Last time I felt anywhere near a total meltdown was a couple of years before the divorce. And then I lived with that near meltdown mentality for nearly four years. I have an uncanny way of being able to put on the happy face and make believe that I'm doing well. Back then there were no kids around so I only had to put on the happy face in public. Once I came home the facade was broken down and I had nearly nightly meltdowns. Although sometimes I could go weeks without even letting my husband see the cracks in the facade.
I was talking to a good friend and colleague, whom I also made feel uncomfortable the other day when I told him he sounds like a therapist...and perhaps that's why I'm able to talk to him so well...he costs a lot less than my last therapist. Anyway, I told him that I felt like I was losing grip on reality and that I was becoming obsessively neurotic about certain things in my life. As a result I made a life choice which I'm still not sure I made the right choice but it felt good at the time...as a result of my neuroses I'm of course, seconding guessing myself about the choice...anyway, back the conversation with the friend/colleague. When I told him I was becoming neurotic he seemed shocked and said that I didn't appear to be that way at all...interesting yes? Here I am thinking that everyone can see me falling apart one piece at a time and really, no one can see it. What does that say about me?
Either I deserve an Oscar "I'd like to thank all my fans, my mom and my dad, my brothers and sisters." (or is that my testimony?) Or it says that I don't rely on my support group nearly enough. I look around me and see the most amazing, fantastic group of individuals who are all there to support me in anyway they can. And the amazing thing about all of these people is they are so varied and different and have such different views on the world, life, God, everything that I could really get everything i need from them...if I allowed it. As I'm thinking about all of this I on my drive home the Matchbox Twenty Song - Unwell Came on the radio. For those unfamiliar, here are the words and you can go here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IOPssHhyXec to hear the song (if there is a way to actually put the song on my blog can a more experienced blogger show me how?)
All day
Staring at the ceiling
Making friends with shadows on my wall
All night
Hearing voices telling me
That I should get some sleep
Because tomorrow might be good for something
Hold on
I'm feeling like I'm headed for a
Breakdown
I don't know why
I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell
I know, right now you can't tell
But stay awhile and maybe then you'll see
A different side of me
I'm not crazy, I'm just a little impaired
I know, right now you don't care
But soon enough you're gonna think of me
And how I used to be
Me
Talking to myself in public
Dodging glances on the train
I know
I know they've all been talking 'bout me
I can hear them whisper
And it makes me think there must be something wrong
With me
Out of all the hours thinking
Somehow
I've lost my mind
I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell
I know, right now you can't tell
But stay awhile and maybe then you'll see
A different side of me
I'm not crazy, I'm just a little impaired
I know right now you don't care
But soon enough you're gonna think of me
And how I used to be
I been talking in my sleep
Pretty soon they'll come to get me
Yeah, they're taking me away
I'm not crazy, I'm just a little unwell
I know, right now you can't tell
But stay awhile and maybe then you'll see
A different side of me
I'm not crazy I'm just a little impaired
I know, right now you don't care
But soon enough you're gonna think of me
And how I used to be
Hey, how I used to be
How I used to be, yeah
Well I'm just a little unwell
How I used to be
How I used to be
How I used to be? I think that is the most difficult line for me to come to terms with. I tell people that I'm an onion (yes, I stole it from Shrek) I have multiple layers to me and those layers have developed over my life. I would guess that each one of you who reads this has a vision in your head of "how I used to be" and you would each be right. I think part of my neuroses is coming to terms with all of those different sides of me, accepting them and reconciling them with one another. How will that happen? When will that happen? How long will that happen? I don't know. But I do know this for sure: I sure do like myself better when I'm not neurotic!
And perhaps the Ofuro Bath
and Japanese stone massage on Friday will help out too...here's to hoping!
I think that a lot of the problems I have are produced by there being all these 'set's of rules' out there telling me what I should or shouldn't be.
ReplyDeleteHowever, when I think about all these 'norms'I think it is important that we question WHAT IS NORMAL' and what warped individual made up some of the 'norms'.
We are all individuals and should be allowed to accept it.
One of my favourite books is called The Chrysalids by John Wyndham and it is set in a Post Appocalyptical world.It is set a number of years after a nuclear storm and one man writes a book and in it he writes down what the perfect human should be like and this book becomes for the people as important as the Bible.Remembering, he was writing many years after the nuclear storm and had just as much idea as anyone else what the perfect human should be like.Anyone who is not born 'perfect'is thrown into the 'Badlands' to die at birth.However,one side effect of the nuclear storm appears to be telepathy and those who have this gift are hunted down because they do not fit the percieved norm.
This book gave me a chill when I first read it because I was born with a Boutonnière deformity(bent in a certain way) of my small fingers which means I would have beeen left to die.
Just because you are not the perceived norms shouldn't makke you abnormal and this is coming from a total fruit cake.
I was only thinking the other day whilst talking to you on lone that I wished there were more balanced individuals like you in the world.
And the girls think you are brilliant too.