sea change

If I were braver, I'd get a nagivator's star - a compass rose - tattooed on my shoulder, to remind me that no matter how lost I am, I will eventually find my way.

I haven't yet; I'm still struggling, reeling. I suppose I have hope, though it's not really what it feels like at this point. More numb acceptance that I can't just quit, so I need to muddle a way through.

I think the hardest part right now isn't feeling as if this has taken over my whole life, but realizing it's been in control of my life for a very long time - I've been in the driver's seat, but not as much as I should have been.

I feel as if I'm spinning, and have nothing to grab hold of - nothing to reel me in and stop me from going in circles and cycles. Constantly questioning my emotions - are they real, or a figment? Am I upset, or will this fall away in a few hours as well?

I've been so angry...for the last few years, I suppose. I took it out on whomever was in my direct path - I was...irrational about the people I loved; both in the way I treated them, and what I expected from them. I pushed away the people who were the closest to me for no real reason that I can fathom, except perhaps fear.

Even now, I lash out and get angry and upset...and it's gone by the next day. It's disconcerting, and upsetting - sometimes it's gone within minutes, and I'm left trying to take deep breaths in between the tears, and I don't understand any of it. Jacob's gotten...the worst of it, really. I suppose because there's some mechanism in place to keep me from showing this to my family - he's the person I can be most honest with, and of course that means he ends up dealing with almost all of the hard moments. I won't say the worst moments - I refuse to let anyone see those, still. I have a hard enough time getting through them without trying to let anyone in.

I've been very up for the last day or two...today especially. Not really happy, per se, but just up...energetic, fun to be around (today), laughing and making jokes. There's a hollowness to it, but I accept it for what it is right now - a day that's better than the rest, even if it's not...normal. Although honestly, I currently have no concept of normal.

I think...the best thing I've realized over the last few days is that despite what anyone else's expectations of me - and of what I should be doing in the next month or two - may be, mine are somewhat more important. I told Jacob that if I need the time to finally get this in order, to finally take the time and the opportunity to get control of this, I'm going to take it. Regardless of what anyone else might expect, if I need to do this to get...back to where I was during the few periods of normalcy...I will. And I'll take however much time I might need to do so.

That might be the first truly positive thought I've had in awhile. The first commitment I've made to actually fighting. It scares me to think how tired I've become, and how little I want to fight. The last 24 hours or so have held a few simple pleasures - a few small things to look forward to - and right now, maybe that's enough to keep going until I have another incentive to keep going, and another. You can't live because other people want you to - you have to find reasons of your own. I'm working on remembering what mine were, deciding which are still valid for me, and finding new reasons. Tired as I am, and as hard as this is and as much as I feel like nothing more than a miniature waterfall lately, I'm...getting ready to fight again.


Everyone thinks of a sea change as incredibly fast - a mere instant in time. It's...not.

The original meaning was...a change brought about by the sea, not a change occurring in the sea itself. Something gradual and slow; something that right now, I can relate to.

"Nothing of him that doth fade
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange. "

At this moment in time, I'm learning to accept that might be what I need...