Here’s the thing.
I make a lot of people happy. Just by being me.
I make people laugh. I warm them with my affectionate nature. I shine for them. I fascinate them with the things I say and my unique perspective on things. I amuse them with my oddball charm. And I give them someone warm and soft and safe in their lives.
I am saying this not to boast but to remind myself that I am not as worthless, useless, and pointless as my depression insists that I am. And that I am not a liability on this world, a world that would be better off without me.
I contribute. I matter. I do things that make the world a better place. The fact that I do it by simply doing what makes sense to me doesn’t detract from the value of my contributions at all.
Nor does it matter that none of it is the kind of thing one gets paid for.
I am a part of things. I need to remember this. Depression lies, and it’s been tell me I am nothing but a drain on society and all who know me for a very long time.
And I have known that it was a lie…. technically… for a while too.
But it didn’t feel like a lie. My depression did a good job of keeping me from connecting the dots emotionally even though they were connected intellectually.
But that’s over now. Fuck that noise.
I think the difference is the one between knowing people don’t hate me and in fact life me and realizing that I actually contribute something by being around and being me.
Knowing that gives me a sene of worth, and I desperately need that. I have felt less than worthless for a real long time, and as a result, I felt guilty just for being alive and being such a burden on everyone.
Shades of my childhood there. Being told by my sister Catherine that I was useless, and that if I wanted to help,. I should just stay out of the way.
And boy did I get good at staying out of the way.
That’s a tape that has never stopped playing in my head. It’s lead to my feeling completely incompetent at life and trying to do the right thing by not trying to help and just staying out of the way.
And it’s true that I have certain hand-eye coordination and general visual difficulties. But I am sure that if I could just keep cal and keep trying on something not too challenging for me, I could work through them.
My brain would route around the damage and I would develop my own way of doing things that works for me.
It would do me so much good to feel like I can take care of myself.
Maybe that’s the real reason I keep wanting to move out on my own.
After all, if I lived alone, I would have no choice but to look after myself, right?
Let’s leave it there.
Back after the break.
Been to comedy at the Kingwood and back.
Plenty of comics tonight. A couple of rude assholes who insisted on talking loudly and trying to insert themselves into the show.
Sign up if you want to talk during the show, assholes. We will give you a whole ten minutes to say whatever you want all by yourself!
Unless, of course, there’s an asshole like you in the audience.
Then you’ll be lucky to get a word in edgewise.
As is usual when I have been to said open mike night, I feel the urge to do stand up comedy myself slowly creeping up.
I know I can be funny. I know I can tell jokes. I know that I can connect with audiences. Really, name a stand up comedy skill and I probably have it.
So it’s really just a matter of working up the nerve to actually do it.
But then again, that’s always the problem, isn’t it? Courage.
I am working on it.
I contribute. I matter. I am not a liability. I am an asset.
Trying to make sure I don’t forget it.
Really tired at the moment. Oh, that reminds me, something unusual and nice happened this morning.
As usual, I laid down in bed around 1:30 am after watching stuffwith Joe and Julian. Usually, what happens is I rest for maybe 45 minjutes, then get up and play video games for a couple of hours.
But this time, I feel asleep and just kept sleeping. All in all,. I slept from 2 am to 8 am, with a couple of breaks to get up and pee.
But then, right back to bed.
So I got 6 hours of constant-ish sleep in a row, and that is utterly unheard of around here. I usually can’t sleep for more than three hours tops.
And when I wake up from that kind of sleep, going right back to bed is out of the question. It takes me a long time to cool down enough to sleep again.
But not this time. And I am pickled tink about it. I can easily tell that it did me a lot of good. I feel less tense and more relaxed than usual, and it’s easier to think and (surprisingly) easier to feel as well.
It feels like my whole mind has more room to manuever, if that makes sense. Probably because I took a big bite out of the backlog of half-processed memories that usually take up so much space in my cognitive workshop.
Picture boxes everywhere.
How did this come to pass? Well I have cut way back on carbs, so that’s a step in the right direction. Junk food as a side dish has been replaced with almonds and peanuts. I have gone a few days sans bread.
So that might be a factor.
Plus my recent revelations of my actual worth probably helped clear some garbage out of my head by breaking up some of the logjam.
I will not give up this recent progress. I can feel the sticky fingers of my depression trying to pull the positive truth away when I am not paying attention, and I simply will put up with it. I won’t allow it.
So I will do whatever it takes to keep the information alive. I will resist the gravity pull of my depression and when it comes to me with its lullaby about how good it will feel to just let go, I will blast it in the face with a flamethrower and tell it to fuck right off.
Never give up. Never surrender. This is the new normal. Get used to it.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.