Processing Emotion

We are terrible at this

And by we, I mean me. I have a hard time processing emotion. What does that even mean? I am as self absorbed as the next person and have been in therapy for all the years, but somedays I struggle with what to do with these emotions. Maybe you do too.

I start the day generally in a lovely mood. I love my coffee and routine, even if it is chaotic some mornings. Summer mornings can be even sweeter. Lately, I have taken to walking a lap around the Compound. The first hit of the air can tell me so much about the day. I usually don’t get out of my jammies, I have my sandals, you might hear me audibly note “oh my goodness, it is a beautiful day” or “what the sigma, it is friggin’ sweltery out here” Don’t tell the kids I said sigma.

In my early 20s, my friend told me that she was going through something that she thought she had worked through already. When she told her therapist, the therapist said “sometimes you have to take the class again.” WHY WHY WHY does it feel like I am always taking the same dang class?

I take the walk, I start the work day, oh right, doing the same thing…will give you the same result, duh. No wonder I always have to take the same class.

I am smarter than this, I promise. Recently I listened to an episode of We Can Do Hard Things related to Internal Family Systems. This is a thing that my therapist and I keep returning to so that I may process the emotions I am experiencing in a way that honors the emotion AND the progress I have made. It can take a minute for me to remember to have a sit with myself and do the work. Instead I will doom scroll, or watch tv, or literally nothing except roll around with the unkind thoughts playing on repeat in my head. I promise I am a delight to be around too.

I write about this a lot: the struggle to be emotionally/mentally well and push for joy rather than the mucky default that the brain often is set on, well my brain at least. Perhaps some do not have such a hard time with it, I sincerely hope you do not. I have all the things that make it exceptionally difficult, along with the normal human condition.

I tell a sweet story to people about the time I had my second child. Said child was so tiny, and first child looked like a giant but still only 13 months, I naively thought to myself “just a couple months sweetie and we will get time together again.” I tell that story and parents nod and smile at my naivety. No shame or weight to that story, just shared knowing.

The story I don’t tell. I was pregnant with baby four. Oh, the depression was so deep. Child 3, a sweet and independent one, never asked for much, we were home most days by ourselves. I lay on the couch as he brought me toys and talked with me. I would look at said child and silently think “I promise to be well again for you one day, please do not be too scarred from the weight of my depression.” I was saying that to both baby four and child 3. Even today, I can be brought to my knees by how lonely and anxious and depressed and isolated I was.

I wonder if I had the tools I would have used them. I was in therapy. I was meditating, I was on medication, I was trying. Moving beyond that weight and shame on the daily can feel like a Herculean feat. It is not for those who are lack courage or bravery and I was dealing with too much already, so I cant imagine being able to have taken the time.

Now, I have had to confront myself on more times than I care to admit. It is not easy or fun. I have stopped and gotten off the roller coaster more times than I care to admit. And sure a walk or a workout can help to process an emotion or two or ten. For me, however, wherever I go, there I am, so when I come down from the endorphin high, the tape might go on, it is a PRACTICE (dammit, not a class).

If you see me talking to myself, it is likely always a good thing. I like to dance to the music in my head and process an emotion with my younger self out loud so I know that today I am enough, worthy, safe, and OK. The younger self, whatever she had to do back then got me to this point and I am grateful, but I am going to take it from here, since when I think about it, man I have it pretty dang good.

With fears for our democracy, but also love in my heart for humanity.