My Emotional Rock Bottom

When I was 12, my mom took me to the doctor as I had a really high fever for over a few days. I’ll never forget what that doctor said to me that day:

“There can’t be anything wrong with her – look how happy she is!”

My mom knew better and was a force to recon with. She pushed to have xrays done and sure enough, I had double pneumonia.

What does this story mean?

To me, it’s a couple things. One – my mom is an ally and advocate like none other. She knows when something is wrong and sometimes, it’s before even I do. Second – those words from the doctor mean so much more than that situation itself.

From Facebook posts, to relationships, to my job – no matter what was raging on inside, I tried to be overly positive and to put on a happy face. Even when things crashed from time to time, rather than dealing with stuff, my goal was to get to that “happy place” again.

Given many life changing events in my life, I don’t think I ever plunged to a rock bottom moment emotionally. I came close, but I would micromanage the shit out of what I was feeling and convince myself that I had changed.   Our minds are powerful that way – masters of rationalization to mold and sculpt moments more seductively than any Ghost clay scene could ever conjure up.

I look back and see where I stumbled. High on hope, and temporary moments of routine change, I would simply self-congratulate and proclaim insight and growth.  Queue Facebook as a means to show how much I’ve grown and changed! Hey world – I can try to be a beacon of positivity! Hey everyone – let me tell you all the concepts I believe in but struggle repeatedly at doing.

Behind the scenes, for the past year, it was a different story. The more I started to pushing aside the mask, and digging down, the more I saw my demons face to face. My mind became a fierce battleground where the Rationalization Master vs Reality Master of my head would duel it out to see who would be the one to respond.  The foe would be different and sometimes all at once. Guilt. Reactive. Anger.  Low self worth.

Somehow, I thought as I would choose to dig more and more, it would be easier. I thought that knowledge would bestow upon me the strength to win those battles.  However, almost 40 years of behaviours have a survivalist instinct of their own. In moments of exhaustion, I have seen regression in areas that I had thought I progressed so far.

Then, I hit my rock bottom.

Not Oscar worthy. Not filled with some John Williams score to make it seem all that more impactful.

It was dark. Quiet. In a bathroom tub. Staring at a door.

I sobbed softly. I was tired. I was exhausted.  I finally understood the gravity of where I was at that moment. I realized how much power I had to rise from the darkness and turn on the light.

But realization is just the beginning. I have had so many of these moments in my past where I have praised the epiphany without doing the labour to get to that point. If you want to make change, it’s a day at a time, a habit at a time. Proclaiming the desire to change is only first step. Change happens when intent is met with action. Making each decision count.

It was time to let go……

Let go of trying to solve feelings, start letting them have their moment .

Let go of defending having boundaries, start defining them.

Let go of fearing acceptance from others, start accepting myself.

Let go of taking on the emotional labour of others, start empowering.

Let go of thinking I can do everything, start asking for help.

Let go of the guilt of letting go, start letting in peace.

When I let go, it means I’m letting in the opportunity to let that which truly matters and enriches my soul, to come in. It is the permission to stop tying myself into the actions, decisions, of others and tell myself “Hey there – I’m listening.”

So many times before I thought I was listening but I wasn’t. I was looking for a way to convince myself otherwise. When you don’t deal with those demons, they will seep out. They are wild.

I can’t do this alone. As fiercely independent as I am, I know that I will need help.

One step at a time. On this journey, there isn’t some far off destination or completion date that I am looking towards. This time, it’s about making that next step. The destination is the next min, the next hour, the next day. And when I fall, I will crawl.

I must keep moving.