Do you want to build a snowman?
Recovery. One step at a time.
Finally! Some snow!
Biography of a nobody day 24. January 24th 2021.
After recovering from broken bones, divorce, death of family and friends, it feels strange to say I am recovering. Like I am belittling how hard it has been to recover from actual bad events. That is what I am doing though. This internal battle against good and bad. Optimism vs pessimism. Try vs give up. I want to be good, to be optimistic, to try. To be able to do all of those consistently regardless of what occurs in a day. I need to recover. I need to recuperate. I also need perspective.
I feel I have always been good at thinking outside the box and great at perspective. Forgiveness has always been given easily to people from me because I always try and look from their perspective. If then I still find I wouldn't have done what they did, I would distance myself and try to forgive them in my own time. Their childhood may have been harder than mine, or whatever other reason I give myself to do it. Anyone was taken by how I found them and I would forgive most things once.
I tried to then surround myself with people of a similar philosophy. Be optimistic, treat others how you want to be treated. It is not so much that I looked for it, it is that similar people gravitate towards each other. If then a member of the group feels down, you all help them get up. One thing I have always loved doing is introducing people I trust to each other. This was doubly so for my ex-wife. I introduced her proudly to everyone I knew. I think that is why the divorce had such a lasting effect on me. Not from losing her, but by tainting all of our friends. I now have fewer people to turn to when I am the one who needs some extra optimism or a pick up. I had spend years forgiving and almost covering up how my ex-wife was, so when I eventually told people what she was really like they were shocked. Shocked so much that I had either told lots of little white lies to them over the years about how great she was, or a big lie about how bad she was now. Neither were really lies. She never changed, how I felt about her did. I was blind to who she was and how she treated me for a long time. The forgiving and pretending didn't feel like that at the time because it was life and I was in love. When my insides finally gave up loving someone who treated me badly, I saw what she really was. I had been my worst enemy however because I had instilled love for her in all my friends. They wouldn't see what she was really like as they didn't have to live with her. So their love for her would hide all it needed to as it is much harder to accept being told you were wrong about someone you love. Only the people who spent considerable time with us saw the truth of what I was saying, and so they remain close friends to me now. Some relatives of hers. Some old friends of mine. but not many of the friends we made together over the years, the 10 years, we were together. A third of my life.
This brings me back to how this relates to recovery. Divorce limits who you can turn to when you need help. I never asked our friends to choose sides, but my ex-wife demanded it. Before this I needed help but never really sought it. I was lucky enough to have some great people remaining who had seen what my ex really was and forced themselves into my days to help me. I wouldn't be here without them people. Covid has done the same thing to a lot of people, including me, that divorce does to most. It removes you completely from the support that you don't realise you need until it is gone. I saw my friends almost on a schedule every week. That stopped with Covid. I saw my family almost daily. That stopped with Covid. I think it is time I realised that I didn't get to where I am now without these people and I need to understand that I was going to find it hard without them. As much as anyone thinks they do it all alone. They likely don't. You likely don't. I am terrible at keeping in contact with people and I am not a massive fan of phones. I used to just pop in to see people for a brew and a catch up rather than text or call. I used to organise days out swimming, climbing or a maybe a drive to the beach. Instead of spending the time I would have been catching up with them I have either gamed, or read, or done something that isn't social. Continually believing that Covid will be temporary and life will resume. It isn't going to. Not for a long, long time. So I am going to do what a lot of smart people already do and book in time with friends weekly. Online.
I am also going to find that part of me that was optimistic (regardless of my Covid statement above) and pull it out the darkness. I will encourage myself to be good, to be positive and to try. When I struggle to do that, I will be talking with friends and they can help. They have said they need to do the same, so that is great.
All people need friends and family. Not on the day to day, or even when things get hard. It is unspecific. I know when I don't have the capacity or strength to even classify the day as easy or hard, that is when I need my friends to tell me what I have or distract me until I realise it myself.
Again. I didn't write this on Sunday 24th, like I should have. I am writing this on Tuesday 26th. I didn't have the capacity to write on this day much more than I had written the day before. I have written what I needed to hear on that day:
You aren't alone, you never were. You need help, you always did.
You just never needed to ask before.
All I wrote for today in my notes under Sunday was: 'Felt really ill in the morning, and not too clearheaded. Felt better slowly throughout the day, especially after me and Alex went out in the snow to make a snowman'
Alex loves the snow, and we had plenty of it. That was really fun and she didn't want to come back inside. Of course like most kids, regardless of how wrapped up against the cold she was, and how much she wanted to be outside, after an hour in the snow she was freezing. When we came back in I definitely felt better thanks to the distraction. That is why I have written what I have above the line. I know that I was smart enough to organise something out of schedule when I was feeling low to catch me before I fell too low. Something fun with Alex, Friends or family. I cant do that at the minute, but I can still talk to the people who make me feel good. The snow was out of schedule enough to kickstart my brain out of its funk. Strangely I know that I felt more sickly ill but better over all. I read Lexi a story goodnight and I then tried to get some sleep.