Tag: fight

Buoyancy
Autobiography · Mental Health · Poetry

Buoyancy

Ruby Pipes17 Comments

It’s different now. When I crumble. The blankets
wrapped up around my face and I squirm
in the sheets.

This is not the same sadness we became so well
acquainted with. Not the monster we learned to
battle. No, I face this one alone and

only sometimes. I do not pull my knees to my
chest anymore. Do not wail into the universe about
not wanting to exist in it.

But on occasion I still find myself fighting
my own chemistry. My own memory of how I am and
how I am supposed to be.

Clay that should become tile piles up in the studio. I
argue with the urge to cut all my hair off.
Stay all day on the couch watching Breaking Bad again.

Familiar feeling, but not quite the same. Closer to déjà vu than a
clear remembering. I’m fumbling, but I trust myself to
find my footing again. I understand that this is

not how it ends. I make phone calls. Send texts.
Reach out like I never felt capable of before. I know I’m worth the
struggle this time. I know.

I find myself wondering if I would have made it. If this
desire to stay afloat was always present, even when not
presenting. If my will to live has always been vivacious,

relentless. Must have been. Because whenever they’ve asked
what they can do for me, I’ve always said, “Listen. But
do nothing.” When the time came, I’ve always known the battle is

fought and won by myself. Just listen. And sometimes that means
just to my breathing. My energy. Be present. Hold space for me and
expect nothing.

We are learning to do that again. In new places with new people and new
ideas of what succeeding looks like. We are beginning
again. And this time I know we’re not quitting.

–––––

Hey! I have a Facebook page now. Go like it to not only stay in the loop with what’s going on over here, but for all sorts of other fun stuff. There will be at least one video. Haven’t you been wondering what my voice sounds like?

Photo courtesy of Wayne Lo.

Autobiography · Mental Health · Personal Development

Yolk

Ruby Pipes16 Comments
"That’s All Yolks" © Rob, 2012. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.
“That’s All Yolks” © Rob, 2012. CC BY-NC-ND 2.0.

The yolk from the white, I try to separate the logic from the feeling. What I cognitively know from what circles like snakes in my stomach. Only one part is used at a time. The things I know exhaust and go home long before emotions tire, and I’m left sobbing in the shower over things I know aren’t true.

We ache. Our hearts, our spirits are pummeled against the shore for longer than we think they can hold up. At night we wrap up into each other and I whisper, “I don’t know if I can do this forever,” and he responds with, “You don’t have to. Just a little while more.”

I shake. Pull my hair and claw at my skin and gasp into the carpet. Put on my coat and scarf and take a walk. Call my mom. Beg for something to keep me just a little grounded.

It’s that time of year again.

In a bathrobe and slippers, I curl up on the couch and read books. Play video games. Watch Law and Order. Anything to keep me distracted. To keep me from looking into the pit of me and still not having any answers for why life feels like this.

But when I’m running Zedd’s vocalist is singing in my ears again. “Take your dark days and send them to the sun and carry on…” And I hit repeat again and again and again. Again. Again. “Let it go until you let go of all the anger…” And I run. My feet pounding the pavement and my heart leaping out of my chest. Unsure if I even remember what breathing steady is. I gasp for air and my legs scream to stop. No. Again. Again. “It’s easy to hold, but so hard to forgive…” Again. Again. “All the words that made you hurt will burn like paper. Straight into the fire, straight into the fire. Let it go until the smoke is gone forever…” Again. Again.

I separate out the yolk from the white. Knowing full well that each part has its own use and sometimes they are used together. I cling onto the scraps of hope still left in me somewhere. The perfect mixture of logic and feeling. I dig my nails in deep.

Again.

Autobiography · Mental Health

Grit

Ruby Pipes18 Comments
"Gravel 2" © Stig Morten Waage, 2008. CC BY-NC 2.0.
“Gravel 2” © Stig Morten Waage, 2008. CC BY-NC 2.0.

I track my footsteps, my water, my food. I have running plans and diet rules and a sleep schedule. Medications to take every morning and night. A handful of vitamins for after breakfast. My whole life is a self-imposed tightrope walk.

Often I try to tell myself that I don’t have a choice in any of this. That I simply have to do everything I do for my health, my mental wellbeing, my sanity. But lately I’ve been reminding myself that every day is a decision. There are rocks beneath me, yes. But laying down on gravel is never beyond the scope of possibility. Deciding to be resilient, deciding to fight back was not the only option I had. That’s the thing I have to remember.

But it’s hard to continue. When every day involves just a little more fight. Just a little bit more commitment. When I want nothing more than to turn off the alarm and stay in bed. It just comes down to a matter of grit. Of deciding to rally the energy and get going, even when I don’t think I can do it. Because there are going to be days when I can’t.

There are going to be days when the depression closes in too tight. When I will have no choice but to cancel the plans and draw the blinds. There will be days I will have to dissolve into the bed sheets. So I must seize any day that is not one of those days. I must close down tight around it and do everything I possibly can. I must continue to remind myself that I am not so fortunate as to have all my days be capable ones.

Even now, when the medication seems to be working and the days are dark, but not desperate, I have to remember that it’s not always going to be like this. Not dwell with the weight of the hopeless days standing over my shoulder, but remember how easy it is to slip back down that hole. Yes, it often comes without warning, but sometimes there are things I can do to avoid it.

Sometimes I can fight it off just a little longer. Sometimes I can say, “No,” and get up and put my running shoes on. Sometimes I can climb into my raincoat and take a walk. Sometimes I can go hug someone I love or take a nap. Sometimes I can fight just a little harder.

And sometimes I can’t. Sometimes there is nothing I can do. Relapses can happen for no reason in particular. Suddenly I just can’t seem to keep my feet under me anymore. And that’s something I have to learn to be okay with, too. I have to remember what I learned last time. Go back and read old journal entries. Think about how much better acquainted I became with myself through that darkness. When there was nothing in the world but me and my own brain sparing.

When I felt completely disconnected from everything outside my own head, what did I learn?