Also, so much drama in my life these days. I'm going to try and fail to expunge some of the angst by writing about it.
One of my college-aged daughters has a friend. Actually, she has a lot of friends, and I am fortunate enough to hear about them on a regular basis. It makes me happy that she still talks to me! Anyway, she has a group of friend at school and one of them is having a rough time. He has a number of mental issues severe enough require medication and his girlfriend just dumped him out of the clear blue. So back down to the sewer he goes.
I've been praying for this kid for about as long as my daughter has known him. He has always seemed pretty fragile to me. I spent an hour creeping his Facebook page last night and my heart was just breaking by the end of it. Why should this seemingly bright, talented, adorable young man should be in such pain that his friends are scared for him?
But hey, I've been there. Maybe that's why it rabbit-punched me like that. I've been there. I imagine I'll be there again, although I pray not. It's such a grueling place to be.
Then the pain gets generalized. How many people do I know that are hurting? I've met this kid once. Yes, I've prayed for him, which denotes a relationship of sorts, but I really don't know him that well. How many people I do know are crumpled up inside, losing ground in their struggle, or feeling weighed down? And what can I do about it? In the end, what can I really do to help? Because it doesn't take much for me to go plummeting too, and there I am, back on the bottom again, struggling up the long hill, pushing a millstone ahead of me.
Why am I writing all of this? Who knows? Part of it is concern for my daughter and her friends and the daughters and sons of my friends as they grow up and move away from us. How easy it is to listen to the siren song of the world and feel ourselves unequal to the cares of life.
Part of it is my own continuing attempts to make something of myself. Outwardly, I look like your average American housewife. I am grateful to be here, looking that good, believe me. But inside I'm still fighting to get back to where I was ten or eleven years ago when my fabulous, thriving life took an abrupt tumble.
I'm so tired of fighting.
Maybe that's part of what scares me for Andrew. Maybe that's why I reacted to the news of Robin Williams' suicide with a surge of fear. Because I am tired. Of fighting. So very tired. It would be so easy to just let the tides of my mind take me along until they submerge and drown me. No more fighting. No more pain.
I don't want that for Andrew. I don't want that for myself. But some days it just costs so much to fight. And I have to wonder: is it really worth the struggle?
2 comments:
We all get tired of the fight, some of us more so than others. You know you're not alone in the fight and that someday there will be sweet rest. In the meantime we keep on fighting. Because WE ARE STRONG! I know. Sometimes we get tired of being strong, of HAVING to be strong. Fortunately we have friends who talk us through these times, even when they're feeling the same say. We got this, girlfriend.
I too sink into fits of depression and just wanting to say to hell with it all. Those days, I ponder running away, I cry, I pitch a fit. Sometimes these days are months... Especially this time of year. When the skies are grey, I sink further into myself. And I kick myself for it and I am so ashamed. Part of that is peeling back my own perfectionism and realizing that I am, indeed, okay - even if I am totally and utterly depressed.
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