Do you know what I hate?

                I was playing a game with my best friend, a game we have invested multiple hours into, a game I love playing with him.  Not only do I love playing the game with him, but it is also time where he and I get to talk and spend time with each other.  Since we live far apart, this is amazing because I don’t get to see him very often.

                And in the middle of playing this game, in the middle of having a good time, I could feel myself emotionally and mentally shutting down.  What does that entail you might ask?  I could feel myself no longer having fun.  But it wasn’t just not having fun.  It was, if I was pressed to explain it more, more of feeling as though I was void of emotion.  I wasn’t happy, I wasn’t sad nor mad.  I felt nothing.

                Instead of talking and interacting, having a good time, I went silent.  And if you know me in real life, you know that me being quiet is always a bad sign to some degree.

                My friend could tell something was wrong, he asked me how I was.  But how do you respond to that when you feel empty?  When you feel nothing? 

                I will be honest.  I have been doing better with my depression and anxiety.  And maybe it was I spent too much time interacting with other people today.  Maybe it was I am just tired and hit my limit.  Maybe this is just my coping mechanism when I am feeling mentally, physically, and emotionally drained.

                But I hate it.  On top of feeling drained and tired, I feel like a bad friend.  I feel like I am making the people around me think I dislike them.  Or worse, making them think I am mad at them.

                I have talked to my husband about this before, and even though I hated every second of it it was something I needed to talk to him about because it felt like it was eating me alive.  When I get into these moods, these mindsets, I care about absolutely nothing. 

                I once told my husband, “I know I logically care about you.  I know I love you and that if anything ever happened to you, I would be devastated.  But when I feel like this, if you got hit by a bus, I don’t even know if I would have the energy to care.”  And that sounds so damn cruel and unfeeling.  Knowing that is how I feel, knowing that is what I am thinking, makes me spiral into even more of a depression.  It is a never-ending cycle where I am drowning in my own self-hatred and self-loathing.

                And yah know what?  I hate that more than I can possibly say.  But I am also thankful, because I have gotten better.  I used to feel like that 90% of the time or more.  Now, I feel like that less than 20% of the time.  And maybe one day it will be even less than that.

                But if you ever feel that way, there is nothing wrong with you.  It is hard to remember, but if you have depression, anxiety, both, or some other mental illness I want you to remember this.  You are a motherfucking warrior.  You are battling yourself every day just to be ok, and you deserve a medal for that.  I am so insanely proud of you.  You got this, you are not alone, and while today might have been hard it was a victory.