I looked in the mirror but couldn’t recognize this girl anymore. I don’t know where it all started, whether it was the bullies, the booze, the joint or lying on my back every weekend. I guess in the end they all link up, despite where it all started. I hated my life, but loved the attention, the zero responsibility, the freeness and the escape that I found. It was never real, but I still felt overwhelmed with emotions, like I was living and feeling everything at once. I was in a fantasy land that I created, but even though I created it, I didn’t know the chick that came along for the ride, who talked my talk and acted in my body. 

In the end it all had to stop, I had to wake up and come back to reality. Be a grown up, be responsible and live life normally, but this was easier said then done. I was so caught up in Narnia that I couldn’t find the door back into the wardrobe where it all started. Consequences were consequences and as real as they were in reality, in my fantasy land they could be blocked with a big bottle of booze or a night with a stranger. 

I shoved all my emotions in Pandora’s box,  that was the best way to feel nothing, see nothing and hear nothing. If there was nothing there, then I did not have to deal with anything did I. 

That’s the timeline of depression isn’t it? You feel secretly overwhelmed, frustrated, pissed off, stressed or simply tired. Then one thing after another adds to the pile, until its too late and the pot boils over. Everyone is too busy to slow down, and know when to stop. We are all too proud to admit we aren’t coping, because then we would be failures in our own and other peoples eyes. Anyway that’s how I saw it. I’ve always been to stubborn to admit that I need help, which makes me independent, but also makes me lonely. 

It’s been 9+ years now and still counting. It gets easier each day, but ten steps forward can easily equal ten steps back. I still have blindness in my life, EVERYDAY, but I am grateful to see the world and what it really is.  To start to understand that it is real, but what it was in the past definitely wasn’t.