The Mind is Willing But the Body is Not Lending...

I wander lost and lonely, unable to heal my soul on my own.  As hard as I may try, my mind plays tricks on me, repeating over and over how terrible a person I am, how no matter what I do, I will never be enough or be able to do enough to make my existence worth while.  Everyday, every single fucking day, my mind tells me I am not worth the flesh I am printed on, the stardust I am made of is worth more than my self is and that despite my best efforts and big hearted ways no one will remember or miss me.

A deep depressive rut of existence...a mere chemical imbalance in my brain causing me to swing from thoughts of suicide to thoughts of homicide is what makes me so sad.  I can't control it.  I can't deny it.  I can barely hide it.

And I can't escape it.

It's a difficult reality, when you really think it through.  I can barely rely on my own body to do as my mind asks it to and then for my mind to tell me the thoughts I have to move and do things and be something are worth nothing at all. 

The mind is willing and wanting but the body refuses to be lending.  Daily, I struggle with being a mother who can barely remember to care for herself but teach my daughters to be strong and confident and real and humane. 

I make a point to ask them not only if school was good but if they were good people at school today.  I often have my toddler remind me that she has trouble not fighting when people make her angry.  It's like looking in a mirror and my own coping mechanisms of disassociative behavior isn't a healthy road for her to go down.  I know from personal experience she needs to learn to grow and remain calm and center herself before she lets her ever broadening strength of emotion lash out and react. 

Think first.  Act second.  Speak third.  I tell them both this, every day when they get home from school.

Then I struggle to be a reliable partner in a relationship where we went from having sexual intimacy multiple times a day to we barely get one or two good ones in during the week.  My sex drive has not diminished but the amount of pain I've had to deal with has changed....it's risen exponentially and it's become harder and harder to function.  Just to be.  I can't expect my husband to do everything needed around the house and take care of our girls AND me. 

I feel selfish and indignant every time I have to admit defeat and just lie still on the couch, hoping for a better day, a burst of energy, something....ANYTHING to make me feel more like the me I remember being before this.

I recently in the past month or so found out most of my menstrual health issues have been from an infection of my endometrial lining that I apparently acquired not long after my second daughter was born...that was four years ago.  I finished the antibiotics for it just yesterday and I already feel more "normal", more me, than I have in years. 

This was shocking news and a painful truth to swallow and deal with.  The medication to heal me made me feel even worse.  10 days of taking a drug that causes such a horrendous taste in your mouth you don't even want to swallow your own saliva.  It's truly a ghastly taste that shouldn't belong in your mouth for any reason but there it is.  Then the stomach ache, the nausea, the sheer will to NOT vomit is what helped me make it through the entire course.

I have my menstrual cycle going on again and it's more regular than it's been for so long.  I hate it so.  It drains me.  It lies to me.  It tells me I'm feeling better, the pain is subsiding, get up and do something while you can.  Or at least while you feel like you can.  Then your legs almost give out on you and your husband is so fearful for your health he is offering to call 911 or a best friend to take you to the ER on a painful Saturday night. 

I told him no.  I explained to him that this was my normalcy for my cycle and that it hasn't been this way since BEFORE I met him.  I even told him to call my mom. 

I know he worries about me in ways I feel I can only worry.  I mean, fuck, I worry about myself when I'm alone or trying to walk across the kitchen with hot coffee.  I don't want to burn myself by spilling just because my body doesn't always react when I tell it to.  It doesn't always do what my brain tells it to do. Add in a lack of sensation in my right foot and most of my outer lower right leg is numb when I stand.

It's a scary reality to live in, one where you can't even be sure that you are in control of yourself, both mentally and physically. 

My mental health has taken a turn for the worse because of the pain and frustration and aggravation caused by my uterus that has somehow spread to every other aspect of my life.  I feel cut off and alone.  As though I don't exist. 

No one talks to me.  No one says anything to me.  No one calls or texts or messages just because they're checking up on me just because.  I really honestly thought I had good friends....all those years I wasted.  All that love I poured out with no rhyme or reason or possibility of return.  I lost a piece of myself over those years. 

And I can't be sure I want to get it back even if I could.  I was so  naive and let myself be.  Just another reason to hate who you are, right?! 

My relationships are strained, I can barely stand up straight and I'm anemic from fighting a four year uterine infection. 

I'm weak and worn down....and just want someone to hug me and hold me and tell me it's going to be okay, eventually....just be patient. 

See, the rational portion of my brain knows I will have good days again, that it will be okay again.  But the irrational part of my brain has a much louder and more pronounced voice when it speaks to me about my failures, misfortunes and bad choices in my life. 

I can never win.  I can fight and I can try but winning isn't what I'm after.  I'm after longevity.  My father left me, WILLFULLY, a month before my 16th birthday after making a promise not more than a few months prior that he would do anything to be there for my graduation from high school (first and only daughter of four who graduated high school....with honors...still to this day). 

I've told my daughters repeatedly that I would not leave them willfully...ever.  I promised them both when they were born...I will always try for them. 

My husband tells me I haven't failed him because I AM still trying and I haven't given up, yet. 

Some days....in all fairness, I'm closer than I should be and other days, I'm not close enough to care. 

When the mind is willing but the body is not lending it causes certain grief of ones self.  Grieving the loss of what you used to be and do before your disease took over and robbed you of everything you had ever hoped for...

For yourself, anyway.