6:45 p.m. - 03/12/03
so tired of playing, playing with this bow and arrow. >
My dad's here tonight. I didn't know he was going to be until this afternoon, and I certainly didn't know he was going to come through the door looking so run down (or perhaps over). When he found out my mom has a class tonight, he asked if they could talk, and I took my cue to go draw awhile. When she left, he came into the room and told me he had news. He quit his job in Narnia. He talked to Mom about moving back. He hopes this is good news for me, and that he's not going to "knock over" our "apple cart." Of course, I told him that it was better to have him here, and I don't think I was lying, though I know I'm far too confused too have told him anything that definitive this soon. A week or two ago, I expected this, but the way things have gone since, it's kind of a shock. And I don't know how to be happy about it. Parents who don't get along in separate states, parents who don't get along in the same house. Staying by myself all day in an ungodly "town" I hate, staying by myself with a parent. I'm just confused.
I went into the appointment today, only a few degrees away from "fuming." I didn't particularly have reason to be, in that exact moment. My mom had come in with me, and she called John and left to meet with him, and as the whole thing went on, I just got more and more annoyed. I wanted her to not be there, so when she left I was fine, except that I knew she was going to talk to the doctor after I did. (She called him last night, and he said he'd talk to her today, even though they both know she needs to stay the hell away from my appointments.) He was only ten minutes or so late meeting with me, but from long before I met with him I wasn't thrilled to be in my own life, and said as much. "How have you been surviving the past few days?"
"Igugh."
We both laughed (just) a little, and he said it was kind of a loaded question- but it's not the question. It's the reality the question compells me to describe. It's my reality, which I do not want to be my reality, and the fact, it wouldn't be my reality except for...me. (He disagrees on that point. He says it's not me. But I really do believe right now that I'm standing in my own way.)
I started out by detailing the joy of my parents- individually, together, separately, with me, etc- in a way that felt reminiscent of our pre-"I-exist-outside-of-my-parents" days, and how much I didn't want to deal with it- now especially. How I'm no longer interested in fixing it, and I hate the fact that I have to be involved in it- that even if I want nothing to do with it, I have to continually say so, continually shut them out, continually deal with their hurt feelings over that. I don't care anymore; (of course I care.) I guess I care, but I don't want anything to do with it. It's hard to care when it's knocking you over all the time, when it's something that must be dealt with on top of all the other Extremely Difficult Things I must deal with. I'd have more sympathy if I had more distance, I guess. But there's no way of making distance. There's no way out of here, and that's where things are looking more than a little bleak.
He brought up something I'd been wondering about: (whatever happened to our talk on) - systematic desensitization. He said that, starting in April, we could use our second session to very slowly dismantle all my stupid, pointless, irritating, hateworthy phobias. Only on the days when I felt like they were stupid and irritating and hateworthy, though. He said that my level of distress over this right now- my passion about how trapped I am and how much I don't want to be- could help move us in the right direction. I think that involves me not thinking that this disorder is a defect in me, which I do. He said I might as well be mad at myself for not knowing how to speak Italian, and thus, being terrified when told to go into the middle of Italy and live there. That's nice and all, but if all my friends had learned to speak Italian, and I had been given the opportunity and hadn't done anything near master it- if small children everywhere were rattling off Italian right in front of me...the comparison might be a little more accurate. I'm so stupidly stubborn about this, which I hate. I hate that I'm being stubborn, that no matter what he says, where he says we could start, I start crying and telling him, no no no, I can't do that. Which makes my head say, "Well, obviously I don't want to get better. Obviously, I'm not even trying at all." And, "I'm never going to get better. I'm finally at a point where I can *leave*- something I've wanted for *years*- and I never will because of my stupid fucking stubbornness, and these phobias that will stay with me for the rest of my life." He says two or three months. I say always. He says we can beat this. I say, I feel like even if I weren't afraid, things would still be as dangerous as they seem, and I'm not giving up the fear that keeps me out of things so dangerous as that. (Instead, I'm staying in D!@#$%^, where I'll rot to the tune of my parents' incompatability.)
He asked if there's anything keeping me here- i.e. if I could conceivably go to Hampshire in April and not be at all afraid about what would happen there, does anything about leaving still seem hard? I told him the only thing in my mind: that I still need him. He said, if school was here, then what? I said no. Nothing. It's horrible, and it makes me sound horrible, and I'm sorry, but there's no reason left to stay in D!@#$%^. A year ago, with things at this intensity, I would have been on one of my, "I'm running away" tracks...which really shouldn't be considered less serious because I never went through with them. I meant what I thought, and I would have gone if there had been a place to go...
So, he says, we'll work, and if anything that does tie me here comes up as we work, we'll deal with it then. Otherwise, great, we'll just go. When I came home I started to think about him. And about illness. And about how badly I don't want to be well. I don't want to not be in therapy, to not be in treatment, to not have this part of my life secure. He's the only person I know for certain I will talk to again, and the only way that stays true is if I stay in this area and stay sick. So maybe that's a reason he needs to hear. As little as I want to say it.
I told him the truth. That I feel like when I went to Rogers- absolutely certain that I can't get better and hating myself for that. But I did get somewhat better at Rogers, and even that doesn't help me now. Instead of seeing a comparison, I feel that for everything I get through there's going to be another issue, and I'm constantly going to be sick. I'm a freak, I told him. I'm so tired of being a freak...
He told me if I really were a freak I wouldn't feel like one. It wouldn't bother me. I told him I want to go home. I want to go home right this minute. And I know this is part of how I get there, supposedly, but I can't make it work in my head. I can't find the transition- the part where I go to this college or that college or no college- where I start working here or there and living in such-and-such a place. I can't find that link that puts the middle and the end together. Oh, Harlan. What if the end won't take care of itself?
I'm scared to get better again. That's what I realize now. That means really, honestly moving on from this, and I can't do that- not when I believe that no one will love me just to love me. Not when the only home I've ever found is a hospital and the only person I've ever trusted not to leave is a psychiatrist. Not then. Not now.
When he talked to Mom, I made myself speak with the girl in the waiting room. She looked a few years older than me, and she was amiable, but not really full of conversational material. I made myself break the ice. I made myself talk. Because I don't want to be like this, I don't. I don't want to be this girl, in this life. But the only life I know to want is one I can't have. I'm just so scared that I'll never find it. I'm so scared that I'm done.
This is my life. I have a house, no home, parents, no family, shelter, no safety. I'm eighteen and I need to be adopted. I'm eighteen, and I haven't the slightest idea where to step. I promised myself I'd get out of this when I could, the moment I could. I told them, "the moment I'm 18, I'm gone. I'm not yours." I told myself the years, months, days I had left. And the doctor says, "There are so many things in your way that aren't you. The isolation, the lack of transportation." But it wouldn't be isolation if I could drive which I can't do because I'm stupid. Stupid and didn't learn. Stupid and got sick. Stupid and have to stay sick, have to stay sick, can't survive if no one stays in my life. Can't start working on how to get away with him, when there isn't anywhere to go. He's talking about running away in slow motion, and I'm talking about...maybe home's like love and you only get one chance.
chord
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