Like a Cat in a Tree, Or My Existential Crisis, Undefined, Or Can Someone Pass Me a Band-Aid, I’m Bleeding All Over the Place…

Seven years ago, my then-6-year-old son looked at me out of the blue and said, “Momma, you’re just like a cat in a tree.” And to this day, I say he’s too intelligent for his own good, but I took those words to heart. I have been thinking about those words for the better part of seven years now. Why would he say that to me? And, why, exactly, does a cat climb a tree?

I’m no animal behaviorist, but my first and foremost guess would be that a cat would climb a tree for protection from a predator. Or, because the cat is, by nature, a curious animal, and the added height gives it a certain perspective it otherwise does not have with its feet planted firmly on the ground. Maybe the cat was just checking out the world around it. Or, perhaps, because it just needed a quiet crook of a limb in which to cradle and take a nap. But that cat may have been hungry, too, and trying to satisfy its primal instinct to feed by hunting an unsuspecting robin as it was just about to light in its nest. A cat could climb a tree for one or none of these reasons. But, if that cat is me, it’s in that tree for all of those reasons.

Seven years ago, I was finishing grad school and my marriage had fallen gravely ill. Saturn was beginning its seven year transit through my astrological house, and Saturn is one stubborn, messy, slow-moving, bossy little bitch. Seven years ago, I did not fit in my body, and a fifth of vodka made me just liquid enough to be comfortable, if only for that night—and every night thereafter. The bad days didn’t seem so bad and the worse nights didn’t matter at all if I couldn’t remember them. Seven years ago, I was suffering a crisis of identity and crippled with existential depression. I don’t suffer so much with the identity issues anymore. I *know* who I am more today than I ever have. I’m just not too confident in why I am who I am, and I’m certainly not confident that I like her all the time.

I am a sensitive person. Overly so, in fact. And I have a teensy weensy problem with perfectionism. Addiction runs rampant on both sides of my family, and because of this, I never even had a chance. Because of this toxic cocktail of brain chemistry, I have struggled with depression for the better part of 20 years, which is, now, more than half of my life. I have tried just about every antidepressant under the blistering sun. I have seen cognitive behavioral therapists and psychiatrists and licensed professional counselors. I have self-medicated with all kinds of drugs and alcohol and cigarettes, and I know this probably makes me look like I ought to be locked in a sanatorium somewhere, but this little space on the World Wide Web is my canvas, and I want to paint it all the ugly colors of truth. And, trust me; you’re in trouble when you can’t confront the truth. I am sober now. I no longer drink, and I don’t abuse drugs. I also do not go to AA. And I would *love* to quit smoking, but I can’t seem to make it longer than two weeks. No matter what, I will continue to try. It’s just that cigarettes are my one last crutch, and some days, I feel so broken that they prop me up.

I am depressed in spirit, and I know it’s going to break my mother’s heart to read that. I have been let down and abandoned time after time, and my fathers haunt my dreams. Especially my stepfather who is still living. I have struggled—for myself, for my son, for others—and I know this is why I can’t sleep at night. In fact, it is 1:30 a.m., and I am still typing. Currently, I am living based primarily on the support of others. And when I say living, I mean food, water, heat, housing, toilet paper. This is disturbing to me. I have a friend who is battling a bedbug infestation many states away from me, and I worry about her living out of plastic totes and Ziplock bags for the next 18 months. I worry about her loneliness, and I dream about it at night. I know I can’t do anything about natural disasters like earthquakes and hurricanes, mudslides and tsunamis, but that doesn’t mean I don’t *want* to do anything about the hurt they inflict upon unsuspecting people. I haven’t been able to watch an ASPCA commercial, or a plea from the Christian Children’s Fund or St. Jude’s for that matter, since I was a small child. They make me want to vomit, and I will cry. I can’t force ugly, mean-spirited, hateful people to believe in peace, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want to try.

And I cannot stress enough the gut-punching importance of love. But you’ve got to be open to it, and, after all this time, I still have trouble with this. I have labored very hard to make it through the last 34 years of this life alive. I am a dedicated and hard worker, although I may be a little too exacting. I just want to know when, and if, living gets any easier.