Happiness – noun 1. the quality or state of being happy 2. good fortune; pleasure; contentment; joy. Dictionary.com Happiness is not a right. It is not owed to you. Though, I believe there are some tragedies that deserve to have some happiness, if not full-blown happiness. In America you are given the freedom for the […]
Have you found yourself yet? I mean really found yourself. Not who you are in separate roles, but who you are as a whole. I’m still searching for myself and I am in my forties. Just when I think I have found who I am, something changes. Sometimes I am surprised. Sometimes I knew all along that this was, as a whole, who I was. Life changes. You can not expect yourself to remain stagnant.
I look back at my diaries and journals and wonder who that girl was. Some of it astonishes me in her hopes and dreams. Some of it was a reminder of that girl’s hurt and joy. Who she was then and who she hoped to be has definitely changed over the years.
That girl, young woman, wanted to be in business. She wanted to be in a non feeling job. Just the facts and only the facts, no feeling please. The trouble with that is, she was, and is, a feeling person. She ran into business and felt bereft. She found herself feeling and getting attached. It was hard to separate the two. And, yes, I am talking about myself in third person. The girl/woman I was then seems so far away from who I am now. Who I turned out to be.
I was involved in my first intense relationship back then. Late teens, early twenties. You are still getting to know yourself. I wanted the penthouse. He wanted the white picket fence. We couldn’t agree on values or dreams. That’s all they were then, dreams. Our whole lives were ahead of us. It ended, but not without regrets.
In my twenties I forged ahead. I tried to go to school but my heart was in working. I couldn’t do both. At the time, my depression was in it’s latent stage. It didn’t quite have the hold on me that it has in later, or earlier years. My illness was unknown. It was there, but not to the extent it has become over the last 15 years or so. I wanted to be something, but I was never sure what that something was. Business was not necessarily what it was though.
By my thirties I had been married twice. The first time, I really wasn’t sure of who I was. I married, standing at the alter, wondering what I was doing there. Once I started realizing that I didn’t have to accept everything, including the lying, and that was the end of that. We tried counseling.
The second marriage happened when I was about to turn 28. Before we even dated, I researched him. Made sure he wasn’t married, he had a job, was educated. Never mind that I was only a Sophomore standing in college. He worked two jobs. So did I. He had similar values. Most important, I knew, if I should decide to have children, he would be a good father. I had a strong idea of who I was. I had gone through PTSD(Post Traumatic Stress Disorder) for sexual abuse. I felt strong. We married less than 6 months after meeting.
I have wavered back and forth since our marriage, regarding who I was. I know I am now the two child, wife, of a picket fence house. Funny how ideas change. No longer do I want the penthouse. I’m not as comfortable as I thought I would be at my own hand. Life changes in unexpected ways.
My illness has played a large part in deciding who I am. I do not want it to define my person, but it is a sum of my person. It has changed me from a hard working woman to a non working woman. I have become, in physical appearance, I woman that I do not know or never intended to be. Actually, I have become a woman I do not know or never intended to be.
I have spent years depressed, unsure of myself, without guidance. I’m in my forties and still wondering who I will be when I grow up. My life has turned out so differently then what I planned. Your life may have too. Life is like that. You can have plans and things changed. Maybe it is due to physical illness, or mental illness, or, maybe, it is just because you have changed. Life isn’t without it’s challenges.
I know this, I am the sum of my parts. I may not be who I thought I would be, but, where my values are concerned, I am exactly as I thought I would be. I may not have the job in business, but I am still business minded(albeit with feelings). The amazing thing with life is you decide who you want to be. You may not be the executive you were thinking of, but, if at your core, you are the type of person you value, than you have reached the person you need to be.
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Seventeen years ago I gave birth to a beautiful son. It was a decision wrought with what if’s and how to’s. Just like anyone else’s pregnancy would be. I was high risk for a number of reasons, part of them medical, part of them mental. It was a question of whether I would be able […]
I pledge my commitment to the Blog For Mental Health 2013 Project. I will blog about mental health topics not only for myself, but for others. By displaying this badge, I show my pride, dedication, and acceptance for mental health. I use this to promote mental health education in the struggle to erase stigma. A […]
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“It sucks that we miss people like that. You think you’ve accepted that someone is out of your life, that you’ve grieved and it’s over, and then bam. One little thing, and you feel like you’ve lost that person all over again.” ― Rachel Hawkins, Demonglass Have you ever lost a relationship without knowing why? […]
Once upon a time, in a land far, far away from here…Okay, not that far and terrible cliches. I use to work several jobs, up to 80 hours a week, yet here I now sit. I had always had some sort of health issues through out my life, but they had not stopped me from […]
Disabled, or Handicapped? What's the Difference?.
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I’m trying very hard to keep my mouth, or my pen, shut. My fingers type away in a desire to talk and I find my brain fighting which most certainly would be a betrayal. Not just a betrayal to others but a betrayal to me. Do I open up and risk the backlash, or do […]
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I’m teary again. Almost a year ago,during a major depressive episode, I was all tears. I cried if I looked up. I cried if someone looked my way. I cried if the water was too hot. I’m sure you get the drift, I cried at anything. Forget humor, it was lost on me. Despite if […]
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What am I feeling? No, really, what am I feeling today? Why should that question be so hard to answer with and actual feeling word? Most people answer ‘fine’. Fine is not a feeling. Fine is a complacent word. It is an answer without an answer. Swell is my favorite answer. It often makes people […]
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