Look at the Birdie

I've been a little out-of-sorts lately. I honestly don't know why. Just the general chemical shifts in a crazy person's brain, I guess.

I've felt panicked. Guilty, oh my God guilty. Guilty about everything. I let my kid watch too much TV. My house isn't clean enough. I say yes too often as a parent when I should be saying no. My kid eats too much sugar. I'm fat. Then I just went to the grocery store to buy a bunch of ingredients to make recipes from my Weight Watchers cookbook, lots of produce and whatnot, and the total came to $200 and I felt so guilty and then the checker told me it was a "blessing" to be able to shop like I do and I wanted to deck her.

I just want to sleep all the time. I can't figure out what I possibly want to do to pull myself out of This. Except, you know, sit on a beach and listen to the waves crash, but even if that were a seasonally appropriate activity I'd probably find some reason to talk myself out of it, the hassle of driving or not wanting to get sunscreen in my eyes.

I've tried exercising my way out of it. Breathing. Watching movies. I still felt physically and emotionally awful after.

I knew there was only one way out of it:

A good cry.

Now, some people just don't get the concept of a good cry. Crying is, by definition, a response to a bad thing. (With the exception of tears of joy when you're on the podium winning an Olympic gold medal or something.) I think no matter how hard I try to explain the concept of a good cry to a non-crier, that person just won't get it.

But for me, crying means I'm Getting It Out. Apparently crying does release toxic chemicals from your body, at least according to Betty, the no-nonsense counselor at the intensive mental health program I affectionately call "Crazy Camp." (If you haven't been with me since my Crazy Camp days, and by "with me" I mean IRL because I didn't have a blog then, I'll post more detail about it on March 15, which will be my 3-year anniversary of Crazy Camp.)

So, yes, Betty. Crying. Releasing toxic chemicals. The thing is, as I've said before, when I feel really stuck, I can't cry. Nothing's getting out. I usually have to be on the upswing of a mental health downturn before I can just let it all out.

Today did not feel like that upswing was in progress. I was gonna go on here and write this sad-sack blog post about how the whole world sucks. "And I don't want one of those dumb posts where there's a cheesy silver lining at the end either," I told myself.

I got up this morning and the house looked wretched. I straightened up about 10% of it, took Nathan to school, and then did a workout at the gym. Except I didn't work out very hard because it was my day to lift weights but then my partner Amy reminded me that we have the trainer tomorrow, so then I just quit. Then I went to the store with the stupid flap with the stupid checker who stupid needs to shut up.

I drove home just feeling awful. And yes I know these problems are all in my head, I have a great life, blah blah blah whatever WHATEVER. I know that. It doesn't stop me from feeling depressed sometimes.

And then I got home and opened my car door and I heard it:

A bird chirping.

I smiled involuntarily. And then I just started bawling. Tears of joy or sadness or frustration, I just don't know. I sobbed and sobbed while I put my groceries away. Each time I went out for more groceries, I looked for birds. I opened the window, 43-degree weather be damned. I held up Leia to the window to sniff the air and see the birds. She was so happy. We both were.

I started to see the little buds forming on the trees. Tiny daffodils were sprouting up. I wondered how the world knew to start spring, even when the weather still seems so wretched and winter-like. But it does know somehow. It always does. Spring comes every year, erasing the bleakness of winter. It always does.

And that is how the world is. No matter how dark it gets, it always brightens again. Spring always comes.

It always does.