Love, CharenLeigh

Happy Fall Y’all!!

Isn’t that what we all say “happy” fall? Not for everyone though. Fall is not always a happy time in peoples lives.

My heart strings have been being pulled towards telling you all about seasonal triggers. The fall and winter months have always been my very favorite part of my life. My birthday falls in January plus its the start of a new year. December has Christmas, family time, with old traditions falling every weekend. November is thanksgiving with more family time and you start preparing for the end of the year. October is Halloween, and growing up there was always fall festivals and church events that followed around this month. September is my baby sisters birthday, so we are always celebrating that, along with a few other best friends whose birthdays come along the months in fall and in winter. It has always been my time to reconnect with family and friends. A true joyous occasion is always had, or should I say use to have. Fall is now big and scary. It sends me into overdrive and I start catching myself making toxic decisions to try and avoid the subconscious triggers. Triggers that the affects of what happened to me years ago start streaming in.

Side note, I have not wrote much in here due to lack of time or lack of diligence. You can clearly see I beat myself up for lots of different things, but I did not realize how much this actually helps me talk about my issues with you all and also how it releases them into the atmosphere and out of my brain. One of the key to my triggers is releasing them instead of trying to hold them in at all times.

Seasonal triggers, or some people know it as SAD. SAD stands for Seasonal Affective Disorder.  Seasonal affective disorder (SAD) is a type of depression that’s related to changes in seasons — SAD begins and ends at about the same times every year. If you’re like most people with SAD, your symptoms start in the fall and continue into the winter months, sapping your energy and making you feel moody.

The months that use to be my favorite are now my worst enemies, I try every year to set my self up so nicely but then comes those months that scare me the most. I am still in school at age 2; I have to admit to people who thought so highly of me that I still have not figured out what I want to do with my life exactly. I allow the thoughts of not being good enough, of failure, plus allowing my anxiety and depression to get the best of me all over again. I learned it was not always me but sometimes this time of year is also bad for a lot of others. Meeting up with family you have not seen in years to remind them, no you have no accomplished that goal. To having family members who made the holidays meaningful now moved away, or passed. To your birthday coming around again and you still are not where you thought you would be at this point in life. You may not have a significant other to share the holidays with and maybe even not having your own little family is what is holding you back. Maybe it is financial burdens that the fall and winters month bring. We all deal with something like this during the fall and winter months. It stinks and sucks. I know because I go through all this too. We all have our own little story. Our own enemies that are triggered during these months.

One of the very first things I do to try and counteract these feelings, emotions, and thoughts is to recognize them. Recognizing them in time before you fall into that “hole”. By the way it is possible to get back out of that hole but I have tried to reach the point to not hang over the edge and taunt myself with falling in either. Ask for help if you recognize but do not know the next steps. Professional or non professional just tell someone how you feel. If that person does not understand just try and go to someone you know deals with the similar things, or even a stranger who has mentioned things of the such in the past. I am always open to talk, but I also may refer you to a professional also. I have a counselor I see, and she already knows this is the time of year where stress and my thoughts take over and I start to overthink small things. She is a huge part of my progress and a huge reason I do not fall head first anymore. I identify my problems and bring them to her so she can help me conquer them.

Remind yourself, that this is not normal, that this is not something you  have to live with. There are ways to tackle all of this. That is the second thing I do after I recognize my issue. I try to tackle it. I take what I have been taught from overcoming past issues and start doing them. Even if the time and place seems irrelevant, just do them. I pick up one of my go to books for starters, “Battleship of the Mind”. I do not reread the book every year but I skim through all the highlights and notes and remind myself just how far I have came. I reread certain paragraphs and see that it is again just my mind playing tricks on me. I start to identify ways that I went wrong again and how I allowed stress to take over my spare time instead of investing that spare time in the things I know will continue to help me. I start to journal diligently my thoughts whether good or bad. I write everything down, my goals, my to-do lists, etc. Writing things down for me brings them into perspective. 

I am not saying it will be easy, but I am saying all this to remind myself and you all that it is something you can overcome. Each year will get better, you have to remember the steps you took each year. You will start to recognize things earlier and handle them quicker. Honestly one day we will not even realize it, but for once we did not sink into the hole again. That in itself is what will help you see that another year of tackling battles actually has molded you into a stronger human in this cruel world.