Recently I had a bit of a revelation. As you may know I am the assistant manager at my job. What you may not know is that I don't always feel like I've earned it. I sometime feel like everything I'm doing is wrong. That I'm failing in every aspect of my job. I can look around and 'see' that I'm doing my job just fine and the store is not failing because of me but I still 'feel' it. So I put as much effort as I can into the store because not doing so make me feel like a failure. Everything that goes wrong feels like someone telling me I'm doing a bad job, whether or not it's something I can control.

I've learned to deal with these feelings and thoughts. Somedays are worse than others. Somedays I feel fine. Others I cry in the bathroom.

The other day was a bad day. First there was an email about a customer complaint. Then another customer came to the store about a cake we had messed up. And then another one called about another cake we had messed up. None of these complaints were my fault but I still felt like I was being told I sucked at doing my job. I tried very hard not to break down. But I couldn't not break down so I went to the bathroom and had myself a cry. Afterward I felt better for having letting it out.

I bought a book called The Depression Handbook. I thought it might help and if I had bought it five years ago it might have been of some help. Today I'm beyond that book in dealing with my depression. Every tip and trick and all helpful advice that fills it are things I've taught myself over the past few years. On one hand I feel good that I am managing my depression fairly well. On the other hand I'm like, "Is this as good as it gets? Am I going to feel like this till I die?" I wanted to see that the path goes on and instead I got a map to where I am now. When I was done reading the book I threw it across the room. Not a very mature response I know but it was how I felt at the time. I wish I had had some sort of realization about where I was headed, some sort of positive message to end on but I didn't.

I'm just typing sweet nothings to any who read this to let you know I'm still alive.