What's in a Name?

I've been wanting to a blog about my struggle with mental illness for a while. But because of said mental illness I lack motivation to put my ideas into action quite often. I just have to wait until it returns or try to force myself to push through. Today is a push through sort of day. 

So why the Firefly and the Bear, right? Seems like an odd name for a blog that's going to be mainly about depression and anxiety, doesn't it? Probably, but there is a reason. I took the idea from this phenomenal poem by Sabrina Benaim, Explaining My Depression to My Mother. 

This poem was sort of life changing for me. It was the first time that I heard someone speak aloud with intensity the things I so often feel. In the beginning she uses the metaphor that her "depression is a shape shifter" and "one day it's as small as a firefly in the palm of a bear, the next it's the bear", to me this was perfect. It became a sort of short hand around our house about how we felt, today it's a firefly or today it's a bear. It seemed right to use that same idea here.

Throughout the fall and early winter most of my days were bear days. I spent a lot of time in bed. I spent a lot of time crying. In the last few months, even through my grief (which will probably be the subject of the next post), I've been having more firefly days than bear days, but a few weeks ago my anxiety kicked back up so I know it's only so long without something changing before the bear is back everyday.

I'm trying to change, to initiate the changes. I'm trying to go back to work, even if just for a couple weekend shifts. I'm trying to meet new people in this new city that I'm still trying to get accustomed to. I've started seeing a doctor about my medication, which might be a source for my anxiety, and I start therapy/counseling in a just under two weeks. I'm moving in the right direction, I need to remind myself of that when the bear tries to creep in.