Interestingly, this autumn we have seen the least sunlight in a long time and tonight there is not only a new moon, but a solar eclipse. The dark side is making its statement, it is inviting us to journey.
This is my exploration into Novembers past.
I remember a night in early November when I was in my mid twenties , I awoke with a strange cramping. Menstrual cramping was nothing new to me so I thought nothing of it. My cycle had never been regular and my flow never even. Several hours seemed to pass and the cramping came and went. Finally, a smooth sac-like dark blob came out of me and the cramping subsided. Relieved that it was over for the night, I went to sleep.
Later November that year brought a road trip. Excited to be on an adventure, but knowing that lack of sleep does strange things to me. Somewhere along the way I started to weep. The weeping became crying, the crying sobbing and the sobbing turned into wailing. My friends asked me what was wrong. I had no idea, I just cried more. No idea what was causing this emotional outburst. Unable to control it. Not able to calm down. Hysteria took over as I became afraid. I shook. I froze. I breathed with quickened breath. The only thing I knew was that I just wanted someone to hold me in silence. Exhausted, I finally fell asleep. The next day, everything was back to normal. No one uttered a word about what had happened the previous night.
It went on like this for several months...out of no where a wave of emotion would come over me and I would start crying. Sometimes it was accompanied by erratic behaviour or hysteria. It would happen at night in my bed, in the middle of my shift at work, watching a movie with my boyfriend. It took me about a year to figure out that these were panic attacks. It took me almost a decade to realize that they were initially triggered by an early term miscarriage. (Yes, it took me that long to admit that I had an undetected pregnancy).
November several years later, is the month I entered a full blown depressive state. Depression is not a blackness or a darkness - it is nothing. It is a void. It is the absence of feeling. It brings irrational thoughts. It brings a search for feeling anything at any cost. It hurts. It pains. It doesn't go away. You alternate between wanting to turn the pain off and rejoicing in the fact that misery is a feeling. I remember sitting in my apartment on my hands in front of a candle - wanting to put my arms in the flame just so I could feel something different. Knowing that once I started, I would not be able to stop. Day dreams of walking in front of a bus. Fascinated by the glint of a sharp edge. Taking a bunch of pain killers and chasing it with liquor of some sort and then staying up all night afraid that if I ever fell asleep I would not wake up. Then doing it all again a few days later.
November is also the month I lost my father. Sadly it is true, you never know how much someone means to you until they are gone. My last memory of him is my son feeding him ice cubes in the hospital and my husband giving him a shave. I remember my pregnant belly getting in the way as I hugged him good-bye and promising to come visit tomorrow. The next morning when the phone rang at 7 am I already knew I would not be keeping that promise.
November is a month of darkness. This year, I am willingly looking into the shadows in an effort to understand them. It is not the darkness we need fear, it is the unknown - the unknown within.
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