Hi hi blog,

I have a heavy digital footprint across all areas of the internet but in a anonymous way. I remember my benzo blog fondly, because I'm pretty sure the anesthesia they gave me for jaw surgery had something in it. Either was, I was a wretch for a week! And now I'm back to sleeping well.

It has been my dream of 10 years to get plastic surgery for my jaw, and nose, and eyes... And I've done all of that after getting off the benzos! I knew I would be too sick while I was on them. I wish I had done it sooner. My self confidence is through the roof. 

I was broken up with a month ago. Life starts anew. I feel more resilient now than ever. I actually feel curious and engaged with life, and I thought that that relationship, however toxic and stressful and damaging it was, it was also beautiful in many ways and I was glad to have experienced it. I hope to only get healthier and happier so that the next one is better. For now I am focusing on improving myself some more. Not that I am even a project to be improved upon! 

I've been thinking about some new mindsets later, less extreme ones. Rather than wanting to be great! ( a form of coping with insecurity and trauma) I've been thinking of being ordinary. The goal is ordinary. Not average, normal, or everybody else. But just, ordinary. Being broken up with is an ordinary part of life. Not a great tragedy. I actually really liked feeling that normalcy. Feeling like a late bloomer who was never loved is an "extreme" feeling, or wanting "the greatest romance ever experienced" is also an extreme thing. Wanting to have "exactly 4 relationships in my 20s like everybody else" is being "normal" or "getting married at 28" is "average", but "wanting a relationship that is appropriate to my life path, growth and personality" is what I mean by being ordinary. It actually feels really good to be broken up with, it feels like an ordinary experience. Having been through benzos most of my early 20s and tapering in my mid twenties, that was an alienating and lonely experience. That didn't feel ordinary. So in comparison, having a breakup was less extreme than being on the benzos.

I feel like no where else on the internet can people relate to how benzos shake up your life. To all respects, I look like a normal person. I go about my day, I set goals, I do them, I go to school, I plan what I want to eat, what I want to wear, buy, etc. Yet, there are all these strange things that affect me because I've been through benzos, and probably some form of c-ptsd that lead to the benzos. Like, after surgery, I was dizzy again, like I used to be that lead to the benzos. I do have lots of coping skills now, including knowing that the dizziness is temporary, due to just having had major surgery. But I can't really talk about it to other plastic surgery enthusiasts, because they might be private about their benzos or have never been on it. So the surgery was a little harder on me because of it. But it might be harder on someone else, because their body is weaker due to chronic stress or autoimmune. 

I really think the benzos also had an influence on that relationship. I had gotten into it when I was just fragile and newly out of benzos. I didn't have experience, I didn't have a healed and healthy mind yet. And it's still healing and becoming better every day. 

The positive mindset I have had to nurture in order to get through it all has been paying dividends every day. I see new thoughts, new connections, and experience a depth of wonder, beauty, curiosity, and joy that I only felt numb on with the meds. There is even a hint of beauty in the sadness, that I am grateful to experience. When I was on the meds, something like this breakup was and did feel like never-ending sadness. Because my brain was so deadened I couldn't really even get out of it. 

As you can see, the benzos still affect me in some ways, like the way my thoughts are a bit scattered. I feel like I've been put back together, but different, but certainly better than while I was on the medicine. And at the time, I needed it to get through what I was going through, so I don't regret that either. The depth of forgiveness and equanimity I have now, I think, is also attributed to having my brain back. There was no subtlety when I was on it. But part of it may be attributed to simply growing up, gaining experience in life. Right now, I truly feel like an ordinary human being with the rest of her life to live however she wants to. When I was 18, I thought, "I can be anything I want to be because I am young and have the rest of my life to-" but I didn't know how to manage my emotions and fell down. Now I am almost 28, and instead of feeling like "I am too old, over the hill, I missed my chance" (like I did during benzos and depression) I feel, "I can truly be anything I want to be again, because I am a responsible adult and I can handle anything that comes my way in life and I will figure it out." 

Now I am back in school. I just got my report card for my first semester in university! All A's. A decade ago, I had dropped out because I was too sick. Now, in my healthy drug free life, I have conquered it through pure mindset and lifestyle. 

I feel so good about going back to school, improving my looks, things I had wanted to do, but felt stuck about, that I really feel confident about my other dreams. Writing comics, making games, making more art! I feel like I'm growing into my own. I feel like this life is really mine to live, and that it's a precious thing a human life is, and what a privilege it is to take care of me! How glad I am to be put in this body, to be this soul driving this vehicle. All this because I slept for 7 hours haha. I am currently working on 2 games, possibly a third. I hired somebody to help for one, and the other I'm making with a friend. I feel like all my dreams are possible, and worthwhile. My brain is truly coming back online again. I missed out on a lot of experiences, because I had anxiety, because I was on the benzos, that now I feel like the clock is ticking again and time has stopped standing still. I feel like NOW I am living the rest of my life. I get to decide what to do with it. Not even my family has a say in it. Not even my childhood traumas and fears. So I'm really proud of that. I feel like I'm more aware now too. I know that my grandpa has admonished me against the creative arts, but it's also the thing that has supported me the most. I realize that was his fear and not my burden to carry. That adulthood isn't so scary, neither, even, is poverty. I know that once I get out of school, I'll find a job, and it will all be taken care of. There is no unsolvable problem. These days I'm amazed at how positive my attitude is, but it's something that I was forced to have in order to get out of withdrawals. So I am even grateful for that experience, to completely break me down and let me re-invent myself deliberately in a new way. My old ways of thinking lead me to despair and benzos, my new way of thinking gets me out and towards the business of life.

The next time I update this blog, I hope to have more good news for you guys! At the same time that I want to "prove" life goes up and up, I also relax and let myself just be ordinary. I don't have to be great. I don't even have to survive. I just have to be. Because another thing I think, that I've had nowhere else to share so far, is that I realized my confidence isn't based on my achievements. There was a time whenever I got insecure, I would rattle off my past achievements in my head. But I thought, I am not even my past accomplishments. I am just me. I should be confident, because I am me, not because of what I've achieved. I'm confident because I know I have a good mindset, I can trust myself, and I can handle whatever life throws at me. That's where it should come from. And yes, it will help to improve my skills at something, create something, taking action too! I think the confidence to do those things will also come from adopting an attitude of being ordinary - I don't have to be great right away, I don't have to have fantastic results, I just need to "be" and that's good enough.

As you can tell, since the breakup I read a lot of books on codependency. It's no wonder that I had a lot of wrong beliefs about relationships and love. I'm getting better. And half of getting better may be improving my mindset, the other half is just going to have to be experience in the trenches. That's what I was missing.