Sobering Up

The first time tragedy invited guilt into my home, I sat on the couch after a fun night with friends and silently wept in remorse as I remembered the phone call I'd received earlier in the day relaying the news that one of my teen girls had been raped. Completely unsettled that I had been able to spend the evening enjoying myself at the expense of forgetting someone else's life-altering sorrows, I felt I had betrayed both her and myself.

That was the first of many tragedies to come. So much so that one day I no longer labeled them 'tragedies,' but 'life.' That was also the same day I lost capacity to empathize like I once had. One could argue an element of healthy boundaries as many of those I sought council from suggested, and I would agree. There is only so much emotional bandwidth one human can have and for as long as there is joy there will always be sorrow in a broken world like ours.

While I was told what I felt was both normal and common amongst other tragedy-facing professions like doctors and first-responders, I still didn't like it. I remember doing my best to come alongside my friends in their troubles and logically understanding the reasons for their distress, but anything less than tremendous loss felt like nothing at all. My mind understood the pain but my heart was numb. Eventually, even the most intense tragedy felt intangible.

"Sober" is what I've come to describe my state of mind as of late. To sober up implies a recovery from an intense high, whether an occasional hit or chronic state of addiction. In my case, I find it to be less of a recovery and more so a state of acceptance.

I've seen or been a part of too many tragedies to feel the high of them all. I've seen or been a part of too much disappointment to buy into hype disguised as hope. The pendulum swings between gratitude and grief so heavily that sometimes things seem worth celebrating without relent and other times those same things seem superficial and unaware of everything else that's happening in the room. I wish it would not swing so easily but my body was never created to carry sorrows like these, so please excuse the malfunction.

While I'm aware that those who do not understand may consider my words a cry for help, my prayer is that those who do understand will find comfort in this shared experience for I know I am far from the only one in this particular predicament. I write not for pity nor for praise. I write because words like these don't make it into casual conversations; they are far too heavy for those untrained in resilience and too deep for comfort swimmers. Words like these remain locked up, restrained by a lack of verbiage and a fear of what's really hiding behind the curtain of "I'm good, how are you?" So, for the sake of those who read these words not as someone else's story, but their own, this is for you: life is a good thing.

Even though it doesn't turn out the way you thought it would, life is a good thing. Even when you feel nothing until you feel everything all at once, life is a good thing. Even when you lose tremendously, life is a good thing. On days when the pendulum swings towards grief, when the world seems dull and the days aimless, remember - life is a good thing.

Life is a good thing.

Life is a good thing.

Life is a good thing.