The person I was a year ago is not the person I am now. Not by a long shot. Even though I’m only a year older, I feel as though I’ve aged at least ten years in the past year. Must be a thing that happens once you hit your 30s.

When I look in the mirror now, I can see the scars that the past year has left on me, both literally and figuratively. I see a person who is a shell of what she once was and doesn’t know if she can ever go back to before.

October 28, 2015. My 30th birthday. I wasn’t entirely a happy person at the time. I was off work, but spending my birthday alone because my husband was at work. I was preparing to start fertility treatments with Clomid a few days later. Having spent my 29th and 30th birthdays childless, I was optimistic and convinced that for my 31st birthday, I would have a baby or at least be pregnant.

October 28, 2016. My 31st birthday. No baby. No pregnancy. Once again, nobody to spend my birthday with since David is at work again. So what great accomplishments have I made in the first year of my 30s?

• Infertility
• Depression
• Intractable migraines
• Brain tumor named Mini
• Pelvic Surgery
• Brain Surgery
• Aneurysm named Uva
• Inability to work (again)
• And look…more depression!

This is all so overwhelming that I can’t manage to do anything but sleep or stare at a wall all day. Sometimes I write in my private journal, sitting in front of the fireplace while a cat tries to steal my seat. So we end up sharing (but she takes up most of the seat.)

Nothing makes me happy. Not music. Not even Christmas music. Not gifts. Not cards. (Not that I’m unappreciative of those things; thank you to those few who remembered me, even though I haven’t opened anything and don’t know when I will.) I’m so depressed I can’t even pick up a book. My favorite movies have no appeal to me. (I haven’t even watched the extended edition of Battle of the Five Armies that I got last Christmas, nor the nine hours of behind the scenes footage, and if you know me you know what a tragedy that is.) I just don’t care. Nothing gives me joy. Nothing makes me smile.

I feel like I have no real usefulness to anybody, especially since I still can’t do my job. I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to again. And that’s been a gut punch to my psyche this week. I don’t think I’ve ever felt that my life is as worthless as it is now. I felt this way earlier in the year, but it’s nothing compared to what I feel now. And I don’t know if it will ever get better.

And now I’m just going to go back to bed because I’m sick of crying.

Happy Birthday Laura.

?ribbonrx