I’ve been putting a lot of work into feeling better and being better, and for the most part I feel like I really am doing a lot better than I have been for a long while. I feel like things are maybe actually looking up for me, and even if I have set backs I feel like I am able to learn from them and move on a lot quicker.
But...there are certain people (or mostly one person) who I feel keeps bringing negativity back into my life. I have tried to bring my newfound positivity to them, but they won’t let me. They shut down all my attempts to help and to reach out. I can see them spiraling out of control into darker and darker places, I can see them struggling to pull themselves from the mire, but every branch I hold out to them they will not grab onto. I feel like I am sitting there on the precipice, holding out my hand, and they are within reach, they could reach out and take my hand, but instead they just curl themselves up into a ball of fear and shame and self-blame and self-doubt and they act as if my hand is not there, or as if they know it will not pull them out. I know it won’t be easy. I know we will both have to struggle and strain, but I know that if we work together we can have the strength to pull them from the darkness. They just have to reach out first. And they won’t do it. And I am so, so tired of standing here on the edge of darkness, when I can FEEL the sunlight on me now, when I can see it, and I am tired and aching and exhausted of just standing here holding out my hand and trying to reach them.
I don’t want to just walk away. But I don’t know what to do anymore. I don’t have a way to help. I want to be better, and I want them to be better, but there is a point at which I cannot help and I am tired of trying, and I feel like a terrible person for wanting to give up.