Three years ago, I sat on a grey chair at the University Counseling Center, waiting to meet with my counselor J for what would be the first time. I was extremely nervous; while I had known for a while that I should seek professional help, I was unwilling to. I had told my parents the previous spring that I was starting to lose it and over the next few months I assumed that by some grace of God I had healed myself.
Well, I hadn’t, so here I was. We talked about everything, from my fears of my family moving out of my childhood home to my serious thoughts about transferring. I didn’t leave that first appointment healed, but over the next three years I would find myself returning again and again to that chair, sometimes happy, sometimes extremely depressed, sometimes anxious and sometimes a little lost.
I was thinking about this today when I stopped into a small church to pray the rosary before I left for home. Out of everyone I have met during my time at Notre Dame, it is J who has seen me at my very worst and very best, who met me as a scared and exhausted freshman and will be saying goodbye to a very different senior.
One way that J measures my progress is how I respond to the stressors in my life. If I can respond a bit better each time, then that shows that I am growing stronger. I can tell you how I normally deal with external stress and that is poorly. I become what feels to me like a limp noodle who is so high-functioning that she can finish her assignments and smile at people but can accomplish little else. This gal has had her share of limp noodle days, I tell you, but with each time I try to be a little more al dente (ha!).
The past few weeks have been difficult, sometimes even hellish, to say the least. I felt like the minute I was knocked down and I was beginning to stand up, the ground would be pulled from under me again. I could hardly keep up with it, and the short reprieve from it all during Thanksgiving didn’t feel like enough. On what should have been an incredibly happy and blessed day, and it still was, for the most part, I found myself curled up in a ball in my room bawling. I have always struggled with my self-worth, and was shocked by events that afternoon that reminded me that people could still be needlessly cruel. I felt like everything I had precariously built back up had toppled, and it is something I am still grappling with weeks later. While it may be true that some need to tears others down and feel no remorse, I want to speak up for the people who get torn down and voice that there are ramifications. There is hopelessness, there is emptiness and there is heartbreak. There have been moments when I felt like I was a stranger in my own apartment. There have been moments when I woke up and knew that if I wasn’t careful that day then I may need to check myself into a hospital the next morning. There have been moments when I wished desperately that I had transferred a year ago when I still had the opportunity. My life is so different right now than what it was last year this time, and some days I really truly hated it. There were a lot of moments.
When you get into a spiral like that, it is extremely difficult to see good. It is during these moments that I am eternally grateful that three years ago I sat on a chair and introduced myself to J. Despite the fact that these things still happen, and I still hurt and struggle and fight, I have bounced back a little faster each time. One of my dear friends pointed out the same conclusion to me last week, saying that I am a stronger, more resilient and older person than I was last year, that while things set me back, they would have utterly destroyed me then.
I am proud and grateful that I still sit in that gray chair once a week three years later. I am grateful that although it really absolutely stinks sometimes, I know when to step in and intervene for myself. This past year has been a whirlwind of change, and anybody who knows me knows I hate change almost as much as I hate the fact that I can’t drink caffeinated coffee anymore. But every single time, with every single thing that has plowed into me and knocked me over, I have gotten up a little faster. I might not be indestructible, but who is? I no longer find myself bed-ridden as often as I did, and I find myself able to remind myself that damn, can I do this. I can do this. That’s half the battle, really, finding the strength in yourself.
As for those things that can act as band-aids, whether it be people or alcohol or drugs (please, if it’s alcohol or drugs, seek help), they will never be permanent. They will never be the thing you are truly looking for. You aren’t looking for happiness, like you should, you are looking for a fast cure for your loneliness, your sadness or your self-esteem. I promise you that this is true, and it’s been a hard lesson to learn this semester.
One day you’ll wake up, like I did, and remember that version of yourself that was tired and afraid. You’ll remember them and feel grateful for their willingness to keep trying, for their decision not to give up. You’ll remember it on a snowy day in December running errands or even a sunny day in October, on the day you felt like you found your life’s work. I will always get knocked down. There will always be things that happen that are outside my control. But every time I get up a little faster, a little easier, and I bounce back.
I bounce back.
This Is She 