Day 242 “The Me Project,” Day 106 “The Bunker”
It’s been a good day…because I forced it.
Normally, we only get to brag about stuff like promotions, new jobs, weight loss, graduations, new babies, weddings…but I’m about to brag about my self just for ‘selfing’ well. It’s taking as much/more work as any of those triumphs that come with invitations and Hallmark cards.
Staying ‘above ground’ right now- as in, staying on the edge of the pit, not succumbing to deep, deep depression and anxiety- is hard. I swallow up the troubles of the world on a good day, so on these 106 COVID-laced scary/sad/awful days, while we’ve also experienced more murders of African Americans by police and a national reckoning (#boutfuckingtime), there’s so much pain to sponge up, I can easily get paralyzed and lost in it.
Today, I felt pretty brutally bad; sick and bruised inside, sliding into a sadness, toes hanging out over the depression pit…and I’m proud because I did the things I’ve learned to do to stay on solid ground; I reached out to someone I can trust and I shared all my stuff, I did a long, therapeutic yoga session, I went for multiple walks, I drank water and tea, and now I’m writing. I also made some time alone, letting my feeling and thinking have space. I cried. I didn’t try to stop.
I also calmly and with a BUNCHA grace helped de-escalate my daughter from, what would otherwise have been, an epic bedtime meltdown. I was able to help her find the source of her feelings beyond her behavior and to remind her of her skills in controlling herself. We ended up hugging, loving, peaceful, then asleep.
I did that. And I’m taking credit, because it was hard and I couldn’t have done that in the past. I would have seen her stubbornness as an affront and her sadness/rage would have been met with my own.
Not today, satan. (Sometimes I call her satan. It’s cute). ;) Not really. What I mean is that is that I’m proud I’m learning to understand myself and to harness my ego and nurture myself. Just like I’m asking her to do. My daughter needed love, needed gentleness, needed reminding of her best self, needing help with healthy choices.
Me, too.
I’ve spent the past 242 days learning how to take actual good care of myself and to listen to and trust myself.
I’m pleased to report that it’s going OK.
Today was a good day.
