Warr;or

 Warr;or, my ass

I used to think I was a warr;or, that I was strong, courageous, brave and capable. Used to.

Lately, I feel as though I’ve been rapidly spiraling through Dante’s circles of hell and I haven’t landed yet.

I survived the Christmas season by renaming the holiday entirely to save my mental health, we now celebrate Winter Break for a full week instead of some imaginary guy’s birthday - don’t even get me started on the fact that the guy who apparently floats above the clouds wasn’t even born in December, but September. I finally had the best Winter Solstice ever, in my entire life. I baked like a crazy person and instead of hosting one large family dinner, I hosted two smaller family dinners plus one with my little family on the 24^th after a full day of board games and stuffing our faces with not one but two batches of homemade cinnamon rolls.  Best week ever. I went completely non-traditional and made full vegan meals too because, well, it’s my house. The food was delicious and in the future, if I have one, mini-family get-togethers are the way to go. Way less stress – for me.

The kids enjoyed their time home with me and got to use all their gift certificates for experiences. This year, in lieu of gifts and more crap they don't need, I opted for fun outings, pre-paid for the teens in my house. They enjoyed sky diving, movies, rock climbing, swimming, the Playdium, and the trampoline park. I bought the gift cards for 50% off thereby saving a little money.

However, since early January, things have taken a nosedive for me and I am not strong enough to fight the pit that is calling my name. It’s an oddly comforting location. I never in a million years would have guessed that my depression lurked this close below the surface. I thought I was content with my life, maybe not joyfully or ecstatically happy, but I felt much better. So what the fuck happened?

Pain happened.

Ageing is happening.

I’m tired. Tired of fighting. Tired of the endless battles that rage within me. Giving up is easier, but I don't think I'm quite ready to take the plunge.. yet, but I do think it's just a matter of time.

I want a pity party, but I refuse to entertain any such thing. It’s not helpful and I know it will make everything worse for my mental health, if I let it all bubble to the surface. I cannot change the past, I don't want to grieve everything I didn't have or all that time lost to surviving.

I also didn’t realize I compartmentalized my depression and suicidal thoughts until … yesterday.

My life just fucking sucks and if I was childless, I can honestly say I’d be dead by now. It’s actually not off the table, in fact, I came up with a better plan for my inevitable demise. A plan I made when I didn’t even think I was depressed.

I’ve been in physical pain for some time now. It started with my shoulders then my arms then my hands. I went to physiotherapy for carpal tunnel (31 sessions!) and my hands still go numb. The x-ray and ultrasound showed my wrists were normal; yet many days I cannot hold a knife to chop vegetables for dinner. Now I wait for an MRI appointment to see if perhaps the discs in my spine are compressing a nerve. I love painting and like to paint my house every 5 years, but for the last 4 years I’ve had a really hard time raising my arms over my head and holding a paint roller, well, I sometimes tie an elastic around my hand attaching it to the roller (when there’s no one home to watch me!).

My left knee makes it incredibly difficult to do stairs some days, or even walk. Just after the New Year, I thought adding more or different exercise would help my pain so I bought an online 1 year yoga program only to discover that no, I cannot do that, just doing the poses was excruciatingly painful for my hands. I now strongly suspect I have osteoarthritis in my fingers, knuckles and wrist of my left hand, on top of whatever is causing my hands to go numb, arbitrarily. So then, I bought the wall Pilates workout which I did do and did enjoy. Now I find myself absolutely unmotivated to do anything. At all.  I gained 10 pounds over the Winter Break and I actually don’t even care.

I’m too young to be in this much pain already and I cannot imagine living another 20 or 25 years with it just getting worse. It’s bad now and I was told the x-ray showed “mild” arthritis in my lower back, wrists, and knees. Maybe it has gotten worse over the past few years, but I feel like I’m always complaining about something to my doctor. I don’t want to be a strain on the health care system either.

I no longer have a psychiatrist either because he retired last year and I managed to convince him I’d be fine. An act I now regret because it’s a full year wait-list to get in for a mere ‘consultation’ – that’s not even a consult with a shrink but a Nurse who will provide you with a few prescription options and send you on your way. No follow up either.  I already take 50% more than the recommended dose of Cipralex, as prescribed by my psychiatrist and refuse to take Abilify for the side effects.

My brain cannot compartmentalize pain. Depression was easy to tamp down, but now I see all the things I will soon no longer enjoy, like baking, cooking, typing, writing, walking my dog, gardening, home improvements, etc. I haven’t been able to knit or crochet in nearly two years. I washed the walls with a mop a few weeks ago and couldn’t use my hands for 3 days after that. I’m 48 years old for crying out loud. I’m useless already. Useless. I'm a mouth breather. My arms hurt just thinking about it. Soon I won't even be able to drive because... my hands sometimes have trouble gripping the steering wheel.

Isolation is where I prefer to be right now. My walls took so long to come down, a lot of work in therapy and in a day, I’ve built them halfway up already. It’s comforting to wallow in depression alone. Why bother other people with my ridiculous bullshit anyway.

On top of all of it, rising interest rates have me panicking. I'm simply too exhausted for a part time job on top of my full time job. I’m not even in debt – yet, but I soon will be (although I do have a mortgage, but that's all). I don’t believe my salary has kept pace with inflation at all which is why I can’t even afford to go on vacation and haven’t been able to for the past 5 years. I have a good job, a University degree; I should be able to see my country one week a year by car. 

My kids start university in 2.5 years and at the moment, if anything happens to my vehicle, I cannot even afford a car payment. I’m honestly worth more dead than alive. I have until I’m 52 to really decide because my larger insurance policy expires at age 52. My brain knows it and it likes to remind me, arbitrarily, that I have a plan. A good one, whereby if, and when, anyone actually figures out what’s wrong with me and what I’ve done to make it so, my liver will have already failed and it’ll be too late for a liver transplant. I often wonder if a DNR applies to someone who’s attempted suicide. I hope so, one day I’ll find out, I guess. I just don’t know when that day will arrive.  It's pretty clear that I don't want any measures taken to save me, yes it's just below my sternum:

The trouble is, I’m chicken. I love my children and I really want to see how they turn out. I’m torn…. Should I make their lives financially a little easier or see the fruit of my labour as adults? Or, am I terrified of proving Big M right by failing and thereby proving her theory that I'm just an attention seeker?...I’m not afraid of the pain involved, I’m afraid of the permanence – which is weird considering I want a rest. I want to just fall asleep and succumb to the darkness and never wake up. Except I cannot have it both ways. I never get what I want in life.

So, that should also explain why I haven’t been able to type any new blog posts in a very long time… as I said, everything I enjoy and live for, is slipping through my fingers.

Read from the beginning:

Prologue : Family
Chapter 1: The Early Years
Chapter 2: Protector: 1979-1981
Chapter 3: Pre-Teen Years 1981-1987
Chapter 4: Teen Years: 1987-1993
Reality Bites - The Truth Reveals Itself 
Chapter 5: University: 1993-1998
Chapter 6: Young Adulthood
Healing
Chapter 7: Parenthood: 2007-2017