living

I miss writing here. I miss all of you lovely people. I'm tired of being afraid because it feels like all of my meaningful words have evaporated. I'm tired of being afraid that all I have left is superficial and shallow.

I lost my job at the end of April, and it felt like a deep, cleansing breath of fresh air.

It wasn't because of me, which was surprising. Every day was a struggle with my boss. She "understood," but she did not hesitate to tell me exactly how much money I was costing her by going to therapy every week. She was "sympathetic," but she openly mocked people who were even slightly overweight and made a big show of her diet and weight loss.

I was laid off due to financial reasons and she cried when she told me. She choked out the words between sobs and I felt guilty because I couldn't cry. I wasn't sad. Not even a little bit. I was elated.

Now I work from home as a freelance graphic designer. I can sit at my desk with a cat in my lap and a dog at my feet. I drink my own coffee and don't wear a bra. In the afternoon I can nap on the couch. It is the best thing I have ever done.

This is the part where it would be easy to say, "and they all lived happily ever after."

But in real life, the chapters keep going.

I get to work with people I want to work with. I get to create things I want to create. But I still lay awake at night paralyzed with anxiety about the phone call I will have to make tomorrow. I still waste an entire day crippled with anxiety about a project instead of working on it. But I am still here. My chapters keep on going.

I've said before that I don't believe you can be healed from depression. You can't recover from anxiety. I still believe that. But there's a third option that I couldn't see until now.

I am living with depression, anxiety, an eating disorder.

I couldn't see that option because it seemed as implausible as reaching up and curling my fingers around the moon. Somedays it still seems impossible, but I can see it now. And I want all of you to know that it exists.

So this is my new chapter on this blog. It's titled living.

eleven o'clock on a wednesday

I am sitting in Molly's office again, but everything is different. Her new office is in a wealthy suburb that takes me half an hour to reach. The lobby of the building sparkles with marble floors and carefully placed black leather chairs. Once I came in to find a woman setting up an enormous golden harp.

She left the recovery center. I found out. I made an appointment.

It's both comforting and strange.

...

I'd heard the ads on the radio, the tv, and all over the internet. "Side effects may include suicidal thoughts or actions..." I'd heard them so much, I became immune. Then my meds changed and so did I. It was as though some outside force had possessed my mind. My thoughts are often toxic, but they are mine. They belong to me. This was different. These were not mine. I hope you never experience what it's like to have thoughts that don't belong to you like some sort of deadly alien virus.

I'd told myself to die a million times, but I'd never told myself to die when I didn't want to.

...

I hate roller coasters. 

I always say no, but every once and a while I find myself clutching the metal seat restraint as we go up and up and up and up. Everyone around me is shrieking in excitement and fear. I am white-knuckled, silent, waiting for the drop. And when it comes I don't scream and wave my arms in the air. I squeeze my eyes shut and wait for the ride to stop.

The drop isn't the worst part. The worst part is going up.

When things are good, I go up. I feel like I can do this thing called life. I make appointments. I finish chores. I shower and do my makeup and hair. I make plans and I then I follow through. And it's elating, feeling like maybe everything is going to be alright, maybe I'm going to be alright. But there's always a knot at the bottom of my stomach because I don't know when I will drop. 

And then I do. And it feels like an old cartoon where I'm carrying an anvil above my head, thinking it's something else. I was holding it up just fine until I looked at it. Then it crushed me. In the cartoon a laugh track would play, and I'd comically run around all squished for a while. In real life, I'm just stuck there, under that anvil. And it's crushing and awful, but worse is knowing that I was stupid enough to run around arrogantly carrying it in the first place.

...

Writing is so hard these days and I don't know why.

say you'll remember me

My sentences are trailing off, skipping down rabbit holes. I am trying to write something because I want to write more, but I keep losing my thoughts.

My thumb burns from holding the lighter wrong. Typical.

"Do you ever think about that girl who was obsessed with Hitler?" I text Bill.

Move. I tell my fingers.

What am I trying to say?

I am sad.

God, I just realized this is sounding like a suicide note.

It's not.

[Spoiler Alert]

But I am sad.

Heavy, sadness. I can't drop it because I haven't decided if the end justifies the means. I am tired of pills. I am tired of this routine.

Hopeless is the word I used in therapy.

But hopeless isn't enough. Despair draws closer, but maybe this is one of those things where there's a word for it in French or Italian that just doesn't translate.

I am sad. I am tired. I think about killing myself every single day.

Every day.

Many, many times.

Call this number. They say. Go here. But I can't. I can't every day. Every few hours. Life doesn't pause for your mental breakdown. These thoughts, they're like the boy who cried wolf. Even I am not sure when they are bluffing.

I broke the mental cord that tied cutting to death. A silver lining that can't quite hide the marks on my leg. It should scare me, how much I understand it, but it doesn't.

I am an addict. I am addicted to darkness.

Juvenile, I scoff at my fingers. Addicted to darkness? Is that a heavy metal band? Are you writing dramatic poetry? How old are you? 

I am too old. I told them that, the first time I sat in the psychiatric emergency room. I'm too old for this shit.

...

There is a baked potato sitting on a pan on top of my stove. It stares me down as I move through the kitchen, icing my throbbing thumb. It's cold now, its skin wrinkled and shrunken, my dinner. I pretend it isn't there. 

I just can't. I can't eat it.

danger night, alternately titled "a lot of Sherlock gifs"

The flu. I hate it.

Since I didn't move off the couch for about two days, I watched a lot of Sherlock.

[If you have never watched Sherlock, go watch it. This post will contain spoilers, and I refuse to apologize for that because you should have watched Sherlock at least a dozen times by now]

A Scandal in Belgravia is my favorite episode. But as I was watching it, I caught something I'd missed before. 

When the Holmes brothers are standing in the morgue after Sherlock identifies Irene Adler's dead body, Mycroft offers Sherlock a cigarette. Sherlock accepts. After Sherlock leaves, Mycroft calls John Watson who is back at their flat.

Mycroft: He's on his way. Have you found anything?
Watson: No. Did he take the cigarette?
Mycroft: Yes.
Watson: Shit. [to Mrs. Hudson] He's coming. Ten minutes.
Mrs. Hudson: There's nothing in the bedroom.
Watson: Looks like he's clean. We've tried all the usual places. Are you sure tonight's a danger night?
Mycroft: No. But then I never am. You have to stay with him, John.

I rewound. 

Danger night?

I had to pause the show so I could do some research. Did I really hear that? I read through several fan theories and that's when I found this:

"Sherlock’s exit gives Mycroft a chance to call John. Everyone’s panicking: the offered cigarette was a test, and that Sherlock (an ex-smoker and clean drug addict) took it indicates his fragile state. John and Mrs. Hudson have both been searching the flat for anything that might help him be unsafe. John asks Mycroft if he’s sure tonight’s a “danger night,” and instantly the gaps between series, between episodes, are filled in. Sherlock has periods where he tries to harm himself; perhaps he succeeds. So John isn’t just his friend—sometimes he’s also a carer."

I re-watched the scene, and it stabbed me through the heart. It wasn't just something familiar or recognizable. I've lived and breathed and walked through this scene. I have the steps and lines memorized, but it still hurts to watch.

John's face when Mycroft says "danger night." He doesn't have to ask. He already knows. They've had this conversation before. 

John waiting for Sherlock to come home, pretending to read. Pretending he's not worried.

This look. This look on Sherlock's face when he walks in and immediately knows that John and Mrs. Hudson have searched the apartment. The moment when he knows that they know he would probably try to harm himself. That they have already acted to prevent that from happening. 

In that knowing, there is so much shame. Disgust. Humiliation. You were certain that this was the bottom, this pain, this heartache, this despair. Then, an act of kindness. A demonstration of love. And all you feel is anger. You're just angry. You hate them for hiding anything sharp. For tossing the pills. For searching through your things, trying to find whatever you are trying to hide. And you suddenly realize that you still have so much further to fall. 

His snippy line about his socks. Because it's easier to focus on the fact that someone invaded your privacy and went through your personal belongings. Don't think about how weak and pathetic you must be to require a caretaker. Don't think about how fucked up you must be to lose the simple right to have privacy.

And John. Poor John who just looks so tired and worried. Because in real life there is nothing funny, nothing easy about loving someone with a mental illness. 

The looks, the conversations that happen around you. The worry that hovers at the ceiling like a heavy, heavy cloud. The questions spoken and unspoken. 

Of which, you are always painfully aware. 

I feel as though I will forever be caught in this endless circle of being honest until I can't take the worry, then lying about being better, then falling to pieces under the pressure of acting like I've got my shit together, then being honest, then lying, then falling to pieces...

It goes on and on and on, and I honestly don't know if there is a way to make it stop.

...

It is Thanksgiving Day here in the U.S. An arguably questionable historical holiday, but a day of thanks nonetheless. 

And I am thankful. For so many things. 

Such as my beautiful Christmas tree:

And, of course, for all of you.

blue

In case you thought it was just a figure of speech.

invisibility

I hate the waiting room at my therapist's office.

The office sprawls across an entire floor of a tall, fancy building. The kind of building that has four glass elevators and real plants growing up up up towards the far away skylights. Business suits and the clicking of high heels echoing down the halls.

It is easy to spot us. The ones who don't belong.

For such a large facility, the waiting room is like a terrible joke. As soon as I step inside, I feel that squirmy knot of panic in the pit of my stomach. I'm third in line to check in which puts me too close to the door. The next person to come in has to awkwardly squeeze in sideways, barely avoiding the knees of the three people unlucky enough to get chairs by the door. There are never enough chairs. It is a horrible box. Too small, too full of people, too loud.

The woman in front of me finishes checking in. She walks three steps, stops, and painstakingly adjusts the plaques hanging on the wall. I check in, mumbling my name as quietly as I can get away with.

Paranoia.

I find a chair in the corner. The woman who adjusted the plaques sits heavily next to me. I notice that she fills the entire chair. I do not. A tiny prick of satisfaction.

The water cooler is in the middle of the chairs. The people on either side of it are having a conversation as though we are all just waiting for a bus or a museum tour to start. Anyone who wants and small, waxy cup of water is forced to wedge themselves between the talkers. I stare at the wall and breathe through my nose. I can hear everything. Noise bounces off these walls like shrapnel. I can feel people staring at me, and I wish I was invisible.

But my hair is blue.

Invisibility is not an option.

...

Not everything looks better in the light of day.

There are bad days that lead into bad nights. There is snow. The wind blows bitterly cold. It seems almost cruel that winter has already arrived.

Bad days. Bad nights.

It would be easy, I suppose, to see that and think, Oh, maybe she was late to a meeting. Maybe she spilled coffee on herself. Maybe she got stuck in traffic.

At work, I struggle. I struggle to focus. I struggle to smile at customers. I struggle to listen to my coworker. I struggle to keep standing when my boss jabs accusations in my direction. I have recently found myself to be the scapegoat, the problem child. By the time I leave work, I am a hollow, beaten down shell. I drive home in silence.

You're so stupid. Fucking idiot. This is how it's always going to be. It's never going to change. You're such a stupid, stupid bitch. Worthless. This is your life. This will always be your life.

At home I curl into a small ball on the couch. The Mr. brings me a whiskey ginger with a bendy straw and strokes my hair. He coaxes me to watch one of our favorite shows, and I try, but I am slipping further away.

It's almost nice here, down the rabbit hole. There are no more screaming insults in my head. There is quiet. I am lightly buzzed on whiskey. I stare blankly at the tv and for a few moments, I feel nothing.

The evening continues on around me. The Mr. is moving about the house. The kitties sniff at my hair and play with the bendy straw in my empty glass. The puppy licks my elbow and follows the Mr. upstairs.

That's when all the nothing and all the quiet become deafening, a tsunami that destroys my desperate illusion. It is too much. There have been too many bad days and bad nights and I am drowning.

It's easier this time. Quick swipes. No emotion. No panic. The pain is like waking up from a nightmare. A jolt. A reminder. Something like calm.

But the lines turn red too quickly. Little red beads forming across my ankle. I pull up my sock and the red slowly stains through. Too much to hide and I am too tired.

I climb up the stairs and crawl into bed. I can feel my pulse burning through each slice on my ankle. It is barely 8:00 pm, but I am asleep before my head hits the pillow.

Sometime in the night, I am awoken by the Mr.'s hoarsely whispered questions. I am half awake, lost in the fog. I drowsily try to say the right things, but he's frightened because there have been so many bad days and bad nights and he doesn't know about my ankle, but he knows. He knows because of the last time.

...

It is several days later that I tell him. We are huddled together on the couch and I tell him. 

I tell him.

I tell him because I can feel myself slipping again, and for the first time in my life it scares me. I have never been afraid of myself because I had nothing left to fear. But I am not invisible anymore. Not to him. Because of the last time. And I am scared.

So I tell him.

these words, down on paper

I never stop writing. I write as often as I breathe.

Just not here.

There are pages and pages of words stuck in my head. I organize them into neat sentences and paragraphs, but my fingers never move.

I am somewhere outside myself, watching, writing. I am writing the story of myself. Not always. Sometimes I am the protagonist. Sometimes the antagonist. But there are the times when I can't bear the weight of my own story, so I step aside and write.

Dissociation. My therapist says.

 He likes to define things. I like to later look up his definitions and have a panic attack.

I want to give you an art project. He says. I want you to make three drawings. One that answers the question "What is your problem?" One that answers the question "What needs to happen to resolve your problem?" And one that answers the question, "What would your life look like without this 'problem?'"

That was a month ago. I haven't touched my sketchbook, but I've thought about it.

What is my problem?

I hate that question.

You. Me. Life. Breathing. NOTHING. EVERYTHING. 

Depersonalization disorder (DPD) is a dissociative disorder in which the sufferer is affected by persistent or recurrent feelings of depersonalization and/or derealization. Diagnostic criteria include persistent or recurrent experiences of feeling detached from one's mental processes or body. The symptoms include a sense of automaton, going through the motions of life but not experiencing it, feeling as though one is in a movie, loss of conviction with one's identity, feeling as though one is in a dream, feeling a disconnection from one's body; out-of-body experience, a detachment from one's body, environment and difficulty relating oneself to reality.

Even now, I feel it. It feels like floating.

...

Bill texts me after a long silence. He voluntarily checked himself back in to the hospital. Thought I sensed your aura in the corridors. He says. 

...

My co-worker's niece was born 3 months premature. She sends me pictures of a tiny, fragile, soft creature with fingers and toes and ears. She weighs 1 lb. She is the smallest bundle of tubes and wires, tucked beneath a glass case so no one can touch her. So she won't break.

But she is so little, so unprepared for life in this world. Her body is failing. 

Airlifted to the city. Incision to relieve the pressure. Surgery is a last resort. She probably won't survive.

I wait, terrified, for the text message from my co-worker. The one that says she's gone.

I don't know this baby. I don't know my co-worker's brother and his wife. I have no connection except that this is another life and I wish, sometimes I wish so badly, that I could trade mine. I wish I could give that baby my life. I wish I could give a terminally ill child my life. I wish I could give my life to any number of people who have found out that theirs will be cut short. I wish I could give my life to someone who deserves it.

I don't know this baby, but I want so badly for her to live.