Tag: reflection

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Update on Life

The last few months have flown by and I can’t believe how much summer has already passed. I’m a few days shy of my first ever summer vacation while working in Korea. It’s absolutely wild to think that I had normalized getting 5 working days of vacation + Chuseok + Seollal every year for almost 5 years.

My dear friends and long-time readers probably know that I started a new job in March (well, technically mid-February… but officially I was supposed to start in March). So far, this job has been such a positive change from where I was before. I have established a steady schedule that balances work and life outside of work well. I don’t feel as if my non-work hours are consumed by work drama anymore. This could be due in part to me having an established social life outside of work and there is not nearly as much drama as my previous workplace.

Life’s been treating me well. The battles I have with anxiety and depression are no longer as daunting as they were a year prior. I recognize that I have come such a long way from the place I was in last summer. I barely recognize the person that I was then. Getting to a better mental space has done so much for so many aspects of life. Here are a few that I have noticed drastic differences in.

Sleep has always been difficult for me. With diagnosed insomnia, I used to rely on an Ambien prescription to get me to sleep. In Korea, doctors really do try to shove a pill in every problem. They have a long way to go until they reach effective mental healthcare. However, getting me the Ambien prescription saved my life. I was on it for over a year. With the guidance of my doctor, I no longer take any prescription sleep medication. I will say that the number of hours of sleep has gone down to maybe 5 or 6 hours, but I know the quality of sleep and the way I feel when I wake up are drastically different. I wake up feeling mostly refreshed and like I can tackle a day. Before, on Ambien, I would feel dread and absolutely no energy to get ready or even walk the dogs.

Physical activity has gone way up! There was a period of about 10 months in 2020 where I didn’t track any of my physical activity or wear my Apple watch. Depression is a real bitch and it just makes you stop caring about those basic things that keep you healthy. I started wearing my watch again at the end of 2020 (around November) and have noticed a general upward trend in physical activity. I have been meeting my exercise, movement, step, and stand goals every day. This may not seem very difficult to the disciplined gym goer, and I admit that old me (pre-COVID me) would not have found this impressive. But I’m proud that I’m moving my body enough every day.

My pets also seem happier because I am spending more time being present with them. During the worst of the depression, I would take them on walks where I would be completely detached from what I was doing. I went through the movements, picked up their shit, and came back inside. I can’t say every walk isn’t like that, but I am experiencing so much more awareness while I am outside with the dogs. I have also begun to work in structured play time with the cat!

There are still difficult days and days where I don’t feel like I’m all the way present. I continue to work through those days and I try my best not to believe that little voice in my head telling me all of this work is for nothing.

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Productivity Shame

2020 was a rough year for a lot of people. A lot of us experienced disruptions in our professional and personal lives. This disruption has forced so many people to work in their homes. It’s also forced people out of their jobs. While I was lucky to not experience much of either of these things, I have recently caught myself in a negative feedback loop. In this loop, I constantly berate myself for a lack of “productivity.” This lack of productivity I’ve been experiencing has been through an active choice to embrace stillness by taking a school term off before jumping into a new job at a new school here in Daegu, South Korea.

I started out 2021 thinking of all of the changes that I have experienced in the last year. I thought about how many things I have completely turned around and I was able to give myself a few pats on the back. But why did I still end up feeling so shitty on most days? Why was I constantly feeling shame for not “doing enough” during my days?

I feel that the reason I am able to clearly see the mechanism in which productivity shaming truly brings a person down is due to the fact that I simply don’t have many obligations at this moment in time. Therefore, any “productiveness” that I perceive is necessary is actually not necessary at all. I literally have nothing that I have to do besides eat, walk the dogs, feed the dogs and cat, and clean the cat’s litter box. Technically, if I wanted to lay in bed all day and sleep, I had no obligations to stop me. Yet, I found myself feeling tired, hopeless, and full of self hatred.

I began to go into productivity overdrive a few weeks back. I scheduled every hour of my day to include some kind of activity. I started working out, studying Korean, walking the dogs 5 times a day, and reading. I even planned out exactly when I was going to prepare my meals and how long my meals must take. The first day was great. I finished everything. I felt this little high off of my accomplishments. I proceeded to try to pack the next day in the same way. While I succeeded, I found myself absolutely drained and exhausted from all of the hours I was devoting to studying and working out.

Ten or so days passed and I woke up this past Wednesday and felt absolutely hopeless. I was doing so many things, but I didn’t want to do any of them that day. I let my alerts on my watch and phone ring. Every time I swiped them away, I felt like a piece of crap. Feeling exhausted was getting to me. My insomnia was and still has been out of control. I was running on 4 hours of sleep every day and not allowing myself to rest was catching up to me. Yet, that Wednesday was not restful. I laid in bed, awake, frustrated and full of self-hate. Why couldn’t I just get my lazy ass up and do the stuff I’ve been doing every day?

I had completely depleted myself and instead of allowing myself to take a break on reaching these expectations, I mentally berated myself for being a “failure.” The guilt and the belief that you are not enough can be extremely taxing. That Wednesday stretched onto Thursday. Somewhere between Thursday and today, I finally figured out why I was “stuck” in this loop. I was setting expectations and goals that were so specific and grueling that I was setting myself up for failure.

You see, productivity shaming is an internal battle you fight with your perfectionist self. The self that sets these goals doesn’t have “happy, healthy, balanced” you in mind. It has the “cracked out, stressed, gotta survive” you in mind. It pushes you to the limit because perfectionist you was created under extreme scrutiny and stress. Your perfectionist self has served you well, and has likely helped you in many of your successes. However, the reality is that we can’t always be in “perfectionist” or “go, go, go” mode.

On Wednesday, when I woke up with the “fuck this and everything on the list” feeling, my mind and body was telling me, “Girl, it’s time to go easy on yourself today.” The checklists and reminders from perfectionist me were there to remind me of how I continue to set unrealistic goals for myself despite how badly I feel when I don’t meet them.

So, between Thursday and this moment, I’ve been working out how I can reconcile these parts of me. I reminded myself that it’s ok to not do everything on my checklist down to the amount of time I have allotted. I began to adjust my tasks from having allotted time slots to simply being a loose list of things that I’ll attempt during the day. I also broke down my list into “obligations” and “desires.” The obligations were simply to get out of the house twice a day for at least 30 minutes each time to walk the dogs. I tried to keep each of the lists manageable.

On Friday, I woke up in a pain flare-up from a condition I was diagnosed with a few years back. It’s called interstitial cystitis, which causes bladder pain/UTI-like symptoms in the absence of any actual infection. There’s limited knowledge on the condition and after many tests and scans, I was diagnosed with it based off of the fact that I was not diagnosed with other conditions that exhibit similar symptoms. I often have pain flare-ups during especially depressive/anxious times, and it’s just icing on the cake. I remember thinking to myself, “Wow, is my body trying to tell me something?”

I recently saw a quote on Instagram that said something along the lies of, “If you’re guilting and shaming yourself while you are resting, then it isn’t really rest. If you feel exhausted after resting, then that’s a sign that you weren’t truly resting at all.” It’s definitely not the exact quote, but the gist of it is there. My body was telling me, “Girl, you aren’t resting enough. You aren’t giving your body what it needs while you can and your mind is making yourself feel like shit while you’re telling yourself to rest.”

If anyone else can relate to a chronic feeling of not “doing enough” please reach out. I’d love your insight on how you deal with this never-ending feeling that you should be busy with something at all times. How do I embrace stillness and rest? How do I get the most out of it when my mind/body seems to reject simple acts of rest such as sleep?

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Goodbye 2020 – Please be nice 2021

Another year, and I have had so many ideas for posts in my drafts that I don’t know where to begin. Let’s start off this post by saying, “Good riddance, 2020.”

So much about my life has changed since Goodbye 2019. I would say that nearly every aspect of normal life has changed for me. For the worst or for the better? I have no idea, but it definitely has been a year of growth, and self-love.

2020 is the year that I learned how to put myself first. It’s the year I decided to put down all of the “responsibilities” and expectations that I have for myself and others. It’s the year that I decided that I am unapologetically a person that suffers from anxiety and depression. While I became much more accepting of this part of me, I also learned how to allow for these parts of me to take a backseat for once.

Things I Quit in 2020

  1. After an on-and-off relationship with my job, I finally decided to part ways and start fresh in a new city. Toward the middle of the year, I realized that my job was no longer serving me. I spent my days drowning in toxic and unprofessional work environments that sucked the joy out of the very thing that I came back for. Once I was able to reflect and pinpoint exactly what I didn’t need from this job, moving on was easy. I will always be grateful for the opportunities I received and the connections I made during my time with my old job. Walking away from some of the most amazing people I have ever had the chance to work with tore me apart, but putting me first is the theme of 2020, and this was the biggest thing that had to go.
  2. One of the biggest skills that I acquired during 2020 were boundaries. I have written a lot about setting boundaries in other posts, such as Boundaries, but actually setting boundaries and maintaining them is a whole different story. I started doing this toward the first half of the year by stepping away from the draining work responsibilities of the “Head Instructor” title. Realizing that no amount of financial gain was worth sacrificing my sanity for was a boundary that I was able to set between me and my employer. Maintaining those boundaries was equally as challenging. It’s hard for people to accept restrictions that were not previously imposed upon them.
  3. I also quit carrying my baggage into my relationships. I wouldn’t say that I am a complete master at this by any means. This is still new. My previous relationship ending in early 2020 definitely revealed a great need for me to learn how to handle my baggage. I learned that it was important to be able to communicate that I had baggage and may need some help with holding it at times. I learned healthy ways to communicate that and how to reach out to loved ones in the event that the baggage was becoming too heavy.

Things I Gained in 2020

  1. Butterscotch. My dear, sweet, Butterscotch. For those that do not know this, Butterscotch is my foster failure cat. I spent most of this year denying that I was falling in love with this cat. He fell into my arms in early April when he was a 5 week old baby. I tried my best not to get too attached but I think that first month was critical for him. After a few foster homes, he came back into my home and claimed his place in mid-September. Oops.
  2. This year, I gained pieces of myself that I thought I had permanently lost. Somehow, amidst a pandemic, I learned how to have fun again. I learned how to enjoy the company of others on my terms. I gained many new connections and maintained others from the previous year. It has made me excited for a life post-COVID-19. I can’t imagine what that will look like anymore, but I’m looking forward to it.
  3. Lastly, I have gained a deeper understanding of what a healthy and sustainable romantic partner can look like. Although, currently, the state of my romantic relationship is rather fresh. I am learning how at ease I can feel with someone. I’m learning what it feels like to not fear that my partner will wake up one day and decide that they don’t want to deal with my shit anymore. Sure, I carry some of that fear from my past and sometimes it does exhibit itself in my present. However, through therapy and a lot of self-reflection, I am able to separate and understand what is “baggage” and what is an actual legitimate concern.

I was recently told by my therapist that she thinks that I am getting close to ending or tapering off therapy. I remember feeling panicked when I heard this, because… what do I do without therapy? Well, I guess I do what I’ve already been doing. I apply the things I learned, and I process things that come up. One step at a time.

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Late Night Thoughts – I’ve Learned Stuff

TW: Discussion of suicidal thoughts and ideations.

Some days when I think I’ve reached my breaking point, life just says, “Nah, girl, I can drag you so much lower. Just watch me.” These days I feel as if no matter how horrible things go, or no matter how low my moods get, I can’t seem to reach the bottom. It’s not to say that I don’t ever feel like quitting… it’s that I am constantly in the state of “I quit,” or “I have quit.”

These days, I’ve been in a constant low. I don’t have energy for much other than going to and from work. I don’t recognize myself in the mirror. I don’t want to make time for anything… not even myself. A few sessions ago, my therapist urged me to take a day to myself to just rest. I did that same day, and I felt great… but awful afterward.

What the fuck am I doing? Laying around like a useless sack of shit? There are people dying in America of COVID, and you want to “rest” and “take care of yourself?!” How first-world of you!

I berate myself constantly and bully myself into believing that I am not worth the self-care. That my shit isn’t as bad as other people’s shit so I should just be grateful. Doesn’t matter though, I still feel like a sack of shit, even if I am grateful that I have the luxury of life and feeling things. I guess it’s a luxury that it’s not my life I’m fighting for but just the feeling of the inevitable rock bottom I seem to keep discovering. A new kind of low that keeps telling me, “Don’t worry, hun, this is the worst that it’ll get,” but somehow still seems to keep dragging me further down.

When I read back on what I’ve typed, I know what this all is. Another depressive episode. Episode. It sounds so temporary and like a “phase,” but I can’t imagine any other way to live. It’s like I live in a fog where I function almost perfectly “fine” in all of society’s definitions of fine. I productively contribute to society, I read up about what is wrong with the world, I have some level of passion for things, and I continue to do what’s necessary to be alive. All of this, while I don’t feel like I’m here for any of it. All of this while I feel like I’m not really “alive” for any of this.

I realize that this sounds pretty horrible. I realize that this is a huge downer for anyone that knows me to read. I used to really care about not burdening others with my shit. It got to the point where all of the people that I called my “best friends” didn’t actually know that I sometimes thought about throwing myself into the Mississippi River, or taking too many pain killers. I was so terrified that someone would somehow find out about these secret thoughts of mine and throw me into the hospital. Lock me up. I was scared shitless of being labeled as the “fragile” or “special” one in the family. So I’d zip my lips, push the thoughts away, and continue to function.

So what has that taught me?

  1. This all comes at a price. That price is years of functioning at max capacity only to watch everything kind of fall apart while the real you is watching from a distance. You can’t say that it wasn’t your fault, but your therapist is trying to tell you it wasn’t your fault. When blaming yourself is second nature, unlearning it all doesn’t just happen. I was taught to be successful, productive, and do everything “right” the first time. The realization that my upbringing has caused so much pain and suffering at this very moment is a hard pill to swallow, because I watched my wonderful parents toil away to give me everything they thought I needed. I had every material thing I could ever want at the price of self-compassion.
  2. Shit just happens and no one needs to be assigned “fault.” This really just applies because I’ve spent countless years blaming myself for things that no one else blamed me for. Every decision or word that’s ever come out of me… down to things I said that one time in band in the 11th grade. Stupid shit. Countless stupid little things that sometimes just come back to haunt me so that I can assign the blame to myself. It’s taken 29 years for me to learn that not everything has to be my fault. Or anyone’s fault. What the fuck is fault?
  3. This whole damn time, I was enough. I’m not sure where the hell I got the idea that I wasn’t. But this whole damn time, I was more than enough. I am enough for my parents. I am enough for my sisters. I am enough for my friends. I am enough for me. Do I believe this every day? Hell, no. But I know that I am enough. I will be enough to pull through this depressive episode. I am enough to get through this rough patch in life. I will be enough for people I have yet to meet. Those that have gone and those that I no longer have connections likely no longer are connected to me because whatever I was at that point was enough.
  4. Absolutely nothing is permanent. My feelings right now won’t last forever. Feelings that I have toward myself will change. Feelings I have toward people that I thought were permanent can morph into other types of feelings. Things are always changing, and I am always changing.
  5. I have to speak my truth. I have depression. I have it bad at times. I have crippling anxiety. It sometimes keeps me home for days at a time on the weekends. Hell, my depression is crippling, it makes it hard for me to see past the next day. It looks different for everyone. I can hold down a job fine. I can continue to function at max level just fine. But imagine functioning and doing all this with a smile plastered on your face, but your brain is screaming “YOU ARE A SACK OF SHIT” the entire time. It can be mighty hard to have room for much else. So, I need to stop belittling it and actually address my mental illness as an actual illness that affects my life in an adverse way.

Mid-year check in with myself… and reflecting on shit that I have learned during 2020. Can’t wait to see what other destruction and despair this year has to offer. This certainly has been one for the books.

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Misconceptions of Love

March 14th – White Day. Korea’s all about the holidays that focus on the couple. New Year’s Day, Valentine’s Day, White Day, Christmas Eve…. all of those holidays plus 100 day anniversaries, all the anniversaries. It’s enough to make one’s head spin. But one of the biggest things about Korea is how much their media is fueled by the same “boy meets girl” narrative.

One of the biggest misconceptions of love, that I am extremely guilty of feeling, is that love is intense, sweeping, and life changing. When you fall in love with someone that’s the single most life-changing thing you will ever experience. It’ll change your world, your perspective, and your life will be complete. At least that’s what all of these Hollywood movies, K-Dramas and love songs are telling us. While I’m not saying that love doesn’t ever feel like that, I am saying that often times people, including myself, are guilty of thinking that love will stay that way forever.

In every relationship, past or present, I have definitely fallen into the trap of questioning whether or not the fading of the intense, sweeping emotions of falling for someone is normal. The questioning often leads to anxiety that my relationship is “broken” somehow, and it may or may not become a self-fulfilling prophecy where it does end up breaking down due to unrealistic expectations.

Some of these unrealistic expectations are handed down to me from generations of the belief that being in a committed relationship equals sacrifice. I’ve watched as women in the generations before me sacrifice their happiness, freedom, and opportunities to “fall in line” with their roles “behind” the men in their lives. I’ve been taught that the biggest joy I will ever have in life is to find a partner to have children with and start a family with because the people around me will question and ask about when I will reach those landmarks. I come from generations of women that believed that their sole purpose was to raise and educate their children to be productive members of society and to fall into the same roles that they once have. Generations of men and women that sacrifice for the sake of creating that family. I come from a refugee family that left their home because they had no choice to raise a family in a country that never has and never will really accept them as their own.

I am very lucky to have parents that have the ability to change, learn, and understand my wants and needs. While I have felt the pressure to walk on that path, my parents ultimately understood that not everyone’s happiness will stem from meeting those expectations. Through a lot of growing and painful experience, I’ve learned that this is what unconditional love is. To love your child no matter the decisions they make because you just want their decisions to lead to their happiness. That is love. Loving me despite the fact that I have made mistakes and continuing to support my decisions as an adult is what true parental love is. Being a supportive force in the background and allowing me to always be the captain of my own ship is what parental love should be. While they haven’t always been perfect at this, they have shown me that people can change and learn even in adulthood. They continue to astonish me in their tolerance of me as their adult child.

Some of the unrealistic expectations I have for my own romantic relationships originate in my early experiences with what romantic relationships look like. Movies, music, television all told me love is a huge sweeping feeling and it’s the “end goal.” Few movies feature stories of maintenance and sustaining a healthy relationship. They just… fall in love… then what? As I grew older and experienced different relationships, I realize that I got stuck in the maintenance and sustaining part. It was always much more difficult than I ever imagined, and sometimes, even if I felt like things weren’t going great, I’d stick around “just to see” if it got any better. It usually didn’t because love is a choice. It takes work and it is a conscious decision you make. You choose the person that you’re with, but the most important thing that I’ve learned is that you should never choose your person over yourself. Likewise, you should never expect the other person to choose you over their own mental well being. The biggest takeaway that I have learned from therapy and from relationships, past and present, is that we must both respect each other’s need to have self-care. I don’t always practice this takeaway, and there are times when my anxiety influences me to selfishly push and disrupt my partner’s need for self-care so that I can quiet my fears. Ultimately though, this is a lesson I’m learning each and every day, as I try to sustain my own romantic relationship.

Another thing I have learned about sustaining a relationship is that, while your partner is here for you and wants to support you, they cannot be your therapist. They cannot be the only person you run to in your support network. If you find that your anxieties and emotions are wearing down the relationship, it’s time to expand your support network and, if possible, seek professional help. That is the single best thing I have ever done for myself and for all of my relationships romantic or not.

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A Year Ago

As I’m reaching the one-year mark of my working contract here in South Korea, I realize that the person I was a year ago was drastically different than the person sitting here typing this out right now. I’ve written and re-written this entry many times now, wondering how can I actually be honest with myself if I’m not acknowledging my starting point. As painful as it is to remember and to reflect on, I need to acknowledge what I was to recognize how far I’ve come. Before reflecting on my past year here in South Korea, I’d like to paint a picture of what February 2019 was like for me.

Everything around me was hectic. I rushed to say my good-byes to people I was afraid I would not see. I tried to pack as much in as I could and, of course, I tried to spend as much time as possible with my family and my significant other. It was bittersweet. I was excited to go back to the job that brought me so much joy and made me feel so accomplished, but I was also terrified that things would turn out in a way that was completely unexpected. Despite the fear that was starting to build up inside of me in the shape of “what if” statements, I kept soldiering on and preparing for my departure.

I remember the last Friday before my departure so clearly, like it happened yesterday. Yet, I have trouble remembering all of this past year in this level of clarity. My phone rang in the morning, the phone number was from Madison, Wisconsin. I knew it was likely the APHIS Office confirming the receipt of Misha’s paperwork. When I answered, I remember the girl on the other line was so helpful. She explained to me that the records she received for Misha were out of date.

The air was knocked out of me. “Out of date? What do you mean? Did the veterinary clinic forget to include the rabies titer test from October?” She gently replied that they did, but that they did not submit the titer test to an accredited lab. At this point, I knew exactly what that meant. Having traveled with Misha to Korea before, I knew exactly which lab the blood sample must be submitted through. I knew I had told the veterinarian that it must be that lab. I even included an informational guide from the South Korean Animal and Plant Quarantine office with all of the information that I had of Misha from the last trip.

My heart dropped to the bottom of my stomach. I felt my knees go weak and I was speechless. The girl on the other line kindly asked if I was still there. To which, I weakly replied, “Yes, yes… I’ll call the vet clinic to get it straightened out.” That day, was a logistical nightmare. Being a person with anxiety, I do not like confrontation, but I confronted my veterinarian who admitted that she did not look over the informational guides I gave her, and that she went through the lab because that’s the lab that she usually sends the tests for pets traveling domestically. The veterinarian offered to send another blood test to the correct lab for an additional fee and that, “Maybe it’ll get here in time for your flight.” For the first time in my life, I think I saw red. I was so angered that all of my planning and instructions were dismissed because someone else thought they “knew better.” At that time, another veterinarian stepped in and said, “No, there will be no fee. You clearly asked us to do something with specific instructions, and we neglected to do it. We will try our best to get the bloodwork done.” I thanked the veterinarian and went home. I knew it would not be done. The lab had a waiting period of at least three weeks.

That night, I had panic attack after panic attack about not having Misha with me. My relationship with her is very close, and I depended on her heavily for my mental well being. I cried and cried and could not possible imagine my world in Korea without her. Thankfully my family and boyfriend were willing to help me get her to me as soon as May. I would only need to survive three months without her.

I’m not saying that without Misha, my mental health worsened. But I definitely was forced to face the fact that I was not well. With or without her, it was something that needed to be addressed.

I arrived in Korea to an apartment with no hot water, heat, or a bed. Nothing was prepared and it was infuriating. My work had tried to get a bed ordered to my apartment, but the delivery was delayed due to the Lunar New Year holiday, and I was forced to sleep on a folding couch for two weeks.

I think at this point, it felt like everything had gone wrong. No dog, apartment is a mess, I’m 6,000 miles from my family, and work was not coming back to me as smoothly as I would have liked. I broke. I broke into a million pieces and I am still picking them back up. I realized that so many factors in my life have contributed to that breaking point that it was inevitable. Whether I stayed back in Minneapolis or I came here, it would have happened.

February 2019 me was someone who broke down almost daily. I panicked about big and small things. I panicked about whether the students liked me. I panicked about whether I was covering the materials well enough. I panicked about whether or not I could keep up my duties as an instructor and a supervisor. I panicked to the point where I physically could not hold food down and began to avoid eating altogether. I didn’t make it more than 2 months before I knew I was completely defeated by my own fears and insecurities. Every week was a new fight, a new issue, a new insecurity that I battled through with my boyfriend on the other line. I could hear the exasperation in his voice. “What can I do for you? What do you want?” He would ask. I had no answer. I had no idea.

Booking that first therapy appointment was the best decision of my life. I practice what I learned through the sessions every single day. I practice mindfulness and grounding. I practice forgiving myself and setting realistic standards. I continue to work through insecurities, trauma and maladaptive behavior. I will continue to fight for me.

Now, a year later, I want to pat myself on the back for getting through those first few months. I want to tell myself that I’ve improved a lot since then. I want to say that even though I haven’t been perfect, I am still doing the best I can do for me. I want to read back on this entry on a rough day and remember that I have come a very long way from what I was. A lot can happen in a year, and this last year in Korea has felt like an entire lifetime.

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A Look in the Mirror

The last few weeks have been a major setback for my mental health. The thoughts have been harder to fight off. The panic is almost daily. I read back on some of the more coherent blog posts that I have drafted up and even posted. In a good headspace, I am eloquent, hopeful, and cheerful.

In a bad headspace, as I am now, I feel despair, hopelessness, and eventually… the panic and anxiety subsides and I feel complacent. I did it. I got through the panic. I look at myself in the mirror and I see a woman that is exhausted. That woman doesn’t look like me, but she is. She fights every day so that I can feel whole. She can continue to do amazing things with a smile on her face, even though her thoughts are telling her awful things. Things that are designed to keep her scared. The fear, is what my anxiety thinks, will protect me. The constant questioning is what my anxiety thinks will keep me prepared.

Deep down inside, I know why the thoughts and these fears keep coming back. Because for a long time, my actual purpose in life was just to get by with distractions. Do what a good daughter does. Play the game of life correctly and go through the steps in the right order. Live out this life that I was expected to live. At some point, something inside me woke up and I told myself, “Fuck this. I’m unhappy and I’m changing shit.” It’s been a constant process of changing and evolving to become that happier and whole person I wish to see. And there have been distractions, bumps, and great discoveries on the way.

Every time I admit to a friend that my original plan in life was just to repay any debts I have, save money, and give it to my parents so that I can symbolically feel better about leaving this life, I know that strikes fear in their hearts. In some people, it angers them. “How can you be so selfish?” I really don’t know how or if I can ever go through with this silly plan of mine without the guilt of what it means crushing me. But I know that everything good that I have encountered on this journey has taken me and led me on a path that has options.

Today I look at the mirror and I don’t see a girl I know. I see a tired, very physically ill, and scared girl. I see a girl that is panicking with everyone around her about the outbreak of disease in the area and the chaos it is causing in the hospitals around her. I see a girl that is hoping to be self-sufficient and ride out these unpleasant symptoms, but she doesn’t have the strength to stand on her own.

I have such a beautiful network of support that as I look at the face of this girl that I do not recognize I see bits and pieces of the person that my support system loves and holds up. I’m not all the way here, and it’s been a rough patch, but I see you, my girl. I’ll come and get you soon.

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One day at a time…

Today has been a little bit of a journey for me. I’ve been feeling very physically ill, and terrified that it was the Wuhan Coronavirus. I know, I know… health anxiety is a real thing and I should stop Googling symptoms. I stopped by the hospital to get checked, and they don’t seem to concerned. Of course, that’s not how anxiety works. I’m still terrified.

Aside from taking care of myself, I have also been sorting through a lot of thoughts this evening. I had planned on doing this, as I mentioned in my last post. It’s my last day of a long holiday weekend and I have been thinking and sorting through a lot of the anxiety, sadness, and fears that I’ve been setting aside because I have been too tired, overwhelmed and anxious to deal with my stuff. Here are some things I’ve sorted through, and some things that I have realized through the last few weeks.

The winter months are packed full of holidays, and I’ve been experiencing some serious sadness and loneliness on an almost monthly basis. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Lunar New Year are all holidays I enjoy spending with my family and friends. I missed out on so many things and I know it’s my own damn fault. I chose to come out here, why? Why did I choose to come out here if I get so sad when I can’t be with people that I love on important days. My anxiety kind of overflows during this time, as my family and loved ones are too busy to communicate and update me. I feel like their lives are flying by while my life is sitting at a standstill waiting for news and updates about their lives. I am justifiably sad/down in the dumps. Even though I have been feeling a little bit sad about things like missing my family, significant other, and friends. I understand that being far apart doesn’t mean that I am not loved and not important. Realizing this and working through the rationalizing has helped me feel a lot less anguished.

Another feeling I’ve been working through is absolute exhaustion from work. It’s really hard to stop myself from criticizing my decisions to come back to a job that does get extremely busy during the winter and summer seasons. There is a fine line between being extremely busy and burnt out. I could feel everyone around me slowly cross that line and enter “burnt out.” And, to be honest, I was getting secondhand burnout and anxiety. “Did I make the right choice to come back?” and “Is this a toxic environment for me?” are thoughts that I actively tried to avoid thinking about during the busy times for self preservation. I know that I enjoy my work immensely. Seeing the kids learn makes me happy. The environment can be what I make it, and I can choose to let the energy of others ruin the experience for me, or I can choose to focus on my own emotions and how I feel.

There have been a lot of days where I did not want to wake up in the morning. I go to bed hoping that I won’t have to wake up the next day. I think about all of the other days to follow and I’m overwhelmed by the weight of the future. I think about all of the things I want to do but haven’t. Before I have even begun the day, I’ve already set myself up for failure. I’ve already set myself up for a day of hopelessness and sadness.

Now that I’ve spent the entire day contemplating what to do with some of these negative and unhelpful emotions and thoughts, I definitely need an action plan to deal with some of the negative and intrusive anxious thoughts. Recently, I’ve been really enjoying a Podcast that brought me a lot of strength today. The Tablo Podcast has helped me see a lot of things about dealing with depression. I really need to take each day, one day at a time. I need to complete thought processes and dealing with my feelings one day at a time. As much as I’d like to just push some of the things off for an “easier” or another day, I really do need to address the day’s feelings on the day so that I don’t carry the day’s weight on me.

Through listening to the podcast I’ve felt a little less alone, as there have been so many moments of “Ahah! I’ve felt exactly the same!” As he describes moments in his life and his own struggle with depression.

A lot of things have been difficult these days, and I know that they can continue being a challenge, but I’m determined to make the best of things and to better my mental health. Every New Year, people make “New Years Resolutions” to be a better version of themselves. I’ve said before that setting a resolution for the year can often mean setting yourself up for failure. So, like Tablo says, I’m gonna make a day resolution for every day of something attainable.

For tomorrow, Tuesday, my resolution is to wake up at a decent hour and do some work around the house before heading to work. And each day, I will need to take all of the emotions and events of the day, and properly address them. No more putting it off for later.

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Giant Potholes

I’m currently going through what I wish I could call a “little bump in the road” in my mental health journey. It really actually feels like a giant pothole that causes your tire to go flat. You have to pull off to the side of the road, but you have no idea how to change a flat. So you panic. You panic because you’re like, “Shit… I’ve been driving for so long, and I seriously don’t know how I can possibly fix this. I need help.” Anyways, you get the metaphor.

To be honest, I don’t really know what triggered this particular slump. It may have been extreme fatigue and stress from work. It may be loneliness. It may be seasonal depression. I have no idea. All I know is that it was preceded with a feeling of happiness and completion. I was previously feeling socially, emotionally and mentally fulfilled. I was feeling complete and happy. I was feeling so confident in how things were going, and that things were going in a positive direction. I may have been riding on the “New Year, New Me” feeling I had at the start of 2020. Even though I know that phrase is completely bull shit. A more accurate saying would be “New Year, Gotta Keep Dealing With the Shit from Last Year.” Unfortunately, you don’t get a “reset” button on January 1st.

Anyways, when I started hitting this slump, I kind of expected it would happen. My eyes opened last Monday morning and I felt a massive weight on my chest. It weighed me down but also made me feel extremely anxious about what was to come. I remember picking up the phone and trying to have a conversation with my boyfriend, but I wasn’t really in a good head space to hold a conversation. I was not confident in myself and I was not confident in my place in the world. I felt like I had no energy to lift myself with the weight on my shoulders. Every day of the last week or two have been progressively heavier.

Now, I have recently come back from a very short overnight trip to one of my favorite places in Korea. I love going to Gyeongju, because it reminds me of home in a weird way. It’s out in the middle of no where, it’s small, but there’s so much history. It was a distraction for a day, and something hit me. I have to constantly be looking for distractions so that I don’t have to sit with my feelings. That’s what I have to do! *cough* It’s not *cough*.

I’m so uncomfortable with sitting with my feelings and the weight that I have not allowed myself during this vacation to even feel what I need to feel. I’m so scared of what could happen. I realize that I have developed a fear of my own mind. Of being alone with it and sorting through what happens in there. The terror has prevented me from really giving myself much needed “me” time.

So, tomorrow, I will allow myself to rest and feel my feelings. Whether they be insecurity, sadness, loneliness, hopelessness, I will allow myself to feel them because they are mine. I know that I am not what I feel. I am not hopeless, and that I am going to survive. This break is a good reminder for me to let myself be with myself. It’ll take some time for me to enjoy spending time with myself, but it’s time that I need.

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