May is Mental Health Awareness Month

Mental Health is the bane of my existence and alternately the core of who I am.  Since I was a little tiny girl, I knew that there was something different about me. A hollow space that wanted to be filled.. an emptiness, a sadness, something that was just different. It was off.  I was sad.   So sad.  I cried myself to sleep when I was 5 or 6, as a teen, all that got me out of bed were responsibilities and plans. I languished through hours, weeks, months of melancholy, wishing and hoping it would go away, but learning to love that darkness like a blanket. It became my security. 

It smothered me. It smothers me.  I've been in therapy for 3 years. Under the care of an amazing therapist and a psychiatrist who keeps my care consistent.  It is amazing how difficult it is to be successful in life, and successful in self care and be aware of mood swings, ups and downs and round and rounds that come with life.  I want all of the pieces to fall into place.  I want the symptoms to not affect my mood or my cravings. I want to be able to breathe easily and freely.  without anxiety also knocking at my door.  Knocking at my door. always knocking at my door. waiting outside. hanging in the driveway. Casing the joint, making the rounds looking for weakness.. for that moment when I am not tending to myself. When I am too tired, or too stressed, or hungry, or dehydrated. When I have too many things to do, when I am normal sad..its waiting right there to invade. to break in.  to break into my life. and to break into my life. and to stay for as long as it wants to. 


Its my job to practice active self care to prevent it from overtaking me. From making it a worse thing that It is.. to stop it from taking root.