Guess mine is not the first heart broken...

I realized something about myself...

Despite all efforts, I'm an optimist.

I know!

Not in the immediate sense though... for instance, if I'm going into what I know will be a tough situation, I expect the worst. All the time. Every time.

But... when things are difficult for an extended time, somewhere... deep inside... I become hopeful. I start clearing out the soot and seeing the brightness of the future underneath.

Maybe I'm just willing it to the surface. Who knows. I am willful, after all...

When things get emotionally difficult for me, like I've said, I retreat within myself. I shut everyone out... e v e r y o n e.

I bear down and throw my shoulder up against whatever the problem is, I attempt to move heaven and earth to fix it. It's not until days later that I start to emerge from this cocoon I put myself in and start to see that there are people around it trying to get in.

I don't mean to do this and I'm sure as shit that it isn't healthy, but it's how I deal. Could it be a throwback from being a teenage mother and being wholly on my own at 17 with no help from anyone? Maybe.

Maybe a part of me believes that when things are tough, it's my problem and no one really gives a shit anyway... despite the -- some sincere, some obligatory -- offers of assistance that are falling out of people's faces.

Maybe.

The thing with "problems" is that they tend to come out in some sort of explosion, which is when I do that whole cocoon thing. When the problem starts to subside and/or I start getting used to the idea of their existence... this Hopeful Tina emerges.

The part of me that thinks it's all going to be alright and/or it's not as bad as I initially thought...

The thing is, this makes me extremely susceptible to re-injure. I'll give you a "for instance".

As you probably know/figured out by now... Jeremíe tried to take his own life about 2 weeks ago.

To say I was devastated would be the understatement of the century.

The kids have gotten into scrapes before... I've been afraid for them before... worried before... sad before...

But this... this was new. This was a brand new kind of ache. I couldn't speak without crying a cry that sounded, to me, like it wasn't coming from me at all. I couldn't stop. I felt ravaged with it.

After a few days of that, I started to see hope for him. He was in the hospital getting treatment. Going on some medication. Talking to a therapist.

It was going to be OK.

5 days later he was out of the hospital. 3 days before my birthday. I was beside myself with excitement to have him home.

The following Thursday he went MIA. He was out with his friends and his cell phone died.

He was supposed to be home at 6:30 to get a ride to his weekly meeting, but he was a no show.

No one knew where he was until he finally called from someone else's phone at 9pm.

Jesse and Kristíe tore out of the house to go pick him up.

Me...

...I sat on the couch. And cried.

Again.

The wounds were nowhere near healed and here came a fresh cut. Any other time I'd just have been pissed that he didn't call.

This time... well, everything was different. I didn't know where he was or what he could be doing or if he was safe.

So I guess I'm just raw right now. And I will be for a while, I suppose. But... the whole situation keeps bitch-slapping "Hopeful Tina". So I keep regressing into this mini-cocoon then re-emerging to then get slapped back in.

I'm feelin' a bit like a yo-yo emotionally.

Anyway, we've found a therapist and psychiatrist for him and here's to hoping that they can help him work through his depression.

In the meantime, as for me, I have to find a way to cope with this constant teetering between hope and despair.