Tag: depression

Autobiography · Mental Health · Writing

Don’t Write

Ruby Pipes19 Comments

"writing table" © Graham Holliday, 2013. CC BY-NC 2.0.
“writing table” © Graham Holliday, 2013. CC BY-NC 2.0.
Don’t write about it. Writing about it solidifies the hurt. Gives it form, texture. Writing about it creates a framework where the darkness can continue to exist. Another form of rumination. It reworks those pathways in your brain, rivers cutting deeper and deeper into the earth every time you put a word down.

Each word is another snowflake leading up to the avalanche. Creating something which used to not be there. Destroying that which used to be safe.

Don’t write about it. Your words are sharp, broken glass under delicate feet. Thoughts like drops of water, each one insignificant, but they come on like a flash flood. You’re drowning.

Sometimes writing can serve as a way to sort. Pulling belongings out of the bottom of your backpack, putting them in the correct drawer. But today writing is doing nothing but fanning your anxious flames. Pulling the cord on a chainsaw until it screams to life and you’re left wailing on the floor.

Don’t write about it. Take a breath and divert your attention. Watch TV, take a walk, make huge gashes of color with markers across a blank piece of paper. Crawl back into bed and hide under the covers. Look at yourself in the mirror and say, “This is really fucking hard.” But don’t say why.

Autobiography · Mental Health

Caffeine

Ruby Pipes8 Comments
"Seaside Silhouette" © James Harrison, 2014. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
“Seaside Silhouette” © James Harrison, 2014. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

“Hey, kiddo,” my dad says to me over the phone. My whole body becomes sunshine for a moment. “I don’t even know what time it is these days. It’s either light or dark,” he tells me when I ask when he’ll be at our new apartment.

“I feel that. It’s five o’clock all day, and then it’s suddenly time for bed.”

Quitting coffee for the second time this year was not timed well. Setting the clocks back is exhausting, caffeine withdrawals doubly so. As a result, I’ve been a walking shell for the last week.

It’s an accomplishment whenever I get out of bed, shower, get dressed. A day I remember to feed myself without Mason having to remind me is marked down as a success.

My writing has became a leaky faucet, drip by drip I work on three different projects. Mostly I just stare at the screen.

Started watching TV again. Lay on the couch underneath a soft, teal blanket and stare at the box as if I’m actually capable of keeping track of the plot line.

The train takes me out to the opposite side of the city and I run from the stop to the office of my new psychiatric nurse. For an hour and a half he asks me questions. “You’re on all these medications and you really don’t feel any better?”

“Some days. Maybe. A little. I don’t know. It’s hard to judge.”

He listens intently to all my answers and begins his wrap up with, “I want to take you off basically all of these, but first we have to find one thing that works.”

Each word felt like he was unburying me. Another brick lifted off my legs. I knew I’d cry if I said anything more than, “Yes, please.”

Autobiography · Mental Health · Personal Development

Growing Pains

Ruby Pipes12 Comments

“Growing up!” © Craig Sunter, 2015. CC BY-ND 2.0.
I’ve been pushing out blog posts like splinters. Only when necessary. Other than that, I’ve just been editing and pretending I’m not a writer at all.

My book release opened up a big can of imposter syndrome on me. Now I feel like everything I write is bullshit. Like the whole thing is bullshit and I’m fooling everyone into thinking I’m a writer. It feels slimy, deceitful. It feels like the whole book is a trick. Maybe that’s just because I’m scared of it. Scared of it failing. Scared of it not doing anything at all.

But I did it anyway. I’m terrified of it and I did it anyway. That counts for something. That counts for a hell of a lot, actually. So there’s that. I can look myself in the mirror and say that even though I was afraid, I did it. And I don’t do that much. Even though I wanted to take it all back, I didn’t. And I don’t do that much, either, but now I do.

This is a new skill in my arsenal. I do things that make me want to dig my heels in and shake my head. To be that person feels like summiting a mountain. Because that’s where all the good stuff is, isn’t it? All the little juicy bits in life hide behind the big dogs, the darkened closet doors, the high heights. So maybe it’s okay to be scared. Maybe it’s okay to be a little catatonic when I think about all the things going on in my life. Maybe that’s a good sign. Maybe that’s where the goodness lies.

If that’s true, then everything is going just fine. And that’s a thought I hadn’t considered yet. That maybe there is something beautiful in hiding under the blankets. Maybe it’s not always a sign that we’re broken. That we’re hurting. But that we’re pushing. Growing pains.

I remember them from when I was a kid. Legs that felt like they were ripping themselves apart. And there was nothing to do about it. I just had to wait it out. Had to get excited that it meant I would be bigger one day. And that’s what this is, too. We can get excited that we’re growing, that we’re changing. We can hurt. We can feel it. But that doesn’t mean that anything bad is happening. That doesn’t mean that we are regressing. All it means is that it hurts. But it won’t forever. I promise. Shhh.