I’m A Failure, My Life Is Useless And I Fail At Romantic Relationships

Have you ever heard a drug addict or alcoholic say that they “hit bottom” and then they sought help to recover?

Several times in my life I’ve hit an emotional bottom. I distinctly remember each time because it felt like a dull knife was sawing my heart in half…slowly.

Have you experienced that kind of pain? I’m sure you have even though you don’t type it on a blog that gets published all over the world. The fact is more than likely you’ve hit and suffered a debilitating emotional bottom.

The first time I hit an emotional bottom was when I was only a young child. Mom had started working outside the home because my parents were getting a divorce. The divorce thing never really hit me until I came home from school one day and found that most of the furniture was gone because Dad had moved out. At first I thought it was burglars, but when my hysteria dissipated, I called Mom and she calmed me down. She didn’t know until I called that Dad had moved the stuff, but Mom tried to tell me it was only stuff and that everything would be alright. The emotional bottom didn’t happen until a few weeks later when I was sitting in the middle of the totally empty master bedroom. The reality of what it meant to have divorced parents hit me like a nuclear bomb and I just sat there sobbing for hours.

That was debilitating emotional pain. From that point there was only two things I could do:

1. Wallow in the emotional pain.
2. Cope with the emotional pain and move forward.

There really isn’t any other choices when you hit bottom.

You may be thinking, “You were just a child! That pain doesn’t compare to adult pain!”

I beg to differ, but let me give you an adult experience that you might be able to relate to more easily.

I have not been in love that many times in my life, but when I have been in love, I’m ALL the way in love. I give everything because I really don’t know how to give a little bit. It feels too selfish to give just part of my love. I want to add happiness to the other person’s life, so I just leap in and love, love, love them.

If you’ve ever read my bio/about page, you know that I have failed at two marriages. Not one, but two. So obviously leaping in and love, love, loving them didn’t make the marriage last. I know it isn’t that simple, but isn’t love supposed to conquer everything? Doesn’t love heal all wounds? Doesn’t the unselfish, compassionate nature of love make staying together worth it in the end?

God knows I’ve tried, but it DOES take two people with the same attitude to make a relationship work. You both have to love, love, love each other or it won’t last.

There are some major life altering events going on in my life right now.

One is terrifying me.

One is breaking my heart.

One is making me feel completely useless.

It is bad enough having one of them happening, but to have all three events at once is overwhelming me to the point that I would welcome a tornado to appear in the middle of the night and take me away. I want to run away and hide, but there is nowhere to run and no place to hide. I can’t escape life and I don’t want to face any of it.

So I sat down at the computer with the intention of checking email, going to bed and crying my useless self to sleep. Yes, I’m feeling sorry for myself. I’m hurting so badly that I think someone is wrenching my heart out of my chest with a giant crane.

I know that MANY people think I share TOO MUCH of my life and emotions on my blog. Even family members think I say too much. Obviously, I hear them, but I continue to write from my soul. Believe me, there are times that I have questioned why I really put myself out there to be dissected and ridiculed by strangers. I always come back to the same thing when those doubts creep into my head. I share my soul on my blog for two reasons…

1. Some day maybe all these words of mine will help direct or comfort my daughter.
2. Other people who read my blog will find comfort because they know I have suffered the same pain they are feeling.

Stupid? Corny? Say what you will, but they are the reasons I blog and I don’t think it is stupid or corny.

For five hours I was dying inside. I felt completely like a failure and that my life was totally useless.

Obviously since I am writing this post, something must have happened between dying inside and going to bed.

While reading my email, I came upon a letter from a new reader of my blog. I am going to share part of the email with you…

I was drawn to your blog by the beautiful pictures of food at first and the recipes..but something kept drawing me back here and now I know why…I have begun to read your blog posts….my only daughter died in a car accident…….then just a couple of months ago (I was) diagnosed with PTSD….I just want to thank you for your blog…not finished reading it all yet but crying too much so will come back later and finish the rest…thank you for being so honest and sharing your story it has helped me realize today …others are suffering too.

What do you think I did after reading this email?

I buried my face in my hands and just sobbed out loud. Here I am at an emotional bottom, feeling like I don’t want to breathe another breath and someone tells me that I helped them by writing on my blog. Maybe I’m not completely useless.

Her words nudged me to look in a more positive and grateful direction as I heard a voice in my head say, “Practice what you preach girl!”

Now if I can just get my brain and heart to listen to my preaching.

Tomorrow is another day. Let’s see what the passage of a bit of time can do.