Atlas

Looks heavy right? I imagine it sucks being a Greek God carrying the world on your shoulders. And not even having a pair of pants. :)

I've had a difficult week. The panic hit on Wednesday. And it hasn't gone away. Four days in I finally decide to take an Ativan. I let it go too long this time though and it's not even working. 

I saw my therapist yesterday. I was cranky. Not only have I been having constant panic attacks, I haven't been sleeping. I was late for work because I was throwing up at home, a delightful by-product of the most awful panic attacks, had a lunch meeting and then had to leave early to make this appointment. 

Him: You're pissed you have to be here. 

Me: I have work to do. 

Him: What's wrong Margaux?

Truth is, nothing's wrong. Work is great. I'm actually taking on some new projects and responsibilities that I'm excited about, working more closely in Communications which I'm passionate about. I'm dating a nice guy. My secret life friend is back in town and that just makes my little group of friends that much more special. 

Him: I'm not sure if it's a good idea for you to work more. And why can't you just take a pill?  And...what's wrong?

Hmmmm. I hate taking pills - it makes me feel like I'm not strong enough to handle this stuff on my own. Sullivan's are renowned for their pride issues. 

What's wrong? Well there has been some worry this past couple of months about my siblings and what each of them have been going through. I'm trying to help. 

Him: Why does it have to be you who does that?

Seriously? Mom off in Panama, Dad in PEI and even if they were in town, this would still be my responsibility. I feel like it always has been. I love my parents, but mom wasn't very um...maternal. Dad wasn't really around. And since we've been in Toronto I just feel like my siblings have always felt that I'm where they go for "home". 

Problem is, that's where the line ends. 

Also, I'm doing this big event at work where I tell my story to raise awareness for Mental Health week. 

Him: You don't have to do that either. 

He doesn't understand. I do. That's why I write this blog. That's why I did an interview with a big magazine. I need to help people. Especially people like me. 

Him: I'll tell you something that someone told me once when I was in therapy. I wanted to be a therapist and they said that I would be no good to anyone else if I didn't take care of myself first. 

It feels selfish right? But it makes sense. That's why if the plane is going to crash you're supposed to put on your own oxygen mask before helping someone else get theirs on. If you're passed out, you can't help them. 

I don't know where the constant pressure has always come from to take care of everyone else around me. Probably started with the family, got worse the longer I stayed JW. I just know it's always been there and if I try to ignore it, if I try to say no, it yells at me, loudly, until I listen to it. 

Him: Who takes care of you? Where do you go to feel safe?

There is no answer to that question. All I know is I've tried carrying the weight of the world, but I only have two hands. What I really want to focus on now is my career, my writing, my personal peace of mind. And I can't do that with all the panic, the insomnia, the anxiety. 

I guess I'll have to make some hard choices. In the meantime, I'll go to yoga. 

After the Rain

"The nice thing about rain is that it always stops. Eventually." - Eeyore

I have some important things to say today, but first of all, let's clear something up. 

These comments I'm getting on my blog "I'm awesome at dating and other lies..." - just to be clear, I did NOT have a threesome. I'm really not the type. The blog was meant to be a funny comedy of errors that turned what was meant to be a low-key, romantic evening into a disaster date. It ends with a friend showing up to crash on the couch (ie. not romantic) but when I said we all woke up together in the morning what I meant was in my tiny apartment. Not in the same bed. Get your minds out of the gutter people!

I'm glad we cleared that up. :)

So you know how I told you I'm speaking on a panel for an event at work for Mental Health Week. I had a meeting with the colleague who's running it today about the whole thing. There's three of us, apparently they get over 100 people who show up to listen to our sad stories. 

She had printed me out a list of questions to think about while planning what I was going to share. How has mental illness affected your life? Have a noticed a stigma around it? What would you like others to know about the situation that you are dealing with? What were key components that changed your life for the positive? 

It's funny to think of myself as someone with "mental illness". Despite a challenging upbringing, I've always thought of myself as a happy girl. My nickname growing up was "Sunshine". 

But I guess that just means I buy into the stigma - the very one I'm trying to break - myself. The whole purpose behind this blog, behind the magazine article I did, behind getting up there in front of my work colleagues and telling my story, is simply to help others. If I took myself too seriously, I'd never be able to out myself as mentally ill. 

It's embarrassing, no doubt about it. I've worked extremely hard to present a certain persona and hide my issues related to depression and anxiety, especially in the workplace. I'm pretty sure that's why I still have a job. 

Here I go back to my Buddhist beliefs, but it's a noble truth: life is suffering. At some point or another, we all face demons, whether we deserve them to show up in our life or not. Living the way I did as a JW, trying to constantly pretend everything was fine and I was always happy is no way to live. This is not to say I dwell in negativity. I work very, very hard to stay positive and upbeat. In answer to the "what would you like others to know" question I would say this: we all go through difficult times. Sickness, death, divorce, unfair situations. We can't be expected to always be fine. The rain falls in all of our lives at different times, in different ways. 

Getting disfellowshipped and divorced were tragic experiences for me, but I also went through hell when my Cat died. We can't control things. I think the most important thing I want people to take away from this experience is that when we deal with depression, anxiety, addictions, that doesn't make us weak. Because we are dealing with them. That makes us strong. 

I've spent years in therapy, going to yoga, meditating, reading positive, life changing literature. These things have changed my life in a positive way. Putting myself out there with new people, trying to rebuild some kind of life is scary but I've been rewarded for the effort. I don't wallow in sadness, I rarely deal with depression anymore. But the post-traumatic stress of what I went I went through years ago sticks with me and I can't always control the anxiety when it chooses to show up. I just have to try to breathe through it (which is sometimes all I can do when the panic gets so bad that even breathing is such a struggle) and if it's a really bad day, go home and try again tomorrow.

The important thing is that we don't give up. Every day that we're still here is a testament to that effort. That we try not to be too hard ourselves, that we try to love ourselves as we are. That even when we're soaking wet from the rainfall, we're looking for the sun.  

Because after the rain, it might be damp and soggy for a long time, but at least the we've weathered the storm. Never, ever, ever give up. You are not alone. :)

The Landslide

Life is a series of peaks and valleys. Which I've grown oh-so-accustomed to that at this point.

I read a great article on my "daily dharma" the other day that said we should forget happiness. The pursuit of it, in itself, is a fool's errand. He said:

"What is freedom? It is nothing more, nothing less, than life lived awake."

This is what I crawled towards at the beginning, before I could walk, when I ventured out to find the real truth. Crawling of course, because confronting reality is a painful ordeal. It's the plot of every great movie, every moving book. Overcoming adversity and becoming more than what we were raised to be, but maybe what we were meant to be? It's inspiring, it's brave, it's fucking hard. We crawl before we walk, we walk before we can run. 

February is always the most depressing month, maybe that's why I born into it (the ever-sensitive Pisces). Lately, the family, the work, the boys, the friends, it's all been depressing. Fighting, severe illnesses, stress, unhappy situations...maybe we're all just experiencing a bad case of the winter blues. And I've been backsliding into the Landslide. 

My eczema is back, after all these years. I guess I'm more stressed out than I thought. I can't wait to add that to the things I reveal to new guys I date: Oh, you know, I was raised in a cult. And I'm divorced. And everything itches. :)

I'd rather hurt though than feel nothing at all. And when you hurt, you know you're still alive. And that soon, you'll feel the sun and the happiness that comes with surviving the winter. And the bad times. Living wide awake means we accept and feel each emotion as they come, and make peace with them. Let them in, learn to love them. That way, even if they bury us, we can find a way to crawl out and learn to walk again. Maybe eventually, we can run. 

Sullivan out.