This too shall pass, but until it does...

If I'm going to get down to the heart of matters, I must admit that my blog tone is mostly one of emotional turmoil. This has been my release over the past 8 months. Nursing the loss of a job, coping with the loss of a live-in relationship, learning how to deal with anxiety and fear, looking at some family stuff and then every once in a while being goofy and fun, letting my hair hang down and letting other people really see what goes on in this mind of mine. As I've said time and time again, I have tried to remember always to write for myself, no matter what the outcome. And since writing has always saved me during times of confusion, my writing is often chaotic and negative-sounding.

Today, however, I'm writing for a different reason. Today I am excited my friends. I am joyous. I feel grateful.

I am sitting at work (oops) and finishing various projects. I am smiling at those who are walking by me, I am making faces at one of my friends who is giving a presentation in the conference room next to me. And it dawns on me. I am beginning to evolve. Into someone that I sometimes do not recognize. I have become part of a company. I have found pride in my work (something I never thought was possible in the corporate world). I have been asked many times where I'd like to go here at this company. I have never been given that type of opportunity before. "Adia, where do YOU SEE YOURSELF. Let us know." Really?? That's a gift.

In my personal life, I have begun to truly adore someone and in adoring them I am accepting their strangeness rather than trying to control them and mold them into who I want them to be. I am looking forward to the future.

I just moved to a fantastic neighborhood and I can't tell you how excited I am for the weekend to roll around just because I feel like there are so many possibilities for me, so many places that I can choose to go. I am not pigeon-holed. I have watched my Madeline come into her own since we've moved. She's stable, she's comfortable, she's happy. I've written here time and time again that my dog is like my daughter, so the pride I have in seeing her flourish is unexplainable and misunderstood to anyone that does not have a close relationship with their dog or does not have a dog at all.

I have begun to feel okay with accepting my anxiety and my fears as part of me and I am trying to take action to make myself better. I do gloat and stay stagnant when I'm suffering because sometimes I feel so paralyzed by it. That's when I need to take the bull by the horns and fight back. And I have. And I've asked others for help. I keep my fingers crossed in saying that I pray that I'm reaching the light at the end of the tunnel with these panic attacks.

Last but not least, I found a picture of my father and my little sister on my computer last night. I have a MacBook and there's an application called "Photo Booth" where you can take pictures of yourself and add distorted layers to them. The photo of my sister and father was so ridiculously hilarious that I wanted to go through the screen and hug them right then and there. They used the "stretch" effect and my Dad's face looked like the shape of a building block. My sister's eye was like a fish eye, vertically longer than it was wide. They took this picture the day the entire family showed up to help me move to my new place, supporting this change they all knew I needed. I felt so freaking great; there was a time when no one would have wanted to come around me because I was not very nice to be around. That's not the case anymore. And it's fantastic.

The sad thing is, but also the realistic thing is, this too shall pass. This burst of positivity and intense gratitude will slowly dissipate. But while it's here, to me it's worth documenting.