Where did a year and a half go? I’ve spent the day backing-up data and music, and now listening to last weeks NPR – ‘Wait Wait…. Don’t Tell Me!’ which is causing me to giggle often while working away here at the keyboard.
I’ve been visited lately by Churchill’s Black Dog – depression. I find myself deep into despair, victim hood, and total self-absorption. When its happening, I know what I need is contact, and I’ll be damned if I can ask for it when I’m in that space.
Yesterday, a good friend called on the spur of the moment, and I so appreciate the way she can simply show up, and that I’m able to be real with her and reveal just how down I’m feeling, and of course she was able to point out how mean my inner critic is being on me.
My internal voices are, to put it mildly, vicious! When I’m imagining I’m less than perfect, ‘the committee’ as I like to call them, are more than ready to beat me senseless – with their lists of ways that I haven’t done all that I could, when I could, and a litany of reasons why I shouldn’t even think of expecting to be happy, or even expect others to want to be with me. It can be not only exhausting, but downright scary, when I believe whatever is the latest bad judgment they have for me.
The good news is that today I have much more equilibrium, and “the committee’s” opinions can barely be heard. I’ve actually managed to achieve some longed for organization of my home space, and completed a few things on my very long to-do list. Both of these things help me feel even better, and reassure me that I’m not sinking permanently into the pit of despair, and that there’s some hope for me to be happy and maybe even to find an intimate relationship, rather than the illicit affair I’ve been indulging in for the past 4 months.
