Undecided Emotions

Some days I decide to be blissfully happy.  Some days I decide to be deeply depressed.  Some days I can't decide what to be.  Some days I know exactly what to be.  Some days I want to feel loved.  Some days I want to feel numb.  Some days I feel life is easy.  Some days I feel life is hard.  Some days I can't decide what I feel.  I wish I could force all these emotions away.  I wish I could just wake up one day and be perfectly content.  I don't know how it's possible to feel so many different feelings all at once.  Like a prism...all the colors of the rainbow hitting me at once.  Happy bright colors mixed with sad, dark colors engulfing me at the same time.  Suffocating me.  I realize I don't get the option to decide what I want to be.  It is decided for me by unnamed forces.  A tug-of-war of emotions each one pulling me desperately in their direction. Trying to win me over so they can suck up all of my energy and leave me breathless with no clue how I got there.  Exhausted from the battle within my head, my heart, my soul, my body.  I put up a strong front to fool everyone else.  Trying to prove I am strong to everyone including myself.  Am I just fooling myself?  Do others see my frailty?  I fear that they do.  Deep down I know they do.  Deep down I know that everyone sees it.  They see every character flaw.  They see every poor decision I've made.  They see it all.  Why do I care?  I know I shouldn't.  Everybody has a dark side.  Everybody has flaws.  Why do I feel like I need to hide mine all the time?  I know I've made mistakes...billions of big mistakes mixed with trillions of little mistakes that seem to snowball together making every new mistake bigger and bigger.  It seems like with every new mistake I burn out a flame that once burned...leaving a vast distance of ash and ruin between the people and things I love and me.  With every little mistake I make the distance grows.  Pushing me away from what I love most.  Pushing me from the people I love most.  Leaving me isolated.  Feeling sad, lonely, angry, lost, exhausted.  The light inside of me is completely burned out and every time I try to relight it the isolation and sadness becomes stronger.  Pushing harder.  I should just be happy to be alive.  I almost lost my life years ago and I should just be grateful for my body, for my soul, for my breath.  Some days I am incredibly grateful.  Some days I feel more blessed than I deserve to be.  Some days I feel like such an incredibly lucky being.  Just when I think I have my emotions in check the light changes and hits the prism and I get disoriented all over again, overwhelmed with all the colors of the rainbow, and the tug-of -war begins again.  So I grin and bear it while my soul gets stretched out in a million different directions while people don't see the reasoning behind my inner battle and thinking I'm just being dramatic over nothing.  The problem is they don't see it.  They don't see the chemicals in my brain playing their vicious games every day.  I did this to myself by putting on that strong front and wearing a smile all the time while incapable of explaining the war raging on in my head leaving scars on my body and face destroying my inner beauty.  To them it's simple.  Just relax.  Don't worry...be happy.  If only it was as simple as that.  I wish it was.  So I continue to let the battles rage on like wildfire burning and spreading deeper and deeper within me all the while keeping up appearances of a woman who is put together and strong and happy.  And here I sit with undecided emotions running through me.  Let the fire rage on inside from the battles past and present...one day I will find peace.  One day there will be no more undecided emotions.  One day I will decide and I will be beautiful again.

Depression Is...

Depression is ugly. It's not like the commercials that make it look simple. Just take a small pill every day and it's all better. It's not. Depression is pain. It's mental pain. Physical pain. Emotinal pain. You take that little pill and it makes you numb to the pain...most of the time...but it also makes you feel numb to everything else. And when the medication isn't enough you are left to fight on your own. You lay in bed all day just trying to get up enough energy to get up and get in the shower. Then when you've exhausted all your energy just showering you just want to lay down in bed again. You don't even bother getting dressed. You just lay there exhausted. Worn out. You just want to sleep even though you've slept plenty and you can't sleep anymore. You know you have a million things to do because you've felt like this for days and have been putting off all of your tasks because you just physically can't do it. You wish you could just snap out of it. You loathe yourself because you feel like you're just being lazy. But it's not just being lazy. It's physical inability to move no matter what the motivation. You want to get up. You want to get out of the bed...out of the house...out of the area. You want to go make healthy choices. You. Just. Can't. You feel guilty for being unable to do anything which just adds to your pain. Depression is feeling ugly. Depression is feeling worthless. Depression is feeling tired all the time. Depression is feeling guilty. Depression is feeling like you're suffocating...smothered. Depression is feeling heavy...like a metal weight dropped on your body. Depression is sadness. Depression is having no control over your emotions. Depression is feeling sad for no reason at all. Depression is crying for no reason. Depression is knowing that life is good and hating it anyway.

So when you hear that someone was clinically diagnosed with clinical depression: Don't judge. Don't try to fix it. Don't push them. Don't give up on them. Just be there for them.  Show them you care. Hug them. Call/text/email them. Be gentle. Be loving. Be supportive. Don't force them to talk about it because 99% of the time there's nothing to talk about. They need your love. They need your understanding. They need your love. They need your support. They need your physical presence...even if it's to sit in silence watching a movie. They need you. They need help. I need help.

Counting My Blessings

Today I've been trying to count my blessings.

1 I am so lucky to have such an amazing husband
2 A nice apartment to live in
3 Decent cars that get us from point A to B and back to A again
4 My amazing family who takes good care of us and who we take good care of as well
5 My amazing in-laws who we love and miss so much
6 Our jobs and the great coworkers/friends we get to share our lives with
7 Modern medicine to heal all of our health issues
8 All other modern technologies to help us keep connected to our friends and family near and far
9 And for all of our opportunities

Even through our hard times it seems that we are making so much progress.  There is one thing in particular that we are working on right now that only a few people know about but we are so excited!!  Hopefully we'll get to share some good news soon but for now we don't want to jinx it.  We are just so very lucky and even though my depression/anxiety and Jonathan's bipolar gets the better of us some days...we try to remember just every blessing we have in our lives right now.  Hopefully the blood clot in my leg will heal soon so we can start exercising and getting a 5k in the plans for this summer!!  Wish us luck!!

Sometimes I Feel Like I'm Going Crazy

I just have such a hard time juggling responsibilities sometimes. I wonder how so many people can get anything done when they're working full time among all the other every day responsibilities that come along with being an adult. It's hard to cope with everything sometimes. I sure could use a long vacation and some extra funds to help our situation out. Man I'm worn out.

Help!

So I have been working my butt off trying to get my debt controllable (since it's not realistic that I could just wipe it out completely the least I could do is make it more controlled) and trying to pay the bills and keep myself eating better while taking care of chores at home...I feel literally exhausted every day. I would love to have the energy on my time off to be with friends and have energy to go out and do fun things with my boyfriend, Jonathan, and be able to feel energized at work so I'm not dragging all day long. I have noticed that when I am making leaps and bounds in my money situation I seem to feel a lot better physically and mentally but if I'm just making baby steps I feel like collapsing at any second.
Recently I just paid off a huge amount of debt and made some huge leaps but I am worried that when it goes back to the baby steps (and it will soon) that I'm going to fall back into the weak, collapsible Kerry that always seems to appear when I'm making very little progress. I feel that I should be able to keep the energy level high all the time like I used to even if I'm making very little progress. It shouldn't matter what my financial status is...I need to just find the energy to do the things I used to love.
I do realize that depression and anxiety are huge factors in why I have no energy but I feel that if I could just find things that will help boost my energy the depression/anxiety will very likely minimize itself as a result. I want to try to do more things on nights I have to work (which is the hardest time for me to do things) that will help me let go of stress and help me to relax enough that I am comfortable doing other activities I used to love. I was thinking about trying to get back in the habit of doing yoga on a regular basis and maybe trying to implement an easy exercise routine or maybe eating more energy boosting foods (which I have no idea what they'd be but I know they're out there) and other things like that. This is where I need the help. Does anyone know any simple ways to boost energy? What do you do that helps you get the energy you need to get things you need and want done? I need ideas because I get so tired of feeling tired and worn out all the time...I'd love to have my old quality of life back but I know I'm going to have to work for it. Any ideas and suggestions? I'd be greatly appreciative!