Some Help is Needed When It's Needed Until It's Not

Beach one, May 11th

(Note: this is about me. It’s not about you. It’s about ME unless you also need it to be about you. If you don’t need it, then it’s not about you. Got it? We are each an experiment of one. PERIOD.)

Yesterday when I visited the lake, she was so changeable. From minute to minute, her color and the light across her surface was different. It was hard to stop taking photos, trying to capture each iteration.

We’re so much more like that lake than we like to admit.

We want things to be steady and constant. It feels good to imagine that we’ve arrived somewhere and that’s that.

But, of course, life is change. We are change. Our very identity is not a consistent thing but ever-evolving.

So, for example, when I found an anti-depressant that helped me, I assumed that was it… forever. But…

I’ve spent a long time in this life trying to heal myself with no help. It’s part stubborn and part stupid and just wholly unnecessary. We’re not meant to be 100% individuated. We’re part of a large ecosystem that includes all other humans and all other life.

There’s got to be a reason for that. Pure and simple. And that reason is that we aren’t as strong as we could be until we tap into the larger, vaster, deeper wisdom, until we partake of the infinite tools that are at our disposal.

We can only know so much. The larger ecosystem knows it all and we can plug in any time. We should plug in all the time, actually.

So when my depression got extra bad about a year and a half ago, I finally listened to the people who love me and I got help. I went on medication and I got into therapy.

That medication felt like a fucking miracle…. no. It WAS a fucking miracle.

The dark and often veering toward suicidal thinking was just GONE. POOF! Like that!

It was CHEMICAL all ALONG, I kept yelling at people. I walked around in amazement at this new found fact.

I needed that medicine like we all need oxygen. I was in trouble and that medicine saved me.

I walked around for months feeling brand new and then I started to notice, well, that it didn’t feel as miraculous any more. I didn’t feel the dark brain coming back to life but the light that had entered was definitely dimming.

I got put on a helper med. It didn’t really. I started to think that the helper med was all I needed, and the first med was something I didn’t want to be on long term, so I stopped. That worked out fine.

Until I noticed that nothing good was really coming of the second med either. I can’t tell you HOW I knew this. I just did. I knew I didn’t need anything any more.

I accidentally missed an evening dose and nothing horrible happened so I continued missing evening doses and then every other day morning doses and then I was off.

And dark brain was still nowhere to be felt. (Of course, I am still prone to despairing but LOOK AT THE WORLD. This is normal right now and it doesn’t come with suicidal thinking.)

Dark brain was nowhere to be felt and other stuff started to happen…

I heard the laughter that comes out of me when I’m actually happy and relaxed. I know it because it reminds instantly of my toddler laugh. I just KNOW this laugh. It’s my core laugh.

I noticed that I was getting REALLY SILLY with my husband again. Like silly enough that he would give me these funny little looks that said, “who is this?” It’s been a while since this me has been around and I know it felt foreign (yet delightful) to him.

THEN…

We watched this movie (WATCH IT!!!!!!!), and a few minutes in, there is a scene at a local TV station with Chris O’Dowd in a very brief cameo. I started laughing and then I was LAUGHING and then I was just LOSING MY SHIT.

Every time I looked at Craig, I just laughed even harder. I couldn’t believe I wasn’t peeing our couch! My face felt like it might crack!

I thought Craig was laughing so hard because the movie was funny — and he was — but he was laughing THAT hard because he couldn’t get over my utter JOY.

Which stopped me in my tracks, right? I was feeling the deepest joy… I can’t remember when I last felt like that and I KNOW I haven’t laughed like that in probably 3 years. THREE. YEARS.

Which could make me sad but I don’t have time for that shit.

Along with my happy and silly brain, being off those meds means my creative and ACTIVE brain are on OVERDRIVE.

My point… sometimes you need meds… and then sometimes you stop needing them.

If you don’t stop needing them, so what? You need them and we are grateful you have them. As I was grateful when I thought nothing could possibly help.

Battle Fatigue During Lockdown

This lockdown we’re all experiencing is tough. And if you already had some pre-existing mental health challenges, it’s tougher. Period. This shit is deeply triggering, even for the healthier of mind among us, so it can be downright dangerously triggering for those of us already battle fatigued.

I’m one of that group who is battle fatigued and who is really struggling to find the next level of courage and strength that I need right now. So if you’re reading this and nodding, you’re not alone.

From the outside, I look okay. You know what us overachieving, perfectionist, high-functioning depressive types are like. We don’t like anyone to really know what’s happening.

It might even seem that I share a lot. I share a TINY percentage of my actual day to day struggle. A struggle that only my husband and maybe 3 other people really understands.

Each day is uphill and slogging through mud, for the most part. Each day is about getting a sort of personal “minimum” done, no matter what.

Then at night, in bed, I crash — physically and emotionally.

As is always the case, I’m not sharing this for pity. I’m sharing this for people who are even quieter than ME about their struggles, about those days when it really feels like they might not make it, about those times when the darkest parts of their minds start generating ways to get out.

I’m sharing it for those people who are even quieter than ME and so you’ll never ever know that every day is a victory worthy of a medal.

Every day that we are still here and still trying, we are growing courage muscles that I wish no human even needed.

And for those of us who didn’t make it — for the Vincent Van Goghs and the Virginia Woolfs of our world — it’s not that their courage gave out. It’s that the battle fatigue got too strong.

So right now… we need to extra watch out for each other.

Right now, the stronger among us must lend strength to those struggling.

Right now, may our compassion grow a safety net that lets no one pass through.

Wibbly Wobbly Timey Wimey Stuff

During the filming of the grief piece which I’ve still not edited even though my schedule is, well, lighter than ever. (see post below)

What time is it? What day is it? What month are we in? How long have we been in this lockdown thing? When will things go back to “normal?” What is “normal?”

Time has become, for sure, something very wibbly wobbly.

I’ve been pretty much in charge of my own schedule for many years. But I had a SCHEDULE. I even used a planner (what the hell is that?!).

I had places to go, people to meet with, things that had to be done by certain times. I had to GO SOMEWHERE to teach my classes. I would form my day around that and then squeeze in the gym or boxing, walking, coffee and writing, errands.

Now all those markers are gone.

It feels like suddenly being plunged into the middle of the ocean when you’re used to living on the shore and diving in and out when you need or want to.

It’s uncomfortable. It can even be scary.

“WHERE THE HELL DID MY DAY GO? WHAT DID I DO?”

I say that a lot. I don’t like the feeling. It all makes me angry and sad and then lethargic. Then I bounce back and start over, still wondering what day it is.

And you?

Another question: is this feeling temporary (of course it is) and are we actually settling back into more body wisdom based understandings of time and our lives?

MELTDOWN!

I'm quite certain I'm not alone...

Thursday was rough. I had a pretty big panic/anxiety meltdown, and I felt paralyzed by it. I have a great helper, who knows how to talk to me, but I am still the one who has to figure out how to rise up out of that quicksand and Thursday...I felt pretty damn stuck in it.

During such a meltdown, of course, everything gets exaggerated and nothing feels like it could possibly help.

All the tools in your toolbox suddenly seem like GIANT JOKES existing only to prove how awful you are or how little hope there is in the world.

Eventually I dragged myself off the bed.

During times like this, even *I* CANNOT bring myself to dance. It's THE tool, but even I just cannot.

BUT I can do other smaller things. If I can get myself to start with the idea of just 5 minutes of pilates -- something concrete and directed -- that can turn into so much more as the healthy brain chemistry starts to reassert itself.

Thursday, that was exactly what happened. I started with a video of 25 minutes of pilates (with no promise that I would finish).

Why a video? I need someone else guiding me; I can't possibly do this myself when I am feeling that badly.

From there, I moved onto a 10 minute core video.

THEN, only then, after 35 minutes of soaking my brain in some endorphins, was I able to approach some free movement, and even for that, I stayed on the floor.

I stayed on the floor and focused on my breathing and waiting and allowing and noticing.

The very basic principles of what I teach.

And as always, quite suddenly, I was fascinated by the workings of this body.

And as always, quite suddenly, I was out of the asshole brain and completely in the whole of myself.

Because here's the thing: your brain is just ONE ORGAN.

When we rely on it exclusively, we easily become rather dumb.

When we dive into the entirety of ourselves and tap into the wisdom of the full body ecosystem... that is the pathway out.

12 Years Ago You Would Not Have Known Me

In this photo, I think I am happy. I have just finished my Yoga Dance teacher training with the amazing Megha at Kripalu. My life felt like it finally had some meaning and purpose. I was starting to feel more like myself than I had in…forever.

And YET.

I look at this photo now and it makes me sad. I can see that it is me but it does not look like me, if that makes sense. There is something off about the eyes in particular. I think I look older in this photo from 11 years ago than I do now, as I approach 51 in mere weeks.

11 years ago, I was starting on this path that has led me to creating Bodypoetics, but oh, my, the distances I have had to cover before I got here.

The distances I had already covered before heading to Kripalu…

12 years ago, you would not have known me.

My body was much bigger, but that is just the outside, which for me is very much about the insides but that’s another post.

My eyes were empty, from over a decade of serious depression, and from living a lie of a life in every way.

My body was always and forever carrying some sort of pain — back, hips, migrained brain, and on and on with one chronic issue after another.

And oh, my, MY MIND.

I had been convinced that I did not like people, that I hated people.

I had been convinced that I did not ever want to be touched or hugged by anyone. BY ANYONE.

I had been convinced that my fears prevented me from pursuing good work or even leaving the house.

I had been convinced that I had this mental illness, then this one, then this one, then this one…all to keep me obsessed and paralyzed.

I had been convinced that getting professional help was a waste of time and wouldn’t help anyway. That pills were bad. That therapy was dumb.

These beliefs came to me from another human who counted on me staying down.

But there was plenty of inner shit to work with that I had been carrying since I was about 9.

I was already convinced that I was worthless.

I was already convinced that I had nothing of value to offer others.

I was already convinced that life was a burden, as was I to anyone.

12 years ago you would not have known me.

And then, long story short, a dear friend died and I attended the wedding of another and I started to dance and eventually met Megha, and well, the rest is (recent) history.

I do not know what compelled me to dance at that wedding.

I do not know what compelled me to go to Kripalu, and in so doing, face about 100 of my greatest fears.

12 years ago you would not have known me but that’s because I did not even know myself.

Somehow I am still alive.

Somehow I am getting real help and am surrounded by well meaning people who only want the best for me… finally.

Somehow, every day, I get up and believe in my vision of me just enough more than I believe in that old version of me. Just enough to keep me going, to keep me trying and hoping.

Spiritual constipation... Yep, you read that right

For some people, a crisis like my father’s stroke last October expands and deepens and affirms their faith. For some people, it has the opposite effect, and I am in that second group… much to my surprise.

You see, I have always and forever been a seeker.

From the day I saw… something… when I was jumped on in a pool at the age of six and immediately started to drown, the air pushed out of my body so fast by the weight of the other body.

From the day I walked into the kitchen soon after and asked my mother, “how do I know I am me?”

There are too many instances to recount here, but by the time I was maybe 10 or 11, I was sitting on a stool in our city library pulling books off the shelf in the Eastern religion section and trying to freaking figure all of this out.

I knew there was more than this and I knew there were too many simple explanations out there, keeping people from exploring and discovering. I knew that wouldn’t be me. I knew I wanted to experience what I had experienced in that pool, that’s for sure, and I wasn’t finding it in any church, though I’d get the occasional glimpse there.

Over my life, I have studied and studied so many religions and philosophical systems that resemble religion. I like this about myself. I like synthesizing and integrating.

If there is something bigger, something God(dess)-like, then a few things I do know are that one container is way too small, containers are metaphors and yet simultaneously real, and language (a construct of this limited human mind) can never touch reality.

And so, I like having Our Lady of Guadalupe on my altar next to Kali next to Kwan Yin next to…

Over my life, it’s been my relationship with Guady (as I call her) that has, for whatever reason, been the most powerful, the most consistent. When I am lost in a dark place of doubt, which happens not rarely thanks to this deeply curious mind, it is Guady who seems to somehow find me.

It sounds… fluffy, doesn’t it? but it’s the only way I can explain it.

My father’s stroke was remarkably transformative in ways I could not have foreseen and have not liked one bit.

Nothing that I used to do was breaking through.

Chant. Prayer. Meditation. Reading. Visualizing. The rosary. Going to mass.

What is the point of life if all we do is die?

I could not get past that question.

I could not get past the idea that there’s quite simply NOTHING MORE than this.

I’m writing about all of this as if it were in the past and it’s not.

It’s my right now.

I have some good helpers in this arena. They are all saying the same thing to me… do the things regardless. Do the chanting and the prayer and the altar creation even if you don’t feel it.

Plant the seeds. Cultivate. Keep working it. Wait.

In the meantime, a good friend giggled and pointed out that I am spiritually constipated, and I just need the right enema.

I’m thinking I’m not alone.

I know I’m not alone in this.

And speaking of Guady finding me…

A few weeks ago we were in Asheville and I knew they had a rather famous Basilica but I wasn’t going to seek it out. Instead, we walked and walked one day downtown and suddenly, we were at it. It loomed in front of us.

And she was in there, in so many of her guises.

I lit a candle and said a prayer that for the first time in a long time felt like a true prayer.

I say prayer like things when I am teaching all the time, but they are more inner directed.

In that quiet, cool, dark basilica, lighting that candle in front of a Marian shrine, for the first time in a long time, it felt outer directed.

I don’t believe in a God that sits above us, watching over us, judging or helping, but I do believe that I am woven into something bigger that I can access.

I believe that when I am not NOT believing it.

I believe that when I am not spiritually constipated.

In the meantime, my enemas include chanting and reading some tantra texts but also a new work by Mirabai Starr about women mystics. A few pages in and I can feel a slight stirring deep in my belly.

I have built a water and stone altar to Guady and I plan to create an altar to some of my significant ancestors.

That’s all I’ve got right now… some hope that these things might take root and grow, that I might find my way back to that little girl on that stool in the library who was so open and wondering and in awe of life.

Food, Alcohol, Pleasure, and Meds

The warmth during our trip to Asheville was my favorite thing…

I’ve written a lot (and still have so much more to write) about the changes to my brain since going on the right anti-depressant. (Here, here, here, and here.)

And before you read: Please remember that I am the mother of #ExperimentofOne. This is about what works for me. That doesn’t mean I think it would work for you. What I DO believe would work for you is questioning your own assumptions frequently and playing with variables.

To paraphrase Thomas Merton, we are built not for pleasure but for joy. The distinction is important. Pleasure is momentary and of the world; joy is deep and abiding and can be tapped into at any moment because it’s embedded in our operating systems, so to speak. It’s always there, waiting for us to notice. It’s not dependent on anything else.

Pleasure is good. I’m not a puritan. But it’s not the point and it can’t be our primary motivation. Or you can easily end up with a nation of high-functioning addicts. (Oh, wait…)

Pleasure is important but it’s secondary to the depth of joy.

Pleasure is easy. Go eat a cupcake. (Now I want a cupcake.) Joy takes devotion and awareness.

And eventually I’ll relate this preamble to food and my depression…

Though the anti-depressants have removed the Chemical Asshole from my brain, there is still work to be done.

I am still responsible for my own health, wellbeing, and happiness.

A pill can take care of the biochemical issue — and thank god for that — but there remains first, old habits developed out of coping with chronic depression, and second, a desire not just for “good” but for AWESOME.

The pill allows me to spend my energy where it belongs — on joy and love and writing and dance and relationships and learning and growing and all the good things that used to get eaten up by the energy it took just to live with my depression from hour to hour and not succumb to a deep desire to give up.

But the pill does not do All the Things. It does not suddenly make me a different or new person. It does not change who I am on a basic level. It simply gives me access to myself again.

I could decide this is good enough, but that’s not my nature.

I know there’s more to life even than this. I have Big Dreams and goals and desires. I have dance to teach, worlds to explore, books to write.

Because I’m not fighting Chemical Asshole, I have the power to dream again (I had recently totally and truly lost that capacity and that’s when I knew I had to seek help because I’ve ALWAYS been able to IMAGINE), and I have the power to go after those dreams. (None of this can be overstated. I’ll try to write about how this FEELS on a basic level at some point but the words aren’t available to me yet. I’m still adjusting.)

One of the most fundamental ways that I know to make my brain even happier and healthier is through my diet.

For example, in the past, when I’ve been pretty darn strict about being paleo (with occasional treats), I have had less brain fog and less systemic inflammation issues in general. I had more energy. I slept better. I felt more rested.

I also do better with VERY little alcohol in my life.

But I’ve noticed something: when I tell people that I am going back to eating like this and only drinking a beer once in a while, I get met with a lot of objections along the lines of…

But you like beer and wine…

But food is yummy…

What about fun and pleasure…

Life is too short…

First, thanks for the sabotage.

Second, life is too short, indeed, and that is my whole reason for doing this.

I’m much more interested in joy than pleasure.

I will eat the occasional cupcake, but I want the energy and focus it takes to do great and good and big things in this life.

I want adventure and learning and curiosity and excitement and experiences of awe.

Wine with dinner that gives me a headache the next day or somehow numbs me to the now? No, thanks. Depression numbed me for 20 years. I want to be HERE in the NOW; I want to FEEL this life.

Food that makes me feel sick and throws off my system and leaves me creaky and exhausted? Nope. A side effect of my depression were chronic pain issues that left me pretty darn immobile and thinking I needed a cane by the time I was 35. (For real.)

Why the hell would I choose yum over being completely in my life?

And why is it not enough to enjoy a simply perfect peach? What about a square of dark chocolate?

Why are we slaves to foods and beverages that do not uplift us and sustain vibrant life? These questions are important and our resistance to answering them can be telling.

I want more joy and if that means eliminating a bit of momentary pleasure here and there… well, that is devotion to myself, to my purpose, to ultimate love.

To paraphrase that rather awful Kate Moss quote and turn it into something meaningful: Nothing tastes as good as joy/happiness/mental health feels.

This, too, is a dancer's body

From a demonstration years ago in our city arboretum. Betty was almost 80 in this photo.

This, too, is a dancer’s body, because all bodies that dance are dancer’s bodies, and all bodies are meant to dance; it’s in your genetic coding. Dancing is an expression of being human, no more and no less.

I got to teach Betty for a couple of years before she passed away. That’s the very happy part of our story together.

The sad part is that it was only during these couple of years with me that Betty felt like she was truly embodied, that she felt her feelings deeply, that she got to know her body. This is not my story of Betty; this is what she said over and over again.

She was a nun for a lot of her life, left that, and became a nurse practitioner. When she came to this work, it was not something she ever thought she'd be doing, but she'd tell you that it's never too late and then she'd add with great passion and seriousness that IT'S NEVER TOO SOON!

So much of Betty’s life, like a lot of women her age, like too many women to this day, was in her head. She walked through most of her life as if just a head or as if the body were just a vehicle for the head.

I spent a great deal of my life there, thanks to chronic depression. I know how easy it is to stay there, how “comfortable” it can be — it you think it’s comfortable to only be partly human, to only know a tiny bit of yourself and this great experiment of life.

For the first time in her life, she FELT HER BODY. And she learned that she loved The White Stripes.