Surviving your worst days…
I keep seeing the phrase ‘you’ve survived 100% of your worst days’, it isn’t being said in a bad way. It’s presented as a way for giving us hope, reminding us of our strength. I understand it. But it doesn’t mean I like it or agree with it. Much like the phrase ‘it’s okay to not be okay’, well it isn’t really. It sucks to be not okay.
Yes, I have survived 100% of my worst days but I don’t always know how. It also doesn’t always feel like I survived. Sometimes it feels I’m still stuck there and that I have to keep reliving those days, over and over. Sometimes I wish I hadn’t survived them. They bleed into each other and just become a nightmare that I can’t escape.
My worry is that it makes light of how I feel, maybe how you feel? It’s often said with a laugh and a hint of super positivity. See you’ve survived, you can keep on surviving, put it behind you…of course I appreciate that not everyone is saying it that way. Some people I deeply respect and admire use this phrase and I know they intend it to be empathetic and hopeful. We all need hope. But I think it’s hard to distil hope into a catchy phrase. Especially if you are surrounded by darkness.
The phrase also makes me wonder what is survival? That phrase really means you’re still alive doesn’t it? You haven’t taken a different way out of those bad days. Surviving doesn’t always feel like living. Being stuck isn’t living. Wishing every day it would be over isn’t living. Survival is fine, of course it’s important. But when do we shift the conversation to living? Living a life that’s not shrouded in darkness? Maybe it’s the tense - you are surviving your worse days, is that more accurate? Is that more hopeful? You may not think or feel like you are but you are, we are. It can feel impossibly difficult and painful. But yet here we are.
Maybe. Or maybe I don’t need to be told I’m surviving. Maybe I just need someone to listen to how hard it is on these days. To see the truth. To see it isn’t okay to not be okay. To see that tomorrow seems as far away as yesterday. That’s the connection we’re all looking for. Isn’t it? Except I’m not sure it is any more for me. Connection is fraught with danger and exposing who I am to others doesn’t feel like it’s working out very well. Unless it’s in therapy and then I can’t help feeling that’s only working out because I’m paying for it. Brutal. But true.
None of this feels very hopeful does it? I’m sorry if this post today feels a bit bleak, it wasn’t meant to. Could that be what sound bites create? You think you can capture all of someone’s experience in a few short words and with those words magic away the pain. Unfortunately that’s what it can feel like to be on the receiving end of them. At least for me. We don’t need to live in a world where everything can fit in 140 characters. Some things simply won’t. Some things need nuance, consideration, reflection.
So from me, remember if you’re trying to survive days that feel unsurvivable - I see you, I know how it feels today, the next day and the next. We can hold on. We can find a space where we fit, even if for just a moment and we don’t have to minimise our experience. Take all the time and words you need.
Hi Jo, Im the editor at the London Aces Hub, we have a lived experience section in our Newsletter and I would love to share your article there. Im due to publish over the weekend, if I don't hear back from you soon, Im happy to put it in the next newsletter. Let me know? Take Care Bonnie
This feels familiar to me. Phrases like “you’ve survived 100% of your worst days” are surely meant kindly, but — for me — survival doesn't always feel like a relief.
Maybe it’s not quite what you meant, but I get uneasy about what passes for “wellbeing”. I’ve seen it in hospitals and clinics: lots of practitioners are genuinely brilliant, and totally present; others are there because a course accepted them or a career opened up, repeating phrases they’ve learned to say.
It feels the same online. Some voices — like yours — are careful, generous, resonant. Others, less so. It feels like a lot of folk talk about “oversharing” vs “resilience” as content — but rarely sit with genuine trauma.
What helps me is hearing from others like you, and being heard in return by those who have the time to listen to me. That feels steady. Hopeful, even. There's lovely people out there.
A subscriber of mine recently recommended Moominland Midwinter — a really sweet book! And a friend/fellow insomniac I play online Scrabble with told me, “easy does it.” and then sent me a a video of a song she'd written. I keep saying “easy does it” it to myself now. It sounds nice in my head.
Ramble!
I hope you take it easy this evening. x