've tried all sorts of meds that make me fatter or sick, so I just don't take anything. You have every right to vent! You're human! and this is what helps you get it out. Big hugs. Niki

Quiltingranny said...

I always try to work through it because as you said, the meds make you fatter or just blah and I would rather feel depressed than feel nothing! Thanks!

Patty said...

Hi Jean, I feel along with you. I've suffered with depression for many, many years. I've tried different meds, and really haven't found anything that makes me feel like me. What you wrote sounds like me too. I haven't been able to do any sewing for about 6 months now. I am going to take a class tomorrow with some friends. I think being there will help me more than anything right now. My daughter got married 3 years ago in April and I started making her a quilt. She then moved and decided the colors were all wrong so we picked out new ones. But it's only about 1/3 of the way done and now our joke is that it cannot be called her wedding quilt any longer. It is now called her
3rd year anniversary quilt. (but I have a long way to go.

Write all you want. I believe it is good for us to do that.