Never a Good Time for a Breakdown!

Why is it never a good time to have a nervous breakdown? I mean, why can't we have built into life a "time out" when we need to just "have a moment". Well, today is one of those moments. Total sobbing breakdown. And the most fun part - for no apparent reason. So that's always fun for the spouse. Here's what I do know - I've been extremely frustrated with my lack of determination with losing weight or sticking to the plan, whatever you want to call it. I have felt for months that I'm just making life hard on myself and I need to "pee or get off the pot". So yesterday I really spent the whole day with what is going on. I'm not sure that I know what's going on yet, but by last night I was pretty depressed and this morning I woke up & had a breakdown - so I must be getting close. The good part of all of this is that I know from experience that when emotions bubble up, it means the need to use food for comfort will decrease dramatically - so that will be the bright spot to hang on to.

But now, to figure out what's going on. Here's what I found interesting in my breakdown this morning - since I was a young child I had an immense, profound sadness. I can't remember when I first felt it but I pretty much remember feeling it most of my adolescent life. I know I felt horribly lonely as a child. I also felt spied on by my family. I thought the pictures on my wall were where they would watch me. I slept crammed against the wall so someone looking in my window wouldn't be able to see me. I dressed behind doors and furniture. And when I entered my tweens I really went downhill. I became horribly depressed and suicidal. I can't say horribly because I was functional, but I cried every day for about 2 years. From an outside perspective one would say, "Yeah, normal behavior for the age" and it really was, I guess. I think what wasn't normal was the profound sadness that I always had. I think it came from so many sources - not feeling part of my family, not having a brother that cared if I lived or died, having a father that travelled so wasn't home much, having a mom that was task oriented and not a nurturer, feeling horribly misunderstood - I really didn't & still don't fit in with my family. I'm extremely different than them and needed so much more than they were capable of giving. I'm sure it also stemmed from the fact that I'm pretty sure I was molested as a young person. I had certain behaviors growing up because of my experience which made me feel like an outsider - I knew it wasn't normal to behave the way I would but I had no one to talk to about it. It wasn't until I was married a few years that Kurt said to one of our many counselors, "I want to know why Wendy sleeps with satin every night." The counselor whipped out a form about recognizing abuse & began going through the questions - one of which was actually, "Do you wet the bed or sleep with a "blankie" or feel satin/silk at night?" I couldn't believe that was actually on the form. And may I say, I'm grateful my symptom of being molested is satin & not wetting the bed!!! So THERE! - there is a reason so hand it over & shut up.

So I would go through these spells of profound sadness & I remember thinking, "when will this end?" As I've gotten older it comes further and further apart - these spells of sadness. I describe it as a hole I fall into that seems to have no way out. This is where the thoughts of suicide come from - it seems hopeless - it seems impossible to climb out in my own strength. Which also is where my total reliance on God has come from. I give God all the credit for my being alive - I would pray and pray as a young person and make deals not to kill myself if certain things could get better or change. In the end, I now know that many thoughts of suicide are an actual wish that someone else in your life would die or go away, not that we actually want to die ourselves - which in my case, was true. Anyway, this morning I felt that sadness again. And it struck me by surprise since I haven't felt it for so long. It's different than the crying of being sick for months on end from chronic fatigue. That's more of feeling sorry for myself - this sadness is that hole that never has been filled coming to the surface and crying out for help.

What's funny is that last night I actually went online to shelters & went window shopping for a dog. I don't want a dog, but I was thinking about it last night. Then this morning as I was sobbing I was thinking about how I felt as a child, when I would feel this sadness and loneliness, and it hit me that the worst mistake my parents made was not letting me have a dog - that really could have helped me with a lot of my depression. It could have helped me with my loneliness, it could have helped me with my need of affection and nurturing and it could have helped me feel that I had someone on my side. Now, I say "could" because the thing could have bonded with my brother and then I would have been even worse off - but better odds of a dog working than my old thought of I needed another sibling.

So I sit here now with the puzzle of, "Why was I feeling this profound sadness today?" What triggered it or what am I in need of? The basic answer is nurturing - the harder question is how?