A time for new beginnings and fresh starts yet I don’t dare to dream beyond the day.  A lifelong habit: get through today and if that works get through tomorrow.  Some days it’s just “get through this hour, get through this minute”.  Sometimes it’s like that for many days.

The tyranny of the urgent pulls at me every moment: the messy kitchen, the piles of laundry, the dropoffs and pickups and diapers and discipline.  I’m lost in the everyday needs of the people I care for – there is no “me”.  I’m lost in my problems: PTSD, struggling marriage, DPDR (derealization/depersonalization), exhaustion from chronic lack of sleep, depression, parenting . . . being HUMAN.  Days turn into years and survival mode has become the only way I know how to operate.  I’ve not developed the habit of including myself as one of the people I must care for, one of the people who has needs to be met.  The day-by-day living has become a trap that I feel I cannot escape.

Then I dare to dream.

I dare to dream of getting some space to breathe and be me.  I fear it because I don’t know what I will find – the “me” at the other end, the “me” in the margin that I create for myself.  I dismiss it because I feel like I don’t deserve it and avoid it because I’m overwhelmed by logistics.  And so my small world becomes smaller until I cannot move and cannot breathe and I spiral, blaming myself all the while and telling myself if I only try harder it will be OK.

This is the year I challenge myself to live outside of survival mode and find ways to honor myself and my humanity.  I want to find things that feed my soul and spirit.  I want to be able to breathe, to rest, to feel joy, and to grow.  Perhaps I can be me and not be afraid.