You know, I don’t think I’ve discussed it much, but I have battled addiction and mental illness all my life.
I didn’t realize that I was battling mental illness til I nearly lost the battle when I was 26. I had my first “breakdown” at that point in my life. I was doing much like I am now, busting ass, working two jobs (three, really, if you count taking care of my best friend/sister’s son) and burnin that candle at both ends while holding a third flame in the middle…it’s that third flame that will get ya. Often you don’t know it’s there, you’re so busy concentrating on the ends that you don’t realize that the middle is getting weak…and there in lies the rub, and often the break.
Anyway. At 26, they diagnosed me as being bipolar. (after ruling out several other things…they just don’t take the time to do that these days in my mind. My truest diagnosis came over time, not in an hour long session). For those wondering, since then I have had some personality disorders tagged on in there…the hardest one to deal with being BPD…(borderline personality disorder…it’s not what you think it is, look it up) and probably the most common three being OCD, PTSD, and ODD.
I have been in and out of treatment, in and out of psychiatric units since then.
Around 3 years ago, I discovered my current Psychologist and Psychiatrist. (Both, people, both, are necessary evils in my mind…to clear up any confusion…A Psychologist is a counselor, a Psychiatrist is a a doctor). I credit them with saving my life. To anyone and anything. They absolutely saved my damn life.
My dog saved my life once as well….my Rebel, the love of my life, indeed did. Not actively, but he gave me a reason to live. Much as my Sugar bear has now.
I have friends that are very much life savers as well. Some I have walked out on so many times it’s stupid, yet they forgive me time and time again. Those are the ones I love most. The ones that let me have my meltdowns, my tantrums, my doubts, and are right there waiting when I get back.
I tell you all that to tell you this…
I have struggled with something else in my life, as well that has proven over and over to be a true life saver…
My faith.
My chosen religion…yeah…shocker. I’ve established that I am not Christian…in fact, I’m not actively religious at all to tell the truth. I don’t go to church. I don’t worship traditionally. I do pray however. But not as anyone else does, of that I’m sure. Instead…I will look to the sky and throw up a prayer in the hopes that someone..anyone, will grab it, listen to it, and help me with it.
And yet….
I very much put my faith in myself more than anything else. I rarely let me down. The biggest place I let me down, and the biggest part of me that lets me down, is this heart of mine. It has piss poor judgement, it does.
Something you might not know though…
I tend to fall in love hard when I fall at all…and no matter what I say…I’ll keep doing so. I will never learn my lesson, because I know there is someone out there that will love just as hard as I do.
I don’t want to jinx it…but I have been very very cautiously tip toeing around the edge of the dating pool again. There is someone. I’ve been in those waters…up to my neck a couple of times with him…and pulled back a bit to shallow waters…never completely stepping out of the pool…but afraid to baptize myself completely in those waters.
He’s different…not as intense as others have been. He lets me pull back. Hell, he pulls back himself sometimes…but over the past month, we’ve been wading around hand in hand together, occasionally pulling on each other, guiding each other to the deep end, testing it, then mutually walking slowly back to more comfortable depths.
What’s this all got to do with saving lives? Or faith, or religion? Or my psych problems? Because My Gods and Goddesses, my Mother Earth, My friends, My familiars (yes..make no mistake they have been familiars), my Doctors, and now him, all have one thing in common…they’ve all waited for me to realize how much I need them in my life.
Song of the day…(it’s back.)
For The Life of Me 