Snow Day

It's another snow day so I have a chance to do all the things I procrastinated about over the weekend. The heavy cloak of depression has lifted a bit and now it feels like I can get out from under it. I like being the age that I am even though it's old. It's quite likely that I am more than half way through my life and I am just starting to figure out who I am.
I was a child who was not loved or nurtured in any way. I was afraid of the world and people. There were so many traumatizing events that shaped my life and world view. As a child you don't have the capacity to understand that something is wrong with the world so you believe that something is wrong with you. If no one ever tells you otherwise, you continue to believe that throughout your life. My coping system used to be that I would assess the situation and decide what emotion or reaction was required and try my best to manufacture that. Meanwhile, I would shove my real feelings way deep down inside until at some point they became inaccessible. Depression was my world view from as early as I can remember. I desperately wanted love and attention but I didn't know how to get it.
One time when I was about 13 I had had enough of this world and all the ways that it had rejected me so I made a plan. I went to 7-11 and bought a pack of cigarettes, a Coke and a bottle of sleeping pills. I went out and sat on the curb and took all 36 pills 2 by 2 until they were gone. I walked to McDonald's and had my last meal. I was walking to Center Springs Park where I was going to lie down on the hill and die to make a statement of some sort. On the way there I saw my sister and some friends and told them what I had done. My sister ran home to tell my mother and my mother sent her back with a bottle of ipecac that I was supposed to drink. I pretended to drink it and then ran away from the people who were trying to help me. I wandered for hours and late that night I quietly entered my house and went up to bed. I was very surprised when I woke up in the morning and I was still here. Life went on as usual and further cemented in me that feeling that no one cared and I didn't matter. I still had a long way to go before I would get to the point where I could even try to convince myself that I was lovable and worthy. More about that next time.