I’m sitting here indulging one of my guilty pleasures… listening to 80s movie soundtracks and golden oldies. I don’t know what it is about them, but they affect me in a positive way. I used to escape into books and movies to help me get through when I was younger and unable to control much about my life. Those have good memories attached to them. They bring out more of the old me than I’ve seen in years.

I’ve been off , recovering from pleurisy, for about a week and a half. I’ve spent a great deal of that time resting, but I’ve also had a lot of time to re-evaluate things in my life. I’ve been thinking about how indifferent I have been and why I lost the desire to truly live.

The realization didn’t come easy. The effects of those mind-numbing drugs that were shoved at me the past three years has finally diminished enough that I am starting to feel again. I am beginning to emerge from the cave and join the land of the living again.

A part of me is concerned I’ll and have another bad episode, but I truly believe that those did more harm than good. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t think they were all bad, but when it comes down to it, I believe they are unnecessary. However, I believe they helped pull me from the depths of a so deep I was obsessed with and self-injury, but the pills can only do so much. They made life tolerable, but they did so by numbing me to the point of barely caring about anything, most of all myself. I have reached a turning point and I’m ready to begin a new chapter of my life. This one has outworn its welcome.

Life is fleeting and the time has come to stop drifting along in the darkness and isolating myself. I considered leaving Oklahoma, but I realized I don’t have to run away to have a fresh start. I just have to give myself a clean slate and loosen the impossible expectations I placed upon myself.

On this day..