Month: November 2023

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Me, Myself and I

 I read a newsletter called Wondermind. It comes to my email inbox three times a week–Monday, Wednesday and Friday. They often have articles I don’t necessarily read, interviews I definitely don’t read, and TikTok videos I feel old to watch. But there are always little tidbits at the beginning of every newsletter that make me reevaluate my mental health or maybe take a step back and look at my day and figure out how to make it better. I like it. A lot.

Last week, one of the newsletters asked this question: What is one aspect of your current life that a younger version of yourself would be excited about? I read this question after having lunch with an old friend. I’ve known this man for over 40 years, but as we ate lunch and talked about our lives, I realized I really only knew the childhood version of him. It kind of astounded me the shit he went through as a young adult and the pain he’s endured as an older one. At one point we discussed how we came to where we are–how did we change our bodies, why did we get into the work we’re in, and what regrets do we have.

So when I read the question, “What is one aspect of your current life that a younger version of yourself would be excited about?”, I knew right away what it was. Or I thought I did.

Seeing this person in the mirror was the first thing I thought of:

This woman just ran 4 miles, negative splits, and had fun doing it. She’s fairly fit, runs for fun and for exercise, and looks half decent. And I love her hair. It’s really pretty. 🙂

Thirty years ago, I could not have run 4 miles or even 1 mile. Probably. I might have been able to but it just wasn’t anything I saw people doing much back then, or really anything I thought I could do. But now? After 13 years of running, I don’t want to stop. There are some days I hate it, but it’s more that I hate going out in the cold or the rain or the wind. But once that run is done? Hot damn, do I feel good!

I think my younger self would be shocked, but ecstatic to see me running. But you know what would really make that 20-year old Holly excited? That I own a house, or rather the bank owns it for another six years, but I almost fully own a house. I always, always wanted my own home, even as a kid. I used to have a dollhouse that I adored and that had a handle so I could carry it around. I used to dream about what my house would look like. A ranch style house wasn’t in my dreams, but when my husband and I bought it, this was exactly what I wanted–three bedrooms, two bathrooms, a huge basement, a living room with a cathedral ceiling, and a porch.

Of course, 50-year old Holly can’t wait for the day to come when she can sell the damn house and move into an apartment again. I want a place that someone else maintains and if there’s an issue, I know who to call. And to be within walking distance of ANYTHING? That, my friend, is my dream.

You know what, though? I don’t think I’d ever want the opportunity to say anything to my younger self. My god…the grief, the loss, the shit that is yet to come for that young woman. Yet, there are also many amazing humans she hasn’t met yet, or experiences she’s hasn’t lived.

This older Holly is hoping for more of those things, too.

But right now, I am desperate to know what YOU think your younger self would be excited to know about your current self?

I’m listening, friends. ❤

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Coming Back from the Darkness

I have been 5 weeks social media free. I feel like I should have a blue chip of some sort. I started the break because of how I was feeling–mentally and emotionally fragile. I can’t say my mental state has dramatically improved, but it’s certainly better.

What I’ve realized during this break is that I don’t really talk to many people that are not work related. I think I conversed with 27 people via text, phone or email since October 1, that I am not related to or work with. Yet I have over 300 Facebook “friends.” Do I miss some people I would “see” on social media? Absolutely. I have a cohort of lovely folks from the library I left in May that I’d like to see and hear from again. I haven’t wanted to this past month because I think I needed to cut all ties for a while. I didn’t want to know what the library was doing and to be completely honest, I still really don’t. In a weird way I left a little piece of my heart there. It reminds me a bit of a divorce. I truly love my new workplace and colleagues and the job itself is the exact thing I want to be doing, but I was hurting from not being a part of this small library community. I had to grieve in a bubble for a while and deal with changes in my life. I have embraced those changes, but still, change is hard!

But what have I learned during this month? I’ve learned that social media eats up a lot of my brain power and often fucks up my emotional health. It is a time suck and takes away from my reading and my family, and honestly? Just thinking! I’ve been observing my son as he takes college classes through his high school, reading challenging materials and I see what a deep thinker he is becoming. I used to be just like that, too. Yet in the past decade or maybe two decades, I’m no longer that person. I’m not sure I think deeply about much of anything except how I’m going to get out of debt. (And that’s not really thinking, that’s just stressing.) I feel…superficial. Like a cardboard cut-out of the person I used to be. Is that who I am now? I don’t want to be. I want to be that person who reads a variety of novels and nonfiction, who loves to talk with people about what they’ve read and are reading and have discussions about all of it. I don’t always want to talk about current events or politics because honestly it often hurts, but maybe that’s ok sometimes, too.

I’ve been reading lots of romance novels lately, partially because they make me feel good. I want the HEA (Happily Ever After) for myself and everyone else, so if I can read it about it and someone else gets it, then kudos for them! But it doesn’t take a lot of brainwork to read these books. They bring me joy, for sure, and I’m not going to give them up, but I need to start adding other things to my reading repertoire again.

A month ago, my son kept encouraging me to read “Darkness Visible: a Memoir of Madness” by William Styron. It’s a very short book, really a long essay, about Styron’s depression. My boy has been dealing with his own depression for several years now, but last spring he was in a very dark place. He found this book at the school library. He curled up in a corner and started to read it. For him, it was the first time someone described what he himself was feeling, “a veritable howling tempest in the brain” (p. 38). He felt seen and not quite so alone. And yet…I couldn’t read the book. I kept putting it off, saying I’d read it eventually. Finally last week, I made myself read the first page, then another, then another. I couldn’t stop reading it until it was finished. It was…literary and lovely and difficult. Difficult only because the pain described is what I knew my son felt, yet it was lovely because now I understood a little more about my child–all through literature.

And maybe it helped open my eyes to reading things again that are not so…easy to understand. Challenging ourselves is how we grow, right? I run longer distances to challenge my body and build up endurance to run even longer distances. So why aren’t I challenging my mind to do the same?

I just…I just want to keep using my brain. I want to keep learning and listening and philosophizing. I had an incident two weeks ago where I couldn’t hold the thread of a discussion in a meeting I was in. Is it menopause brain? Is it early onset dementia? Whatever it is it scared the bejezus out of me. I didn’t tell anyone but my therapist at first. I want my doctor to run some tests to see what’s going on with my brain. (But now I don’t have health insurance for a month, so that’ll have to wait!)

So until then, I’m hoping to read more, work on my Spanish, maybe even try a sudoku. (I’ve never done one in my life.) I’m back to eating salmon once or twice a week and upping my vegetable consumption. And with all of that in my mind, I think I might dip my toe back into social media once again. Just to see some of my friends’ faces again, to see their children, and to see their holiday decorations. (Seriously, you know how much I love the decorations!) But if I start to sense that fragility in myself again, I know what I need to do. And maybe I need to downsize that friends list a bit, too.

Baby steps, right?

Thanks for listening, y’all. Hugs to you. ❤

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Reality Check

I’ve been running a lot lately–for me, that is. I ran just over 15 miles each week for the past two weeks. They all felt just so…good. I ran in Springfield, Massachusetts two weeks ago while I was at a conference, and it was so atypical of my runs while traveling. Usually I’m over tired and cranky but desperately want to be outside for a bit and log a few miles. But this time it was just….freeing.

The Lorax at the Dr. Seuss Memorial Sculpture Garden in Springfield, MA.

I am trying to be present in not only my running, but my life. Breaking up with social media has helped me do that. When I run, sometimes I can’t really be where I am or be fully conscious of each step I take because it can be torturous and I just need to finish, damn it! But sometimes I can really enjoy my surroundings, the wind on my face, the sight of the gorgeous fall foliage, the way the light has changed now that we’re into autumn, the crisp smell of the air–it’s all really quite wonderful.

And sometimes, you just have to drag your ass downstairs and onto the treadmill because there’s a nor’easter and the rain is just a bit too much. Whenever I run on the treadmill, I try to be elsewhere in my head. Just focus on that ink blot kind of spot on the basement wall and think of running outside. The other day, though, in that rainy weather, I was halfway through my run, when my husband came downstairs to continue to sort his father’s belongings. After his father died in March, his mother moved back to Maine and brought much of their “stuff” with them, which is currently being housed in our basement. My husband’s job is to look through what’s here and determine if anything should be kept, donated or thrown out. Watching this man, whom I’ve loved and spent nearly my entire adult life with, slowly pick up every one of his father’s items and toss in one bin or another, was difficult. I saw this wide range of emotions pass over his face (grief, apathy, confusion, joy) and I couldn’t help but wonder if some day, I’ll be doing the same task with his things.

As many of you know that read this blog, my husband has had a variety of health challenges over the past four years, with the worst being congestive heart failure. Just this summer he has finally gotten control of his diabetes, which was a huge contributing factor to his worsening health. He feels better now that his blood sugar is where it should be, doesn’t ache as much, feels like living again. And yet…he has chosen to face up to the fact that he may not live another 10 years. In this day and age, when you’re 55 you think you might have at least another 20 if not 30 years left. But when you have a chronic health condition, especially one like congestive heart failure, living to a ripe old age is just not reality.

But while he was sick, he didn’t want to talk about, nor was honest about his mortality. Nothing. And now? This weekend I mentioned that one of the retirement accounts I have, I can actually start withdrawing from in 10 years. He said, so matter-of-factly, “I’ll never see you do that.” At first I didn’t know what he meant. Then I asked, “Because you won’t be here?” He replied that yes, he’ll be dead before then. There was no joking, no laughter like we often do when we talk about our health or aches and pains. It was just a fact and nothing more.

For several years, I’ve known that my husband will not live to be a very old man. And I’ve been ok with that fact. Sound cold-hearted? Maybe, but I come from a long line of women who outlived their husbands and kept living anyways. It’s what women do. Plus, in all honesty, I am very different from my spouse and live a different life, a healthier lifestyle for sure.. I am more social, do different activities than he does, often eat different meals.

But the reality of living alone, after our son has grown, isn’t the most welcoming thought I always figured it would be. Just the other night, I was lying on the couch, reading, with the tv fireplace glowing. My kid was out and my husband was sleeping, so I felt like I was all alone in my home. And for a few minutes I just sat in that feeling of being alone, or rather, being widowed. I have my son and many friends and a few family members, so I am not lonely but often enjoy being alone. This night, though? It was a little scary, a bit sad, and not the best feeling. It’s something I’ve been talking to my therapist about, to understand what’s going on in my brain and heart.

So now, I really, really try to enjoy my time with my spouse. There will always be moments and hours that I’m angry with him or frustrated or fed up, but that’s ok. We’re humans and living with and loving someone for decades is not an easy thing to do in all honesty. I think it’s tough as shit. But we do our best, right? We carry on, we try to live our lives as well as we can, and we love as much as we can, too.

So that’s what I’m going to do.

Love well and carry on.