I Need a Little Air (Morpheus)

"Who was that? That you were talking to and laughing?" My mother asks from the home office after I disconnected the call.

I don't answer. I must have been loud. I don't care.

The Old Sin [Updated]

Pine Summit Market is about five miles from where I live with my parents. It's on the edge of the ranch, and it properly stocked with needed-in-a-pinched items, and three rows of booze. A few weeks ago, I made the unfortunate discovery that every day, fresh donuts are delivered. The donuts are okay, not the best I've ever had, but for an addict, they'll do.

And that's just it--the sugar is sickening. The icing is over-the-top. There's too much of it. Makes a mess all over my hands. Every time I take a bite, sitting alone in the Tahoe with just me and the dog (who is rather bored by the experience, and just sleeps in the backseat), I think about the scale rounding out at 230 pounds. How easy it is to wake up one day, obese again. Just from a couple of donuts. It's beginning of losing control. Of the body winning. Everyone knows that losing weight isn't the difficult part, but keeping the weight off. So, my solution? Always be trying to lose weight. Five pounds. Ten pounds. Fifteen pounds.

It's not binge eating because it's only a couple of donuts, but it's not exactly healthy either--to do some sin off by oneself. Ashamed. Guilty. I didn't even like the donuts that much. I don't even get a decent high from it. But I might as well be filling my water bottle with cheap vodka and cruise all the local parks. Sit on the bench and waste a day.

I tell myself, it's not really bad. I go from there to cleaning three stalls and feeding and unblanketing horses. I haven't eaten. I didn't eat dinner from the night before. I'll be hungry. I'll starve to pay for it. It will all work out.

Fight to Find a Voice

I had to fight to get on G2P this time despite the severity of my symptoms. My Stanford psychiatrist was on board, and told me to go--he knew, like any knowledgable person knew, that auditory hallucinations (especially commanding hallcinations in which the sufferer is being told to kill him/herself) mixed with depression and suicidal ideation warrant hospitalization.

My therapist was just dazed and bewildered. When I broke the news to her that I needed to go, she sent this in a text-message: "[Jae], I feel a little confused that you feel so distraught that you need to be hospitalized. That was not my impression the last couple of times I've talked to you..." I must admit I wasn't being entirely honest with her, and I acknowledged that fact to her in the conversation. I didn't tell her specifically about James, about his influence or about how frequently he bugged me, and despite the fact that she's been my therapist for over a year, she has no idea that Morpheus even exists.

Earlier before my admission, I had shown up to the ER at Stanford (under the direction of my Stanford psychiatrist who told me that there was a discharge on H2, and a bed potentially available), and after spilling my guts about all the magical things going on with me--I was told there was no room at the Inn, on either of the units.

 I stared into the face of a girl who was probably barely thirty, who looked like she just finished clearing her skin of acne. "Well, I feel it's my duty to put you in a bed at one of our sister hospitals," she tells me.

  "Okay, that's the last thing I want to happen," I remark frankly. I realize that I just did it to myself--they could put me under a 5150. I panic inside. "How about my parents come and get me and you release me in their care?"

The triage team calls my psychiatrist late at night, and he convinces them that I can be sent home.

I am told to contact the Inspire clinic social worker, who shall remain nameless. I go home, three hours of a drive, exhausted and scared.

Days later when the social worker calls, and ask what my plan is (social workers beat the dead horse by constantly asking, "what are your coping skills?" I always want to lie, and say, "Cigarettes and booze.").

Eventually, I'm tired of avoiding the question, and I tell him I'm planning on heading back to Stanford as soon as a bed is available. He gives me the proverbial "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" by telling me that going to my therapy session and a telehealth session with Stanford psychiatrist should be enough to "straighten me out." I hang up on him. Does he secretly work for Medicare? Is he worried about my medical bill debt?? Otherwise, what the fuck? If someone needs to go to the hospital, someone needs to go to the hospital.

Morpheus and the Fever

The genuises at Stanford don't have the whole picture because I haven't told them. Mostly from shame. He said (twice) we would have coffee together.

 That was mid-December.

 But he was going out of town for work, and wouldn't be back until mid-January.

 Nothing. I've heard nothing. 

 We've known each other for 14.5 years. In all that time, we've never met in public.

 Of course, I fantasized about it. Obsessed over it. Thought about all the things I would say (the things I would cautiously avoid saying). The roles I would play. I couldn't just be myself. No, I had to be someone else, and James was there to coach me. If you're wondering what an auditory hallucination would possibly add to a healthy conversation--lots, I'm telling you. Lots. James knows all those dark, gooey, soft spots in me that I have to keep tucked away. That no one can see. The festering wound that just won't close. Expectation turned to thin hope--and then to disappointment. Like a fever that broke.

Introduction to James

The voices, his name is James in particular, keep telling me, "Jump! You're a wimp for not following through with it! A coward!"

  I think about wandering off the unit (G2P). There's just a soft door between us and G2, and then the rest of the hospital. There's a nearby elevator.

Would it take me to the top? Surely someone has thought of this before. There would be precautions, of course. A nurse or a nurse assistant would notice my absence, and would call security. I wouldn't exactly blend in, in my hospital-issued PJ's.

Would hanging off the side of the building thrill me to finding new life, breathe sweet joy into depression? Or would it just driving the voices to new levels of psychosis and craziness? Would it only add fuel to the fire that is consuming more and more ground?

Swimming Thoughts

I take a short glass from the cabnet in the kitchen and fill it with cubes of ice. I walk out the door, down the steps and into the garage where the refrigerator is holding all the alcohol--vodka, beer, whiskey. I choose Tito's and orange juice. I swallow fast. I refill my glass and leave it in the frig. Then, I pay attention to the laundry in the corner.

K

It's been what? Two years and seven months, some odd days--

I have no idea why on that particular day that I checked Facebook to see if Morpheus had an account. But he did. He was recently added (a profile that was only a few months old from the looks of it). The only information that can be gleaned from his profile is that he's single and he's grown a beard. 

To be honest, it was too much temptation for me. I sent him a PM. Deleted it. Another PM. Deleted it. Finally, Harry convinced me to just leave up a message long enough for him to answer it. 

So, I wrote this: "Hi, I want to respect your boundaries but also let you know the door is open on my end. May we be friends on Facebook?"

Four days later, I received this reply: "K"

(Facebook then told me that "you can now call each other and see information like Active Status and when you've read messages.")

On August 31st, I sent another message telling him that my contact information was still good. And left my cellphone number and email address.

A part of me wishes I wouldn't have done that. After all, during that two year and seventh month period, he could have contacted me at any point. I don't buy the argument that he was afraid I was angry with him. That wouldn't stop him. 

A part of me wonders if I'm not that ex, the one who won't take a hint, keeps bugging the other person, maybe even harassment. I had to block Elijah. He was treating me with such disrespect that even I was aware of it. He wanted sex without actually talking to me or apologizing for the things he said when I told his father that he was suicidal. My doctors told me to never speak to him again. 

A part of me wonders if I'm pathetic. A long time has passed, and I'm not over him. I still think about him every day, and waiting for a response makes that anxiety worse.