Where Are You?

After the tears stop flowing, after the anger subsides to a dull ache, after the sadness turns into a pink scar, after the emotions lose their rawness and settle into a familiar state, where are you?  What do you do now?  When the emotions were what drove your day and set the pace for your sleep no longer have the intensity to move you anywhere, what defines you?  When someone asks you, what do you do, do you answer with your occupation?  Does your job define you?  Does your adversity explain your position in life?  What do you do after all those ferocious feelings no longer have the power they once held over you?  Is there relief?  Is there fear?  When you can no longer hold onto the pity you’ve cherished and the pity that gave you the permission to be idle is no longer valid, what do cling to?

This past month has been the most intense emotional journey I have experienced to date.  Each time I’ve thought to myself, ‘there’s nothing harder than this,’ someone listens and tosses me something else to challenge me.  There was a moment during a long drive that I was listening to the radio.  I skipped around several stations and various genres.  I laughed out lout when I realized there wasn’t a single song that played that I couldn’t relate to on some level.  I said, “You’re a walking cliché.”  Whoa.  Epiphany.  Huge epiphany.  It made me laugh even harder at myself. 

I heard songs about longing, loss, desire, passion, need, unrequited love, use, abuse, escape, triumph, defeat, you get the idea.  I found myself thinking about the things that have gone on over the past 10 months.  The ups and downs came without warning and with the sharpness of a bitter cold at the end of a seemingly warm day.

So many times I’ve thought things were a certain way and discovered I was either lying to myself so convincingly that I was blind or I was lied to substantially for reasons I still can’t wrap my mind around.  I learned something through all of this.

I have thought for years that I am a realist.  It turns out that for the most part I am.  When it comes to love, I am an optimist.  I have created realities for the sake of sparing myself disappointment.  The optimism was so graphic, that realizing the actuality of things; it knocked me to my bathroom floor in a puddle of tears and snot.  The pain was so harsh, I couldn’t breathe.  I couldn’t stop crying for hours.  This was the first time I have had a hardcore break down in years.  I’ve cried and sobbed, but nothing compared to this.  Never before had I cried this hard.  Ever.  It took me two weeks to recover.

I thought about getting some medication.  I thought about checking out.  I thought about losing my mind and having myself committed and medicated so deeply that I just didn’t feel anything anymore.  The emotions ran through me so fast and violently that I couldn’t feel any one of them for more than a few seconds.  It was by far, the most manic I have every felt.  To go from fury to heartbreak in a matter of seconds is exhausting and frustrating.  To not be able to rest on one feeling long enough to expel the depth of their wells was so unbearable.  Writing about this right now is conjuring up some of the remaining remnants again.

Then something happened.  I can’t tell you exactly what it was, but I just stopped reserving my truth for the sake of anyone else.  I didn’t care if my words would injure.  I decided I was going to be selfish for once in my life with the way I want things to be.  I decided to eliminate any responsibility for another’s feelings.  Me.  I have to take care of me.  It had been said so many times over the past two years.  It has been difficult to do that.  I have put everyone in my life ahead of me.  Somewhere in the back of the bus, sat my spirit, alone and wilting.  I pulled her to the front and reacquainted myself to her needs.  Don’t get me wrong.  The welfare of my children and my siblings is still just as strong as it was.  The difference is, in order for me to efficiently tend to their needs, I have to make sure I’m as whole as I can be. 

No one is going to help me feel better about myself.  No one is going to hold my hand right now on this path to resurrection.  Just me.  At the end of the day, I’m the one who has to answer to me for the level of satisfaction I have with my life.  No one else is responsible for the esteem of my “self.”  Can others damage it?  Of course, but I’m the only one that can repair it.  Emotional deposits are great.  Ego boosts are marvelous.  What I do with those little building blocks is solely up to me.

I read a lot.  I try to navigate my life these days around the similarities of other’s experiences.  Where do I fall in this part of grief?  Am I stacking up to what others have done?  I’ll be the first to tell you that each person’s journey is unique and individual.  But, there are commonalities amongst us.  A common question or subject is that of redefining yourself absent of those who had been prominent.  Funny thing.  I know who I am.  I have for a long time now.  The big difference between the me prior to these past few months is I now have given myself the permission I’ve withheld to be the person I know I am.  Reread that.  That’s some powerful shit. 

So, where am I now that the tears aren’t falling anymore?  Where am I now that I’m not consumed by that raging anger?  Where am I now that I’m not hanging on the moves of another?  I am at the starting line of the life I have full control of.  I am at the beginning of a beautiful new volume of my epic life.  Does my history define me?  Hell.  No.  I don’t want anyone to look at me and think, “Man, she’s had a rough life.”  I want people to look at me and think, “Man, she’s my freaking hero.”  I want my kids to look at me and see a person they don’t have to search in order to find qualities to emulate.  I want my daughter to see these moments, right now, five years from now, call me and say, “I get it.” 

Do I feel the need to find me again?  No.  I have me.  The future is not intimidating at all anymore.  The fears I have held like a grains of sand in my hand are now a string of pearls around my neck.  I feel liberation unlike anything I’ve ever known.  There is a bounce in my step.  There is a humble confidence pushing me through each day.  I am staring my depression in the face each morning and flipping it the bird.  I have the most amazing friends anyone could ever ask for keeping my focus correct and I am eternally grateful for their presence.  My family continues to be my rock.  My sisters are my best friends. 

I hate the way things have gone down.  I don’t go a day without missing my parents and wanting to talk to them about the things that are happening in my life and the rest of their kids’ life.  The most significant thing I have in my arsenal at this stage is the feeling of total competency.  Life has made damn sure I am prepared for things ahead.  I’m a little broken and definitely bruised up.  But, I’m not wasting the lessons that have been taught.