Mental Hell-th

Anxiety and depression what a combination,

A life filled with dreadful anticipation.

I’ve got pit stains on every shirt I wear,

My bedroom is a mess, I’ve got things here and over there.

Plates of food stacked a mile high,

I’ll clean it tomorrow I say with a sigh.

No one understands how burdened I feel.

High functioning anxiety with a mix of sadness, how do I deal?

No one notices anything is wrong,

I show up for work, looking normal and playing along.

She’s just being dramatic, that’s what they are thinking for sure

Look at her at happy hour, she’s not sad anymore.

I keep it all locked up inside,

But what if I gave in? What if I died?

There were no signs they’d say,

She seemed happy, I just saw her the other day.

Meanwhile, I’m holding a sign as big as Hollywood.

Help me, help me, I don’t feel so good.

But mental health isn’t like real health.

When your body is sick, then they care.

But when your mind wanders, there’s nobody there.

My brain tells me I don’t matter,

That if I were gone, no one would be any sadder.

Influencers

Cool, calm and collected so they seem.

Behind the curtain and the closed doors, they scream.

Help, help, help me.

Everyone is listening but no one hears, the irony.

Follow in my footsteps and you’ll be just fine.

At least that’s what they say when they are online.

Honesty is the key, my success was all me.

But they forgot to mention that they came from money.

How honest could they really be?

Comparing ourselves to people we don’t even know.

Follow that link, buy that product but be less shallow.

Brand deals and promotional ads,

Fast fashion and fleeting fads,

Looking rich but going broke,

That’s the punchline but what’s the joke?

You can only see what they let you see,

So, who might they really be?

What if I died today?

A scary thought occurred to me. What if I died today?

What would I leave behind?

A dog.

A room filled with empty water bottles and plates of stale food.

A full trash can I kept saying I’d empty tomorrow.

An overflowing laundry basket.

A car filled with old receipts and take-out trash.

Twenty bottles of lotion, I swore I needed.

A few candles waiting to be burned.

A refrigerator full of food that I planned to cook.

A lunch box packed for the next morning.

A planner with days I’d never see.

A new dress I was saving for the perfect date.

A bottle of wine I kept for the perfect occasion.

So, I encourage you to think about what you would leave behind if you died today. It might change your perspective. It’s not easy but we should always try to live like there is no tomorrow because one day..

there won’t be.

 

 

What is love?

I am truly terrified to love someone. I always believed love was the happily ever after at the end of every Disney movie, it was the fairy-tale fantasy that society has brainwashed us into desiring. That one day, someone would come along whose hand fit perfectly in mine, whose eyes could see straight into my soul, who would never make me feel lonely or unloved, whose weird quirks just made me love them more but it’s been 25 long years and I can’t say that has happened for me. Most people would reassuringly remind me that I’m young yet but I’m more scared now than ever. The longer I’m singly surrounded by relationships the less I want one. It truly hurts my heart to see the unhappiness that exists in relationships at all ages. It terrifies me to think it’s all just a temporary bliss. It’s haunting to know things about others’ relationships that they themselves don’t even know. I’m sorry to the wife who’s husband hit on me at the bar and I’m sorry to the beautiful girl whose boyfriend snap chats me late at night. I’m sorry to the woman who’s man just winked at me in the checkout line and I’m sorry to the girl who’s man just asked me for my number even though he’s taken. I am so afraid of being one of these people one day. I’m so afraid of not knowing these same things. I’m so afraid of living in a world where nothing is as it seems. I’m afraid of giving my whole life to someone who might ruin it.

The truth is, I fought hard for love but..

the married man who hit on me at the bar, ruined my idea of love.

the married man from my work who tried to sleep with me, ruined my idea of love.

the man who cheated on me with the other girl in class, ruined my idea of love.

the man who said he’d call but never did, ruined my idea of love.

the man who said he loved me and left, ruined my idea of love.

the man who kissed another girl at the bar while we were dating, ruined my idea of love.

the man who belittled me, ruined my idea of love.

the man who didn’t support my dreams, ruined my idea of love.

the man who complains about his beautiful wife, ruined my idea of love.

the man who stopped telling his wife she’s beautiful, ruined my idea of love.

the man who hit his wife, ruined my idea of love.

So forgive me if I seem a little cynical, forgive me if I seem a little bitter with love. Forgive me if I fear for the newly engaged couple because I wouldn’t wish these painful moments on anyone. I really believed love conquers all.. so maybe it just wasn’t love. But then, what is love?

 

 

City

No room for self pity in the big city,

People don’t care, ask for help

Don’t you dare

Homeless with signs

No emotions from passersby

Did it themselves they say

Give them money, no way

Dirty streets, putrid smells

Sewers, depths of hell

Self defense, bitch face

Out alone, carry mace

Traffic for days,

Everyone going different ways

Work obsessed,

Children depressed

Chill, pop a pill

Cheating husbands, perfect wives

Faking their happy lives

Why did you come after me?

I noticed you
You were married, I knew
You didn’t notice me
I was safe because we couldn’t be
Your charm swept me off my feet
Downloaded snapchat for me, thought it was sweet
My entertainment on the boring nights
There was trouble in your paradise, constant fights
Said you guys were separated
Starting hooking up with me but it was complicated
Making promises you couldn’t keep
Up all night, can’t sleep
Wondering, why did you come after me?
When you knew we could never be

“Don’t Let Your Fear Decide Your Fate”

I recently read this quote and it  spoke to me. For so long, I have been afraid.  Afraid of big things, small things, silly things, serious things, EVERTHING.  I feared commitment, making decisions, uncomfortable social situations, the future, slicing my finger while peeling a potato, getting bitten by a spider that’s living in the shoes I haven’t put on in three weeks.  You name it, I probably feared at one point and time.  But if there is anything at all that I have learned in this past year, it’s that you can’t let your fear decide your fate.  It’s perfectly normal to be afraid but you can’t let fear keep you from living your life.  So take that trip out of the country, give your number to that cute boy that sits in the third row of your 9 am general psychology class, and wear those shoes you haven’t touched in three weeks even if it might house a frighteningly large spider.  Because I learned that what I truly fear the most is regret, it’s all the what ifs?  Embrace the journey, the mistakes and misfortunes included because without them there would be no way to distinguish the good times and the truly brilliant moments in your life.

What’s wrong?

The worst question you can ever ask me is.. “what’s wrong?”.  I despise this question because in this moment as those words are uttered from your lips, it rings true in my ears that something is wrong.  A lot of somethings are wrong and I spent all morning convincing myself to get out of bed, trying to forget about all of these troubles that you brought rushing back with one stupid question.  I was temporarily happy, I had forgotten about the class I’m failing, I had just managed to put the boy who broke my heart out of my mind, I wasn’t dwelling on the fact that I hate my body or that I got written up at work last week.  I know you think you’re helping, being a concerned citizen or friend or what have you, but you’re not.  I don’t need you to tell me I look upset, I don’t need you to remind me of my ever-troubling problems.  I don’t want to talk about them, believe me.  I haven’t been walking around all day looking sad, waiting for someone to ask me that dreaded question, so I can spill my whole life story, have a good cry and move on with my life.  I don’t want to talk about my problems.  It’s not how I work, I bottle things up and pretend they don’t exist, walk around every day with a smile on my face, until it takes such as toll that you can read it like an open book, but even once you notice or catch a glimmer of my true self, the sadness that burdens my soul, I won’t open up.  I’ll say I’m tired, busy, stressed, any lame excuse to get you to bugger off and stop questioning me.  At the end of the day, if I had seriously responded to your question, what would you have done about it?  Probably never asked me again for one.  You certainly can’t fix my problems and I’m not asking you to.  There’s nothing that you can do to change any aspect of my life or the way I’m feeling.  You don’t have the answers.   You can’t cure my heartache or change my attitude.  My questions will just become your questions and you’ll start to wonder, start opening doors in your mind that otherwise would have went unopened, start questioning your happiness.  Then, instead of one broken soul, there will be two and the world certainly doesn’t need that.

Fearful of freedom

This might sound absolutely absurd to most people.. but I am terrified of freedom.  The freedom to choose my fate, my career, my friends, my boyfriend, my car, my breakfast, my outfit.. my life.  That’s a lot of pressure because what if I screw up?  What if I make a horribly bad decision?  There are no take-backs in life.  My ENTIRE life I have been doing what I either was told to do or what I thought I was supposed to do.  I played sports because my dad played sports and that’s what he would have wanted, right?  I played the flute because my mom played the flute and that’s what she would have wanted, right?  I got good grades and joined lots of clubs to make my parents proud and to get into a good college because that’s what they wanted, right?  I went to college because that was my only option, right?  I am a double major in Pre-Med and Spanish because I need to get a good job and pay off all my debt, right?  Not being happy is a small price to pay for food on the table and a roof over your head, right?  I never really gave any thought to what I really wanted, probably because I never really knew what I wanted.  There’s two people, the me that I want to be and the me that I should be, unfortunately they are entirely different people.

So, what do I do?  Who do I become?  Who am I?

Just a name and a number

Now, I sit and stare at my phone for hours on end.. hoping you’ll text me and say “I love you and I’m sorry, let’s get back together”.  I know it’s pitiful, I know I am better than this, I know a lot of things but that’s the problem with love, it’s not some long thought process that results in an ethically suitable decision to either be in it or not.  It’s felt, by the heart, and for that matter, every inch of your body.  When you said you thought we should part ways, I was okay with it at first but I guess that was only because it didn’t feel real to me.  You were all I had known for almost two years and the thought of my life without you was.. frankly, unthinkable but not in some super obsessive, I NEED YOU, scary freshman year, first boyfriend, crush kinda way, in the literal can’t imagine my life without you kind of way because I hadn’t lived it without you for longer than what I could now remember.  It hit me slow at first then all at once.  I would wake up and want to text you but realize I couldn’t.  I would get great news or horrible news or any news and want to tell you.. but couldn’t.  I would get off work and want to cuddle and relax with you.. but couldn’t.  It took me to weeks to remove the cute heart emojis that had been what seemed like permanently settled next your name in phone. That’s when it really hit me. We weren’t anything anymore.  You were just a name in my phone.. no special connotation.. no significance.. just a name and a number.