It's OK to be Sad

So as I am sure you all have noticed, I have not posted my two or even one blogs a week in awhile. There have been a few sporadic "Yay we will get through this," posts but nothing that has seemed truly honest or open or regular. For that I am sorry. I made a promise with this blog, to myself and the small group of people that take the time to read it. I promised I would challenge myself, I promised I would find things in life that could give us joy, and most importantly I promised to write. 

These are crazy times. We have started baking bread and going on five walks a day to make time pass and to feel normal and present. We zoom call people we used to barely talk to, spill our emotions and fears to professors, and get through a day realizing we never saw the sun. This is a time of trial and isolation and fear. This is a time where class seems unimportant and where our lives seem to be in limbo. I am certainly in that boat. I sit here writing after talking to my mom for an hour. Ranting about the unfairness and the difficulty I am facing. My meds aren't working, my classes are useless, and I cannot bring myself to get out of bed and shower in the morning much less attend a lecture. I have drained my bank account buying useless items for my apartment as a way to try and make the idea things will return to normal a reality. I have cried in my bed thinking I will never go out again, see my friends, date. I have created lists upon lists of things to accomplish to do nothing other than watch a documentary about a gay, polygamous zoo owner who is accusing a woman of feeding her husband to tigers.

I. Feel. Useless.

My motivation for life and for learning is gone. My love for time with my family is replaced by a desire to isolate myself further in a time where we are already mandated to isolate ourselves from the rest of the world. I sit here and write this in awe that I actually forced myself to blog today.

I wrote that this is the time to appreciate what you have and take the time to love people a little harder and smile a little wider because there is nothing else we can do. We are facing an invisible enemy killing thousands and that is turning our world upside down. However, I am struggling to take my own advice. I hate COVID-19, I hate social isolation, and I would do anything to sit on my balcony with a cup of coffee and my roommates. I would do anything. Anything to hold my friends tighter, to go on dates, to walk to class just to skip and get breakfast at Ye Olde. I would do anything to go to office hours, to sit on the quad, to people-watch in the pit.

We take it all for granted. We take our lives, our friends, our small loves entirely for granted until they are gone. We don't realize how suppressed our mental illnesses are until we are forced to sit in a room with just ourselves and it. I know I didn't realize it. I thought Bipolar was hard before? Now I sit and stare at a screen every day, and once I am done I eat and go back to a different screen. I sit in bed and stare at the wall. I buy excessive things. I cry and I convince myself I will exercise more than ever over quarantine, just to still sit in my bed trying to will myself to get up. It all feels impossible and out of control. It all feels permanent no matter how many times they say one day the states will be open again and that we will have a vaccine and go back to normal.

I need dates. I need time. I need answers. We all do. We all need something to cling to because right now all I have is a spiky hedgehog and my glass of pinot. All I have is the promise of breakfast and mimosas in the morning followed by screens and sleep. I guess that is all we can hold onto right now. All we can do is hope. Hope this is over soon, hope we will come out of this a little more compassionate, a little more thankful, and a little kinder. I hope I do. I hope this does not all end in a sigh of relief and a return to our old lives. I hope that we live days with more passion and happiness and find more lights in the darkness. I hope that we create more and love harder. I hope that we understand one another and aren't so quick to judge. I hope I can learn that while things are bad, they could certainly be worse.

My intent with this post is to express that it is ok not to be ok. I certainly am not, as I am sure many of you aren’t either. It is ok to put away the pep talks and the uplifting social media posts. It is ok to scream at the abyss and cry about how it isn't fair. You are entitled to your grief and you are not alone. Just know our lives are not over, they are sick. We will recover and we will return to normal. We will step back into the sun, we will walk and hug our neighbors instead of avoiding them. We will go to parties, we will have classes, we will have friends. We will turn off the computers and look at each other in person, we will have birthday parties and holidays.

This will eventually just be a few months we talk about later down the road, “Remember the semester our world ended?” “Remember when our lives came to a standstill?” “Remember when we met over facetime?” “Remember when we felt the world stopped spinning?” “Remember when we came out ok?”

It will be over. I keep telling myself this because dammit if the black plague ended so will this. We will push to fight this. We will allow others to grieve their loss, of people and of life. We will come back together; there will be traffic and sports and fun and reality once again. So stay safe, embrace the sad, and keep hoping; because right now that is all we can do. As always, happy adventuring, even if the adventure is just getting yourself out of bed in the morning.