depression – Patricia Elliott

Starting Over…

When I was 41, my husband left me. Over time, he wanted to come back, but I refused to let him return home, unless he got help with his addictions and anger. But I should have acknowledged by that point that my marriage was over and had been for a long time. We’d been married for 21 years, but it wasn’t going well. He had gotten into some stuff that wasn’t good or safe for myself or the kids. Three years passed and soon it was 2022, and I got the fateful call. The stuff he had gotten into had killed him, and I was a widow at just 44 years old. Fentanyl had taken another life.

Now, not only was I trying to figure out who I was as a woman, I was also trying to figure out who I was as a widow, and now officially single. What kind of life did I want for myself? Who did I want to be? What kind of example did I want to set for my kids? In life, we are going to face all sorts of disappointments and traumatic situations, and when we do, we have a choice to make. We can rise to the challenge or we can fall. We can choose to let depression take over and wallow in our miserable existence, or we can make a decision to live. I found that when the hard times hit, my mindset was everything.

That isn’t to say that you don’t allow yourself to mourn or that you don’t deal with negative emotions, but you also know that your life is going to be what you make it. Life isn’t just our sad times or our bad times, so you either learn to rise and rebuild or you let them destroy you. Hard times are inevitable. We can’t get through life without hard times, but how we respond or what we choose to do when they happen will make or break us.

So I rose up. I made a change to a better job with better pay. I mourned for my husband, and then I chose to find love again. This time, I knew what I wanted and what I didn’t want in a relationship. I wanted someone who would step up and be a true partner, and not act like another child. I wanted someone who knew what they wanted out of life and was already established. I wanted someone who was kind and gentle and knew how to handle their anger. Someone who would never take it out on me and wouldn’t abuse me when they were angry.

I started dating for the first time in 24 years. I met some nice guys, who I saw more than once, and then others, who, quite frankly, gave me the willies. And then when one guy said he didn’t think it was going to work out after two months, I met an incredible man on Bumble. I know this is probably cliché, but I could see the beauty of his soul in his eyes. He’d faced hardships in this life, but he didn’t allow those to define him. He rose above them just like I had. He takes care of me and is super supportive. Even after a busy day, he doesn’t come home to sleep. He invests his time to help around the house and spends quality time with me. He doesn’t live all his life on a video game or with his nose in his phone. He’s present with me and I love him incredibly. He wants to help my kids be the best version of themselves and invests his time to help them. I couldn’t ask for a better man in my life.

I never thought that love could be this way. I’m able to share my feelings and not worry about getting my head chewed off, and he’s receptive to my fears. Sometimes I still feel like the other shoe is going to drop, and I know he sometimes worries about the same, but honestly, we’re so similar, but different enough, that it just works so amazingly. When my dad died, he was there for me. He took care of stuff around the house and took care of me while I processed what happened.

I guess I’m kind of rambling, but the point I wanted to make is that, no matter your age, you can start over. It’s not the end of the road when something tragic happens, it’s a vehicle to create change. How your life turns out really depends on your mindset. If you believe the world is out to get you and always complain about everything, that’s exactly what will happen because it’s all you train yourself to see. My husband had that mentality, and it fostered such a bad temperament that it was draining. You need to surround yourself with people who want to reach for the stars.

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“I hate my life.”

“Why do other people have it easier than me?”

“I hate my job”

Our thoughts are full of negative comments. If we wrote down every negative word that took up residence in our thoughts, they would probably fill an entire book. And most of the time, we let them sit there and fester, creating more and more negativity until we are down in the dumps, curled on the couch with frown on our face, wanting to hide from the world.

Some people will tell you to take actions in your life to change what you hate. Hate your job, get a new one? Someone who hates their life may leave their spouse in search of the grass being greener on the other side.

But I say it’s not always our life that we have to change as such. We could have the greatest life, yet still be down in the dumps. Because it’s not really our life that has us depressed. It’s the way we allow ourselves to think. That is why when someone attempts to make physical changes in their life, they may be happy for a bit, but it won’t last. The negative thoughts will come back as strong as ever, and they can’t figure out what the heck is happening and why they aren’t content. So the cycle begins again as they seek to find the one thing that can make them happy. But it won’t work.

To change our life, the first thing we have to change is our mindset…our thought patterns. We have to stop saying things like, “I hate my life” Or “If only I had this, then I’d be happy.” We need to filter out the negative words before they ingrain themselves in our mind.

And while we can’t necessarily control what we think, we can control whether we accept it. We can be mindful of when negativity pops into our head and counter it with better words, positive words. We can retrain our brain to accept better information.

Shouldn’t this year be the year we do that? The year to stop letting negative thoughts overcrowd our minds. What if when you hear that first negative word, you say “Stop, not today! Today, I’m gonna love my life. I’m gonna live, and I’m gonna breathe. I’m gonna look for something amazing in today.”

When you can start to train your mind to see the beautiful things, the positive things, then they become your focus and while life may not perfect, you’ll start to see amazing things at the perfect time. And contentment will follow. But it all starts inside you.

Your emotions will mirror the way you allow yourself to think. I chose this year to be the year of less negative thinking. What about you?

Tag: depression

When I Was 41, My Husband Left Me

Change It!