What am I to do with the love that remains?

A friend said that love is a feeling that will pass if not nurtured. Is it really that simple? It doesn’t feel that simple. How can I stop loving and caring for someone who has been my best friend and a lover for the past four years? I can’t even stop caring and loving the friends who have made an impact in my life, even if they’re no longer with me. Is it really that simple? Is it really that simple? Is it really that simple? IS IT REALLY THAT SIMPLE?

If you answer me from your heart of hearts, I know you will say it’s not that simple.

Can I completely forget the memories, the moments, the love I shared with him? Short of resorting to repression, I don’t think I can completely forget. For however long or short the time we’ve spent together, we were part of each other; our lives intertwined.

I wake up every day since the day it ended, and for a short time I fool myself into thinking I’m alright. Then reality sets in and the pain comes flooding into my being. There are hours when I forget and I feel calm, then the simplest memory flashes into my mind without my beckoning. Once again, I am rendered helpless, lost, and drowning in the sorrow of our parting.

It’s always been him and me. Thesis, graduating, getting on the dean’s list in our last semester, finding jobs, surviving work, enduring his mom, my disordered eating and depression, running, getting fit, travelling, vices…. We’ve always made a great team. I always imagined we’d get through all of life’s calms and storms together. But now, our life together has ended.

How do I just move on and let go?

I know I can do this if I just take it one day at a time, but that doesn’t make the struggle less painful or the pain less real.

* losing weight
* exercising
* restricting

I don’t mind not seeing my boyfriend because that means I have more time to get in one or two workout sessions.

I want to cry when I think about my weight, see my body, and think about wearing any of my clothes.

Seriously contemplating purging again.

This time around, I am actually considering giving in to Ed.

I haven’t been eating well.

I’ve been skipping meals.

I started making to do lists without any mention of eating.

I may take a while to get over being cheated on but at least I struggle and fight each and every single day.

I can’t keep lying about my true feelings to spare the sensibilities of other people.

It is not a flaw to love completely, honestly, truly. If people are scared of intense feelings, then they can get the fuck away from me.

I don’t do pretentious and dispassionate. If I like you, I will show you every chance I get. If I’m not too fond of you, I will keep my distance; I sometimes won’t even bother making conversation with you.

I don’t do shallow relationships. I may only have a few good friends but our friendships survive time and distance. I’d rather have one good friend than a million who don’t really give a fuck about me.

I believe in being open, mindful, and honest in my daily life. If authenticity is not your thing, then maybe I’m not your thing.

I may have my prejudices but I am highly tolerant.

When I say I love you, I mean it with all my being. I don’t do the regular relationship dynamics where I have to make pakipot for someone to realize they really love me. If you can’t realize that on your own, then fuck you.

I don’t keep tabs on the things I do. I don’t give time begrudgingly. I don’t think the people I love are a waste of time.

I believe in giving back to those who deserve it.

I believe that true love can be felt even when you are fighting or arguing.

If someone can’t accept all these things about me, then they can just fuck off and leave me be. Because I need to stand up for myself once and for all. And it’s sad because the one person I have loved over the past three years can’t handle all these things about me. That I know now…. And while it breaks my heart, I have to slowly accept how he feels. Whatever becomes of our relationship, only time will tell. All I can do now is love myself and wait.

The year 2011 started off quite negatively for me. There are people who would see that as an indication of things to come but I beg to differ. The year, despite the horrible beginnings, is turning out to be wonderful.

New Me. Or at least that’s how I feel after a change of BC pills. I already wrote about it in my tumblr so I’ll just copy that here.

I’ve been on Yaz for about two years. When I got on it, I felt like some crazy person took over my body. There were so many crazy, jealous, paranoid thoughts going through my head. I couldn’t control my emotions or reactions. I mean, I tried to but I felt like it was so hard. I’ve always been a private person so I never really let anyone see into my mind. When I was on Yaz, it was like I was on transparent mode. All my anger, jealousy, sadness, all my emotions were on display. I was a nervous wreck and I could feel my heart racing every single moment I was awake. It was such a bad year.

Just this month, with the encouragement of my therapist, I decided to switch to Diane 35. It’s only been a couple of weeks but I feel my old self returning. I’m more calm even if I’m in my manic episode. I’m not all nervous and jittery. When I start thinking negative thoughts (that’s always been a problem of mine), I always expect a really really awful sinking feeling in my chest and stomach. But no, it’s just the usual negative emotions. Nothing amplified by hormones.

I’m feeling happy with my decision so I hope it doesn’t bite me in the ass in the months to come. I hope this goes on because I hate not having control over myself.

New Love. Last year was such a bummer because I totally ignored myself. I forgot my hobbies, ignored books that were begging to be read, and I even stopped my marathon training. I attribute that weird behavior to Yaz because it made me totally crazy and so not myself. This year, even if I didn’t write about it here on my blog, I made a promise to love myself more. I’m going to do that by surrounding myself with people who truly love me, doing things I enjoy and love, stop apologizing for what I do, what I believe in, and what I am, and basically staying true to what makes me… ME.

New Hobbies. Staying true to my new year’s resolution, I decided to take up new hobbies that are related to crafting. I started cross stitching and I’m almost done with a hibiscus (or gumamela for Filipinos) flower pattern. I chose that pattern because the colors (reds and greens) make me smile and because I love how a gumamela looks.

I’ve also started learning how to knit. I’ve been meaning to learn this craft for quite some time now but never got around to it. Last Sunday, while at the craft store buying embroidery thread, I decided to get a knitting kit. It came with two balls of bright green yarn (love it!) and a pair of metal knitting needles. The kit also came with a knitting guide which is actually rather useless. I had to resort to YouTube videos to learn how to cast and how to do a knit stitch. I never thought I would be able to knit but it’s actually quite easy. It is definitely waaay easier than crocheting, which is like hell on earth for your hands.

I’m quite excited and really ecstatic (love how the word just seems to convey total, absolute happiness) to be doing crafts again. Someone on PostSecret emailed or tweeted (or something) this: I’d rather spend twenty dollars on craft supplies than thousands on a therapist. (Or something to that effect.) I totally feel that person. Crafting is such effective therapy!

New Books. Now that I’m crafting again, I bought some books on crafting and knitting. I also bought a fiction book about a girl who is best described as a slacker. Anyway, on to the books…..

The first book I bought is Knit Couture: 20 Hand-Knit Designs from Runway to Reality by Gail Downey & Henry Conway. The pieces featured are really stylish and can be worn by the everyday girl.

The second book is a crafting one with many different projects. It’s called Wild With a Glue Gun: Getting Together With Crafty Friends. The projects chosen can be done by craft groups and is meant to encourage people to craft together. I love how quirky the projects were. I can’t wait to try their Book Lamp project where you use a stack of books as a stand for the lamp.

The last book is Slacker Girl by Alexandra Koslow.  From the book synopsis, the girl and I seem to have the same personality. I can’t wait to read about her story. Even if she is just fictional.

New Tasks. Lastly, this month I was given an additional task for the site I work for: moderating and responding to comments. I’m very honored that the owners trust me with this responsibility. I’m glad for the break in monotony that sometimes comes from writing posts.

Okay, so I guess this is it for now. I’m so excited for this new year and I think it shows. I’m trying to keep a nice pace in all my endeavors so I don’t lose steam along the way.

I hope your new year is going as great as mine!

Today was my deadline. I forced myself to write even just three articles because I didn’t want a wasted week to go by. It’s really sad how my productivity has declined. Now, before anyone thinks I’m lazy, I’m really not. It’s just the nature of depression. You just lose the will to move, to do anything.

During depressive episodes, I get really anxious when I do things that involve using my brain. It’s probably because I am working at a 30% capacity to concentrate and focus. Take for example, when I have to write. My chest tightens, I feel short of breath, and I get moderately to extremely lightheaded. I try to do breathing exercises but when I return to write, the anxiety comes back.

I finally emailed my employer explaining my performance. I had to because I didn’t want her to think that I am a slacker just because I’m a slacker. Because I’m not.

I was looking through Youtube for video blogs that talk about depression. I found this one guy talking about how hard it was for him to express himself. It truly resonated with me.

I quote:

“…I’ve got like a million thoughts in my mind. Right now, at once. And because of that, nothing’s coming out properly…. So we just end up saying nothing instead.”

Maaan! That really expresses what I’ve been going through for the past two months!

Again, trying to write while feeling depressed is really hard for me. I end up staring at the monitor and not writing anything. That gets me really frustrated and disappointed that I just start to cry. However, today, when I was frantically trying to get myself together, I discovered that I am not completely hopeless. I wrote my three articles in 5 to 15 minutes intervals. I wrote as much as I could and when I started to get anxious, I would stop and do something else. I actually feel proud of what I was able to write tonight.

Oh, and I decided to try a new approach to my writing style and voice. Instead of being so uptight, I tried writing in a highly conversational manner. It was easier and was quite freeing, actually. I think that I’m going to do it more.

With my new discoveries, maybe the next week won’t be as dismal as this one.

photo credit harold.lloyd

It’s not like I want to be like this forever. I am trying so hard to stay positive. I’m doing really well these past few years compared to my university days.

1. I go through months feeling highly motivated and inspired. I have all these plans and goals. I write steps to achieve all of things I want. I feel confident in myself. Then all of a sudden, I fall hard and go back to square one. It’s quite frustrating and disheartening if you ask me. I work so hard only to have to start all over again.

2. My crying spells can last for a whole week. Sometimes the spells are spread throughout a couple of months.

3. There are months when I feel so down and suicidal. I usually stay away from anything sharp because I always get the urge to hurt myself.

4. I know I’m in a terrible state of feeling depressed when I cannot write anything coherent for work. Journal writing is no problem but if you ask me to write anything informational, then I become at a loss for words. It’s like I forget my vocabulary.

5. I let myself go. I don’t bathe if I am not going out. I forget to floss and brush.

6. I don’t want to run or do any physical activity. I’m not being lazy. It’s just that I constantly feel light-headed and tired.

7. I sleep too much sometimes but still feel tired.

8. If I don’t sleep too much, then I sleep too little. I stay up until I feel like puking from the tiredness and headaches.

9. I don’t feel like talking to anyone. I am highly irritable and volatile during depressive episodes.

10. I push people away. I only notice their bad habits.

11. I become highly critical of myself. I get the urge to reunite with my eating disorders.

12. At the height of my sadness (if you can say there’s a height to feeling low), I imbibe copious amounts of alcohol. Two weeks ago, I drank myself senseless until I swam in my own puke. It’s nothing to feel proud of but it made me realize that I do have a problem with alcohol. When I feel really down, Jose Cuervo and cheap rum become my best friends. I’ve also recently discovered a liking for peach vodka. I didn’t drink any alcohol after that puke-swimming incident except for a little taste of crappy German beer.

13. When I feel very happy, I don’t care about money. I spend and spend without thinking about my savings. But when I feel awfully down, I become really paranoid about my finances. I barely spend anything and I save a lot. Until another happy episode, that is. When I spend all my savings.

14. I’ve quit jobs during very low periods of my life. Against my better judgment. But it was really hard to be in an office with many people. I kept bursting into tears and I didn’t know how to deal with it. The Philippines is not exactly accepting of people with suspected mental or emotional disorders.

photo credit .neha.

1. New Found Glory is my all-time favorite band.

2. I love old punk/ska bands.

3. I don’t listen to enough music.

4. I’m an emotional listener.

5. I love music but I absolutely hate talking about it. Like getting all technical and stuff. Or trying to remember band member names. Or trying to identify from which album a particular song can be found.

6. I don’t like going to big concerts because I hate crowds. And I hate feeling stupid when I don’t know lyrics to some songs. I hate feeling out of place because I just want to bob my head and stomp my foot rather than jump around and mosh.

7. Sometimes, I’m impatient when I listen to music. I jump to the next song before the current one ends.

8. I love love love karaoke.

9. Most of the songs I love are linked to some sad memory. I’m trying to replace negative emotions with more positive ones.

10. I can play some guitar. But I only like playing slow songs because I suck at finding the right plucking or strumming rhythm.

11. I tried learning the brass flute but I got too lazy to practice. My flute is now tarnishing and gathering dust.

12. I can appreciate any kind of music. Just give my system some time, like a couple of months or a year, to get used to it.

13. There are days when I sing in tune. But there are days when I feel down, bored, or sick, that I just sing out of tune.

14. I tried writing songs. I played one song to this musicican guy I was dating. I cried while playing it because I felt mortified. I was afraid he’d hate it. I didn’t write any more songs after that.

15. I’ve been in a couple of bands before (new wave, punk, and a mix of various genres). Even if I didn’t have a particularly wonderful voice, I was always the vocalist because I couldn’t do anything else. Hahaha.

16. My public playlist greatly varies depending on the guy I am with. However, when I’m by my lonesome, I indulge in the songs that make me happy.

17. I hate mainstream songs. And I hate it when my favorite songs go mainstream. They just get overplayed on the radio.

18. I don’t like listening to FM radio stations. The songs are boring and the DJs are annoying.

19. Rock music sometimes acts like a lullaby to me. I just drift off to sleep if I listen to it long enough.

20. I prefer guys who have the same taste in music as I do.

21. I can’t write or read with music in the background. I also can’t think. I always end up singing along or spacing out.

We both understand that happiness is not determined by the size of our house, the amount of cash in our bank account, or the things we have.

♥ ♥ ♥

So what if I want hugs and kisses;
sweet nothings whispered in my ear;
roses and chocolates;
romantic dinners;
monthsaries in addition to anniversaries?

Is it so bad that I want him to make me feel like a princess;
write poems of undying love;
give handwritten letters;
surprise text messages saying he’s thinking about me?

If he loves me as he says he does,
he wouldn’t think it’s impossible to be a little sweeter;
to show love in ways I will understand.

Wanting to spend time with me is amazing and all.
But I also want the sweet actions and words sprinkled throughout our relationship.

I’m a hopeless romantic.
I don’t wish he were one.
He’s fine the way he is.

But I wish he’d try harder.

Even after I cried telling him what it is I want, he still said he won’t change. And that he will never be the kind of guy who does all those things.

I was thinking: You love me, right?