Emotions are complicated, and many of us have an equally complicated relationship with them; I know I do. I’m afraid of having emotions, being overwhelmed by emotions, not being able to control the intensity of the emotions or stop them when necessary, and being seen as emotional rather than logical. I don’t think having emotions is weak, but I do think expressing them opens me up to vulnerability. Vulnerability is terrifying when you’ve been taken advantage of even one time, let alone several.

So, what do I sometimes do with my emotions? I suppress them. And what happens when I do that? All the things I have been working to change or eradicate in my life. Today should be 1320 days without self-harming. It’s not. It is day 45. I was suppressing emotions, and they all came out in a complete rage against myself. And yes, I do mean rage. My complicated relationship with emotions had gone unchecked; the pressure valve had, without my consent, been released. I didn’t want what I did to count as self-harm. I didn’t want to start over on day 1. The challenge of making it do day 2, 3, 4, 5… would suddenly be that much harder. But so would dismissing it as just a moment of frustration. I knew people would be disappointed; I didn’t want to disappoint people. So what did I do? I took some time to breathe. My fists and jaw were clenched, but I managed to pull enough air into my nostrils to get thinking back online. I acknowledged what happened. I had become so frustrated with something so simple that I had viciously attacked myself. But that wasn’t really what happened. I had been holding a lot of frustration, hurt, and powerlessness, and I hadn’t been giving myself the time to take care of myself in light of those feelings. Finally, I cried. Saying “finally” makes it seem like it had been a while, but really, this all took place within one minute.

Sitting on so much—processing and wrestling my own demons—too afraid to let anyone know what I am thinking or feeling. Those are the things that cause the pressure to climb. Those are the things I am hoping to address now.

Back to feelings being complex. Each event, large or small, brings with it an amalgam of sensations, emotions, and thoughts. The more I note that, the harder it is to think my way out of the feelings. I recently shared with my therapist that I do not know what to do with the complexities/intricacies of emotions. How do you make space for joy and sorrow at the same time?! We do this all day, every day, with various emotions, but when the emotions are big, it feels harder. And I think I am at a stage in my life and healing that everything feels larger than life. I am opening myself up to things that maybe I wouldn’t allow myself to experience before, at least not in its entirety.

June 28. In early June (or maybe slightly sooner), I finally sensed that I was ready to share the ins and outs of my story. I had made a few obvious discoveries about therapy, and I discussed my need to talk with my therapist about what I experienced (I share this minor detail because I wholeheartedly believe not everyone needs to talk about what they have been through). Sure, I have shared details before, but this would be different in that I wouldn’t leave out the details that even now make me wince, close my eyes, shake my head as if trying to shake the memory away, and feel the familiar pain on my skin. I finished sharing the details on June 28th (and wrote about it in Challenge By Choice 2. The emotions and subsequent actions leading to this decision were difficult to sort through. First, I had to gain the courage to even speak about the possibility with my therapist. That often entailed crying in my car after a session. Then, I had to find a way to communicate it. That was far more debilitating than I anticipated. Last, I had to sit and write it all out. I would sit for ten minutes at a time to write, and then I would get up and DO something. I would clean something, walk the dog, get the mail, shower, contact a friend, contact my therapist, drink a bottle of water, read a book, go for a drive, whatever! The process was painstakingly long (yet not). Once it was written (and in the process of being read), I ran the gamut of emotions—complex freakin’ emotions. I felt relief from the years of carrying something seemingly so heavy by myself for so long. I vacillated between derealization/depersonalization, nausea, shame, powerlessness, and being fully alive and present. I felt grief and pain, physical and mental. My body was reliving every sensation as if in real-time. My brain was seeing the spoken words in action while my eyes were viewing the swaying of trees outside the window of my therapist’s office.

Rage, Panic, Tense, Stun, Fear, Anger, Restlessness, Anxiety, Worry, Repulsion, Disgust, Queasiness, Optimism, Pride, Hope, Hopeless, Disappointment, Sadness, Alone, Supported, Exhaustion, Drained, Content, Calm, Secure, Gratitude, Thankfulness, Relief, Shame, Grief, Pain, and many more. Those were the feelings/emotions I have been working through from one decision.

June 29. The anniversary of my brother’s death. I hold so much guilt and shame over our relationship. I hold so much grief over his death and the relationship I now have with his family (my sister-in-law included). I am pained with the grief of his sudden passing in small moments and big ones like this anniversary. I feel incomplete. I feel alone. I feel angry with him and me. I feel disappointed. I feel so sad. And if those “negative” emotions aren’t confusing enough, I stand on the teeter-totter of feelings, almost perfectly balanced, while experiencing gratitude. I have gratitude for the time I had with him, the relationship I had with him, and the relationships I gained because of him. I am grateful for my family members who are still alive. I am grateful for my siblings, who have become my best friends. I am grateful for the words my brother spoke with me the last few times I saw him. I am grateful for our attempts to restore our friendship and the comfort that brings. I am grateful that even though we didn’t connect on that last phone call, the phone call itself was a symbol of the friendship he and I had. That brings me to regret. As I reflect, I notice the pangs of wrong decisions—yet decisions I made as best I could with the resources I had…the phone calls not made or answered, the words both spoken and not spoken, the visits not made, the Mountain Dew not enjoyed. All of those things—the positive and negative—come barreling back at me each time I am reminded of him. It’s been 6 years, and sometimes it still feels like it just happened.

June 30. My parents are old (Sorry Mom and Dad, let me correct). My dad is young-old at 74. My mom is middle-old at 79. My mom has had health problems for quite a while now, so I have lived with the realization that I only have so much time left, but June 30th was my first full day visiting my parents ( actually, many family members) while on vacation. My dad looked tired. He was obviously worn out. I’ve seen him physically exhausted, but this just felt different. He had been working around the clock to remodel the basement while also taking care of my mom and dealing with all of the other daily tasks: Cooking, cleaning, doing dishes, taking care of animals, opening and readying the pool, getting groceries, and so much more. It’s one thing to think of your parents as “getting up there,” which has been in the back of my mind since my mom has struggled. It is totally different when the other parent shows signs of age. Don’t get me wrong, I consider my dad fit and capable of almost anything. But he was tired. Like, really tired. That opened up a totally different experience for me. I was grieving and frustrated, felt a sense of urgency and pulling away, love and anger, gratitude and dis-ease. Those things are hard to balance when facing the waves of a changing identity and the renewed grief of a brother who can’t be here to witness it all with me. And I am so thankful I still have my other brother and sister to experience this life with me.

July 1. AM. Speaking of siblings…we ALWAYS make a point of getting together for a sibling breakfast when we are together. It was a tradition that started when Matt was still alive and has become even more important through the years. I am reminded that at one particular breakfast, my sister said, “We will always have each other.” It was a mere months later when Matt passed away. That hurts. That is grief. And it is also joy. I still have Shelly and KJ, and there is nothing we don’t share. This breakfast was no exception. We shared our hurts, fears, challenges, joys, and so much more. With each story or shared experience comes the emotions we feel in our own hearts, as well as the “sympathy” emotions. Time stands still when I am with the two of them, but emotions don’t. I was both revived and exhausted from the ebb and flow of both difficult and agreeable emotions. I wouldn’t have it any other way.

July 1. PM. I received a text message from my college friend and suitemate. She told me she had received an email that our alma mater was closing officially due to financial instability and low enrollment. Friends, my undergraduate and graduate degrees are from this school. It was where I made friends, honed my soccer skills, championed my dorm in intramural sports, pursued my relationship with God, found my love for hiking, camping, and climbing, met some amazingly intelligent and compassionate professors, and found my husband. There is so much joy, happiness, fond memories, and delight gained from that place. The grief and disappointment washed over me as I opened my email and read the news for myself. Yet, I also experienced relief and a sense of safety. A college that loved students, faculty, and staff well, taught them all as accurately as they could, focused on the individual, sought to develop character as well as critical thinking, and provided incredible opportunities one wouldn’t even think possible was ALSO a college that caused me a lot of harm. Sure, I am grateful for my undergraduate degree and most of the people I met along the way. I am also angry that some of that education was sub-par and led me to be without a license (I will be required to redo my masters to become licensed), some of the people were treated as second-rate humans, and some of my experiences were what led me to my experience of digging out of the grave of PTSD. So, what is, to some/many, devastating, is a complicated whirlwind of confusing emotions. I am mourning the jobs and homes of so many people I respect and love. I am mourning my own loss. But I am also celebrating the end of an era of people like me getting hurt in the name of righteousness. And along with all of that, I feel guilt for feeling the way I do.

July 5. I woke up on one of my last days in Michigan to drive South and visit a friend at a coffee shop in the small town of Goshen, Indiana. It reminded me somewhat of the streets of Vicksburg, where I spent a few days each year attending a popular car show with my family. Parking was to shut down around noon for a food festival, but the friend I was meeting pointed me toward some on-street parking nearby. This friend and I hugged, went inside the coffee shop, and ordered. She ordered tea, and I, of course, ordered coffee. This was the first time in 24 years we had seen each other. She felt familiar. She hadn’t changed, and yet she had changed so much. She has a husband and two adorable kids. She has an education and career. She looks the same. She still likes running (we ran cross country together). The only downside I see here is that she doesn’t drink coffee. Just kidding. Anyway, it was one of those meetings that is best described as sweet, just as I would have described her for all the time I have known her. Sitting there for nearly five hours catching up, I felt excitement, contentment, delight, joy, happiness, calmness, and nostalgia. I also felt frustration, grief, sadness, and foreboding. You see, this friend has cancer. It’s hard to reconnect with someone after so many years, sit with them as if you are the only people who exist in a space, and then walk away, not knowing if you will see them again. This cancer is for sure beatable. It won’t be easy. It could also not be beatable. My sadness at that fact doesn’t change the outcome or how I interact with this friend. It does make the time I spend with her, as well as the conversations I have with her, feel bittersweet. I know I could look back on these days sometime in the near(ish) future and grieve over the loss, or I could be laughing at myself for having the thought that these random meetups and conversations would end before we reach old age. Either way, I handle this friendship the way I have learned to handle friendships. This is a blessing. This is an opportunity. This is a gift. Every day is a gift. And…all of the emotions that accompany this can still be complicated.

Also, Friend, Thanks for sending that email. It has been one of the most meaningful events of my life and has given me the courage to live and face some challenges.

July 6. This is a small thing, but it still is something. My entire family came together to get a picture. I say entire, but I don’t mean entire. Two of Matt’s kids were there. Their Mom wasn’t there. Their Dad wasn’t there. Their older sister and her husband weren’t there. Family members were missing again. This isn’t the first time. It won’t be the last. Things change, and when I try to hold onto how things were, it only makes it worse. The delight in having family there was overwhelming. The grief and sadness were all-encompassing. Two very opposite emotions were working together to create both satisfaction and longing.

My family, like most, has faced hard things. We have death, divorce, fights, relocations, typically and differently developing kids and adults, abuse, neglect, and addiction in our family. And we have each other, in whatever capacity that is. That makes me happy. But maybe it doesn’t seem like enough. Maybe it isn’t enough. Maybe it never has been enough. That makes me sad. I struggle to reconcile the two.

July 7. I loaded the car to come back home to Pennsylvania. I was ready, and I wasn’t. It’s always hard to say goodbye. It’s always hard to feel like you have spent enough time with everyone. Enough. What does that even mean? So, I left feeling exhausted and not enough while also feeling energized and like I did my part. Once again, the dueling emotions seem to be pulling me apart.

July 8-10. We pulled into the driveway at our house at exactly 7:00pm on July 7. We were unpacked and sitting down by exactly 8:00pm. That was TIm’s goal. But man, when we woke up the morning of the 8th, we hit the ground running. I spent the next three days in full send mode. I worked, had doctor’s appointments, cooked, cleaned, packed camping gear, cared for the animals and Ian, paid the bills, bought the groceries, and so much more. I was exhausted, and I knew I was setting myself up for another spin on the merry-go-round of emotional suppression. I was tense and anxious. I was excited and optimistic. I wasn’t living, though. I was surviving to get to the next thing. I sat in my therapist’s office on Tuesday and said I would take the time in the woods to reflect and feel anything that did come up for me. Spoiler alert: Things did come up. That is where I actually finished writing Challenge By Choice 2.

July 11-14. After a hectic three days back in the “real world,” I packed up my Rav4 for an adventure. On Thursday, after finishing some minutes from a Council meeting I sat in on, I drove to my campsite in the woods. I set up my hammock, backup tent, screened canopy, and chair, and then I started a fire so I could cook. My friend would be arriving around dark, and I figured I’d also help her bring her stuff to her site and help pitch her tent. The music played as I threw salmon, potatoes, green beans, and carrots on the grill over the fire. It was 10:30pm before I was really able to relax. And as I lay in my hammock, swaying gently, I listened to the fox calling and deer passing through my site. I didn’t sleep well. A migraine was brewing.

Nonetheless, when I awoke, I made breakfast, stirred the coals to reignite the logs in the firepit, and sat down to read. My mind was stirring for days, no, weeks, and I was exhausted. Mentally, physically, and emotionally exhausted. My friend and I spent time together and apart until it was time to leave for the music festival we purchased tickets for. Despite the previously medicated headache resurfacing, I felt life and energy pulling me away from the slow calm I had been sitting with earlier in the day. The music, food, and vendors opened up the excitement I had been longing to feel. I danced, sang, and talked with people I had never met as if we had known each other before. Common interests have always brought out the social butterfly in me. I felt sad when it was time to leave, but I was truly so tired I couldn’t keep my eyes open much longer.

As soon as my friend and I returned to the campsite, we retreated to our own sleeping quarters. I was once again to tired to sleep. The sounds of night were even more pronounced as my headache throbbed on. A pack of coyotes carried on somewhere close until they had apparently caught what they were chasing, deer wandered through again. In fact, one bumped something on my friend’s picnic table and startled all of the deer in the vicinity. My hammock was bumped in the scuffle and began swaying again. I was tired, amused, somewhat afraid, and experiencing the frustrated anticipation of sleep that wasn’t coming. And then something large came lumbering into the site. Sticks broke, leaves were shifted, and I could hear the sniffing and chewing from whatever that thing was. Okay, I admit, I was a little afraid at that point.

The following morning, my friend decided to leave for a few hours. I welcomed the alone time with gratitude but felt guilt. I thought maybe I had done something to make her want to leave. She said she had a headache and was feeling off. I also know she didn’t like the bugs and humidity. So, I accepted her answer and sat with feelings of loneliness and relief at the ability to let down my guard completely. I finished a book. Satisfaction. I solved a word search. Amazement. I finished a blog post. A. FLOOD. OF. EMOTIONS. I don’t know what happened, but it was as if every feeling since the beginning or middle of June started leaking out. All of the emotions I have written about above suddenly had a voice. Boy, did they ever. I let them. And when I finally stopped, I grabbed a change of clothes, a towel, and my shower bag, and I washed the emotions, sweat, soot, and dirt from my body. The combination of released emotions and clean skin pulled me back to the music festival. And once again, I danced. This time, though, I felt the music in every cell of my body. There were no emotions taking up space at that moment, and I felt lighter. I had been convinced that allowing all of the emotions to catch up would paralyze me. Instead, feeling them gave me movement; feeling the emotions gave me the gift of being alive.

Today. The emotions keep coming in waves even now—all of them. The one I feel most is grief. It’s terrible as it washes over me. It exhausts me. But when I don’t allow myself to feel the sensed emotions, including grief, I notice I am more easily frustrated. I have tasted life outside of the cave of suppression, and now I can’t live in the cave willingly or happily anymore.