Hatsuyume.

Hatsuyume, in Japanese culture, is the first dream of the new year. Traditionally, it is thought that the contents of the dream with foretell the luck of the dreamer in the ensuing year.

On the night of new years this past year, I dreamed I was at a grocery store. I looked up from checking out, and Jordan was standing at the door. We locked eyes. I hadn't seen him or talked to him in years. We said nothing. My dream ended.

I had gone to sleep excited to have my first dream, particularly because of an upcoming trip to Japan planned for that May. You can imagine how perplexed I was that my hatsuyume was a dream about someone who I hadn't spoken with in so long. 

What is perhaps even stranger, is the fact that this dream did, indeed, foretell my year, in the truest way possible. 

This year deserves a summary if any ever did. While it is a marker for the world's history books: it also marks a particularly large and momentous chapter in my own book. I remember the 31st of December, 2019 and how jubilant I felt: I, like so many others, dressed in my best interpretation of the '20's and celebrated a year that I couldn't have yet realized would completely strip me of my then-current self. I had a lot to look forward to: a 3-week trip to Japan, my new job, weddings, Dragon Con, and my then-husband applying to medical school, which would shape the future of our life: would it remain in Atlanta? Or somewhere far off? Part of me mourned the thought of leaving the first place I'd ever truly called my home. The other, couldn't quell an itch of desire for some other adventure in life, something to make me feel like I wasn't just stuck where I was at, which I suppose is common to your mid to late twenties when you're settled and in your career. The old familiar "what's next?" will always come creeping up to visit you and make you ponder where you are at.

I, like every one else, never pictured a pandemic affecting us. I read the news like everyone else. I looked on with concern at the headlines about the virus, but it was something far away that I never considered would affect me. We booked our tickets to Japan, figuring it would all blow over. Then the news many of us here dreaded: the first case in Georgia. It felt solemn. That far-off virus was here now, and I didn't know what it meant. But I quickly learned. $800 worth of gigs cancelled that second week in March. I thought that was bad. But then, they all cancelled. Every single one. My extra income was eliminated in almost 3 days' time. And then, it started happening at work. Patients called to cancel. They were too afraid to come in. There were no new evaluations. Things screeched to a halt, and somehow I had to figure out how to make it work. My hours were cut drastically. I was in charge of building a caseload, and I was new to my job, too: and I had 3 patients left. I was fairly powerless to change it. People were just scared. I drove to Newnan almost every day to help at another building, just to get hours. The coping mechanisms I would normally use to get by were gone. I couldn't spend time with friends. We had to cancel our Japan trip, finally. Weddings were postponed. Church no longer met in person. The gym was closed. The only thing that really kept me going were my daily walks on the beltline and freedom park trail, and even those threatened to close. I was so relieved that they didn't. 

I did worry about our income, but did my best to manage with virtual princess calls here and there. I invested a large portion of money when the stock market took a giant dip, and I stressed about it greatly... but thankfully it seemed to be the right call after several months, despite losing quite a bit of sleep over it. One good thing that came out of it all was that I finally understood how refreshing that having an entire weekend off was. I hadn't had any consecutive weekends of in years due to my tenure as a princess. I realized that much of my anxiety was due to chronic overworking. Truth be told, prior to the pandemic, my anxiety was getting overwhelming. On my lunch breaks, I would shut the door to the clinic and lay on my back on the mat, breathing, eyes closed, willing my anxiety to quell. I tried CBD. I tried lemon balm. It helped a little. But I was still so anxious. Taking the weekends off honestly got rid of a huge amount of my anxiety. And that is something I will carry with me even after this all ends: learning to not overbook myself. Being selective about gigs. Resting. I learned to stay still. It's a surprisingly hard task. 

But as for many of us, the pandemic had its sinister side for me personally. It brought up a great deal of hurt and questioning that I had buried deep inside of me for years. Suddenly, without coping mechanics to quell it, it was right at the forefront. A lot of hurt having to do with my marriage. I had a great deal of insecurity about things: had I gotten married too young? Had I married someone I didn't know? I'm not sure I was too young, because trauma has a way of maturing you, and I've had my share and had to mature more quickly than many of my peers. But I did know that I had married someone I didn't know. I had known that for years. But I didn't want to admit it. We tried, time and time again, to address our issues with counseling. Me: codependency. The hurt from my father. The walls I built. Poor conflict management strategies. Poor communication. And him: alcohol. The thing that had haunted us for years. The one thing I hadn't known about going into our marriage. The one thing that would haver changed everything, had I known about it. I have carried so much guilt over it all for years, and truthfully I hesitate to write about it now, lest I seem like I'm just trying to drag my ex-husband through the mud. He deserves to tell his version of his story, same as I am free to tell my story, too. Because there are different versions. There's the woman who become cold, distant, and angry when she found out. There were the times she picked him up, having gotten a call, and he was a person he wouldn't even remember the next day, and she screamed at him. She was the woman who held it inside and decided to talk to someone else about it while questioning if she should be in that marriage. There was the woman who tried to, sometimes begrudgingly, do counseling at his bequest, insisting she didn't need it when she really did, but wasn't ready to open up yet. The woman who pinned all the blame on him. Who carried her anger and let it make her become someone he hadn't married: waiting for him to slip up. Picking after every trait she disliked. Realizing she'd made a mistake, just 6 months after getting married. But not having the strength to say so. She stayed. It was the Godly thing to do. She had to make it work. She hurt because of that decision to not be honest. To fully confront her pain. To heal. She became resentful. And he felt like he walked on eggshells because of it. 

The result of carrying so much hurt but choosing to hold it in to avoid hurting the person I loved was that I had threatened to end things several times over the years. And then this year, after being stripped of almost everything I knew: it happened for the last time. Except this time, there was no going back. Belongings were packed. Leases were signed. Tears were cried. Arguments ensued. Promises were made, later broken. She told no one, because she didn't truly believe it was the end. But as the long summer stretched by, and then the papers came one day, she finally had to let go. 

It was more painful than I could have imagined. There were days when it first happened, that I could barely will myself out of bed. That's when I realized I needed help. I got a psychiatrist. I bought every book on codependency and healing marriages I could find. I attended counseling steadfastly. I picked up new hobbies, forced myself to push down my walls and let my friends and family help me, despite wanting to ball up and fade, alone, in my condo. I thought the pain was so great that I couldn't make it. I would sit some days with the weight of it all, feeling my heart crush underneath my chest, and hurt me with every beat. I would pray on my hands and knees and cry to God, wiling him to hear my truest confessions and apologies. I thought it was for him, but he couldn't be brought back. 

But I could. 

I look back on this year, and I am so proud. I have grown more in 8 months than I did in the past several years. I broke painful cycles of codependency, and while I still struggle, I am learning to be happy in solitude, and happy with who I am. I still have my bad days. I struggle with inadequacy. I struggle with not being around the person I love 24/7, because the codependency I deal with makes me want to find my meaning in the person I love, and I have to wrestle with myself to not do that. I struggle with loneliness, and waking up in an empty bed. These things linger, and I will likely struggle with them my whole life: but like a chronic illness, I can get better at managing them, and I know I can thrive.

There was happiness in the last 5 and a half years. I discovered all the ways in which I loved my city. I looked out at the vast expanse of Chicago from stories up and explored the streets to my hearts content. A smile a mile wide spread across my face all the times I got to dance. I hiked mountains in Colombia, and rang in New Years atop a belltower in Prague. I listened I Wish I Was the Moon played on guitar more times than I could count and felt it resonate in my heart. The wind in our hair atop the lighthouse. The make-up birthday hike. Slow dances to La Vie en Rose. He was a good person. There were good times. There were bad ones. He did flawed things at times. I did flawed things at times. I did not feel like a good person, much of the time. There was great sadness in the last 5 and a half years. The pain of watching the person you love lose themselves to something when they can't entirely help it, and having been taken my surprise by it, is immeasurable. I felt my heart die and resurrect itself again over many times, trying to struggle with my feelings over it, and ultimately it was our undoing. Too great for me to bear, and too great for him to continue with me. It will be okay. Sometimes, forever doesn't mean forever. Sometimes, it's a lifetime in a few years: the birth, life, and death of a great love, teaching us its lessons and pushing us onwards to continue in another life when its time has come to end. I see now that this was how it was meant to be. I see now, in many ways, that this needed to happen, to teach me what I needed to learn. And so I am grateful.

There is happiness to come. Jordan has been my truest friend for almost 10 years: the man I could never forget, no matter where life took us, in its twists and turns and separate directions. His counsel has rang true on far more than one occasion, and I knew that if I ever needed help, he would always be there for me, in spite of how my choices impacted him. After everything happened this year, and we reconnected, it felt like the most natural thing in the world that we should be together. It felt as though, perhaps, it was always supposed to be this way. But I had had to find myself first. He was still there at the end of that road, after our paths had diverged, and finally when they came back together. And that in and of itself is a miraculous thing.

Tonight I take the last of my antidepressants, which I have been weaning myself off of this month. It is symbolic for me. It has not been an easy month, no longer having that cushion to dull the sometimes difficult to bear highs and lows. I did not even mean to time it to the end of the year, but I believe that it is rather fitting that I should close out 2020 by finishing the last of them. I have felt more fragile this month than I have in past months this year. But this year has made me strong, and I know that I will be okay. It's time to be who this year has made me. It's time to take all my lessons I have learned, and move forward. 

I am ready.

And my dreams in this new year? I will listen to them. They appear to hold some truth, after all.