"I took a walk around the world to ease my troubled mind"--Kryptonite by Three Doors Down

In this age of social media and texting and touch screens and minimum-wage part-time jobs, it's easy to forget that you have to communicate with people.


Specifically, that you have to put effort into it. Generally, I get by. Generally, the people who matter to their varying degrees understand well enough that just because I don't talk to them doesn't mean I don't love them. But then I get to face, all at once and by surprise, that I am losing them anyway.

Specifically, I have an uncle. My favorite uncle. The one I'm closest to, the one I know and love best of all of them.

I am probably never going to see him, hug him, or touch his hand, again. He is Not Well. He's fine, apparently, he's himself, which is the most important part. But he is probably not going to be there the next time I visit that corner of the country.

The last time I was there, I spent a day with him. We went out in his boat, and he took me to see manatees, my all time favorite animal. He encouraged me to get in the water with them, and even though I couldn't see them from there--they were so close. I got second-degree sunburns that day. I spent the rest of that two-week trip in varying states of pain and tears and panic, and have scars. Freckles, too, but scars, all up and down my arms. Because I was foolish that day, because I forgot that there are many more consequences to not wearing sunblock that having an uneven tan my coworkers would mock me for when I went back home. And he knew, and he laughed at me, and that was good.

I spent a huge portion of that day leaning next to him, shoulders bumping when the boat went over a wave, laughing and singing along to the radio with him. And every so often I made sure to look over at him and burn that image into my mind, because I knew then, at his side, what it's so hard to remember when I'm on the other coast. That I would probably never seen him again.

Then I saw him three more times that trip, in those two weeks, and like an idiot, I forgot again. Because he was fine, he was walking, talking, laughing, mocking. He was brash and big and just. So perfectly himself. So perfectly and completely the uncle that I love so fucking much that I lost track of reality again. And worse yet, during those times, I was aching and pained and exhausted from my burns, so I barely interacted with him as I should have. I could have had an entire other day with him, or at least the afternoon, but I slept through it.

I was hurt, I was healing, fine, whatever--I missed a chance.

I won't regret my scars, but I'll always regret that nap.

I spent one magical, amazing, shocking day with my uncle on the open ocean, and it was amazing. Even now I can stop sometimes and just--remember what it looked like, light on the sea, wind pulling at my clothes and the waves, at the way he urged me on when I took the helm and tried--not well, mind--to guide the boat. I turned us around, and he just said, You started a figure eight, now you have to finish it! And he laughed.

So I finished it and I spent the day with him and I etched every second of it I could into my soul, because I loved it.

I hope he loved it, too. I really do.

We got lunch.

It was good, I think, but maybe, probably, that was the company.

So. Uncle--this is something I want to tell you but don't have the nerve to say in person, on the phone, in text. I'm better with prose, and maybe you knew that but maybe you didn't, because I don't think I ever spoke to you about my writing.

I asked you, last April, about tattoos. I mentioned, very deliberately, that I'm thinking about getting one. I wasn't bold enough to say, guess what it is. I was worried it would make you sad, or uncomfortable, or--something. I'm not sure how it will make you feel.

I don't like needles and I don't like pain and I never wanted a tattoo, but about a year ago now I woke up one morning and thought, I want a tattoo that says Tank Girl. I want a tattoo for my uncle, to remind me how strong and sturdy he's always thought I was. I want to be able to look at it and go, Yeah. I'm tough enough to do this. I want a tattoo to remind me of the first man I ever really believed was invulnerable. I want a tattoo dedicated to my personal Superman.

I want that. I'm looking into local parlors. I'm trying to decide on a place--somewhere I can see it, without a mirror. Somewhere bold, but tasteful. I'm looking at prices. I'm looking at fonts.

If you die, Uncle, before you get to see it, because I'm poor and broke and I work minimum wage, part-time, and I don't know when I'll be able to afford it, let alone tickets across the country, I want you to know it's going to happen.

I love you, I miss you, I cherish you. Even when I don't say it. Even when I don't text you. Because I'm bad at that, at staying in contact even with the people most important to me. I'm so goddamn bad at it. You helped make me. Formative years, and earliest memories--you're there. You'll always be there. Important moments and critical events, you were there.

Thank you for taking me to see the manatees. Thank you for showing me the dolphins. Thank you for giving me the ocean. Thank you for every hug, every afternoon or evening of babysitting, thank you for every time out. Thank you for letting me help you with your Star Trek Christmas Tree a few years ago.

I think, maybe, I should send this to you as an email.

But I don't think I even have your email address.

I love you.

"Even despite our estrangement I've got a small query for you: What Comes Next?"--What Comes Next, Jonathon Groff, Hamilton

So.


Yeah, things are really rough and difficult right now. Meds are hard to manage and remember why it's so important to take them, when they don't feel like they're helping manage or balance my emotions. But at the same time... You know I had a really terrible day yesterday. Really terrible. But last night, I saw something a friend posted on their blog asking, 'someone write this', and.

I did?

I just sat down and wrote a short story for her, for this friend I've never met but who has been there for me during some of the worst moment of my life. The first author I ever properly collaborated with on anything, let alone the hundred small projects we've debated and considered and brainstormed. Most of those will never come to fruition, but for once writing isn't the point, thinking together is.  I had an authoress friend once before, also online, and somehow she vanished a little after a year talking to one another. I still don't know if she had some kind of problem with me or if something bad happened. I really, genuinely hope she's okay.

I thought this newer friendship would end the same way. We stopped talking, we had some distance. But eventually, every so often, we'd talk again. Brief little discussions or jokes. Sometimes that's enough to keep a relationship going. It's enough to be able to say, yes, I still know you and we still get along. We've been talking much more regularly since last week, when she contacted me out of the blue to ask if I'd been watching a new show on Netflix. I hadn't, but I did that day, and it was funny, cute, and clever. Not a lot of internal coherency, but that's alright. There's foreshadowing and theories and a new season coming out at the end of the year. We're both looking forward to it.

Last night, while in the middle of a bad fit of depression, I saw that she wanted someone to write something funny, so I did. I finished up and notified her, then posted it online. I haven't posted a story in more than a year, but for her I did. And she loved it! I was so glad.

Bad things are everywhere, and Bad Thoughts haunt us. But there's an astounding amount of pleasure and joy to be found in giving someone else a little of your time, a little of your energy, a little of your thought. It's very, very rewarding.

I have a lot to do today, and i the next few days I hope I can hold onto this feeling.

Ja na!

"I couldn't stick around, so text me in the morning,"--Text Me In The Morning by Neon Trees

It has been a terrible year. It will continue to be so, because things have not yet settled and won't in the next several months. I don't just mean 2016, either--but really, from whatever day you're reading this to a year in the past, I promise, it's been awful.

There have been break-ups, panic attacks, abandonments, child development evaluations, hospital visits, deaths, lost jobs, quit jobs, stolen jobs, lost money, lost homes, massive financial debts--

I could scream. I'd like to. I'd really like to, but I live in an apartment with three roommates and that would be super disrespectful of the time--currently three past twin in the morning. I'm not that far gone, yet: I still have more than enough reason to understand panicked and-or frustrated screaming at two AM is generally considered a bad thing. It's a bad thing most of the time actually, however necessary it seems.

Right now, though, I'd like to talk about medication again. ADHD medication. Mine, in fact.

My father lost his job, which means I lost my health insurance, which means I lost my ability to purchase my Concerta. Which means I've stopped taking it again, sort of, or at least I did this week and most of last week, because hey, isn't it better to have later if I need it than to run out because I kept taking it?

Well... not necessarily. I'm an adult and I function, and I'm moderately used to being off my medicine because I do this often: not falling off the belief in medication bandwagon, but falling off the taking medication train. I get distracted, panicked, depressed, frustrated. I want help, I want attention, sometimes I even want the suffocating despair for reasons I can't fully articulate but occasionally borderline dangerously self-destructive--and before you get too concerned, yes I've notified my family, roommates, and health providers that I'm currently at that level of depressed and frightened and desperate to run away from everything bad, which most of my major daily life concerns currently registers as. It's not like I'm unsupervised or ever going to, y'know, do anything about it.

I'm too practical for that. Mostly I consider that a good thing, though there are of course intense moment of frantic--

Frantic whatever. I'm trying to avoid using the world we all know I'm thinking because this is maybe sort of a supposed to be a family-friendly-type blog. But here, let me fail spectacularly at that avoidance for the sake of saying: No, I don't consider suicide a valid option. I think about it, but I'm not going to do anything. More specifically, when the urges and thoughts come, I refuse them.

Medication, though. I'm not sure, this was a very spur-of-the-moment post so it's not exactly polished--not as though any of them truly have been, ever. I was thinking about the blog out of the blue when I really should be asleep but instead intended to work on a story, and, well, here I am. Ha ha ha, impulse control, not a thing right now. I'm tired and my foot's asleep and if you say 'stream of consciousness' I might just, I don't know, my thoughts aren't exactly making sense right now. I'm part thinking about what I'm writing and part thinking about Mrs. Potato Head from Toy Story. So.

... Yeah. I mentioned I'm not on my ADD pills and this is generally what happens when that is the case: some focus, bursts of creativity, lots of panic over not understanding what's happening in my own head. As someone who has extensively trained myself ot analyze my own mind, that can be a very frightening situation to find myself, and for years now I've characterized my 'extremely ADHD moments' as those during which my thoughts skid to a halt and I urgently think to myself I don't know what I'm thinking about.

There will be words, a complete sentence or paragraph or rant in my head, and I will not know where it came from or what it's actually about. Abstract thought, in that sense, is actually not my friend and never has been: it's more a source of anxiety.

When I work on this blog, I think about Dan. From CHADD, which I haven't attended in a very long time. I miss it. I miss the familiarity of the conversations, even the ones that annoyed me because it was the same stories or questions over and over, repeated every few months. That bothered me eventually, and now I miss them because I could anticipate what was going to happen next. I didn't need to have control to feel in control or comfortable; things were familiar. Now, even if I go back, it wouldn't even be to the same place, let alone the same people. Maybe. Probably. I can hope, but I'm also frightened of the prospect.

I'm frightened of a great deal these days, and I really detest that.

I am not afraid of fear, but I guess I am afraid of the impact fear has on my life. It can tear it, or me, apart. That's an intimidating prospect. I don't like going through my days and having seemingly random, entirely paralyzing and panic-inducing thoughts like "Oh yeah he starts preschool next month I need to have another job by June" and "Should I move out when the lease is up in September even though I should be able to live here another year" and "If I do stay then I'm wasting my sister and Red's staying where they are until September to wait for me".

Adults. Actually honest to god grown-ups out there, reading this right now. I would really, really love someone to talk to about this who isn't my age. I feel very overwhelmed, and most people I can talk to about it have their own problems right now that I am too close to or preoccupied with by half. I'm 23 and feeling alone and abandoned, helpless and hopeless, scared and dumber than I have in a long time, and I don't know what to do. Sorry. I know it's not your problem. I know that'll hurt my parents to read, but right now I'm too close to tears just writing this to pull my punches any more than I am--

And make no mistake, I am. There is so much I spend my time and energies holding back.

Help? Help. Help me.

Sorry.



Ja na. 

"Sometimes courage is the quiet voice at the end of the day saying, 'I will try again tomorrow.' "—Mary Anne Radmacher

I know I had something clever to say here, but I can't remember what. I got distracted—surprise!—by reviewing some of my old posts. And then, just now—mind you, it's literally four in the morning as I type this—I wanted to use an M-dash by my Chromebook can't, so I went through an older post (Denial is not just a river in Egypt) to find one.

It was horrifying to read. I remember writing it, vaguely. I remember how hurt I was by everything that had been going on. Worse than that, though, is how God led me to reading that post now of all times. Why? Why.

My grandfather is dying. He is in hospice, and I don't know what to say to him. My uncle's kidney is failing because of his chemo—he can keep up the chemo and die from the kidney, or he can stop the chemo and die from the cancer. There is no third option. My mother was upset and went out somewhere at night and didn't answer her phone no matter how many times I called; like that time with my dad, I thought she was dead. There was screaming and sobbing, and I'm pretty sure I scared my dad with the way I reacted and the things I said. My—

My—
My parents are splitting up.
I can't handle the things going on in my life right now. A few days ago I came the closest I ever have to killing myself. It wasn't particularly close, but it was still scary. I'm trying sometimes to work on exhuming the things that haunt me, but it's hard to remember to when things seem so okay until I let myself sit down and think. When that happens, it's hard not to scream and claw my own skin off, my eyes out, I—

My psychiatrist said I'm not a violent person, and I laughed in her face. "My violence," I told her, "is self-destructive. It's self-directed. I'm a very violent person."

I would destroy my body if given half the chance, the time or tools. It's not masochism, it's self flagellation. Not in the truest sense of the word, of course. I'm not that religious. Maybe, just maybe, I'm not that crazy either. I hope.

Bottom line is: I'm alive. I'm trying to stay that way. It's hard. It's been a hard few years, and the fact that the days keep passing it becoming more and more frightening as I realize how little I've accomplished, changed, or accepted. I'm trying to remember that I've made "progress". I'm trying to remember that I "have grown so much." I'm trying to remember how to face my problems. I'm trying to remember how to be part of the world I've spent the last two years just watching, and I'm trying to remember why I should even bother.

I want to talk to my kids. The four, the siblings, the ones who I love so much and haven't seen in more than a year. I'm scared to because they might not like or remember me anymore. They're children, and children are hurt so easily. Their parents are—were?—my friends. I should be able to call them and say, "Hey! Sorry I fell out of touch, but do you think..." and ask to meet somewhere, or if maybe I could visit. I should be able to, but I'm scared and busy and sad.

The monsters in my life are swallowing me and I can't remember how I used to fight them.

But I remember how I was going to begin this. I was going to say: "I know I used to have a specific format for these posts, but I can't recall quite what it was." I could go look, but that requires more checking, double-checking, and cross-referencing than I want to do at 4:23am.

I have another blog post to write. But hey, I want to apologize. I'm sorry this isn't about ADHD anymore. I'm sorry I lost the plot and purpose of this. I'm sorry I stopped posting and writing. I'm sorry my life has taken the direction is can. I'm sorry a cry for help like this is the best I can manage right now. I'm sorry I only come here for the bad stuff. I'm sorry I don't have better news. I'm sorry I stopped going to group.

I'm sorry I try to take on so much responsibility for what other people feel. That's one of the things that scared Dad the other night, I think. He realized how much I try to be nice by protecting others' feelings. I'm sorry, in the sense of deep regret, that I was so genuinely confused when he said it was more than I should try to bear. And I'm sorry, in the sense of deep shame, that I wish I hadn't shown him that part of me, because now he is frightened and worried about me, and he has enough to deal with already.

I will try to post again soon.

Ja na.

Denial is not just a river in Egypt.

Hi guys.

Here's something I've been stewing over lately. When you've been in therapy for as long as I have, and especially when you've studied Psych./Soc. like I did in school, you develop certain... talents. Skills if you will. Such developments are very helpful, both in therapy and in life. When something goes wrong, or you catch yourself behaving in a way that is resultant of whatever you're receiving treatment for, you can apply the mechanisms you've learned. They can be incredibly helpful, but like everything else in this world there are pros and cons. Once you've mastered (so to speak) the art of self-examination, you start looking at other people the same way. You start applying what you've learned to them. And that doesn't always turn out well.

The ability I'm referring to today is that of psychoanalysis.

Dictionary.reference.com defines psychoanalysis as follows:
noun
1) a systematic structure of theories concerning the relations of conscious and unconscious psychological processes
2) a technical procedure for investigating unconscious mental processes and for treating psychoneuroses

Today, let's talk about the latter definition.

Having psychoanalysis in your supply closet of coping methods is invaluable (unless you are one of those individuals who take it too far *cough* BBC Sherlock Holmes *cough*). It allows you to ponder things out for yourself, to pick apart your motives, desires, and actions. Once you've done that, it's easier to focus on each aspect. That's where the professional help comes in. Understanding not why you do something but what drives you--or stops you as the case may be. What blocks you from getting what you want?

In theory it's a fairly straightforward process. Ask questions; get answers. The questions my therapists usually ask me, and I have now begun to ask myself, are paraphrased below.

What do you want?
What actions can you take to achieve that goal?
What steps have you taken?
What stopped you from taking those steps?
What are the excuses your subconscious provides?
What are you afraid of?/What about this makes you anxious?

What are the reasons behind your reluctance to act?

What is the origin of that reason?

What can you do to manage those fears and anxieties?

Well, essentially those questions. I think I got the spirit of it, anyway. Fact of the matter is that these aren't just questions; these are The Hard Questions. At the source of every decision or non-decision you make or don't make (choosing not to decide is still choosing, by the way) is a reason. A fear, anxiety, a traumatic incident, whatever. It is one of your vulnerabilities.You may not be able to recognize it.

More importantly, chances are you don't want to.

Your mind and heart and sometimes body will fight and fight and fight to keep that Reason hidden. Safe and untouched at the back of your mind or deep in yourself where it won't hurt as bad, and you can live without acknowledging it. You will rebel against the invasive, cruel, rude and unnecessary interrogation you or your therapist is putting you through.

You will get angry.
You will be afraid.
And it will hurt.

There are as many reasons, many of which are instinctive emotional reactions, to bury your vulnerability. Sometimes you hide these parts of you because you're ashamed. Sometimes it is because you have been hurt before. Sometimes it is even because you have examined it before and know it's irrational--but you feel it is truth regardless.

(Shit like this is why we need therapy.)

I can't very well expect you to examine yourself so uncomfortably closely without doing so myself. In the spirit of fairness and the immortal words of everyone everywhere:

I'll show you mine if you show me yours.

I genuinely believe I am replaceable. To expand on that a little: I believe myself to be a burden, and feel very deeply that "I am not the child my parents would have wanted". Why do I think that? Simple: I was conditioned to, through many unhealthy friendships, believe absolutely in my lack of self-worth. I am worth nothing without them by my side, I am unwanted, I am substandard, I am a bad person. Those thoughts wormed their way into my mind around the same time I started to really grasp the concept of "money" and understanding that my medications and therapy sessions were draining my family's funds. I was causing trouble, I was making life difficult for them. I still am: I am unemployed, I do not drive, I drain the family coffers with my wants and wishes and medicines. To this day I have problems--big problems--with feelings of inadequacy and worthlessness. I wrestle everyday with the concept that I am loved [And here I am stumped. I don't know how to phrase the next part of the sentence. ...because of who I am? ...despite who I am? ...regardless of who I am? They all have drastically different meanings. I'm not in my family's heads; I can't figure out which words to use and be accurate.] Because of this:

I am afraid of being left behind and/or forgotten. That is it. That is the bottom line. This one is simple. I submit myself to abuse, I am desperate to leave an impression, I dress in an unusual fashion, I spend time memorizing jokes. I am grateful for every single instance in which someone I have not seen for some time recalls who I am, and yet due to the above, remain incapable of speaking to such people for fear of interfering in their life and causing them trouble. In school I was so desperate to be acknowledged I maintained abusive relationships, openly mocked not only myself but others in a frantic bid to impress my so-called friends. I devoted myself to them, some more than others. I loved them and gave them everything I could--nearly all of me. It wasn't enough. For almost three years I spent money, my family's money, to talk about my friends and get advice on how to help them (she wondered why my years of therapy didn't seem to make a difference). Even now, even this second, I am fighting the urge to give in, throw what little self-respect I've built up since graduating out the metaphorical window, and contact them. Just one of them. Just her. Just her.

I hold myself responsible for things out of my control/I give myself too much credit. In contrast to the above I tend to feel that I (potentially) have a large impact on those around me. You saw some of this in my last post, but let me give you an example: If my father and grandmother get into a fight, and he leaves angry to go on a drive, I consider it my duty to catch him before he leaves, give him a hug, and try and calm him as much as I can. So far he's always come back. No car crashes, no arrests, no anything awful that doesn't bear thinking about. But if I were to move out, and my father and grandmother get into a fight, and he leaves angry to go on a drive, and crashes and dies because he wasn't thinking clearly--that would be my fault. I would carry my father's death on by shoulders for the rest of my life, not simply because I would mourn and miss him, but because I was responsible for not being there. I selfishly left home and foolishly expected my family of adults to actually be rational, responsible people. I also consider myself responsible for losing friends. You see, I have been friends with and lost so many people who are so very different. The only common denominator in every one of those relationships--was me. Logically, I am at fault. Which leads quite nicely into my next admittance.

Something is wrong with me. No ifs, ands, or buts. Something is wrong with me. As a person, a friend, a daughter, a sister, niece, cousin, goddaughter, human being, something is wrong with me. And whatever it is, is irreparable.

(I go to therapy to deal with shit like this.)

So. Psychoanalysis, yes? For me that means prying myself apart, combing through the separated strands of my memories, feelings, impulses, and thoughts, and looking at them very, very hard until I start seeing how maybe this way on the left there has something to do with that down in the right corner.

It is an invaluable ability. It tides me over between sessions. It empowers me to take the lead in my own therapy appointments instead of following the guidance of the person giving counsel (thought sometimes that is most certainly needed). I can direct us to where I want to go, what I want to work on, what I think needs to be examined.

(Therapy means unweaving the messy tapestry of my life, one section at at a time, and painstakingly investigating the source of the errors and mistakes before putting it back together, better. More like I wanted it to be when I started. Thankfully, despite my metaphor, I still get to jump around. I don't have to do it in any particular order. As things come up, as I have my revelations and epiphanies and go through various life experiences, I tackle them. One step at a time.

It's sewing and realizing you fucked up a stitch a while back but not so far it's worth tying off the thread where you are. It's going back and looking at what you did, trying different ways to fix it, and finding something that works. Then you move forward.

It's trying to get a degree and having to go through prerequisite classes, only the classes are the therapy, and the degree is you finally in control of your life.)

But you can't do it alone, not really. I have had several experiences with bringing something up and having my therapists calling me out on that one, odd thing I said. Like a thread sticking out of the hem of your shirt. And she pulls at it insistently until I am clinging to my defenses/excuses/reasons by the skin of my teeth... and then once more. And out comes the truth. The hard truth. The painful, shameful, embarrassing, irrational truth. And then I can start thinking clearly.

At last my defenses are down. At last my blinders are off. At last I recognize that I am in a safe environment, working with someone who's primary concern is not to make my life easier, but to help me make my life better.

So yeah. At the start of this I mentioned the pros and cons.

Fact of the matter is, there are very few cons. Just one, really, that comes to mind...

I bring all this up because a fortnight or so ago I found myself idly, coldly, objectively dissecting the reasons my sister has not taken a certain action. I came to a perfectly reasonable, rather upsetting conclusion and wondered how she would react when I mentioned it to her.

Then I stopped and thought how much that would hurt her, and decided not to do so.

During the subsequent moment of clarity I made a choice... a new rule for myself: I will not psychoanalyze the people I care about. And if I do, without realizing?

I will not bring up my deductions in a fight. I will not back the people I love into a corner using things I've learned in confidence or realized on my own as weapons against family and friends. I know that pain. I know that fear. I know the helplessness and misery that comes with becoming the victim of people less conscientious than myself. I know what it feels like to be betrayed.

I also know what it feels like to be the assailant.

I've done that. And I spent years trying to make up for it. Years never being quite forgiven. It hurt. Hurts nearly as much as being on the receiving end of such an attack--and yes. They are attacks.

As someone who has been on both sides, I think I'm entitled to say that both suck and nobody ends up truly happy. One because they are haunted by another's words and deeds, the other because they will always wonder 'what if'.

I would say it happens on accident sometimes but I've never had that experience. Each time I hurt someone like that, using my intimate knowledge of their feelings and weaknesses and personal demons, I knew exactly what it would do. I planned what to say ahead of time. I steered the conversation down a path that would allow me to say, quite naturally, the thing I knew would hurt them most.

So. Psychoanalysis, yes? No?

Pros: better person, handle on your own emotions, understanding the reasons behind (in)actions, taking charge of your own life, making progress, learning more about yourself, able to better understand others

Cons: better able to hurt others' feelings, temptation to use knowledge against others, potential for social disaster when incorrect, potential path to misery

Basically? It would behoove you to remember a few things:
Golden Rule: Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.
Karma is a bitch.
Think, then speak.
With great power comes great responsibility.
They are rubber and you are glue; whatever you say bounces off them and sticks to you.

And that's a wrap, folks. I know my personal views and experiences got us way off track. But honestly, it says at the top of the page I'm ADD, why did you expect me to stay focused?

...I think that's the closest I've come to writing an essay is about four years. Golly.

Ja na!

Rumors of my death have been greatly exaggerated.

Hi guys.

Been a while, huh? I'm sorry. Life happened, and this blog became one of the things I would think of and then flinch under the weight of my guilt. I liked doing it, and felt productive when I did so. I thought I was contributing something, maybe even helping people.

Who knows? Maybe I did. EDBBSO (wow) isn't... dead. Not really. It just became less than what I had hoped. But I'm still going to tell the truth. Not the whole truth--but nothing but.

So, um. To catch you up on things. My trip went well. I got a boyfriend out of it! That October I worked in a costume shop and became a sound tech for another, amazing play. Seriously, everything I've done and that was my favorite. Woman In Black. That is some scary stuff right there, man. And I got to make about a third of it happen. I'm still so proud of that show. Just before Halloween, my long-distance boyfriend of five months called, and we mutually broke up with each other. Then we didn't talk for almost two years.

That doesn't matter though.

Not really.

Umm, what else happened? I worked for an in-home daycare for awhile Spring 2012. That sort of gave me a wonderful opportunity--I spent just over a year working for an Indian family, which was a wonderfully enriching experience. I didn't really do much else. But my mom lost her job around the same time, so that was scary. I ended up going more than a year without my Concerta, which was even scarier. There were times when I didn't even know what I was thinking. I would be having a thought and suddenly realize I didn't know where it came from. Which was unpleasant to say the least.

I got a lot of ideas, though. For writing.

There was awhile somewhere in there that I had to live out of my sister's room, because mine was infested with ants. Considering my crippling fear of insects, that was... kind of a problem. Eventually things got better. I didn't realize my mother was steadily draining her retirement fund to pay our rent. At this point, there's pretty much nothing left of it at all. Illogically, I feel like it's my fault. I should have tried harder I shoulder have worked more. I should have gotten a day job. I should have grown the hell up, faced my demons, and spit in their faces.

I didn't.

I carry a lot of guilt over that, I guess.

I carry a lot of guilt for a lot of things.

It's stupid.

I ignore it whenever I can.

(To me, by the way, guilt feels like the prickle of gooseflesh across the backs of my shoulders, the itching sting that follows the planes of my nose down to my cheeks, and the sickening hollow-heavy feeling you sometimes get in your stomach. Yeah. That one.)

I've... been working to improve myself.

I got a watch.

I got my meds back.

I kept my job with that family.

I went to therapy.

Didn't do much else. (What a waste of time. I wonder--in seven, ten, twenty years will I look back at this time in my life and remember how awful it feels to do nothing for daysweeksmonthsyears on end? Or will I envy my younger self for having so much time?)

Pottermore came out! I joined. Got through the entire first book in one sitting. Before you ask: Hufflepuff. (I always identified with them. It wasn't a surprise.)

I was able to get 'my' kids presents. That was nice. I won't be able to do it this year.

I haven't even seen four of them in months. My fault, all my fault--I haven't contacted them since they moved away, I keep telling myself to, I keep composing the message I want to send and just... never... writing it. I've missed two birthdays. I felt awful on each of them. I should call, I would think. I should send them a message. But because I didn't on the first, I was afraid to do so on the second. They're siblings--what if the former thinks I like the latter better? I don't want to hurt anyone's feelings, I don't want to interrupt their life, so I just keep to myself and hurt like hell over it.

I ignore it whenever I can.

I got a wicked cool new laptop for Xmas. It's a life saver and now I'm just putting off sending it in for repairs--which it needs, the power cord keeps slipping loose which is BAD. I really love my little computer.

The last thing I needed was a way to spend every day in my room.

I tried dieting--lost some weight. Gained it back when when my Grandmother died this last February. The eighth. Feels like that should be in caps now. The Eighth. My dad's mom, who lives... lived... In Maine. (I spoke to her while she was in the hospital. Just once. Why didn't I say anything? I couldn't think of what to say. Her last memory--if in fact she remembered my, at the end, would be of me essentially speechless. Stumbling and awkward and uncomfortable. I should have said something. Something meaningful. I thought I knew what regret was. I thought I was familiar with that bitter, coppery, bloody emotion that creeps up my throat and tries to fight its way past my tongue, my teeth, my lips. At least I saw her on my trip. At least she got to know me, the real me, the me who is a person not a child... But I was invited to stay with her a few days. I didn't, I didn't because I enjoyed my aunt't house and company more--it didn't smell bad there, like piss and disease. Not like Grammy's.)

I found out my favorite uncle has cancer eleven days later. Stage 4, incurable, no-doubts-about-it-he's-going-to-die-soon cancer. I didn't even know he was my favorite uncle. I hadn't realized it, hadn't examined my feelings or our relationship. Not until I called that ex-boyfriend of mine, whose younger brother has had cancer. Twice. He asked if we were close and I started crying at the sudden, club-like realization. My employer told me to believe in miracles and his strength. I secretly wrestled with the fact that if I saved enough money to visit Maine like I had wanted, to see my aunt to see my cousins to see my uncle to visit my dead grandmother, God, I would be too late anyway, she is dead... that I would have to give the money to my mom. Because getting to see her baby brother is more important then me getting to see my uncle. (At least I saw him on my trip. At least we had a chance to talk, for him to see how I've grown, into me, the person who is not a child. We didn't get enough time, he was going to work every day, he had the cancer while I was there I should have known, done something, changed things somehow. Damn. It was like I'd swallowed a serrated penny.)

Plans were concocted. Of visitations, of trips to Florida, or him here. Wonderful! I would get to see him before he died! (Three months, they said. Three months to five years. With treatment, and only if he took to the chemo. Then they found more, all over his body. Going towards his brain? I didn't ask. I don't like details.

I'm a writer.

I have a very vivid imagination. So I don't want to know, I don't, I don't, I don't. But I do, because this is what's taking my uncle. My uncle. It can't have him, no, he's Superman. He was my Superman. And this was his Kryptonite.)

This hurts. Writing this hurts. That was in February.

My employers told me they were moving to India. They didn't want to, but her father's health was failing and his were getting older every year, ha ha, and they felt the very strong need to be with family. I could relate, so I smiled for them. Helped them pack. Watched the kids. Cleaned their house. The normal stuff. We promised to stay in touch. They said to call them if I ever go to India. But my god, they had become such an integral part of my live. I was devastated when they left. (Their two year old wouldn't hug me. He didn't understand what was happening. Didn't know he'd never see me again. I miss him, the annoying little shit.) And I didn't hug either of them good-bye, because we'd never hugged. We were friends by that point, but we never hugged. I should have done it. I should have. I should have messaged her on facebook. I should have done it. I should have. They said I could call. I should have done it. I should have. I still should. Bitter, coppery, bloody.

I got another job at the same daycare. Under the table, below minimum wage, but still work. Still money, when my family was in such need. I should have quit there and interviewed other places. I had done it once and nearly gotten the job. I was one of two people they seriously considered. The other won out because of experience. But as my Indian friend regularly said, "How can I get experience if I do not get this job?". I suppose that's too logical though. Still, at least I tried. I tried. The job I did end up working wasn't what I had been told to expect. I did not get the hours I was told I would. More children came. One of my favorites left. I was devastated. Again.Why do I keep losing people? Our oldest dog collapsed and couldn't stand up; she was dying. Bitter.

My uncle did manage to visit. He brought my cousin, his eldest son, who is older than me by a few weeks and never lets me forget it. I spent some time with them. But I had to work. I hadn't known they were coming with any advanced warning, and besides, with that many kids at the daycare she needed somebody else to be there. Legally. (For some reason her husband didn't count?) The time I spent with them was.. minimized. Diluted, I guess. I didn't get to talk to my uncle alone. They went to the beach without me, I remember that clearly. I made me start sobbing: I got home from work to find them and my grandmother in the car, and my mom walking towards it. She said they were going to the beach, and they just left. They just left me standing there in the yard without a second's thought for how that might effect me because Mom was too distracted by her brother being there to remember her kids. Or at least me. Copper.

She didn't say goodbye to my dad either. All I could think was how hurt I was, how much I would have wanted to go with them, how I hadn't gotten so much as fifteen minutes with my dying uncle when they'd spent days and days and days together already by that point. And if they got in a car wreck or something and all died... But they didn't, and it didn't matter, and my mother apologized, and I forgave her. (That doesn't mean I've forgotten how much it hurt. I have abandonment issues, okay?) Apparently, a plan had been made for my uncle and cousin to spend time with my sister and I--together--that Friday. I worked Fridays. I didn't know my mother being emotional also meant her being stupidly cruel. Because, you know, it never had before. I took the day off.

(While they were here--or rather while they and my grandmother were visiting Seattle when they were supposed to be here visiting us--I finally got the second piercings in my ears I'd planned to get before leaving for my trip. Hurt like a mofo, but worth it. I've had a few scares with them though. Like having to be held in place by my father while I screamed and sobbed as my mother pushed the piercing earrings back through closing holes. Apparently I have a metahuman healing factor? And wow, can you tell I'm a DC girl, not Marvel? Metahuman. Not mutant. Ha. Funny, the things that occur to you. The way little things come up in the oddest of circumstances. I went with my dad, and we ran a few errands, and he held my hand because I hate quick pain. I hate stabbings, I hate splinters, I hate water running over a bloody cut when I shave).

My sister, cousin, uncle, and I went to Multnomah Falls. I got an overwhelming sense of deja vu as I'm pretty sure we went there the last time he'd visited with his younger son my sophomore year. (Bad memories, bad memories, go away, go away!) The three younger of us started to climb up. Please note that my cousin attends a military academy and has for several years, and I... have asthma, weak ankles, and am 200+ pounds. I don't look it, thankfully, but I am--which is, hahahanotfunnystoplaughing--a heavy weight for me to carry because I decided long ago I would never be... well, I would never be obese. Like my parents. (Tell me a fat joke and I'll punch you in the face, I swear to God I will.) I didn't get very far. I felt horrible, but had a nice chat with this nice old lady who visited the falls regularly since she was a little girl. I got to know the history of the area, which was nice. The next day, or maybe the day after that, my sister, cousin, and I went to Oaks Park. We had a really, really great time. Laughs, songs, jokes, exhilarations galore. They went home a few days later.

I still hadn't really gotten time with my uncle. A few vague comments, thinly veiled as jokes to disguise my pain, and his solemn responses don't count. (Tell me everybody dies as much as you want, that doesn't mean you can.)

The dog recovered. I wished to God my uncle had instead. Blood.

I worked more. A lot, really. Visited my best friend, her hubby, their amazing son. Turned twenty-one in July. Got drunk a week or so later. That was fun. I... don't really see what the fuss is about, so that's good I guess: I missed out on the alcoholism gene. (I'm afraid sometimes that my sister didn't.)

Months passed. Life resumed, with the new addition of regularly getting updates on how close my uncle was to death. He needs surgery, gets it, gets infected and nearly dies from that, falls ill, keeps going with chemo, goes back to work. He's a cop! By all rights he should have been given a desk job, I don't know what the hell they were thinking letting a terminally ill man back into the field. The school. Whatever. Whatever. Bitter.

When school started the number of the kids at the daycare went back down to manageable levels. I lost my job. I'm so done with unsatisfying everything. And I'm so done being a burden on my family and sometimes, sometimes I think about how it would be so much less painful if I just--But no.

No.

I won't. I won't. For everyone. For everything. Life is beautiful. Life is kind. Life is worthwhile, and it will get better. It will get better. It will get better. It will get better. It... it might. It might. It might get better, but I don't see how, I don't see when. Copper.

I got a boyfriend. He's... pretty wonderful. We don't live close--in fact we live pretty far from each other. And neither of us drives as of yet. We talk on facebook, but... not as often as I'd like. He has a heart condition. The last time I dated someone with a "heart condition" he was lying to me. I lost nine months of my life to that boy. And they have the same first name. And I still miss my last boyfriend. It's been two full years since we broke up, he and I, and I still miss him. We were... really in tune. Unusually in tune. Too in tune: we didn't need to talk because we knew how the other would react. We held conversations with the other in our heads, and didn't talk for weeks. I'm just having issues with being in a relationship again. Ignore me, I'm being silly. (That doesn't meant I'm not still scared, I don't want this ignored I want answers. I want to know where I stand with the first boy I ever truly imagined a life with.) Blood.

The second of my four grandmothers died. Completely out of the blue. My grandpa walked into her room in the morning and found her dead on the floor. I don't have that day marked in my calender like I do the other things. I started crying. I cried for... I don't know. Probably half an hour? I just exhausted myself. I couldn't--can't--understand why people keep dying. Why do I keep losing people? At least I saw her on my trip. We spent the evenings together watching funny, silly reality shows. When I realized I forgot my deodorant at the last place I'd stayed (my uncle's, the same uncle, the dying uncle) she gave me some unused ones she'd gotten from various hospital stays. She was totally cool with it and helped me not be so mortified. She teased me for having a new boyfriend. We talked books. She made breakfast for me every day I was there. She... we had apple pie for breakfast before I left, they said it was my birthday pie. I hugged her before I went out the door. I remember clearly how I felt when Grampy kissed her goodbye--because they had split up but were still married, still lived on the same land, I was so surprised and so happy--and that I thought, When I get home, I'm going to call her. Just on some random day. I'm going to call and chat with her, and Grampy. But this is me we're talking about here, and I didn't. I just... didn't.

I missed the convention I got to every year. I've missed plays at the theater. I've missed chances to see my friends, my boyfriend, my kids. I keep not contacting my psychiatrist. The dog is going back downhill. And again, again, that feeling.

Bitter

copper

blood.

Regret.

Cory Monteith died.

I didn't realize he'd had any effect on my life until he was gone. It wasn't much, but he still... still reached me, you know? With music, with his acting. I was sad to realize he was gone. Is gone. Why do I have such a problem with changing tenses after a person I've seen waking, talking, moving, is dead. It doesn't matter. A part of me cheers up with the thought that at least I have firsthand experience writing grief now. Another, louder parts wishes I didn't. Most of me... Well.

I ignore it whenever I can.

I learned what explosive, devastating relief feels like. Seeing people you love safe after their house catches fire. Being told that yes, we can make the rent this month after all. Coming clean to your family about that one, huge, ugly lie you've kept hidden under smiles and pain and misdirection after five years of hiding the truth... having them accept and forgive you your own, personal deadly sin. Learning that your uncle has reacted to well to the experimental chemo that his cancer is for all intents and purposes gone. My Indian employers told me to believe in miracles. I do.

I ignore a lot of things. I live in fantasy worlds of my own making or choosing, until reality slams home--in my dreams. I've never had dreams relevant to my life and worries, not really, but a month or so ago I had one that the youngest of my kids, the ones who aren't really mine and I haven't seen since spring--I had a dream, a nightmare, where he couldn't remember me. I was devastated. And I have these waking moments where I stand stock-still, frozen by the fact that I remember picking up a little blonde bundle of joy and smelling smoke in her hair. I guess I learned more about fear this year, too.

I ignore it whenever I can.

One thing I can't ignore, though: I thought I knew what regret was. This year I learned I was wrong. I mistook shame for regret.

But none of that is what I actually came here to tell you about. I came here because I need somewhere to talk about this... incredibly traumatic experience that I've gone through. It was last night, just last night and--God. It brings tear to my eyes just to remember it.

Rewind.

Basic fact about me: I don't like sleeping until I know my whole family is in the house. Shut up, yes, I know it's stupid. But my brain is wired to jump to the worst possible conclusion of any scenario I'm presented with. My sister is going to be an alcoholic. I am never going to learn to drive. I will never publish a novel. We are going to be evicted. Our dog is going to die and I will be the one to find her corpse. My relationship is going to fail.

My dad worked the closing shift last night. She should have been home around midnight. But he didn't, when he's promised--he'd promised--to call home on the nights he had to work late after closing, because I stay up when I don't know where someone is. (I have stayed up until ten in the morning waiting for my sister. Turns out she had an impromptu sleepover with a friend from work after drinking.) And I hadn't been told of any such call. So I called him. I expected to have a snippy conversation with him about how he didn't call when he should have to let me know he'd be late.

The first call happened--in my room with my Superman nightlight on, sitting on my bed, with only a few of my numerous blankets to keep me warm--probably somewhere between 3:30 and 3:45. I got his message box. Hang up. Redial.

By the fifth call--each of which was exactly 25 seconds of ringing and the first few words of his message--I was no longer angry. I was worried.

By the tenth I was frightened.

By the fourteenth or so I was calling by rote. It was automatic. I decided to keep calling until he came home, in case his phone was dead. I quickly squashed the thought Or he is. I left a message. I composed it in my head, very calm-like. I manged to almost say it right, only my voice was raspy as I tried not to cry and I mixed the order of two of the sentences.

"Daddy, this is ridiculous. It's ten to four in the morning--where are you? I've called at least a dozen times."

It was supposed to be "Where are you? It's ten to four in the morning." What a stupid mistake. Really. I couldn't do anything right. Sure he was okay--and then that vivid imagination I mentioned before? Kicked into full gear.

The problem with entertainment today is that there's too much blood, gore, and violence. There are too many movies with cars crashing and flipping and tumbling down mountainsides. To many advertisements with horrible things in the background, whether played straight or for laughs. It's too much. Much too much. You don't like gore, skip the next paragraph.

I was able to--or rather unable to stop myself from--visualize with big-screen hi-definition clarity my father driving home. A deer standing in the street. Whether he swerved and went over an edge or couldn't stop from hitting it and it slammed through the windshield and crushed his head the result was the same. A crash with a drunk driver; his car flipping and landing top-down. My dad suspended from the seat belt, blood leaking from his body in the various places where the car had contorted and crushed his limbs, and pouring where the various things he keeps in the back had struck or impaled him. His phone laying on the roof of the car, flashing at him as I called and called and called. Maybe he was conscious. Maybe he wasn't. Maybe he was in the hospital, rushed to the ER. Maybe they wouldn't find him in time. Maybe the phone was in the street, lights blinking, and he could only watch it as life drained from his torn body. Maybe my calls would be how the cops tell us he's gone. My dad, laying on the side of the road. From attack. From freak accident. From falling asleep at the wheel. From getting distracted.

(People can't understand why I don't drive. I can't understand why they do.)

Because the worst possible, frighteningly logical conclusion of someone being hours late and not picking up the phone is because they are cheating, or they are dead. And I cannot, will not believe my father would do the former. So: I was left with the latter. After so much loss, death, and fear in the last ten months, is it really a surprise I immediately believed?

Last night, I thought my father was dead.

My dad.

Dead.

My dad.

Impossible.

I was going to keep calling until he came home. I had to. Trying to get to him was the only thing I could do. I felt five years old. Terrified and alone.

The thirty-third time I called he answered. Or at least, I think so. I didn't count. Couldn't count. First thing I heard was him saying something to someone--a male voice, a coworker. He said, "... my daughter."

Then he asked what I wanted, and I started sobbing. Understandably he panicked.

My dad has years and years of experience understanding me when I cry and try to explain why I'm crying at the same time. He got angry--because he had called home. He had told my mother he would be late. And she hadn't told me, so I'd stayed up hours after I should have, with the back door unlocked for him to come in through, fighting the sleeping pill I take to counteract my insomnia every second of every minute of those hours, waiting for him to come home. So I could lecture him on needing to call home to let us(me) know he would be late and not to worry, like my sister never does, and make sure he got the dinner we set aside for him, and lecture him about needing to take care of himself, and listen to him tell me about whatever thing had kept him this time, and I would sympathize, send him off to bed, drop into my own and be out like a light in thirty seconds.

He had been cutting lumber with a buzz saw with his iPod playing. He didn't even know his phone was ringing, or vibrating, or whatever. (I imagine that coworker saw the number of missed calls just as I was calling again. He got Dad's attention too late, but then I called again and Dad answered. That's all she wrote.

But there's more to the story.

Of course there is. (Every story has three sides: yours, mine, and the truth.) He said it was okay to lock up the house. After crying for a few more minutes I did so. But I didn't change into my nightclothes, I didn't get into bed properly, and when I got back to my room the first thing I did was step onto the foot of my bed and start digging though the boxes and piles of stuff there, looking for something, anything, that my dad had given me. But really I'd already made up my mind, and I was still crying and fighting crying, and as I searched I must have really lost it because I was whispering, begging for my Ty stuffed leopard--named Nathaniel--to just be found already because I needed him.

I found him, sat on my bed, pulled my top top covers back over me, curled into a ball with my face buried between two pillows, started rocking myself, and stopped fighting that sort of truly agonizing, gut-wrenching crying you never see on TV. Where every breath is like a gasp after drowning and every sob is that deep, throaty, wet, ugly sound of pain and fear and despair and relief and exhaustion all at the same time. True to ADHD form, I was rapidly, insistently, stroking the very softest part of Nathaniel, and pulling the covers tighter and the pillows nearer as I tried to just disappear. Eventually the tears stopped.

A minute or so later I got another flash of that--of Dad, hanging upside down by his seat belt, with the phone just out of his reach and blinking while I called and he couldn't answer and there was blood everywhere, and a cop picking up the phone. The tears started again. I remembering noticing that I could actually feel the individual tears sliding across my face, over my nose and down my cheek. I usually can't. But I could last night.

Last night, when I honest-to-God went though some sort of twisted, rapid, intensely painful and frightening form of mourning for my father.

Last night, when I thought my dad was dead.

He woke me up when he got home--for which I'm grateful. I shot up and hugged him, and eventually found my way into bed properly.

This morning was... awkward. Because I was really mad at my mom, and didn't want my dad to leave my sight. And when I say morning I mean 12:10pm when I was woken by my sister. Or my mother. Or father. I don't remember. Whatever.

It doesn't matter. Not really.

It happened. "We all learned from it," I said to Mom today.

Yeah. Well. What I learned was that I had to make a goddamn iron-clad indisputable rule that if Dad calls home to say he's gonna be late, he can't hang up until he talks to me directly. Like what happened tonight, a few hours ago. We spoke for about ten seconds, it seems like. That's all I needed. Just... to make sure he knew, and she knew, that I knew he would be late. 'Cause guess what? My parents finally got it. Finally understood, through guilt, and pain, and empathy.

I don't like sleeping until I know my entire family is in the house.

Shut up.

Yes.

I know it's stupid.

I'll ignore it whenever I can.

Ja na.

"There's more to life than trying to survive"—Annie, Vanessa Carlton

SO, when D at the the CHADD meetings found out about my trip (I'm in New York at the moment) he essentially told me to blog while I was gone. The problem with that, I have found, is that while doing things worth blogging about, I am, well, busy. Doing them. And when I'm not, when I have a minute, I'm not blogging because I'm taking that minute for myself. So I haven't really managed my time well enough to blog. I've only gone online twice before this, to email my family. I haven't even texted my friend like I said I would. I need to get on that...

But I digress. The only reason I'm (the following no longer applies as it is several hours after I first put pen to paper today; right now I'm at the computer. Duh.) sitting here right now, by myself in the basement apartment of my aunt and uncle's house with a blanket wrapped around me, scribbling away in a borrowed-without-permission-but-with-FULL-intent-of-returning binder is that, for once—or rather, for the first time this trip—the words came into my head and I couldn't stop them. Clear words, when I often think initially in intentions and impressions. The words were:

"I'm so overwhelmed right now. I'm so overwhelmed..." Completely and totally overwhelmed by what is going on with/to/for me. I had to "take a minute. Just a minute. Just a minute. A minute, a minute, a minute. A minute, I need a minute. Just a minute, a minute, a minute..."

Which I did, curling up with a blanket that doesn't smell like home wrapped loosely around me.

...
...

That reads, to those who don't speak panic-attack-ese: I took a blanket off 'my' bed, wrapped it around my shoulders, debated over bringing a stuffed animal with me, walked over my suitcase very carefully wihout looking at it as tears gathered in my eyes. It means that I sat down on the part of the couch I've spent the most time on, brought my legs up, and fell slowly over into the fetal position as I adjusted the blanket so it was over my head, still muttering (maybe, I'm not sure, I may just have been thinking it with increasing anxiety and decreasing coherence, as is often the case in such circumstances, about needing a minute, just a minute, a minute, a minute, a minute, a minute.

(Sounds poetic, doesn't it? It isn't.)

It means that I gave myself over to helpless, hopeless (I wasn't sure which so I went with both) shuddering as near-scalding tears rand across my face to my temple. It means I was listening to the sporadic pouding of feet over my head as my second cousins ran around and my aunt talking to my dad  on the phone, and it means that I was hoping, vaguely but sincerely, that someone (Jen) would come downstairs and find me and hold me or something. But that, of course, didn't happen.

It hardly ever does.

And then it means, if you read very carefully and think about your own experiences in such things, that I stopped listening to them and started feeling the heat of my own frantic-ish breaths against my face, and that I realized somewhat that I did not, in fact, want to get up and walk over to my bed for my inhaler so I had to calm down. I started feeling, slightly, the pulsing pf blood through my veins as I started, perhaps,  to regulate my breathing.  Which of course got me thinking about runnings laps outside in the winter in my seventh grade  year, and the female eighth grade Phys. Ed. teacher telling me/us to breathe in through our noses and out through our mouths. I did that for a bit, then shifted slightly and the blanket moved an inch or so and I could see light, which I didn't want, and smell fresh air, which I realized I kind of did.

I moved the blanket back to darkness and realized acutely that the blanket did NOT smell like home, or dreams, or anything familiar, not even, really, the house I was staying in, so likely it was the smell of the last person to use the blanket before me, which was weird. Then I rememberd, I think, that the teacher had actually said in through the mouth, out through the nose (so as not to harm the sinuses or somesuch thing) and started doing that instead.

That was about when I realized that there wasn't much difference between having my eyes open or closed. And no, that thought didn't lead to some for of epiphany. In fact, I'm not sure what I thought about then, but it wasn't long before the tears dried on my face, at that time proving I had taken several minutes, not one, and I sat up.

And started thinking about how D had said I should keep blogging while I'm gone. That was when I got the binder off the bookshelf. Then I sat back down and started writing.

As of now I'm starting (again, not true present tense as I'm on the computer, but whatever) my fourth front-side-only sheet of paper, and my hand is cramping because I've written so much in so short a period of time.

Yay me.

And Jen has come downstairs, though that was just to find out if I would prefer she drive me to the bus stop tomorrow, or her husband, my cousin. (I picked her because we get along really well, whereas I've never been all that close to my second-eldest cousin. [Hah, funny story: my eldest cousin was born on the due date of the aforementioned second-eldest, and vice versa—one was early, the other late, just enough so they switched birthdays.] )

I'm suddenly realizing I haven't eaten yet today, and that I should try to finish the "DEEP JUNGLE" level of Kingdom Hearts today AND that I need to  pack up down here because my "jast murried" cousin and his wife are going to crash here tonight. Probably. And I'm leaving this place. Tomorrow. Not never-to-return or something—I'll be back in about two weeks—but I have to go and get on a bus at about one A.M. on Saturday to go to Maine.

Which is what started all of this, by the way. Talking about bus tickets and the buying thereof, and getting to the bus stop. And I'm proud of myself; I never once mentioned that I HATE BUSES.

I really do.

But, yeah. So, hmm, let's see... a quick (HA!) run-down of events since the night before I left.

I was supposed to have started packing the day before (Saturday) but I went and got my hair cut and then spent a few hours with my mom talking to my hairdresser, as apparently I now have one, and I'm not realy clear on what happened then, but I only got around to packing my new $60  purple suitcase on Sunday, late-afternoon at best. Then the Secoind Degree Sunburn for HELL that I got on Friday started acting up and giving me incredible amounts of pain.  At which point I became essentially uselkess in the matter of packing my own luggage. I could and did, however, prove the case I've been making agains cleaning my room: I know almost precisely where nearly everything in my room is, even if you can't find it, thankyouverymuch.

In fact, there's a Marvel Universe character, Dr. Modern (not a superheo) who deals with things so case-sensitive that he doesn't use a filing system—he names folders things like "Weird" because he thinks the contents are weird, and leaves all the oddly labeled folders stacked around his place of residence/employment, I'm not sure which. And he can find anything he needs to because he memorizes the information and where he put it. No one would ever be able to be all in-steal/copy the file in question-out  because they would have to look through everything!

So, yeah. Just because my room is terribly disorganized doesn't mean I don't know where things are. And a good portion of the tisme I can't find something it's because someone else touched it since last I did. So there! (Can't you just imagine someone stamping their foot and sticking their tongue out immediately after saying that? I can. But I didn't.)

Anyway, I proved my case, and after hours of intense discomfort I passed out on my mom's shoulder, my arms (where I was burned) wrapped in a towel or something with an ice pack and calami lotion, doped up in Benedryl. And they still hurt when I woke up.

But whatever. Dad drove me to the airport, and having already gotten special permission to come with me past security due to my anxiety issues, came in with me. He helped me with my bags, felt triumph over the fact that my larger bag weighed in at exactly 49 pounds... and got chosen for a 'random' search. Grr. And my bag was searched too, my carry-on! Apparently my tube of toothpaste was too big. I had to let them throw it away!!! I mean, this was a totally new package of Aquafresh, bought just for me, for my trip, and they threw it away! I felt horrible, terrible. That was money, that was mine, that was... in the garbage can. I could've killed somebody. I swear, if I weren't so anxious... And my arms, which had calmed down as I had? (My body has this neat history of having actual, legitimate physical problems crop up when I am uncomfortable with something. Like, I would be panicky-nervous about a class before school and I would throw up, thus ensuring I couldn't go to school for 24 hours.)

But back to my arms. Yeah, they started acting up again. Just like that. A tube of toothpaste, a theoretically "...entirely random, I promise. A lot of people think it isn't true, but the system really does just select random people..." search, and I was almost back to full-blown agony. And I still had to repack my carry-on ! Then, of course, as we were looking for my departure gate, this announcement comes on both the speakers and the TV screens that we don't pay attention to. Then we realize that it mentions my flight number and includes the words 'about to depart without you'. My dad and I looked at the nearest screen.

Yep, that's my last name, but... "Victor", it said. My first impression was more or less, I hate it when my name has too many characters. as my whole eighth grade year my name in teh school system was Victor. My second impression was more along the lines of oh my god no way.


There are four and a half more pages that I wrote earlier this afternoon, and I'll post that tommorrow or the day after, but I'm burning time and, frankly, sick of transcribing things from paper to screen right now.  I mean, I already wrote this once today! And, yeah, okay, I figured this point made a nice cliffhanger.

If your nervous, however, I suggest you go back and read the first sentence.

I obviously made it here.

But thanks for the concern.

Ja na!

"Just ignore all these present tense"— It's Beginning to Get to Me, Snow Patrol

"Some people don't know what depression is like. Others do. I know some of both, but for some reason many are unable or unwilling to accept that having depression is not the same as being depressed. They are very different things: you are depressed when your boyfriend breaks up with you three days before Valentine's; you have depression when you spend days, months or even years at a time feeling like a waste of space. I am not embellishing anything. I'm not exaggerating to get the point across or emphasizing any one particular idea or stereotype. Okay?

When you have depression, it's not like being bipolar or moody, okay? It's not just being sad all the time. When you're sad, you are sad. When you are depressed, you are at the bottom of a ten-foot hole with no ladder, no rope, no helpers, and not enough [self-]control to stop digging. You can't stop digging. You can't. Every time you try the ground caves in just a bit more, so you get even deeper, farther, without ever having lifted a finger. You fall down into what amounts to an emotional pit of molasses. You can't really move all that well because you can't gather enough energy to try. You can't see your way out because some of it got in your eyes. You can't really call for help because you're choking—on everything; loneliness, pain, failed hopes, fallen dreams, and an unyielding, God-like fury that this, whatever 'this' is, is happening to you. You want to scream, "why do you keep doing this to me" at the top of your lungs, shout out to the heavens, "leave me alone" and whisper in the darkness where only you can hear, "help me, someone please help me".

But you can't. You can't, because there is an overriding knowledge that you are not worth it. You are useless. You are a genuine, certified, waste... of... space... so why would anyone help you? You don't even have the right to ask. Your advice and opinions are useless, your questions a waste of time, your shoulder unworthy of anyone's tears, and your tears unworthy of anyone's shoulder.

So why even bother?

Surely not because some part of you that knows these things aren't true is crying out in denial. Not because you can see the concern on the faces of those around you—if you have them. If you can find the strength to look.

While it's easy enough—or no, not easy, simple—it's simple enough to find a good day or thirty during a lingering, soul-deep depressive state that goodness, optimism, hope, or even joy is truly only skin deep. Maybe it permeates through to the bottom layer of skin. If so, you're lucky, and I envy you because for the rest of us, or at least for me, something happens every day to strip away one more inch of what, where, and who I wanted to be at this point in my life until the picture I held to so strongly is riddled with holes and rips and scorch marks to the point of being unrecognizable. Those single days of skin-deep happiness are slowly chipping away at the life I wanted to have, the life I dreamed of that got me through my senior year of high school. At this point, even my memory of the full and clear image is more than fuzzy around the edges.

Here is a brief report of my life since graduation in June:
I've done some things I wanted to do, but there are more, important things that I haven't done.
I've seen and spent time with people I never thought I'd see again, but the people I really want to see are completely out of my life.
I've done things I never thought I'd be able to do, but other, personal things that used to come naturally have become incredibly difficult.
I've met, and as such now know, more people than I expected to know, but the people I spent the last six years with are no longer accessible to me.
I've matured in ways I never expected, but my coping skills have regressed to what they were during Frosh year at the latest and/or six years old at the earliest.
I've proven myself capable of so much more than I ever dreamed, but I haven't done anything more than spend my days in a constant state of idle, depressed boredom.
I've decided that I deserve more than I was settling for in so many aspects of my life, but I'm expecting progressively less and less in others.
I've got so many good ideas, but I lack the self-discipline required to actually be productive
I've been working hard to be a better person, but I've started to hate myself again.

I don't know what to do."


I wrote this several weeks ago during, obviously, an utterly downer mood. But that doesn't mean that those feelings don't follow me around from day to day. They do. That's what true depression does. Sucks, doesn't it?

Yes, yes it does.

No matter how many good, or even amazing, things happen to me, there is still always something that can be taken away. You can lose things even more quickly than you gained them, and when that starts happening with frightening regularity, the scales tip because suddenly the list of things you've lost is much larger and heavier than the list of things you have, many if not most of which are of little consequence.

I'm not trying for sympathy, okay? I'm trying to explain just a bit of what it's like to be in my head when things are going wrong. When things start going bad, my head is a very, very unsafe place to be. Not because I'm going to be so overwhelmed that I kill myself—I won't—but because there are times when I desperately want to.

Really, I'm so lucky in that regard: many people just give up.There's nothing around them, nothing within sight or reach, that is important enough for them to fight themselves for. Many people, an average of about 3000 people daily, in fact, just give up. And I, for one, don't actually blame them. I mean, yes, they're at fault, but I can't bring myself to be angry at them at all. Frustrated, yes—why didn't they try harder?—but the fact that they did it is pretty much evidence to the fact that, in most cases, they couldn't find anything worth living for. Which brings me back to my being lucky.

See, I've developed, after several years persisting misery, a respect for myself that I did not previously have. I was told hundreds of times, by several different people, the words which are paraphrased below:

"It gets better."

And after a few years, without even realizing it, I began to believe that things would, in fact, get better. Lo and behold, they did. Those simple words, or rather, that simple and persistent sentiment, fought its way to the core of my being through the thick and thin of the misery I was in without any help from me whatsoever and it has stayed there all this time. I do not always remember that I have this solid assurance that things will get better within me, but I know that it's true. I know that the pain, however terrible, is temporary. It will go away, and I'll be okay again.

That knowledge created within me another truth: If I give in and let myself die things won't get better, because there will be nothing at all; I'll be dead. Whatever kind of afterlife claims me, be it heaven, purgatory, hell, rebirth, or simple nothingness, I won't be in my life anymore, and that will be the end of that.

I can't kill myself because things will get better. And if things will get better I can't kill myself.

Simple as pie, really. It's a miserable existence, but I can and will keep living with the hope that the best of my past will be the worst of my future.


Ja na!