I saw a therapist

Tags

anxiety, headaches, mental-health, stereotypes, stress, therapist

My head throbbed. It stung. It felt like it was being poked by tiny slivers of glass.

All I could think about was everything I had to do, and how I wasn’t doing it.

It started the first day of school, spring semester of my sophomore year. No, actually I don’t remember when it started exactly, but that is when I really noticed it. The headaches. The headaches came whenever I angered or stressed. They came in little bursts, just like how long I was upset. Soon they started to come in longer sessions. This is when I would go weeks with one constantly there.

It would be so distracting. Sometimes I couldn’t think of anything else but my headache. And sometimes it was like it wasn’t there, until I thought about it. I began to stress even more because of them. I would worry about not being able to do homework or go to class, or think straight. People that I would mention it to would throw out extremes that made me ache even more with worry.

But no, this was not when it started. This wasn’t the first time I felt like this.

My second semester of my freshman year of college is when I first felt the physical effects of anxiety (Spring semester must be cursed). I have always sweated more when I was stressed, even more than I already do. I have hyperhydrosis, which pretty much means, I sweat…A LOT and when I stress, it pretty much doubles. I was stressing so much that the sweat glands on my hands has swollen into red, itchy, stinging bumps.

I went to the health center at my school and saw a doctor, who reminded me that I have hyperhydrosis and talked to me about stress. Then he suggested I see a psychologist/therapist. I was outraged.

Therapists were for people who had something wrong with them. They were for people with completely messed up lives or brains. They were for people who were mental. Gosh. This doctor thought I was crazy. That is what I thought.

This last semester when my headaches became an issue, I went to the health center again. I saw someone who I trusted. I was told I was having chronic tension headaches. I was given an anti-inflammatory medication. I was talked to about stress (in a much kinder way). I was told that it wouldn’t be a bad idea to think about seeing a therapist on campus. They could talk to me about better handling my stress, because stress isn’t going to end after college. I will always have it. I considered this.

I must say I was still quite cynical of therapists. But a little less so after some things that had happened with myself and others I knew the past year. I still thought: therapists were for people who didn’t have friends to talk to. But I was desperate; more desperate than I have ever been in my life.

The first session was free. What could I lose?

For those of you who know me well, this was a huge step for me. You might have heard me say this before but I do NOT like asking for help. So Ali Clark going to a therapist might have been a hilarious joke to some…or a giant concern.

It was a lot different than I thought it would be. The first session she tried to get to know me. We talked, like regular people do. We discussed why I came there, what was happening. We found out we both love the Lord and strive to follow Him.

After each session she gave me an assignment. At first it was, do breathing exercises, write down times when you don’t have anything scheduled, try a relaxation CD, things like that. Then it became, find time to spend with God, read your Bible, pray, be silent, bring your favorite Bible verse and tell me why it’s your favorite.

It made me realize. God uses people to work in your life that you never would have thought He would use. He uses things that you would never have considered doing. He pushes you out of your comfort zone and helps you grow in ways you never imagined you could. He takes your stereotypes and crushes them. He shows you that you do indeed need help, and then He gives it to you.

The planning scared me

I have always been a girl with a plan; whether it was a plan for a hang out with friends, a sleepover, a habit to kick, a new routine to follow, or my future career path. 

As the years have passed I have realized that not all plans are fool proof. Not all plans work out. I was the girl who was devastated when friends canceled on plans. Let me repeat: DEVASTATED. I still get upset sometimes. When my plans were made, they were “set”. I counted on them. I relied on what I thought was their “unchanging steadfastness”. When things went a different way then what I planned, I let it crush me. 

I find that I seem to always contemplate and think and blog about the future, planning, and trusting God. These are things I have always struggled with. I think many people do (please raise your hand!). 

After realizing that things don’t always go according to plan, that plans fall apart, that people let you down, I started to become afraid of planning. Not short term planning. I didn’t stop making plans to hang out with friends later that week or to plan a friend’s birthday party coming up in a few weeks, but the long terms planning shut down completely. 

Someone mentioning next month, next semester, or God forbid next year, was likely to make me scream in terror (just ask Caleb). I would actually freak out and tell that person that I couldn’t discuss that far in advance (not saying this doesn’t still happen on occasion). I am getting better, but it is still hard for me. 

I know that God has a plan and it’s better than mine. But that doesn’t mean I’m against planning, or that I have stopped. I think it’s important that we prepare for the future that God has for us. Planning can be part of that. But that doesn’t mean I should be devastated when my plans aren’t followed. 

I should rejoice in plans that fall apart because I have faith that better ones will fall together.

Planning isn’t bad. It’s my attitude about planning and the future that I need to keep in check. And when I have my heart and my head in the right place, knowing that God has it all figured out, that is when I become excited about the future, instead of scared. 

Check out more thoughts about planning and expectations. 

I thought I’d have it all figured out by now

When I was younger I thought I knew a lot of stuff.

I thought milk was bad for you (since milk is pretty much heavenly like chocolate and candy). I also thought that you would go to jail if you didn’t enroll in college after you walked across the stage at your high school graduation. I remember each moment when I embarrassingly realized that I was mistaken. They were both pivotal moments in my life because 1. I  hate being embarrassed/feeling stupid & 2. I hate being wrong.

I had perceptions about life that were changed. I found out that milk has calcium and is actually good for your bones. I also found out (perhaps a little too late) that you don’t HAVE to go to college right away, or even at all.

As I grew, my perceptions changed, just like I did.

I learned from people who were older and wiser. I gathered information and thought out my beliefs and goals (even if at first they might have just been copied).

You know how, when you’re younger, you thought your parents knew EVERYTHING? They were all knowing. They had an answer for your questions. They knew all these things and you didn’t know how they could possibly remember it all. But of course, they were your parents after all. When you became a parent and you were old, you would know everything too, right?

After I realized that not everything I knew was true, I began to think about what I would learn and know in the future. And then I began to have expectations for my future self.

Just like Ariel, I would meet my true love when I was 16. I would also be fully physically developed, with no acne, AND I would have perfect hair. Did I mention I would be incredibly stylish? Yes. This is how I would be when I was 16….so I thought…when I was 11. Because 16 was then the perfect age.

In actuality, when I was 16, I was convinced that I was going to be single forever (because I had a list that no boy could match) and change the world by becoming a microbiologist and doing medical research to cure the world of every disease (acne was probably one of those diseases).

I turned 20 years old last week. I believe that I am the female version of Peter Pan. I always wanted to fly to Neverland so that I wouldn’t have to grow up. But I have left my years as a child and now I have left my teenage years. I never thought this day would come so soon and I never thought I would feel so unchanged. I thought by this time I would have figured out exactly what I wanted to do with my life. I would know what I wanted as a career. I would have a plan. I would be a stronger Christian. I would break out of my introverted shell. I wouldn’t have anymore acne (just kidding…..maybe).

But I think that I will always feel this way. Maybe not exactly this way. But I think that the older I become the more I will realize that it doesn’t matter how old I am. I will always be growing, learning, becoming wiser (I hope).

I think I’ll always feel a little out of the loop, a little silly, a little dumb, and maybe even a little childish. I think I will always feel this way because I know that this is not all there is. It’s not just a bunch of silly screwed up people on earth. There’s something bigger. God is bigger. He holds me in His hands and tells me that I am still a child. I will always be His child. I will never know what I’m going to be like next year or ten years from now. I won’t always know the right thing to do or say. And I think it’s supposed to be this way. I may not like it all the time. I may get frustrated. But that’s because I’m just a child, trying to understand. What I need to do is trust that God knows. It’s God’s plan. It’s His timing. And everything will work out for the good.

I don’t have it all figured out, but He does.

 

Choosing Finland

Reblogged from My Suitcase Semester:

I've had a passport for almost a year, but I've never been out of the U.S. I have a bucket list full of places I want to see and things I want to do and many of them are far out of my reach. I've always known I wanted to study abroad. I never thought it would be for a whole semester.

Read more… 401 more words

Check out my new blog I will be keeping for when I'm getting ready to study abroad in Finland and when I'm actually there in the Spring!

Snow White Didn’t Steal My Heart

I finally saw Snow White & The Huntsman. I had heard mixed reviews from people I work with at the movie theater. I had been looking forward to seeing it despite the blemish of Kristen Steward as Snow White. I was hoping that this could be overlooked if everything else was well done. Let’s just say I was glad I didn’t pay any money to see this because then I would have ranted about it for weeks.

First, let me go over some good points (AKA why it gets all 2.5 of my pretty blue stars). Most of these go to Charlize Theron, the actress who played the evil queen. She was exactly what I always thought the villain in Snow White would be. A beautiful, strong, power hungry, beauty obsessed woman who had a messed up child hood. Her character is the one that intrigued me most throughout the movie and is the one I awaited to know even more about. She was terrifying and brilliant.

Now on to the not so great stuff. No, Kristen Stewart did not overcome her terrible acting. I think the writers knew that she couldn’t handle the role because she barely had any lines whatsoever, minus her short and awkward speech near the end. Her character was lacking in that she had no qualities that were seen in action, only what people said of her. We were told she was beautiful (the fairest of them all) and pure and brave, but I never exactly saw it. I think if Snow White the character from the stories and fairy tales wasn’t known so well, the movie would have been completely confusing. She walked around. Stood there. Gave her “Kristen Stewart Awkward Stare” that makes me think a vampire will come out of no-where and everyone was pawning after her.

The best part of the movie for me (or you could call it the worst) was near the end when Snow White and the evil queen were struggling/fighting and Snow White finally killed her. The queen sat there, completely frightened as she died, and Snow White just stared at her (with her awkward stare) and just said: “You can’t have my heart.” I cracked up laughing in the theater. It was so lame. It was so lame that I laughed (just imagine what everyone else in the theater was thinking while this happened, then maybe you’ll laugh too).

This movie was made to make money. Kristen Stewart supplied the Twilight crazed fans while Chris Hemsworth supplied the drooling women. It probably did the job. I was at least curious enough to see it. But I wouldn’t ever waste my money on it.

This is my first movie review that I’ve ever typed up, written out, or even posted online. I don’t claim to be an acclaimed critic or even know what I’m talking about. I’m just a girl with a job at a movie theater this summer that allows me to see any movie for free. I accept criticism, ideas, suggestions, arguments, and opinions. And if you want me to see a movie before you do so you don’t waste your money, just let me know! I will see it and write something up. Also, if you want to know if a certain movie is kid appropriate, or any other specifics I would be happy to add those things in as well. I am going to learn as I go this summer and I’m happy for help.

 

I dew not think this is working

Tags

headaches, healing, mountain dew, pain, prayer, stress

As many of you might already know, I have been having reoccurring and painful headaches the last few months. It started the day school started. I remember the first 3 weeks of school I had a headache every single day. I didn’t know what was up. I rejoiced when I didn’t have a headache for one day. These headaches were sudden and short and sometimes I had several in one day. I especially noticed them when I was stressed, annoyed, angry, or irritated in any way. I would be in a stressful situation, be angry at something or someone, or even think about a situation or assignment and it would suddenly come instantaneously. At first they would last only 15 minutes to an hour and then they began getting longer as time progressed.

Throughout the rest of the semester I kept having them and over the past few weeks they have gotten severely worse. Sometimes they are like they used to be…sharp pain and then a squeezing feeling around my temples and sides of my head. Sometimes I would also have pain the very back of my head. Now I can hardly tell where it is. It’s all over. It’s in my upper neck, back of my head, middle of my head, sides of my head, and forehead.

Just within the last few days my nerves have been giving me hell. Have you every gotten a back rub and they rolled your skin up your back? It feels like someone is doing that under my skin on my head; from the back to the front. It’s this tingling that is tiny sharps of pain like glass poking the most sensitive part of you. Now it just seems to tingle all over whenever it wants to. Then sometimes it will quickly do the “roll” up my head, starting with a sharp pain the back.

I figured out that caffeine (Mountain Dew) significantly impacted my head. It eased the pain right away (the first time). The next time I tried it it eased the pain but it was still there. Although I think it made me so hyper I hardly noticed the pain (I don’t usually drink pop at all). Today I tried it again because I was desperate. It eased the pain a little, but just for about an hour. Even mountain dew isn’t enough.

I used to think that my headaches were not a big deal, but then they kept getting worse and I finally started describing them to Caleb and it wasn’t until he told me that that wasn’t normal or good that I realized it (maybe they are messing with my common sense too). I started researching headaches and I was for sure that I had chronic tension headaches. It seemed like exactly what I was feeling. But then I started getting them all the time. Like, every day, all day; just like today. I have had a headache for almost 12 hours today with no relief (did I mention ibuprofen doesn’t help anymore?). Then the nerves started feeling like they were going raw. Someone told me they sounded like cluster headaches and a precursor to a migraine. I don’t know anymore.

I’ve been keeping a headache diary where I detail how they feel and when and where I get them (did I mention I’ve been really shaky today?). I’ve also been keeping track on what I eat and drink as well as other factors.

It must be somewhat stress related. I know that. I’ve been trying to change some things in my life. I took a break from my college newspaper because that is the biggest thing that stresses me out. I bought a desk to organize my room and add to the lack of furniture. However, I realize you need something other than a 3 inch long screwdriver to do this, so now a bunch of desk parts are on my floor. I started drinking more water. But what stresses me out the most right now is the actual headache, which probably makes it worse.

I don’t know what the point of this blog post was. I just needed to get it all out there I think. I’m going to my college health center on Friday. I can’t stand it anymore. I iced my head last night. I hate ice. Hate it. But I did it with the hope that maybe it would help with the increasing soreness in my upper neck and back of head. Honestly I think it irritated my nerves, but I did it anyway because I’m desperate.

I’m a professional hider, or hermit. When I’m in pain or stressed I seclude myself in my quarters to get away from the world. I wouldn’t want to get irritated or annoyed and have a flare up or annoy someone by talking about my pain. So I am in a cocoon (I’m hoping butterflies don’t get headaches).  But really, I really need friends right now. I really need a stress reliever(s). I really need love. I really need Jesus’s healing (also, in case you didn’t know, it’s really difficult for me to admit I need help).

So, I’m not asking for medical advice, but I will ask for your prayers. Prayers that Jesus will reveal to me or my doctor what is wrong so that I can have relief and peace and joy. Or, even better, Jesus could just miraculously heal me (because He can!!). That would be cool kids.

On a different note, conjugating the subjunctive in Spanish isn’t nearly as hard as the preterit. Thank goodness.

Tornado Days…

Tags

damage, KS, Pittsburg, storms, tornado warning, tornadoes, wind

I hate the wind.

I had the way it blows my hair everywhere. I hate the way it makes me blind. I hate how strong it is. I hate how powerless I feel.

I can take rain pouring or beating against walls and roofs. I can take thunder and lightning, in fact, I really enjoy thunderstorms. I love the sounds and the feeling of warmth under the covers as I listen. But the howling of wind, the feeling of shakiness and seeing debris fly everywhere… it freaks me out. Especially the wind that sounds like screaming.

It didn’t used to bother me as much. I’m going to admit that last May might have had an effect on how I view tornadoes…or just wind in general. It can take away things you never really thought about losing.

Last night around 10ish, I was in the bathroom about to put in the new earrings I just bought. I had washed my face, brushed my teeth, and I was going to bed soon. The lights flickered and went out. I waited a moment for them to come back on, and when they didn’t I went in the hallway. My roommate Megan was out there too and that’s when I found out her window was broken and wind was blowing through her window. I went back in my room and called Caleb and told him what happened and that is when the sirens went off. I told him I’d call him back.

My other roommate Kate was in the living room trying to hold one of our windows up as the wind and rain was beating against it and the sirens were blasting. I went to help her. I ended up tearing the rest of it off and leaning it against the wall and leaving it there so I could grab a jacket, my phone and wallet, and put some pants on. We all ran out to Kate’s car so we could go to the hospital that was right next to our apartment complex. We didn’t stay there that long before the tornado warning had past and it went into only a watch.

I would say we were pretty lucky only our windows were damaged and they were actually fixed last night at about 12:30am by our landlord. The power was still out when I fell asleep at about 1:30AM, planning to wake up at 7AM for work and class the next morning. I ended up waking up at 6AM wide awake, but found out school had been canceled for the day due to the power outages and damages.

This picture below is from the baseball fields at my school.

Many large trees were uprooted

So many power lines were knocked down, it was ridiculous. This was across from dollar general which is about a minute away from our apartment. More power lines were down that were even closer.

The roof of Chatters Grill was also damaged. It’s just down the street from our apartment.

Even grave stones were knocked over

Lots of damages were reported at my school as well. Clean up is going on today.

This is the roof of our Weede Building which has our basketball court in it.

We also had damages to our Recreation Center and Technology Center. I’m not sure how bad it was. Classes are said to resume tomorrow, except for classes that are in the Rec Center and Tech Center. They both still do not have power and might not have it until Friday.

I don’t hate valentine’s day

Tags

valentine s day

Red roses, big stuffed bears holding red hearts saying “I <3 you”, heart shaped balloons, boxes of chocolates, hugs & kisses, The Vow, romance galore, dinners at high class restaurants, love letters….are you barfing yet? I think many people who were filling up my Facebook news feed yesterday would…or maybe if some people just read my news feed. “So in so, and 78 of your friends have posted about Valentine’s Day”….

The title of this blog post probably made you barf too. “Of course she doesn’t hate Valentine’s Day because SHE has a boyfriend!”

I never remember hating valentine’s day. I don’t remember ever hating Valentine’s day even when I was single (for the first 17 years of my life). My parents and family and friends always made me feel loved and treasured. I always received some sort of gift whether it be a flower, a stuffed animal, or candy. There was usually an awesome party where we got to make creative valentine boxes to hold cards so that we could exchange them with others (heck yeah BCHEF). Valentine’s Day to me is about celebrating the people in your life that you love. It doesn’t have to be romantic love. It can be, but that’s not the only kind of love there is.

I admit that Valentine’s Day is very commercialized, but we don’t have to give in to that. If we don’t give in, it won’t work. Don’t buy that huge stuffed bear or those red roses. Make something homemade. I know it’s February, but if you’re lucky you might find flowers to actually pick for yourself (really lucky I know). Make paper flowers. Be creative! Let the people you love (not just your boyfriend/girlfriend/spouse) know that you care about them.

I’m not going to pretend that I am not a hopeless romantic and I’m not going to pretend that even thought my boyfriend lives in a different state, that we didn’t have an awesome big date this past weekend. We got all dressed up, drove off to Tulsa, visited the only fish only pet store (we were way overdressed for that place), visited most of the bookstores in the city, went to dinner at Zio’s (I love Italian food), and then he surprised me by taking me to The Vow, which I had confessed to him a while back that I wanted to see, but did not expect him to take me to.

The fact is, Valentine’s Day should not be that big of a deal…for couples…or for single people. You should treat the person you love like royalty every day of the year. I remember asking Caleb what he thought of Valentine’s Day (before we were actually dating). He told me that he thought that a guy shouldn’t have to have a special holiday to treat his girl like a princess. I’m glad I don’t have to wait until Valentine’s Day every year to receive a letter from him, or a special date, or be taken to a chick flick.

Caleb gave me these flowers in September, just because. It was a wonderful and very sweet surprise in my room when I came home from school that day. It wasn’t Valentine’s Day, it wasn’t even an anniversary or any special date for us. It was just September 15th.

This is my fish Haiku. He is a dragon scale betta fish that Caleb got for me a week and a half ago. No it wasn’t Valentine’s Day.

No, you shouldn’t have to have a special holiday to show the person that you love that you care, just like we shouldn’t have to wait until Easter every year to celebrate the amazing sacrifice that Jesus gave the world around 2,000 years ago and we shouldn’t have to wait until Thanksgiving every year before we thank God for what we have. But they are good reminders. They are good days to contemplate and sit back and think about what they really mean to us. I honestly don’t know much about the history of valentine’s day. I know there are many different stories, most including a Catholic saint who was martyred for doing something awesome, whether it be helping Christians escape from Roman prisons or helping young couples in love get married. I don’t honestly know. But I know it is a holiday about love, and that’s not stupid. That’s not something to hate. Hate the commercialization. Hate the cheesy cards in Hallmark, but show love to the people you care about the most.

Don’t hate Valentine’s Day.

5.5 hrs of sleep, no chai tea in sight, Gladiator watched in class, and surprise surprise…

Tags

chai, college, collegio, school, sleep, surprises, writing

And so the first week of school commences…

Today was my first day of classes. I was so excited/nervous last night that I didn’t get to sleep until about 1:30AM. I had an 8AM class. Now, this normally wouldn’t have been a problem. Weird as though it may seem, during the school year I am quite used to running on little sleep, but I believe that over break I became used to the staying up late, sleeping in, or just getting 8 or 9 hours (which is amazing). So being in an intro to business class at 8AM wasn’t ideal when my body was definitely not functioning properly. I can say that I am not a fan of that class, or I can just blame it on the fact that I was in a bad mood and kept wanting to raise my hand and criticize everything that the instructor was saying. He just confirmed the notion that all everyone is concerned about is money (I hate money).

I worked for 3 hours after that while trying to avoid using the desk in the office as a pillow. I managed to stay halfway awake without burning a whole through the computer screen with my glazed over eyes. On a brighter note, the chair of the department just gave in to buying an iPhone (he has always told me that phones should just be able to call people and have voice mail and that is all he wanted) and admitted this to me by first showing me a picture of his first texting conversation with his son… I think it belonged on autocorrectfail. Hilarious, I must say. His words to me: “I have no idea what I’m doing”

Advanced speech communication. Sounds…advanced, doesn’t it? The class will be all about persuasion. Exciting. My instructor says he wants us to become critical receivers…and then he showed us the beginning of Gladiator and asked us to write down our thoughts as we watched it. Afterwards he asked people to share theirs…people said stuff like how the music and the theme and the colors made them feel…what they assumed and thought about the plot…very deep stuff man.
My notes consisted of:  ”For some reason the music at the beginning reminded me of the Prince of Egypt and I started humming that music in my head” & “My mom hates Russell Crowe because he broke up Meg Ryan and her husband” & “I wonder what animal that is on his back…a fox? Wolf? Coyote?” & “The headless horseman! I remember reading Sleepy Hollow in High School” & “Aw. a dog. I love dogs”…..Okay. I think that is enough embarrassment for one blog post.

My Students for Violence Prevention training program was next. It’s a one hour class taught by a lady who is a victim advocate at the Safehouse Crisis Center here in Pittsburg. From the overview and discussion today, it should be a very interesting course that I should gain a lot of new knowledge and perspective from. I am looking forward to future Tuesday afternoons.

Communication careers was next with the same instructor from Advanced Speech (he seems awesome). I knew quite a few people in that class as well. It should be a fun class of exploration into communication careers, and planning for the future of when I have to take COMM 699 and make a portfolio of all of my Comm work in order to graduate (no big deal).

And now for the kicker…
I had the first Collegio meeting of the semester this evening (my school newspaper). My editor had stated in the email she sent out a few days ago that there would be some changes to the way things were run this semester…I had no idea she meant this. I suppose when someone starts out the meeting with… “Some of you may be upset by this..” I should be on my guard. But as she explained I saw no reason to be upset. My editor explained that they would be splitting up the writers into two categories: “news” and “feature”. She said this might make people feel as if they were in a box and constricted with what they could do. What was wrong with that? Why would anyone be upset by that? After all, we wrote in our specific areas anyway right? I was a feature writer. I wrote feature stories. I have always written feature stories. My first Collegio story I ever wrote was a feature story. I started writing for the yearbook because I was told I was one of the best feature story writers at the Collegio. I write features. Well…I think you get it by now.

My editor began reading off names and I became slightly confused and befuddled by the group of names mine was associated with…until a huge red stamp labeled “news writer” smacked me on the forehead (not really, but it sure felt like that). Okay, I was still confused and befuddled even after that. Me? Me? Diddd……I hear you rrright? (ever heard your own thoughts stutter? I have.) The throbbing of my head from the impact of the stamp made me wince and I am not sure I kept my facial expressions intact during the next 3-9 minutes. Me. News. No. What. Dream. . . Except the ink still hasn’t washed off.

On the bright side I was immediately assigned a story that was explained as hard work and a for sure front page headline. Perhaps I am looking at this all the wrong way. Perhaps my writing was seen as something to be placed on the front page where student eyes seemed to be glued instead of the middle/back pages where features seem to find their bliss. Although I will miss that world and I may travel back to it often…maybe this is what it means.

Tomorrow will continue with an 8AM beginning, a few hours of work, a few more new classes, and most likely a whole sling of the unexpected. Gotta love it.

at the end of it all

Since all I have seemed to think about this year (ha) are either extremely depressing or extremely serious things, I decided to lighten up a little with a blog post. It is now 2012. Happy New Year (a few days late I know). This was the first new year that I rang in completely by myself. Yes, I was alone in my apartment in the near ghost town of Pittsburg drinking sparkling grape juice out of the bottle and watching Jane Eyre. Have I ever mentioned how much I love that era? I loved just listening to the way they talked in the movie. This is why I have also watched almost every single version of Pride and Prejudice known to man. They just seem so much more clever then than now. I also ate pizza rolls. How romantic.

The wind was howling outside that night. Scratch that. It was screaming. I thought Sylar from Heroes was outside murdering people (no joke. that guy scares me). I started to make a timeline of every big thing that happened to me in 2011. 1 1/2 pages later I only made it until March before I went ADD. Then I started thinking about the end of the world. Did you know that when I typed in “zombies” into Google the first suggestion I was given was “zombies vs. penguins”? It is actually a game where you are a BA penguin shooting down zombies in Antarctica.

I do not personally believe that the world will end this December. It might. Who knows (no one). I don’t believe that anyone truly knows when Jesus is coming back except Jesus (of course). I saw a lot of posts about it though after midnight. People said things like…this would be our last new year…and things like that. It was humorous but it also got me thinking. What if the world “ended”? What would I want to do with my final moments? Would I be satisfied with how I lived? Would I want a redo? Who would I want to be with in the end?

I received a phone call from my boyfriend Caleb who was on his way to Hong Kong and was about to fly out of the LA airport. It was almost 2am my time. The call only lasted 1 minute. I think I have talked less to him the past few days than I have in less than a day normal time. When I say goodbye to people on the phone…or actually when I say goodbye to anyone…sometimes I get this weird thought. What if this is the last time I am going to say goodbye? What if I never talk to them again? What if something happens? I get this thought frequently (this may be very strange. I don’t know). Whenever I see a friend and we say goodbye…I usually say…”see you…” and then I have to clarify. When will I see them next? It always bothers me when I don’t know.

There are times when I have reality checks (yes, multiple). I have to tell myself what is real and what is not…what is possible…and what is impossible. There are times when I am on the top of the world and I am pushing myself so hard because I believe I can do something…but sometimes I just have to face the fact that I can’t do it alone. It eats me alive. Reality is not somewhere I would really want to live…it is just something that checks in every once in a while.

Life is short. It ends. As a teenager (the last six months…) I know that life can feel surreal. I always heard people said that teenagers thought themselves invincible. I always thought that was silly. But when I actually thought about it, death didn’t seem real to me. Me? Die? That is forever away after all. Or is it? The average life expectancy in the U.S. is 79 years. The last year of my life has gone by so fast that January of last year almost seems like last week. In 60 years I will be 79. That’s only average. That’s if nothing else happens.

But that is not what really gives me a reality check. Actually, that fact doesn’t really do much to me. So I don’t expect it to really do anything to you. The only thing that really gives me a reality check about death is…death. My Grandma passed away two weeks ago. She was 76 years old. She went to heaven to be with Jesus. I don’t think death has ever felt so real to me as it has the past two weeks.

At the end of it all… will you want a redo?