I meant to write this post back in July. I’ve been meaning to write many things, but my current state of procrastination makes me reluctant to sit down at the computer unless it’s for a more specific purpose; one which helps pay the bills.
This pandemic has been unending, unyielding, unforgiving in the way it has forced us to change how we operate our daily lives. And while some parts of each day seem to function as they did in the past, before COVID, others simply showcase the scars and wounds left unhealed.
It has been over one year, more than 365 days. One complete rotation of the Earth around the Sun since I was last awake all night, pangs of confusion, regret, and fear churning in my stomach. I remember the scene in my mind as if it were a movie, of me bursting into her room when I heard her sobbing. She looked up at me from the carpet, a bottle of chemical cleaner in her hand, empty, and fear etched upon her face. She was barely 15 years old.
The minutes, days, weeks, and months since have now settled together. The fuzzy, unrecognizable self portrait of a beautiful girl slowly returns into focus. In a world ruled by unattainable social media perfection, she will always doubt the beauty of the portrait. Sometimes her bravery and courage will push her through, to the place beyond self-doubt. Other times, her friends and professionals will grab her hand, drag her through the darkness, and help her step back into the light.
Anxiety and depression still reside within her mind. They attend the party, but they are no longer hosting. Through a combination of therapy tools, medication, and modifications to how she goes about her life, this girl surrounds herself with a soft cushion of friends and family; she is wrapped in their warm blanket of support.
It’s exhausting to be her day in and day out. I have my own issues with anxiety and depression, some I manage and others I continue to fail daily. Yet I’m in awe of her survival skills, her courage to continue to try new things, to view this life with wisdom and maturity surpassing her years.
In some ways, she’s still like a delicate tower of blocks. It only takes one interaction, one rejection to threaten the delicate placement of pieces painstakingly put together. One hurtful gaze to crack the shield she’s constructed. In that one moment, like a tire after running over a nail, confidence leaks, deflates her, threatens to undo all she’s accomplished.
In a testament to her newfound maturity and coping skills, she deals with the hurt in ways that don’t involve taking razor blades to her skin. And somewhere along the journey of putting herself back together, she’s met someone gentle and sweet, someone who wants to know her more. He has been welcomed into our family with open arms, and she into theirs.
She doesn’t know what the future holds, none of us do. But she has approached this new relationship with a pure heart, and a determination to balance it with school, friends, and family in a healthy way. Most importantly, she now recognizes that the thoughts which plagued her last year, the darkness of the pit she found herself in, were never permanent. Her mind now chooses light, even amid the dark. It chooses perspective over naivete, but most importantly, it chooses life over death.