A new year, a new beginning! The world is your oyster anew and each step you take is meant to be filled with new possibilities!
These are the typical thoughts that come swirling to mind every new year. Help it or not though, I sometimes also start the year by peppering on my own premium anxiety by pressuring how my should’s should look:
I should be able to be happier this year
I should be able to enjoy the moment more
I should be able to become some other version of myself that it not currently me
But I suppose that is the mystique of starting a new year. In a ceremonial fashion you are stripping away the exposed raw nerves of the past twelve-months by visualizing a fresh new chapter in your life’s storybook. Set to the tune of a resolutions list, each day in the month becomes amplified as either a win or a loss.
If you are someone like me, when a mental health curveball suddenly comes hurdling through, having an episode that stretches from days to months is not uncommon - just incredibly frustrating and distracting. Truth is, sometimes the start of a new year might actually come in the summer.
Case in point - When fireworks went off for 2021, I tried to start the year with every ounce of enthusiasm that I could humanly muster up. Unlike many who weathered through the prior year, 2020 was an unusually positive time for me that produced more surprising personal and professional gains than losses. As an added bonus, my depression and anxiety, although agitated by the events of 2020, managed to stay at bay, allowing me to administer constant self-care. I should have had no issues going into 2021; I should have had a running start to the year. Should, should, should.
Like waking up lost in a fog, January 2021 immediately felt more unnerving than the previous months. My joy for new beginnings became dread about potential future losses. All hope for the possible turned into pent-up angst about what hadn’t even happened. Although I left 2020 relatively unscathed, I brought with me an unquenchable anxiety that refused to disappear. It eventually morphed into existential dread and undeniable truths about living a sustained solitary life, removed from loved ones during a worsening pandemic; about having to continue working at maximum capacity without having real breaks in-between to relax and be human; about wishing more than anything for time to just stop, so that I could be absent from the weight of the present. At the root of all my thoughts was a sour belief that no one is lucky enough to survive a pandemic year (let alone two!) without shrapnel, and I was about to walk into the battle field again.
As January peeled away into February than March, my diligence, energy and mood started to taper. I wanted desperately to pause time and clear my thoughts, but each passing day brought on more work, more expectations and more of me that I didn’t actually have. Despite my want to keep performing at my typical near obsessive gold-star level, unbeknownst to me I had long surpassed my mental limits to both operate and endure.
The seeds of my anxiety eventually blossomed into a tyrannical depression and soon it felt like I was being stripped-mined for all the accomplishments I gained from the year before. All forms of exertion became a chore while my new job became hiding my depressive symptoms from others. Surprisingly the worst part was the self guilt and anger I had. In my hyper analytical and high-strung mind, the fact that I was becoming a barrier to myself in completing what used to be routine tasks, was purely unacceptable. And so more should’s came to mind.
I should be able to handle this
I should be able to pull myself together
As winter transformed into spring and melted into summer, my depression too started to thaw. Finally, my “anxi-depress” cycle was coming to an end. I even began to fill my life with non-work-related things that made me happy, like adopting a cat and seeing loved ones again. For three months I felt like I was actively present and mentally still. I felt like me.
By the end of the summer I had sustained a work related injury that than led to bulging disks, four months of physical therapy and cautioned mobility. At the start of November, I became a breakthrough statistic and caught COVID, along with strep throat. After weeks of extreme illness, I was able to celebrate Christmas with loved ones. As I counted down new years I was able to count my blessings for making it this far. My first resolution was to erase should from my vocabulary. No amount of should’s would have prepared me for how much was really actually out of my control.
It’s a bit odd how (cautiously) optimistic I am coming into 2022, but maybe that’s the mystique of starting a new year. I know in the back of my mind that there is always a chance that I won’t get the fresh start when I want it, and that I won’t always have control of my mental or physical health along the way. But life is too unpredictable to be weighed down by should’s, and by acknowledging this little fact, I’m already starting the new year off better than the last.
Third time walking into the pandemic battle field. Shrapnel, healed wounds and new armor. All I can do is pray for the best and do what I can. In the meantime, my anxiety and I can agree that should’s matter as much as a delayed new year.
Whitney Hill is Founder and Director of SPORK! During the day she works as an Accessibility Specialist, serves on Chicago’s public transit (CTA) ADA advisory board, is a member of Disability Lead, a board member of 3Arts and appointed member to Governor Pritzker Blind Services Planning Council. At night she practices being human and works on self-care.
If you or someone you know is suicidal or in emotional distress, contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline (1-800-273-8255). Trained crisis workers are available to talk 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Your confidential and toll-free call goes to the nearest crisis center in the Lifeline national network. These centers provide crisis counseling and mental health referrals.
If you live in Illinois: The Call4Calm program launched by the Human Services Mental Health Division provides residents wanting to speak to a mental health care professional. For this free service you can text the word “TALK” to 552020.
Cover Photo: Livia Falcaru
*Audio Narration Coming Soon