It is so unbearably hard to pretend I’m fine when really I’m not. Insanely hard. Smile cracked and wavering, eyes stinging, blinking away tears that won’t quite come. My throat is like sandpaper, but it’s been like that for a while so I don’t think the two are related. Often I’ll stare into nothing for five, ten minutes, doing nothing but stare. In those times I’m not even conscious of thinking. Sometimes. And those are the best times. But then I’ll shake myself and blink and I’ll be back here, feeling this pain.
I realised the other day that I only seem to remember the bad things. And small things can devastate me. Like, it is insane how much tiny, tiny things can set me back. I actually tried to make myself disassociate {and yes, both ‘disassociate’ and ‘dissociate’ are valid spellings, even my spell check tells me that. One is the American spelling and the other is the right spelling J } the other night to make me forget something. I just didn’t want to have that sadness in my head or in my heart.
Is it bad that, now that I know I do it, I’m trying to use it to my advantage? Maybe, I will concede that. But I think I’m allowed. I remember EVERYTHING and I don’t want to have to. So if I have this tool in my arsenal, this magic wand to take away the bad, I will try and use it. At least I’m not getting oblivion drunk to get rid of the memories. At least I’m not hurting myself physically. That has to count for something, right?
I don’t know.
Anyway, this post is about emotions. Why do I feel them so strongly? Why does every tiny little thing hurt like it’s the end of the world? Maybe because it is. I wasn’t taught how to deal with my emotions when I was younger, maybe because nobody knew the extent to which I was different, mentally and emotionally. Maybe because I never started feeling things this strongly until I was 18 or 19 years old. That’s when I had my first anxiety attack, my first 3 month long bout of depression, my first love…
It’s true, all my emotions and the divide between positive emotions and negative ones grew exponentially stronger when I hit 18/19. I do not know why. There is a very black and white division between my emotions, and the physical memory thing sticks for emotions as well. Just as I cannot remember what my little finger looked like before I had this scar on it, and I cannot remember what I looked like 6 months ago, as far as I’m concerned I always looked like this and always will; when I am sad I cannot remember ever being happy and I cannot imagine ever feeling happy again.
I wish it was like that when I’m happy but honestly, I have no idea what it’s like when I’m happy.
When I am sad (like I am right now) I can still laugh, I can still be amused, I can still be excited or smile. But the underlying emotion is sadness and that bugger won’t go away. No matter how hard I try.
People have tried telling me things, all sorts of things “just pretend you’re happy and it will go away” “cheer up” “just forget about it” “let it go, it’s in the past”…
Ad infinitum.
Doesn’t work like that. And considering some of the people telling me this claim to have had anxiety or depression, you think they’d understand that.
Stupid brain.
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