It finally happened and it was like someone walked  into the room and turned on a light.  All the pain and longing I was struggling with is gone.  I think it happened for a couple of reasons.

1. Being able to share my heart in a meaningful way and feeling I had been heard and respected and hearing positive words in return.

2. Making the choice to go off a medication my doctor had put me on 1 year and 4 months ago when all this anxiety and angst started.

The talk was a wonderful thing and I am glad I did it.  It made me realize that things happened for a reason and I am not less than because I am no longer in that relationship.  I hold no grudges or anger any longer.  I have moved on, finally.

The medication issue is something that I have struggled with for a long time.  For years I was totally against any psychiatric medications because of what I learned in my college courses and what I had seen first hand.  In addition I did some of my own research and I was not impressed by a science that is not exact in anyway when it comes to these particular medications.  When I was in so much emotional pain that I just could not function I gave in and agreed to try something.  It worked for a few months and gave me the courage to end my relationship but then it went terribly wrong.  I began having intrusive racing thoughts of killing myself.  I could not sleep and I cried all the time.  I blamed it all on the breakup.  Yes, I was mourning but this went way beyond that and I could not understand why I was suffering so much.  I felt embarrassed and I was full of anger and resentment.  I was sharing some but hiding so much more.  This is not my normal personality.  I am a forgiving person who has never been one to carry a grudge.  I chalked it up to me finally getting in touch with my inner warrior and working on anger but that is not what was happening.  This was pure hatred that after awhile had no rhyme or reason.  So one morning I got up and decided that my medication was no longer helping me and I stopped.  I do not recommend this way of stopping.  It was not a fun withdrawal and I was sick for weeks but then it was like the light switched on….the racing suicidal thoughts stopped and I was no longer obsessed in my head with thoughts of regret, hatred and revenge.

About two months before this my doctor had also given me something to help me sleep which I continued until a week ago.   I made the choice to discontinue it and use CBD and other natural means which seemed to be working very well so far but this past week has been scary as hell.  The drug I was taking for sleep was Lorazepam.  I would not recommend this drug to anyone.  It is the strongest and most dangerous benzo.  I had been telling my psychiatrist for months I never wanted to take a benzo and when he gave me this drug he made me promise that I would not look it up because I am super sensitive to drugs and he was afraid I would have symptoms just reading about it.  I was desperate for sleep so I trusted him.  If I would have broken that promise I would have immediately have known that I could not take this drug even for a short period of time.  I took it for a little over a month and I did sleep but drugs are not a long term answer for me.  I stopped one week ago.  I had no idea that such a short time on the drug would bring on such a strong reaction from my body.   Within 24 hours I was sick.   I was dizzy when I moved at all, headaches, body aches, sweating, nausea and my brain felt like it was crawling and shocking me.  I could not sleep and my ears rang constantly.  It has gotten better day by day but I am still having issues.  Yesterday I got dizzy and the next thing I remember is my granddaughter Lizzy yelling to her sister Lilli that I had fallen.   I was ok, but shook up.  I am super pissed about this.  I will never take another psychiatric drug under any circumstances.  Some people may feel upset and defensive reading this but this is my experience and I am not judging anyone else for taking them.  I know this much for sure.  If you have been on them long term do not try to just quit.  I have read many articles about them and people die from withdrawal sometimes.  It is not something to mess around with.   I am having withdrawal but long term use withdrawal is the reason some people end up on heroin or other drugs.  I truly believe that 100 years from now they will look back at this time and shake their heads at the “cures” that were handed out.

So where am I now.  I feel like I have woken up from a long nightmare.  I feel hopeful again.  I cannot believe I came so close to taking my own life.  I have a bright future ahead of me no matter how long that may be.  I am grateful for my life and those who have stood by me.  I am returning to work next Tuesday and I am looking forward to it.  I feel I have so much to live for.

I am finding that gratitude is the answer to all this pain I have been carrying around.   I spent months focused on what I had lost.  I was dwelling on the fact that someone who was such a big part of my life was no longer there.  I felt confused, lost and rejected.  I could not climb out of that pit and I when I would I ended up falling right back in.  Part of the falling back in was returning to places that triggered me.  As much as I did not want to I had to give up a part of my life that I loved at one point.  I know now that it had become our place in my mind and when it was no longer our place going there just broke my heart all over again.  I have let go of that.  There are other alternatives and I have things to do and friends to hang out with that make me happy.  I am focusing on gratitude and taking care of my body.  I have been going to the gym almost every day.  I am tracking my food and getting enough sleep.  Slowly I am feeling better.  Two days in a row of feeling good is a great thing for me.  I am so grateful for everyone I have in my life who loves me and cared during this whole process.  It is not over yet it is a work in progress but I am no longer spending hours sobbing my heart out because I was in so much pain.  Progress…. it is happening.

Last night I closed the door.  I would be lying if I said that I had closed it months ago.  I kept it ajar and checked it on occasion to see if there was still some possibility.  But the truth is that I did not want to step back through that door.  When I was a part of that relationship I was living a lie.  I was trying to be something I was not to make someone else happy and in the process I was killing my true self.  When things ended I was bitter and angry and I put that anger on the wrong person.  I am sorry for that.  I will no longer blame someone who is not to blame.  I will not blame anyone.  I have looked my past in the face and said I forgive you and I am ready to move on.  I needed to say it.  I needed to say goodbye for good to what I used to to have.  Each chapter of my life has a lesson in it.  The lesson of this chapter has been to never lose my authentic self again.  I get this thought in my head every time that this will be my last love, that I will never be loved again …  that is not true.  Right now I just need to work on daily meditations of forgiveness and taking care of myself.  I wish nothing but happiness to those I have walked with in this world.  I am a work in progress and your entrance in my life helped me to grow.

I have not been writing much lately.  It is not because I do not have anything to say it is because it all seems to be jumbled up in my brain in a way that I cannot untangle it.  I am confused about how I feel about so much in my life.  One moment I think that I am just one of those people who needs to have a intimate partner and the next I feel I am better off alone.  I have been working on healing from my past relationships.  I am working on forgiving those who have wounded me.  I am trying my best to focus on myself.  I feel like I have always been alone even though I have had relationships for most of my life.  I have always been with emotionally unavailable people that I invest love into only to be rejected.   I am really tired of it.   I want to go back to the days when I could go dance and not even have to talk to anyone…on the dance floor I felt free.  I would dance and then just go home.  I had no regrets.  I felt no jealousy.  I felt no envy.  I just danced.  It was my therapy and it helped me so much.  I am still working through that loss.  I am moving on.

If we are seeking spiritual enlightenment we must ask ourselves if our needs, lust and wants are more important than the pain it may cause someone else.  We may see something or someone as a gift but a gift at the price of someone else suffering is not a true gift.  We are handing the person we are hurting a box of darkness that when opened will find it’s way back to us like tentacles seeking their origin.   We cannot blame the other for being hurt and lashing out in that pain.  We are seeing our own future in the beginning of the suffering we have caused someone else. We will not escape.   Wishing good to the person we have harmed is like taking a dropper of water to a roaring bonfire and pretending we have done our duty.  We should not expect to be forgiven just because we have sent some good energy out of guilt or self righteousness to a heart we have wounded.   We must remember that every action we take affects those around us.