Embracing heartbreak with humor
It’s a roller coaster, you guys. I’m finally having one or two alright days put together, and he’s being withdrawn and grumpy and angry and annoyed. Is that how it always is? One person is okay and the other isn’t? Tell me now so I can prepare myself.
Or maybe I’m being really annoying and he’s reacting. I can see that, too…
Life is really hard, y’all.
Day 107 – Roller Coaster
We talked it out. Maybe I need to calm myself, but I don’t know how. Other people must be really good at life, because they seem to be succeeded and, even, flourishing.
I don’t get it. I just cycle through panic attacks and in between (and during them), eat a ton of food. So it goes like this: wake up, moan about being awake, start to panic (heart beating fast) so I check my phone to make sure no one has tried to get ahold of me, pee, eat, panic again about the time it took me to pee and eat because I have to get to work, start driving aka constantly panicking (heart beating fast, stomach roiling, sweaty palms, racing thoughts about how everyone is a terrible driver), get to work, panic about everything from parking to the parking attendant to getting inside to sitting down without my stomach popping over my pants to whether or not the coffee creamer I like will still be there, eat second breakfast, panic about work and whether or not I can do it and how much I want to run out the door and get on a plane and fly far away, then snack. It’s now 10 am. This will continue until I attempt to fall asleep.
Day 105 – Anxiety and Coffee
One day behind. I can do this…
That “one day” rapidly became 4 by the time I posted this.
Is it weird to be impacted by someone else’s news? I mean, it’s someone I love. So that probably makes sense. But I feel a split. I feel supportive and annoyed. I feel sympathetic and unsympathetic. Like, “I’m sorry this happened to you. It’s bullshit. Now pick yourself back up and fix it.”
Because once you’ve been to hell and are partway back, nothing seems that ridiculous anymore. Everything seems simple. Friend is being an asshole? So what? Fix it or end it. Hate your job? Figure out how to make it better or quit and find what you want. I know that sounds simplistic, but sometimes the simple answer is the best.
And those don’t even seem like problems to me. I feel like my heart has been dragged under a semi-truck for the last 2 years, 2 months, and 24 days. I’m not the person to complain to.
But I also love him and really do feel angry on his behalf. I really do feel like something hurtful and awful and frustrating and life-changing and painful and ridiculous happened to him but I also think that until you lose the most important person in the entire world to you, you have no idea how trivial those things are. I shouldn’t be such tough-love. He deserves sympathy. I’m not sure I have it in me.
Oh, and I’m obviously an asshole.
Day 102 – Sympathetic but not
Well, had a fun little (read: large) breakdown today. So if anyone was wondering how my life is going… that’s how.
Day 77 – Breakdown
Someone told me that after 21 times of doing something in a row, it becomes a habit and you won’t forget to do it because it will be built in to your routine. Tell that to my diet, exercising, and writing my blog.
Unfortunately, last night slipped through the cracks of how habits supposedly work. Though, for the record, I actually had such an enjoyable and sadness-free evening for the first time in a long while that I didn’t look at my phone, I didn’t check my social media, and I didn’t notice the lack of blog post.
Enjoyable despite the ultimate job rejection. And despite the fact that I am surrounded by people who are kicking ass. I’m genuinely not jealous. I’m thrilled to watch it and support it and cheer it on and be friends with successful people. I want to be one of those successful people.
And then I epically failed on my diet yesterday because PASTA. And delicious craft cocktails. And desserts. I mean, it was probably worth it, but I felt weak and pathetic that I couldn’t make it a full week before breaking down. A new day today, I guess?
The sadness is creeping back in a little bit…
Day 76 – Bad Habits
I feel like most people are torn between doing something great and world-changing and trying to stay under the radar so they can continue to wear pajamas to the store. IF you are not one of those people, then you must be living a pretty happy life.
Time has come to be that person. Make those differences. Take off the pajamas. (And then put on other clothes.)
As I say this, I’m wearing (dirty) pajamas. Some of this is essentially self-talk to convince myself to stop crying and start doing. It’s easier said than done, but maybe if I send this message out into the universe, I’ll be more likely to do it. Or does that make it less likely? I’ve heard it both ways.
I want to take charge of my life and get going. Like, yesterday. But I let sadness get in the way. I let guilt get in the way. I let invented, invisible obstacles get in the way. I let fear get in the way. I don’t want to fail. I’m a perfectionist. I want to succeed with flying colors. I want to sweep the entire world off its feet. And I DEFINITELY don’t want anyone to say anything mean to me. Ever. So, basically, I can’t leave my house if I never want to fail, if I’m afraid, and if I don’t want criticism. Which is why I’m in my house in pajamas. Makes sense…
Day 73 – Do It
Nothing like completely blowing a good opportunity to remind you that you suck and you’re not moving forward in your career.
I have to say, it did feel GOOD. Even though I stunk up the place, I really, really loved getting to do that. Wasn’t as fun for the audience, that’s for sure, but it was glorious for me. Nervous and poor performance and all. Even bombing felt good.
But it really reminded me of how much work I should be putting in if I’m going to justify being away from the people that I love and not being present in my grief. I ignore it. I distract myself. I deny it. Every once in a while, because I can’t think past it, I live in it, but for the most part, I try to get as far away from it as one can get from their own skin and bones. Which can’t be easily justified or rectified if I’m busy failing at other things. All it really does is remind me. You just set up shop, didn’t you? You think you fucking live here, don’t you? I can’t deny everything that happened. I can’t pretend this isn’t my life. But I can NOT talk about it. Which is what I’m doing. Which is why, when I come home from absolutely destroying opportunities to advance my career, I sit down to a silent reminder from my (traitorous) brain telling me, “you don’t deserve this anyway. You should be somewhere else. You should be helping. You should be sad.”
My brain needs a vacation. Or a chill pill. Or alcohol.
Day 71 – Blowing Opportunities
Here’s the thing… The thing is… I can’t articulate the thing. I spent the evening at a work-related workshop I got invited to, and I can’t quite capture my feelings. On the one hand, it felt good to be in a space working on my craft. On the other hand, I don’t think I had a lot to contribute tonight. Maybe I was off my game. Maybe the material wasn’t accessible to me. Maybe the writing worked well enough that it was easy to ignore the flaws but not so well that it blew me away. Mediocrity, or something just north of there, is easy to gloss over because it’s hard to correct.
So, instead, I ate chips and thought about whether or not my stuff would land. Would I be mediocre without a solution? I had no notes for the first person, but I honestly thought it was okay. It felt like a scene I’d seen before (do NOT pardon the pun), so it must work because someone has put money behind that at one time or another and it probably met with some level of success. So who am I to say it doesn’t work? It DOES work, it just isn’t exactly what I would want it to be. But who am I?
Should I tell her that if I wrote it, I’d want it to show more push and pull, more fighting, more struggle, more frustration, more lightness, more everything? Or should I smile and nod while eating a seemingly endless bag of chips, which is what I actually did?!
And then there’s that very real moment where I had to wonder – really, really wonder – if what I would bring in is actually better. Or worse. Or the same. Or neither. I listened and I watched and I felt like I was truly being faced with things that needed a lot of work. Great. Let’s work them. But why these are all working writers and directors? What are they doing differently than I am? Maybe they’re not bitching about it online… Hard to know for sure. I don’t know anything anymore.
But then I left my confused state behind in that theatre momentarily when I got a text from my parents bringing me back down to the reality of my life. I hate those texts. I hate that I look at my phone afraid I’ll have one. I hate that I hate hearing from them and I hate that I hate the way even a confused moment can seem “good” in comparison. I just wanted a normal moment where I thought about my career and not about the pain and the struggle and the fears and the deep down awfulness of the rest of everything. Thank goodness for modern technology reminding me that that’s not possible.
Day 64 – I Don’t Know Anything Anymore
Update: One of the friends mentioned in yesterday’s post actually did respond to me finally via Facebook simply to alert me to the fact that he’s busy and having a great life and will let me know if he’s ever not busy. So I basically just got rejected/breadcrumbed by a FRIEND, but I still got all needy and was like, “just let me know if you ever have time.” I guess I deserved the breadcrumbing…
I don’t even like him that much. I mean, we’re friends, but we’re not that close. Stupid anxiety blowing things out of proportion again.
I had to blink back the tears all day today. I really miss…everything. I miss talking to him. I miss laughing with him and hanging out and hearing his voice. I miss it all. I feel crushed by this almost every day. I went out with a friend. We got dinner. I laughed. It felt like a hollow laugh, though. I was there, but I wasn’t there, you know? I wanted to be alone on my couch to cry and grieve and get out all the pain that was inside but I couldn’t. It’s still inside. It aches.
Day 61 – Everything Hurts
So if people I consider to be friends completely ignore me, should I assume I did something or assume the problem lies with them? This is one of the Great Struggles of my life – aside from living itself – that brings my anxiety to a boiling point and then causes me to do weird things like SIMULTANEOUSLY call and text and Facebook message them (I just did this as I typed this sentence) and then get rejected on three fronts all at once which then causes me to IMPLODE DUE TO ANXIETY.
So now my dog lives alone. Please come rescue her.
I highly value my friendships. They have saved me time and time again. I’m sure I pulled the 16-year-old-idiot move where I ignored my friends in favor of the gentleman caller of the day way back when, but learned my lesson quickly and figured out that friends are the ones who stick around. They have literally pulled me away from the edge of a cliff (thanks, Natalie); they have comforted me when I cried or ranted or complained or grieved (thank you, Emily, Eric, Kathleen, Jessica, Harrison, Allie, and myriad others); they have given their time, their advice, their hugs, their love to me when I probably deserved it least. But I appreciate every single one of those moments, every single one of those people. They have laughed at my jokes, and even though I’m clearly hilarious, they do laugh louder and longer than anyone else. They’re supportive and kind and have my back. I picked my friends very carefully. Because I am loyal forever. That’s why, when I get ghosted by a friend or they don’t respond/answer for a few days, I have an ABSOLUTE BREAKDOWN AND LOSE ALL SENSE OF NORMALCY. I contact mutual friends for information. I call them relentlessly like a psycho ex. I alternate between thinking it’s all fine and I didn’t do anything to full-on hating myself for most likely having done something terrible to this person who isn’t talking to me.
There are currently TWO of these friends in my life. WHAT DID I DO? I can’t know unless they tell me and they won’t talk to me so I don’t know so I try to talk to them and then they don’t answer and around and around we go. Honestly, having anxiety and insomnia and depression is like the triple threat of mental instability and daily dysfunction, but that aside, WHAT DO OTHER PEOPLE DO? Do they just… not care? Do they care but it doesn’t bog their mind? Do other people NOT EVEN NOTICE?
Oh god, there goes any chance I had at sleep tonight.
Day 60 – Ghosted By Friends and Anxiety-Ridden
A Year to Grieve 