I want to be the train wreck

I am sad. I am angry. I am hurting. I am anxious. I don’t know if my anxiety is driving my stress or my stress is driving my anxiety. I want to be nurtured without having to give something back. I don’t have the capacity to give anyone anything. I want a hug to feel like somebody cares. I want to cry and have someone hold my hand.

I went to my son’s music concert recently. Everyone had designated seating due to covid regulations – social distancing – and I was seated next to my ex-husband. My skin was tissue paper thin that day. I was already over the top with stress and anxiety about work and finances and I was not prepared for having to make nice with the man with whom I barely ever have a verbal conversation. I had a trauma response to that situation. It triggered my fear and made me question myself and my choices. I was afraid of just sitting next to him. It’s not normal. I suppressed all emotion at the time, but the next morning, I could feel the fear – it was palpable. It was lurking around in my body. And the sadness came rushing back in – the lost dreams, the hopes that never materialised, the memories of things said and done and how much they wounded and hurt.

I am angry that I have to deal with this. I am angry that this is what I have been dealt. I can’t stop THAT thought from crossing my mind every now and then – I must have done something very bad in this life, or some other life, that I got lumbered with this. The pain of rejection, of not being good enough, of not being enough, of being the source of endless disappointment, of not being able to rely on people, of not being accepted, of not being wanted.

The world is feeling massive and that it is crushing me inexorably. I am trying to make my world small, but even my dark hole, that normally makes me feel safe, is leaving me wanting. I know that things are out of control when I have a meltdown over what time to order pizza and whether it should be eaten on the couch, at the table, at the coffee table or outside. Such trivial things suddenly were impossible to decide. And I have big decisions that I need to make and I am frozen. I don’t know which is the correct one to make and I know that longer I leave it, the worse my situation will be, but I just don’t know what to do.

It was my son’s birthday recently and I cried because I was so worried he would hate his presents. I so desperately didn’t want to disappoint him.

And as I type this I realise that I still would like to have approval from my mother or my ex-husband. I won’t get it. My logical brain knows that. That part of my brain also knows intimately that hoping for it is fruitless. But my heart still hurts and I still wish for it. It’s just stupid that the mind can’t be better at regulating the heart, at burying pain and hurt and betrayal.

I detest Covid and lockdowns and stupid regulations that are pointless. I abhor how it has torn friends and families apart and I am not talking about death. I am talking about people being so driven by fear that they have become insular, exacerbated by huge swathes of them working from home. Friends that I used to speak to and see on a weekly basis, I don’t see for weeks on end and in some cases, months. I miss them so much. But I am trying my best to let them go. To move through the grief process and keep moving forwards without them.

I despise the fact that I have been unable to get a better grip on my mental health. This is not how my life was supposed to look. The temptation to block everything out in some way is so strong. Right now, I resent the fact that my kids need me. I don’t want to be needed. It means I can’t be reckless and do stupid things to try and smother the pain. I was so good at doing that in my 20s. I had it down to a fine art.

I don’t want to be a functional part of society. I want to rebel against it and do stupid and reckless things that can endanger my life. I want to be the train wreck. Maybe it will give me some respite from everything else.