I am out too far. I cannot safely return to the shore. I have many more strokes to execute before I reach the other side. Dark thoughts haunt me as I tread water just managing to keep my head above the swirling darkness. I have come this way many times before. I never manage to make it to the other side…

Have you ever wanted to freeze your perfect moment in time? One of my favorite movie special effects happens with time freeze. All of the action is frozen except for the principle player and maybe one or two other key role players, a theatrical aside. Brilliant; until that is how you feel your life is unfolding. I plod along. I feel like I am finally gaining an understanding into why I rely on food so heavily to keep me happy and then I have an aside. I have been on program this time around for almost two years! I have been doing well. I know what I want. I know I can I break that tape across the finish line, and then I have an aside. I pause the action so I can freeze all the good things that I am doing with my life… so I can have an aside and misbehave.

WHY? wHy! whY?!?

It is late at night and in this moment I am LOST. I am surrounded by people I love who love me and yet I feel singular, alone, one. I feel abandoned, cast away to fend for myself. I blew up at my hubby yesterday over nothing and everything. The battle I rage against is mine and mine alone. I create the walls, the monsters, the self-hatred. THIS IS how my ANXIETY manifests itself. I begin to doubt everything that I am doing. I OVERTHINK the smallest of details. I have a difficult time remembering my worth. I feel like people can see the tears in my fabric, that like a prop I am not real.

I feel the rut of sadness fast approaching. I feel uneasy. I just want to have the strength to stay the course, putt through to the next hole. I head back to work, my regular routines in a few days. I know I will be able to do this. I just need to find a way to be honest when I am feeling overwhelmed. As my kid sister would say, “You are not lost. You just haven’t been this way before. All roads lead somewhere. You’ll figure it out.”

For her I will keep on until I figure it out and I am not lost anymore.