9:10 p.m. - 04/07/03
?* what is it in me that refuses to believe ::?::
I just wrote a silly e-mail to Chas and a heart-ful one to Shannon, and I kind of feel like crying now, when before I felt oh-so on top of things. I've done pretty well with my investigating; I've ended up with some actual insight I can share tomorrow in the too-early morning on the anniversary of our really bad session. I guess understanding means feeling, too. I understand it rationally, and ain't that grand, but now I have to feel it, too. Feel how much I love loving. Feel how much I hate distance. Feel the brokenness outside me and the ready spark within. Two weeks until New York. Friends. People. Lights. City. Sound. Two weeks, and I won't be here; if only for a moment, I'll be gone.
It makes so much sense, now, that I can't believe it didn't earlier. What scared me about the midweek emotional collapse was how instantaneous and intense it was. It came on so hard and appeared to do so for no legitimate reason. Suddenly, I felt the worst I had in a long time, and I didn't even know why. Sound familiar? It finally resonated with me. It's so similar to how I felt when the good doctor took leave of the country, and I- shortly thereafter- took leave of my senses. And how much sense does it make that the same feelings should come up? Suddenly, what was "I didn't get into Hampshire" became "Hampshire rejected me" - an injury followed by a (temporary!) disconnection with the doc, followed by giving a shout-out about caged (which meant opening myself up to who-knows-whom, when I completely expected to receive nothing but violent, attacking replies.) Three incidents in which I either tell myself or am told that I'm alone and I'm going to stay that way. I may love, but certainly no one loves me. And of course the shame, and the memories of Rogers, and the hopelessness; of course. Why didn't I see it before?
He said to me, on the phone, to know that this pain I'm feeling is not intrinsic to (what he calls) my relational gift; the pain is a consequence of the way my "gift" has been mishandled. And that's something he's said, less specifically, to me in the past - in the same part of the past, where I freaked out and he left the country. He said to remember that this part of me, which I feared was coming up too quickly, this part of me that I didn't recognize, and which brought pain and shame and couldn't possibly be good- in all likelihood, was. He said that it was connected to me, and therefore it was good, and that the pain had to be what surrounded it, not the actual part of me. And so maybe that part has to do with relation. Maybe that's why I can't get my head out of my heart, and I can't get my love out of my head. And also - we were just about to start the work on systematic desensitization (a.k.a. That Thing) - which is also about being able to go into the world and meet people, and if I truly believe all that can come from that effort is rejection, why wouldn't I feel hopeless? And if I don't truly believe it, what am I covering with the shame?
"I'm not good enough to go out into this world" sounds to me like a way of not hearing something deeper. "No one can love me" sounds like a lie; I may feel that way, but I know better- even in my heart now, I know that isn't true. So what am I afraid of? The lack of reciprocation? The rejection? The breaking apart? The loss? The grief? The love? What the hell scares me so much, I feel safer suicidal than facing it?
I don't know. But he's a smart one. Maybe he has some ideas.
chord
�
�
