Drowning is Drowning

"I'm caught in a rainbow, but it feels like I'm drowning." - Liz Skelton

A lot is going on in my life right now. I'm two months into a new job, we're starting fertility treatments, we're buying a house, and my church is expanding just to name a few. It's all good stuff. None of it is something I have to go through alone, but it still feels just as overwhelming and stressed and anxious and out of control as when my life has been falling to pieces. 

Needless to say, all these are great. We've been dreaming of a house for years and not only did we find a perfect starter house, but we can actually afford it. We have a great fertility doctor who has our issues figured out and we're working through a game plan of how we can overcome them to get pregnant. My husband and I both have good jobs that make it so we can pay bills and not live check to check. Everything is great, but that doesn't mean everything is perfect. 

We're overwhelmed with blessings and answers to our prayers, but we're still overwhelmed. And for a long time I struggled with feelings of guilt because even though everything was going well, I wasn't magically happy. I was still feeling stressed and tired. I deal with my anxiety by micromanaging as many aspects of my life as possible (I'm on the waitlist for therapy, no worries). But we were thrown into a pool of unknowns. I don't know the intimate details of mortgages. No amount of color coded lists will guarantee my body cooperates at the doctor. My zeal for my growing church doesn't mean I don't feel exhausted Sunday mornings and have to drag myself there sometimes without much excitement. 

I felt so guilty about that. I'm finally getting everything on my dream board lined up, but I'm still asking God for help. I'm still trying to figure out how much I can get done while chewing Xanax. I'm wanting to go to bed at a good time while also wanting to stay up so I can enjoy a few hours that aren't clogged with anxiety inducing to-do's. I didn't feel like I had any right to still not be perfectly content. 

Like I said at the start, I'm caught in the middle of a beautiful, vibrant, colorful rainbow, but I'm choking on the colors. I'm not well-versed in the bible. I recently equated the book of Jonah to being "like the movie Pinocchio, right? He ends up in a whale?" (Not quite as my bestie and Pastor gently informed me), but I am pretty sure there's no verse that says the price of an answered prayer is unflinching happiness in perpetuity. 

Long story short, it isn't a crime to still feel overwhelmed and stressed when things are going well. Answered prayers don't mean you have to grit your teeth and smile forever. Good stuff can be exhausting. Blessings can come with overwhelming work attached. If you're religious or spiritual, there's no shame in thanking God in one breath and asking him to help see you through things in the next. If God isn't your jam, there's also no shame in just being happy for good stuff but still feeling stressed. And if anyone tells you different, send them to me. 

So be happy, but deal with the stress too. Acknowledge it and figure out your best ways to cope. I go for loud car singing, some stress crying in the shower, and rewatching my comfort shows while playing mindless puzzles games. The greener pastures aren't sunny 24/7. There's still rain and mud and hail and windchill. As Paramore says, "Just hang with me in my weather". 

Are you Bi-Polar? Or Just Toxic AF..?

 Like. Share. Like. Share. Like. Share. Like. Share. Like. Share. Like. Share. Share. Share. 

My main purpose for having social media is to mindlessly scroll, like, and share cute/funny/all too true things. Lately, especially, I’ve found a lot of comfort reading memes and other posts around the topic of mental illness. I’ve even seen some I’ve sent to friends that I don’t relate to, but that I know will hit home to them. 

But here’s the thing. A lot of people see these posts and like or share without thinking it through. In this day of internet diagnosis and the unlimited access to info there are people out there who are just self-diagnosing themselves with serious mental illnesses like depression, anxiety, OCD, BPD, and more. 

They see a post/meme/GIF/video/etc. that talks about a flaw or quirk they identify with and after five seconds on google they decide they’re bipolar, or have anxiety. They make it part of their personality, a hashtag for attention. They use it to explain away or excuse toxic behavior and, to be blunt, it’s so ignorant. 

What many people, specifically ignorant people on the internet who see mental illness as a way to get attention, don’t seem to understand is that being diagnosed with mental illness is a journey. It is extensive, harrowing, soul crushing, and can sometimes be a fight. 

You know my story. After years of dealing with undiagnosed depression and severe anxiety, and years of praying to God to end my life, I asked for help. I asked to see a therapist, and I did, and it did NOTHING. She asked me general questions about if I liked school, my plans for college, and other basic niceties. After 50 minutes she declared to my mom that I was perfectly fine. Not long after that I attempted suicide. I assumed that she was right, I wasn’t sick. I was just broken beyond repair and I would never be free of the agony I carried with me every second of every day. 

After my suicide attempt I saw another therapist. She made me make a list of my good qualities. We played a little card game designed to find out if I was being abused. Eventually, for some reason or another, we stopped having appointments. It would be another two years before anyone actually diagnosed me. Two more years of seeing the occasional counselor and doctor to no avail, while still dealing with relentless panic attacks, crippling depression, and thoughts of suicide. 

I was nine when I started having symptoms of anxiety,12 when my ADHD started causing me to have trouble in school, 15 when everything kicked in full force, but I was 19 when I first got medication, and almost 20 when I found the first therapist who actually helped me. It wasn’t until I was 23 that anyone figured out the ADHD. Since then I have still had to seek out doctors and psychiatrists in order to get the right medications, which includes stints of being on the extremely wrong ones. I’ve sifted through hundreds of listings for therapists and spent hours on the phone being told there are no openings or that they only offer shock therapy. Right now I’m on the waitlist for a therapist, because that’s the only option. 

I’m not alone. I’ve had family members have to go through doctor after doctor fighting for the right diagnosis and treatment. I’ve watched friends spend weeks and months going through endless hours of complex and expensive tests only to come out the other side with a diagnosis (if they were lucky and had doctors who actually listened to them) which is really just the first step. Once you’re diagnosed with a mental illness, the real work starts. You have to find the medication that works for you (and pray your insurance covers it). You have to dig into all of your problems and your past to find the roots of your issues so you can start dealing with them. You have to explain your diagnosis to everyone in your life, trying to make them understand it doesn’t define you, while also setting the boundaries you need to thrive. 

Mental illness is a lifelong battle. Just getting the right diagnosis can take years of suffering. In the U.S. alone almost 50,000 people ended their lives last year because for one reason or another they weren’t able to win the fight against mental illness. I’ve had a diagnosis and treatment for 11 years. I still suffer. I still struggle. 

That’s why it makes me so genuinely angry when I see people on social media calling themselves bipolar or “so OCD”. That’s why I want to scream when people talk about having a panic attack as hyperbole, like it’s a joke. Everytime you, or someone you know, uses mental illness as an adjective, or decides they have a condition without ever having actually been diagnosed, you spit in the face of the people who actually struggle with those illnesses. You diminish the inconceivable effort those people put into finding answers and getting better. 

The next time you have a mood swing, think before saying “OMG I’m so bipolar”. The next time there’s a crowd, stop yourself from saying “I’m gonna have a total panic attack”. And most importantly of all, if you think even for a moment that you’re struggling with mental illness, GET HELP. You cannot self-diagnose OCD, BPD, etc. Google cannot diagnose you. You can’t take an online quiz. When you just decide for yourself you not only do harm to every person out there who is struggling, but you do harm to yourself. You cannot get treatment or get better until you sit down and have an honest conversation with your doctor, a therapist, or a healthcare professional. 

I am always here to listen and support, and here are other resources too. 

I'm Speaking, Still.

In 2021 I, along with millions of other Americans, sat down to watch the 2021 Vice Presidential Debate. That night led to a turning point for me, and I’m still working through the aftermath. That night, Kamala Harris turned to Mike Pence and said, “I’m speaking”. 

Despite being 28 years old, that was the first time I had truly understood that as a woman, I had the right to speak up when men interrupted me. Some of you are probably thinking, “Well duh”, but, like many young girls, I was raised to be demure, polite, and quiet. If a man interrupted me, talked over me, or cut me off, I was to smile, nod, listen attentively, and finish my thought when and if the opportunity arose after others were done speaking. 

That night opened my eyes, and I suddenly started noticing just how frequently people, mostly men, would cut me off in the middle of sentences. Worse yet, most of them seemed to either not notice that they were cutting me off, or weren’t listening in the first place, and didn’t realize I had even been speaking to them. 

The most heartbreaking part though was what happened when I brought it up. Mind you, I was still terrified to be perceived as impolite, so I broached the subject gently and politely, because as we all know if women show any type of emotion we are immediately labeled as hysterical and everything we say is ignored. But even when I said “I’m sorry, but I was still speaking” and explained that that was upsetting, a lot of men did not change their behavior. 

I expected that some people I didn’t know well, colleagues or acquaintances, might not take me seriously, and might ignore my comments. What I did not expect, and what was the most gutting of all, was that men I was close to, who I had long-term, close friendships and relationships with, would ignore me. Even after exposing my insecurities and how being talked over made me feel small and insignificant, some of them were still incapable or unwilling to even try. 

Interestingly enough, when I expressed the same feelings to some of my female friends, the response was instant. Even now if one of my close friends interrupts or talks over me, they apologize, genuinely, before I even say anything. And that genuine concern has taken all the sting out of those interruptions. When one of us, because I’m guilty of cutting people off too, speaks out of turn, we note the behavior, correct it, and apologize before the other person even has time to be hurt. For me, knowing that they care enough to be cognizant of how that makes me feel, is huge. 

Now, several years after first having this realization, I’m more comfortable speaking up, and I’m working on assuaging the guilt I feel speaking up about it and asking to be treated with respect. But, I am still dealing with the fact that, on an almost daily basis, there are still men in my life who interrupt me, talk over me, and don’t notice. There are some men in my life who, despite knowing that being talked over makes me feel weak, unloved, and takes me back to an abusive relationship in my youth, still can’t or won’t work on their behavior. 

With the Barbie movie sweeping the nation, and hopefully with more and more women beginning to see their own worth and speak up for themselves, I want you to know, as someone who is walking that same path, that it is not easy. But as you begin to set boundaries, remember that the people who love and care for you will have no problem respecting them, supporting you, and celebrating you as you grow. So when you find yourself faced with people who are upset with your growth, who push back against the boundaries you set, or who don’t change their behavior that hurts you, you’re allowed to push back and speak up. You deserve people who support you, and you will find them.