9:22 p.m. - 06/29/03
i had a dream my life would be:::>
I'm starting to feel dizzy from my own mood swings. Earlier today, I was raging again (and having a really hard time, considering how little I can do about what's making me so angry, and the fact that anger in general is among my least favorite emotions) - carrying all the necessary rage to take on my punching bag but unwilling to hit something that wouldn't show the damage I inflicted. I went out with my mom, trying for a little happiness, but couldn't stop snapping at her, and feeling like it was all worthless. And it really is quite the defensive act right about now to keep the anger from turning inward. Seeing as, if it does turn inward, I'm going to hate myself really fiercely again, and I'm going to be eating-disordered, and I'm going to hate how I look and hate caring, et cetera - I'm trying to keep that from happening.
Unfortunately, going out only threw in my face that it's so difficult for me to do so, heightening the anger even more. Plus, the places we went are the places we always go - making it even clearer that I'm trapped in a world I despise. And the shopping issues came up, except I didn't buy anything because I'm still entertaining fantasies where I grab my own apartment, and considering I have just over a hundred dollars to my name and no source of real income in my immediate future, spending didn't seem like the best option. In the end, I asked to go "back" (because I will never, never call this home, even accidentally) and ended up in tears and yelling at my mom, who kept saying she could take it. She kept telling me it was ok to feel what I was feeling, which just made me more livid. Obviously, I understand that it's ok to be feeling this; otherwise I would not be screaming and crying and, eh-hem, feeling it. The problem is that no one can help the situation, and also, she helped create it. So, being told to share what I'm feeling with her doesn't really help me, though I do think it was good to just scream ... I was trying to do that on my walk yesterday, but for some reason (the fear of being spotted?) couldn't attain the proper volume and mostly ended up muttering. At least today, I managed to actually exorcise a bit of it. And then I fell asleep (sadly, considering that I'd only woken up about four hours prior...but honestly I think it's a blessing that my new sleeping meds are working so dramatically at this stage that anytime I feel compelled to hide from the world via sleep, I'm pretty much able to do so...) and woke up frightfully close to ok. I felt a bit sore for my mom, who - although she is responsible for some of what I'm feeling and did encourage me to yell at her - didn't seem to have benefitted from the experience quite as much. She's been a little shaky-looking ever since. But we talked Harry Potter (she just finished OotP) and watched the other Daria movie (Is It Summer Yet?) so I know we're pretty ok. Maybe it's good for her to look a little less steady. After all, she always worries about me when she sees I've been crying, despite the fact that if I've been crying I'm usually in a much better place than if I hadn't. (I guess I have enough to warrant the tears, so it's better if I let them come.) She's on the phone now with a friend, I think, so I'm going to allow myself to focus on picking up the pieces of myself rather than the pieces of her...
You know, there's a line from yesterday's entry that doesn't even sound real to me when I read it. It falls flat, like there's no emotional reality linked to it, nothing inside that wakes up at the words. The weird thing is, it's a line I know is true. It's the one about how I wouldn't care *so much* what my family thinks about (mainly) Rogers, if I had solid support from the people at Rogers. And since I just met a really weird possible interpretation of the dreams that have been plaguing me for ages...it seems kind of important to consider this. I know that I'm not ok with their absence, so I might as well admit it...I might as well try and figure out why it's not immediately acceptable.
The dreams aren't necessarily similar, they just have a common reality that groups them together in my head. I am, in all of them, somehow "gifted" (usually by the ability to defy one or more laws of physics) and somehow ill or disabled. The illness/disability is often an impairment in my limbs that either locks them in a contorted position or almost does - making it very difficult to use them regularly. Other times, it's (this is gross) an inability to quit vomiting. (Unfortunately, those dreams haven't quit yet. Hell, I even still lose my teeth in dreams... I'd be more than happy to have all that stop.) Anyway, I was thinking this morning that there's also often a common character: my N*land choir director. Often in the dreams, she's around as one of the people making my sick life more difficult, and really, really often I end up telling her off. That's even true in dreams that are different from this general scheme. I've been telling her off during the night off and on for probably a year, and I've never been able to figure out why. Our relationship wasn't exactly *earth-shattering* even if it wasn't *good.* I went into high school (partly pretending I was) scared of how she'd treat me because she'd had a really awful run-in with my brother Joe, generally won her over, didn't particularly like her, but appreciated her willingness to let me hang out in her room during my lunch or study hall hours. I didn't agree with her politics, both small-town and national, but again...there's not much to examine when I try and think of our relationship. And it doesn't make sense for her to be the N*land villain, disguised or not. I have two other people who both make much more sense: one openly vicious and one confusingly so. So why is she here?
The only other explanation for her presence I could come up with was her name, but there didn't seem to be any information in that either. I know I've thought about it before, and what kicks up right away is that her last name sounds (in different syllables) a lot like "ruby" and a lot like "house" - which as I type it makes me think of dropping houses on wicked witches - but in general makes me think of home. So then it finally came to me that...maybe...it's about needing to tell off home. I started to compose a letter to Dave on the ride home, and it was pretty harsh, even though I didn't mean it to injure. And if we're talking about the ability to heal my life, to mend the balance between illness and gift, one of the things that definitely needs doing is resolving Rogers. (Which I don't like to say because I think of "resolution" as "end" and that's not cool.) I'm thinking about that other dream I had, probably weeks ago now...where the doctor pretended he was the one with the magic so that I would be able to escape persecution. You know, I haven't been able to remember, ever since that dream how he did escape, but I do remember thinking early on that it might have had something to do with a hot air balloon...
Anger at Rogers? Yikes. How am I going to manage that when I don't have a support system in my present surroundings? ...But I am seriously sick of these sick-dreams. And even more seriously ready to be moving along in the right direction, especially to the extent that would involve actual moving. Without a parental unit. Speaking of which: my mom needs to have feelings but not in such a way that I feel responsible for them and my dad needs to be back in therapy (in no small part because I miss the ability to have Dr. R push him gently toward a more helpful way of being with me.) And I'm pretty sure I'm waiting for my parents to go back on the divorce. I guess I need a way to slip back into denial even as time goes on. I wonder how I'll manage it after the paperwork's done.
chord
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