AFK

I have obviously not posted in about a week.  I believe I am now ready to get back to normal posting, and I apologize for my absence.  Most of my readers are close friends and family anyway, so I felt like it might be appropriate to post a little about why I haven't been writing, even though it is somewhat personal.

I have been unhappy for quite some time.  I have posted a little about this before, but there are other reasons that I'm just not going to go into here.  A little over a week ago I reached my breaking point and fell into, what I believe was, the darkest moment of my life.  I reached a point where I did not want to go on.  The thought of having to make the hours of yet another day pass was unbearable.  I finally realized that I had to go somewhere with family and friends.  I gathered a few things, stuck the animals in the car, and went home.

I surrounded myself with friends and family all last week and I am happy to say I am in a much better place today.  I thank those people from the very bottom of my heart.  You may have seen me last week and still not know exactly what was wrong.  You may feel like you didn't do anything to help me.  That could not be further from the truth.  I was reminded that I was loved.  No matter how bad things get, I know there are people out there who care about me.  More than anything else, that was what I needed.

For a long time now I have not been happy with me.  I have known it on some level, but up until a few days ago I was blind to exactly how huge of an impact this was having on my life.  I came to the realization that I had to make changes.  I need to be able to look in the mirror and like the person I see.  Before I can hope to accomplish anything of value in this world, I need to love me.  I am working on a plan to make this happen.  I have a long way to go, but I have already begun taking steps in the right direction.  I came back down to my apartment in North Carolina today.  Some people wanted me to stay longer, knowing that I had been so broken only a week ago.  This is something I need to do though.  I have the reassurance I need from my family and friends and now I need to figure some things out by myself.  Please try not to worry, as I believe I am on the right track.

I want to say one last thing before I end this.  I realize that this is an extremely personal post and some may think it doesn't belong here for the world to see.  While you may be right to some degree, I do have my reasons for posting things like this.  I have always had an extremely difficult time expressing my emotions in spoken words.  I tend to keep everything bottled up inside and don't tell people what I'm going through because I don't want to appear weak.  After starting this blog I realized it could be a good outlet for my feelings.  There are people in my world that need to know what I'm going through, but maybe I don't have the courage to tell them face to face.  While I work on finding that courage, I am able to shine a little light on my life here.  I guess this is like a first step for me on my path to understanding myself and allowing others to know what I'm experiencing.