numb.

Is this what happiness feels like?

It's been so long, I think I've forgotten how to feel.

Because it's been so long, and all I've ever known is numb.

One day at a time, I try to feel something new, something real. I try to enjoy the little things in life. I try to feel the breeze that brushes across my face and actually feel something. Anything.

And all I want to feel is happy.

Sometimes I wonder if I do feel happy, and my brain is so confused, so shocked, that all it's letting me feel is nothing. 

Sometimes I worry that I will never be able to experience true happiness again because my brain has forgotten how to respond with anything but numb.

Sometimes I think that maybe I'm fooling myself into thinking I'm happy, when in truth, I'm still nowhere near.

Mental illness sucks. I can never be sure that the feelings I feel are mine, or if they're part of the messed up chemicals that are misfiring in my brain. I never know if what I am is actually me.

Things have been going so right for me lately.

So many reasons for me to have moved on and feel like my life is improving. So many reasons that I should be happy.

And yet, the more I fight to have access to my feelings --the more I try to engage with those parts of my feelings that I haven't touched in years--the harder it is to feel anything at all.

But I still fight, because I know I'm meant to feel more than numb. I'm meant to feel happy.

This is what happiness feels like, right?