Jangan kira, ketika digelapi
Kami mati, ketika dunia menghilang
Kami kehilangan kehidupan
Topeng-topeng tak berguna
Melupakan bukan jalan
Menyembunyikan bukan jawaban
Bersahabatlah dengan kami, bayang-bayangmu
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 6, Part 7
As my previous post said, Bayang-Bayang Retak *there I said it* was that school anniversary drama that I wanted so badly to participate as in my stories before. Yes, it was that event that my dad had his hand to completely ruined my chance and the first time I experience, what, depression? On a high school student? Even then and now I would “you’ve gotta be shitting me”. I used to think I was that unfeminine and strong girl, there was no way I wanted to be weak. But then, I didn’t even know about it and I had no one to actually talk about my thoughts and feelings. Certainly not my parents who were the source of my distress or my sister-figure who got busy with his date nor my cousins who enjoyed priviledge and affections from my dad and my aunts nor my friends whom i got jealous because they were lucky to participate while I got stuck with my parents.
The drama was a story about humanities’ collective consciousness vs their subconsciousness (typical good vs evil, light vs dark, brain vs heart, jedi vs sith) with one side was influenced by the Devil. The orchestra and the choir was pretty awesome.
Yep, while looking for my old anatomy ebooks, suddenly I was overwhelmed by the thoughts of revisiting the songs from the drama, Scene 83 was the song which described the willingness to embraces weakness/darkness while Scene 87 was the song of the rejected darkness/subconsciousness arising. I definitely should make a post about that while still remembering the complete lyrics, the script was in my house, tho.
The last I left my post with the arising feelings of despair, hopelessness, loneliness which couldn’t be curbed by any other means. My housemate had successfully calmed me the first time about my growing and steady anxiety about being accepted into residency. However, there was this underlying emotions of fear that couldn’t be resolved and it was peaked again when I started to think about the future. I finally opened up to my housemate because I desperately needed help to calm my mind which began to spiral out of control. And fortunately, my housemate succeeded to calm me for a while before I started to overthink about completely anything else. By this time, I realized that I became a little bit dependent on her, which was comfortable and not comfortable. Comfortable because I finally had someone that I could trust, someone that understand me and can tell me the world and I are okay and I believe it. Uncomfortable because I knew this was temporary, that everything would come crushing down again, everything would be gone.
After I told my housemate about #everything, I got several tips on how I managed my feelings from my housemate. She even lent me a book by Thich Naht Hanh, How To Fight *my housemate asked it back to lend it to my senior, okay right, fine!*. My BFF also recommended some books to help me battling these, what, anxiety? Factfulness by Hans Rosling and Victor Frankl’s A Man’s Search for Meaning. My housemate also recommended Factfulness, she probably thought that I was on my edge because all that fear, worry, despair and hopelessness were from my own thought, and the book could help me to see that the world or the reality wasn’t as bad as I thought. So guys, if you have anxiety, overrhinking or depression, I really recommend the books that I mentioned before. Also, I went back to my hobby, which was reading novels and astrophysics books. Ahhh, it felt sooo great to read those stuffs again. *I probably should quit becoming a physician, took a degree on modern physics and went after my old flame and declared my no-longer-existent love to him, achieved Ph.D and won Nobel, perhaps*
Also, my housemate also recommended to listen to TED talks and started meditation. Or maybe after I saw how calm she was, I kind learnt how she managed to do that, several of them were listening to podcasts and meditation. So I started to do that. At first, I did the anapanasati meditation which take focus on breathing. I used to do this long time ago when I diligently went to temple every week during med school. Then, I tried vipasanna/mindfulness meditation. Although the meditation went good, but I couldn’t sleep at night because I was hyper aware of my feelings and my fears and the overthinking became a little intense, although it wasn’t as stressful as it used to be. I resolved to do meditation every day and guess what, it never materialized.
Trying to hold my breath, let it stay this way
Can’t let this moment ends
You set off a dream in me, getting louder now
Can’t you hear it echoing?
My favorite TED talks usually around about astrophysics, depression, mental health, anxiety, psychology and self help. I desperately wanted to help myself and not to dwell in a state I had been in the last 2-3 years. Then, peace went by and my feelings got more stabilized.
However, after a period of peace, I started to overthink again about entirely new stuffs. I was right, I started to think about I had no place to come back if I became a radiologist, but more so that someday I would be alone again fighting my own demon because there would come time to part with my housemate, who provided me with warm and comfort I never knew I craved all time. By this time, I noticed that every single time my senior visited us or my housemate was gone for her business, these kind of thinking pattern just like to burst out and causing moderate distress and insomnia. However, as a compensation, I felt more patience in front of the patients *although lashing out still happened twice or three times in a very uncooperative patients*. Even the nurses noticed my general mood had been improved and I told them my housemate helped me to resolve several personal issues. Continue reading “The Woman Who Belongs To Nowhere (8)” →