Let’s see if the “Third Time’s the Charm”: A ‘Mea Culpa’, a Lesson in Humility, and a Plan for the Future
By: Guadalupe González Overall
Tags: Philosophy, Self Improvement, Mental Health, Personal Essay

Your feedback helps me have a better understanding about how to improve my approach and my writing so that I can make this project as successful as possible. A big heartfelt “Thank you!!!” to everyone who’s weighed in. Please never stop. Now, here are a few things I’ve learned, a few things that have happened, and what they mean for us moving forward.

WARNING: Opinion piece ahead. Read this before going in.

NOTE: To be clear, I am writing these blogposts mostly for me. However, I am publishing them online with the hopes that the topics I’m writing and thinking about resonate with you no matter how different our life experiences are. I am hoping my unsolicited advice will somehow bring you peace, joy, and help you become happier in life, or at the very least allow you to consider an alternative path or point of view. I say this because I’m writing about things I’ve learned that have helped me attain serenity and happiness. I’m so eager to share these tools because it has been *really* hard getting where I am, and now that I’m living in Cloud9 full-time, I want everyone to hurry up and move here with me. I am also, and intentionally, writing this particular post for my husband, James. He is the love of my life — my forever one and only— and the funniest, most patient, most selfless, most devoted, and, crucially, the most self-conscious and most self-aware human being I’ve ever met in my life (way more self-aware than I currently am, that’s for sure). James, mi amor, I know I‘m always telling you how much I love you, and how much I’ll never stop loving you. I realize that, because I say it so often, sometimes it may seem like I’m sputtering out words without giving them any thought. Let me assure you: I’m not. Forgetfulness is my weakness, you already know this (by heart). The thing is — sometimes — I forget that you already know how much I love you, and so I keep reminding you all the time, because I really don’t want you to ever, ever forget. I will remain eternally grateful (and thankful) for your infinite wisdom, your infinite patience, your continued support, and — most of all — your bountiful, never-ending, unconditional love. We’re so lucky our friends and the universe brought us together. (Like our song says: 🎶“I don’t [ever] want to be somebody, without your body, cloooooooose toooo Meeeeeeeee” 🎶) I love you, mi amor, I really fucking do, and I know you already know it but I still wanna say it. I also know that you love me just as much as I love you, and that’s because you show it to me every single day. Te amo forever ever my love, my amor, 💖 mi James 💖.

This gif of Matryoshka dolls is a perfect representation of how my brain works. I’m someone who can easily spot the forest but has a harder time focusing on or noticing the trees. Using the Russian dolls as an example, I can understand complex theories and ideas (big Matryoshka doll containing everything) but it’s harder or it takes me longer to grasp the little details (individual, littlest Russian doll), which some would consider to be the “easy” stuff. I think people generally learn new ideas by going from the particular to general, in other words, most people see the trees and then notice the forest. My brain works backwards. Giphy from CecyMeade, retrieved on December 12, 2020.

First of all, I owe all of you an apology: I’m sorry.

I’m sorry it took me three posts (and an unexpected hospital staycation) to realize that I’ve been spreading myself too thin. I’ve been running around — racing no one at all except maybe my own shadow— trying to get out all the thoughts bubbling inside my head as quickly as possible. I’m sorry I didn’t realize I was asking you to follow along my “Big Ideas” without ever sharing the theories (i.e. “building blocks”) that inspired them. I’m really sorry it took me this long to figure it out, and be warned, it’s still probably going to take me some more time to get it all sorted. (Time and I have a funny, and complicated affair. We’re working on it. We’re always working on it.)

Now, finally, I’m coming to terms with the fact that it’s OK to slow down, and that it’s time for me to do so. I’ve already started, as I’ve delayed finishing this post multiple times now, always in favor of living life more fully (more details about this up ahead.)

For those of you who are starting to know me, you should know that I’m known for attempting to do a million things at once. I’m sure, or at least I hope, that a lot of you can relate to this penchant for multitasking. At work, I take on more than my own assignments. I also volunteer to help do the things no one else wants to do. In my personal life, I listen to and help out my friends and family whenever they’re in need, especially making sure to reach out when I can tell that they are struggling and uncomfortable asking me or anyone else for help. I do these things willingly and happily, because being of service and helping others are a main driver of what makes me happy. That said, humans are generally built with one brain and two arms, and if you try to have one eye looking out one way while the other one looks in the other direction, you get a headache. We’re not chameleons (though I really strive to be one). What I mean by this is that my whole life I’ve struggled with wanting to do too many things at once, and for the most part, because I haven’t quite figured out to slow down time to be able to do everything I want to do, I end up hurting someone(s). This time around I ended up hurting myself, and by extension, everyone who cares about me.

Allow me to explain: Last week, I did a 9-day stint at the hospital. My husband took me to the ER on Saturday morning — the one after Thanksgiving — because I was having trouble telling apart my dreams from reality. For example, at one point I thought James was telling me I was African American, but in reality I was hearing dialogue from a movie that was playing in the background (‘The Help’). For some reason, I thought that my husband was the one saying the stuff coming out of the TV. Obviously, he was not.

Something fractured in the flow of my synapsis which made it impossible for me to distinguish between a dreamlike state and our reality. Think back to when you’ve been dozing off or are about to go to sleep while you’re also listening to your surroundings. Those moments when you’re not quite awake but you’re not quite asleep either. It’s that middle stage where you may imagine things are happening in the real world but they are actually only happening inside your head, in your imagination and dreams. That’s a little bit of what happened to me. Except I was “conscious,” walking in the real world, experiencing everything as I would in a dream. As though I was a character in Inception, Rick & Morty, or The Matrix. It would’ve been cool if it wasn’t so fucking frightening to know that I was walking around unaware that I couldn’t tell the difference between hallucinations and reality. (Our brains are really powerful, you know?)

Days before our ER visit, I had told my husband that I figured out how to get the high without the drug (meaning weed or THC), and I have. I’m not quite ready to explain my methods, because practicing this landed me in the ER with a fractured psyche and scared the shit out of my dear husband. So I’m hitting pause on that for a little bit.

Doctors are still trying to figure out exactly what happened, so there’s no “official” diagnosis. The working theory is that I could be bipolar, except I don’t really fit the traditional or classical/textbook definition of the disease, so maybe not. Again, the jury is still out. I’ll let you know as soon as I know.

I am OK now, in case you’re worried. Thank you for worrying, I really am OK.

What prompted the fracture? Well, there are a myriad of potential factors. For one, I still had COVID-19, a month after I had first tested positive. Long story short, I contracted it at my November 1 fairy-tale Vegas wedding (because it’s 2020 something had to go wrong, even with all the precautions in place, and believe me, we took every precaution for our very small wedding). I was also having trouble sleeping, eating poorly and at odd hours, as I stressed over my loved ones’ troubles and neglected exercising because of it.

My mother, a doctor, found several studies showing that in some cases COVID has been found to cause hallucinations. But the doctors at the hospital where I was admitted, while acknowledging I was still testing positive for COVID and putting me in isolation because of it, told me that because I wasn’t on a respirator and my lab work seemed fine, there was no need for them to treat the disease outright. (CDC guidelines say you’re only infectious for the first 10 days after testing positive, so the doctors weren’t too worried about it. Instead my treatment has been focused on my mental state, which I think is fine now. But again, doctors are still trying to figure out exactly what caused my “dissonance.”)

I wouldn’t wish on anyone the experience that I lived. I was locked up for nine days, isolated, in a psych ward where people were yelling crazy shit day and night and I had no one except myself to keep me company. I had access to a wireless phone with spotty reception I used to call my husband now and again, and sometimes even a tablet where I listened to music while I colored some mandalas that a social worker gave me to entertain myself. I also watched movies on Netflix, the only streaming app that worked on the device even though it had Hulu too. I read some books that were there, including the Bible. I prayed.

In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t fun. At times, when the song Hotel California would come on, I thought I might even die there. It was a really low point, but if I’m honest, it hasn’t been the worst experience I’ve had in 2020, this stupidly obnoxious year outta Hell. I think many of you might have had worse experiences too.

Anyway, that was part of what happened in the past few weeks I’ve been away. I’ll say it again: I’m OK. I’m following doctors’ orders, taking medicines, going to therapy and exercising. I’m also going on walks with my mom, who came to visit, and in her own way, nurse me back to health. We’ll be spending Christmas together and I’m very excited about this. Plus, James and I decorated our first Christmas tree as a married couple. I have this blog, my outlet, and I have you, my friends, and readers. I also *finally* tested negative for Covid-19 this past week. Life is good.

Our first Christmas tree together, which we are almost done decorating. James’s stocking is out of frame. Photo taken December 16, 2020, edited on Paint.

Now that you know all that, let’s get back to business.