The Next Year

I have big plans for the next year. The past one has been traumatizing. Between intensive work for too many hours per week for entirely too long, the traumatic and sudden loss of an important community and friends, the treatment I've seen my husband endure, this presidency, just... so much... I haven't taken care of myself in a way I deserve. I've always deserved better treatment than I've given myself. I've been in therapy for 9 years and while I've made great strides, I've never buckled down and allowed myself intensive treatment and comfort. Here's what I have figured out so far for the next year:

I will continue my severe cut in emotional labor. There can be precious few exceptions as previously outlined when I started this, and I am allowed to make mistakes.

I will focus on my health with regular exercise and fueling my body instead of harming my body. I will also take my supplements as recommended by my surgeon.

I will keep reasonable hours at work and not give in to accommodating outside of set parameters. I will not over-function for my clients.

I will engage in EMDR (eye movement desensitization and reprocessing) therapy and finally integrate my trauma, and then I will continue with a recommended course of talk therapy. I will also take my medications as prescribed (piece of cake).

I will attend meditation class as scheduled, ideally every week. I will also integrate practices like reiki as available.

I will journal or write consistently (not blog, that's more an occasional thing).

I will regularly engage in my favorite self-care: my beauty rituals.

I will spend more time with the people I love.

I will have more conversations with the people I miss.

I will take more time to myself and away from all of the noise, and do this regularly.

I will start to read again.

I will get to bed at a consistent time, and wake up at a consistent time.

Yeah, that's about all I have now. It's going to be a good year. I'm ready.

The Circus

It's unbearable, really, when the circus comes to town in my brain. It's a semi-regular schedule but sometimes it doesn't show. It's rare, but it happens. The posters go up and I prepare for the inevitable, but the week goes by and there's no circus. The show is something I've memorized yet it's torture each and every time and there's nothing I can do to stop it. I can only fight as hard as I can. The taunting clown is the very worst of it.

For my first act, an extensive list of why you're a horrible person who deserves to die. | Not very original, but you never were.

Everyone hates you and will leave you. | That's overly simplistic.

But what about that thing they said? It's a sign! | No, it's not.

It is! Keep thinking about it! Keeeeeep thinking about iiiiit... | *yawn*

You're still thinking about it, aren't you? | Can we move on?

It's only a matter of time before they get bored with you. | That's not a fair assumption about them.

Or they'll see what a trash person you are and leave. Everybody leaves eventually. Think about everyone who's left. | This is really getting boring.

But you're still thinking about what they said. | You know, I could just talk to them and ask for clarification.

Ha! Yeah, that definitely won't make things worse. Besides, you already did and that didn't help, did it? | ... no.

Now watch me go! Have you considered that you might be awful at everything you do and people might just be really nice because they don't want to feel bad when you die? | Well, now I do.

You're still thinking about what they said, aren't you? | *sigh* | Good. Balloon animal? It's in the shape of a sword, which is a tool you could use to kill yourself now that I think about it. Right?

A co-worker pops their head in to say goodbye to me on my final week here and asks how it's going. I conjure up a convincing smile easier than nearly anything I do and say, "Pretty good!"

Misunderstood

I've been used to being misunderstood my entire life. My mom didn't really seem to understand me growing up. Maybe that's just a thing between kids and their parents, but like she really didn't seem to understand me. She never understood where my emotionality came from, why I behaved the way I did, what my intentions were, anything. If my own mother couldn't understand me, my friends and peers didn't stand a chance. Many of them would be alarmed or even mocked my upbringing, not realizing that the things they found shocking didn't hold a candle to the truth I was hiding. Teachers? Forget it. When teachers tried to understand me I had DYFS (CPS) called. I was told I was a know-it-all, that I was bright but didn't seem to understand why other children didn't know what I knew. I couldn't explain to people how I reached the right answer, but I often did.

Really the only person who seemed to understand me at all was my little brother. We were only two and a half years apart and he was forcibly glued to my hip. When we were really young people thought we might be twins. For a long time he was the only one I could look at and we'd both know we were thinking the same exact thing at the same exact time. It almost felt telepathic, but it only made sense. We had shared so many life experiences that we were bound to think in similar ways. There came a time when, as we grew, that bond was lost. When I started going to therapy I mourned that lost and lamented that I would never feel that bond again. It turns out that's not true, it just takes a lot of time and special kinds of people I hadn't met yet.

All of that is to say I've been largely misunderstood my whole life. I understand why. I say things, I inflect in a certain way, I write in a certain style, my face moves and people think they know what's going on with me, but the truth is so many just don't have a clue. It's only natural and normal to make assumptions. Thoughts need to work quickly. Decisions must be made swiftly. Time's a-tickin'. Still, being misunderstood has burned me so many damn times in my life when so much could have been avoided if people just asked me one simple question, "Hey, is this what you mean?" Because no. Likely, that's not what I mean. Let me see if I can explain further and let me know what you get from what I'm saying.

I really don't know how smart I am. I've been told I'm smart my entire life, but I'm not sure what that means or how smart I actually am. I was never in the gifted programs. My grades weren't perfect, merely good. I knew how to understand what people wanted from me and give them exactly that in school. A friend once told me that did make me smart. He might be right. I just don't see how it helps me, though. It got certain people what they want and only seems to contribute to me being misunderstood.

Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that I think a lot of people misunderstand what's going on with me or what's going on in my head. I write a lot about it and talk a lot about it but the god's honest truth is there is just so much that happened, and so much still happening, that I can't talk about. I have no right to talk about it. It kills me that I can't say things. I just can't. If I could, so much would be clearer. I know it would. But I can't. I promised. It would hardly matter to most, anyway, I fear.

What I can say is that some have certainly misunderstood my reactions. Maybe no one owes me anything. Maybe I take things too personally, but I've been begging, begging people to talk to me since before I could tell anyone there was a problem. I had the door slammed in my face and was told no, we don't get to talk about this. No, you don't get to lean on our friendship. No, you were wrong about the love you thought was here for you. Maybe it's selfish or wrong, but I thought I had earned more than that after everything I'd done to be a good person, a good friend, everything. I thought I had at least earned the benefit of the doubt or a moment's hesitation to ask, "Hey, is this what you mean?"

There is a portion of this that is my fault. I don't know how big a portion, and I don't think that matters. I need to believe there is a portion that belongs to me because if there isn't then I'm not in control of anything and if I'm not in control of anything, then what is the point of trying? Of living? Of anything? I trusted people more than I should have. I misread and misunderstood them, and didn't accurately assess what we had or believe them when they told me what they were about and how they were. That is on me. It absolutely is. I know I'm an optimistic person, yet I set these traps up for myself every time and let it hurt me.

So, when those metaphorical doors got slammed in my face I straight up lost my damn mind. You might think you know how this affected me and what my reaction was, but if you weren't in my head you really can't know completely. I lost. My. Mind. I've never really been prone to paranoia, but there was some sort of wellspring of it that flooded out and everywhere I looked my brain was screaming. I saw betrayal and abandonment, conspiracy and two faces. I was still with it enough to know that it was paranoia, but then came the one lie mixed in with half-truths and I fully lost it. It didn't matter what the truth was. Truth is of no consequence. I am of no consequence. None of this is real. I'm not real. Reality isn't real. I well and truly lost it.

It's interesting that I was able to make semi-logical decisions during that time, because I completely lost myself and felt truly alone. Now I know that people were afraid of me because of misunderstanding me. Somebody please talk to me. Tell me. Tell me, please. I screamed and cried that over and over again and there were precious few that answered the call, not the least of which was my husband. I trust him completely. I've said time and time again that I don't believe he's perfect, but I know him and I know what he told me was true (except for a brief period while I was losing my damn mind that I thought even he must be false and a liar, which wasn't fair). People thought they knew my position, knew the whys, knew the order of events, but really the overwhelming majority still don't know everything or much of anything, can't know everything. I promised. People were afraid to lose me, to challenge me, to talk to me at all, let alone ask, "Hey, is this what you mean?" The ones who were finally brave enough got the correct answer from me, but so many were not that brave. I don't blame them, but it was so fucking painful and lonely.

I know it's probably not fair, but I thought I had earned more than their silence and fear. I thought I had earned the benefit of the doubt, and just so many people assumed the worst and left me to rot. I've rotted, and most people have hardly noticed, or maybe they blamed me for it. Like I said, there is a portion of this that belongs to me. Besides what's already been stated, no one asked me to put myself out there like that, to love like that, to be there for them like that. Pretty much not a single damn person did. I just do it.

A friend said they believe that I'm a true empath. Truthfully, I roll my eyes at people who claim to be an empath and post listicles and memes about how they're such an empath to the point that I hate claiming the title myself, but I am. This is why my mom couldn't understand where my emotionality came from. I don't think it came from her or my biological father. I don't know where the "gift" comes from, but I've always had this ability. I know how it sounds. Trust me, I know. It sounds haughty and self-important, even delusional, especially because I never let on how much it truly hurts to be this way. Only the people closest to me have witnessed it first-hand and therefore know it's real. I've been drained and incapacitated for weeks because of my empathy. I've learned how to adapt over the years, but it's like a damn mutant ability not dissimilar to Rogue's. I can't control it, I can only manage it. Wear gloves. Remove myself. Try not to get too close. I even weaponized it, used it to start a career and make money. I am a true empath, and it is sheer torture. In my head, I have this image of myself curled up in a ball and just absorbing everyone's feelings in a 5-mile radius. That starts to approach what it feels like. I don't expect everyone to believe me. I do expect people to find it co-dependent and toxic, but I know my truth and that's the damn truth. Why would I lie about that? To what end? What the actual fuck does that get me?

I guess what I'm trying to say... somehow... is there is a really good chance that if you haven't been talking to me, or haven't been asking me to clarify what I mean, you just have no idea and you're misunderstanding me. I thought I was making myself clear, but I guess only some (precious few, really) speak my language. So few people can actually see me. That doesn't make you bad or wrong for not having that ability. It just is what it is, but I'm asking you to try to understand and to ask me the question. And I've been begging you please, please talk to me.

I don't know if any of this makes sense. I think it could do more harm than good, but it's been kicking around in my brain and needed to go somewhere. It lives here now. I'm tired. I'm going to bed.

A Reason

So, it finally happened. I finally had to spend an extended period of time confronting people who have turned their back on me or fell into silence. I didn't know where I stood with these people, not all of them and not really. I've been sick with anxiety about this weekend for a while now, but it finally happened and I'm glad it did.

Friday night was the hardest. I didn't know how to act, who still wanted to know me, and what I had permission for. I waited and watched and let how others behaved inform my moves. I'm a hugger. I'm a lover. I want to yell and run into my friends' arms and hold on for a good, long time with a good, hard squeeze while telling them how much I love them and missed them but I didn't do that to virtually anyone. I noticed who came to me and embraced me. I noticed who merely addressed me cordially. I noticed those whose behavior didn't change at all from what I remember. It was a hug from a dear friend and his kind, loving words that broke me. I knew he loved me. I knew he always loved me, and always would, and my heart was so relieved that I cried.

But unfortunately the ill mind doesn't know how to prioritize these things, and what kept nagging me was the cool indifference coming from those I loved, probably still love. I fell to pieces. I tried. I tried so hard not to. I managed to mostly make it back to the safety of the camp I was staying in, away from those who wouldn't understand and in the loving arms of those who have my back 100%. It didn't take long to compose myself and return to the festivities but I learned a lot this weekend.

I learned that, for me at least, managing my mental health takes a lot of energy. Energy comes from calories. When I'm on restricted calories (like, say, after a gastric bypass operation), I don't have as much energy to manage my mental health. Wacky fun times ensue.

I learned that I am worth more than just what I can do for people. I am relentlessly cruel to myself and if I'm not serving every purpose possible, I am useless and lack value completely. This, as it turns out, is completely unfair and untrue.

I learned that it's okay to need help. I'm used to being so independent. I lift the heavy things. No, I don't need help. Thank you, though. I spent all weekend apologizing for needing help because, you know, I was about a week and a half post-op and on all kinds of restrictions (which I did not faithfully adhere to, but whatever).

I learned that having a new perspective is really good for me. I fight toe-to-toe with the toughest people. No, I don't want to sit down and play nice. Not my thing, but you're free to do so! Getting to sit around while the fighting was going on and interact with different people than I usually do for longer than I usually get to was so nice, even though I was pining for beating up nerds. Even wandering the fighting area, casually fanning myself and giving hydration to my loves was fun in its own way. I got to see everything unfold, see their story from the outside. I never get that opportunity. Mind you, I still would have very much preferred to have been a more violent part of that very story but whatever.

Finally, I learned what is perhaps the most important thing of all: there very well could be a good reason for everything that happened to me over the last six months. I'm still working it out, and I don't believe that "everything happens for a reason" or that anything really happens for a reason, but what seems to be happening is that my life appears to be clearing out people that needed clearing in order to make more room for the truly good people who truly love me. I love so many people so much. It's easy for me to love. I just know that language, you know? Maybe it's time for me to stop spreading my love vertically and start expanding the love that I have. That feels different to me.

I hugged some people and I felt their love enter my broken heart. I cried more happy tears than sad. If I believed things happened for a reason, I would believe there is a reason for all of this and it's all because of this weekend.

Us

I never thought it would come to this. I hoped and I wished and I might have even prayed once that this would stop, but it hasn't. And it's finally enough. I've had enough. I've had enough of people slinking off in the shadows, enough innuendo, bandwagoning, and enough blind people falling into a convenient narrative because it's more comfortable than taking responsibility for what they should. It hurts too much. I don't think people understand how much it hurts. Every time it comes up, even six months later, I have suicidal thoughts. That's how much it hurts. It hurts so much that my brain thinks, "Dying would help." I try to reason with myself, tell myself I'm being melodramatic, and try to trivialize my own feelings, but I'm done with that. I can't any more. It's literally hazardous to my health.

You know, people often like to tell me that so many people love me. I believed them. I guess in a way I still do, but the thing is... what does that even mean? What has that even amounted to? Why does that even matter? The vast majority of people who supposedly "love" me can't be bothered to show up, to dialogue with me, or even check in on me regularly when I've been crystal fucking clear that I've not been okay for a while now and crystal fucking clear why.

I was assigned by my therapist to write a list of people who love me, and she was impressed by the large number I managed without even completing it. I wasn't. What she should have asked was for me to compile a list of people I actually feel loved by. That list is much, much smaller. I try to reason it out. People have lives. People don't know what to say. Blah blah blah. The truth is I throw myself in front of the people I love and take bullets for them when they wouldn't piss on me if I were on fire. My boyfriend says that's not about them and he's right. That's a deep flaw of my own that I desperately need to work on.

Here's where I stand. You can't say you love me and not be there for me. You can't say you love me and talk shit behind my back. You can't say you love me and believe I'm married to a monster. You can't. Not any more.

I'm humiliated that for years I let people do this. I let them loathe my husband and love me, mostly because I was blind and stupid and thought they couldn't possibly loathe him as much as he feared but then I see how easily people re-write history and accept false narratives to make spaces unwelcome to us.

"Don't take it personally," you might say. "This isn't about you." Well, it is personal, and it's about us. I will not argue those points further. I'm so tired of being disappointed by people. Even if I didn't over-extend myself in relationships, this behavior is disappointing. How much does it cost people to do the right thing? How much does it cost them to be there for someone they love? I guess for most the price is too high, even if it isn't for me.

You don't love me. You love the idea of me. You love the shiny wrapping paper. You love me when I serve a purpose for you. You love me when I'm quiet and compliant and stupid. I don't need that love. Take it with you and go. I have what I need, and I'm done.

I Don't Think You Understand

I don't think you properly understand how much I want to die.

I was so little. I'm not even sure it is a true memory. I remember it always being dark, and now I realize it's because that's when my mom would get drunk. I remember cowering in dark corners and crying for her to stop, but it quickly became clear that she wouldn't or couldn't so I prayed to God to make my pain stop. Sunday School had taught me that He loved me and didn't want me to be in pain. I thought maybe He could just take me to heaven where I'd never hurt any more.

I don't think you could truly and fully understand how much I want to die.

School was always hard for me socially. No one could really get to know me because no one could really know what was going on at home. I was already an outsider because my mom was an immigrant. I was a liar because my mom was an abusive alcoholic. I remember the phone call that broke me. My friends were tired of my lies and suddenly I had no friends. That's when I put on a lot of weight. That's when I stayed in my room a lot and cried more than I ever had in any other period of my life. In a couple of years, I was sitting in my kitchen and staring at a knife I got from the drawer and trying to work up the courage to make it all stop.

I don't think you can see how much I want to die.

I made deals with God that I could be gay (I thought I was straight at the time) if it meant I was happy. While I hadn't internalized my mom's homophobia growing up I knew the societal implications all the same. I made another deal that if I didn't get to go away to college I would walk out into the ocean until I drowned. I read that in a book in high school. I also hid a bottle of asprin in my room. The deal was that if the pain stuck around too long, I was allowed to take them and He'd just have to understand. No one had the slightest clue, least of all my mom. I was bubbly, smart, and capable.

I don't think you can truly believe how much I want to die.

College wasn't much better. Though there was physical distance my trauma was always a phone call away. Summer and winter breaks at home were torture, even though it had been a few years since my mom had put hands on me. I lived in fear of her wrath returning despite the deal she made in front of my brother and I, her pastor, and God that she'd never lay a hand on us again. I started partying in sophomore year of college. I would always turn in early when my social energy was all out from maintaining my bubbly, smart, and capable persona. I'd curl up in my bed alone and cry myself to sleep. Even physically removed from my trauma, it was still hurting me and I became despondent. I thought it would never end unless I could get up the courage to end it. I tried overriding my protective mechanisms by driving drunk a couple of times, hoping to be truly reckless and do something that would take me and only me out. I was so ashamed, so it only happened a couple of times, but... nothing happened.

I don't think you can understand how much I want to die and fight it every day.

It got the worst its ever been a couple of years ago. My muscles tensed and got ready to pull my vehicle into oncoming traffic or off of the bridge but years of therapy and perhaps the new meds I was on helped to override this overwhelming feeling and forced me to drive to my husband's workplace. I thought I was going to the hospital. We got me help without all of that. Since then it's been sharp, oddly-timed, intrusive thoughts like suddenly being very hungry except wanting to die. I've had to hand over my keys, hand over medications, be aware of my sharps, and have people watch me.

I don't think you can properly understand how much I want to die because I didn't really properly understand it myself.

I failed to see some of my thoughts and behaviors as red flags. I pushed down a lot of memories and pretended I never thought that way or did those things. Now I'm ready to let my inner demons out and embrace them until they can be coaxed into peace, then I have a few moments of peace.

I want to die, but I want to live. I want the pain to stop, but I want the joy I'd be missing out on. Every hug and kiss, every child who adores me, every bit of growth I see in the people I love including my mother have made my efforts to stick around worth it.

But I still want to die nearly every day. No matter how I look or what else I might say, this will probably always be true but it is also true that I don't plan on dying any time soon. Maybe I'm working with a new set of deals with a god I no longer believe in. Maybe the deal hasn't been broken yet. I pray they never will be.

I don't think you properly understand how much I want to die, but I'm slowly figuring out how to put it to words.

The Ground Floor

I think people assume that those who suffer from severe mental illness like myself are all starting out on the ground floor every day. You know, like typical people do. Start the day off like normal, achieve from there. It's much easier to climb up and achieve your goals, however big or small, when you're starting out on the ground floor as opposed to, say, several dozen sub-floors below.

See, people like me can often feel like it's a mammoth climb just to get to the ground floor every day. Sure, we can continue to climb up from there but we didn't start in the same place as those without mental illness or who have only experienced depression and/or anxiety as a mood state as opposed to an illness.

"Well, I was down in the dumps once too and I made it!" Yes, I believe you believe that's true, but when this kind of thing is your daily reality for years and years, climbing to the ground floor can feel tedious and tiring. Sometimes we have nothing left once we've made it to the ground floor, if indeed we made it there at all. Sometimes we learn how to get shit done in the sub-floors. Sometimes we're so sore and tired that we don't climb that day at all.

I just can't climb out right now. The ground floor isn't even visible from where I am.