Nothing in the world seems to help. I spent forever trying to find something to watch, but literally nothing felt good. Even when I eventually put something on it felt empty and I just ended up staring at the wall. I tried playing videos games, some of which I really love, and I turned them all off after a few minutes. I’ve tried other things too. Half the time I don’t even eat. Time passes in slow motion, like some kind of purgatory. The worst is I can’t even sleep. I have the next few days off and they’re going to feel like an eternity. It actually scares me. How do you get through this? I’m desperate.
For what it’s worth, I see a therapist weekly and I’m on a few different medications. This particular bout of sadness is caused by an especially painful rejection.
knowing what you’re sad about is half the battle. grief is emotion without an outlet.
have you thought about why you’re trying to ignore or hold onto that sadness?
have a good cry, or paint something, or hell buy something beautiful and destroy it.
you need to find a healthy outlet for this emotion you’re holding onto.
I once was overcome by a bad breakup, was spiraling and drinking myself stupid. one particular night I had enough and ripped a broken fridge out of my house and took a pickaxe and sledge hammer to it, then set it on fire.
The next day I woke up in my ditch, sore, exhausted, wet. I saw the fridge and was sad for myself. I realized that before I was sad at the loss but never felt sorry for myself. then I started to laugh at how absolutely absurd it was to pull a fridge out of my house, drag it 50 feet into my yard, and absolutely demolish it.
when I was laughing I knew I was going to be ok.
That’s kind of a great story, though. At one of my old jobs I got to demolish a lot of things in a similar fashion. We took used furniture and resold it, and anything that didn’t sell had to fit in the dumpster, one way or another.
I don’t know what I’m trying to do with the sadness, honestly. It always felt like it was the one that had me, and it was a matter of when it wanted to let me go.
I hear a lot about processing grief but I’ve never fully understood that as a concept. I have grief. I understand why I have it. But what does processing it mean? If it’s not something I can sit down and do with my hands, then I’m not sure. I spend a lot of time feeling it and having it. But that’s more like a loop. Or I feel like a hamster in a wheel.
it sounds like you may know what to do, you just haven’t found something meaningful enough to do it with.
try new things. carve wood, weld metal, write books.
when I was young I had to process a lot of emotions. nobody told me how, so I just did what came natural. I did dumb shit like run around in the woods naked at night, howling like a dog. climb up in a tree and cry myself to dry heaving. I wrote stories where the characters lived the way I couldn’t. I hated my family. wanted to kill my father. so, I wrote about kids running away from home, or becoming an orphan, etc.
my point is, as long as you aren’t hurting yourself or others, let your emotion tell you what it wants and give it what it wants for a bit, even if it sounds like the dumbest thing ever.
I hope you find your peace.