This is a Really Real Mental Health Post.

(Trigger Warning: Mention of past suicide plan)

I came home from the hospital yesterday.

I walked into an empty sink and empty trash, but there were still obvious signs of my depression.

I needed them gone.  I needed to pick up the pieces that I had left scattered around as my brain fell apart around me.  I needed to sweep away the evidence that showed I was gone for almost a week. I needed the house to return to normal as quickly as possible.

I needed to reclaim my space.

I was exhausted but driven by a need that I couldn’t put words to. I hadn’t yet figured out why I was straightening the kitchen and cleaning out the fridge.  Why I was changing the litter and cleaning my desk. Why I was cleaning my craft room and doing my laundry.

I just wanted to sit down and play with relaxing things that I hadn’t had access to all week and I couldn’t let myself.

So I kept going through the house, cleaning this and that, working from one thing to the next until I had finished picking up all of the pieces left behind by my depression.  Until I had finished putting everything back in order.

We returned the 365 count bottle of Benadryl that I bought that last day home (with every intent of ingesting it along with a bottle of wine). We discussed whether or not any of my new meds were dangerous enough to be locked away.

And then we got dinner at the one place I had been craving the entire time I was eating hospital food (RoFo Fried Chicken of all things). And we got me the first real coffee I’d had in nearly a week (Holy Shit I missed coffee).

I sorted my meds for the coming week with the new dosages in place.

Eventually, everything was done, I felt like I had picked up all of the pieces.  I went to bed knowing I had wiped the slate clean.

From this episode.