This week was kind of... miserable.
Trial after hardship after painful occurrence piled one on top of the other.
And then Friday showed up. I don't know if I've ever felt so emotionally, physically, mentally, and spiritually exhausted.
I went to my morning classes and felt mostly okay. But then as the clock was ticking closer to 10:10, I had an unsettled feeling in my stomach and a lump in my throat.
After being dismissed from Journalism, I went to my room, closed the door, held my pillow, and started to cry.
Everything that had been going on all seemed to have collided, exploded, and collapsed in front of me at the same time.
I cried long enough to make it painful to breathe. I cried until my eyes were so sore it hurt to blink. I cried and felt like I was physically going to fall to pieces.
I cried because I am helpless. In all areas of my life, I am not in control. The problem is that I don't often believe that and try to manage everything on my own anyway.
One of my suite-mates came by and talked with me, and like the angel she is offered to get me coffee. I'm not huge on people going out of their way for me, but her willingness to be a friend was like somebody had opened the window a crack to let some fresh air in.
My brother called, recognized that I sounded like a frog, and said that he'd be by in ten minutes to pick me up. I spent time with my brothers, albeit mostly silently, and just sat and thought about things. Tearing up every so often when something would trigger my tear ducts into action.
After a long day of feeling so low, I went to bed and eventually fell asleep. All I could do was lay there desperately hoping that in the morning I would feel better.
I wasn't going to let Saturday, which was going to be awesome, be ruined because the day before was a pretty awful 24 hours.
I woke up still feeling pretty awful. But I had lunch with a few wonderful friends, and spent time getting ready for the Sadie Hawkins dance with my best girlfriends singing country songs, and rapping Super Bass like a boss.
I think God knew I would need to have a great night, and blessed me with an amazing group of people to spend time with laughing, dancing, and teasing. Back when I asked my date to the dance, I knew we'd have fun, but had no clue just how much fun we would have. It wound up being one of the best nights of my time at school so far. I really appreciate people who can be silly and let me be silly right back.
Inside jokes were created and hilarity ensued. I needed every single laugh that escaped by lips.
With every funny moment I could feel the broken pieces of my spirit slowly starting to mend back together. I felt like even though there will still be a lot to deal with and a lot of emotions to sort through, I will still be able to laugh and have fun.
So, at the moment, I still hurt. Things are still kind of fuzzy and I'm still really unsure how everything will play out. I have a dull ache in my chest, and if I think about certain things too much, I start crying again.
But laughter is good. It's the best medicine, actually. And my friends mean the world to me.
Knowing that things will get better eventually is a relief.
In fact, there's nothing better.