Owning the bad times

I've been having an increasingly difficult year and November is a difficult time for me.  A couple of people really understand how crap it's been because I've told them everything that's going on AND they understand me but I think most people don't really know. 

This is partly because I don't always say, for a variety of reasons that include:

• life isn't crap all the time
• things are ongoing and nothing new to say
• things are not just my business so I don't feel I should share

and chiefly

• other people are having a crap time too

but today I've had a bit of an insight.  I've always believed that suppressing things, avoiding talking about them, avoiding acknowledging them and making light of them lead to ill health.  For me, I'd say about 90% of what is wrong with me physically has an emotional root.  It's not lost on me that my plantar fasciitis started up around the time my parents began having problems which caused worry and stress.  Of course, having got a physical problem you're often stuck with it and it may need treating by conventional means.  Bodies and minds are complicated.  My parents' lives are settling down but I've got plantar fasciitis, which notoriously can take months to go.

I digress, slightly.  The insight is this:

Having a crap time will do you harm, whether or not other people are having a crap time.  Own it.  Acknowledge it.  Behave appropriately in response.

You can share this with someone else providing they're going to let you.  You don't need anyone looking on the bright side or saying 'at least ...' or similar.  The point is to feel what you need to feel.  Shout or cry if that's you. 

I'm very fortunate to have a few friends that totally get this.  Possibly they've been wondering when I'll wake up to it myself.

This really is not a call for sympathy though it may seem like it because I haven't been sharing it recently, for all the above reasons. 

I've been having a crap life recently.

If you have too, then own it.  Don't wallow, but don't pretend either.  You'll feel better for it in the end.