9:00 p.m. - 02/12/03
love, love me do.
I really don't have the energy to write, but the good news is I'm medicated to the point that I might have the energy tomorrow. This means that, yes, I did my duty and informed the doctor that my heart was trying to relocate somewhere on the other side of my chest whenever I went to sleep. I realize this morning that I could very easily become afraid of sleep if this continues, which further motivated me to mention it. I remember what it was like to not want to sleep because I was scared of not waking up. I would like to not have reason to experience that again- at least for nine or ten decades...
To summarize, today was difficult the way life is sometimes. I'm highstrung from not having slept properly in over a week, and anxious about the ensuing weekend and the plans required to survive it. (Where to go, where to go.) I'm leaning toward staying, I think. Everything else seems more tedious than helpful, and I think I could use some crash time. Plus, the doctor reiterated his lovely "You know where to find me" clause, which means that I'll probably be able to call him if need be. I really do need to consider switching to twice-a-week appointments for awhile. Other than the obvious benefit (right now) there's the added bonus of actively explaining to myself that right now I am struggling at least as much as I was, and deserve at least as much support as I had, when active in the ed part of this. Also, it's been awhile since I imploded, without apparent provacation, halfway through a session. It's been awhile since I flipped out because I realized that the session would end and I would have to deal with a week on my own. (I've gotten around that lately by asking for more time, but since I have no idea where I'll be this weekend, I couldn't exactly do so this time. If only I were wealthy; I'd rent a room in his building and visit daily. I'm a mess, yes, but at least an honest one.) So, after some semi-random talk about family (random because it involved a relatively long discussion of my paternal grandmother, and why I admire her so much) I collapsed into tears without any apparent reason, and started to explain that it's too hard, and I feel too badly, and I don't even know what's going on so I can't deal with that. He said again that if I don't know what to do, I can try doing nothing, and I told him I'm scared of that. I'm scared to just let myself be having a hard time right now. To do so would require admitting that I'm struggling, first off, and letting that be ok. I would have to give myself permission to be having a hard time right now, which is terribly difficult, but on top of that...and this is honestly the kicker- I don't know what to do about struggling. I know how to be in recovery when I feel lit to accomplish it. I don't know how to stay safe when I don't feel safe.
And even as I write that, I know it isn't true. Somewhere in me I know how to do this - because I do it. I do it over and over again, praying that at some point I won't have to, aware that I come closer every time I do. I'm scared. I wanted to crawl up in a single cushion of his couch, knees to chin and lie there. I wanted to be a kitten for a day. I still want that sometimes.
I will get through this, and I know that. I have to get through this. I have to be the one, whether I'm the first one or the last. I have to get through this whether or not my family comes along for the ride. I have to get through this no matter how terrified I am, no matter how terrified I am of being different, of being ostracized. Nothing scares me more now than the possibility of losing myself as fully as I did, and nothing gives me more hope than finding her more fully than I have. So it comes down to, I have to choose me, and whether or not that ends up excluding them (which I don't think it will, but hell- I get scared, too), I will do it. I will pick me. Pick me. I will be my own favorite. I will.
Exhausted, struggling, and desperately optimistic. How is that still means to me that things have changed?
He told me that I'm different, not simply for how I used to be, but from my family. Different and destined for a better, happier life from an earlier time. He told me that he doesn't mind working with four members of the same family because we're so very different. He told me that I am not my parents. He minimized the DNA to "some small similarities of apperance" (you mean I'm not my mother's clone?) and told me I'm not then. And it was refreshing and liberating, marvelous and terrifyingly real.
I said to him that I feel like it's I/they thinking. Like I'm separating myself, saying, "this is what my family does that I don't understand" when obviously, I have to do it, too. If they do it, I have to do it also. I just don't see. And maybe I'm scared that I *am* a fluke within my family, that I don't fit as well as I need to...or maybe I'm afraid that they will think I'm judging them. All I'm saying is this course is better for me. All I'm saying is I couldn't live that way. And. Maybe I do think I'm better at some things. Is that a crime? Is it a crime that I grab onto people with my whole heart, that I wrote a play I'm proud of, that I know myself and follow my feelings and my needs? Is it a crime that I talk therapy-talk a lot simply because it's the language I know? It's the voice that gets me through this life the best.* It's got to be about me this time. I don't have enough life left to fake it anymore.
In other news, I made more jokes than I do in a week just during school today. I got an e-mail that says someone has a secret crush on me, but didn't feel like paying the forty dollars to read that it was spam. Of course if it wasn't...well...there are less anonymous ways of contacting me. Ah. The interesting point behind that statement is that for the first time in possibly-forever, I wasn't scared at the possibility. I mean, I'm not ready for a relationship. Duh. I'm getting closer, but I'm not there. And at the same time, I didn't freak out the way I did when things happened with Andy or with Matt. I didn't freak out the way I always do. I felt like it might be nice to have someone feel that, whether or not it was anything we could pursue, could act on, could consider in that regard. It's the first time in possibly-forever that I haven't equated interest with the end of the world.
Interest. That word struck me today. The idea that someone can be "interested" in someone else. We use it so blandly, but I think it could be really beautiful. Beautiful in the way Dr. R said- that someone looks you in the eyes and wants all the details of your day. It's not a bad word, really. Someone could be *interested* in me. Could be intrigued, could want to know me, could love me. It's a downright lovely possibility, and it's nice to draw closer to seeking that out.
That said, today I saw two darling girls who were barely school age checking out purchases (by themselves) at a Wal-Mart. I love watching small children do things I can't do myself. But they were entirely entertaining, and in my delight over them/ confusion about the situation, I ended up (gasp) paying for two yarn scheens without someone running interference. And the cashier (who had also checked out the two lovely girls who are already ahead of me) checked me out also, and she asked what I was making, and I told her scarves, and she said, "I wish I could do that" and (this is how me I am) I wanted to say, "Oh!...Well, you can. It's not difficult. When do you get off work? Because I just moved here...well, ok, I didn't *just* move here, but I don't know anyone all the same, and I wouldn't mind teaching you if you want." She had this really wonderful smile that reminds me of someone I can't place, and I wanted to say those things to her, but instead I said, "It's actually not that hard. You could learn" and took my scheens and left. I realized on the way home that one of these days I need to learn to say what my heart says rather than the revised version. Damn that editor: insecurity.
But, yes. I wanted to go home, make her a fluffy blanket, and hang around waiting for her next shift. I think it's kind of lovely that I wanted to do that, and that- since I'm an *honest and determined* mess, someday I will do such things.
love-
chord <--who would seriously do nothing but crochet for hours if she had the energy
*WM allusion (When I grow up, I want to be in Winter Machine. No, seriously; that's the newest future taking root inside my mind. And it's a darling one.)
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