Summer hibernation or loner isolation?

Summer hibernation is the answer I give and loner isolation is the answer I live. Honestly, who hibernates in the summer when the birds, sun, and trees are calling out to you to come out and play? It’s almost funny how people find nothing wrong with my answer. How most of my friends don’t seem to know me that well. On one hand, it may seem like I’m just wasting away my summer, not doing anything, but on the other hand, I AM taking 2 online courses, volunteering, working part time, and attempting to care for my family. Although it’s true that I haven’t been doing much this summer yet, as depression holds me captive most of he time, I feel drained and busy doing nothing at all. I don’t want to go out with friends, I don’t want to socialize…there’s just no extra energy left to do that. Dealing with life and waking up to face the day is a challenge itself. Sounds like a sad life eh? But I just can’t seem to get out of this hole just yet. I’m trying to pull myself up but things just keep coming down, burying me alive in this hole.

I guess ignorance is bliss? I knew that my mom’s high blood pressure couldn’t be a good thing but I guess I didn’t want to face the fact that she has heart damage. Heart damage…I can’t help but keep thinking about things that could happen because of that. It scares me. It scares me that I could lose my mom. It also frustrates me that she treats it like it’s no big deal and continues to live the way she always has. I guess it’s hard to change habits and lives of people who’ve been shaped by their experiences for a good half century. I mean, I have trouble changing my habits and they’ve only been cultivated for 2 decades! I wish I could help her in some way. To heal whatever is possible. But when I’m met with a steel wall with barbs of wire everywhere, it’s hard to get through. It pains me seeing her that way. And seeing my brother having the same traits, I sometimes just hate that they’re like that. People can change. People do change. There are things and people that you shouldn’t allow to ruin your life. And it’s okay to get help. It’s okay to admit you’re hurting. It’s okay to trust others. If she were to die right now, I’d have so many regrets. Regrets of not being able to show my love for her as openly as I do for my dad. Regrets of not being more mature and taking up more responsibilities in the family to lighten her load. Regrets of not being able to protect her from the hurt she’s experienced from her in-laws. She just can’t die yet. Plus, I can’t even handle things now, how will I handle things then? I’m just so selfish eh? It just keeps coming back: what it would be like if both my parents were gone. How I don’t think I’d be able to get back up then. How I don’t even know if I can survive without them. How I can manage to care for both my brother and I. I’m not ready for these thoughts yet. These thoughts confine me with migraines and fatigue, chaining them to my bed where I try to sleep but I can’t. Sleeping pills every night bring me to a restless night where I wake up feeling horrible, yet I force myself to sleep yet again the day after.

I guess change is inevitable. So how to deal with change? By changing along with it. People are (thankfully) not static creatures. Yesterday, I did the bravest thing I’ve ever done and hopefully the bravery carries on for the rest of my days or at least for a while. I cut and dyed my own hair. Dun dun dun… (And it doesn’t look that bad according to my friends!) Growing up as a goody-two-shoes, my parents have basically dictated and owned my life. Recently I’ve started to try to live my own life and it’s been hard. Specially with a brother who loves to tattletale and having the whole family be on the other side no matter the subject of argument. We just never think the same way. Correction, “I” just never think the same way. Therefore, cutting and dyeing my hair was a big step for me. Without asking for their opinion and in a way, changing my look/outlook. I feel more like me. I’ll be living my own life sooner or later, and I don’t mind taking on the consequences of my actions, so why not learn how to make decisions by myself? It sucks feeling bogged down by life AND being restricted in so many other ways as well. We only have one life to live, so let’s make it one that we’re happy with.

To be or not to be, that is the question.

The hardest choices in life are those where you can choose to give up something that is comfortable for something that may or may not be better. I still think about my choice months after I made my decision. Some things in life we will never know whether it was “right” or “wrong”, or maybe there was no right or wrong answer. I feel so conflicted on making my choice for something “better”. It might not even end up being anything, but I took the risk and gave up what I had. In the future, I guess I’ll see whether or not it was worth it. But, I believe that whichever way I went would leave regrets in not choosing the other path. Go with what your heart tells you, and don’t look back. Once you make your choice, what you’ve left behind is in the past and you just have to live with that choice. As I’m typing this, the words are more for myself than anything else.  The past can’t change, but you can change the future you make it. Life is too short to dwell on regrets. Of course, we all make mistakes sometimes, but we can learn and see how the mistake might just be a blessing in disguise. Although I just said we all make mistakes, I believe that there are no mistakes, and our “mistakes” are meant to be, to teach us a lesson or make our lives better. Whether this post makes any sense or not…that’s another question.