Emotions are a tricky thing

It's funny sometimes how the most simple things are the most satisfying. I just got done giving my horse a bath at the barn and Im sitting in the car passenger seat, door leaning open, barefoot with my feet resting on the dash. The day is sweltering but just the slightest breeze rustles the loose strands of my hair across my face and makes the atmosphere serene and tolerable. I read a library book while my mom chit chats with the other barn moms and for this one still moment I feel right. Everything feels in place and imperfectly perfect. I think this feeling is natural and it comes from a place that is completely my own. When the tides turn and the emotions seem uncontrollable I often question if they are really my feelings at all. But this, this moment of peace and contentment is completely me.

As one day passes...

I sigh with relief every moment that I can cross a hatch mark through another day on my calendar. I made it through another 24 hours and I'm still breathing. Sometimes it feels like the world is a big roller coaster and I didn't strap myself in tight enough before we took off. Now I'm just hanging on as tight as I can and closing my eyes while I pray that it will all be over soon. I wish life did not have to feel this way for me so often. But the truth is, it doesn't. According to the book my mom has recently bought me entitled "Ten Days to Self Esteem", you can change the way you feel simply (or not so simply) by changing the way you think. This is a concept I am still trying to grasp and I have far from mastered it. In fact, I would say I have barely begun to understand it. It does make sense to me but it is a difficult thing to try and rewire your thought process after operating in one way for so long.

Frustrations and other mood killers...

So lately I have been having this issue about completing things. I have been laying in bed for the majority of my day but sleep often escapes me due to the thoughts swimming about in my head. I have so many ideas and I get so inspired that it creates a restlessness that I can't seem to shake. I lay there for a few minutes and gaze up at the ceiling or whatever aspect of my environment that grabs my eyes attention and I wait. I wait until my mind tells my body to get up and try doing something. It seems to be getting harder and harder for my mind to get this message across to my body. I believe this is happening because I often am unable to complete even the smallest of tasks that I assign myself which causes an immense build up of overwhelming frustration that says to me "why bother? you should have never gotten out of bed today, Hannah. You can't even decide what to eat or concentrate long enough to draw" . Drawing used to be one of my favorite hobbies but it seems I am
no longer experiencing the same satisfaction of doing it because I cannot complete a single picture. The only solution I have found to my racing thoughts an lack of concentration comes to me in the form of a little 70 mg pill called Vyvanse. It is used to treat ADD/ADHD and it does wonders for my concentration and when I take it I am extremely productive....for about 2 hours . As soon as it wears off my motivation gets flushed down the toilet. Does anyone else experience this?

When Life Happens

Sometimes life reaches out with it's greedy claws and snatches up our remaining strength at a time when we needed it the most. When this happens, even the strongest of humans will not be able to keep up with every detail of living out there day. Sometimes I cannot even keep up with the details necessary to stay sane for an hours length. When this happens, previous commitments become broken, plans fall through, people who lack understanding get frustrated with us, and in turn, we end up feeling as if we are wandering through a pitch black cave searching for the exit when in fact we are going in the wrong direction and running deeper into the madness. Now we are lost and it feels as if all of our choices were wrong, the maps we were given aren't real, we can't tell of we are living our own lives or our lives are living us and we begin to lose faith in our own judgement. These are sensations that are, surprisingly, familiar to a lot of people in the world but when you are currently in this state of hopelessness it is hard to imagine anyone living in a deeper pit then the one you are currently in. A few cheesy words that sometimes can help are "you are not alone". I promise you aren't. I understand the difficulties of believing in a statement like that in a time like this but it is something I must continuously remind myself of so that I can feel even an once of comfort in this world. I have lost touch with this blog since the day I began it and I decided that today I would give it some attention again. An update about what has been going on in my life as of lately: Last Wednesday I was discharged from the Seay Behavioral Center after being there for a total of 15 days. I had gotten to the point where I was at rock bottom and the out-patient treatment I was receiving was not enough to keep me stable. I had become extremely suicidal and got back into some self-injurious behavior that I had been successfully sober from for at least a year's length. No, I was not a chemical dependency patient although the center assists with that too. The behavior I'm referring to is self-mutilation and a purging disorder. The lucky part for me is that I had my mother and family by my side who are all extremely understanding and are always there to support me. I went to my mom, who knew how truly bleak I was feeling, and I told her that I needed more help than I was getting. She was a life saver for me and found this treatment center. This is a lengthy story so I am going to sign off for now and pick back up in the near future. Thank you to anyone who is reading this and I hope everyone that is hurting right now finds the strength within themselves to stay with me for this intense ride
called life.

When Life Happens

Sometimes life reaches out with it's greedy claws and snatches up our remaining strength at a time when we needed it the most. When this happens, even the strongest of humans will not be able to keep up with every detail of living out there day. Sometimes I cannot even keep up with the details necessary to stay sane for an hours length. When this happens, previous commitments become broken, plans fall through, people who lack understanding get frustrated with us, and in turn, we end up feeling as if we are wandering through a pitch black cave searching for the exit when in fact we are going in the wrong direction and running deeper into the madness. Now we are lost and it feels as if all of our choices were wrong, the maps we were given aren't real, we can't tell of we are living our own lives or our lives are living us and we begin to lose faith in our own judgement. These are sensations that are, surprisingly, familiar to a lot of people in the world but when you are currently in this state of hopelessness it is hard to imagine anyone living in a deeper pit then the one you are currently in. A few cheesy words that sometimes can help are "you are not alone". I promise you aren't. I understand the difficulties of believing in a statement like that in a time like this but it is something I must continuously remind myself of so that I can feel even an once of comfort in this world. I have lost touch with this blog since the day I began it and I decided that today I would give it some attention again. An update about what has been going on in my life as of lately: Last Wednesday I was discharged from the Seay Behavioral Center after being there for a total of 15 days. I had gotten to the point where I was at rock bottom and the out-patient treatment I was receiving was not enough to keep me stable. I had become extremely suicidal and got back into some self-injurious behavior that I had been successfully sober from for at least a year's length. No, I was not a chemical dependency patient although the center assists with that too. The behavior I'm referring to is self-mutilation and a purging disorder. The lucky part for me is that I had my mother and family by my side who are all extremely understanding and are always there to support me. I went to my mom, who knew how truly bleak I was feeling, and I told her that I needed more help than I was getting. She was a life saver for me and found this treatment center. This is a lengthy story so I am going to sign off for now and pick back up in the near future. Thank you to anyone who is reading this and I hope everyone that is hurting right now finds the strength within themselves to stay with me for this intense ride
called life.

First Steps Are the Hardest

My name is Hannah and I am a teenager paving my difficult road to recovery in the dusty, sun-soaked area of Dallas, Texas. I have bben struggling with multiple uphill emotional battles for the past few years and I am just begging to see the light at the end of the tunnle. My strength is found when I can share my journey towards healing with others, so I am creating this blog in a desperate attempt to reach out and find relief from the thoughts that are trying to kill me and in turn help others with similar inner conflicts. I have been diagnosed with cyclothimia, ADD, severe mood disregularity, and an eating disorder not otherwise specified. The psychiatrists and therapists I speak with on a weekly basis are doing their best to help me get off the ground but no one is really sure what disorder I have. I am not so concerned with the diagosis myself, only how I can cope with it. My yearning to find relief and happiness has caused self-destructive actions and thoughts.