ON THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS - ONE YEAR LATER
“Eva, it seems like you’re doing so much better. Was it your vacation?” - friend
“Yep. Once a week therapy, antidepressants and a vacation seems to have cleared that up.”
You can read where I was at this time last year here: On The Pursuit of Happiness - And a Family Meeting. Basically I had come to the conclusion that things needed to change if I was going to start to feel like myself again. I didn’t really know what that meant, but I did know that I felt so sad and low and most of the time that I didn’t feel capable of doing anything. That every little thing that went wrong sent me into a deep spiral of what felt like well-deserved self-hatred.
The words in my head were: “You messed up. Everyone hates you. You didn’t do that properly. You messed that up. You’ll never get it right. You’re wrong. Why did you say that? Everyone thought that was dumb. You hurt that person with what you did. You suck. You’re the worst. Stop messing everything up. Call Kyle and cry.”
I went to two doctors - one for therapy (Cognitive Behavioural Therapy) and one for medication. They both gave me the same test and told me the exact same thing. What I was defining as anxiety was depression. They told me that being afraid the world was ending was anxiety, but aiming all that anxiety at myself was depression. Then they gave me practical tools to deal with it. I can breathe again. I have a life again.
The thing that defines this best for me now, is that I can parallel park. It’s such a small thing to be able to parallel park. I didn’t start my journey to learn how to park. But when I go to park, I don’t have the words “you’re going to mess this up, everyone’s looking at you, if you can’t even do this you’re a total failure and don’t deserve any friends any more” playing in my head. Now when I go to park and mess it up I say “huh. I should try that again.” and that’s it. The whole innermonologue. I remember the young person who could just do things and thought she was capable. The one who felt worthy even when learning a new skill or making mistakes.
The words haven’t entirely gone away. I am hit with moments where I just feel sad and low. When I make mistakes I start saying those things, but Kyle and I have learned some skills to deal with it better “Eva, what are your hot thoughts?” - a term from my therapist - and I can usually stop.
Both the therapy and drugs were supposed to be temporary. I don’t expect that this is the last time in my life I use therapy and drugs to help me over those types of feelings. But, I have just stopped taking my medication and am flooded with feelings of creativity and I’m excited to experience the overwhelming feelings of Christmas. To really sob through it’s a wonderful life, and make Christmas cards.
It’s a wonderful life
I’m so glad I get to enjoy it again.
On the pursuit of happiness - And a Family Meeting
I haven’t been feeling like myself lately, so Kyle and I held a family meeting to set goals for living our best lives. It includes more people we love, creating + exercise + mental health support and less worrying about jobs and skipping things we love because we’re “too tired.”
One year ago we decided as a family some things needed to change in order to feel true (or really any) happiness again. We took action. I did the work. And I’m here to celebrate that one year later.