2012 arrived with a sigh of relief. 2011 was basically shit for a year and the Universe gave me the middle finger on more occasions than I consider acceptable. It wasn’t ALL bad: I lived in Spain, got more freelance business, and had a kick ass 30th birthday celebration in Austin with people I refuse to live without. But I would say, as a whole, there was a whole lot of painful “learning.”

happiness

me and charlie

When I left for Spain last April, I had high hopes of happy experiences waiting for me abroad, and a supportive boyfriend patiently waiting at home. Call me naïve, ignorant, or ridiculously optimistic (I am all of those things at any given time), but I saw no reason why life should not play out exactly how I expected.

Well when the opposite took place, I felt cheated. How dare the Universe not hand me my fantasies on a unicorn shaped plate! I’m afraid I got a bit petulant and pouted for a bit, before changing tactics and desperately trying to accept my situation, as The Power of Now so adamantly stresses.

Aside from dealing with a miserable living situation, the boyfriend aspect went from bullshit to abysmal. Before I knew it, I was engaged in a battle so emotionally traumatizing and so deep that I couldn’t see the white surrender flag I always carried. The emotional battering that both of us took left nothing but a wasted carcass of a relationship, sagging on the cusp of death. I didn’t love myself enough in that moment to kill it; despite the agony I was enduring.

And the agony was profound and unrelenting. The capacity of despair that a human being is willing to take before saying “enough” is quite unnerving. Even more impressive is how emotions will bring you to an acute point of visceral pain, but never actually destroy you. No, instead you get to linger with the pain, and figure out every day how to be a normal human being on the outside as your insides turn black and decay.

It had been years since I had sunk that low. I had no idea how to cope. I had no support system, nor did I ever have the opportunity to be alone and sort through all that I was experiencing. You know The Scream by Edvard Munch? That was me. Twisted, excruciating turmoil. And silent.