every time

i haven’t felt this breathless sadness in a while. it’s been anger, pain, or numbness lately. but tonight it’s hot, streaming tears that remind me i have skin that feels, and it’s tight, quick gasps that remind me i have lungs that work. and i’m grateful to have those things, but i wipe the tears on a duvet he never saw and i exhale into a pillow he never used on a mattress he never tried in a room where he never snored and never will because he’s gone and can’t come back but i have to keep going and pretending and trying and forgetting and remembering and hurting and comparing and regretting and crying and crying and crying

whenever i feel like this i don’t know what to do with it. i know i’m not supposed to do anything with it. there are no rules. but it’s so uncomfortable and painful that i guess i want to make something out of it. which i guess i am by writing this. but i also wonder (every time) whether this is my come-to-jesus moment yet. if this is my moment where i figure it out. where i realize it’s horrible and sad but now i can pack it away for good. or where i realize it’s horrible and sad but now i am going to do x about it and that will define my life forever.

but (every time) i realize it’s horrible and sad and now i am going to try to get through the night and hopefully i can get out of bed tomorrow. and for some reason that reaction disappoints me and it compounds how upset i am. the coping fatigue sets in along with the self-loathing and i don’t want to ground myself or unwind my spiraling thoughts or walk back my generalizations. i refuse to add “but i know it’s fine to just get through the night” or “but i know not all pain turns into purpose” or whatever.

it’s a special type of self-harm that, once the fog clears, makes me think of an obstinate toddler who decides to throw a tantrum because they don’t have a green crayon to draw the sky. it’s an exhausting, absurd negotiation that should have ended thirty minutes ago with, “the sky is blue and you have a blue crayon.”

i have depression and my therapist has given me SO MANY depression crayons why not USE THEM wow this post TOOK A TURN good thing this blog is COMEDIC