This past week has been the happiest week I have had in SO long. I was actually dreading October and what it was (or what I thought it was) bringing me, but I am happy to say that the exact opposite occured this year.

I have been struggling since the beginning of the year. Struggling. To make sense, to make peace, to push forward, to forgive, and to be strong for myself. It has been an inner battle laced with circumstances out of my control in the “real world”, and I haven’t been able to find my footing in so long. I have written so many times about this exact struggle, but it has never come full circle. I was always waiting until it did.

And finally it has, but I am slowly sinking back into depression out of guilt. Guilt that I don’t deserve the happiness that is suddenly so easy, or the perfect companion I’ve found that doesn’t make me hate myself. Everything is so much easier, and it’s come on so fast that I am starting to doubt whether I deserve it…and whether it’s going to last.

I was looking for something else entirely this morning, and I stumbled across this:

Cassie Explains It All.
“It is often the most deserving people who cannot help but love those who destroy them.”

I never claimed to have the answers on days like these, and sometimes I really believe it would be easier to act like I did rather than admitting the truth.

I’m fed up though.

I’ve been taken for granted for a long time, underestimated for longer, and over these longest months of my life…my will to fight for it is becoming less and less. I know that relationships with anyone take work, but after all this time…after all these tears…after all my hard work.

I’m going to regret this entry, I know it.

Some days, I just don’t feel like it’s worth it anymore. Defending something that everyone can clearly see, shouldn’t be defended. Defending someone who knows, deep down, right from wrong….nice from mean, calm from raging. Trying one hundred percent, while I get (maybe) thirty seven percent in return…it’s not worth it.

The embarrassing part? People were right.

Granted, in oh-so-many ways, they were wrong. Things didn’t happen the way people said, memories have faded over time, and the road hasn’t been half as bad as it could have been. I learned, I grew, I figured shit out, and that was more valuable than anything over the years. The knowledge was the key…and I was the only one who had bothered to learn it.

Still, in all the numerous people who tried to persuade me otherwise, my mind remembers only two.

I don’t carewhat people think of me, I have done the impossible for three long years. I lived the craziest, hardest years of my life…but I have lived them happily, and aware of who I am and what it truly takes to put a smile on my face. I do care, however, that certain people were right. People I never intended would know that fact. They still won’t know.

I’m standing in that spot. That spot where the whole damn building is going to come crashing down, and I’m going to let it. I am going to stand there and watch that building crumble, knowing I did all I could to save it, but ultimately choosing to do no more in the end. That damaged building was doomed from the start…and I know very little about repairs.

Or….

I’m going to keep learning, keep figuring it out, all the while allowing pieces of that damn roof to fall and hit me in the head sometimes. I can’t blame that building for falling apart on it’s own, can I? The first time I saw it, I knew it was special…with potential and a beauty all it’s own. I saw, like I always do, something great within those crumbling walls, and I had to do my part to fix it. Had to see if my vision proved correct. Eventually, even if it’s never perfect or my exact vision, that building could be livable again…right?

I’m standing in that spot. And time is running out.
—

Time DID run out for that beautiful building, and it hurts so much to just walk away. I know that I can't return anymore, and I know that I am going to feel bad and want to. I hate to see people suffer, or feel pain, or be the one to cause it. I hate to walk away from love, but that love didn’t love me back.

At least not enough. Not enough to deserve me any longer.

Too much pain, too many tears, too many sleepless nights and missed chances. It’s painful, and the arrival of so much happiness has me gasping for air. I don’t know how to be happy like that, I don’t know how to allow myself the chance to own that.

But damn, I am going to press forward anyway. Because I’ve earned it…even if I am terrified.