The ramblings of a person who is OCD and MDD
Trigger Warning: Suicide, Mental Disorder, Death
After months of feeling pretty okay and handling life, this last week has been a call back to reality. Maybe that’s just life with a mental disorder. Months go by, and while you may experience small hiccups, things seem to go by without much hassle. Maybe that’s a lie too, or at least over exaggerated or only half-truths. I’d like to say that I am fine, but my memories on just this last March tell a much different story. I was still able to maintain to facade of doing well; partially because a pandemic started and everything else shut down.
I don’t mean to make light of the pandemic, I am truly sorry for those that have and will lose their lives. It’s odd, but for me, that shut down was a blessing. I needed time away. Time to breathe. While I have read about the stress of the virus and the seriousness of the effect it has had for others, it actually improved my mental health, if only for a short while. I do not feel guilty about admitting that. I do not mean that there is a silver lining to the death toll or the damage it has done to others. I do mean that each of us experience things differently, and with certain circumstances it has helped me in the previous months. This could hold not true for the future, especially as Florida numbers continue to rise.
Before the pandemic, I was starting to slip. I was sleeping more, and avoiding situations more. I was feeling overwhelmed by life, work, everything else in general. Then I got time off. Working in the community…who knows when I will go back to actually giving classes to populations now fearing the virus…But in any case I got the privilege to stay home and work remotely from a laptop. With that, I was able to focus more on making buttons and cassettes, that I hope to share with you soon. I actually hope to write an article about each in the coming days, and have one half written already.
Now something new is on the horizon, and I essentially have the path to follow the change or resist it. I knew the change was coming, I was not unaware, but I was unprepared. “To do or to do not, there is no try” -yoda. Although I honestly wouldn’t take advice from someone that let the whole galaxy fall to the Sith, and gave crappy advice that was rarely listened to. But it is time to either do it and commit to it, or not.
My track history has been bad. So many failed starts or stalling near the finish line. When the teacher told me in 2017 “You aren’t cut out for this.” I quit. I like to say that, but it wasn’t true. I had already quit long before. I had skipped two of my other classes already, and that day just happened to be the last day before I threw in the towl. Before that it was business? music? history? the list goes on.
“What do you see yourself as?” I have no fucking clue. Is it a generational thing? inherited? just me? All of the above? When I was 13ish I came to the conclusion that I would be dead by the age of 20. It was an easy conclusion. I hated everything around me. I didn’t/couldn’t/wouldn’t fit in with peers. Ill leave the story there, but in any case I am now 24. My death didn’t come true, and I am quite glad about that.
However, it did leave me with something else… a lost identity. My imagination could not fathom a 24 year old me, so there was no use idealizing a profession or a future life. It wasn’t going to happen, and then it did.
This is also not to discredit how far I know I’ve come. I am not suicidal, my angst is no longer harmful, I have sought help, and I have a list of different accomplishments. Progress is not linear.
I don’t plan on giving up. My progress has led me to a nice rental townhouse, a loving fiance, cats, rabbits, a stable (at least before pandemic) job, a paid off car, and a decent style of living.
My progress for college and future choices is more of a wave with highs and lows than anything like a straight line. I graduated 2013 valedictorian (one of them anyway) from my high school. I achieved my A.A. in under a year in 2014. Since then, I have taken many college credits and have an outstanding gpa, but I am not where close to a degree- too many changes. I fail at committing to a degree or a plan. I jump headfirst only to discard the whole thing at the slightest of mishaps. Maybe I am scared of that occurring again, maybe I am not.
A problem with having a mental disorder is that my thoughts and rationalization could be coming from a place of well-thought out tactics or fearful impulse. While I feel good most of the time with my meds, this is not just standard quo. This is “change is happening.” I am between therapists, mostly because I didn’t agree with the last one, that is a subject for another article.
Back to the dilemma, to take this educational opportunity or not. It’s not an easy choice. The price tag is heavy, and it could be financial instability. Once in, getting out will not be easy and will hurt more than not starting in the first place. Yet, if I manage to finish, it is likely things will improve for the better. Different advice comes in, all trying to be helpful, all out of love and support. If only it were that easy to take it. If only it were that easy just to do it. Maybe for someone else it would be, but it isn’t for me.
The benefits of successfully completing it would mean financial stability for my little family. It would mean more funds for side projects or social causes. It would mean a skill and a sense that all my college credits were not in vain.
There are tips for people choosing to make decisions. Write out pros and cons, brainstorm in bubbles, etc all the way down to roll a dice or flip a coin. The problem is that, on paper decisions look so much easier and so much different than reality portrays them. Could it be that I am just over-thinking it? probably, but could there be some legitimate concern too? probably.
“Do what makes you happy?” What if I am already doing that. What makes me happy is sitting next to my rabbit listening to music and tuning out to the world. Can someone pay me to do that? probably not… wishful thinking there…
“well if you knew the choice was coming, why didn’t you prepare?” That is a good question. It really is, I would answer as soon as I was able to, but I am not. When things are in the “distant future” there is no worry about them. It’ll happen when it does. BUT NOW IT DOES BE HAPPENING! the near future is upon and the time for action is nigh! lol In seriousness though, It wasn’t a thought in my head before. I was all in. lets do this shit. Maybe that is how I should be now. Maybe that attitude is naive or maybe it is the one I should have. It’s not that I don’t want to do or do not do it. On paper, I would say, yes, sign me up. It’s no longer just on paper, and as the dates press on, I grow more hesitant.
This article isn’t to make a decision, but give some insight into my own thoughts. In conversation, I feel like I am drowning, but on paper (again) I feel free to express ideas, thoughts, feelings, etc. I leave at a crosswords, and a thank you note to all those that listen to my senseless ramblings. I realize that in the grand schemes it doesn’t matter. There are bigger and more important things happening (especially with a pandemic and the collision of those seeking freedom and those willing to use brutal means to keep control) So… these become 1am thoughts, as another day happens. Wouldn’t it be great if live was as simple as live, laugh, love? Reality is so much harsher, but also so much more. I guess I wouldn’t want to live in such a simplistic ideology.
Recycled Hearts Records 
Not senseless ramblings …….
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