Tag Archives: pain

Invisible Choking

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It’s one of those days where I feel like I’m drowning. I try to catch my breath, but I just suck in more “water”. I try to calm myself down, but it seems any little thing makes it feel worse. I hear a notification, and it raises my anxiety. My phone rings, I get irritated. I can’t breathe, and any little thing is constricting around my throat tighter. I’m being invisibly choked and there’s nothing I can do about it. I can just sit here and take it.

rain01A client from yesterday told me “Your life sounds so great! You do what you love, make time for yourself everyday, run races, go hiking and hang out with your dogs all day, and you attracted a pretty amazing dude! It’s because you are awesome and have such a great energy! You live the life I want to someday! You worked hard to get here and it shows!” It was kind of great to hear her say that, but it made me think. She’s right, I do have a pretty amazing life. I did work my ass off to get to where I am. And I train everyday (almost), I have an amazing dude and I do get to spend my days with my dogs. I also put myself in the situation where I am now, and I don’t regret a single thing I’ve done because it has gotten me here. Not here in this physical sense, because I’m in a kind of fucked up situation… but more as in I am who I am because of the choices I’ve made and the lessons I’ve learned. I know where I want to go, and what I want in my life. I mean, I don’t have all the answers, but I have a general idea of what I want and that’s more than most people.

I hurt today. I feel like my life is pretty damn amazing, but I’m anxious (4) and depressed (7) today. My foot really hurts and can’t hold my weight for very long. If I stand up for too long, it sends shooting intense pain through my whole leg. I buck up, I deal with it, I stretch, ice, rest, etc. I’m doing everything I can be doing… but I want more. I want it to be fixed. I’m inpatient and feeling it hardcore today.

Distractions from my stupid ass feelings help. I had a client session where we went to the park and let the dogs socialize in an appropriate way off leash. This was a goal of my clients’ when they first started doing training. We met this goal with one of their dogs, and now we are working on the other one. Tired dogs are happy dogs, which makes me happy a little. I go home, do dog chores, answer social media, emails, voicemails, etc. And then I feel it again. It’s like a looming shadow over me today.

I feel like I’m suffocating from this poisoned cloud of negativity. And I can’t seem to find the positive thoughts anymore. I kept trying all day, but I’m done, I’m exhausted. I’m trying to even find the energy to finish this post, and it’s taken me way longer than it should have because I can’t even find the words. Fade to black because I’m being invisibly choked. Who cares I can’t finish with an actual good conclusive ending paragraph, I’m done.

Love Yourself

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“If I loved myself truly and deeply, would I let myself experience this?”

“If you’ve had a thought once, it has no power over you. Repeat it again and again, especially with emotional intensity, feeling it, and over time, you’re creating a groove, a mental river. Then it controls you.”

“The goal here is to create a groove deeper than the ones laid down over the years – the ones that create disempowering feelings.”

These are all quotes from Kamal Ravidant, “Love Yourself Like Your Life Depends On It”

painPeople who are going through a trauma, or a change, or trying to self improve know who they want to be, but usually they don’t know HOW to do it. How do I be better? Willpower. That’s how. Set goals. Stick to them. Oh, ok. Well, that’s easy…not.

Any action you do can either move you towards or away from your goals. Does this decision help me? How? I used to have self destructive patterns where I would fall into depressive emotional loops for days at a time. How did I stop? I literally refused to do it again. I refused to shut down and give up. Right, but how?

Find a thought. A goal. And stick it in your head. And repeat it. Over and over again. Every time you start down that path, say it out loud. Again and again, even if you don’t believe it. That’s what Kamal did in his book and that’s what I did. I refuse to let stress take over and send me back into those depressive, destructive ways. Those thoughts don’t have a place in my head anymore. Literally, I push them out. Ok, BUT HOW?! Willpower. I focused on that one thought. I made a deep, powerful vow to myself, just like Kamal did. One really late night, I just realized what I needed to do. It just came to me.

My thought was: “I am in control of my own state of mind. I will not let anyone or anything control how I feel or how I act. I am in control of my own life.”

I said this to myself a few times, and then I believed it. My brain works fast; it heals fast, it thinks fast, it works fast. It was like a huge weight was lifted from my shoulders immediately when I started to believe this. I felt free. Peaceful. What is, is. What will be, will be. I don’t control anything besides myself. I let everything else go. Just like that. For the first time in my life, not having any control doesn’t give me anxiety or fear. It just is. I just control my own feelings and my own actions. Nothing else in the world is as important as this. It is empowering to have this feeling, but not in a powerful “I can do anything” way. But more in a tranquil, carefree, zen-like way. I observe others without judgment, I listen without wanting to add my own stories, I enjoy each moment without worrying about what is going to happen or what others think. I just be, and I feel like my soul is a silent lake. No fish under the surface, no ripples, totally still without any interruption. I appreciate the little things more, and see how absolutely amazing the world is and how beautiful every person is.

“Memory is not set in stone. The more you remember something, especially if it’s emotionally charged, the more you will reinforce the pathways connecting the neurons.”

This also goes into something I have learned from years of therapy. Let yourself feel it. The emotions that are brought up in a memory shouldn’t be fought. Let yourself feel those emotions, and then let them go. Cry, be angry, be sad, scream, feel the anxiety, and let it pass. Don’t fight it, just let it go and move on. Take the time, every time (dog training reference). Take the time to understand the feelings, process them, and then ACTUALLY let them go. This is how we grow. Don’t fight or hide them. Fear and fighting always make it worse. Face it, and overcome the emotional block. Think about the emotions, the blocks, the challenge or whatever it is that is handicapping you, and ask yourself if it is real. Most of the time, it is our mind making it into something much bigger than it is. Let yourself take a step back and see the problem, then make a decision. Don’t get caught up in the ‘I don’t know what to do, I don’t know what’s going to happen’ trap. Make a decision and move forward, or you will be in the same destructive pattern, and you won’t ever let go or process. Things don’t ‘just happen’ or ‘work out’, that’s not how the world works. When the mind is left to itself (dog training reference again), it repeats the same stories, memories and thoughts. Most of the time, these don’t serve us and get us stuck in yet another loop. Get out of the loop. The only way to get out is to fully commit with as much intensity as you can to your truth. Or your vow. Or whatever it is.

Easier said than done, but if you really want to change, you can do this. Set your goal, repeat it. Believe it. It worked for me, and I love myself. I love my life, and I love the world I live in. Because I choose to.

Endless Spiral of Emotions

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Sometimes, even after having a good day, the day was bad.

I’m going to try to use my ‘I feel words’ as my therapist liked to say…

I feel like nothing.

I feel like everything inside me is breaking.

I feel like I shouldn’t exist on this world.

I’m a waste of space and resources.

I’m not good enough.

I can try to be the best I can be, but I will never amount to anything.

I just want the world to ignore me. Just let me be. Don’t bother talking to me.

I feel alone in the whole, wide world. Just let it eat me.

I feel like inside, I am dying. In my head, I’m drowning. It won’t end though. It’s like I’m undead inside, so the pain continues. Forever.

It won’t stop. It’s a monster inside me, laughing while I am drowning in my own sorrow.

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http://quotes-lover.com/picture-quote/i-was-once-sad-and-lonely-having-nobody-to-comfort-me-si-wore-a-mask-that-always-smiled-to-hide-my-feelings-behind-a-lie/Yes, I know people love me. Yes I know I will be missed if I cease to exist. Yes, I know some people will be angry for me writing this. I KNOW. But that doesn’t make the pain go away. It doesn’t make it any easier.

It’s hard to talk. It’s hard to breathe. A weight is just pushing me down into the ground, and no one notices but me. I still have to put on my happy face and ‘be ok for society.’ because people don’t know how to handle someone who is suffering internally.

I don’t want to do anything. I don’t want to sleep. I don’t want to read, or eat, or play a video game. I just want to do nothing. So instead, I’m typing this. Somehow, it seems to help. I’m forced to do something. So, the tears fall, and I type.

What started this today?  The feeling of realizing how much farther I have to go, and how big my dreams really are. How much work I have ahead of me. Realizing how much life I have to live with. My life isn’t even near being over. I have so much left to live. ‘You are young, you have time’ they say. No one realizes this means the shadow over me just got even bigger. It seems like it won’t ever end. Because if I keep on living, so will this monster, this cancerous thing inside me. It was hungry, so it took what little happiness I had, and ate it. Now, It feels like I’m back to my ‘normal’ self – empty.

The pain, the feeling of being alone, the dealing with it, the breathing, the studying, the working, the…the living. And then, I feel guilty for thinking that way. Because my friends and family wouldn’t want me to think that way. So, now, I’m feeling hopeless and guilty. Great. Just one more thing. I can’t handle all these negative emotions. And to ‘think positive’ on top of it all. It’s all just too much. Wow.. there’s the emotion I was missing… overwhelmed. Fucking wonderful.

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And I get to do it all again tomorrow…

Soothe My Pain

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This blog is how depression feels. Physical pain, emotional drowning. You are alone, and along for the ride. The only thing that ends the suffering… is the one thing we can’ do.

Backstory

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A story about my life, and the struggles I am currently facing. It’s difficult because my life would be out there for everyone to see. But… maybe it will help people who also struggle with depression and/or have gone through a personal trauma.

Now, about me. I was diagnosed with clinical depression at the end of 2010. At the time,
there were quite a few traumatic events that took place leading up to a nervous breakdown, and eventually ended up with me at the therapist…because I tried to kill myself. Since then, I have realized I have always been depressed, though unable to accurately describe how I was feeling. I felt I had no reason to feel that way, and felt guilty because I was unhappy and sad when I should have been feeling happy and grateful for my life.

Since then, I have been medicated, gone through talk therapy, done self-improvement
programs, and discussed feelings. Some of it was effective, but when I was drugged, I was
numb. Instead of feeling sad and worthless, I felt nothing. I welcomed the lack of
feelings for a while, but then I felt like an empty shell of a person, just being a zombie
– going through the motions, but not really feeling anything.

In March of 2011, my husband and I adopted a gorgeous yellow lab, who is now a member of our family. He has helped me so much, and I can talk to him without feeling judged, lost, or walk like I’m on eggshells.
People don’t understand. When I open up and actually tell someone how I feel, they get
defensive or say ‘Don’t feel like that’, ‘Don’t talk like that’, ‘You know I love you’, or
‘You have friends you can talk to. Just talk it out.’. Yeah, well – because I haven’t
tried those before, right? Well, my dog doesn’t tell me those things. He just rests his
big head on my lap and licks my hand. In my world, he’s telling me that he understands and wants
me to know he’s there for me. With no words. He understands, and with just one look at me,
takes some of the pain away. He has become a crutch, and I depend on him to be there for me when I get home.

Napoleon

We thought about training him as a therapy dog. But his personality isn’t the right fit.
That’s alright, he’s still my crutch at home. I just can’t take him with me on trips or to
work or the grocery store. I just have to hold on until I get home and I’m with him again.

I love my husband, and I have talked to him about all my feelings. But again, there’s a
difference between a dog and a human. It’s not that I love him less, it’s that it’s
different. He tries to be supportive, but doesn’t understand how painful it is to be alive sometimes. When I try to tell him that, he gets upset. He doesn’t understand. We have been working through it, and he is trying to learn more about depression. He wants to try therapy again. Last time, my therapist wanted to talk about my childhood. I don’t want to
talk about it. There are a few reasons for that, which I won’t get into. Not yet.

This blog is about handling my depression and how I have/will overcome challenges. Right
now, I am in the process of opening up my dog training business. It has always been my
passion, and I am finally doing it. I am a ‘baby’ in this field, but I want to learn
everything there is to know, and become great in every aspect. I want to handle any
problem, any dog, and have any discussion (this includes the incredibly difficult
discussion of euthanasia). I want to be great, not just an average trainer.

Some of the challenges my husband and I have faced over last year have been trying on our marriage, on my career, and on my sanity. And I don’t exaggerate when I say ‘sanity’. We bought a new house in 2010 and had massive flooding problems. In 2012, we believed we had completely fixed the problem since we didn’t have problems for over a year. We struggled for 2 years to fix the problem, and rebuild 1/2 our home. Finally, we rebuilt and laid down new carpet. We refurnished our home – almost every piece of furniture in our house was bought new. We were finally done. This constant stress point put my stress levels and ability to deal with anything else at an ultimate high. For the last two years, this chapter of my life has been a constant struggle and pain point. Above that, we dealt with death, broken promises to each other, and loss of work.

This blog is going to be personal, challenging, and a journey for me. I hope that in writing this blog, I won’t be judged or seen any differently. For those of you who already know me, some of what I post will be a shock. I’m putting it out there, I’m not hiding anymore.