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October 2008 I had lost my job, my relationship, and numerous friendships in a three week span. The situations were not interconnected but were as they all affected me. Additionally they were probably all over dramatized by being 24 and prone to early life crisis at that age.
In December of 2008 my grandmother who had been my closest friend in life unexpectedly and suddenly passed away. I remember the call, I remember collapsing to the floor, the panic atttacks that come (less so now but still frequently) whenever my father calls are a direct result of that.
I drank that entire month, and the only day I was sober was because I was too hungover to drink.
In that span of months I would find myself barely conscious. I'd take sleeping pills as soon as I'd wake up and then watch the next 24 until I passsed out again. I wasn't eatiing much, and only texting my parents to let them know "I'm alive".
I put up black paper on the windows so it would always be dark enough to sleep, and that was life. I guess. I don't know what I was hoping for, or waiting for, but there were occasional sparks, reasons to continue, and so I prayed one night.
I wasn't and still am not particularly religious, but I got on two knees, and talked aloud to whatever and whomever was listening. I asked that if I can survive until the new year, I'll do whatever it takes to never be in that place again.
And on Janiary 1, 2009, I took the paper down, I got a gym membership, and I sobered up. I stopped taking sleeping pills, and started job hunting like it was a job. I bough a bicycle and a used camera, posted on a blog and pushed forward.
That was six years ago. I am not a perfect person, and most situations I've been in have been on my own accord. But I'm thankful to be able to try to push, to move forward, to see today and hope for tomorrow. Because it could've been a day without one or two people, or a mistake that I didn't see in context, or just one step in the wrong direction that I wouldn't be here.
I'm so excited for today, I'm so excited for tomorrow's promise. For what's possible. And I'm grateful for anyone and everyone that's had a part. I only hope to contribute the same. ------ “There is no fate that cannot be surmounted by scorn.” -Albert Camus
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