Quick Before the Hyena Come

 

Accurate depiction of inside of my brain, also what the title is from.

 

Hiya friends, so I’m being told that I need to write this blog post right hoofin now! Are ya ready? Let’s rap. (Buckle up kids…this is gonna be a ride.)

So, December has been a tunnel month. I can hear you asking, “Biblio…what in great tarnation is a hoofin tunnel week?”

First off, look at you using fancy language. Of course, I’ll answer your question, my little chingus (definitely not how to make that word plural, but we are going with it). [EDIT: the plural of one chingu is apparently chingudeul *five points to you if you know the language, post on that coming soon*] Tunnel times are essentially when the Asshole throws a fucking house party in my brain and invites all his asshole friends. They come in with their ice luge and start doing keg stands, breaking all the priceless ashtrays I made in kindergarten (side note: why were we allowed to make fucking ashtrays???). I am plunged into infinite darkness, and I can’t really see any sign of light at the end…is my tunnel metaphor making sense now? I’m basically cruising through said tunnel and who knows how long I’m gonna be there. I live here now, forward my mail.

For those wanting to send me something, the address is:

Biblio Feels

123 Tunnel Way

Assholeville, AH 91119

Accepting all baked goods and who knows maybe my Harry Potter acceptance letter will finally find me.

This is a shitshow already…but I did warn you. I’m like Shrek, okay? I’m a hoofin onion, my dudes, and I have layers, just go with it. Lord knows, I am.

Hold on, I’m forgetting something else I was supposed to put in this…gotta ask Hobbs.

 

You know you said it like the show.

 

Okay, apparently I need to also say that I’ve taken to using the word “beech” in place of “bitch,” and when asked why by Hobbs I answered, “I find the term offensive to female dogs.” This tunnel shit needs to end soon, otherwise, I fear for my marriage. I think he’s starting to realize that under my cool as a cucumber exterior I’m really just a massive weirdo.

I feel like if I post this, I’ll either get a lot of people telling me to lay off the drugs, or

“Secret, secret, secret, secret tunnel!”

people wondering if this is how I actually act. I’ll answer these currently unasked questions now: I’m not on drugs, I have anxiety people, I’m paranoid enough. Secondly, this is the real me. Awkward, anxious, random and unfiltered…plus books, I mean, what more could you want.

 

Oh, this reminds me of another lovely thing I’ve been doing recently. Y’know how “AF” was a thing…is a thing…I mean, I still do it but that doesn’t really help its cool factor. Well, now there is that whole thing where people are living their best fucking life…I have shortened that to BFL. Though Hobbs thinks it should be BFLB…Best Fuckin Life, Beech! (Merch coming soon! Link in the description below! Okay, I need to stay away from YouTube.)

I think this is enough of the inside of my brain for one day. I really hope you enjoyed this, and remember…BFLB, chingudeul. Until next time…

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The Day of Darkness

Hiya friends, welcome back. As I woke up this morning, I knew it was going to have a good day (in regards to the Asshole and Panic). I was right, too. I woke up at a perfect four, and I felt I could take on the world. This feeling happens so few and far between that when it does I fucking revel in it.

I took my happy feeling and got a ton of shit done today. This morning I got up and got a good bit of my homework done. Then I prepped some stuff for dinner and cleaned a few rooms. I also got to work on getting our guest room ready for our first ever house guest in our new place. It really was a great day. In fact, dare I say, I had the perfect four day.

I asked a friend tonight if it was weird that good days always made me reflect on the bad ones. She assures me that this happens to everyone. It’s almost like I can see the Asshole in my memory warehouse, feet kicked up on the table, checking his manicure and saying, “Enjoy it while it lasts, girl. I’ll just sit here biding my time, I’ll wait for the perfect moment to knock you down again.” Then, as he looks at the dark mass hovering near him, he laughs. Man, he really is an asshole.

In my reflective state tonight, I got to thinking about the worst time I’ve ever had with my anxiety and panic. Which inevitably reminded me that, in that time, I never thought I’d come out on the other side. Whenever Hobbs and I discuss this period of time, we just call it ‘The Dark Time’. Obviously, it’s not really my favorite thing in the world to talk about. I mean, I’d much rather talk about my family and friends, or my pets. Actually, I’d really rather poke hot nails into my eyes, then go back there again, which is exactly why I’ve decided to talk about it now. I feel this need to tell people about how bad it can get, how bad I can get.

I can say with all honesty, there are very few people in my life who know about this. In fact, I can literally count them one hand. The only reason I’ve kept this bit quite close to the vest is because people look at you differently the second you tell them. There is a moment after the words come out, that you notice the look in their eyes changes. You are no longer what they thought you once were, and instead they now know all the darkness that lives inside you.

Okay, I’ve procrastinated long enough, let’s do this.

Four, maybe five now, years ago, Hobbs and I were living with some of his family. (It was a duplex, we had the ground floor, and they lived above us.) When I tell you that there are reasons people tell you to not live with relatives, there really are. I was still rather new in my dealings with anxiety and panic, and I’ve said before, I was struggling. The only way I can describe the struggle that I was dealing with is like this: have you ever felt like you were doing everything in your power to keep your head above water, and yet you know that it’s futile? That there is something dragging you to the depths? This is how I felt everyday when I woke up. I never had four days then, and looking back on it, I was certain I never would have a good day again. Between the anxiety/panic and living with people who were constantly finding ways to belittle me, I was drowning, and I knew it.

What people leave out when they talk about anxiety, is the idea that depression is kind of like it’s best friend. The despair I felt was tangible; it took shape in every single thing I did. I couldn’t laugh without being shitfaced. I was actively pushing every person in my life away, including my parents and Hobbs. I wanted absolutely nothing to do with anyone, and judging by the words I was hearing at the time, no one wanted anything to do with me. In that time, I was seeing my life in shades of grey; nothing made me happy. I knew on some level this was happening because I was actually believing the words I was hearing, but I couldn’t drag myself out of it. I tried not to listen to them and to block them out, but nothing worked. I was constantly hearing how horrible I was, stupid, fat, worthless (I actually described myself that way to my mother one night and I’m positive she was trying to climb through the phone to throttle me).

I should clarify, Hobbs was not saying these things to me; his family that lived above us were. During this time though, Hobbs was afraid to say anything for fear we would get kicked out and then what would we do?. (Looking back, I don’t blame him for his fears, and I don’t blame him for not saying anything. He was just as confused as I was.)

I had been dealing with this for a while, and one morning I woke up and honestly greeted the depression. I knew something was different. I went through the day like I usually would, cleaning, laundry, cooking. Later in the day, after Hobbs came home, I stepped onto the porch for something and I heard some of his family talking about me. “The girl is no good, she’s just dragging him down.” The last things I heard were “white trash,” and that was it. I was done. I knew I couldn’t face these people anymore. I couldn’t even stand to look at myself in a mirror then. I remember sitting down to dinner with Hobbs and really giving it my all, he actually said, “You seem better today, that’s amazing.” I wasn’t better, I was gone. I drank my face off that night, I needed the liquid courage.

He went to bed, and I laid there, listening to him snore for a good hour and half, just wondering how he could sleep so peacefully when inside I was so broken I couldn’t remember who I’d been when I was happy. He had no idea, at the time, how lost I was. I got out of bed and went to the bathroom. I wasn’t even crying, I just felt numb. I don’t know if any of you have ever felt that but god, I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy. I opened the cabinet near the sink and searched for the pills, they weren’t there. Now I know that Hobbs has gotten rid of them without knowing what I had planned. I was fucking angry, and I took the fact that I couldn’t find them to mean I needed another way out. I thought about breaking the mirror, I mean, they do that in movies all the time, it can’t be that hard. My next thought was how I didn’t want Hobbs to have to wake up to that. It would be much better for him if it looked like I just went to sleep, no gore, he didn’t deserve that.

I sat there contemplating how I could do this, and thinking to myself that maybe I couldn’t do this. My mom always told me suicide was a cowards way out, but I was also certain my mother had never felt like this. It literally hurt to be there. I didn’t see any other options. I had told people I was unhappy, but I hadn’t really pushed the issue. I left the bathroom and stood in the doorway of my bedroom. He was still snoring. I paced the floor that night, trying to figure out how I was going to do this. One half of me was begging for the calm that would follow, while the other was telling me to fight. It wasn’t until Hobbs walked into the living room and asked why I was still awake that I realized I had stayed up all night fighting with myself. In that moment, I looked at him and just knew I couldn’t go through with it.

I spent the rest of that day, while he was at work, trying to find another option. When he walked through the door that night, I had a solution but I wasn’t sure he would go for it. He barely made it through the door and I said, “We need to move.” He was definitely confused and asked why. I explained that no one could live in a place like this. He said we didn’t have an option. I knew I was going to have to tell him the truth, so I ripped the metaphorical bandaid off. The next words that flew out my face were some of the hardest I’ve ever said, “I was up all night trying to find the pills from the cabinet.” His face was blank for a second and I saw the moment he realized what I was saying. In true Hobbs fashion he said, “Find the place.”

I started seeing a new therapist within the week, on Hobbs insistence. We also started looking at new places. It took a little while, but we found a new place. We never told them we were leaving, just started packing and one weekend, moved out. It wasn’t until we had moved into the new apartment that he finally got the courage to say, “You were going to take them if you found them, weren’t you?” I gave him the only answer I could, “Yes.”

I’m not saying it’s always this easy to get past that point. It wasn’t overnight that those feelings stopped, I had to purge them. I basically cut myself open and purged the darkness that I could get to. Hobbs knows that this is a reality for me, and since that moment things have changed with more than just me. We don’t talk to those people anymore, and I never once asked him to stop, Hobbs made that decision on his own. I knew that certain people had to know, like my parents, so they were told. My mother raged at me, as I knew she would. My dad just doesn’t discuss it, I think it hurts him.

Personally, I try to block this out, my life looked so fucking bleak then. I hadn’t ever been to that place before, and thankfully, I’ve not been back since. I know that talking about it helped me, and I’m not saying that’s all it took, but it helped. If you are, or you know someone who is, in that place right now…reach out. Reach out to anyone, I don’t care if it’s a significant other, a friend, or a fucking stranger, no one deserves to go through that alone. The dark is scary when you’re alone. Sometimes it helps to ask a friend for a flashlight. I’ve got one if someone needs it.

You guys know the drill by now, there are two numbers down at the bottom, the National Suicide Prevention Helpline, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Treatment Referral Helpline, use them if you need them. See you lovely lot tomorrow.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255

SAMHSA: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)

Brace Yourself, The Man Cold Is Coming

Hiya friends, welcome back. So I just realized that I completely forgot to write a post last night for today…oops. I swear, when I’m finally feeling 100%, this will get back to normal. (I also think, somehow, I got all off track and I’m now writing in real time…interesting development.)

Let’s see, today was pretty good. I actually did some housework, and finished my homework. Hobbs had to work this morning, but last night I knew that wasn’t going to last long when he looked at me and asked, “Did this *gestures in my general vicinity* start out as a scratchy throat?” In that moment, I knew I was about to have a man baby on my hands. He was home by noon, and within fifteen minutes of walking in, was camped on the couch in his sweats.

Since he’s taken up residence on the couch, I’ve been cleaning and trying to get these germs outta here. The cleaning had two purposes. Remember I mentioned that me being sick caused me some major anxiety? It’s worse when Hobbs is sick. It stems from the same place. Y’know, the idea that getting sick equals dying, at least, I think it does. I mean, I’m no doctor but it’s my best guess. Which means cleaning becomes my focus task, because “a busy body can’t possibly panic”…well, it can but I can usually handle it better. I didn’t get too anxious or panicky today; I mean, there were some blips, but nothing too earth-shattering or meltdown inducing, so I call that a fucking win.

There’s no telling what tomorrow holds, but I’m figuring I should probably get some good sleep tonight, just in case. Which brings me to the end of this post, I apologize for the brevity but I promised Hobbs we’d watch Timeless tonight.

As usual, below are two numbers, the National Suicide Prevention Helpline, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Treatment Referral Helpline, use them if you need them. See you lovely lot tomorrow.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255

SAMHSA: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)

Rollercoasters and Mazes

Hiya friends, welcome back. Holy shit, I have had a very weird day. After yesterday, I was hoping today would be a little better, and luckily, it was. The Asshole didn’t hang around all day, but he did make a few guest appearances. My friend likes to joke that the week of my period should be known as “date week” between Flo and the Asshole. Personally, I love that visual; a passive-aggressive woman sitting at the bar, drinking a cosmo and chatting up a greaseball chugging bourbon on the rocks, while Lady in Red plays on the jukebox (see what I did there?). A little humor among an otherwise shitty time.

 

This makes me think of the Asshole standing in front of the roller coaster.

The day after a particularly anxious time is a somewhat uncomfortable one for me. It’s almost like I’m caught in between two realms. One where I am feeling really drained, and the other where I just want to move on. This feeling tends to cause me to roller coaster through the day. I’ll be fine for a little bit and then the anxiety hits again; it’s a constant feeling of up and down. This is what I felt today. Sometimes it’s even more annoying than the actual anxiety or panic, because at least when that’s over my body can relax. When that feeling of up and down happens, it’s like my entire body is on high alert just waiting for the next panic attack to swoop in.

 

So, I spent most of my day having (and preparing to have) panic attacks. Granted the ones that ended up happening weren’t terrible, I’ve had definitely had worse. I like to refer to this as rolling panic attacks, I think it’s very fitting. They just sort of happen and then wane off. I don’t know if anyone out there has panic attacks but every doctor I’ve ever seen told me not fight them. Just let them get on with it and move on. There are many things I’ve tried that doctors told me would work, and quite a few of them didn’t (at least not for me), but I learned very quickly to stop fighting the panic attacks. When I fought them it seemed like they were growing and would quickly get out of control. I’d literally be white knuckling my way through them, all while trying to get them to just stop.

We went to the store tonight, just a quick trip to get a few things until we can do

Pretty generic, but close.

a proper shop this weekend. Now, when I go out anywhere, I try to lock the Asshole up inside a maze. Before we walk into anywhere, I sort of go quiet because I’m focusing on fortifying the maze to keep him from busting out and causing me to run out of the store. I know the maze sounds absolutely ridiculous but it has actually worked.

 

This is one of those weird things where, if you don’t struggle with something like this, it’s hard to imagine having to retreat inside and build a maze inside your brain, all for the purpose of being able to do something as simple as grocery shopping. Honestly, though, this is less annoying than having to leave a shopping cart full of food as you quickly walk to the nearest exit. People tend to stare when they see a someone moving fast toward an exit, which makes me feel even more anxious because I can’t only imagine what they’re saying about me.

I’m afraid that’s all I have for today, folks. As usual below are two numbers, the National Suicide Prevention Helpline, and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Treatment Referral Helpline, use them if you need them. I’ll see you lovely lot tomorrow.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255

SAMHSA: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)

A Month Inside My Brain

Hiya friends, welcome back. I don’t know if you guys know this, but May is Mental Health Awareness month. So, I’ve made a decision: this whole month, in an attempt to help reduce the stigma and bring awareness, I’m going to be documenting my personal month dealing with mental health.

The interesting thing is, you are probably going to see one extreme to the other, and everything in between. Like most people who live with mental illness, I have good and bad days. I have days where leaving the house and going grocery shopping is just easy peasy, and then I have days where I’m literally forcing my ass to get out of bed. Though the month, in addition to chronicling my life, I’m also going to be talking about all the things that work for me, and all the things that don’t.

Fun fact: I’m both excited about this and fucking petrified. Just being this brutally and unapologetically (which is very hard for me) honest about my day to day when it comes to my mental health is scary. On one level I know it could be helpful to someone who just might want to know they aren’t alone. On another, it’s frightening to put myself out there like this.

I guess, the best way to start this is to give you my rundown. In case you’re new and don’t know, I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD), and a panic disorder. I think the anxiety and panic was always there growing up, but I was probably just too busy to really focus on it. I wasn’t actually diagnosed, by a real doctor, till about 7 years ago. My life has been a rollercoaster ride of trying to find some semblance of normalcy ever since.

To be truthful, the first year after my diagnosis was hard on me. I tried medication after medication, and doctor after doctor. I seriously struggled with finding myself among the anxiety. It was a scary time in my life, and I think that boils down to never knowing anyone who was dealing with anxiety. I mean, we’ve all heard someone talk about something making them anxious, or feeling anxious, but no one ever told me the full effects of anxiety.

My first anxiety/panic attack was horrible, I was certain I was dying. My heart was racing to the point where I was positive others could see it beating out of my chest, then the chest pains started that made me think I was having a heart attack. I was sweaty and cold all at the same time, and I felt like I couldn’t catch my breath. The nausea and dizziness made me scared to move, which only heightened the panic. Oh man, it was rough, and looking back now, I honestly can’t imagine having to go through that first attack again.

I couldn’t believe people weren’t talking about this, I mean, people had to be dying from it? (Side note: that’s a lovely example of my anxiety right there…my brain takes something completely normal, and not life-threatening and blows it out of proportion.) But then again, in the beginning, I didn’t want to talk about it either. I just had this fear that people (including family and friends) would judge me, or think I was “crazy.” Cut to 7 years later, and now I see how talking about it helps. I mean, it’s really two-fold, I get to get my feelings out, which makes my brain sit down and shut the fuck up, but, by talking about it, I can help someone like me. Someone who may be newly diagnosed and looking for a face in the crowd, looking for anyone who understands just so they know they’re not alone.

I guess, in a roundabout way, what I am trying to say is that I can only hope that by doing this for the entirety of the month of May, that maybe one person will read something that resonates with them. That being said, here is my promise to you: I will be unflinchingly honest about my mental health. Whether it be good or bad, you will read it. Thrown into the daily posts, I’ll try to talk about the how’s and why’s of mine, what works and doesn’t for me, along with all of the ups and downs I’ve lived after anxiety showed up.

You will also notice at the bottom of every post there will be two numbers: the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline and the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) Treatment Referral Helpline, because this is a very real thing. I encourage anyone who is struggling, or feels lost – or knows someone who is – share the numbers, use the numbers. There is no judgment on the other end of those numbers, only help…and hope. Which, to be fair, we could all use a little more of, mentally ill or not.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-8255

SAMHSA: 1-800-662-HELP (4357)