I am currently in LDR with a guy I met at Berkeley who graduated already. He's amazing, the relationship is great, and I love who I am with him. It's my happily ever after. Covid-19 has separated us, for obvious safety reasons, and now hes in Toronto, ON and I am in Berkeley, CA. Wed been in an LDR since the beginning of the school year, and I made sure to look up and follow every suggestion I could because I knew that the anxiety of being far from him would kill me without structure. So, we scheduled times to call each other, flights, fun date ideas for when we were in the same country, and life was great because of the security I had in these flights.
I had classes to wake me up for a purpose in my day. Places where I could cut in between the monotony of a similar setting with a gentle walk or hastened run before entering a new setting focused on the subject at hand.
I had a schedule. I had a structure. I had a way out of the darkness I was recently buried in.
When the Spring Break flight was cancelled, I was on the BART getting back home from a domestic flight I took to spend some time with family. I was in tears on the ride home.
To now be separated indefinitely from him was beyond difficult and there were no guides I could turn to. No suggestions. No structure. I could feel myself crumble slowly yet dramatically like a high-tiered wedding cake. I was a mess of tears so frequently and so violently that it only made sense to be comical about the mess of it all.
Its selfish sure, and I will get through this, and I can still connect with my boyfriend by other means. We will still love each other at the end of this all, and thanks to our precaution, no one in our family is at risk of this mysterious virus. However, I just wish there were others to relate to about this. Being unable to hug him for over 4 months, stuck in uncertainty with when I will next see him, stressed about jobs and applications, and anxious that my work efficiency has been declining has made me crumble into a mess. And I feel this way as the tears and the medical issues get worse, yet how can I not be fine because I have all that I could ask for and the world around me is on fire that my only job feels like to not add to it. But I dont feel fine. I havent felt fine in over a month. Stable, yes, fortunately. Yet completely unraveled and distraught. I can cry for hours collapse into my bed and scream into the sheets, sleep for 16 hours, and then wake up exhausted from the nightmares playing chase with my memories.
I suppose, I look for relationship advice and compassion of the situation as it is pulled apart.
A doctor told me today depression can be reactionary. The physical changes are often seen as symptoms of depressive moods, yet not a cause. Yet the symptoms could hold the trigger for the depressive reactions we have that relate to our defense mechanisms. Because when we were little in my house, the eggshells were sharp as you pressed your feet into them. Remember, walk delicately when you live with a lion. So, anxiety is quick to develop. You need to be careful and proper. When it didnt you ran the risk of damaging and consequently of being damaged.
Yet the body hates that. No being wants that much cortisol and so little serotonin that your gut twists with disgust. And you push and say its alright, its alright when its not. So, you fall. You sink. Your body will find a way to calm itself down, even if that means sedating you with the most intense sadness it can conjure. It will keep you there, your mind and body are at war. You dont trust you anymore. And so what would happen if the eye indeed were to say to the hand, I dont need you (Ref. 1 Corinthians 12-21)?
I discovered how my defense mechanisms manifest today. I tried to understand the reactionary behavior of depression today. Am I better? Am I structured? Am I confident? Do I feel capable? Will I see my boyfriend soon? No. Just as the solutions to complex population problems do not manifest with a snap, neither do solutions to complex personal problems. I struggle with how humanity embodies itself within mewhat is normal and what isnt. What is healthy change in developing from child to adult and what is disease? And are they perhaps the same.
I can walk outside today and Im able to reach the crest of a steep paved street. A view of sleepy Oakland can be witnessed through a frame of oak trees and grey birds. I can stand there and wonder for a few more hours on all these things. I can wonder when to buy a plane ticket, and I can wonder how to announce my plans to leave the roost permanently as a functioning adult. And I can wonder if I will ever be able to manage to get there with my skill set and expected years of debt for medical school. I can wonder if I will get into medical school. My brainthere it goes againmakes me feel tired.
And it is hard to even move one foot in front of the other when feeling like this to get to the hillside and only receive a peek of freedom. It doesnt even feel like success as I turn around to walk back home. But the breaths, the steps, the one word typed out a timethat is success.
I had classes to wake me up for a purpose in my day. Places where I could cut in between the monotony of a similar setting with a gentle walk or hastened run before entering a new setting focused on the subject at hand.
I had a schedule. I had a structure. I had a way out of the darkness I was recently buried in.
When the Spring Break flight was cancelled, I was on the BART getting back home from a domestic flight I took to spend some time with family. I was in tears on the ride home.
To now be separated indefinitely from him was beyond difficult and there were no guides I could turn to. No suggestions. No structure. I could feel myself crumble slowly yet dramatically like a high-tiered wedding cake. I was a mess of tears so frequently and so violently that it only made sense to be comical about the mess of it all.
Its selfish sure, and I will get through this, and I can still connect with my boyfriend by other means. We will still love each other at the end of this all, and thanks to our precaution, no one in our family is at risk of this mysterious virus. However, I just wish there were others to relate to about this. Being unable to hug him for over 4 months, stuck in uncertainty with when I will next see him, stressed about jobs and applications, and anxious that my work efficiency has been declining has made me crumble into a mess. And I feel this way as the tears and the medical issues get worse, yet how can I not be fine because I have all that I could ask for and the world around me is on fire that my only job feels like to not add to it. But I dont feel fine. I havent felt fine in over a month. Stable, yes, fortunately. Yet completely unraveled and distraught. I can cry for hours collapse into my bed and scream into the sheets, sleep for 16 hours, and then wake up exhausted from the nightmares playing chase with my memories.
I suppose, I look for relationship advice and compassion of the situation as it is pulled apart.
A doctor told me today depression can be reactionary. The physical changes are often seen as symptoms of depressive moods, yet not a cause. Yet the symptoms could hold the trigger for the depressive reactions we have that relate to our defense mechanisms. Because when we were little in my house, the eggshells were sharp as you pressed your feet into them. Remember, walk delicately when you live with a lion. So, anxiety is quick to develop. You need to be careful and proper. When it didnt you ran the risk of damaging and consequently of being damaged.
Yet the body hates that. No being wants that much cortisol and so little serotonin that your gut twists with disgust. And you push and say its alright, its alright when its not. So, you fall. You sink. Your body will find a way to calm itself down, even if that means sedating you with the most intense sadness it can conjure. It will keep you there, your mind and body are at war. You dont trust you anymore. And so what would happen if the eye indeed were to say to the hand, I dont need you (Ref. 1 Corinthians 12-21)?
I discovered how my defense mechanisms manifest today. I tried to understand the reactionary behavior of depression today. Am I better? Am I structured? Am I confident? Do I feel capable? Will I see my boyfriend soon? No. Just as the solutions to complex population problems do not manifest with a snap, neither do solutions to complex personal problems. I struggle with how humanity embodies itself within mewhat is normal and what isnt. What is healthy change in developing from child to adult and what is disease? And are they perhaps the same.
I can walk outside today and Im able to reach the crest of a steep paved street. A view of sleepy Oakland can be witnessed through a frame of oak trees and grey birds. I can stand there and wonder for a few more hours on all these things. I can wonder when to buy a plane ticket, and I can wonder how to announce my plans to leave the roost permanently as a functioning adult. And I can wonder if I will ever be able to manage to get there with my skill set and expected years of debt for medical school. I can wonder if I will get into medical school. My brainthere it goes againmakes me feel tired.
And it is hard to even move one foot in front of the other when feeling like this to get to the hillside and only receive a peek of freedom. It doesnt even feel like success as I turn around to walk back home. But the breaths, the steps, the one word typed out a timethat is success.
