Recalibrating

Earlier this week, while having drinks with a friend, the conversation turned to how we had changed over the past year.

Some of these answers come easier, and more obviously, than others. Changes include my short haircut, my single status, becoming a renter, a full-time job, a tattoo, a new commitment to my health, and a slew of new people in my life, along with a rekindled relationship with my family. Major, right?

But, as we discussed these physical and situational changes, I realized the biggest difference for me was that I was finally free. I could give myself permission to let go and have a little fun.

I've always been the serious, responsible one. Working part-time during high school to save for university, participating in every extra curricular activity I could sign my name up for, studying hard, and excelling, academically.

Come university, things became even more stringent. Classes were harder. Finances were tougher. And I couldn't accept anything less than perfect. While friends were enjoying the freedoms of late nights, concerts and casual dating, I pushed myself harder and harder, and my world got smaller and smaller. My migraines got worse. I started on a steady stream of medications. Painkillers. Preventive medications. Pills to keep the other pills down. Pills to make me sleep through the pain. Plus, I was battling depression on two fronts: my own, and that of my partner.

Between the migraines, the depression and doing what little I could to help the man destined to become my ex husband, my days took on a terribly regimented feel. I slept terribly, or in a drug-induced stupor, waking up in the morning dreading the day. I could drag myself to classes and work, but couldn't bear the thought of getting out of bed for anything else. Every morning became a struggle to convince myself to simply get up, get dressed and do normal daily things like brush my teeth or make dinner. Curling up in bed at the end of the day was the ultimate goal.

And then my migraine routine started. Minimum eight hours of sleep a night. No red wine. Cutting out salty foods. And sugary foods. Minimal drinking, maybe once a week, until the cocktail of antidepressants and migraine meds put a stop to that. One cup of tea a day, between 8 and 8:15 a.m. Not allowing myself to be enticed by more. And the long, long afternoons, hidden under the covers sobbing, in some state of pain, real, imagined, pressing, or not, just wishing that the world would go away.

With the help of antidepressants, I could robot-like make it through my daily routines. Classes, thankfully, still came easily, but I felt distant, not engaged, like I was experiencing everything through a layer of Jello. Like it was happening to someone else. Whose plastered on smile, that never quite reached the eyes, was just convincing enough to keep people from asking how I was really doing. Because I kept these struggles a secret. I didn't want anyone to know I was anything less than the perfectly calm overachiever I appeared to be. And the more I bottled it up, the more isolated I felt. Like I was disappearing.

This time in my life was my opportunity to party, to travel, to see what I was capable of. But how could I even fathom trying any of that when every day felt like an unbearable, mind-numbing chore?

Finally, I got sick of living in nothingness. I wanted to feel the ups and downs again. Really, I just wanted to feel something. So I weaned myself off the anti-depressants. The migraines continued, crippling me once or twice a month, until, at its worst, it hit a minimum of once a week, no matter what I did to control them. Regularly feeling on the brink of slipping back under the depression, but refusing to once again succumb to the pharmaceutical numbing that made the days simpler, if not more pleasant.

Years slipped by in this way. We finished school. We got jobs. We moved to Toronto. Forever promising ourselves that if we could just fix this or that, everything would get better.

Eventually, the fog started to lift. I started asking myself, "What if ..." I started regretting the things I'd missed out on. The things I thought I would never try. Crushed by the weight of the previous years, our ups and downs, and loads of other complications, my marriage ended.

Suddenly, I had options. I had freedom. And I was feeling things. A lot of hurt, but it was something. Better yet, I stopped having migraines. I was getting zero sleep, was off all my meds, and was seriously cheating on my caffeine and booze routines.

It was unbelievably liberating. I lost a dear relationship that had been a huge part of my life. I lost most of my stuff. I lost my home. I may have lost my mind, and definitely lost my internal censor - is that normally the product of such meltdowns? But, I figured, if I could survive all that, I could survive anything. I gained permission to explore my boundaries, push myself, and make up for my lost early twenties.

By losing everything, I got a chance to recalibrate. To start over. And to feel like I was living life, rather than just watching from the sidelines.

So my biggest change is that I've given myself permission to live my life, rather than become penned in by it.

Of course, I'm still very much a work in progress. I'm looking for meaning in what I do, and what I don't, and ways to make sense of the past few years. But I'm improving. And "better" and "progress" are beautiful words filled with possibility.