TRIGGER WARNING – This post discusses depression, intrusive suicidal thoughts, parenting conflict, perimenopause, and legal struggles. Please take care reading — and see the resources at the end.
There’s a phrase that’s been running through my head lately: I don’t want to play anymore.
It sounds childish, maybe even selfish. But in truth, it feels like the most accurate way to describe where I am right now. Life has been heavy—so heavy that even the grounding exercises, the walks, the breathing, the poetry writing aren’t cutting through the fog this time.
As a mom of four, I don’t get the option of quitting the game. I don’t get to put down my cards, walk away, and say, “I’m done.” Every morning, the alarm still goes off. Kids need to be fed, driven, supported. Bills don’t stop. Lawyers don’t stop. The chaos doesn’t stop.
And so I keep playing.
But I’ve been crying—more than I like to admit. I’ve been hiding how I’m truly feeling because it’s easier to plaster on a smile than explain the weight pressing on me. People see me writing hopeful poetry, see me fighting for my family, see me trying to rebuild. But they don’t always see the cracks. The nights when my strength folds in on itself. The days when one more unexpected crisis feels like the straw that will finally break me.
I deal with so much shit—and there’s no other word that fits. It’s not just the ordinary parenting struggles or the bills stacking up. It’s the high-stress, unpredictable things that keep blindsiding me, one after the other. It’s the relentlessness. The constant testing of limits I didn’t know I had. It is fighting for freedom from a narcissist who does not want to give up his control over anything and so will fight for everything no matter how big or small.
I’ve also had to admit something else to myself: sometimes strength means asking for help. I had been doing really well without antidepressants for a stretch, but recently I went back on a small dose after speaking with my doctor. Because let’s face it—when you need help, you need help. And with court cases looming, meetings with Crown prosecutors about the upcoming sexual assault trial, and the knowledge that I’ll be cross-examined by a lawyer who has no morals—it is daunting, to say the least. Pretending I could carry that weight alone would be unfair to myself and to my kids.
I am fighting in three court systems right now — criminal, family, and civil — and that reality is brutal, slow, and sometimes feels pointless. It takes so much energy. I have to accept a bail breach outcome because his lawyer made an error and no one is held accountable. It is unfair. I don’t want to play anymore. But I will — because there isn’t another alternative, and once that train departs the station you cannot get off until the legal system decides the ride is over. Strap in and buckle up. I am not a rollercoaster lover in real life. This one is a nightmare of a ride.
I’ve spent some time with friends lately. They deserve the joy they’ve fought so hard for, and I love seeing them happy. But I found myself holding back, afraid that my sadness might spill into their light. I felt guilty, as though my heaviness could wash away some of their happiness. Honestly — they’d kick my ass if they knew I wasn’t sharing how bad I am feeling right now. It isn’t just one thing. It’s the culmination of taking so many hits for so long and knowing that there are more to take. Lots more.
There is also a quieter fear that lives under that guilt: the part of me that thinks my good friends — and the lovely fella across the ocean who came over recently to see me and took me on our first proper date — might not want to hear the worst of me. I worry that if I tell them how close to the edge I feel, how much I’m struggling, they’ll decide it’s too much and walk away. Logically I know this is the conditioning from years of abuse talking — that ingrained belief that being honest about pain will make people leave — but knowing it and feeling it are different things. So I hold back, and then I feel guilty for holding back, and then I hold back some more. It’s a cycle.
My teenagers ask more and more, and when I say no they keep asking until I don’t have the energy to argue. It’s easier to say yes than to fight. So yes, in a few weeks I’ll be driving an extra three hours each way for a two-day trip because my daughter bought a concert ticket against my advice and then used a university open-house as cover for the plan. There are no direct buses or trains, she can’t drive yet, and now her friends have bought tickets too. Kids learn from the example they see — if an abusive, manipulative parent gets what they want, kids learn the tactics. I see that reflected back at me, and it makes me ache. For they are choosing as my kids to do this to me. It is hard not to feel it is my own fault.
And while they’re at the concert, I’ll be waiting outside for five or six hours. Then at 11:30 or midnight, I’ll turn the car around and start the drive back home. We’ll have left at 6 a.m. that morning to get to the campus, and by the time we pull into the driveway it will be deep into the next day. It isn’t really an eight-hour drive — because I can’t do that kind of haul anymore, not at 48 with a bad back. Even with coffee, sugar, and energy drinks, I’ll have to stop again and again just to stay awake and safe. Which means it will stretch out longer, with more exhaustion piled on top of already being on the go for 18 hours straight. So we wont get home at 8am but sometime likely in the afternoon and hitting about 30 hours plus. For a concert that i told her not to book the ticket for. The truth is: I don’t want to play anymore.
There are renovations I can’t move forward on because there never seems to be enough money. I’m still on partial child support; Section 7 expenses haven’t been paid. He even took back child support money he wasn’t allowed to take — and yet he gets away with it, again and again. I have police calls to deal with where he alleges I hit my son or that the boy fell out of a car. None of those things are criminal — I don’t hit my son — but sometimes he gets yelled at, and that becomes another headline, another CAS interview, another wellness check. Two days after police dismissed charges, the ex had a friend call in a wellness check. We all know it’s manipulation and lies, but it still eats up my time and energy.
Another child has threatened suicide in the past and now talks about moving to Scotland for university in a few years. The thought of relocating across the Atlantic to keep them nearby is something I don’t even have the energy to consider yet. There’s not enough time in the day to do all the things that need doing. And then the second garage door broke and came off its wires — so I can’t even lift it up to think about how to fix it, and there isn’t the money to hire someone, so it will be another YouTube-and-do-it-myself job. I don’t want to. It is so hard to do everything on my own.
On top of that, I’ve been applying for jobs — nine so far. Only one turned into a computer interview, and it went nowhere. None of the others even wanted to see me. Part of me knows I’m overqualified, maybe even not ready to step into a workplace yet. But still, each silence, each rejection, feeds that old voice: you’re not wanted, you’re not good enough.
I’m also recovering from a recent brush with aspiration pneumonia. The good news is my lungs are clear now, but I can’t shake the cough and “exhausted” doesn’t cover how tired I feel. Simple things take more effort. It’s humiliating and frustrating to be this drained when there’s still so much to do.
I also feel fat and frumpy in my skin, I have put on some weight recently (middle age sucks! ) and there’s a grief that follows that — like the best part of my life was stolen or passed me by. I feel cheated out of years of joy and love, and I can’t get that back. Perimenopause is kicking my ass too: the hot flashes, the brain fog, the mood swings, the shifts in my body and sleep — it all piles on top of everything else. When your body changes and your energy drops, the small humiliations stack into a larger, quieter sorrow.
It’s the same refrain that shows up in other corners of my life — with parenting, with money, with relationships. And I know, deep down, it isn’t the truth. But when rejection, fatigue, and grief pile onto everything else, it becomes another weight pressing down. Another reason I have to remind myself: I am not defined by who hires me, or who doesn’t. My worth isn’t measured in job offers, in paychecks, or in anyone else’s approval.
And there is one more truth I want to be honest about here, because I know I’m not the only one who has felt it: the image of the water — of walking out into a lake and letting the water take my pain away — has floated through my mind in the small hours. I am not suicidal now, and this thought has not been a plan. But it is real, insidious, and scary. When you are spiraling at 3 a.m., your thoughts can drag you into places you never wanted to visit. Saying this out loud matters. Naming it matters. If this is true for you too, you are not alone and you deserve help and care. I was at such a low point yesterday that I wrote this poem to try and describe how I was feeling. That by bleeding my pain in ink I could let some of it go.
The Water Sings But I Keep Walking
People ask me how I am feeling
but they don’t really want to know the answer,
so I say I am ok.
People ask how my day is going
but they don’t actually care,
so I say it’s good and carry on.
What if I told them the truth,
that okay was a lie,
that some days I just want to stay in bed
and hide from the world?
That I don’t feel good enough
and am not wanted for anything
but what I can give them.
Part of me thinks I have cried so many tears when alone
that I could drown in them —
a private ocean pooling at the edge of my thoughts.
Letting the water envelop me
sounds like the only way to end the ache:
to let the icy kiss become a part of me,
to breathe the cold until everything unravels,
and finally relax as I sink into the depths.
Wrapped in that embrace the noise will go dim.
The handed-out expectations and polite check-ins will peel away.
There will only be the slow, steady pull
and the sweet forgetting.
A hush that will take everything.
And will leave me with nothing
but the water’s love,
holding me close and not letting me go.
But I will not give in to the water
as it sings, beckoning me.
I will keep going —
for my children, for my friends,
and maybe someday, for me.
Some days blur into a busy, bright daze
where I cannot hear the song,
and for those hours I breathe
as if the world is loud with mercy.
Still the tune is always there,
beneath the clatter, soft and patient.
For now I ignore the song of the water
and we dance,
a struggle in silence,
the rhythm sharp but unbroken.
So I make small promises I can keep:
a lunch packed, a bedtime story,
the patience to sit,
and wait for children to finish —
sports and clubs and dates and work.
I choose the tether of ordinary things —
the shoes by the door, kicked off in a hurry and abandoned,
the sound of the trampoline outside,
the remarkable miracle of dishes done,
and laundry up to date.
The water may sing
and the dark may reach,
but tonight I answer differently:
one foot forward, then another —
a stubborn rhythm, a careful step.
Nothing heroic;
only the quiet work of staying.
And that will have to be enough for now.
The water sings,
but I keep walking.
Right now, I’m not feeling the joy. But maybe that’s the point: it’s not about feeling it every second. It’s about holding on long enough for the joy to circle back.
For now, I’ll keep playing. For my kids. For myself. For the hope that tomorrow, the game might feel a little lighter.
If you are reading this and the song of the water is with you: you are not alone
If the poem or these words land with you in a way that makes you feel seen or raw, know this: so many of us carry that same quiet ache. We think we’re the only ones who have dark images at 3 a.m.; we think no one would understand. You are not the first to feel this, and you don’t have to carry it on your own.
If these thoughts are with you and you’re worried, please reach out to someone — a friend, a family member, your doctor — or use a crisis line. Asking for help doesn’t make you weak. It makes you human.
If you are in North Bay / Nipissing area:
- Emergency: call 911
- Canada Crisis / Suicide Support (24/7): call or text 9-8-8
- Local 24-hour mental health / crisis (Nipissing): 705-495-8198 (alt: 705-495-8148; toll-free 1-800-352-1141)
- CMHA — North Bay & District: 1-800-352-1141 (office: 705-476-4088)
- Amelia Rising — Sexual Violence Support (North Bay): Crisis 705-476-3355 (office: 705-840-2403)
- Child & Youth Mental Health Crisis (Nipissing & Parry Sound): 1-844-287-9072 (24/7)
- Kids Help Phone (youth, 24/7): 1-800-668-6868 or text 686868
- 211 Ontario (local referrals / non-urgent): dial 2-1-1
Small closing
This is not advice; it is a sharing from my life. If anything here lands — the exhaustion, the guilt, the tiny hard-won steps — please accept the quiet permission I offer you now: it is okay to not be okay, and it is okay to ask for help.
Some days survival is the victory. Some days the best you can do is feed the kids, answer one email, or just keep breathing. That is enough. You are enough.
Today I have a plan. I’m sitting in Tim Hortons with an Earl Grey tea, my laptop, free Wi-Fi, and a list of paperwork and administrative tasks. It’s a neutral, trauma-free space — unlike the house, which is full of triggers. I will update my Word document with the most recent poem. I might even research how to publish, since I now have over 50 poems. I’ll keep busy. A child missed the bus this morning, so I drove her into school and later I have a meeting with the school to set up support for her. She’s finished a 20-week CBT trauma course and is doing okay right now, but I want a system in place for when things resurface — so we’re prepared instead of scrambling.
If only I could manage to look after myself the way I manage to look after everyone else.
I know what it is to feel like you’re drowning while everyone else thinks you’re fine. I know what it is to fear being “too much” for the people you love, and to carry guilt for not being stronger. But you are not alone.
So if today feels impossible, let tomorrow carry some of the weight. If the water sings, keep walking. If the night feels endless, know that dawn has a habit of showing up anyway.
Keep one foot forward. Keep taking the careful steps. Keep walking. Not perfectly, not heroically — just stubbornly. And maybe together we will stumble into lighter days.
