You ever say one thing when you mean something totally different? I do this on a daily basis. Most of the time it's unintentional. Usually it's me trying to answer someone's questions about how I feel about something. I'll get done answering their question only to realize that I said one thing and that it probably meant closer to the exact opposite of what I meant or at least it was different enough to cause confusion.
Sometimes my brain just does this great thing where it automatically reroutes my answers so that I can tell people generic things in an attempt to protect them from me. After I say something aloud it sometimes hits me that I just lied to someone about how I feel. I hate it. If I'm lucky I can catch myself and restate my answer. Especially if it is to someone I know genuinely wants to know the truth.
Lately this has become a real struggle for me.
I find myself telling one specific lie over and over and over again. I think it's just my brain's way of trying to derail a conversation and throw off any kind of suspicion before anyone can worry. "I'm tired," I'll say looking directly into your eyes. Lie. Not complete, but not truly honest. I don't sleep. I've always had trouble sleeping, and when my depression or stress or anxiety gets the better of me, I'll start the cycle of sleeplessness all over again. So it's not a full lie, I mean, I am tired. Often exhausted, but the problem is, when you ask me how I am, I usually have about a million other feelings that are more unsettling or louder than just being tired. I just don't always know how to express it.
I am tired, but I am also fighting. Daily. I'm fighting to be the best version of myself I can be. I'm fighting to keep finding light through the darkness. I'm fighting to see the good and not dwell on the bad. I'm often lonely, and that's why I'm trying so hard to connect with other people. That's why I try to make everyone around me laugh and why I try to write encouraging notes and remember the details about other people...I don't want anyone around me to feel this ache I feel. I don't want anyone else to feel like this. I am tired, but I feel like if I express to someone else the depth of the sadness or the level of anger I feel that it will frighten them. My heart is the Mariana Trench when it comes to emotions and often the ones I feel deepest are the farthest in that trench and I try to keep them there. I have them sunk in those inky depths for a reason, and it's probably because I think I'm protecting everyone else from me. No one wants to listen to someone talk about their anger or sadness or depression, so instead of telling you that I feel hurt or alone or depressed or angry or frustrated or trapped I'll just tell you I'm tired.
Is any of this healthy? No. Not really. I know this, and I'm trying to find a safe place to deal with it, but in the meantime I'll continue to write these weird blog posts that help me empty out my head like I do my pockets at the end of the day. Hopefully they'll help someone else feel a little less alone, and maybe we can talk about it.
