Faking It

So, the other day I was complaining to a friend about my statistics class.  The class hadn’t even started yet now that I think about it, but I’d read the syllabus and the individual modules and learning objectives and I was…. overwhelmed.  Overwhelmed before I’d even started.  (This is my second go-around with Statistics, by the by.  I’d taken it a hundred years ago in my first foray at college, and I ended up taking it pass/fail so it wouldn’t bring down my GPA.)

Anyway.

I complained to my friend, and she said:  “You can do it!”

Me:  “I’m not so sure.”

Friend:  “Fake it till you make it?”

Me:  ::Sigh::  “Sometimes it feels like that’s my whole life.”

Just last week, a mom I’d recently met through Tegan’s play was chatting with me while we washed our hands at the bathroom sink.  “You have four kids?  How do you do it?  You’re so calm!”

I don’t even remember what I said in response, but what I did not say was the truth:  That whatever calmness she saw was through the aid of pharmaceuticals and faking, in equal measure.

Like many depressed people I know, I’ve gotten really good at “smiling depression.”  Smiling on the outside, crying on the inside.  Putting on a (if I do say so myself), reasonable or even impressive display of happy.  Of friendly.  Of normal.  I smiled a lot last week.  I also went to sleep crying at least two or three nights, and woke up crying just as many.

I write so much about gentle parenting.  I dismantle all the common mainstream ways of doing things, and I wax poetic about how we can do things better.  I don’t write about the fact that as of late my patience and emotional reserve have been so shot that it is taking all of my energy not to snap at my kids just for … talking, or for making any sort of noise, or for being in my space.  I don’t write about the fact that I’m currently so completely flummoxed about an issue I’m having with one of my children that I’m immobilized.  That I haven’t the slightest CLUE how to handle it.

I’m good at faking.

Some days are hard.

Some days are really, really hard.

I am, as I write, and as I stand before you, the proverbial man behind the curtain.  Pay no attention to him.  Listen to my booming, confident voice!  Listen to my authority!  Listen to my wisdom!

And know, that sometimes, I am faking it.  That I am broken.  That I am scared.  That I, like so many of the rest of us, struggle with not knowing what the hell I’m doing on any given day of the week.  That sometimes, I feel like an impostor in my own life.

I’m good at faking.

My one consolation is in knowing that all of us, at one time or another, at least a little, have faked it.  Faked the happy, the confidence, the friendliness, the conversation.  Faked the fact that we were completely capable of interacting like a normal person when we really just wanted to be home, in bed, with the covers pulled over our head.  Just like my friend suggested, we fake it until we make it.

Today I have things to do.  I have people to see.  I have to put on pants.  I have to have conversations.  I have to be okay. I have to smile and make the right faces and say the right things. And I’ll do it!

And I’ll be faking it.

Because between you and me, right now, in this moment?  I’m tired.  Deep, deep in my bones exhausted.  Mentally, physically, emotionally spent.  At the present time, I am not okay.

But you know what?  Sometimes being not okay is okay too. Sometimes the answer lies not in faking it, but in raw, brutal honesty.  Right now, I’m not okay.

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6 Comments

Filed under about me, anxiety, bipolar, depression, life, mental health

6 Responses to Faking It

  1. Cally Brown

    I have no wise words. Just know that my heart is full of love for you, and understanding, deep knowing understanding. I don’t so much stand with you, as sit, collapsed on the sofa, with you. If ever you need a complete stranger on the other side of the world to talk to, yell at, cry on, or even laugh with, here I am.

  2. Sam

    I very much feel this in my soul. I was just telling a friend last night that “I am not ok.”
    On the outside I am fine, and no one knows how not ok I really am.

  3. sarah e duran

    I loved this! And relate so much right now. Thank you!!

  4. FT

    I love your blog for all its gentle parenting advice and encouragement. But I really really really love this post for its brutal honesty. I’ve been trying to do this gentle parenting/ unschooling life for over 8 years now. And most nights I fall into bed feeling like a failure and like I still don’t know what the hell I’m doing or how to parent my kids. But tonight I shall go to bed feeling like it’s ok. Thank you for making me feel not alone tonight. Hugs to you.

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