THE WEIRD ARCHANGEL MEDIA.

The last month has been an absolute crap-fest of emotions, anger, irritability, and all-around exhaustion. I have been dealing with all kinds of idiots and hurdles, and at some point, I forgot to take care of my health. Whenever I am dealing with a problem, I shut down and shut everyone and everything completely out. That has always been my coping mechanism for dealing with issues. The process is simple, start by I shutting everyone out and shutting out my emotions, don’t talk to anyone about what I am going through, try to deal with the problem by myself until I completely can’t, start stress eating, get angry with myself for being a failure and for adding weight, let those thoughts eat me alive and when I am about to completely lose my mind, MAYBE only then will I ask for help.
Most people would assume that me not asking for help is some fort of “toxic masculinity” or “fragile masculinity”, but it isn’t. It is a direct link to a certain point of my childhood. I hate asking for help because I don’t like feeling like a burden. I loathe asking for help because it has always been transactional from childhood. It’s a debt that has to be repaid. I hate owing people debts.
This very old problem handling method has always worked, I have only had to technically ask for help at least 7 times in my life. The others don’t count since it was offered, and I rejected it at some point in the “being helped” process. All was going well, but the human body, like any creation, can only push itself for so long before shutting down to reboot. Just like a computer that needs to be rebooted and upgraded in order to work in the best way possible, the human body needs regular breaks. Breaks like vacations, holidays, naps, and working out.
This has been proven to be me by body because a long while back, I started realizing that it would fight back whenever I would try to go back to my old technics and would only run efficiently whenever I would take a break from the chaos and reflect and slowly solve the problem. In the last 5 years, on at least 4 different occasions where I was experienced a major problem, I completely disregarded my body and in retaliation, my body completely shut down, rendering me completely and absolutely useless.
This very beautiful event happened about a week ago. I had a ton to deal with, and I was essentially running on fumes. I didn’t want to ask for help for a number of reasons, the most important being pride. Around Wednesday last week, I got a very scaring and threatening email from the government that needed instant action from someone whose entire job and profession is dealing and handling such situations. Considering the fact that it should have been done a month ago and the consequences of lateness are life or death, I was not in the best mood. I contacted the person in charge, got some half-assed answers, and informed them that they had better get back to me with something more substantial. They later reached out to confirm some things that needed approval. You would think that all the questions they were asking were a sign that they would fix the issue, but when I called back both panicking and angry hoping that they had made some progress, nothing had been done.
I tried to get in touch with them again on Friday, but no one was around, so I left a strong, worded voice mail for them. While I was trying to get to them, I got rained on. Actually, it was more like drizzled on, but that still counts. The weekend comes and goes without any communication, and that, together with another very alarming report, puts me in an absolutely stressing situation. I tried to keep myself busy through the weekend, waiting for Monday. The day finally came along, and I got no answers from my people, and by the afternoon, my body had completely shut down.
The symptoms were simple, a fever, a cold, muscle aches, headache, and a stomach ache. These symptoms sound like those of an absolutely sick person. My first thought was that maybe this was all happening because I got rained on, but it wasn’t the first time in months I had been rained on. “Why is this one different?” I couldn’t help but think to myself.
That evening, I got to talk to one of my acquaintances because I had started getting everyone worried. “You’re usually a jovial person. This isn’t like you,” he said as we sat down. After about 10 minutes of explaining the two problems, he looked at me with an unfazed look on his face and said, “You could have just told me. Let me show you how it’s done.” He picks up the phone and makes the call, he changes his voice to a “business voice” and spends about 5 minutes going back and forth with the person on the other end of the call. “They’ll solve it in an hour or so,” he says while still holding the phone to his ear. We talk some more, and he asks, “What was the other problem?” I explained it to him, and he smiles back at me and simply goes, “That one takes time. Don’t let it stress you.”
“So I was worried about nothing?” I ask as I get up to leave. “You were worried about something, but you were stressed about nothing. All you needed to do was ask for help,” he responded. “You know how that makes me feel,” I responded. “We all need help,” he responded as I left. I spent the next hour watching as most of the issues got solved, and I couldn’t help but think about what he had said. Tuesday comes along, and my problem has already been solved, but I am left with the consequences to deal with. My body had, in fact, gotten better. The only thing is, I now actually have the flu. I got myself rained on, and my body rebooted, but the virus was already in the system, so I now have to get an antivirus, the flu shot.
Everyone tells me how asking for help doesn’t make you a burden, and it doesn’t make you weak, and I know all that to be true. I still don’t want to do it. Accepting that would be accepting the fact that I can’t do it all. It would take me accepting that asking for help is healthy and that I am not a weak person if I ask for help. Don’t get me wrong, if I don’t know something, I always ask for help. I don’t actually ask for help, I ask for the basics and try to figure the rest out.
I am too proud to acknowledge whenever I am facing a problem that will need external intervention.
I am now slowly trying to change that, I’m now even meditating, I don’t want to die young because I didn’t have an outlet or didn’t want to accept help.
We all need help, but always choose wisely where that help comes from and why it is coming to you.