Funny How That Works

Lately, I’ve been having this issue of wanting to write, but it never happens. To think, last year I wrote almost every month, and if I post this, it will be my third post with just over two months left in the year.

It’s been a rough year. I feel like I’m always saying that.

Each year it’s for different things. I find myself nostalgic for times when I was suffering. Funny how that works. There are parts of me that I miss, and I’m watching them disappear. The parts that were creative and outgoing and hopeful. The number of times I would have posted this year if I had written when I felt like it. Something once so easy.

I had to say goodbye to my car and get another one. It was more emotional than I had expected. I knew for a while that the day was coming any time. No bumper, cracked windshield, random loss of engine power while driving, and the steering was going out, which is what did me in at the end. When I bought that car in 2020, I was about to turn twenty-four. My credit score was trash since I hadn’t made payments on my loans when they were no longer deferred. I think of that experience. I was stuck across the country at the dealership, expecting I’d have to fly home and figure it out. Any car payment was going to be a struggle with what I made financially. Yet, I was calm. Some expected anxiety, but I had the belief that it was going to be okay. This time around, my nervous system was so unregulated. I was still in a place I wished I wouldn’t be in by this time. I was also physically sick, and work was draining me and making me cry weekly. This time around, buying a car was one of the hardest times. I had done things I’d never done before. I hadn’t felt so empty and hopeless.

I am very well off for all that I have gone through. I shouldn’t be as functional as I am. Honestly, it’s somewhat a miracle I’m still alive. In order to be okay, I use so much of my energy on being okay. So, when that energy is being used for other things, it can be harder for me to self-regulate.

I was so anxious, I missed several family events such as weddings and birthdays over the summer. In the last six months or so, I’ve gotten to a place where I need to change things soon. There are parts of my life that have been so hard on me that it’s starting to tear me down. And now not just mentally but physically. That’s a new one. I believe so much can be changed in how you think, but when you feel like one thing or another is tearing you down, it’s not easy to do. Alongside trying to change my environment, I’m trying to figure out what I can change and do with where I am at. Even if it’s little things. I am such an all or nothing person. Even when it comes to something as small as cleaning. Most of my life I’d spend a good amount of a day cleaning, but these days it’s not been as feasible to do that. Habits that I’ve had for so long that now need to be broken since they aren’t working anymore.

It’s hard.

As someone who feels behind in life so much of the time, it can be difficult not to compare myself. I had to mute a few of my friends on social media because it was creating more harm. I am so proud of their accomplishments, but it was causing me to obsess over how I wasn’t where I thought I would be. I was starting to focus on the shell of a person I’d been becoming. Which made me feel guilty because how can I feel that while also being in a loving and healthy relationship with someone that has given me back so much I had lost? In ways, it has given me a place to feel safe, and all that I was holding together for so long started to crumble.

I have to remind myself that I’ve had to overcome more than most and that some of those things still have had a lasting effect on how I navigate life. I try not to go through life thinking, “Oh, look at all I’ve had to deal with.” That’s not healthy, but it’s about finding the balance of continuing to find out what makes me the way I am and healing those parts while not letting it take control.

I’m also still trying to learn how to be present with where I am because I know soon enough I’ll be looking back and missing where I am at now.