The Break-Down

So......... I had a nervous break-down this last weekend. Or maybe it was a mental break-down. I’m not really sure what the difference is. Mental break-down sounds a bit more serious; like there is a probability that your roommate will check you into a psych ward while you are sleeping. I’m pretty sure that things aren’t THAT bad yet… though that might be due to the fact that I’m such a light sleeper that my roommate could never sneak into my room without me sitting up bolt-right and asking her what the H she’s doing in my room. Ha. Jokes on her.

Anyway, here’s how the collapse happened: I was given an assignment to write a paper for British Literature over a week ago. It was only a 3-pager. Not too bad. But when he announced it, I just couldn’t think of a topic. I figured I would deal with it later. The week went by. I realized that the paper was due the day after my birthday. That would be annoying, I thought. Again, I forgot all about it. The weekend came. I had a birthday dinner on Friday night, which turned out to be only slightly less than disasterous. Nearly everything that could go wrong did. It was awesome. The next day we had an 80’s party at work. We all got dressed up, and encouraged the girls to be crazy. I wanted to get into the full swing of things and go all-out, so I spent the morning before I went in to work going to DI to look for off-the shoulder sweatshirts, putting on bright green fish-net tights, and applying blue eye-shadow. Good times. I will post pictures of this as soon as I have them. Anyway, after work my co-workers took me to Applebee’s, so I didn’t get home until around 2am. Sunday I had about 800 things I had to do which kept me from starting on homework. After church I had a RS presidency meeting, then ran to attend the deaf ward for credit in ASL, then went to go see my mom (after all, it was my birthday), then I stopped at work to pick up my power cord (my co-worker had left it there), then I went to my grandparents’ house for the family birthday party. For those who don’t know, I share a birthday with both my grandpa and my uncle. So there is always a bit of a to-do about this day. I just could not miss the party. By the time I got home, I was so exhausted (probably because I stayed up until nearly 3, and then got up for church at 8) that I fell asleep on the luvsac while trying to read. Around 8 pm I decided to start the paper that was due the next day. Nice.

Now, I want you to know that this is not just an extreme case of procrastionation-itis. No, this is much more. A normal happy, healthy, brain-functioning person can whip out a 3-page paper in a couple of hours. I could not. And when I say could not, I mean that. I COULDN’T. I sat there for hours trying to think of a topic. HOURS. I took a break around ten when Dusty came to visit me, and then went to visit some guys in my ward, but all along I was still brainstorming topics in my head. Nothing. I decided to pull an all-nighter. I pulled out the Dr. Pepper, and my roommate made nachos. Then I sat in front of the computer until about 3am. Just sat there. I searched through my book and the online comments from my classmates and surfed Wikipedia for relevant info. My brain was a dark void. That was when I recognized the nervous break-down. My brain was done thinking. Not only was it out of order then, I have since realized that it has been off-line for quite a while now. I’m pretty sure that this craziness was conceived sometime before Christmas, and has been just incubating since then, waiting to come out and surprise me. Sort of like those fat ladies who don’t know they’re pregnant until they go into labor. I feel a little like that. In the way that it snuck up on me, at least. Not in being pregnant or fat.

I wish I could say that it was only the paper that I missed, too. But upon arriving at school Monday morning (or rather Monday afternoon) I realized that I had blown off assignments for two more of my classes. What the--? And I’m now officially 6 chapters behind in my grammar class, which means I have no idea what in the world he’s talking about. I’m pretty sure I don’t help the situation by sitting in the back typing blogs and stories or playing solitaire on my laptop. But what can I do? My brain is turned off. It is like when your car has a dead battery. No matter how many times you try to turn it over, you’re going to end up still sitting in the parking lot with a completely useless car.

The up-side of this story is that my professor was totally understanding for some reason. I simply told him I’d gone crazy, and he told me to take the day off and go do fun things like go tanning, get a pedicure, see a matinee, go to the art museum, etc. He said that only after this, I could talk with him about making up the paper. My other teachers weren’t so understanding. Well… at least not my English teacher. Since I have a hard time communicating with my ASL teacher, I decided not to attempt hand-speaking this problem to him without a brain. Too risky. I will just take the grade dock there.

I have also realized that though I may be failing at life, I can still feel happy. I know, weird, huh? But it’s surprisingly true. I’m stressed beyond belief, but I’m still smiling and laughing. I’m not sure why. Maybe it is because without a brain I am too dumb to feel the full weight of what’s going on here. Or maybe it is because I have this great friend who, when he found out that I was going a little crazy, took me to a drop-claw machine and got enough quarters for me to keep playing until I won. THAT made me happy. I mean, those things are usually impossible, but I WON! See? So not everything is terrible. I see a ray of hope at the end of this excruciatingly long and darkened tunnel.