"She Was Me and I Am Her"--Accepting My Success

I’m currently (or was when I started writing this, this post took me 10 days to write!!) 35,000 feet in the air going 550 mph making my way to Tennessee!! I flew to OKC this last weekend to meet up with some gals of mine so we could make a weekend trip to Kansas City for my friend Mary’s #LastWeekendAsABabb!!! It was my first time to fly by myself and boy was it an experience! My thrill-seeking heart was completely satisfied as I wiggled my way through crowds of people in Atlanta and as I accidentally sat down at a gate headed to Mexico in Dallas—ah, the joys of travel.

I had the best time in Kansas City!!! Mary has always been such a dear friend of mine, so it was great to shower her with love and fun as we took to the streets of downtown Kansas City. I can’t wait to visit KC again—browsing the very well-displayed racks at Dear Society and sipping malted milk lattes from Monarch Coffee.

I love long road trips, so I volunteered to be the captain and drive us the 4 hours and 47 minutes back to Oklahoma. We aired up the tires, grabbed a few roadtrip eats, and hit the ground running. Mary and Caroline quickly fell asleep which left me alone with an open road and a head full of thoughts. I thought about a lot of stuff, but one thought that came to mind repeatedly was the fact that I had lived in Kansas before. I really didn’t want to think about it, but the thought just kept coming. So I gave in and I thought about it.

I had lived in Kansas from July of 2015 to May of 2016. I spent most of my time in El Dorado which was a small town not too far out from Wichita, but I had traveled all over the state going to track meets or driving back and forth to Oklahoma. So I was very familiar with the fact that I-35 goes straight through OKC, Wichita, Kansas City, and spits you out in the Missouri side of Kansas City, which is where we were coming from. So then I started thinking wait a second... that means we’re going to be driving straight through El Dorado.

My immediate reaction was “How cool is that?” Which quickly switched to “We should stop!!” Which quickly switched to “We’re definitely not doing that.” There was no way I could stop. The last time I was in El Dorado was the day after we returned from Nationals. We had gotten back around 4:30 in the morning and I had told my mom to come and pick me up by 7 so I could get out of there. So my mom had done just that, she was there by 7 that morning, I threw the last bit of my stuff in to the back of my car and I left. I was able to leave that day, but someone else was left behind, someone I wasn’t willing to bring a long with me.

That person was who I used to be. That person was depressed. That person was anxious. That person couldn’t eat. That person couldn’t sleep. That person hid under a blanket of a fake desire to thrive and a strong emotional well-being. When I say that she was “left behind” I mean I literally felt like there was someone there, watching me as I pulled away for the last time; someone I had come to know all too well, whether I liked her or not, she was a part of who I was. When I’m asked questions about my depression, it’s easiest for me to describe it as me being me in the physical, but a completely different person in the mental and emotional. And when I recovered from depression, I explained it as the fact that I still felt as if there was someone else that was once a part of me still on that campus.

So that’s why I couldn’t pull off the highway and in to El Dorado. I couldn’t bare the idea that I would go back and meet her again. That I would feel her trying to be a part of who I am now. Not that I didn’t like who I was when I was there, because that side of me got used to the fact that I felt alone, felt that it was just me, and I was able to control and cope with who I was in order to make it through an entire year of feeling how I felt. I didn’t want to reintroduce myself to that instinct of doing anything I could to survive.

As I established I didn’t want to stop and had found peace with that, Mary sat up and said “Let’s get off at the next exit so I can use the restroom.” Yup! You guessed it. The next exit was for none other than El Dorado.

I kind of chuckled to myself at the pure irony of it all. I still didn’t say anything about going by my old campus because I still wasn’t sure if I could do it. None-the-less, our exit came and we merged right, heading back left across the bridge over the highway and in to El Dorado.

Instantly I was flooded with memories. It was the weirdest feeling, but I felt almost calm. I didn’t feel anything like the fear or anxiousness that I had imagined I would feel. We pulled up to a Casey’s General Store where Mary and Caroline got out, but I sat, frozen in my seat. I didn’t even want my feet to hit the ground out of fear that I wouldn’t be able to stand. So I just sat there. Looking around at what once had been a huge part of my every day life. I sat there, arguing with myself over whether or not I could go the 2 and a half hours we had left without using the restroom first. I told myself I’d be fine, but I knew better. So I took I deep breath, opened the door, and stepped out.

I was standing!!! I didn’t pass out! Okay, granted, I knew I wasn’t going to pass out, but I was so proud of myself for taking that literal first step. I walked inside to the gas station I had visited frequently because it had the best ice and the best puppy chow in town. I was doing it. I was walking around in a place where I once felt knocked down. I felt small and defeated when I was there. But now, it was different. I had done the defeating.

We got back in the car and I knew I couldn’t leave without going all the way. I asked my friends if we could swing by the campus. They, of course, said it was fine, so we went. As we got closer my heart begin to beat faster and faster. I was so nervous yet so excited. My eyes darted from one side of the road to the other as I tried to take everything in. My head was flooded with so many memories, it was almost overwhelming. We turned on to the street the dorms were on, then in to the dorm room parking lot.

Everything was the same, but so, so different. As I pulled in, there were a few students walking across the parking lot. They glanced toward me and gave me a polite wave, but it felt like I knew them. I certainly didn’t, but I had a desire to stop and go up to them and tell them that I knew. I knew what it was like. I had been there before, walking across that same parking lot, headed probably to the same place they were headed. But I didn’t do any of those things. Instead, I smiled, waved back, and kept driving.

I pulled up to a spot that faced my old dorm room window. As to what I said or did next is all kind of a blur. Next thing I knew, I was standing outside of the car, happiest I had ever been, smiling for a picture. 

It’s funny to look back at this picture because all of the other pictures I have while at this place (and by all I mean maybe 10, I never took pictures while I was there) I don’t think I look like myself in a single one of them. It’s my eyes, I think. You can see the depression in my eyes in old pictures. But in this one—in this one depression has been defeated and I’m not afraid.

As for the “someone else” I referenced earlier, she was gone. I didn’t feel her any more and I don’t feel her now. That part of me that felt bruised is no more. Instead, it’s a beautiful memory of what I’ve overcome. I feel whole and connected with every part of who I am. There’s not anymore faulty connections or missing links. The old part of me is gone and done away with. I’ve beaten the things that have tried to beat me. I went back to the place where it all started and I said to myself, “I beat this.” And yeah, I’m right, I totally did.

So whatever it is you’re facing right now, know that you, too, can beat it. My biggest advice would be to accept your success. Going back there is when I finally realized there was never a “someone else”. She was me and I am her. The only reason I felt like I left something behind is because I had. I had left behind all that had brought me down. I had defeated depression, leaving me with a weight that was no longer on my chest, but on the ground, and I was stepping over it, leaving that weight behind. So I was leaving behind a part of me, but it was a part of me I had been fighting so hard to get rid of. And when I did get rid of it, I never accepted my success. I hadn’t accepted that I was strong, and brave, and powerful. I hadn’t accepted that I had done what I once thought was impossible. But now that I have, I know and can tell you, your success is at the end of your fingertips, all you need to do is grab ahold. It may be scary and it may even feel undeserved, but I’m here to tell you the success, it’s yours—and rightfully so.