Coming Clean

This post is going to be ReeeeALLY messy.

 

Don’t say that I didn’t warn you!

 

I’m in deep folks. Deep in a big ugly, messy, dark, hole. I haven’t wanted to talk about it here for a few reasons. But you want the big fat truth? …. it’s because I’m a liar! I tell you to be brave. I say courage is contagious so share your story- no matter how ugly it gets. I preach be “real” and yet when things are dark, when the down gets dirty in my own life, I choose silence every. single. time. The thing is I have this hang up sometimes {okay, a lot lately} with Smitten. I feel like Smitten is the place to come and share the big, the bad and the ugly but also leaving the story on a happy note, full of hope for those who are still on their journey.  I’m not sure how I can explain everything I am feeling but here is my go at it.

 

I feel like I am stuck in a box trying to figure out how to get out of it and because I’m not out of it yet I couldn’t share my real life with you. I had to keep my big mess a secret from you until I had it all sorted out  and put away so I could give you the happy ending full of hope. Does that make any sense to anyone else or is my explanation as messy as what’s in my head?

 

I came to this earth a sensitive little soul. With that sensitivity comes compassion for others like you wouldn’t believe. I am not sure if it is was meant to be my trial or my gift in this life. Lately it has been my Mt. Everest so to speak. Let me explain…

 

“Compassion hurts. When you feel connected to everything, you also feel responsible for everything. And you cannot turn away. Your destiny is bound with the destinies of others. You must either learn to carry the Universe or be crushed by it. You must grow strong enough to love the world, yet empty enough to sit down at the same table with its worst horrors.”

-Andrew Boyd

 

You know the line where he says “You must either learn to carry the Universe or be crushed by it” well, I am being crushed by it. There are so many things that are coming at me and the weight of it all has gotten too heavy. The heavier it get’s the harder it is for me to put myself out there. I’ve been feeling the wounds of vulnerability and my emotions are still too raw.  The thought of putting a voice to it all hurt too much. It was too real and down right embarrassing. I was ashamed that I couldn’t be the girl I encourage you all to be.  Then this morning I got the answer I wasn’t looking for when I read this post. There it was in black and white and it made it okay to come clean.

 

“Because this place is not about how I SHOULD be or how I’m SUPPOSED to be. It’s about how I ACTUALLY am” - Momastery

 

BAAAAM! It was okay for me to share here how I ACTUALLY am. It was okay to share the down and dirty of my life. All the things that I have been trying to stuff back in the closet and shut the door as fast as I could because it’s less messy that way and it looks better to the outside world, was okay to give voice to. It is fair enough to say that I am still sensitive to what the outside world thinks. So, please be gentle with me as I trade in my dark box for a glass jar. A glass jar where my real life becomes visible to the outside world and all of you.

 

I battle depression.

 

There I said it and I refuse to go hide in the closet out of shame for saying it. I want to be real and I want you to know the real, raw, ubber messy, awkward Kallie. The Kallie that I don’t share with people because showing the real Kallie leaves me wide open for cruelty from the world. The world I find myself hiding from when I am in the trenches of depression.

 

Back in January I went on anti anxiety and depression medication. I did not make that decision lightly. I had a prescription for Prozac hanging on my fridge for a year and a half. In that year and a half I tried everything under the sun to avoid it. One day reality hit and I realized something had to give and taking a pill each day was worth a shot at feeling normal. About 3 weeks into it life changed dramatically for me. It was like I woke up and life was good for the first time in a long time. Nothing seemed as hard as it did before. The light was back in my eyes and I was happy. Awhile back I felt like I was in a great place and I went off my medication. I felt strong, healthy, happy. I was positive that I had the tools to deal with real life on my own without taking a daily “happy” pill. And like that the un-medicated life began. In the beginning everything was the same and then slowly it wasn’t. I wasn’t sleeping at night because I was worried about this or that but during the day I just wanted to sleep my life away. I was emotional and short tempered. I was turning into the girl I thought I had left in the dust. Then one day I woke up and life was not okay. The light went out and the tears wouldn’t stop. I was broken in that moment because I realized I can’t be happy and healthy and do it alone. That reality rocked my world. I felt like I had let myself down, my family down, and you guys down. I could not even begin to look at all that, let alone talk about it. That was the biggest wave that hit my already battered ship.

 

The second wave that hit- I was putting the weight of the world on my own shoulders. My friends and family have been going through some serious crap. Hard things. Gut wrenching things. Things that break us and have us questioning our own strength. When I hear their stories I am connected. I feel what they feel. My heart hurts like their heart hurts. I stay up at night thinking about them. I wonder what the bigger picture is. I try and wrap my brain around how life can get so ugly and messy.  I’m like a sponge, in that I absorb other people’s feelings and emotions. I soak it up and sometimes it turns toxic. I don’t think feeling connected to others and having compassion- is a bad thing. The problem lies in that I don’t know how to control it and disengage my feelings from theirs. I’m strong enough to love the world but I am not empty enough to sit down with the horrors that go on and not have my soul be affected by it. I haven’t mastered that ship. So, while I wait for the world to magically get better, or for me to learn the tricks to this trade, I am being crushed by what life can look like and saddened that I cannot change it.

 

The 3rd wave that hit and flipped me belly up was that thing we like to call ED! He is rocking the boat as of late. My husband wrote his post all about my eating disorder from his point of view. I read it and there were things that were very healing for me to read. With that said, there were things about me that I am not ready to share and it hit me like a ton of bricks when I read his post. I’m still ashamed and mortified by a few things and that weighs heavy on my heart. I want to share it with you because I know so many of you want to read it but there is still apart of me that is broken and too vulnerable to people and their judgments. Because I am not ready to share everything yet I feel like ED wins. Some say that ED goes away for good and I cling to that for hope but there are too many days when I think I will never be rid of him completely. That gets me thinking and then I come to the conclusion that ED is just apart of who I am. I hate that thought. I hate ED. I hate feeling like I am not in control. He still has some control and I feel ashamed to say that statement out loud.

 

For now I am still in the process of flipping my boat over ( just like many of you are) so we can sail to calmer waters. I guess sometimes the thing that makes us brave is realizing at some point it is time to come clean when life gets messy. We are still considered brave when we keep fighting to make our way across the treacherous seas because we are sure the seas will calm and the sun will shine again on our beautiful mess.

 

xoxo Kallie

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