7 days...

It's been exactly seven days, six hours and thirty-eight minutes since I came undone. I'd sauntered through life all the days preceding that moment... not necessarily in a zombie like state, but definitely not as a reflection of my true self. A shell. Force feeding myself with normalcy, maintaining appearances of togetherness, painted on smiles and mischievous eyes, all for the sake of my sanity. Everything done for appearances sake. A ruse. Make believe can consume you. It can tear away at the seams of your internal fabrics. Like a tear constantly growing, subtle yet seemingly. It's hard to appear together. Being together is hard.

So often people mistake my angst for being extra, comic relief to keep the conversation going. Jokes to lighten the moment and ease the internal conversations inside my head with my self. Punctuation and grammar aside, sometimes it's hard to be who you want to be, while maintaining the perception that everyone else has for what they want you to be. What they think you are. I wear many hats. A friend to many, an associate to more, a sister, a daughter, an aunt, a believer, a seeker, a lawyer, a writer, a procrastinator, a lover and sometimes less than that, sometimes more and sometimes nothing. Being pulled in so many directions can sometimes make you lose direction. I yearn for consistency. I crave control. I live for loyalty. But it gets hard. Life can be hard.

I don't know what exact moment triggered it. Maybe it was the stress and demands of work. The everyday grind, the deadlines, the numbers. Or maybe it was him, or him, or him. Him telling me that I couldn't have all of him anymore, as if I'd ever had more than a piece. Or him demanding my attention, my availability, my accessibility with nothing in return. Or him asking for absolutely nothing in return for the chance to see the real me. But that me, the one who has so long orchestrated every interaction, was too critical of that version of me. The vulnerability caused discomfort. The intensity of revealing my true self overwhelming. Fear inducing. But ultimately it was me.

Control is dangerous. Life is not meant to be controlled. Life is not some animal in captivity waiting to be told to sit, stay, roll over. Life is unpredictable. Life is ups and downs. Life is letting go and just living. Without restraint. Without the roles. Without the labels of what you think is the way things should be. Life is hard, but losing yourself is harder.

I went from routine to reckless. I couldn't think straight, I couldn't breathe. I couldn't see clearly, nor could I make sense of the simplest things. I overanalyzed. I obsessed. I screamed. I took the blame for everything. Because of course my lack of whatever is the reason the world does not revolve at my command. I overanalyzed some more and then I just broke down. There was nothing left for me to do but admit that I needed help. I needed genuine people who were willing to talk me off that ledge and mean it. I needed self care, I needed self love. I needed assurance that every wrong in the world is not my fault. I needed to admit that I truly could not pray it away, without some real work. I needed help, because life is hard. It's not supposed to be easy. It will never be perfect, but it can be manageable. It can be great. It can be free. It can be enjoyable. But life is hard. And if anyone tells you it isn't then they aren't truly living.