The Bloody Doors Off

So it seems that I’ve made it through 2016.

Sunovabitch.

Honestly, there were times I doubted it; or at least seeing the New Year in outside of Ward H.

(Language ahoy; if you’re easily put off by a potty mouth, I’ll understand if you don’t want to read.)

The truth is, it’s been a wretched year. I’ve detailed a lot of those reasons earlier in the week, so I’m not going to repeat myself now. It just feels like body blow after body blow, going 12 rounds in the ring with anger, depression, anxiety and bipolar episodes.

But I’m still standing. How the fuck am I still standing?

And yes, you might say “because you’re still standing, it means you’re strong and you can keep going”. There’s truth to that. But there’s also the fear that one more setback is going to knock me on my ass.

When I was self-admitted to hospital in 2013, I immediately panicked. It was scarier being inside, where there was help, than it was outside. Or so I thought. So I basically lied to the attending psychiatrist after the 72-hour hold and convinced him that I was ‘scared straight’ and could go home. What no one knows about the following days and weeks were just how close I came to going back. I now know I should’ve stayed longer, received help. Maybe I’d be in a better place.

Which is why, the past week or so, I’d been debating readmitting myself at Toronto East York General. But more than disappointing me, I don’t want to disappoint my friends and family. And yes, getting the help I need seems like a setback; like you look at me as being someone who should have their shit together and are looking down at me for failing.

So I take the body blows and keep propping myself up.

The funny thing is, I’m fine when I’m with other people. Yesterday I had a lovely time with my friend Laura (after the initial freefall in rushing Peppi to the vet after he ate chocolate, naughty boy). We ran errands, cooked delicious carrot soup and haddock and played (most of) a game of Scrabble before her friends arrived to go to a movie. So of course it was after I got home and was alone that the anxiety and dread seeped in.

And I’ve got plans to see my aunt and my brother Kevin for a movie early this evening, and then a NYE party and Neil and Helen’s. I’m actually looking forward to that. Because I’ll be with people I care about. But it’s the after part that causes my heart to race.

Tomorrow is a new year. And it should be seen as new opportunities, and new possibilities. But I feel like I’m being haunted by the ghosts of 2016 (and to an extent, 2013). And the ghosts are tangible; they can reach out into my chest and squeeze my heart until it stops beating.

Which I don’t want. I don’t want to leave. I’m not planning on leaving (although yes, I have a ‘plan’, but Laura’s holding onto my pills for safe measure).

I just don’t know how to stay.

So, in closing I just want to say this.

Fuck you 2016.