I’m going to the doctor again tomorrow. The tightness in my chest and difficulty breathing has returned. I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I feel overwhelmed, constantly. This isn’t me. I don’t get it. I’ve been put through the ringer before with various careers. I worked in the film industry, in the art department, which is the department with the highest rate of suicide. If I could handle that why can’t I handle my life right now? I was a professional athlete for heaven’s sake! I thrive in high pressure situations, with little sleep and a lot to do.
In therapy this week, I discussed this feeling of being overwhelmed and my health. My therapist said I needed to get help and take care of myself. I agree but I don’t understand what is making me feel so crazed. If I could figure that out I think I would get this under control.
I do know that recently I’ve felt very isolated. We have no family and only two close friends with whom I would leave P with. This seems insane to many people. We have many friends but I only trust two people enough to leave my only daughter with them. Actually, there are about three other families but they are either a: not geographically close or b: have young kids of their own. They’re overwhelmed. I feel like D and I are on an island alone. I’m pissed that neither one of us has a supportive family. And I’m so tired of hearing my expectations are too high when getting help for P. Why don’t the people who say that raise their bloody standards? 1 out of every 2 children in this country are sexually molested. That’s a hell of a lot of kids for people to tell me my standards are too high.
I’m not sure if missing my dad is playing a part in my lack of health. I miss him a lot. It physically pains me. I think I’m also mad. I’m mad he died now when we finally were starting to have so much in common again. Every time I pick up my tools I think of him. I can feel my chest get tight. I want him back. I want his support back. Now, that I know how proud he was of me I want him back to feel that pride, to basque in it the way I never got to and to pass that feeling onto P. Instead I’m alone and I feel like I have no one on my side. My mother and I have grown apart since I became a mother.
The past two years have been brutal on me. I nearly lost my marriage, I had to terminate a 6 month pregnancy, I lost my dad and I just had a miscarriage. The hardest hit was my marriage. After a year and a half of hard work from both D and me to get to a positive place I think I’m finally letting my guard down. You know how in a car accident often the pains come later when the body has finally let go of bracing for the hit? Well, that’s what I think I’m feeling.
I have friends who are going through what I went through but the outcome is different. It makes me feel lucky, blessed that things worked out the way they did. It took both of us to rebound. And it took a lot of things happening at the right place and at the right time for it all to work. Truthfully, I think the lack of family and outside support is a large component to making us continue to work. I guess I need to take the positive and negative of this circumstance.
I just want to be able to breathe again. I want to feel strong like I use to. I want to be the woman who had no fear on the tennis court, or who traveled the world alone or who moved across the country to start from scratch. I want to feel that I’m doing a good job with P. I don’t feel like I am because I can see it in her eyes. I need to figure something out. I need to get back to living to win instead of not to lose.
