The Straw that Broke the Camel’s Back

I’m not very good with idioms, but I have always been partial to the straw that broke the camel’s back. This one I understand, this one I recite correctly, this one resonates.

I know there is a lot good in my life — I know that when people see my pics on social media, it peaks jealousy even if they read 70% of my posts talk about my hardships and frustrations and I lack of support to get through this life —

But the 1-2 punch of relentless shittiness that comes my way, that perpetually force me to run off adrenaline fumes, tensed up in survival mode, with that fight -flight-freeze response, me always fighting, always fighting to survive even though I don’t want to. Fight no matter how broken my mind is, how broken my body is, I overcome. I am “highly functional.” Do I feel confident and assured that I will persevere everytime I face a setback? Hell no. What depressed person does? I feel overwhelmed and exhausted and suicidal but I take every single step I know I am supposed to without a single person stepping into lighten the load — and all those assholes rather than offering emotional support, patronize me with problem solving advice when they’ve led charmed lives that never required them to step up to deal with this bullshit (which I know how to handle far better than they do). Their confidence that I’ll be fine, coming more from a place of complacency, absolving them from responsibility of offering help- especially given the consistent stability of their lives. They also believe nothing will land them in need of any help from me, which is everyday a starker reality I must accept. That my peers are unlikely to experience even 0.1 % of the kind of bullshit that has been nonstop for me.

Maybe my highs are higher, even when the lows suck and hit hard time and time. Maybe stability breeds boredom and a mild discontent, one that never requires action, and an unfulfilling life checking off societal expectations is its own kind of awful. — Maybe when you have it all together you are anxious of losing it all when there’s no actual danger you ever really will, but when stressors hit day in and day out and you rebuild your life out of ashes time and time like a phoenix, there’s a part of you that is fearless. Which is a life you rather have than paralyzed by fear. But you don’t fear death either, and sometimes — one more setback, one more battle, that unseats you and disrupts you and sets you steps back after exerting every ounce of your body’s effort to move forward, to follow the tenets of wellness that make up the inane and repetitive advice from every person in your orbit —- that fucking thing, it’s the straw. It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

I see myself disintegrating, too tired to consider suicide once again, but too tired to keep going. As much as I resisted forced hospitalization and know that the system is not designed or able to really help those of us in need, I found myself fantasizing about being locked back in the psych ward. Fantasizing about being robbed of all my agency, not having to formulate a thought and mobilize myself to care for my basic needs, a place where I could be as honest and true to my sadness as I feel and not repress and perform, and where even if utterly false — I am surrounded by people who are supposedly dedicated to caring for my well-being. It’s a fantasy, b/c I know that’s not actually how it plays out, but where can you to find that without a zillion dollars in your bank account?

What do you do when you fall apart not at your lowest low but after you weathered it all and your depleted and you just can’t muster what it takes to be in this world, to participate in this society? When the memories of the trauma are so stuck inside you and come to you in flashes and it’s not just that you just remember the way you were dehumanized by everyone, you still feel the dehumanization at the core of your being, even if it’s just in waves that you know will pass but they never cease. And you can’t relay any of this to the people around you because they forgot what they didn’t even pay attention to care about in the first place when you were in the worst pain of your life. You can only discuss the victories they want to “celebrate” in order to alleviate their own discomfort with the reality of inevitable tragedies in life and let them tell you — not help you — how to solve the current problem.

Here’s the thing. Once the straw breaks the camel’s back — lifting that one piece off won’t restore the camel. It’s broken. It’s immobilized. It can no longer carry the weight of this life and move forward and no one wants an unproductive camel. It has no value. Worth nothing to no one.