It’s OK to Not Be OK

I will be the first person to tell you that I do NOT deal well with change as a whole. Unexpected changes? Even worse. It does not matter if it something that has been in the works for a while or if a situation changes, literally in seconds. I’ve been like this my entire life. Yes, I have control issues, it’s something I work on everyday. Yes, I also have super high anxiety and that rarely makes a situation better. I am a lister *I literally have lists for my lists, I’m not joking*, a planner, and a highly organized person, so when something goes askew my head basically explodes.

Being pregnant, there is a LOT of change that comes with whole process, from the way my body changes almost daily, hormone fluctuations that make me borderline psychotic at times, to the fact that my family dynamic and lifestyle will be changing. Now let’s add to those changes that we will be moving into a new house in the coming weeks and my husband just lost his job yesterday. To say I am stressed is the understatement of the century.

I normally go through a mourning period (especially for life altering changes) for what I was expecting, what I’ve lost, and the upcoming unknown. After that, my brain starts churning out ideas on how to fix or redirect what I see as a catastrophe, what the next steps are, and how to smoothly navigate what is about to transpire.

When I received the news that my husband had lost his job, I went numb. I threw myself into working on Lunar Rising, writing, researching, you name it, anything to not think about, or deal with the situation. Earlier in the day I had read an article about whether or not you are processing your emotions or avoiding them. Serendipitous really because here I was hardcore avoiding feeling. After I had realized what I was doing, I had a choice to make. I could continue in avoidance of the whole situation which I knew would lead to a huge meltdown over something inane and stupid, like dropping a fork. Or, I could sit with my emotions. Accept them. Then process all of it.

Whether I had made the decision or not, just that pause in avoidance was enough to allow traces of anger, sadness, and a fear to start to creep in. Within minutes, I had devolved into a silent, sobbing, mess who was hiding in the bathroom because I didn’t want the kids to be worried, or scared. I cried for hours, which may be partly due to hormones, they make me weird. But I needed to process, and tears are the body’s way to release emotion.

Today, I was still NOT ok. Not even a little bit. Not because I had more emotional issues to process but because I was exhausted from the night before and my body does not handle stress well. Yes, I was still hurting, angry, and scared for what is to come but the worst was over. I was scrolling through my emails and there was an article about what to do when you are not ok. Again, rather serendipitous don’t you think? It had all the basic, get out, get moving, blah blah blah, but why I really chose to read the article at that moment was because I wanted someone else to give me permission to “NOT be ok”!

Why do we shy away from hard emotions?

Why do we feel like we need to hide in bathrooms to cry it out?

Why does no one tell you that it’s ok to not be ok?!

This is me telling you… IT IS OK TO NOT BE OK!

Take time to process your hard emotions, your grief, your fears. Try not to let them own you and alter your life to the point where you can not ever get out of bed. But if you need a day to hide under the covers because life is so overwhelming at the moment you don’t know how to function…TAKE IT! It’s ok to mourn the end of a chapter in your life.

I was always told as a child/teen to just suck it up and move on. Life is change, there’s nothing you can do about it so just deal like a normal person. It caused so much resentment, anger, and fear that eventually I became incapable of seeing my way out of situations. It wasn’t until my mid twenties when I realized that I needed time to process. Once that processing has taken place, I can look at the situation with a clear head, make plans to move forward, and deal with what’s in front of me.

For those people who can just go with whatever and flow naturally from one situation to the next (like my husband) I commend you. However, if you are more like me… process, don’t avoid. In the moment, it may feel like you are dying, I know it did last night and even part of this morning. By the afternoon though, I was able to do some kundalini mediation, a bit of yoga, even some research, and clearly writing. You can’t force your way out of your emotions in a healthy way. You need to sit with them, accept them, and move forward knowing just a little bit more about yourself than before you went through your last experience.

They are right, Life is Change. Nothing remains stagnant, not even death. That does not mean you have to “suck it up” and force yourself through what may seem unbearable to you. We are meant to have emotions. We are meant to FEEL those emotions. If you need to hear it, YOU ARE ALLOWED TO EXPERIENCE EVERY ONE OF YOUR EMOTIONS IN A WAY THAT IS HEALTHY FOR YOU! And then… move forward in your new-found strength. Make your plans, put yourself into action.

I wish you all healthy coping mechanisms and the inner strength to help carry you through whatever you are dealing with.

Dayna B.

 

For clarity’s sake, I still believe that life happens for us, not to us. This is a bump in the road for us, a really crappy Michigan pothole sized bump, but it WILL lead to better things. When I am first dealing with the change, however, it does not feel that way. It is hard to envision because I become shrouded in a blanket of the unknown; and that terrifies me.

Another quick note in regards to my children, I do not usually hide my sadness/tears from them. We believe that children need to see that parents are human too. I do prefer to cry alone though. My children are extremely compassionate and empathetic humans. They often try to “fix” the situation; when really I just need to cry. It breaks their hearts to watch. While I do teach them that sometimes you just need to let your emotions out, at 6 years old (let’s be honest, any age really) it is hard to watch a parent fall apart. Truly, I prefer to be alone in my sadness and I have taught them that that is ok as well.