WHEN YOU LOSE ALL OF YOUR HOPE

HOPE

• noun
  • the feeling that what is wanted can be had or that events will turn out for the best.
    

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Although defined in the textbooks, hope means something different for every person. Hope can drive you towards more success, hope can bring you up from rock bottom, hope can make you scared. For most people though, hope is essential to their day to day life and the idea that you can lose all hope, lose everything that you were leaning on to give you a better day, is terrifying.

I use the idea of having hope every day of my life, even if my life is going perfect. (well, it is never perfect, but still can be a great day.) I think about how great my future will be and the endless opportunities that will cross my path in the future. I HOPE for a better day, for my family, for my friends, for myself.

But lately, that hope has been
slowly
slowly
slowly
disappearing.

It is as if hope was my friend, and grew tired of the countless problems that I go to every single day, and decided maybe it needed some distance. So every day that I go through, every problem that I have been encountering, hope has slowly walked away from me, and today, I do not feel the presence of hope at all. It is gone.

I have always taken pride in my ability to be so open and vocal about dealing with mental illness and the way that I can use coping mechanisms to deal with my feelings and problems. The problem is that now, I feel like I am falling into my old ways of wanting to deal with my mental health, which involves isolated myself, self-pity, and lashing out at the people I love. This is not healthy, I know this is not healthy.

I have educated myself on the issues that I deal with, and I know what usually helps me, but right now…nothing helps. I don’t have passion anymore, I don’t have the wanting to go out and see friends, I don’t want to make music or do my makeup or do any sort of self care. This is a real problem that I just have to face and that I am trying to deal with…but I lost all of my hope… I have lost the ability to see a brighter day. I have lost any sort of positive outlook and love of life because of this. I feel like I am screaming and no one can hear me *which, I am not really talking in depth about my situation so that is my own fault, but every time I try talking about my problems, I get lost in so much self-pity and I just start crying, so I don’t find it to be very rewarding or helpful to talk about this.*

I am writing about this because this is the only way I know how to talk about it. I still don’t feel comfortable talking about my illness with my friends and family because I still feel like I will be rejected and misunderstood. I know I am loved, I know I have so much promise, I know that this pain will pass, but I feel so stuck and so sick to the point where I constantly want to throw up, constantly thinking about triggering issues, and overall all I do is cry. When everything feels like it is falling apart, my mental illness loves to play with me and hit me where it hurts the most.

The worst is when people try to console me about the horrible time I have never. I am not saying that they don’t understand what I am going through, but even with all of the amount of support I get, I don’t find any solace from it. I also have never liked the idea of people telling me that “everything will be okay, you will be okay” because the truth is, maybe it won’t be okay…and even more so…why should we settle for okay? Although thinking this is a positive response to a hard situation, it truly does not give any sort of rest for the person dealing with all of the problems.

So what do you do when you lose all hope? If you came here for the answer, I can’t help. Maybe in the future when the storm passes, I will be able to have a better outlook on the situation and I will once again have hope, but this isn’t something that I can truly see in the future.

I am not sure where this post is going, but I do know that I am not okay. I have had the worst month of my life and this depression and anxiety is vengeful. It’s dark. It’s horrible. The only thing that I think about is trying to convince myself not to do any of the triggering things. I feel stuck. I wish I could hope that one day I will get out of it, but I can’t.

If you are reading this and relate to this, I feel you. I am here for you. We can indulge in the pain together.

If you are the opposite and have no idea why I am so frustrated and sad and have lost all hope, then I am so glad that you are living your best life, and I wish nothing for the best for you.

Hope is lost, but I am not giving up.

Thanks for reading.