One of the reasons I started this blog was to put my energy into something positive, an endeavor that would help me see the blessings I have and bonus points if it somehow helped other people who have also experienced a loss. Positive, feel-good blurbs about persevering. Some days I will write about those types of things. Today is not one of those days. Today I am pissed. I. Am. Piiiiissed. I’m so angry that I feel like my head might literally pop off and go spinning like a top across the floor. Like I may snap at any moment. I can almost see it. I can picture the scenario in my head and see the shock resonating on everyone’s faces when I literally grow horns and start speaking in tongues. Don’t worry, it’s not directed at anyone or anything in particular, not even at the things that you would think I’d be entitled to be angry about. I’m angry for no reason at all, which makes perfect sense.

This is usually what happens when I’m depressed. I don’t get weepy or tired or sad, I get irritable. Irritable and cranky and easily offended. That’s usually how depression manifests in children because they don’t have the socioemotional maturity to process and express their feelings, which makes me feel great about my overall psychological health. So here I am, not able to deal and acting like a giant effing child. It feels odd to me because I’m not an angry person by nature. Side note, I actually was a pretty angry child. When I was four, I smashed a bunch of oranges on my sister’s closet floor because I was mad at her. No one knew until she returned from a weekend at her dad’s, and by that time all her clothes already smelled like rotten citrus. Genius. I was the kid who told the other kids that Santa wasn’t real. I thought that everyone intentionally ruined my happiness, so I often sabatoged theirs. I was generally grumpy and bad-tempered, like a surly old man. Maybe I actually am angry by nature.

Anyway, luckily I’ve learned since becoming an adult about emotions and whatever. And I’ve learned to hide in a cave until my fury passes so I don’t spew misdirected fire at anyone, and a dark cave is what I need anyway because a lot of it is just over stimulation. And a lot of it is just feeling out of control. And hurt. It’s not actually anger, just a bunch of messy feelings that get all jammed up until I’m not sure which is which and where everything goes. Some days it’s exhausting just trying to sort them all out. And then Thomas tells me he’s growing bigger and starts jumping up and down, and Luke laughs at him, one of those deep belly laughs that he uses his whole body to make. And then everything is sorted out again, and all the feelings go back to their proper place, in the right order. And I feel peace and love and joy, and I can breathe easily and deeply. It’s wonderful.