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Put your foot in the stirrup and just go
Jan. 8th, 2018 01:10 pmOkay, how to get back on this horse? It's been a few years since I did this regularly. The muscles are rusty and things don't quite work like they used to. But I miss writing. I miss reading things written by friends and facebook, for all it's pluses, is a pretty shitty platform to do anything long on.
So, how to get going again? Maybe by looking back? Get it all out there in one go? When I stopped, livejournal was still a US company and I'd just survived the worst year of my life. Within a matter of months, both my brother and my dog died in pretty horrific and guilt filled circumstances. It was like the universe took a look around and said "This one? Fuck this one!" and stomped on me until I was a nasty little mess of blood, snot, and emotions.
I couldn't talk about it, couldn't process it and sure as shit couldn't write about it. Most days, I was doing good just to be standing upright and not falling into the pit in my head. I spent a lot of time drinking and even more time flipping off the void.
My coping mechanism, such that it was, was to get angry, stay angry and and use that anger to keep moving. When I ran out of reasons to keep moving, I invented some more. I signed up for more than I could handle. I beat myself to shit when I failed. I did it again and again, with projects and people and too much stuff into too little time and yeah, a puppy and a two year old horse the size of a small elephant both sound like GREAT ideas when you're having a mental breakdown. I took jobs I knew I didn't want for the sole purpose of keeping me busy and frustrated and distracted. I kept moving. If I stopped moving, I'd have to actually deal with this new world, with it's missing walls and windows, with it's gaping holes in my mind and at my side. I stopped being able to fall asleep without chemical help. I gained weight. I got a reputation at work that I'm not entirely proud of. I did stupid things.
And by some small miracle, it got better.
Slowly, it is getting better.
I still can't look too long at the area in my head where my brother used to inhabit. I haven't gone into his house since the day we carried him out of it and I don't know that I ever will. I still sometimes cry as I walk up the stairs, my hand reaching down feeling for a missing pair of fuzzy shoulders, my best shadow. But I no longer feel the need to either numb myself with alcohol or run myself ragged to avoid these things. Now they're just there, missing parts of me that still need to be avoided but that are no longer actively hunting me.
I had epic panic attacks the first year I tried to go back to PA. I had more this spring while trying to pack but they, too, were better. One room got frantically cleaned over the space of an afternoon, not the entire house, not for 30 hours straight with my poor husband helping me scrub molding at 4 in the morning while I ranted and cried. I call my mother a couple times a week now and it doesn't involve a 30 minute pep talk first.
It's getting better.
I'm still paying for some of the stupid.
My approach to work got me labeled both a go getter and a ball buster at the day job (those are the polite terms). Now I'm a technical lead on one the largest military projects in the nation, under constant scrutiny from both my companies' management and congress. It makes me miss my Darpa days where the budget and deadlines were just as crazy but at least everyone admitted failure was an option.
Additionally, one of my bigger bits of stupid involved pushing that young horse past her ability to cope. That landed me in the emergency room with my lower spine fractured in three spots. I spent months in bed and then more months figuring out how to move again. It's been almost a year and a half and I still can't sit for more than an hour or so before everything from the waist down starts bitching. I will most likely be paying for that bit of stupid for the rest of my life, both in physical pain and with a fear on horseback that I never had before. I've lost faith in my instincts and abilities to ride out whatever gets thrown at me. I tell myself that it's probably wisdom and not cowardice but still .. I used to laugh when a horse got squirrely and stupid. Now I have to fight to not immediately hop off. But my old horse is a saint and my young horse is a good apple, if still a baby in the head, and we'll get there eventually.
And its getting better.
I spent this weekend of wicked cold hanging out with Josh by the fireplace, playing games and cuddling pets (and Josh) and being still and quiet and it was okay. I couldn't have done that two years ago. Not entirely sure I could have done it 6 months ago. But I can do it now and that's what counts. And apparently I need to be still in order to write.
So here we go.
So, how to get going again? Maybe by looking back? Get it all out there in one go? When I stopped, livejournal was still a US company and I'd just survived the worst year of my life. Within a matter of months, both my brother and my dog died in pretty horrific and guilt filled circumstances. It was like the universe took a look around and said "This one? Fuck this one!" and stomped on me until I was a nasty little mess of blood, snot, and emotions.
I couldn't talk about it, couldn't process it and sure as shit couldn't write about it. Most days, I was doing good just to be standing upright and not falling into the pit in my head. I spent a lot of time drinking and even more time flipping off the void.
My coping mechanism, such that it was, was to get angry, stay angry and and use that anger to keep moving. When I ran out of reasons to keep moving, I invented some more. I signed up for more than I could handle. I beat myself to shit when I failed. I did it again and again, with projects and people and too much stuff into too little time and yeah, a puppy and a two year old horse the size of a small elephant both sound like GREAT ideas when you're having a mental breakdown. I took jobs I knew I didn't want for the sole purpose of keeping me busy and frustrated and distracted. I kept moving. If I stopped moving, I'd have to actually deal with this new world, with it's missing walls and windows, with it's gaping holes in my mind and at my side. I stopped being able to fall asleep without chemical help. I gained weight. I got a reputation at work that I'm not entirely proud of. I did stupid things.
And by some small miracle, it got better.
Slowly, it is getting better.
I still can't look too long at the area in my head where my brother used to inhabit. I haven't gone into his house since the day we carried him out of it and I don't know that I ever will. I still sometimes cry as I walk up the stairs, my hand reaching down feeling for a missing pair of fuzzy shoulders, my best shadow. But I no longer feel the need to either numb myself with alcohol or run myself ragged to avoid these things. Now they're just there, missing parts of me that still need to be avoided but that are no longer actively hunting me.
I had epic panic attacks the first year I tried to go back to PA. I had more this spring while trying to pack but they, too, were better. One room got frantically cleaned over the space of an afternoon, not the entire house, not for 30 hours straight with my poor husband helping me scrub molding at 4 in the morning while I ranted and cried. I call my mother a couple times a week now and it doesn't involve a 30 minute pep talk first.
It's getting better.
I'm still paying for some of the stupid.
My approach to work got me labeled both a go getter and a ball buster at the day job (those are the polite terms). Now I'm a technical lead on one the largest military projects in the nation, under constant scrutiny from both my companies' management and congress. It makes me miss my Darpa days where the budget and deadlines were just as crazy but at least everyone admitted failure was an option.
Additionally, one of my bigger bits of stupid involved pushing that young horse past her ability to cope. That landed me in the emergency room with my lower spine fractured in three spots. I spent months in bed and then more months figuring out how to move again. It's been almost a year and a half and I still can't sit for more than an hour or so before everything from the waist down starts bitching. I will most likely be paying for that bit of stupid for the rest of my life, both in physical pain and with a fear on horseback that I never had before. I've lost faith in my instincts and abilities to ride out whatever gets thrown at me. I tell myself that it's probably wisdom and not cowardice but still .. I used to laugh when a horse got squirrely and stupid. Now I have to fight to not immediately hop off. But my old horse is a saint and my young horse is a good apple, if still a baby in the head, and we'll get there eventually.
And its getting better.
I spent this weekend of wicked cold hanging out with Josh by the fireplace, playing games and cuddling pets (and Josh) and being still and quiet and it was okay. I couldn't have done that two years ago. Not entirely sure I could have done it 6 months ago. But I can do it now and that's what counts. And apparently I need to be still in order to write.
So here we go.
