In all this wellness

All clichés aside, 2013 has flown by and it’s hard to believe that it will draw to an end tomorrow. Perhaps the speed is due to our habit of wishing days away in order to reach the weekend, but it certainly seems that time is becoming more precious as we age. When I was kid I was sure that it was slowed down to punish my impatience to grow up, but now that I am an adult it appears to be racing through the days like it is now time itself that suffers from impatience. I feel lost to it sometimes and dream of ways to slow it down, to saviour it, to slow down others, to saviour others. It seems our busyness has taken something very important away from us. I always talk about connections because my life often lacks them. I have many around me but struggle to find the real connections that move me forward. I love those around me, I love the conversations, the laughs, the nights out, the fun but I also still crave the deepest of connections like oxygen. I miss people far away and it never seems to get any easier. I imagine the what ifs and buts too often which perhaps prevents me from seeing those in front of me clearly enough. I dream of old days with no respect for future ones. Recently I was contacted by someone in my past again. He seems to pop up with surprising resilience every six months or so. It is almost like he is bobbing his big toe in my waters to see if this time they will be warm. I’m fascinated by this as most people don’t bother, don’t try and just give in too early. I certainly did with him but I was also embarking on a long depressive episode and I needed to push him aside for his own or my safety. That isn’t a cop out, it’s a survival instinct and mine kicked in and he wasn’t the only casualty from that time, but he is the only one that asked to come back in. This in itself needs some respect, some admiration and perhaps a good enough reason to loosen up a bit. I certainly miss parts of him, the parts that my depression didn’t demonise anyway. I have learnt so much about living with depression but I am still confused about which opinions and feelings are based on the illness and which ones I determine myself. I have lost so many friends this way and the sad part of me realises that there may be a lot more in my future that will be lost this way. There is no point making declarations of change when my mind is so healthy and vibrant as the ugliness of depression changes everything about me. I will not act, feel, be the same when I am unwell. I can’t judge through the eyes of depression in the same way I cannot determine things through the rosiness of wellness. I just feel bad, move on, try to learn from it and just hope I can doggy paddle in this warm pool as long as I can. At my best I am unstoppable and charismatic, I am beautiful and witty, challenging and intriguing but at my worse in the grip of my illness I am anything but. I am cold, distant, impatient and mean. I didn’t want anyone to see that. I never do. I just leave. Relationships, jobs, sometimes cities. I shed my skin in silence and then reappear in a different room, difference career, with different friends. Most people sense this and allow time to stretch out between us like some sort of romantic accident that our busy lives allowed. I could make a new year’s resolution to grow roots and stay but to be truly honest, a large part of me well or unwell, just doesn’t desire that. I wouldn’t even know how. I can’t even imagine it. Yet I crave connection. I crave the company of someone to stay up all night talking to as much as I crave my own solitude. I crave the company of another that can make me laugh till it hurts as much as I crave time alone with my music and books. I crave the excitement of another as much as I crave the beautiful routine of a tidy life alone. I crave the compromise that I am just too frozen to take. I know that people read this blog as I can see the stats but I am unsure whether people I know read it. I write messages to them all the time even though I know it may never reach its destination. I think about them a lot, I gladly give over the time to admire and love them from afar. I wonder if they ever realise this. I fall short in so many ways but I can assure you my intentions are always beautiful, and noble and surprising. I love the parts of you that you don’t even know that I noticed. For 2014 I will the same, as that is what I am, but I can assure you that there are parts of me that I have not shown you that are worth staying for. I wish I could show you. I wish I could stay even if it is just in your minds for now. 2013 brought a lot of beauty, a lot of grateful moments and hard won battles. I gained so much back of former self even parts that the first depressive episode took from me. I am so well now but I cannot know its timeframe which is what makes the compromise that much harder. I am still lost to the waiting game. I am still afraid of the unknown. I still struggle with what it is I actually deserve even in all this wellness.