it is december
it is december
i’m allowing myself these
twenty-five to thirty-one days
of holiday feeling
[perhaps it’s a mistake,
but,
in nyc i believe
i am not beholden to old memories —
this city makes new ones all the time
and i can learn from all of that
and all of those
and have an nyc holiday season
instead of suffering from memories
of midwest christmases
long since passed]
as fall approaches
but isn’t quite here
not yet
not yet
the memories of late summers past
invades my mind
sans consent
[do flashbacks ever ask?]
and no matter how stable
and lovely
and mine
my life is today
i keep seeing
loss
upon loss
upon lost trust
upon that feeling of any control in life
fleeting though it may have been
stolen in an instant
and this current administration
certainly doesn’t help this
weird ptsd i’ve found myself in
everything seems to be
culminating in something
and i continue to avoid all emotions and memories
until absolutely
necessary
i heard a stat the other day
that straight depression
[and also perhaps straight anxiety
don’t know specifically, since the show
was only about depression management]
is so much easier to treat
than the intertangled combo of the two
and coming from someone who has been officially diagnosed
with major depressive disorder
and generalized anxiety disorder
[at the same time]
and feel like i’ve never known a brain
without the two holding metaphorical hands,
this sounds quite accurate
what gives me distress?
is it the depression?
is it the anxiety?
i honestly have a hard enough time differentiating the two
since they seem to egg each other on
like the “bad kids” at the back of the classroom,
and simply identifying one
or the other
is trouble enough
how would i even begin to just take on
one
or the other?
[and, honestly, i also have to ask
how
in the world
someone even could have one
without the other?]
watch
in fifty or so years
they’ll change the diagnoses,
and my particular issues
will be called something different
[and maybe, by then, they’ll have come up with
a great treatment regiment…
but for now, i just keep trying to keep them both at bay
as best i can
with the resources available
to me/
to us]
uncertainty
in what to write
in what to do
at any given moment
day
or night
the uncertainty
is what freezes me
not potential good
or bad outcomes
but all the options
showing themselves to me
beat
by beat
by beat
until
the overwhelm becomes too much
that inaction is the safest path to take
[but it actually
never really
is]
i’ve hit a roadblock
in my own lungs
and i can only theorize
about stress and anxiety showing itself in my body
before it gets to my conscious mind —
that’s the reason i can only take full breaths
in very specific instances
and never using the full capacity
of what my lungs should be
and i’m getting enough oxygen
[probably]
it’s just a little more than a little unsettling
to know i have more space for air
and to simply
not
be able to get it
quiet the mind
just enough to hear the important thoughts/
the creative thoughts/
the thoughts that are often drowned out
by anxiety rambling
and existential depression blues
there may be creative moments
inside those diatribes
but i’ve heard enough of them to know —
it’s getting past them
that the true me
lies
[in truth]
i don’t know how to stop my kip
from staring at their phone
reading the terrible news
and feeling worse
and worse
and worse
as the hours go by
because
if left to my own devices
i would stare at my phone
and watch videos of
on the ground tragedies
and feel worse
and worse
and worse
as the hours go by
and neither of us feeling worse
will change the things happening
halfway across the world
or right in our own backyard
we need to fill our cups
and have the hope
and energy
to put forth change
that will help
others
and ourselves
but
how
how
how
when everything feels so important
and hopeless
in the palms of our
hands?
create a chaos demon in your head
and maybe the anxiety you feel
on a daily basis
will have some sort of
reason for existing
[maybe]
how do i tell
tomorrow’s me
to just go for something
without shaming
yesterday’s me
for not?
[how?]
[how?]
[how?]
the post-show let-down
is holding me in its grip
as i grasp for a way
out
kipventures 