I’ve carried this for years

Photo by Ina RH on Unsplash

I think a lot.

A lot.

About everything.

Everything.

It is exceptionally difficult to turn my brain off.

I will unwind the why of something until it’s been ground to dust, rebuild it and then unwind it again.

In a recent set of spirals, I’ve been trying to figure out why 40 year old me feels like the majority of these behaviors I exhibit would be more fitting of someone far younger than I. An example I’d use is my near inability to regulate my emotions in any kind of safe, or appropriate capacity when it comes to things involving just me.

The more I think about this the more I feel like there’s a crater-sized chunk of me missing. Who am I? Some broken 40-year old that has ~30 years of everything all pent up, needed to have his hand broken in order to have his mind broken open and crushed? I didn’t have a say in any of this, nor was I able to react in any kind of appropriate manner, though let’s be honest I probably wouldn’t have reacted appropriately. And perhaps that is what hurts the most out of all of this.

This most certainly isn’t my first bout with depression, anxiety, spiraling uncontrollably, black/white thinking, splitting, etc. Though it definitely is the first time it’s lasted months instead of days and shows no signs of letting up. I’d also argue that even the bouts that only lasted a few days I never, ever dealt with properly. Though the more I think about it, not dealing with things properly is pretty much par for the course in my life and just typing that tears me up.

The more I think about this, the more I feel like my life has been…a waste isn’t the right word…missed out on? I never really could grasp what people meant when they said that they weren’t really sure who they were, until now.