Embracing heartbreak with humor
Bad news bears. My mom’s dog died. It’s hard to explain to people when your dog is ACTUALLY your best friend how hard this is.
It’s hard. Loss is hard.
I can’t seem to eat, drink, sleep, exercise, laugh, run, avoid, work, or beg the sadness away. How do people get out?
Day 120 – Sad Day
Relationships are hard. We pee with the door open now. We’re there.
We still date each other, which is nice. But now it’s like: go to work, text about work while at work, come home and talk about work, sleep so we can go to work.
He’s not working right now, which is amazing, because that means he has more energy than I do to clean or cook or walk our dog or workout. I appreciate all these things. But it’s unsettling, too.
Are we just going to end up as roommates? Will we still like each other? Will we still love each other? Are we going to have chore wheels and arguments about splitting the bills and sit around in our sweats burping up our takeout? Is that what happens? I feel like that’s what happens.
Day 114 – Roommates or Romance?
All I do is work and eat and work and sit and try to stay up and sleep and work. Do other people have hobbies? Energy?
I have a writing deadline… So far, all I’ve written is my name at the top of the page. You do not write your name at the top of scripts.
Day 113 – Work Work Work Work Work Work (thanks, Rihanna)
I had a terrible dream. I was desperately begging someone not to do something and they kept doing it. I’ve never felt that desperate before. I was crying and begging and watching him ignore me. I felt powerless and hopeless simultaneously. It was the worst.
But then I woke up like: Oh, thank god, that was just a dream.
But no. The reality is so much worse. I woke my boyfriend up to comfort me because I was completely losing it.
To realize that your real life is worse than your worst nightmare??? Fuck me.
Day 106 – Waking Nightmare
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
Today I learned THAT lesson. The one where you never know what someone else is going through. I made a mistake by not asking/checking in with them before we started down a snarky, fighting, annoyed-at-each-other path. We mostly recovered from it, but not before I discovered what had happened.
He’s always there for me. He sits with me as I cry and complain and talk about my family. He listens to me grieve and holds me when I feel like I won’t survive. He stands by my side no matter what. I had a really rough, very grief-laden day – I don’t even know WHY, some days are just like that – but he had a rough day, too. And he doesn’t lean on me nearly as often as I need to lean on him and instead of being there for him in a clear way from the beginning, I jumped into the fight.
I guess we all live and learn, but I appreciate how often he’s there for me and I appreciate the fact that I can’t always do it alone. I can’t always get through the day by myself anymore. I don’t really remember what I did before him, but I can’t imagine how I would have survived the last 2 years without him. This grief… it’s like drowning. When I come up for air, sometimes the waters are calm, and sometimes the waves crash right back down on me. And even though his day wasn’t full of grief – in NO WAY do I want it to be, trust me – it was a no good, very bad day in its own way and I should have been there for him.
I know what it’s like to be heartbroken, but I also know what it’s like to just have a regular old bad day where you just need to go to sleep and wake up the next day and feel like it’s a new day and the mistakes of yesterday can be left behind. I can never and will never be able to leave anything behind because I HAVE ANXIETY THAT’S ALWAYS TRYING TO KILL ME AND REMIND ME OF EVERY DUMB THING I’VE EVER SAID OR DONE OR ALMOST SAID OR DONE. But still… grief is selfish sometimes.
Day 59 – Lessons Learned
Sometimes I feel like I put effort into things that other people treat like a whatever, bro, no worries type situation and they generally turn out to be correct. I work hard at something or I worry about making sure I’m on time, fulfil my responsibilities, honor my commitments, do the work, and truly give it my all when other people are just, like, I’ll do it later if I remember and then they don’t and THERE ARE NO CONSEQUENCES.
None. None consequences. But I don’t know any other way to be. I don’t know how to be un-committed to things or chill about literally anything or do half-ass work and not completely stress and lose sleep over it when other people seem to have NO ANXIETY WHATSOEVER about these things and they are no worse off for it. BUT I HAVE NO CHILL. NONE. I was taught that it matters in school and in life that you give it your all 100% of the time, when, in actuality, it seems like it doesn’t much matter and those people get just as far IF NOT MUCH, MUCH FARTHER in life without that same level of responsibility and work ethic.
I always come back to this idea. No matter how sad or how down or how worthless I feel, I know that I am always going to outwork anyone else on the job. The problem is, I’m not the one who gets the job in the first place. It’s the person who didn’t worry, and kind of did some of it last minute, and mostly just winged it who got the opportunity. What the actual fuck, life? WHAT? No one told me this is how it would go.
I guess it’s the whole: The good die young. Life isn’t fair.
Day 55 – I Have No Chill
Oh my lord. I just saw “Eighth Grade” and I swear I’ve never had so many feels. All the feels. The actress and storyline are so essentially relatable and loveable and cringy and cute. I laughed, I cried, I remembered all the times kids were mean to me…
Growing up is never easy. Life isn’t fair. Someone said those things to me on repeat as a kid, usually my mom probably, but nothing reminds you so obviously of that fact until you see a cinematic throwback to experiences that mirrored your own to make you sit up and hate/love the person in front of you as you beg her not to make a bad decision.
I don’t think we ever stop growing up. When I look back on me and my decisions a year ago, a week ago, yesterday, I immediately cringe and try to find a hole to go crawl into. I stay up and night and wonder WHY IN THE NAME OF GOD DID I SAY THAT? THAT’S SO EMBARRASSING. And then I think of something I DID that was actually worse than what I said and all I can think is, AND THAT, TOO? CAN YOU JUST BE NORMAL FOR ONCE?
No, no I cannot be. I must be weird, it’s my only option, it seems. I must draw awkward and embarrassing attention to myself. I must relive those moments when I’m trying to sleep and get jolted awake again from the horrible memories. I must push people away with my awkwardness and then wonder why I don’t have any friends. Some people have to keep up their perfect Instagram stories. This is just my cross to bear…
Day 54 – Eighth Grade and Growing Up
I had a really good day externally, and a really bad day internally, but the important thing is that I checked everything off my to-do list.
I also added things that I happened to do today to my to-do list after the fact so that I could have a longer, more complete list. If you don’t do this, get on it, it’s a great way to look like you did a lot, such as “Shower” and “Brush Teeth” and “Eat Lunch.” I am an expert at lists.
So I nailed that part of the day like a boss. Then came the reminder that I am never very far from the grief. It cycles. Guilt and expectation are big components. Mostly because of my Mom.
Feel guilty. Feel terrible. Feel sad. Feel deep grief. Feel guilty. Laugh at a joke in my head. Feel guilty about laughing. Laugh at another joke in my head. Open up the “Notes” on my phone to write the joke down. Feel guilty while typing. Receive text from my mother mid-typing full of guilt and criticism. Forget what was so funny. Remember grief. Rinse and repeat.
The only two pluses I can think of are that A. My house is now very clean due to stress-cleaning and B. I will probably be able to fall asleep tonight despite my insomnia because emotions and crying tired me out.
Yay. Winning.
Day 35 – Guilty conscience and oh so sleepy.
It was one of those days where I decided I was going to do something with my day, and ended up doing all the stuff I hate: dishes and cleaning and tidying up and generally using Clorox.
I woke up late because I was up sick last night. Apparently if you drink a large coke at midnight after not having soda for years and then immediately lay down, you throw up all night. Who knew?!? So since I didn’t sleep due to that, and then my insomnia kicked in and I had to – had to – watch Friends for several hours, I didn’t get out of bed very early. Then I walked my dog, at which point I got yelled at by a stranger, as tends to happen.
Let me tell you what this strange person said to me. He stopped in the middle of traffic – cars honking all around him – to yell at me. I was listening to a podcast so I didn’t notice until the yelling was impossible to ignore. I take out one earbud, and this guy yells at me, “it’s too hot for her feet.” So I look down at my dog, who’s sniffing some other dog’s pee, and look back at him. But before I can tell him to fuck off with his unsolicited opinions, he tells me that “I have to feel the ground with the back of my hand for 10 seconds” and then proceeds to open his car door in the middle of traffic and put his hand down to DEMONSTRATE HOW TO TOUCH THE GROUND WITH A HAND. I was a combination of flabbergasted at the mansplaining and confused as to why it was happening. It was 70 degrees out. My dog was in the shade and very content. AND I KNOW HOW TO TOUCH THE GROUND. So instead of murdering him with my words, which I wanted to, I just said, “yeah, she’s fine. Thanks for your opinions!” and put my headphones back in and kept walking. I could hear him continuing to yell at me over the honking of the cars he was still blocking, but I ignored him. Later, I felt the ground because OBVIOUSLY NOW I HAD TO but just like I thought it barely felt warm and that guy can fuck off.
So I came home from that and cleaned my entire house for what seemed to be the first time ever based on the amount of grime and dirt and Swiffer pads I used. It was an effective way to distract myself, but not an effective way to make myself feel better. I ate Top Ramen for dinner and drank lemonade out of the carton like a frat guy (maybe they wouldn’t drink lemonade specifically, but the image is still accurate).
Maybe tomorrow I won’t cry into my overly salty, undercooked noodles. Oh, did I forget to mention the crying? Hmmm.
Day 11 – Numb but my house is clean.
A Year to Grieve 