What depression feels like (to me)

If I had to pinpoint the first time in my life that I experienced depression, I would probably say it was during the first semester of my senior year of high school. Officially, I had become a new student at the school the year prior, starting my junior year in a new school district, walking into school on day one with a plan to ask some nice-looking students if I could sit with them at lunch, because other than a few acquaintances from my church I didn't know anyone. Interestingly enough, my first day of junior year I met someone who would turn out to be one of my best friends -- we ate lunch together every day that year, and we are still in touch today, some 20+ years later. 

But I remember very clearly the night before starting senior year that I felt like the next day was going to be my first day at that school all over again. Other than my one very good friend, I hadn't made many other friends at school my junior year. I didn't know who I was going to sit with during my lunch period, and I felt nervous, the way one might if they in fact didn't know anyone at all, as had actually been the case a year before. The nervousness was legitimate, but the circumstances didn't match or explain why it might be present -- after a year, I should have felt like I would be walking into a building full of familiar, friendly faces. 

As that first semester of senior year progressed, I felt -- without really realizing it or having language to describe it -- very without friends, without connection, without a lot of joy. I went to school, came home and did my homework. When I wasn't doing homework, I read books, watched movies checked out from the library, or watched TV on one of our few basic network channels. More than once I recall doing my calculus homework on a Friday night, because there was no other robust social activity taking place in my life. A couple of times I think I forced (dared?) myself to go to school football games, in an attempt to socialize? live a more normal high school life? I'm not even sure, but I still stood in the stands among strangers, I believe, or acquaintances at best. I never had plans to meet someone specific there, no one was waiting or saving a seat for me.

Throughout August, September, October of that year, I carried around these feelings I didn't have words for, and just progressively felt more and more uncomfortable, unhappy. I had checked out Father of the Bride (the novel, not the movie) from the library, and came home one day after school and tried to read it on the couch in the living room. I couldn't concentrate on the sentences on the page, and as this persistent ache built up inside of me I finally set aside the book and wept, alone in the silent house. I didn't understand why I was crying, or what was happening to me exactly, I just knew it hurt. The way I felt inside, emotionally, was painful, both dull and deep, and just absolutely would not let up. 

Just before Halloween I developed a freak illness, with bizarre, painful, and specific symptoms that led to a terrifying misdiagnosis and ultimately, by Christmas, a clean bill of health. There never was a determinate cause for why I experienced such symptoms, and to this day I'm convinced it was from stress and just bottling up all that mental turmoil. After a week out of school and several follow up doctors visits, I remember at some point during my final semester of high school telling myself, "You're going to college in six months, just try and enjoy the people and things around you that bring you some joy, and everything will change soon." I gave myself permission to kind of ease off the gas of my worry, reminding myself that my whole life would be entirely different a year from then. 

In fact, it was. I did very well socially and emotionally (overall) in college. After moving around so many times in my adolescence, I was a head and shoulders above all my classmates in terms of meeting new people, talking to strangers, making friends. Some of my friends marveled at the fact that I would sometimes eat alone in the cafeteria -- really, I just wasn't good at time management and oftentimes it would be 1:45 and I'd realize I need to hustle over to the dining hall before they stopped serving lunch. To me, it was a necessity, a practical response to my lack of planning, whereas my peers always scheduled to meet up and eat together. Our perspectives were entirely different -- I hadn't come from a past reality where mealtime partners were a given, so I didn't expect them to always be there. 

I went to a small school, and pretty much everywhere I walked across campus I said hi and stopped to chat with people I knew. While I absolutely carried around some pretty severe and embarrassing anxiety that I tried to hide from my classmates at times during college, overall the environment was one where I felt very safe, happy, and where I thrived. At some point I did my schoolwork (always at 4 a.m., mind you), as evidenced by my diploma, but when I think back to those years I mostly remember just laughing and talking with my friends. It was a full on chatter fest, all the time. I had people who made me feel happy and excited and bubbly when I saw them, we had shared jokes, we whispered about our crushes, we ate ice cream, we hugged upon every new meeting each day. We loved each other and being around each other. 

So it was when I left that magic collegiate bubble that depression -- this time REAL depression, much deeper, darker, and scarier than before -- really started to seep into my life. I actually recall anticipating that I might be depressed after graduation, and also thinking that I just wouldn't let myself be depressed. 

Ha! Yeah right. I WISH.

If only one could control it, stave it off, say no thank you and shut the door on the most unwelcome of visitors. That strange idea that I thought I could just not feel depression if I didn't want to is one that has never entered my head again since. Because unfortunately I know better now, having experienced depression -- in bouts as quick as a passing 30 seconds to, I don't know, weeks? months? at at time? -- on and off since I was about 21 or 22 years old. 

It's both fascinating and maddening to me when people describe depression as feeling numb. If I had the option to feel numb, i.e. nothing, over what I in fact feel when I'm depressed, oh people I would choose it every dang time! Are you kidding me?! When I feel depressed, it is always an uncomfortable, un-ignorable, very unfair and nagging emotional pain. It is a low, not a medium or a neutral space. It is not often accompanied by tears -- in fact, when tears do come they offer a welcome relief; rarely a lasting one, but they help ease up the moment almost for sure, to an extent. Depression hurts. It sucks. It feels inescapable, because as far as I've experienced (and I have experienced, many many many times) it is inescapable, until it decides on its own terms that it will now leave you alone for an undetermined amount of time.

Absolutely things like exercise (particularly for me getting my heart rate up to a certain intensity level; running is the most effective) make a considerable difference and can help bring in some light, some air, something of a break, but if my body/brain decide they are going to be depressed, I have exactly zero control over how long that will be the case. Depression has its own timeline, its own calendar, and if you experience it like I do where it has come and gone for nearly two decades of my life, you don't have any belief within you that this will not always be the case. I always expect it to come back, I just don't know when. And I keep up on my exercise, and make sleep a priority, so that hopefully it will delay its next appearance in my schedule, and/or be less intense when it arrives. 

Depression manifests itself in varying ways within me, and I'd say most of the time most of the people in my life probably don't pick up on its presence, unless I say out loud, "I'm feeling depressed." And I do say that, probably way more often than a lot of other people do. Honestly it probably gets construed as a casual expression, in the way I just insert it into everyday conversation, but the feeling within me is anything but casual. It always hurts, I always want to get away from it, want it to pass, wish I didn't have to suffer. But I experience it so often and have been in therapy for so many years and taken meds for so long that this depression talk is my second language -- or, really, my native language at this point.

I don't say it to shock people, or to ask for attention. I think I say that I'm depressed so people know that it's there -- because they can't see it, and often can't sense it. I can feel absolutely awful, terrible, completely pessimistic and hopeless, unable to draw a positive thought to the surface of my mind (for days, sometimes), and people will think I'm fine -- happy, in fact. I'm not trying to act fine, it's just that depression isn't (apparently) obvious to those outside of the body that is experiencing it.

If I had a nickel for every time someone told me, "But you're so well adjusted," "You seem so put together," "You seem so happy," "You're so positive," I'd be riiiiiiiiich. I want to be authentic, and I want people to know the truth of how I'm feeling, I think because if nothing else I spend so much time and pained energy looking at other people's lives and thinking/assuming they are happy/not depressed, and it makes me so jealous and mad. And I guess I want people to look at me and know the truth of what's going on in this head and heart of mine, so they don't assume I'm feeling good and treat me as such. And, I wish that they would be honest and authentic in return. 

I am by no means going to cover all the ways that depression feels for me, the ways it appears in my life, within this one blog post. But I want to try and describe at least some of the ways it can feel or be experienced by me, so people know and maybe to see if others share the same types of experiences and feelings.

For example, depression is often described and experienced as being unable to get out of bed, or not wanting to get out of bed. My experience is quite the opposite -- particularly if I'm well aware that I'm in a bout of depression, I will intentionally make myself get up, go to work, exercise, and not stay in bed past the time that I am sleeping. 

Depression often makes me think in one of two ways -- I either assume everyone around me (coworkers, friends, strangers in line with me at Starbucks) is happier than I am, not experiencing any depression of any kind or at least not at the level that I'm experiencing it, OR I project my depression onto literally everyone I see in the grocery store, passing by my car window as they walk on the sidewalk. My brain will absolutely think and believe that everyone feels terrible, that we are all feeling hopeless, that this life is crummy and we all hate it together and are clawing, desperately hoping for better feelings of joy to come be within us. If this is how I experience and perceive the world around us, why wouldn't we all be experiencing the same world in the same way?

I can go quiet, find it difficult to speak a word or a simple sentence into a simple conversation. Every thought that runs through my head is negative, and I feel I'm either going to bring the mood down for everyone else if I say one of them out loud, or it just feels pointless to say any of my words -- what change will it make in how I feel? I will sit through whole group dinners and barely say a word (usually this is with family, whereas if I try this around friends who know me to be gregarious/sarcastic/obnoxious, they might be more likely to call out my unusual behavior and I may feel uncomfortable with the prospect of addressing it in the company of those who aren't immediate family and are therefore less familiar with my private emotional tendencies).

For those who are more intimately familiar with my seasons of depression -- my family and my romantic partner -- they can try and cheer me up. This can make me mad, or I can be appreciative but someone trying to get me to smile (and even being able to do it) doesn't have any sort of significant impact on how I feel, nor does it speed up the process of getting the depression to abate. 

Alternatively, getting around people and socializing almost always can make me feel markedly better, if I'm in the midst of a very low, dark, hopeless state, but generally just getting me to laugh at something silly one is doing is not going to make much of a difference in how I feel. 

I see those close to me get concerned, worried, fearful, impatient, or angry in response to my feeling depressed. Save for the depression itself, knowing that they feel upset is perhaps the worst part of all of this. Some of the hardest moments in my memory have to do with someone who loves me deeply not being able to understand how I'm feeling, why I act the way I do, why I can become mute at the dinner table, why their silly antics don't fix a damn thing, why them caring for me isn't enough to make me feel or be better.

To this point, I'll say another thing that is among the most lonely, frightening, and infuriating factors of life with depression is that -- for me at least -- it is often not enough to just know I am loved. This is a  message that often gets shared, both with me personally, and within social media accounts and organizations trying sincerely to help those who experience mental illness: you are loved. You are not alone. 

These are valuable messages, but I have in fact and in very full, devastating truth, many times seen a text message or heard someone say out loud how much they love me in the face of my depression, and in that moment, that season, it doesn't help me feel any better. 

I think we have this belief in our society -- and maybe it's true for those who grow up in less loving homes than the one I came up in, for those who have lower self esteem and haven't known very often or ever that they have a lot of family and friends who love them -- that being loved, admired, liked, or valued is the only ingredient needed to make you feel good and happy, both overall and within a particular moment. For me, unfortunately, this has not proven to be true. 

In so many ways I have been dealt the most positive, loving hand of cards in life -- an affectionate, loving family; safe school and church environments where I was never mistreated or touched inappropriately; a body that is proportionately sized with no missing limbs or visible defects; never a day wondering when my next meal might be -- and yet, I struggle, from what I can tell, in ways and intensities far beyond what several of my peers do. I so wish it were enough to know that I am loved, to be able to watch a silly 30 minute sitcom episode and snap out of it, but that so very much is not the case. 

I don't share any of this to scare anyone -- believe me, I think about certain people reading this and it makes me upset to think how it will make them feel -- but just to make known what depression has felt like for me. For a couple of weeks now I've been thinking about writing down some of these descriptions; I'm curious if others' experiences are similar or not at all like mine. Particularly when I hear of the classic cases of "can't get out of bed" or "feeling numb," I just scratch my head in wonder at how those manifestations (particularly the second one) can possibly be the same "depression" I speak of in my life.

What I've written here is just barely scratching the surface, too, of the many nuanced experiences I have had over the years with a depressed state of mind. I'm not kidding when I say it will just flicker across my synapses in the middle of a workday, randomly. I'll be sitting there typing and will feel this sudden sense of gloom, for no sensible reason whatsoever. And it will pass in 60 seconds. (Other times, please know, it is not nearly as fleeting or forgiving.) It is bizarre, and I cannot control when or how often or how intensely it will occur. This has been, and continues to be my experience. 

I suppose I will stop here for now. I may write a follow-up post to describe some more of the specific ways I experience depression -- or hey! Maybe for funsies will talk about anxiety! Yay! -- but today I will just leave this with you. As an edification for you, or perhaps as a way to see that you're not alone. Because as I mentioned whereas simply knowing you are not alone -- particularly when you're in the thick, thick, thick of it -- may not always be enough in the moment to help, it is still a valuable truth, a truth that is worthwhile to hold with you in between seasons of emotional difficulty.

Xox,
Bailey

Books -- they do this brain good

When I get into bed at night (well, when I get back into bed after having been there since coming home from work, then brush my teeth, then return to bed for the actual sleep act of the evening’s entertainment), mostly stop looking at my phone, and get in the groove with reading my book, that is the moment when I truly let go these days.
I feel safe. The worry that’s been following me around allllllllllll day finally gets too tired to bother me, like a kid sibling who’s been repeating all your sentences back to you and then gives up once you just stop talking, giving them no more words to fuel their mission of annoyance. Once they stop getting a reaction out of you, all the fun dissipates and they go find something else to do – maybe they even go and, like me, read a book.

I’d say for several years now I’ve very consciously been using books to escape reality, and while a therapist may not love that statement, honestly I’m pretty OK with it. Because it's not like I don't LIVE in reality -- I put in my time at work and everywhere else, but when I crack open that novel or Calvin & Hobbes collection of strips, that's my little break. And it's a break that serves me very seriously well.

I don’t know what it is about words on a page, but I am reflexively drawn to them, want to bond with them like someone you meet at a party and just can’t stop jabbering with, passing back and forth quotes from your favorite TV shows, rapid-fire swapping childhood stats – hometowns, number of siblings, shared high school extracurriculars.

It’s fascinating to me that I can have such a natural relationship with a thing that is man-made – humans don’t need the written language to survive, yet it is indeed what keeps me functioning. This is fascinating to me in the way that certain people are so adept at playing guitar or piano. Singing, yes, that’s natural, we can all do it – a voice comes pre-packaged in a person’s body. But the six strings of a guitar, the 88 keys of an upright? Doesn’t make sense how someone – very many someones, in fact – can be so gifted in interacting with such tools, and moreover to pick up those instrumental skills rather quickly. I mean, it’s weird, right? It is.

Maybe it’s no less weird than how some people are more in step with urban surroundings than others. While one may have been exposed to concrete and steel structures their whole life, it still doesn’t make it inherently natural for a human to interact with them, does it? And for some, modern decor and white, drab, beige walls and sofas and throw blankets and clothes and and and…make us sad. Some people need to be around some good old wood paneling in a basement to feel safe, happy, connected with life and humanity. Not that wood paneling is actual nature or an actual tree with roots in the ground that one would have to step outside to see, but for a girl born in the 80s who grew up in modern American suburbs it’s close, OK?

I don’t know what I’m saying. I love to read. I need to read. 
I remember as a kid hearing the message that reading is so important, and one really needs to be able to read, and wondering in response: why? I wasn't a book hater, but I genuinely wondered why it mattered. It wasn't like knowing to look both ways before crossing the street or to avoid touching metal if you were outside in a thunderstorm, or to understand which foods have which vitamins to make you strong.

I mean honestly -- and I say this as a pretty clearly established book lover -- I still don't have an answer other than that being literate allows you to read various things like signs and menus and warning labels on paint cans. Some years back I looked into local programs that I might get involved in to help teach adults to read, and while I never fully pursued it I learned from my brief period of research about the concept of "functional literacy," which is just that -- being able to read signs and such, enough to be able to live more safely and inclusively in the society around you.

Anyway, I'm not sure what exactly I thought way back when when I saw people like Maya Angelou on PBS or some other celebrity on a "READ" poster in the library say that we "need to read," but I think that probably my general pushback reaction was that reading beyond what we were told to read for school was really just a hobby, and aren't hobbies kind of a person by person choice?

And I still feel that way. I hear people say now, "Oh I really should read," "I need to read more," and I often tell them no you don't. It's like trying to force yourself to watch a TV show you don't like, listen to music that grates on you, or try to pick up knitting or flyfishing if you really just don't care. I love reading so much, it is my absolute most favorite activity, but there is a whole long listttttttttt of things that I could CARE LESS about doing and that's fine. And if someone's a super talented painter or beermaker or nail tech, then I'd rather have them gracing the world with that specific skill that I don't have so that a) I can enjoy the fruits of their labor and b) so they're not losing time to some other forced, would-be hobby, thus preventing me from looking at their sweet timelapse videos on Instagram or drinking their handcrafted suds or helping me relax while they attentively sweep hot pink polish onto my fingertips.

So all this to say: I love to read. And pretty soon I'm going to close this laptop and brush my teeth and snurgle up with the cat and get my nose in a book! And it's gonna be great. But if you're not into it that's totes fine, Friend.

So what do you think? Is it weird that we interact and "bond" so well with these creations and buildings and things that humans have come up with, even though we don't naturally need them to live? (Although, now, maybe we do??? Since we're past an era where all of our time had to go to tending the land and hunting our dinners, do we in fact, actually need books and guitars and fancy architecture and roller coasters to keep us alive? I mean, from the standpoint of someone who's in her head all the time and can easily get depressed, I will say that I very much count on these things to keep me happy and focused and moving forward -- to fill my time, if nothing else.)

And is it weird to say that we NEED to read? I mean even though I need to read, I still think it's weird that we say that! Ha! Like there should be a follow up tagline to go with that slogan! Because kids' favorite question is "Why?", we all know this. So librarians and teachers and parents, I'm just saying, you better have a comeback ready when you tell the youths of today that they need to read. Or else those children are just going to bypass Ramona and that -- to me, at least -- would be tragic.

39 things that are true about me, a 39 year old

Photo credit: Crystal Larsen

1. In many, many ways, I feel not like the person I ever expected myself to be, and very different from how I felt even five years ago.

2. On the other side of that token, some things absolutely never change. As was true when I was a child, I still love to read, snuggle/talk to cats, and cross stitch. 

3. It seems that others’ perceptions of me are largely opposite my own. I know that my thoughts are quite negative quite a lot of the time, and I try most of the time to present my truth honestly to those around me. Yet frequently others comment on how positive, happy, and fun I am. Just in the last couple of weeks a coworker said to me, “You’re like our mascot!”

4. My diet comes down to my fluctuation between craving salt and then craving sugar. Back and forth, forever – and the more processed the better. 

5. Chores/errands that I don’t hate doing: laundry, dishes, vacuuming, putting gas in the car, writing checks then finding stamps to pay bills. My lack of extreme dislike for these tasks of course does not mean that I tackle them with any great haste or regularity.

6. I am an incredibly messy person, and I hate it and would desperately like to change it. I have a high tolerance for messes, hence their constant presence around me, but that doesn’t mean they are doing any favors for my mental health or feelings of self worth, and I do very much wish for a calmer, tidier space. 

7. I never thought I would find myself lacking in friends, but I feel deeply disconnected, isolated, jealous, and left out a lot of the time. I really, really need to get back to a place where I am in regular communication with several people who make me feel good and for whom I feel genuine compassion and affection for in return. It is imperative that something change in this department of my life. 

8. The primary activities that I can generally count on to spark joy for me are: petting Max (God, I LOVE that cat!), reading, cross stitching, exercising, and drinking beer or white wine. Everything else is a toss up these days. 

9. I never thought that squats and deadlifts would be such a big part of my adult workout routine, and I resisted incorporating such humdrum movements into my life for a long time, but I finally am OK with it and actually really love working out with weights several days a week. Nothing, though, offers the specific brand of stillness that comes after a run.

10. My taste in music is all over the place. Christian, pop, country, classical, indie, folk – I’ve said many times that were it not for music and a sense of humor, the human race would have died out a long time ago. Praise the good Lord in heaven above for music. 

11. My favorite compliment to receive is when people tell me I’d be a great teacher. It is both a dream profession of mine and also one I am way too intimidated by and terrified of to ever actually pursue. So when people have the faith in me to be great at something that I think is SO HARD and special and valuable, it means a lot to me.

12. That said, the only career I ever actually consider for myself outside of writing is to be a children’s librarian. I mean, I already read, dress, act, eat, cry, and watch TV like a child…I might as well be handing out recommendations to them on what to be reading. 

13. While we’re on the subject, I don’t think I’m good with children, but when I interact with one who enjoys reading, I become slightly better at carrying on a conversation with that particular child. I am now best friends with that kiddo, and we have a lot of Ramona and Bad Guys and Matilda to discuss, thank you. 

14. I can really enjoy hiking, when I’m in shape. If I’m out of shape, I HATE hiking and you’re best advised to not join me. 

15. I am an extremely tough sell when it comes to podcasts. I'm not an auditory learner, and I think it’s incredibly hard to regularly produce content that is palatable for listeners, no matter how funny, smart, endearing, or interesting the podcaster is. It seems there needs to be a very specific balance of bringing a genuine, relaxed persona to the mic while also letting oneself go off script, all the while having some sort of loose agenda in place for each episode. 

16. Our society has become extremely self-righteous in recent years, and I don’t care for it. It seems we spend a lot of time telling people how to live, giving instructions to fellow adults the way we would kindergartners. I absolutely want people (including myself) to be more kind, but when for example I see clothing and notebooks and stickers that say “Be Kind,” it bothers me. It feels very hall monitor-ish, and I wish that we could behave in more genuinely kind ways rather than policing each other to do so. To me, sharing messages to "be kind" presumes bad behavior/intention on behalf of the person receiving the message; rather, why can’t we trust and have faith in the person that they will be kind? 

17. I really, really struggle with extreme wealth and am no longer charmed by fame. I think it’s incredibly damaging within our culture that so many of us truly ache for more public attention and more material stuff to our names. These things will not bring peace, and yet we spend so much of our being believing that they could. 

18. Inside Out is my favorite Pixar movie, and it makes me cry every time, but not during the scene that makes everyone else lose it. I have never cried at Up or Toy Story 3, but I did cry during The Good Dinosaur. I’ll let you psychoanalyze me however you wish with that information.

19. Only a certain number of people have seen me cry in my life – I mean, we’re talking a small group – but indeed I do cry a lot. Way more often than my peers, I would be willing to bet. Interestingly, immediately following a tearful session, I don’t look like I’ve been crying at all, however if I have a heavy bout of crying, the next day my eyelids will be super puffy, like a muppet’s.

20. The older I get, the less confident I am in a lot of my decisions. I joke that I peaked in middle school, in terms of my self esteem and social skills, and I’m not actually really joking, Friends. When I was younger I had more time to fulfill my dreams and goals, and I could confidently say I was going to do all these wonderful and brave things because all those lofty things were always in the future. I didn’t have to make good on them. Now I’m several years and milestones down the road, and have watched myself not do a lot of stuff I thought I might, so I don’t trust myself to suddenly be better about that. 

21. All-or-nothing thinking is my jam. I’m really good at it. Curiously, it is really not good for me.

22. One of my greatest personal life mysteries is that I used to LOVE dancing, and was quite naturally good at it, but that is no longer true. Now this skill (and the freedom that comes with it) eludes me. I don’t grieve this loss as much as I used to, but I definitely still scratch my head at it. I doubt my sweet moves will ever come back, but who knows. 

23. I am baffled at my newfound social anxiety and discomfort around people in various situations – many permutations of which used to make me feel happy and good, excited. I wrestle with this reality daily. 

24. There are a lot of things that I found abhorrent in history books I read in my youth, but when faced with similar evils developing in real time in the modern world around me, I find it frightening and not at all simple to decide how I should behave or react. When the noise of the world gets louder around me, I often find myself drawn to the notion that being quiet is the most helpful path. It is a true challenge today to discern when it is necessary, effective, or healing to speak about something (particularly when the digital soapbox is there for us at all times to step onto), but I think it’s a question we should pay more heed to. 

25. Lately I struggle frequently with being angry, annoyed, and frustrated when others have things too easy – one might say I am jealous, because I am – but then I also know that I absolutely don’t want that person’s life – so…I’m not jealous? But I am jealous. Anyway this is something I could really afford to work on. 

26. If I could change something about my physical self, it would be to drastically reduce the frequency and severity of my headaches. Mercy. These things suck.

27. Until last summer I wanted nothing to do with plants and the caring of them. Just today I bought some more potting soil, a ceramic pot and matching saucer, and a "string of pearls" succulent to add to my patio collection. The green color (my fave) of the leaves, the smell of the dirt, the satisfaction of pruning and repotting and rotating and watering and seeing growth and change and improvement? I'm in. Absolutely life-giving and good for my hard-to-influence attitude.

28. Since day one of being Bailey, I have pursued the hobbies and books and music that have interested me, without regard for whether others might have something to say about whether those things were cool, worthy of my time, etc. I credit my parents and my brothers with modeling and fostering this specific determination, and while it is so ingrained in me that I hardly notice it, when I do reflect on it (and watch others engage in things they find boring in an effort to feel accepted) I am so. deeply. grateful.

29. You will rarely hear me talking about politics, sports, or...I don't know, Coachella. You will without a doubt hear me talking about my cat and whatever book I’m reading at the moment. It does not matter whether or not you ask.

30. Color sparks automatic joy for me. The brighter the better and the more hues we can put side by side the more serotonin my brain will be producing. If I ever declare myself to be a woman with a closet full of black clothing, assume I’ve had a lobotomy. 

31. There were definitely many challenges that came with moving across state lines at ages 9, 14, and 16, and to a degree I think I will always be picking apart the ways in which my adolescence was not linear, but I have never stopped finding connections in my adult relationships that I wouldn’t otherwise had I not been a student at so many schools, a member at so many churches, an employee at so many jobs. It is a complicated gift, but one that absolutely keeps on giving, and always will, I know it.

32. When it comes to concerts, I genuinely prefer a venue that is standing room only. It’s always more intimate and special and brings joy and peace and (ironically) quiet to my heart.

33. On that note (ha), while I have changed my tune (ha, again!) about a lot of things in Los Angeles after living here for many years, I do still love that we are a hub where so many musical acts come to perform. So other than lesser known country acts (who are more likely to play in Nashville), I have frequently been able to see artists who I love that I wouldn’t necessarily have been able to see in a smaller city.  

34. Alex tells me I’m a great audience member at stand up comedy shows, because I laugh loudly and a lot. So keep that in mind if you ever need a seat filler at your event. I’ve also been asked to get the ball rolling with baby shower games, karaoke, etc. It’s like people think I’m not shy or something.

35. I’ve had great fun planning the nitty gritty details for several events celebrating people I love — a surprise 40th, bachelor/ette parties — but I have no interest in doing it professionally. 

36. For some reason I very specifically love to make things out of construction paper, poster board, paints and markers. Working with those media just gets me into a stay-up-all-night, childlike type of focus. When I was making outer space decorations for my nephew’s fifth birthday (which no one asked me to do), Alex said, “How do we get you this excited about your writing?”

37. I never thought the team I grew up cheering for would win three Super Bowls in my lifetime, but remarkably here we are. And I’d like to say for the record to the haters out there that these are not the Chiefs I grew up with, OK? None of us saw this coming.

38. I never thought life would be nearly as hard as it has proven to be. Even though I have been largely protected from trauma and grief thus far, I skew toward a depressed or anxious state of being, which often makes things especially difficult for me. I am not one to make five-year or ten-year or even next-year plans, I am not confident in big life decisions like getting married or having kids or buying a house, I am able to complete University-level degree programs but way less good at translating those diplomas into careers, and I don't know if I'm doing most things "right" or in a way that best serves me or my loved ones. I will say that one goal/priority I have is to reconnect and build fresh friendships before I turn 40, as I think tending to that element of me will serve as a balm that will ease the pain and angst of a lot of the rest of life's...stuff.

39. And finally, after nearly four decades of comparing notes with others, I can say with absolute certainty that I am just so, so blessed and lucky to have grown up in the family and home that I did. It was a traveling home that toured Kansas, Colorado, Missouri, and hey! Kansas again!, but it was affectionate, safe, healthy, warm, fun, silly, filled with soda pop and Nintendo and hugs and kind, encouraging words and prayers and wrestling boys and purring cats and casseroles and an old-timey service bell that was deemed "the sick bell." The sick bell sat upon the tray of food served in bed to one who was ill, and it could be rung in case the infirm needed something while the rest of the family dined downstairs in the kitchen. Even when we felt our very worst, we were given permission to call to one another for help, and the muffled chatter coming up through the floorboards was a refrain declaring that our tribe was ever nearby to answer that call. Mom, Dad, K, P, R, J, J, C, A, J, L, O, C, M & L, I love you. Thanks for seeing me through my first 39 years. Xoxox

I have changed.

So, is anyone else just totally disappointed with how they've turned out? 

I never thought I'd be the person I am right now, in regards to so many various categories of personality, behavior, thought patterns, etc., and I sometimes find myself just deep down a spiral of thinking that leaves me nearly breathless at how unhappy I am with myself. I don't recognize this person, I am regularly befuddled by how I got here, and I don't know how or if I ever can recover a lot of the good, positive things in myself that for so long I thought were just part of the given, standard, Bailey package. 

The vast majority of my thoughts are negative.

I am extremely hard on myself, and others. I judge others' situations and actions immediately, without a benefit of the doubt, without grace, without nuance, and use it as fuel to feed my already out-of-control jealousy and bitterness. 

It's bad. It's rough, and I don't know if it can be fixed, or if any of this mental poison can be lanced from my system, any of this deep trauma reversed. Moreover, I feel this emotional trauma is almost entirely self-inflicted, so it doesn't feel possible to make things better for myself if that same self is the one who brought all this on. How can a person who is broken be trusted to think and behave in ways that will make herself unbroken? A toaster that's gone awry and now chars bread even on its lightest setting can't be expected to suddenly start heating things more evenly, can it? 

It's interesting that a toaster metaphor came into my head just now, as I have referenced my internal wiring in discussions about these changes that have occurred in me over the past handful of years, on the rare occasion when I have discussed some of these things with people. 

One thing that seems to have undergone a major shift within me is my social self. Personality tests, people who know me, and I myself just of course assumed that I was an extrovert since always, basically. I mean I'm not shy. My self-consciousness levels have always been way lower than the average person (we've all seen my non-matching, not stylish outfits, and heard me just blabber on about whatever, whenever, wherever). I've experienced several times what I describe as a "high" that occurs when I talk specifically to strangers. Like, that's just straight up uncommon, I think. So of course, I'm an extrovert, right? How could I not be?

In recent years I've come to think that maybe I'm not actually an extrovert, and at least one therapist has been comfortable to declare such about me, as I require a lot of by-myself time to recharge. (I also at least used to gain energy by interacting with people, so this distinction of intro vs. extrovert is still a mystery that is being worked out.) I have always needed my alone time, and find great peace and joy in sitting-at-home-alone activities such as reading, cross stitching, smooching on the cat -- this has always been true, we're talking since I was 10 years old these hobbies have not changed. So I can accept the argument (with some adjustment still, of course) that I'm an introvert, and sorta kinda move past the idea that I don't fit into this extrovert label, because meh, it's just a label and I've always kind of been my own category of a person anyway, ha.

What has been so hard, and difficult to comprehend is how I now feel in situations with people. Things I thought were for sure hard-wired within me (see? I was going somewhere with the toaster/electricity thing) seem to not in fact be a guarantee, and it has sent me reeling. Up until about five years ago, I loved getting together with people and by and large didn't like to miss any birthday party or happy hour or what have you. I was filled with genuine joy when I had the opportunity to talk with friends old and brand-new, to tell my gal pals how beautiful and wonderful they are, to plan surprise parties and bachelor/ette parties, to hug and squeeze hands and hold eye contact and giggle and cry and get real and dance from the shoulders up on our bar stools. 

It was life-giving, almost always, and now it's rare when I walk away from something thinking, "That was fun," "I had a good time," or "It was really nice to talk to that person." There's always so much riding on any given social situation now; I set the bar so high (to make up for past disappointment so strong) that the event and people in attendance can't ever satisfy.

***

Today, I frequently have to put in all my energy to gear myself up to attend any sort of party. I get so nervous about how I will feel, if I will be standing alone, if I will have to insert myself into conversations (knowing I absolutely don't want to do so -- chit chatting until recently was always one of my favorite activities and came so naturally, so it's infuriating that it now feels like work or has the potential to make me uncomfortable). Before, during, and after social events, I almost inevitably feel left out in some way, to some degree, feeling not included or involved enough, or sometimes just not invited in the first place. It feels pathetic, embarrassing, childish. 

And yet. 

Here we are. 

I've known and owned for decades at this point that I am too sensitive for my own good. But am I really that selfish that unless I am the center of attention or regarded as the best friend, the life of the party, if I am not missed when I am absent from a gathering, that it's not worth attending that gathering and my wounded ego will reduce itself to all-or-nothing thoughts that I therefore must not be considered a friend at all, and I should just consider these people acquaintances and give up?

I didn't think so, for a long time. I thought I was more thoughtful than that, able to tell myself "it's not about me" and hear that and let it register within my emotional bloodstream, making me stronger and less petty, freeing me to be the kinder and more thoughtful friend I most often knew myself to be.

Now I'm really not so sure. 

I avoid going to get-togethers, particularly group activities beyond more than a one-on-one interaction or a double date. I find excuses not to go -- something I never, ever did before. On the contrary, I was always the least self-conscious person within a group and could be happily thrown into a situation where I was meeting all new people. Offhand, I can think of at least two occasions in the last few years when I have gotten dressed, put on makeup, picked up a six pack to share at an event, driven all the way there, parked, and...driven back home, never to even enter the party. 

I sit there in my car and run through what it will be like to walk in to someone's apartment or condo and I decide, ultimately: Nope. I picture walking into a space full of conversations already in progress between people I don't feel connected to or close with, snaking my way through the crowd to find the host, I hear them say "Hi!" and pull me into a hug and then feel the situation immediately deflate, without any real friendly air in there to begin with. 

I picture people, in more alcoholically "lubricated" situations, yelling "Bailey!", then hugs, then...nothing. No true connection, nothing else to say to each other, no one asking me how I am or if they do ask, then I don't want to answer honestly. Because that answer would be: "I feel totally left out! You guys hang out all the time and I see it on social media and I am just here once in a blue moon and I feel totally out of place and self conscious and I hate it!!! I wish I knew all of you better and that you liked me more and that you cared to get to know me and that I didn't feel like an add-on invitation to your guest list. I wish I didn't feel like an afterthought and that I weren't so jealous of your home, your body, your youthful skin, your better-paying job, your contentment, your..."

[The weakest fake smile I can muster on my face. Say I have to pee so I can exit the situation as quickly as I entered it.]

***

I was a better person before, a better friend for sure. I have always been inclined to feeling left out, but I also used to be genuinely thoughtful and kind. I made time for people, stayed on the phone for long periods to listen as they talked through things, wrote emails and cards, felt deeply for what my friends were going through and made a point to make them feel seen, understood, loved and valued. For years I've had a lot of friends, and it occurred to me just this very week that while I still may have a lot of friends, I just don't feel like I have a lot of active friendships. I feel wounded, and don't know where to go from here; licking my wounds of friendships faded (whether it's their fault or mine or no one's) hurts like hell, but also -- now what? Having retreated from relationships in ways I never thought I would has deeply changed me. This unexpected, albeit gradual, change has left me lost, feeling stuck, and quite ashamed. 

I don't think I am fully 100 percent a monster, but monster-ish thoughts about myself definitely win out and overshadow a lot of other would-be positive, helpful, healing thoughts. 

***

I think about posting this -- and I probably will -- and I see some adults who have known me since childhood feeling very upset when they read this. I think about my current peers thinking, "Wow, Bailey is not a very nice person and it seems she needs things to be all about her. I'm not sure I want to spend time with her anymore, particularly if she might think that I don't care about her or give her enough attention. What a whiny baby."

That all may be true. I don't like it if that's true or if that will happen. But I guess I just want to say some honest things, get them out there in the universe, see if maybe it lances some of that emotional poison from within me. Like I mentioned above, I do by and large blame myself for having become this negative, bitter, emotionally stunted (or emotionally fried?) person, even if my brain always go to snap judgments and wants to actually blame my bitterness on other people not being kind or thoughtful enough (or for being prettier and more successful than I am, you know who you are :). My knee-jerk reaction these days is to blame others who seem happier than I am for why I feel less happy, but ultimately I blame myself for not being a more mature person capable of growth and humbly accepting the larger picture of life and at least attempting to believe that people are trying to do their best and be kind. And while neither quadrant of blame is enjoyable at all, the latter is much more punishing, I assure you. 

If you need me, I'll be navel gazing, cross stitching, reading, and cuddling this angel cat who has been curled up against me for this whole typing session. 

I am also going to try and get out for a run/walk/hike or do a weight lifting workout today, as I do have at least one mentally well thing going for me and that is that I know the power of physical fitness to ease my mind and have made it a priority and a habit. I am able to find gratitude for that. 

I hope some of this damage in me can be reversed. In many ways, I really liked the Bailey I was before. And I hope if my damage has damaged the relationship between you and me, whoever's reading this, I hope that can be fixed, too.