transabled.org

 

• About
• Login
• Contact
• Accessibility

Google Search:
Web transabled.org Go

 

Blog > Thoughts > Sean's Thoughts > Putting on the Mask

Putting on the Mask

Written by Sean on Monday, July 14, 2008

I woke up from a pretty horrible night this morning, and as I got ready to go to work, I psyched myself up, and got ready to put on the mask of happiness. One must put this mask on, the brave face to show the rest of the world we’re functional. And it eats up so much energy, nothing much is left for the rest.

It was a night of nightmares. One after the other, bad dreams assailed me. Not the kind of nightmare that makes you sit up in bed, drenched in sweat with your heart beating at 200 MPH, but the kind of nightmares that make you twist and turn and frown in your sleep, that make you anxious and restless. It’s the kind of bad dreams that ensures you get no real rest. I woke up with a bad taste in my mouth, feeling tired.

And part of getting ready involved barricading the hurt, making sure it stayed in, and that as little of it leaked out as possible. Something always leaks out, but to someone who doesn’t know me well, or doesn’t pay attention, they may not notice. Or they may think I’m having an "off" day. If they only knew how much pain was inside, they would likely be felled, as if they’d been hit by a wrecker’s ball. Besides, what good would it do to tell them, or show them, that I am having a hellish day? It’s not like they can do anything about it.

But the emotional cost of such disguise is enormous. Already quite low, the amount of energy left disintegrates. You put some into the mask, you put some into going through the routine of driving to work, grocery shopping, cooking, eating, and there’s almost nothing left. Certainly not enough to be active and productive. Someone recently told me to "put on a brave face". As if it resolved something. It doesn’t resolve anything. it is helpful, in as much as others won’t feel too uncomfortable around me, but it doesn’t resolve anything. A band-aid on a gushing artery.

Even telling my loved ones, my friends, about how bad I’m doing is wearing me down. They ask me how I am, and if I tell them just how bad I am, they feel bad. They wish they could help. And there’s nothing they can do to help. And I feel guilty about that. I feel horrible knowing that they genuinely want to help and there’s not a thing they can do to help. And when they say that they’d like to see me trully happy one day, I can only say that I would like that too. But I feel bad. I feel responsible. I need to not show them how much I hurt, how much I *really* hurt, because I know they’d feel bad. So I feel responsible for making sure they don’t feel so helpless. But that too eats into my energy resources.

It is a juggling act. It is rationing my energies and deciding where to use it. And if I don’t update the website for a long time, it might be that I have nothing to say. Or it might be that I have no energy left to actually start writing. This very post took me longer to write than it usualy takes me. Focusing my thoughts is difficult. Sending signals to my hand to actually write the post is difficult. I don’t really know what I want to say, yet I want to say many things. I’m rambling. I know I’m rambling. Hence, I will stop here.

Tags: Emotions, Energy

Twitter Updates

Follow me on Twitter