There’s a lot of that going around.
Covid has only more sharply defined that which has been slowly gnawing away at our society…the devastation of a plague of loneliness, isolation and depression. We lived with it prior to covid…we just looked through it, past it, over it…we didn’t live in it ourselves so it was easy to pretend it wasn’t a big deal.
That has changed.
It’s in our faces now. And in a lot more places within us, too. We have all been touched by it now. We can’t ignore it.
Wanna know how I know this?
This is the hardest thing…overcoming ego and vanity to say that…
I, Heidi Happiness Laughter Love Heyns, (haha the irony) put in my first call in to the National Suicide Prevention Hotline. That, in itself, isn’t how I know that there’s more of that out there….
How I know is…I felt like I needed to talk to someone RIGHT AWAY…and I felt like my friends would not be comforatble with that conversation. AND I didn’t REALLY want to DIE….but I was considering what I would need to do if I did lean that way…and that scared me….So, I called the Crisis Hotline.
…and I was put on HOLD!
THAT is how I know that there is a lot of that going around.
“The loneliest moment in someone’s life is when they are watching their whole world fall apart, and all they can do is stare blankly.”
― F. Scott Fitzgerald
So, now I’ve confessed to something that’s been living inside of me for a LONG time. WHILE I’ve also been this Happiness Joy and Laughter Queen, I’ve ended up institutionalized twice. Both times I managed to easily talk my way out after one night.
If you have never stayed in a mental institution overnight, honestly, I promise, do your BEST and KEEP yourself as balanced and healthy as possible. Talk to friends. Find a therapist. Write. Dance. Take long meditative walks. Meditate. And there is always going to be a person there, at the end of the line, on the Crisis Hotline. And it’s worth it to wait a few minutes, if you get put on hold.
Seriously! WORTH IT!
When the woman at the Crisis Center finally answered the phone, all I could think about was what If I had been sitting in this room with a bottle of pills spilling over into my hand, or worse…and I was put on hold! Right??
I spent 20 minutes with her, me talking and her listening and every few minutes she would stop me and ask me a few leading questions to get me talking again.
It was a good call.
But, tonight, well…that quote above, from F. Scott Fitzgerald above, really resonates with me.
Maybe I’ve become crisis level suicidal because I’ve lived my entire life without ever once choosing one of my abilities over another, to focus on…to make a living doing…not once. I’m a writer who doesn’t write. I’m an actor who doesn’t act. I’m a DJ who quit DJ-ing. I’m a voice actor who doesn’t work. The one that kills me the most, that drives the anger bug in me up to the surface the MOST often is the Writer. That piece of me screams at me and flails her arms with a knife at me. “Why the HELL aren’t you WRITING, you STUPID BITCH!”
I’m pretty abusive towards myself. I did some stupid stuff during this time, too…like signing up for a coach who charges $96/month when I have no steady income. Totally stupid!
AND then I get angry that I’m so abusive and Stupid.
Oh yes! It’s a shit show of OneUpManShip, Heidi vs Heidi. Oh boy!
I am ok today. It’s a day to day reality check-in for me…I really just wanted to check in honestly. No smokescreen today.
Just LOVE for the real you aching to be expressed. I know that this little bit of writing has helped. I will probably be able to sleep now.
Thanks for listening.
Heidi & Co - Joy Injection 
Beautiful honesty. Perhaps it will help someone as well. Love you!
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