Choosing to Continue

Depression is something that I have struggled with since I was a teenager.  I went through a really dark time in high school where I felt utterly alone, unlovable, unwanted, and like I was just nothing.  Kids can be mean and since I was a little girl I just wanted to be accepted.  There are only a handful of people that have accepted me and loved me for who I am, but I still have some serious abandonment issues.

I can remember being under the age of 10 and putting a plastic grocery bag over my head because I had heard you could suffocate and die.  I remember even trying to hold my breath to speed up the process.  I wasn’t doing it for attention, I was doing it because I honestly felt like I was worthless.  Since I was adopted on my dad’s side I so badly wanted to fit in with that family.  They were this big awesome-looking family who all got along and who, to this day, are still incredibly close.  Some of them accepted me and loved me, while others made it a point to remind me that I was not a “real” Bassett.  I have always felt like I am not a “real” anything, like I don’t belong anywhere.  These were some of my very first wounds, along with feeling like my biological father didn’t want me either.  That is an entirely different topic, though. 

I think my hurt and anger made it easy for me to verbally lash out at people which made it difficult to make and keep friends in high school.  My friends were all on again and off again.  I look back at who I was in high school and totally understand why people didn’t like me, I mean, I didn’t even like myself (and sometimes I still don’t).  In addition to this, people in school called me fat, which made me feel even worse about myself. My youth pastor even used words to hurt me deep to my core.  I was completely at the place of feeling like there would never be redemption for me, that there was no hope of ever being loved or understood.  I was alone and miserable.

My senior year of high school I had pretty much given up on everything, I stopped doing my homework, slept through classes, and it got to the point where I didn’t even get to walk at my graduation.  I had my diploma a week after graduation and still had a 3.425 overall GPA but I never had a graduation party, I never had a celebration, I didn’t get to walk with my friends.  This was very hard for me and at this point I had almost entirely stopped eating and if I ate, I was throwing up my food.  The thoughts of suicide were always there.  I was desperate, alone, and didn’t want to keep living with the pain I was in.  Everything felt hopeless.

My anxiety also grew as time went on which made life even more unbearable.  I was worried at all times about everything and it literally made it difficult to breathe.  By the time I was pregnant with my second baby I was fantasizing about jumping out of the car while we were on the freeway.  I used to time it to where I knew a semi truck was right beside us.  I figured it would be quick and painless.  The mom in me didn’t do it.  I would then be hurting my unborn child and didn’t want to do that, so I pressed forward.  I was put on antidepressants as soon as Alex was delivered but it just made things worse.  I was in a fog, I had no feeling at all.  I was mostly numb, but still wanted to end things.  We switched medicines around but have still never found anything that works. 

Being pregnant actually kept me alive.  Having my kids kept me living.  I wanted to be alive for them.  I wanted to strive to be the best mom I could, for them.  I knew if I gave in to my depression I would end up getting them taken away from me, and I couldn’t live with that.  It isn’t a life I wanted or one I wanted for them.  So I pressed on.  I pushed through because they deserved better.  I never wanted any of them to feel unwanted or unloved the way I had felt.

Then March 24, 2011 happened.  My mom died.  Strangely enough I pressed forward.  I went into action mode.  I fed my dad, I talked to medical examiners, to detectives, I notified all our family and friends.  I took care of everyone.  I buried it.  Everyone around me to this day has been worried because I haven’t grieved the loss of my mom, not really.  I have turned it into a fact, something in a box that is almost unreal, something that can’t really hurt me.  Why?  Because I am not sure I can make it through that loss.  My mom held me together through all of my ups and downs.  She was one of the few people who saw my heart, saw my good, saw who I really am.  She didn’t just see my behaviors, but she saw my heart.  She advocated for me.  She loved me.  She deemed me as lovable and demanded that others saw me as such.  And then she was gone.  I was dealing with deep life altering depression before I lost my biggest advocate.  She was my mediator.  She was everything.  She really helped keep me alive all those years, and she made me feel worthy, lovable, and special.  I know that I cannot handle that loss.  It is way too big. 

I have chosen to keep going because I could not leave my kids motherless the way that I am motherless.  They deserve to feel loved and worthy.  They deserve to feel understood and advocated for. They deserve to have their mom.  So I am here.  I will always fight for them.  But sometimes the suicidal thoughts still flood in.  Sometimes I still fantasize about ending it.  I will not take that selfish route because my husband and kids deserve more.  The handful of people who truly love me deserve better. 

Depression is no joke.  Anxiety sometimes strangles me to the point where I can’t function.  These are my daily struggles.  Last night I got a semicolon tattoo.  The semicolon represents my choice to keep going.  A semicolon is where the author could have ended the sentence but chooses to keep going.  My story isn’t over yet.  It may be an incredibly painful journey, but it is my journey.  I choose to keep walking it.  Sometimes I have to take it minute by minute, but I am choosing to continue on.  

I was lucky enough to have my best friend by my side when I got my semicolon, and she got on as well. 

Lost in the woods, unworthy of rescue

I have been working very hard at keeping myself busy.  I workout, clean, take kids to and fro, work part time, swim, etc.  There has been so much going on in my head that I am sometimes unsure how to deal with it all.  Be it the pain of losing my mom, the pain of my kids growing up, the physical pain in my body, the stress of finances, or the emotional pain of life, I occasionally feel incapable of coping.  There is stress, there is sadness, there is confusion, but most of all there is longing.

I long so much to have my mom back in my life.  I long to hear her, to see her, to feel her.  Since I have been so good at repressing my feelings, I have lost so much of her.  For a couple years now I have not been able to hear her voice, to hear her laugh, or to see memories of her.  I try to go back in my head and remember specific things that I know we did, but I cannot see her in them.  It is like my brain has removed the very existence of her.  When I try even harder my brain replaces her image with that of a photo, generally a picture I have seen recently.  She has been reduced to nothing but photographs. 

I blame myself for this mess.  I am the one who has chosen not to feel the pain of her death.  I am the one who has made it a fact, something generally easy to talk about and not at all personal.  I am the one who has separated myself from reality, in fear that it would destroy me.  The times I have let a little bit of the sensation in, I have been unable to control the overwhelming explosion of sadness.  I am terrified that if I allow myself to open the closet door, to let all that darkness in, that I will not ever get back to the light.  I am afraid it will swallow me up and I will never emerge out of it all.  Just cracking the door open a little takes me off my feet and I am inconsolable.

I still don’t know how to move on with my life.  I honestly do not even know who I am anymore.  I look back over the past couple years and it feels like I am looking at someone else’s life. I long to remove the past four years from the record.  If I could snap my fingers and go back in time I would. I don’t know how to move on without my mom.  She kept me grounded in a firm foundation of truth and wisdom.  I was a better mother, a better wife, a better friend, and a better person.  I just do not know how to do it without her, and without being able to hear her, feel her, or even remember her, I am just lost. 

Sometimes in life I feel like I am just going through the motions, but am almost empty inside.  I feel like I am lost in the woods.  It is breathtaking and beautiful, but also scary and lonely.  I can hear the echo of birds calling to one another, finding each other.  But I am here alone with nobody to find me.  I am a lost cause who should honestly give up hope of any rescue.  Nobody has probably even noticed I am missing, and the ones who have probably feel better off without me.  When I look at myself I think they probably are better off without me.  I am so inclined to just mess everything up.  I am so talented at ruining the good around me.  I turn smiles into tears, approval into disappointment.  I push everyone away from me. 

I sit around here feeling lonely, but I have shut anyone close to me out.  There are so many people upset with me right now and that is mostly because during a really hard time I stopped responding to anyone.  I stopped answering my phone, didn’t respond to texts, and disconnected all social media.  People who had been close to me, who had been a support system were shut out and I still haven’t found forgiveness for that.  I chose to shut everyone out of my life, but then felt lonely and bad about myself that nobody was there.  It is such a vicious cycle. I have been doing better about this, but sometimes still go back to shutting people out.  I just fall off the face of the earth because it is easier than dealing with reality.  I feel like everyone is just ready for me to be okay and that I am going to disappoint them all again.

This downward spiral that I have been on since my mom died has been very unpredictable, unstable, and devastating to those of us involved.  There have been very few able to walk it with us and for those who have stuck with us, I thank you from the bottom of my heart.  It is by the very grace of God that our family is still in tact, that we are still married, and that there are still a few people who truly love our family. 

I am so very ready to wake up from this nightmare.