I had a bit of an emotional shake-up this past weekend. I won't go into the gory details, but I was forced to face a reality that I had been avoiding with every fiber of my being. And it kind of came out of the blue. I knew it was coming. And (for the most part) I shouldn't have been surprised. But still, it caused quite the meltdown for me.
I am a creature of habit. I like my routine. I don't take too many chances. I'm not the girl taking mystery shots and vomiting in trash cans in Tigerland on a Thursday night. I like familiar things and people. And I'm happy that way. So sudden change freaks me out. Sudden change that I do not want shuts me down.
I am not one who is comfortable crying around others. I think part of it is that I don't want other people worrying about me. It makes me feel guilty. I think the other part of it is that I think I'm a hideous cryer. I turn red and my chin scrunches up and it's not pretty. Save for family, I can count the people I've cried in front of on one hand. And they don't even fill up that one hand. So when I go through an emotional shake-up such as this one, one of two things happens. I either a) act like a baby and cry hard until I've exhausted myself to the point of sleep or b) become numb to every thing around me and stare at the ceiling until I've stared myself to sleep. And when I wake up and realize that what happened was real and not a dream, I act like a baby and cry hard until I've exhausted myself to the point of more sleep. This past go round, I went with choice B. It's best I have a few days to live out this phase. I just need some time alone to mope and sleep and cry. Plus, when this phase is cut short, it just makes phase two last longer, which is bad.
Why, you ask?
Because phase two is food phase. This is the phase when I tell myself that I can't feel much worse, so I might as well make myself fat while I'm down. This go round, my shut down phase was cut short thanks to school and being at home where parents expect you to get out of bed at some point during the day (though I think they sensed something was wrong and for the most part just let me be. They didn't question me when I announced at one that I was going to the most expensive grocery store in town for Ice Cream. They didn't question me when I was back in bed by 2:30. They let me sleep until I woke-up on my own at 5:30. The only time they expected anything of me was when my grandfather came over for dinner). But I was back at school today and had to wake up and stay awake and not cry during philosophy. So lots of food. Yesterday, I ate half of a Raising Cane's three finger combo, almost an entire bag of Extreme Cheese Goldfish, half of a piece of Lasagna, and a pint of Vanilla Bean Ice Cream. Today? About 10 Reese's cups, a bag of Lay's potato chips, half of a Papa John's personal pepperoni pizza with a container of garlic butter, two Swiss Cake Rolls, and about 40 ounces of Coke. REAL Coke. I never let myself drink real coke. And I'm strongly considering ordering Jimmy John's.
And nothing tastes right. In the past two days, everything I've eaten that one might consider somewhat real food has tasted funny. Thus the half eating Cane's meal, lasagna, and pizza.
Oh, and my teeth hurt. Because I manifest my emotions in my jaw. Which mean lots of unintentional teeth clenching the past couple of days.
Other people cope differently with shake-ups and some think I should be dealing with this differently. My roommate, for example, is trying to convince me to go down to New Orleans with her and our friends for Mardi Gras this weekend. She believes I need to hit rock bottom so that the only way I have to go is up. I can think of a lot of ways that can go horribly wrong.
I really have no idea why I just wrote this blog post. If I were thinking rationally, I would probably not click the "Publish Post" button. But I'm not, so I will.
Maybe this is supposed to be therapeutic? I think I just needed to write down what I'm going through so that I can try to understand the cluster fuck that is my mind right now.
And I'm comfortable posting this because I don't think that anybody is actually reading this blog. When I was little, I used to line up my stuffed animals and barbies and talk to them and put on little shows for them. I kind of see my blog in the same way. I'm just writing this out for my stuffed animals and Barbies. I don't really expect any one to read this or really care about this.
That being said, if you are a real person reading this blog, now is not the time to tell me.
One good thing that happened this weekend? I discovered a new chapstick thanks to my friend Caroline. Or maybe it's a chap ball? A lip ball? A balm ball? It's called the Eos Lip Balm Smooth Sphere.
I have the yellow one, which is called Lemon Drop. Like the Nivea Lip Stick I mentioned in my last blog post, it goes on smooth and doesn't really have a taste, but on top of that, it smells good and the shape makes it easy to find in my black hole of a purse.
Ok, that's all I got. I should probably try to get some schoolwork done before I turn into a pumpkin. A sad, pathetic, fat pumpkin.
