The Art of Pretending You are Fine.

If you look at me you will probably think that I am okay. I look pretty put together. In reality, I am far from okay. Sure I get up and go to work every day but I do not want to be there. I have a good life. I have a good family and I love my friends. I like my job and enjoy it but I would rather be somewhere else. Where that somewhere else is I do not know. I was always good at running away.

I know that it's not going to be any different, nothing has changed. Nothing will change, it will always be this way. For a long time, I felt like I was coming up short all of the time. I sometimes still think that I am coming up short. I always hated taking so I always gave. I gave way more than I could possibly take. I wake up and it breaks my heart. I wonder where is that girl that I was last year, two years ago? What would she think of me now? Would she think I made the right choice? Am I becoming the one person I hoped I wouldn't?

I recently discovered that I am tired of being a person, not just tired of the person who I was but any person at all. I'm not going to do anything about it but it's the truth. I began to forget myself in the middle of sentences. I get told that if you want to be happier you have to try but I did try I am trying I have tried every day for the past 1o years. I am just so tired. I am not doing well but I am not doing well in a typical way. I can get dressed and go to work and act like nothing is going on but once I get home, I don't want to leave. I know that me being not okay has been worse but it's not the best. At some point, I realized that no one deserves this but I did not include myself in the anyone part.

If you keep storing that anger and grief. Eventually, it spills over or you will drown in it. I don't really talk about what happened. I look at old photos and believe it is still happening. it affects you differently once you realize that you may not be normal ever again. I just repeat that tomorrow will be a better day over and over again till I might actually believe it. Maybe someday I will believe it.

I knew I was getting depressed again when I stopped doing the things I once loved. I noticed that I have been doing that recently. I stopped going to therapy because I knew my therapist was right and I wanted to keep being wrong. I wanted to keep my bad habits like charm bracelets. I did not want to be brave. I think I like my brain best in a bar fight with my heart. I think I like myself a little broken. I'm okay if that makes me less loved. I like writing better anyway. It healed me more than therapy. So I get up and feel a little sad and get to get on with my day while feeling a little awful. I haven't fully given up yet. I know that things might get better. I am most likely going to be okay in the long run. I have faith that everything is going to turn out okay in the end. I am very good at pretending though so I guess that counts for something.