How did I do it? Mental Illness SUCKS!

 How did I do it? How did I learn to manage and de-escalate anxiety? How did I learn to trade feelings of worthlessness, loneliness, and other feelings of depression for happiness and contentment? How did I do it?

I remember so clearly those feelings back when I was in school. I remember the fear I felt and the thoughts of being judged. I remember how I felt crowded all the time and that I didn't want to be around others that much. I remember how I wanted to just run. Run out of the building and away from it all. I also remember how I wanted to be looked at by others and for them to smile at me. But instead, I knew that sneers and insults were waiting for me. That was my reality at that time. 

I remember not fitting in. I was not like my peers and that was painfully evident when I took a chance and actually voiced my feelings. My interests and skills and thoughts of relationships were so unlike the others. They were so foreign and weird to the social mindset at the time. So I never really talked much or about much or engaged much. 

I was an enigma it seemed. 

Depression came after where I was self-aware of this chasm of differences and it created such a sense of sadness. A sense of being profoundly alone. This caused me to shy away from people, to go off on my own, and isolate myself in behaviors like hiking in forests and building things in my grandpa's shop. But those things in turn ended up magnifying my differences. My anxiety. My mental struggle. I kept searching for that essence of myself and developing who I was and how I looked at the world. And the more I found deep within, the more I distanced myself from my peers. It was more often than not that I ended up being alone in a room full of people. I was physically there but I was not there. I was unnoticed. I was ignored, I was looked over.

And I truly didn't mind.

But then, I did mind too. 

What a weird sense of reality. 

I never wanted to hurt myself or anything like that. No. I cared about myself too much for that. The depression, though, ended up being like a warm blanket. People can let it be that way, you know? It can be so comfortable and you tell yourself you need to leave but you are snug and warm and wrapped tight. It becomes easier to just leave it on. Familiar. Routine. You know?

Well, I am still that way at times. It is nowhere near where it used to be when I was a teen and a young 20yr old. Far from it. I have actually found my place in the world, my niche, and I thought that would never happen. Then I found my love of a lifetime and I also thought that would never happen either. As I grew older and experience more of the world around me, I found that my differences actually made a difference. They actually made a difference to others and I never thought that would happen. 

But for the life of me, I can't remember or know how I did it. How all those things came about. 

I still struggle though but I have these things now that I do to help myself. I draw and explore and build and tinker and read and enjoy nature and lots of other things. That is what I do now. How did I learn what helped me? How did I learn that those things pushed back the anxiety, the fear, the loneliness, and the sadness before it consumed all my thoughts and feelings? That is the million-dollar question.

I am finding it is a state of mind really. Like, you have to decide to change the way you think about yourself and the world around you. It seems so simple, right? Well, no. No, it's not. It's actually hell and near impossible for your brain to do. It is not that simple. Your brain is an adversary that is in complete domination over you. And when it gets comfortable, when it gets used to the routine, it sets up house. 

Telling your mind to feel and think differently is like making a river flow in a different path. That will only happen one of two ways; Either the world is shook to its foundations and the whole earth rearranges itself or it changes paths one grain of sand by one painstakingly minuscule grain of sand moving only an inch at a time over decades. . . . centuries. Either way, it is not easy and in real life, your brain and feelings are the same way. It is usually painful. 

So, I am back at my original question. How did I do it?  How did I learn to manage and de-escalate anxiety? How did I learn to trade feelings of worthlessness, loneliness, and other feelings of depression for happiness and contentment? How did I do it? 

God, I wish I knew. Because if I did, I might be able to help my son navigate this same thing because lately. . . .  lately I feel like I am only drawing short straws.