I drove home today and the tears began to fall. I had had the shittiest day and topped it up with attending something which should have been relaxing and fun but because of the stress of the day, the forgetting of the meds in the car therefore not taking them at the right time and the worry over my little boy who had had a fever during the day at childcare, my heart and focus wasn't into it properly. Due to already feeling less than confident I then began to feel worse and worse as I felt more and more out of touch with things within my industry.
I am hopeless with names, with remembering what this or that program are called and who gave this or that PD. I can put plenty of educational initiatives into place and yet I cannot tell you what they are or who they were written by. It is something I am a little self conscious of, I long to be able to do it! Truly long to. I wish I could because to me, especially growing up in the socio-economic bracket which I did, it meant that you were incredibly smart and also perhaps a little better in social standing if you could sound like you knew what you were talking about. If you could quote people when talking and talk with confidence then it gave you a higher social standing...in appearance anyway. So when I am among others who can fluently and confidently speak the talk I feel once more like the stupid little poor girl who didn't know all that much. I felt so incredibly stupid. And then I felt so bad. These are wonderful and lovely people who I respect so much, who are friends and here I am wanting to run as far away from them as possible. Not because of what they are saying or who they are but because of my own insecurities. I did as best I could to join in and feel confident but I felt anything but confident. I felt as though I was talking about dutch while everyone else was talking English and I was waiting for the moment when they gave me the 'we don't quite think that you belong here?' look or even worse, ask me why I am there and to see my credentials to determine if in fact I really did attend Uni and get my Bachelor degree and am qualified to do my job? Of course they never did give me that look or ask to see my credentials...it was all the way I was viewing myself in the situation, it as all about my own insecurities.
When the conversation turned to laughing at the ways in which we take home our bad days and take them out on our partners, I needed to physically fight the urge to run far far away. As much as I laughed along and I could relate to what they were saying, I did not share nor join in because it hurt a little to think about. Soon enough though I really could leave and it was only when I got in the car that it all fell down upon me!
I drove, music blaring as I tried to drown out the sorrow in my head and heart...trying to forget the things which hurt so much and distract myself but this evening it just was not working! No amount of music nor distraction could stop the tears from falling. There I was driving home after an incredibly hard and shitty day where I needed to be far more disciplinarian than I ever like to be and I had no opportunity to vent it out to anyone. I couldn't go home and pick a fight with someone, I wasn't going to be asked about my day and be able to bitch about how crappy it was...noone was going to be there just waiting to hear about my day... :(
My friends have been so incredibly brilliant in the last few months...as I faced the worst depression I have ever gone through and then the break up of my marriage they have been a tower of strength to me. Messaging me, bringing me flowers and caring how I am. But as I drove home I thought about them and the impact that I must have made on their lives during that time. They have families of their own to take care of and be with, partners to chat with and lives of their own to lead and here I was in a fallen heap in hell and reaching out into their worlds to say hi, to make a connection of friendship which I just do not have at home. I was infiltrating their world and I suddenly felt and feel so incredibly bad about that.
What right do I have to put my problems upon them? What right do I have to interrupt their lives with my anxst?
I had the strongest urge possible to message them and tell them that I was sorry. I am sorry for putting so much of my troubles on them. I am so sorry for asking so much of them. I am so grateful for all that they have done for me but I am so sorry that I have been so much trouble. But then I thought, maybe that will come across as attention seeking rather than genuine? so instead I did nothing. I thought maybe I should just back off...not message, stay away...quietly give them back their lives and stay away. But then I worry that to do that might also come across as though I have a problem with them when infact it is the complete opposite which is the problem...I have a problem with me. Such a huge problem with me that I cannot imagine that their lives wouldn't be better off without me in them.
I had the strongest urge to turn my phone and computers off forever. What right do I have to keep on putting this shit, this hell out there on the internet forever for people to stumble upon and read just to drag down their day?
I watched my children play in the backyard yesterday when we got home and I saw the joy they got out of being out there and I suddenly had the strongest thought that I just had to do whatever I could to keep this house...for them. It is a great area, it is a terrific house and block and has everything I want for them. So I brainstormed and tried to work out money and if I can work more, do more...something, anything to give them what they deserve. But I sit here now, typing through tears and I know that it was all just a complete waste of time and energy to even think about it! There is no way we can stay here...the dream is over and we will have to move on. And you know that deep down I know that that will be ok, that eventually it will all be ok. But for one moment in time I wished and dreamed that I wouldn't have to change another thing in my childrens worlds. That they could feel comfortable and safe here without worry...that I could too.
I don't think that I have ever cried so much and so deeply as I have lately...sporadically when alone or when the kids are asleep as they are tonight. Deep, gut wrenching tears unlike any before. Not from the soul and self crushing place of the teenage me when my relationships broke up..but from a more mature and so much more scary and alone place. I hold it together with my friends, I dry my tears and pack away my worries before I pick up the kids. I ask them about their day and I soothe their anxst and their worries, I am more than holding it together at work and focused...with only the occasional zone out moment when alone.....but in the dark of night or when the house is vacant of little bodies it hits me hard. As the Therapist said to me it is not the grief of something I have lost but it is the grief of something which I never had which is tearing me apart..for what I have lost brings relief...but what I do not and never did have....that is the hardest to bare.
The realisation that my people all have someone who thinks about them during the day and longs to be with them at the end of the day and ask about them at the end of the day brings me so much joy for them but so much sorrow at the realisation that I am that person for my children and to an extent they are that for me...but there are things I cannot share with them...there are things that I need to deal with alone.
Sometimes that is just so hard to do :(
To those friends who come to read, whether I know you only through the net or I know you mainly face to face please believe that I mean it when I say through my tears right now that I appreciate you so incredibly much...more than I could ever express but I am also so sorry to have shared this all with you, to have offloaded my worries and pain on you. I am genuinely GENUINELY sorry. As Elizabeth Gilbert replied to her friend in 'Eat Pray Love' when she was reminded of just how much support and love she had at home to get through this stage of her life, "but how much am I giving you?" . What good am I to you right now?
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