Not Like You

I was out with Lucky, at a bar, and my cell phone rang. It was Joseph. I turn off the ringer.

"Who was that?" Lucky asks.

"Joseph, he's an ex," I say.

"Oh, like me."

"No, not like you," I reply.

Snips, Part II

"Are we ever going to be together?" I ask.

Silence.

Snips

"You know you got me, right?" He says.

"No, I don't know that."

The Last Five POunds, Part II

You try to lose weight on clozapine, and see how well you like it.

The Issue Is, Part II

I want him to say that he forgives me, too.

That I'm okay, he's okay.

Blurb

"But I'm here to apologize for the hurt I've caused you, in your life."
--blurb from the latest email I wrote Morpheus

A Note on Beck

Beck is out on the front porch, squeaking her ball, completely happy.

Don't you wish you had a ball to squeak?

GG

The bottle of Grey Goose is empty, but still on the counter, in the corner.

I don't know what we're hoping, that it will refill itself in the middle of the night?

Miracles of miracles?

Fun and GAmes

"I wouldn’t use those words, but let’s be real, I worked with girls with trust funds who were doing it for, I don’t know, their own sense of gritty realism and I think they needed to get lives."

Because you can't strip, I don't know, for fun and domination, for the constant reinforcement of your sexual prowess, for beauty and for games.

Yeah--it's for fun.

--Red, Tits and Sass

Drunk Emails

The therapist asked what was said in the drunk emails to Morpheus.

"Do you really want to know?" I said.

She nodded.

Compartmentalization While Stripping

"Compartmentalization is one thing, but inventing a whole other personality to avoid accountability for what one does while stripping is ludicrous."
--Caty, on Tits and Sass

Sub-clinical Bulimia

My eating habits have been wacky. STarving myself one day. Overeating the next. Sub-clinical bulimia.

Losing and gaining the same three pounds.

I hate it. I hate eating as much as I hate being hungry.

About Morpheus

"I wonder if, not that you're OVER him, but if you're ready to start moving on?"

--Rosa in an email, referring to Morpheus

More From the Therapist

"What makes you depressed?" My therapist says, "That you can't have him [Morpheus]?...I'm just throwing that out there."

TXT-message Conversation

This is from a TXT-message conversation I had yesterday with a person in G2P at Stanford University hospital, which is their psych unit:

"I know I should have just carried out the [suicide] plan I had today. Than [sic] I would be dead right now and I would be happy."

My response: "You can't be dead and happy. There's just dead."

Beck is My Best Bud

What's Cool

My therapist asked, since I've been feeling better, if I've asked friends out, for lunch or coffee, or just a meet in town.

Initially, I said no. I spend the vast majority of my days (and evenings/nights) at home, doing laundry and the dishes. Because I'm wild like that. But then I remembered--yes, I asked the Advisor out for a beer.

"Like a date?" She replied.

No! Which I thought was funny. So, then I had to explain the over ten year relationship I've had with a man who is older than my (step)father. How the Advisor has always been there for me, in sickness and in health.

"He has been a major part of your life," she said.

Yes. Of course, she wanted to know what his response was to my invitation.

He said yes, after the quarter was over at the University, he would hang out with me.

Which I think is cool.

Move In?

Joseph asked me to move in with him.

I didn't really give an answer.

Thanksgiving with the Relatives

It's Thanksgiving, and my uncle is saying goodnight to everyone because he has to get up early (3 am) for work.

He's walking around the front room of his house, shaking hands, and he comes up to me, grabs my hand, says, "I don't know you---," pauses, "Hey, I changed your diaper."

Right in front of Joseph, who was sitting next to me.

Yep, it's the holidays.

Moments of Possession

The scary thing is,

I don't know why I took the lithium. I just did. It's like the disorder has a mind, a consciousness of its own, as if I'm possessed by an illness that I periodically loose control over.

The devil took my hand and led me astray for a few moments as I tipped the bottle up, and down my throat they came.

Worried About Drinking

"Do I need to be worried about your drinking?" The therapist asks.

"No," I reply.

A couple of shots never killed anyone. Joseph is driving me nuts. His nervousness is palatable through his emails and calls.

It's only dinner. My uncle is an alcoholic, so he'll just sit and drink. My grandmother will probably be the sole one who will talk to him, short of my parents.

Me? I'm thinking of getting drunk--or close to it.

Wondering About Last Moments

There were only three of us in the PACU for ECT this morning. I was second in line. It has that industrialized feel--the doctor rolling the machine around, bed to bed.

Every time I go under, I wonder if I'm going to wake up again.

I'm sure the anesthesiologists (resident and attending) are bored with the assignment. It's simple, routine. There are heart monitors, cuffs for the blood pressure. You breathe into a mask. Perfectly safe.

Still, I always ponder if these will be my last moments on earth, drugged, surrounded by doctors in some warehouse at Stanford.

They put me down, but couldn't bring me back up.

College?

The ECT doctor (double doctorate) told me not to register for college, that I needed a program more "flexible"--advice I'm not taking.

I'm currently enrolled in two classes for next semester--calculus and "Intro to Novel." I don't need the English class, but I'm taking it anyway.

One of these days, I plan on finishing my undergraduate degree.

Beck

Today, Part III

There's a large, tall bottle of Grey Goose sitting on the kitchen counter, ask me how happy I am about that.

Glee growing inside my soul like a vein flooding.

The Great Alcohol Debate: Co-Enablers

So, it's evening, and I'm pouring myself a glass of Belvidere (not my favorite vodka, but I don't have much for options), and Mom walks into the kitchen.

"You can't have alcohol," she says.

"I'm just going to have one drink," I reply.

"You can't because of your medications," she continues.

Dad overhears the whole conversation.

I add a little orange juice to the glass, and take it over to the couch, and sit down.

Mom goes back into her bedroom, where she stays for the night.

I down the drink quickly, and place it on the floor, empty. I start typing on the computer in my lap, not paying attention to Dad, who is heating up dinner.

In a little while, he walks up to me, with his finger up to his lips, and an orange-colored drink in his hand. He gives it to me, and goes back to the kitchen.

My Mother About Joseph

"Trust me, after thirty years of marriage, everything else wears off," My mother says, explaining her bias towards Joseph.

My Friday

On Friday, I had to wake up at one am to get on the road at two am for Palo Alto. My appointment for ECT was at six thirty am.

Mom had to drive me since I'm not allowed to drive for three weeks (from the date of my last intensive treatment). She got even less sleep, as she was up from midnight--but she was allowed to drink coffee. I couldn't have anything by mouth past 12:00am.

"Keep talking to me, I'm getting sleepy," she kept saying while we were on the road.

I did my best to entertain her for close to four hours.

We discussed the fact that if we had the disposable income, we would drive up the day before and spend the night in a hotel.

We arrived at the patient registration desk at six am. The third floor of the ambulatory surgical center was filled with people waiting for op's and their families.

After one of the ECT nurses grabbed me, and took me back, everything was the same as it has been.

Starting Over Again

You have to be desperate to agree to bilateral ECT. Memories make up who we are.

I was willing to lose all of that.

As I Walked Out One Evening

"O look, look in the mirror,
        O look in your distress;
Life remains a blessing
        Although you cannot bless.

"O stand, stand at the window
        As the tears scald and start;
You shall love your crooked neighbour
        With your crooked heart."

--"As I WAlked Out One Evening" by  W. H. Auden

The Old Woman

The old blind woman (who is a patient) eats with her hands, for everything. She was licking her finger after diving into a container of pudding.

I can't stand to watch her move through her huge plate of food.

She also pretends to be deaf. The nurses will come up to her, and she'll ignore them.

She's usually the only other person besides me who paces up and down the hallway for exercise.

I have to avoid her and her stick, which is painted red on the bottom half. 

Questions, Part II

"How's your depression?" The nurses will ask.

I always answer the same. "It's a seven."

Finally, I got pissed at one of them--because she kept asking over just a few hours from the last time. "Why would it have changed?!"

In Hell

"Fathers and teachers, I ponder 'What is hell?' I maintain that it is the suffering of being unable to love."

--pg. 299 of The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky

Woe

"No one is wise from another man's woe."

--The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky, pg. 286

The Man With Boots

The man with the boots said during OT group yesterday that he made Carlos Santana cry once with his music.

He said that he hears music in his head all the time.

He drew a picture with notes on it.

The Perv

"Please keep yours hands to yourself," the psychologist says during group.

I see she is looking over towards me.

The gentleman sitting next to me in the circle is trying to casually touch my arm by pretending to stretch.

He says later during our hour, "I like to flirt with women..."

EAting

"How's your eating?" The psychiatric resident asks in our meeting with the team.

"Fine," I lie. Should I give her the "disordered eating" speech? I skip meals. I see how little I can eat all day. Sometimes I don't eat at all (although it's been more than a month since I did that). My "ED" is the only thing I have left that the doctors leave alone. NO one lectures me on my eating, no one cares, no one messes with my brain over it. No one has labeled me since 2009. I'm free to torture my body with food and without it.

Turning Thirty--Words From Dostoevsky

"...that if I didn't believe in life, if I lost faith in the woman I love, lost faith in the order of things, were convinced in fact that everything is a disorderly, damnable, and perhaps devil-ridden chaos, if I were struck by every horror of man's disillusionment--still I should want to live and, having once tasted that cup, I would not turn away from it till I had drained it! At thirty though, I shall be sure to leave the cup, even if I've not emptied it, and turn away--where I don't know. But till I am thirty, I know that my youth will triumph over everything--every disillusionment, every disgust with life. I've asked myself many times whether there is in the world any despair that would overcome this frantic and perhaps unseemly thirt for life in me, and I've come to the conclusion that there isn't, that is till I am thirty, and then I shall lose it of myself I fancy." 

--pg. 212 of The Brothers Zaramazov

MOm, Part II

"She knows how to manipulate people," Mom tells the psychiatric resident in the ER during my evaluation as to whether I go up to G2P or H2 or not.

Don't hold anything back, Mom.

Mom

"You not telling the doctors how depressed you are is not doing them nor you any good," Mom says to me.

Charcoal, Part II

I don't know why but I guess they thought if they added sugar to it, it would help--so the charcoal has this sweet, syrupy taste to it.

And the EMT is looking at me, and he says, "Just down it like a sports drink."

All I want to do is vomit.

Suicide Attempt [Edit]

"Was it really a suicide attempt if you called 911 almost immediately?"

--Amara in a recent email

 I believe it matters completely on intent.

IN other words, if I sit down on the floor of the bathroom and swallow 36 Norcos 325mg/7.5mg and 4-5 handfuls of Extra Strength Tylenol with the full intention of dying--and talking to 911 dispatch while downing pills--is it really a suicide attempt?

It takes something dark and unyielding to swallow that many pills. It takes an impulse that cannot be directly explained.

Yes. I meant to die; however, I did not want to die at home so I called 911. For the record, that's a lot of Tylenol. That's a lot of self-hatred built up. The only reason why I stopped stuffing down the pills was because I ran out of Propel water.

" 'Do you know the meaning of despair, Alexey?' "

--pg. 108 of The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky

Principles of ED

Mom brought up my ED on the drive to STanford University Hospital. "...all I'm saying is that I taught [5150] how to eat heathy," she says to Grandma.

It's not like I downed a half a' dozen donuts and cookies and some cake and--god--that eclair looks good too because I didn't know to eat my veggies.

Doing "The Right Thing" Again

I thought about doing the "right thing," by calling the county crisis line or going to Cottage hospital or even making the trip up to STanford.

Part of it is, I don't believe anyone in the medical field can help me.  Another part, I was tired of being treated like everything was okay, when it wasn't. Some of this is my fault--I knew when I switched from having a private practice psychiatrist to the county system that the care was not going to be the same.

I cannot put words to my depression anymore. I have become my depression. It has been there so long that I can no longer distinguish it from me.

Potentially

"...Potentially life threatening..." the ER doctor said that about the lithium being in my system, as his rational for giving me 4 liters of GoLytely.

A Lot of Lithium

"That's a lot of lithium," Rocky, the county psych tech told me.

We were having our psychiatric evaluation to determine if I needed a 5150.

Really? Because I was considering at the time to call the pharmacy to see if they would refill my lithium ahead of time, and OD with more pills.

STraight Face

Dr. Morris shows up in ICU in red slippers and comes to my rescue (he's a kidney doc, and lithium affects that organ the most, he also was on my case for my acidosis), and recommends dialysis. My lithium level was still 4.0 after the GoLytely. The upper normal limit for lithium is 1.2 to give reference.

The staff was constantly asking me stupid questions to see if the OD had affected my cognitive abilities.

Dr. Morris comes up to me, "Do you know where you are?"

"Yes, [Yuppieville]."

"No, longitude and latitude."He stares at me with a straight face.

Charcoal

"So, you know the drill," the EMT tells me, sometime before he hands over the tube of charcoal, referring to my suicide attempt back in 2008.

The first line of defense in the world of OD's is, of course, charcoal, but if you've ever tasted it--you'll never forget it.

I managed to get down half of the tube before I started vomiting.

"Let's see if you can get down the rest in the next two blocks," the EMT encouraged me as we were almost to the hospital. "It's either this or they will put a tube in your stomach."

I couldn't finish it.

GoLytely

"We're going to put a tub down your nose into your stomach," the ER doctor explained, "And then we are going to administer a solution called 'Go Lytely' at about a liter per hour until we get the results we want."

"What are the results?" I questioned

"Until your diarrhea is clear. We have to flush out all the toxins in your system."

"About how long does it take?"

"It varies--I can't say."

"It's just a small tube," one of the nurses says.

They all leave again.

One of the nurses returns with "the small tube," which doesn't look that small to me. It reminds me of all the times I watched a vet "tube" a horse, and how the horses start to breath heavy and shake their heads as the tube goes down their necks into their stomachs.

As the tube goes down, I bleed a little. Drop. Drop. On the sheet in front of me. Just as I start to gag, one of the nurses tells me to swallow the water they have for me.

They bring in a commode.

"How long do I have to use that?" I ask one of the nurses.

"As soon as the doctor says you don't, I will tell you," she responds.

Not Enough

I was in the ER on Monday on a bed, just waiting, no doctors, no nurses in sight.

"Did I not take enough pills?" I thought.

An Idea, Part II

On Monday, I sat down on the floor of the kitchen with two Propel waters, medicine bottles, a cell phone and I downed 56 pills of 150mg lithium and then 6 Ultrams (50mg) because I'm hoping the tramadol will get me high and/or make me pass out. I didn't wait long before I called 911, and told dispatch what I had done.

People are going to ask (I leave for STanford on Friday), and they have, but I don't know why I did it.

I'm depressed, sure, but why Monday? Why not some other day? What was the trigger?

An Idea

Maybe I did it because I was tired of telling people I was "depressed but stable," and what does that mean exactly?

Miserable but alive?

No quality of life but still breathing?

Half-awake but still operating?

Once the idea got into my head, I believe it first came to me on last Friday, I couldn't get rid of it, it just grew stronger and stronger.

Finally, by Monday, I had to do it. I had no other options.

While Writing Without the Manic Urge (Dampened)

"After reading the entries you've posted that were written several years ago, I had some thoughts.

I really think the meds are dampening your personality and mental state a lot. (Not news?) You're a writer - there's no arguing against that. The meds tamper with your creativity, and frankly this makes me sad in more ways than one. You have a gift for description, whether of your surroundings or how you're feeling. 

I don't think you were more interesting back then, or less interesting now - I just think that you've been dampened. And of course that's understandable - that's survival. But I am sad to see that creativity drowned by medication. 

What's the answer? I'm not sure that there is one, except to keep surviving. Keep plodding along until one day you start to see light and hope again. Or as close as we ever get to that, anyway.

I think Harry's right - manic you and stable-depressed you need to be integrated, because they're both you, and neither one is the sum total of who you are.

Lastly, when you get through this, I want you to write a book. Elizabeth Wurtzel did, and you're far more interesting than she is. (Don't look at me like that, I read Prozac Nation, and I know you. I can make an objective observation in this case.) "

---from an email by Amara

In the Morning

Originally written on August 16, 2009 at 9:28pm

Crank (In Line for Coffee Boy) is standing, leaning against my bed. He isn't looking at me. "What if I brought over [a friend's name]?"

We're discussing the possibility of a two guy-one girl threesome, an idea I immediately ruled out. He tried one friend already, but he knows I like this other friend better, the oldest of the bunch at twenty-six, named "October."

I pause, half because I'm thinking about October, and half because I'm watching his face. Some emotion is flicking through the channels, somewhere between his forehead and chin, but I can't read it. "No...He's a nice guy. He doesn't strike me as the type."

"He's not," Crank admits.

"He's the cuddler, I remembered. I like him." I smile.

"Yeah, and I don't cuddle."

"I noticed that."

"Why did you get up and leave in the middle of the night?" He asks. "I woke up that morning, and was like, 'What the fuck?' Because I was gonna give you a ride. [October] said he talked to you for a bit before you left. Said you were wide awake."

I debate how I should answer, the truth or something silly like I needed to feed my cat? I decide he's a grown player, he can handle it. "It's one of my rules, but I don't sleep with a guy. I can't, actually. Plus, I didn't want an awkward situation in the morning, you know?"

"I'm the same way!" He's excited over this. "I can't sleep with a strange girl either. I sleep better when I can hog the middle of the bed. This is why I'll never get married."

Just Another Long Distance RElationship

Originally written on September 13, 2009 at 3:10pm

It's the Phoenix, Arizona airport, and I'm sitting across from my gate watching a man watch me, watching him lumber up and down the hallway, his lip slightly jutted forward, the sleepy gait of someone under heavy drugs, a patient straight from the locked down psych-ward--the ever present effects of enough antipsychotics to drop a horse.

"So, it's serious then huh?" The Writer ex-boyfriend says. This is his noncommittal way of testing waters. He thinks he can lull me into a false sense of security.

We know each other too well. "I don't want to get into another long distance relationship," I put my head down, and look at the tips of my sneakers. "I didn't particularly enjoy it the first time." The crying, the fights because fighting was the only way to get a man's attention when he lives on the other side of the country.

His voice lowers. "I can understand that."

It's some time in April of 2003, and I'm standing at a pay phone inside an old, dying casino in Reno, NV. I remember the carpet being the color of dried blood, and the smell of cigarette smoke so heavy you could feel the tumors starting in grow in your lungs like the first kicks of a fetus.

I'm dazed, holding the phone. I hear my own voice, the voice somewhere in the back of my skull, rattling down a long hotel hallway to reach my lips. "I can't do this anymore."

"If you're going to do it, if you're going to say goodbye, then just do it," he dares me.

Without a word, I hung up the phone, knocking over an ass tray, which shatters on the floor.

Mania Calling Cards

Originally written on September 16, 2009 at 12:26pm

The Parts Dealer comes to the gate to pick me and help me move, except my father and I had done the hard work already.

After we settle into his Lincoln Mark, he waits, and waits and waits.
 
I don't make eye contact, and pretend to be ignorant.

He leans towards me.

I stare straight.

"C'mon, give me a kiss. I haven't seen you in days," he says.

"There's something I need to tell you."

He pulls back, and turns the car towards Yuppieville. He's running the possibilities through his mind, I'm pregnant, I finally realized I'm a lesbian after all, I've been diagnosed with a STD.

I look at him. "So, I've had this friend for a while, and we decided to be committed." Whatever the fuck that means, but vague is better in these situations.

"And when did this happen?" Were you fucking this guy behind my back this whole time, and didn't bother to tell me? Because I asked if you were available. Bitch. Liar.

"Well, we went to Vegas together, and you know stuff happened..." We fuck a lot, and I think I liked it. More than I would ever like our fucking. So--

He nodds slowly, and the pace of his gum chewing slows as well.

Is he going to flip out on me, and try to murder us both like something out Vanilla Sky?

"I tried dating two people at the same time. I couldn't do it. I'm a sensitive guy, and I don't like being hurt, so I wouldn't want to hurt someone else like," he finally remarks.

I know the more I say, the worse it's going to get, so I stay silent while he repeats himself with only a slight variation of what he originally said. Silence is my best defense, how can I explain so much of my psychology in a fifteen minute car ride back onto campus?

It's earlier this year, and my therapist says me, "What does mania look like for you? How do you know when it's happening?"

When you are manic, you have a surprisingly small amount of insight into your own behavior. Depression is like an elephant in the living room, easy to point out, easy to hate, but almost impossible to move. "Alcohol, sex." The mania calling cards.

"What about alcohol?"

She has my history in front of me. She knows I was officially labeled with substance abuse problems (most bipolars do). "I'll go months, even as long as a year without drinking, and then when I'm manic--bam--I'm drinking a few times a week, maybe more."

"How much?"

"Binge drinking, the classic definition, more than three shots."

"What about sex? Do you use protection?" She is staring at me calmly as if this something she knows anything about.

"The more, the better, the more random, the better. No, sometimes I don't use condoms or birth control." Playing Russian Roulette with my body and potentially someone else's.

"So, when you start doing these things again, you're going to know to get help, right?"

To explain to the Parts Dealer the impulsivity of a bipolar addict would take a semester long course, and even then, he wouldn't understand how it's not personal. In fact, it's not about him at all. He's just there, he's just easy, and then you move on to someone else because a long attention span isn't a bipolar's strength. You get addict to people's energy, you feed off of it like a goddamn vampire, and when they're drained, when they're dried out and when they're not fun anymore, you sink the fangs into someone else.

I'll Be There Every Day

Originally written on September 18, 2009 at 5:29pm

"I don't care how great this guy is, and he sounds pretty great, but you can still screw this up." (The LSU Professor)

I remember being twenty-years-old, and running down the halls of the Newark airport away from him, running past people in my boots, carrying my bag, running and running because I couldn't stand to see the look on his face. I didn't think about what was going to happen once I was back in California. I didn't think because I was young and foolish.

"You can't do this to me, you can't make me feel this way, and then leave me. It's not fair." I'm crying, and I'm into dramatics because I'm intoxicated. These are things you're not supposed to say if you want him to think you're sane, stable and not a needy mess. I know this. I'm crying anyway. I can tell him this because he can handle it, because I know I won't scare him.

I keep repeating myself like my brain has gone into emergency mode, and all is left is the short circuit from the mouth to the most recent cognition. I'm half-naked, and I don't know what's wrong with me. I want him so bad it's all I think about, it's all I want to do, and when he touches me, it's like being lost in heaven. The fear, but, is almost equal to the lust.

Whenever he's inside of me, I have direct access to all of the emotions I can suppress during the day. Whenever he's inside of me, I can feel myself losing control and falling in love. Surely, he must know. Surely he must understand this when I ramble, unwilling suddenly to take off my pants.

He tries to calm me down, "I'll be there every day, okay?...Shhh....what do you want me to do, hun?"

This, I don't know.

After Enough Coronas

Originally written on September 22, 2009 at 4:55pm

I know I shouldn't be drinking because it's the day before school starts, a new quarter, a new challenge, but I can't resist the urge to drown out the voices in my head, the tired march of drums and trumpets, the relentless assault on my sense of self.

The cashier at Cabo knows me by now since back in summer quarter, I went to the restaurant several times a week for the cheap food and cheap Coronas.

I smile and ask if it's happy hour yet.

No, he says, but I'll spot you anyway.

I order four beers and a veggie burrito to soak up the alcohol. I sit in my usual table, outside, watching the traffic stall and stack up in the town's busiest intersection. If life was different, if Hades and I were just friends still, then I would call him. I always did when I was at this particular spot, at this particular time.

Three beers later, and I somehow think that talking (isn't talking the cure for everything?) is going to change something. I, strangely enough, was wrong.

I drink my fourth, and ponder life, because life is super important after enough Corona, life is just one giant puzzle. I laugh out loud at the sheer irony--I mean, you gotta admit, it's kind of fucking funny, but it's a joke I'd be the only one who would get or even like.

I'm lucky no one is at any of the outside tables when I pay for my fifth beer because I'm laughing at things that don't exist, perhaps I am schizotypical after all.

My father shows up at Cabo just after I down my last Corona, and he takes me back to the ranch. I pour my own cocktail, Stoli and cranberry juice, and we talk about everything except for the fact that I called in the middle of the afternoon, and why I called and why I'm drinking.

Life is Lovely

Originally written on October 1, 2009 at 1:47pm

It's the same ol' scene at Father's Tavern, except the usual male bartender is in a meeting with the other managers. If I'm lucky, sometimes he runs through the bar, and fills my drink while the girls are slacking off. If the glass is empty, put more vodka in it. I'm here to drink, not fuck around.

(This female bartender charged me full price for Grey Goose, making my tab a whopping fifteen dollars more than last time, even though I had two shots less. I might be drunk, but I can still count.)

The first guy slides up, putting one chair between us. He started with beer, but seeing that I was alone and a heavy-hitter (that's right, baby), he moved on to vodka himself. The world is full of co-enablers. Want to make friends? Drink. Drinkers find each other, calling out with their secret language and their common instability. We're impulsive, destructive, and in general, more fun. He hands me his card. He went to law school, but never became a lawyer, is a business owner, but he talks more about his horses than anything else.

He buys me a drink even though he was educated that Grey Goose is horribly overpriced.

"All it is: great marketing. I'd rather drink Absolut," my father argued with me one day.

The government is sending me to school--to learn to drink. Life is lovely.

When man number one heads back to work, man number two comes sliding up next to me. Wolves, they always know prey, and I'm easy pickings, the wounds are visible through the white t-shirt, and I'm limping, leaving a trail of blood from a bite way too close to the heart.

He tilts his head towards my phone, which is beeping and chiming like  from IMs and several people TXT-messaging me.

The Parts Dealer is asking, albeit nicely, for me to give him another chance. He says he didn't know I had an anxiety disorder, he didn't know what was going on, and he thought I was left the races to go talk to my boyfriend.

And You're So In

Originally written on October 2, 2009 at 6:23am

[edit]

I've wondered how much time I do have before I'm back into the hospital rotation again, in and out of facilities, radiology departments and MRI machines, before they're handing out the MS Contin prescription to a girl who's too young to be on the hard core stuff, who has a history of substance abuse, before they hook me on this shit and then accuse me of being an addict, before I find myself living in a hotel room, talking to no one, holed up, only leaving to work, living off of mini-candies and the high, pushing everyone out of my life with my violent temper.

The only chance I have at a normal life is to stay away from the morphine because it is mind control, it is sufficating, it is consuming, and becomes the most important thing in your life. People, places and emotions are all second place to the hold it has on your body, on your mind. And you're so in, you don't even know it until you wake up one day, on the day you took your last pill.

The apathy alone, the ability to care for nothing, no one, is in and of itself addicting. Morpheus can walk out that door without saying goodbye, and I say nothing. He can leave me, and he's fucking white noise in the background. The bad costumers in the club, who rarely tip, who want you just to reject you, who want to humiliate you, who want to fucking rape your soul, those bastards are out of your head before they ever even arrive at the club.

I made the most money at the club when I was at my worst, mentally and physically. Somehow the only person this didn't seem to bother was me.

I Miss the Manic You

"I miss the manic you. I used to think her arrogant, but I miss the arrogance. It's an essential, vital part of you. It must be hell to have to lop it off in favor of the depressed you that's more stable. Neither one is who you really are. If only, instead of either-or or back-and-forth, you could be both at the same time, integrated. You deserve no less. "

--email I received this morning from Harry

A Little Sensitivity Always Seems to Get To Me

Originally written on October 4, 2009 at 4:34pm

--Patty Loveless, "That Kinda Girl"

The past two mornings, I have opened my eyes to look over at my arms curled around my Blackberry, as if it's going to leave me, run away and never come back. This is symbolic for something, but I'm not too sure what.

I wake up to some dream about him, mostly I just hear his voice.

I never wanted to get into another long distance relationship. I didn't particularly like the first one I was in. I got real unhappy, real quick, and since I was the only one willing to do anything about distance aspect, I pushed him until he gave in and let me move to New Jersey. Somehow I think it's much less tragic to fail when you're face-to-face with someone than dodge each other through emails, phone calls and TXT-messages.

I woke the Writer ex-boyfriend up this morning. "Do you know what fucking time it is? I know you can count," he snaps at me. "You must be just getting back from the bar."

"Do you think I made it hard?"

"Huh?" He's still half-asleep.

"Do you think I made the distance part hard for us?"

"Something about you personally?" When he's tired, he sounds like he's straight out of Philly. "Nah. It was just a hard situation in general."

"I think it was harder for me," I add mournfully. It's three in the morning over here on this coast, and I'm still drunk.

Even after all the time, he refuses to believe I ever did anything wrong the entire course of the relationship. He likes to take all the responsibility. "So, tell me all about [the female bartender]. Did you flirt with her at all?" Whenever he's needing to change the subject, he brings up my bi-curiousity.

You Can Be the Good ONe

Originally written on October 5, 2009 at 1:30pm

"How do you know you love me?" I ask Morpheus since he just blurted it out one night.

"Gut instinct," he replies simply.

Over the years, I have watched his love and attachment to me ebb and flow. It's painful to be fucked by a man who is so far gone inside himself that he doesn't even know you're in the room when he's inside of you, but these were bargains and odds I accepted as someone who was deeply in love with him. I was willing even to be married to a man who would never want the level of intimacy I desired.
Sometimes people make the mistake that loving someone else is enough, and in the beginning, it usually is.

You can shoulder the whole misery on your own, you can be the available one, the good one, the one whose own needs and wants are forever put on hold. Eventually, you realize that you're not so good after all. In fact, most of the time, you're hurt and pissed off, and you start fights over completely unrelated shit, because that is safe. You can fight about that.

I'm a Sucker for a Love Sick Fool

originally written October 5, 2009 at 1:50pm

--Patty Loveless, "That Kind of Girl"

"Insecurity is contagious." Rosa

There are things in life you can never ask from someone. You can't ask them to love you or want you or want to be with you.

"There's a lot of drama for you guys not being together any longer than you have been," my roommate adds last night as we're all standing around the kitchen at one am.

While I try to close my door when I'm talking to him, sometimes it's too hot in the apartment to do so, and my roommates end up knowing the latest update on my relationship. One morning before I even stumbled towards the coffee pot to make my first cup, I am overwhelmed by one of my roomies asking me if I need to talk. "Are you okay?" She looks at me pitifully. Out of all of us, she's the only one married.

I shrug at the drama accusation. I've lived through much more serious. "It's because it's long distance."

She remains unconvinced. She's watched me stumbling into the apartment for three nights in a row now, drunk and angry.

"He's not your boyfriend," the married roommate comments in. "He's not your boyfriend because he lives all the way over there."

This is a good point. I nodd my head.

About Going back to October of 2009

Hidden in these drafts (among other bits of narrative) at PRivate Whore HYsteria is most of the untold story between Hades and myself that I previously didn't want to reveal because I was afraid of what he might say or do in retaliation. However, it's been four years, and I think it's interesting to look back at myself from that period.

I drank too much.

I partied too much. I make references to men who I don't even remember.

I squandered away my financial aid at bars on Grey Goose and hamburgers. I showed up to classes, but that was it. I flunked my Fall Quarter.

I was manic and out of control. The only thing I could do, it seems, was write. I probably wrote more during October of 2009 than any other period in my life. I wrote about Hades, but also about Iago and the WRiter Ex-boyfriend and about Lucky.

Currently, the only thing I regret is ruining my chances at the University. I managed to get out of those F's because I have a disability (I was manic throughout the summer and the fall), and I received medical W's; however, I no longer qualify for financial aid because I did not show academic progress (you do have to pass some classes). I wasted a real opportunity to graduate and advance in life.

I will continue to post from the past as I see fit.

Napalm on That Shit

Originally written on October 8, 2009 at 4:16pm

"So, you don't want to be friends [with him] then huh?" The LSU Professor is staring at me from above his glasses, and when he looks at me like this, he is questioning me as a previous student of his.

"No, I don't want to be friends...The sex was too fucking awesome...."

The LSU Professor rolls his eyes at this.

"I mean, I want to be friends, okay? But I want to have..." I lower my voice because it's climbing, and the walls of the Science building are thin. "sex...too."

"So, you lied?" The LSU Professor is a genius at saying something without having it come out judgmental.

I cross my arms and avoid the question. "It was a test...You know women, they do these things." I also read a great relationship book that said: never ask a question that you don't want the answer to.

He gets up from his chair, and walks over to his small fridge. "Oh, yes, I know." He reaches for his ice tea.

"Besides, he wants to be friends." I put emphasis on the word "want," because the word itself has a double meaning. The word is lying, if I am lying.

Want is a slut though, but want is often the easiest to figure out.

I continue, "What I don't understand...no, really, I don't get this because this is how big my ego is..." I pause, and lower my voice again. "Why would you want to be friends when you can have sex with me? Why?" Every man should want to have sex with me, even if I've gained fifteen pounds, lost most of my conditioning, and cut my hair off. Why? I don't know. Men should just take sex when offered, and not complain.

"Because sex complicates things, even when it's good. You know this already. You have all those rules, right? Well..." He gives up. "What did I say? I said don't talk about it. Just stick to your plan. You're gonna finish out the year here unless something else better accepts you. That is your plan. Detriot in December, and you stay here until there's other opportunities. Now, you're not even going to Detriot because you blew that up." He's disappointed in me.

If I had come up with a reasonable, calm, rational solution to everything, then I would have had his acceptance. No, I was drunk. I lose points with the LSU Professor. "I threw some serious napalm on that shit." I admit.

"I've seen you drunk. You're another person, some evil alter-ego pops out." He dislikes this part of me; others have indulged me. "Remember? Things come out that you wouldn't otherwise see."

"I remember."

He bought me a few shots of GG. I leaned up against him the whole time at a physics major's party, embarrassing him slightly. He is a professor, and a professional after all. Students expect certain conduct out of their superiors. We spent the rest of the night at a cafe as he was sobering me up, and then he drove me home.

"What happened to the ol' [Jae] who put her nose in the books? What happened to her?" He asks me, almost pleading.

"I'm going to stay sober. I'm going to try. I can do it. I've done it before."

"Good." He nodds sharply.

You Don't WAnt Baby

Originally written on October 9th, 2009 at 9:07am

"I want to know why my tits hurt all the time, and I've had cramps for like the past two weeks. And don't tell me to pee on a stick," I tell Rosa via IM.

"You know that's my answer to everything."

I start laughing so hard, my roommates think I've lost my mind.

This morning, I've just washed my face, and wandered into the kitchen to make some coffee. My roommate, the older one with four kids, walks up to me, and says, "I was just going to leave a note on your door that I've missed you these past few days. Where have you been?"

I'm poor company before I've had something to eat and coffee in the morning. I mumble. I don't want to get into my self-destructive tales this early.

When I sit back down in my room, I lift my head from my computer to find two of my roommates staring at me from the door. I hear a round of "Are you okay?"

"Did you tell him you want baby?" My Chinese roommate asks.

"Yes, I think he knows now," I say with a small smile. Practicing right now would cure a lot of my life's problems.

"You don't want baby. They are pains in the ass. They're cute, but pains in the ass." She leaves.

"Are you really okay?" The other roommate says.

I shrug. I'm depressed, but what else is new? "I went down to the counseling center yesterday. I'll be fine." When the last one finally exits, I close my door, and put on my headphones, and check out.

Secrets

Written originally on October 9, 2009 at 12:45pm

"You never told him?" The therapist asks, tilting her head more to meet my gaze as I'm staring off towards the door of  the room.

"No," I answer flatly.

"Do you want to tell him?"

I tear up, and I stop myself. I just shake my head. I know from the way she poses the question that she believes I should, only there's some secrets you can't give away, no matter what type of relationship you have with this person. Some burdens you just carry on your own. In this way, romantic relationships are more isolating than friendships because when you're in love, you're trying to be the person who will allow you to receive the most love and support and affection--and the you who's ugly and selfish, well, you keep her pushed out of your mind. You cut yourself up into pieces, he will swallow you better this way.

Five Year Renewal of Marriage License

written originally October 11, 2009 at 5:25am

It's one of those nights before Vegas (as if Vegas tears the space/time continuum, as if all the world changed at Vegas, in Vegas, on Vegas), and we're arguing about marriage and kids. We've been debating these topics for probably months, if not since the beginning of our relationship, but now, it's arguing. I'm quoting textbooks, and California state marriage/family law, and he's quoting his state laws on division of assets and custody. He has a theory, the five year renewal theory of marriage, while I think that idea is prosperous, and I tell him so.

 "The idea of marriage is that it's supposed to be forever," I say. "You're supposed to say 'I do' and then have the mentality that it will last."

"But in most cases, it doesn't! So, why not just change the law."

"Because it's a religious ceremony. It has a social meaning."

"Five years, I'm just asking for five years, after that, two people can go their own ways or they can stay together, but they have a choice."

I groan audibly. I'm doing laps outside of my apartment in the late summer night, and I'm realizing that this is possibly the sign of mania. I stop, and sit in my mother's grey 2500HD. "If you think that way, why not just have people move in together, and then no marriage."

"Okay."

"But it's not the same as being married!"

"It can be, if two people are really committed."

"No way, in the United States, moving in before marriage actually decreases the chances of success, and abuse and assault rates go up."

"But why?"

"I don't know why. I read it...I've never moved in with someone, and I wouldn't unless I was married. Or at least engaged." These are remnant ideas from my ol' Reformed Protestant background.

We circle each other, neither side giving in. Back in these days, fighting was fun because little to nothing was at stake.

"If I was going to marry you, then I would want it to be forever," he says finally and slowly.

I'm silent; he can't see my smile over the phone.  "That's all I wanted to hear."

I'm Gonna, Gonna Lose My Baby/So I Always Keep a Bottle Handy

Originally written on October 11, 2009 at 6:30am

"Rehab" by Amy Winehouse

My roommate drags me out of my bedroom for breakfast with her and another girl.

"Yeah, I'm a real tale of caution," I say sarcastically after we've finished discussing my Wednesday.

"You know? That's not a bad idea...giving talks...that could be very therapeutic," the eldest of us comments.

I'm not that bad, right? I mean, really?

The Truth is Always Scary

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"Days?"

--Originally written on October 12, 2009 at 3:51pm

The only serious question in an entire, dirty TXT message conversation I had with a random guy I picked up last night.


The Psychiatrist is a closet, heavily cynical romantic, one of those guys who believes that love can cure anything, conquer anything, and yet willing admits, most of the time, love is sorely disappointing because while love is an ideal, people are still people, frail, selfish and ignorant. I picked up most of his attitudes about love over the years as he's the only therapist who's advice I've actually followed. In fact, his verdict towards someone has quite the influence on me. I might go my own way, regardless, but I will keep his words of caution in the back of my mind.


Strangely, I know what he would tell me now, even though I haven't talked to him in weeks, because he knows I'm not happy unless I've tried everything in my power to make something work. Once I hit my point of no return, it's difficult to quit when not all of the options have been exhausted. This is for my own wellbeing, and it doesn't even matter too much who I'm running after.

People Suck

Originally written on October 16th, 2009 at 5:42pm

I'm buzzed and wandering through Costco, but nothing bothers me, nothing is touching me. I can see why addicts rally with their substance against all others because let's face it, people leave you, people don't love you, people suck. Alcohol? Always the same. Every single fucking day.

Love is Just "Chemicals"

Written originally October 18th, 2009 at 6:58pm


When he said he wasn't in love with me, when he said this to me, as I'm sipping on a Corona at Cabo--I didn't believe him.

I wouldn't discount my instincts that quickly. In reality, of course, I never argued with him. He doesn't want me, he doesn't love me, he doesn't even like me, he wants us to be friends, he doesn't want us to be friends if I'm going to act like I have a heart and can be hurt, he doesn't know, he has heavy doubts that weigh on him, he doesn't believe I'm the right person for him, he doesn't want me to move, he does want me to move, but only if I move in--it's all very confusing to my brain--so I don't listen. I shut it out and down. I shut down.

I focus. I focus in on memories of his face, his body, his emotional energy. And I believe.

In myself, mostly. Because I only have myself. I'm all I've got. So, maybe I'm psychotic, maybe I'm delusional, maybe I was there in Vegas all by myself, and I dreamed the whole experience up. I'm not against the idea that I'm wrong or that I'm foolish or that I'm just seeing what I want to see because my ego can't take the rejection.

Because no one wakes up one morning, and thinks to himself, "Geez, yesterday, I was falling in love with this crazy girl, and now, today, I feel nothing. Amazing!"

He tells me over the phone, maybe a week later, that I don't know my feelings, they won't last long, and that love is just "chemicals."

I burst into tears. What other response is there?

He backtracks. Tells me he'd say this to anyone. Because he doesn't believe in love anymore.

Then, what the hell are you doing talking to me? What the fuck we were you doing sleeping with me?

He didn't ever think I would fall in love with him. Probably on his list on possibilities, that was somewhere down near the bottom.

One Mass of Misery

Originally written October 18, 2009 at 10:06 pm

You realize one day, sitting in a empty classroom, leaning against one of those plain professor desks that you're wrong, and the problem with being wrong is, you're struggling against a pain that is connected to other pain like the chains of amino acids in a protein, all twisted up into a glob, one mass of misery.

Where does it start? Where does it end?

You lied to yourself, you knew what you were doing when you did it, but somehow, you thought it was better this way, lying to oneself is the perfect excuse for injuring others--how can you convict when you have no intent? But the only person you hurt was yourself.

You're hurt because you know he doesn't want you, and he doesn't love you, and somehow you think you can ignore these two statements and march forward like it doesn't matter--when it does. You can't forget it--he said the words outloud, unmistaken, undeniable--it's in the back of your mind every time you talk to him. How can you face rejection every goddamn day? And pretend it's okay? You're okay with it, maybe he's okay with it.

Maybe it's just not. fucking. okay.

One of his very inalienable rights is pursuit to his own happiness, and that means he can end your relationship with him. He can do that.

But for you, you're fighting the pain, only you're not doing such a great job of it, which is why everything hurts. Because while you can lie to your head, you can't lie to your heart. To your soul. It won't fucking listen. And it knows, all the love in the world can't make someone want you.

But you, you, you don't want to hear that because then that means you have to let go, and admit that your experiment in Vegas was a failure. That you failed. That it failed. And like calculus, you'll just keep taking it over and over again, until one day, some day in the distant future, when everything makes sense.

Sadistic Fucks

Originally written October 20th, 2009 at 9:33am

So, I'm jogging on the treadmill at the University's gym, and I'm watching the news on the large flatscreen in front of me when I look over to the TV to my right. It's on the Food Channel. And guess. Just guess what they're showing? How to make desserts. Now, what sadistic fuck did that? So, I'm looking at cremes and cakes and sugar, carbs, carbs, I can hear carbs with every foot fall.

The Cellphone is Not Your Friend

Originally written October 19, 2009 at 2:15pm

"These things, you cannot resolve over the phone, you know that," The LSU Professor tells me over lunch. He ordered something small, and I had the balls to order the "Beached Whale" thinking somehow it wasn't going to be that large.

I nodd, looking at my huge meal, and feeling intimated by its mere presence.

"The cellphone is not your friend!" He parrots back to me a saying I once gave him in response to his troubles with Nichole. Good ol' Nichole. "But if you go over there, you will leave with more questions than the answers you got out of the trip."

"Yeah, and for the money I spent on booze and therapy, I could have flown last minute to Michigan, and sat down, had a fifteen minute talk, and it would have been a much more mature response instead of being drunk for a two weeks straight. At least then, I'd have a little piece of mind. You learn a lot when you look someone in the eye. Even if he slammed the door in my face, hey, that's a pretty strong answer, I think." Yeah, do the math on that. That's a lot of fucking GG.

"What are you going to do the next time you two get into a fight? Are you going to fly out again?" The LSU Professor reasonably argues. "Save those conversation when you guys see each other at the planned times you've made in advance."

"He brings it up!" I defend myself.

"I don't care. One of you needs to change this thing, and it has to be you because this is not healthy." He holds up his hands like blinders on a horse. "Just keep the conversations on track...Emails aren't your friends either," he adds just to make sure I remember.

Between my cellphone and my computer being ruled out as forms of communication, that only leaves doves (or is it pigeons?) and--

"You know what you should do? Write letters to each other, because it will take six days for it to get here, and by the time it arrives, you'll be pining for him. Problem solved."

Six days? Maybe immediate forms of communication are the death of relationships, because they are as confusing as they are compulsive. Men have often referred to their cellphones as "leashes."

The Runner

I have a rule:

I exercise the dog at least an hour six days a week, unless I'm in pain or running a fever, which means I hike trails or I walk along the road just outside the apple farm where I live to keep in shape and get the dog out of her pen.

He runs--he runs like a Thoroughbred on a flat track.

I see him a few days a week on one of the trails I visit. He usually says "hi" as he flies past me.

We parked next to each other one day, at the start of the hike. There he was, changing his clothes with just a towel around his waist.

I couldn't help but stare at him, wondering in fascination and horror if he was going to accidentally drop the towel.

Instead of letting the moment go by awkwardly, he asked about Beck. Is she a Doberman? 

Yes. 

She's very beautiful. It seemed like she wanted to go with me when I went by you.

Yes. How long did you run? About two hours right?

Yeah, I ran to Costco. It was about eleven miles. 

He has dark, slightly curly hair, clinging to the sides of his face from sweat. 

A Confession

I am convinced that my writing would be better if I was off of all my meds, and that fact has led me to believe that all my writing on the meds is shit.

That fact is a little voice in my head sing-songing as I'm trying to write while on the Topamax, lithium and clozapine.

Mostly, I blame this on the clozapine and the Topamax, although you could throw in--fuck it! Blame the lithium as well.

I don't like any of my recent writing--matter of fact, I like the shit I wrote while I was psychotic better. Even if it didn't make sense, it had its own music. You can't help but love people who dance in the street to their own music--I was that person. Raving. Scary. But there was at least music.

I wonder if there will always be some cosmic trade off. Will I have to hide myself in some apartment, strip away all the medications, the doctors, sit at the computer and wait for the craziness to come out before I could ever publish a book?

And then, worse, I think, is it all really the same? The quality equal, but I just can't see it because I hate the medications so much?

Fuck. 

Madness Becoming

"To this day, I still have a fear of the shower room at H2, being locked in, all alone, waiting for Nora to manifest right there before me—there’s a boogie man hiding in the closet, and Mommy is nowhere to be found to make it okay."

--"Madness Becoming," an essay I wrote for my Math 265A class

Bartering

I was all snuggled up in a blanket on the coach, slowly drifting into sleep when my phone beeped. I mean, how many people would you leave your comfy bed for in the middle of the night to go bang?

I barely remember him. That is the sad trade off. IF you want the pain to dissipate over time, the healing to begin--you barter your memories. They are not as vivid, they are not as frequent. They slip away into the corners of your mind. It is a part of the death you experience.

I want to remember him of how he was. The night he called me up and told me he'd never stop fighting for me. The glass of Pinot in his hand when he looked down and said he loved me for the first time.

I am standing at a cross road. I know if I see him again--I will make new memories. But I mourn what was--back when I believed we would be together someday.

Stop

"I've always said I sought out the things I feared in order to conquer them. My greatest adult fear is and always has been that I could try to stop drinking and fail."



--Life in the Age of Byrony, entry: In the Land of Gods and Monsters

The Little Boy and the Big, Bad Wolf

My grandma drove over from the desert to Yuppieville so she could go to her doctor's appointment.

She arrived late in the evening, and sat down on the couch. She started to talk about her drive, and then finally said, "I want to kill myself."

I gave a scripted answer. "I think you should see a doctor for your depression."

"No, it's I don't want to drive back and forth anymore. It's a two hundred mile trip. I want to find doctors in [her hometown]."

I let the subject drop. I didn't know what to do except call county's mobile crisis.

I called my mother the next morning while I was walking the dog, so I could have some privacy, and I told her what grandmother said.

"If you turn her in, she will never forgive you, at least not for years," my mother warned me. "Spend some time with her, ask her questions, play amateur psychiatrist and see how she's doing. "

I was with her all day, looking for clues into her mood. She seemed her usual self. That's no way to determine suicidality. SEverely suicidal people fool their family members all the time. Finally, while we were riding in the SUV, I asked her, "Did you mean it when you said you wanted to kill yourself?"

"No...I'm not the type of person who commits suicide."

"Don't you ever do that again," I said.

"Why are you so adamant about it?"

I don't remember the response I gave her, but I was silently pissed.

"They tried to make me go to rehab...I said, 'No, no...' "

--"Rehab" by Amy Winehouse

"So, you and Dad have cocktail hour, huh?" My therapist says and softly laughs.

Not My Best DAy Ever

 "All this before noon. Well, at least I can have some wine once noon hits.
Oh. Right. We’re out of wine."

--"Not My Best Day Ever" by Amara

Need a Diet Pepsi?

The mobile home is so small that my mother has to stack her bottles of Diet Pepsi's along the wall of the spare bathroom.

You open the door part of the way, and there they are.

Sometimes she uses the drinks to prop the door open to keep the house cool.

This is my mother.

Quick Learner

"You're not over [Morpheus]," my therapist says to me yesterday.

She's a quicker learner.

We Could Meet On Sundays

I wish I could start a group for women who are in love with married men. We could meet on Sunday's, and drink coffee, and eat lots of donuts in frustration.

So, there could be one woman in the group who speaks up, and says, "No, really, he said he was getting a divorce."

And I could watch eyes roll around the circle of the group.

"No, honey," one of them could say, "He's just trying to either fuck you up the ass or tie you to the bed."

Nods all around.

It's Summer

Summer time reminds me of my psychotic episode, the chaos, the terror, the confusion, the constant threat I felt of pending death--

Out of everything anyone could have said, I wish someone would have just told me,

"Hey, it's going to be okay."

But no one ever did.

Giants of Affection

"You see, in the beginning, love seems like it's boundless, endless, captured only by the imagination. It isn't until years pass before reality cripples and hobbles it.

Then we learn we are much too small in the face of the giants of affection."

--private journal dated May 17, 2013

Hard to Tell

"Your complexion is distracting," my new therapist said.

I think she meant that as a compliment.

Hard to tell though.

BAck Then

I remembered when it happened.

It was March of 2008, and I was brushing my hair, his smell was there.

I realized at that moment that I was experiencing something different.

If I could stand next to her back then, I would whisper in her ear that he will only break her heart.

But then again, she would only whisper back that she didn't give a shit.

Life was about broken bones, backs and hearts.

Changes

I'll never be the same. I know this now.

Moving On

"Almost everyone just moves on--not because it's easy but because they have no choice."

--personal journal, date: Feb 11, 2013

Hell is Here

"I don't know what you are supposed to do when you love someone more than anything in the world, and you don't even talk to him. You don't see him. He's becoming a stranger to you. And this is life. It's the cruelest reality imaginable. It's evidence that hell is here, not in the afterlife."

--personal journal, date: April 2, 2013

Let Him Go

"But you loved him enough to let him go," the psychologist said.

Is that what this is?

--from personal journal, date: Jan 25, 2013

"He's just trying to keep his shit together."

--Rosa about Morpheus

My 30th Birthday

Before I was even a teenager, I have been planning to kill myself on my thirtieth birthday, thinking in part that 5/28/13 would never come.

I have a plan. I want to OD on morphine or heroin.

I don't have access to either at the moment, although I do know one drug dealer well enough to ask.

The people at county mental health know about my plan, and they have been helping me with options besides suicide. The Psych Tech has asked me if I want to spend my birthday in the hospital.

This is a "no."

By Sight

I'm sitting in a cafe, across the intersection from where I watch you drive into town. It's the closest I ever get to you.

In the ER

I went into the ER on Thursday looking for answers which, perhaps, was the wrong reason.

No answers came.

He was a bald man, skin spotted by the sun on his head and arms, and he sat down on the chair next to me, saying the ER doctor was convinced I was not safe, and needed hospitalization.

I said, "That's his opinion."

The psych-tech from county said, "What do you think?"

"If I wanted to be hospitalized, I would have went to STanford or Cottage."

He didn't say it, but he asked himself, "What is she doing here?" "You can talk to Mobile Crisis over the phone, and someone will come out to where ever you are. You don't have to come to the Emergence Room unless you feel like you just have to be somewhere safe right then."

I already knew that, but in the ER the pressure in my brain decreases. I can't explain it. IT has a calming effect.

"I don't know what you expected. I can't help you with your problems, just evaluate you for hospitalization, " the psych-tech continued.

I wanted something. Encouragement. Some words of wisdom. Some window to be opened. A light shined in the dark. A hand stretched out to hold onto.

There was nothing for a girl who dreams of driving her car into a tree or telephone pole.

Why Marriage?

"You should marry him," my mother says while we are driving to the prison, where she works. She is referring to Joseph.

"Why?" I respond.

"Financial security," she answers back.

I can't imagine it. Settling down and just settling.

"He's crazy about you," she says.

Living an upper middle class lifestyle, plastering a smile on my face 24/7. Becoming a stereotypical bored housewife eating prescription opiates or benzos and finishing off bottles of wine by myself because life just doesn't thrill me, life just doesn't fuck me hard enough anymore.

I  see it as a giant trap while others see marriage as a life accomplishment, a part of growing up--bills paid, house bought, student loans cleared, becoming an adult from a kid.

No Words

"I wanted to fuck her, the way she sat there offering herself up, was like candy on the counter..." --Hades, entry: No Words Come to Mind

Lost Loves

I am testament to the durability of the [American] institution called marriage.