Background: The Emotional Breakdown

The cycle finally broke on September 6, 2006. The day I hit bottom, the day I had a total emotional breakdown. The previous day I was a complete mess, unable to cope or function, remember what I was doing (like where I was going while driving), stay focused on an activity (like remembering what to buy at the grocery store) or complete a task (like leaving the grocery store without any food). Sadly I am not exaggerating. On the 6th I went to work and the only way I made it through the day was in an extreme manic overdrive. A customer even offered this cosmetics sales girl a job at her law firm because I was so over-energized and hyper! I felt like I was running to myself from behind, knowing that if I was not racing, I was collapsing. So when I got on the train after work during the 6 o'clock rush-hour commute, I fell apart. I jammed my sunglasses on my face and sobbed for an hour. I could not stop.

I was mourning. The life I almost had. I knew I was just not strong enough, I simply could not go on. I saw no end in sight, no relief, and I was spent. We could not afford to live on my husbands income alone and the effects of my health, through lost wages and heavy medical bills (remember that diagnosis of exclusion?), were already beginning to swallow us financially. I got home and spent the rest of the evening fluctuating between wailing and manic pacing. I was trying to convince my husband to move on, drop me, and go live his life. I knew I was going to ruin it and loved him too much to let that happen. This was a very painful evening for both of us. I was more than a little mentally off balance and in a very desperate state and he had no clue what to do with me. In the back of my head I was looking at my baby Yorkie puppy and the man I love more than anything in the world, knowing that this was wrong. I had made a commitment to them and I had to see it through. And there is nothing that pisses me off more than people that don't see their commitments through! I just did not know how, let alone if, that was even possible.

I thank God every day for the faithful steadfastness of the man I married. He is still the man of my dreams to this day and is a true angel in hunky-human-masculine form. He is the reason I am here, both physically and mentally, and it is through his strength I was able to find my own and fight to overcome the crippling effects of this disease. I am all that I am because of the grace of the almighty Lord, and Their foresight to bless me with a man greater than I ever imagined I was worthy of.

Thanks for joining,
Leah