On Loneliness

I'm low at the moment.  Very low.  To be perfectly honest, I don't think I've ever actually been lower. I recognise this and acknowledge that it is coloring my thoughts and impressions fairly strongly at the moment.  But this morning I think I hit the bottom of the barrel so far.

One of the things that I think complicates issues is the standard dissociation that comes with PTSD.  I can associate with things, often quite strongly, but it takes a while.  And it takes effort, a lot of it reciprocal.  So at the moment I feel much like the footage we've all seen of sharks cruising through schools of fish off the coast.  The ones where the shark ends up swimming alone, surrounded by thousands and thousands of fish, but unable to touch or connect with any of them.

I currently feel my ties.  If I'm perfectly honest, the ties are all thats holding me around from a full reset.  The family and friends that are around.  They're slim ties, think spun silk, but strong.  To pull on them is to disappoint those people around me who care, and I hate disappointing.

I'm sure there are upsides to where I am at the moment.  I do get to attempt a soft reset of sorts as to where I want my life direction to go.  It's been an expensive price to pay: I'm currently over thirty, all of my job qualifications count for nothing, I'm divorced and I'm living alone with my two dogs.  When I have my kids I spend most of the time just trying to survive and not to disappoint them too greatly.  At this stage, I certainly don't spend most of the time with them enjoying them (although I do hope that day comes).  I'm unlikely to ever return to a "normal" job.  Most of the changes with PTSD are permanent and they won't change back.

So yeah, I'm low at the moment.

I can happily lose myself for hours in my art.  Or, oddly enough, singing along in the car.  Reality inevitably comes crashing down at some point though.  And I'm starting to get over the fight.  I'm starting to get over the push to get out of bed.  To get out and walk the dogs.  I have days where I'm even struggling to get myself as far as the studio or the kitchen.

I'm starting to get over the bone-crushing, aching loneliness.