Reverend Copernicus

A Slow Descent Into Madness Care To Join Me? Just reach out...

[apostleofsilence]

Silence.

They put me on Abilify. The constant nagging in my head is gone. The stressful, circular thought. Gone. Not sure if I can even write under these conditions. The long quiet is nice, but it certainly is lonely...

[apostleofsilence]

Vaguely Rhymes with Dance Bincard.

Well, actually, this one was a bit of a stretch, but I figured that not only would this be more fitting, it also further obscures his identity by referring to him only in vague rhymes of one of his older aliases. Anyway.

So yeah, my buddy, we'll just call him "Rhymes-with-pants", or just "pants" for short. I dunno why, but the wordplay helps with this. Easier to talk about if I can jest about it, and bonus points, the narcissists into constantly googling themselves can't just find this by accident. If they arrive here, they have earned their way into my stream of consciousness. Unless one of them has discovered me by cheating!!! and browsing my phone without my permission. In which case, good job, I guess. You found the warpzone to the final level or something. Whatever. I'm procrasrinating, because unlike all that came before, this story hurts the most to tell.

Not because he is more important to me than everyone else I have lost for any period of time, but because this one is the one that will never, dearest reader, have a "good ending" so to speak.

Pants was my best friend for the all-important and influential second to fifth grade. We did fucking everything together. He was like the brother that I would tailor make at Build-a-Brother workshop. Of course, rational folk like you (and me, some twenty-something years late to the party) know that such an arrangement can only breed destruction.

Take that how you will.

The nature of my seclusion was nigh absolute growing up, with few exceptions. But blessedly, there was school. And at school, I had at least one person I could call a friend. And, at the time, the cynical circus show of school still held the occasional pat on head, and the dopamine rush that came along with it. I was a smart student. But always quiet.

Pants could bring out something else. A desire to play games with friends. Interact with others. This led me to Magic: the Gathering. I loved playing against friends. It was a great way for me to make friends with others who liked to play. It was invariably led me to meet many people in middle school. My cards always got confiscated by Celery, the Spoiled Hippie Produce (but we will shorten it to just Celery, because it amuses me). She was concerned that Satan was trying to get in my head and sent me to a whackadoo shrinky-dink who could somehow charge $100 a session for years to finally say that I really just needed Jesus. Ugh. Anyway, this is a huge digression, but it's important. To **me**. You see, the Tragedy of the Schitzotypical Pants is a tale of many compounding, intertwining tales that build to an ironic creschendo, dear reader, one that I promise has a payoff. If my writing style hasn't completely repulsed you by now, I urge you on.

So off to the Pentecostal hellhole I was sent. I was made to stay away from the people I fit in with. I replaced them with people I more worried about than identified with. The Pastor's daughter was blonde and doe-eyed. Her token Asian best friend looked like she patented Resting Bitch Face^tm at birth. The rest of my creepy Hellhole Fan Club were males, and not the well adjusted type. I guess Youth Pastor Crow was pretty alright. Well, until the night he wouldn't let me leave the Wednesday night group until I quote, 'let Jesus in'. Which, in every day parlaince meant that they wanted me to "speak in tongues". I did all the things I was told. But this poison "gift" would not come to me. So by God, I did the only thing that seemed rational.

I fucking pretended.

If there had ever been a possibility that I could just be a good little Christian ever again, it ended with my face in my hands, on my knees, begging for the touch to speak through me..and nothing. The veil was lifted. The magician has shown his hand, the illusion crushed. These people were no better than any other, why was *their* flavor of God the only way? Hell, the ginger boy Steak would get his ass beat so bad at home he wouldn't be able to come to church. People would ask questions.

They already did, dear reader.

So, while I was forbidden from having normal friends that I had shared common interests with (and I'm still sore that my dad lost track of my cards...prolly thousands of dollars worth of Legends, Arabian Nights, and Revised Magic cards), I was instead hosted a front row seat to this shitshow. So when I turned sixteen, I told everyone I'd had enough. Went and stayed weekends with Pants, playing d&d (another verböten activity under the tyrannical reign of Celery), and why not experiment with some grass while we're at it? Sure. Pants had the keys to escaping reality. And when it came to escaping reality, Pants was like Houdini. I didn't mind, it gave me a chance to decompress. Up until now, I had existed to participate in a series of show dog style obstacle courses, told how high I was expected to jump, and roundly ignored when I regularly jumped higher and higher to show someone that I was dying inside.

Those stiffs at the Pentecostal Hellhole didn't understand me. Nobody did. Thankfully, there was one person out there for me with the patience and generosity to help build me into the relatively better adjusted man writing here. She's the best!

So with my newfound liberty to come and go as I please, I got into plenty of trouble with my compatriots. I won't issue a confession to anything here, nice try NSA. But goddamnit if I didn't feel alive. And all this while, I wrestled with feelings I had no words to express until well into my twenties. And in tiny pisswater towns the nation over, if you wanted to suck cock, you were a faggot, and that made you a bad person. Why? No reason. But that couldn't be me, because I am a connoisseur of the feminine form. I love them all. Every bit of it. Nay, the mere idea that I could be bisexual didn't hit me until twenty five, and didn't feel official until the year after. So I guess I've been openly bi/pan for like...eight years? So, yeah. I had a crush on Pants. He was very rough around the edges. Stank most of the time. But I was attracted to the person I saw in him, and not the person he let everyone view. But when you don't have the words for "I like both shut up don't judge" for another ten years, you just get more confused, more infatuated with what amounts to an idea.

Part two to come. Maybe I'll just edit part two in here to make this whole thought superfluous. Sweet sleep please take me.

<3 Rev.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Hookay. Part two. More lucid tonight. Maybe I can fix that before too much longer. But not yet.

I was a bit latchkey off and on, here and there. The best part about my main job back then was the ability to ask to be taken off the schedule indefinitely, and show up six months later to be put back on. I lived there for awhile. I don't know if Pants felt the same way about me, but we never talked about it.

Eventually we drifted apart for awhile, and reconnected in the education program we both enrolled in. And once he was out, I helped him find a place to crash for a couple weeks. Weeks became a couple months. Nobody wanted him around anymore. It strained my relationship with my partner, and her mom to boot. I really tried to help that sonofabitch. But I wasn't gonna look the other way while he continued to treat people I care about like shit. We drifted apart again.

I would sometimes see him at mutual friends places, and we'd be mostly cordial, but no longer familiar. What I didn't realize was that he was in the middle of a psychological break. Lots of magical thinking and psionic orgasms. Or something like that. And finally, the bombshell.

So his friend, whom we will here refer to as dickhead (an allusion to his nickname that like six people will get), had given him a bible in all this mental anguish. And he latched onto the Book of Revelation. So, imagine my shock when one day he looks me right in the eyes and tells me that I am his great desteoyer, and that I will bring him ruin. Total fucking insanity.

So yeah. There is much more I could add here, but I would rather not have this get out, and end up sued over things I can no longer prove. Until next time, Space Kittens. Watch this space, I think next time I will discuss Celery the Horrible. You ready to strap in? This is where reality's thin veneer starts to peel ominously, places where I believe my madness was hand picked for, whether intentional or no.

I think, with this next tale, we wend inexorably onward toward the heart of the matter. Care to come along?

[apostleofsilence]

Interlude with Ludes, or, Sit a Spell and Lemme Ramble At You.

Greetings, internet. Here I sit again, in the throws of a multiweek manic spree. It's fucking terrible.

Mania itself isn't that bad, it's literally all the other stuff that comes along for the ride. I'm one of those that gets sexually impulsive when I've been manic for awhile. The longer the spree, the more it physically hurts me to continue making the right decisions. But, I owe that to myself, and also to my partner. Aside from the almost overwhelming urge to have slutty meaningless sex with as many guys and gals as I can fit into my schedule, I also haven't had more than five hours of sleep since Novemberish. I constantly feel restless. I can't make myself stop saying the first words off the top of my head. So far, being this manic has seemed to provide the right answers, like my mental illness has the Biff Tannen's sports almanac to my life and is using that advantage well.

So we finally made it to mom's house. Too bad the hiking GPS me and the missus got for my mom won't be in until after we have to skip town again. What I wouldn't give to just be able to spend longer here. I feel so much more at peace here.

If anybody reads this and takes notice, anyone have experience with long manic periods? Any secrets to get yourself to sleep? I think I've probably tried everything I could figure, and still lucky to snatch two to four hours at night. Any advice would be appreciated.

Umm. I feel like I opened this post to say something more important, but this has just turned into a sorta journal entry. Heh. That's all right, nothing wrong with keeping it informal.

I guess one of the main reasons I've opened this back up is that I need to write more, even if no one else cares. Moreso the better, mayhaps. If nothing else, I can approach my therapist with what I have entered here. I mean, present me managed to glean some precious information about the kind of frightened, wide eyed beast that I had been during those stolen months of drug induced stupor back in 2014. I don't know if that last abomination of a sentence adds up to anything meaningful, and I apologize if half of this is gibberish. Lack of quality sleep seems have rendered my brain a cold, lumpy mush. But I must plunge onward. Despite efforts to the contrary, sleep still will not find me, and writing here seems almost like having company.

Hmm. I think I should tell a story. Friends, people whom have been referenced in earlier posts, I halfway expect at least one of you to find this, and if you are reading now, as I transition from one post to the next, I warn you that this next story will 100% verify to you that I am, in fact, whom you think I am. Remember my plea from earlier. Please.

This story is about a friendship. It's about a girl, too, but I don't think she was ever aware that she was ultimately part of this story. For the best, I imagine. She could've effortlessly done better than him. What this story is NOT about, dear reader, is happy endings. See you in the next post. Watch this space.

[apostleofsilence]

Chapter two; or, Jesus Christ, so this is still a thing.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

[[AUTHOR NOTE: I made the executive decision to delete most of the old entries. Preface stays. Honestly, though, it is a fitting end to a portion of my life now forever gone to the ravages of too many benzos be represented by a missing chapted. No longer shackled to the words of a dead man, I hope to pull myself out of despair. Gods know I deserve it.]]

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Two and a half fucking years since I started this. I noticed that I got followed by what looks like two real life people. If you ever read this, hiii! I was just gonna delete this churning trainwreck, but since there is a possibility others might see this someday, I shall trudge ever forward. So lets fill in the gaps, or what I remember.

So where we last left our intrepid adventurer, he was staring into the stygian abyss, and while it stared not back, it it gave threat with it's flying blanket elemental. Eesh. Terrible place to leave on a cliffhanger. So, what did happen?

Benzodiazepines, kiddos. Proof that if there is a God, it is a cruel and capricious one indeed. My ultimate salvation, it whispered in my ears, the siren song of modern medicine. It made me complete. And completely an asshole. So the benzos had to go. I was prescribed 6mg of Xanax and 6mg of Kpin. Daily. As is a supply of 90 each every four weeks. If your not familiar, that is a fuckton. Like, an irresponsible dose. I had been getting small caches of .5 xannies, and those were perfect. Shut out the negative thoughts, let my mind drift in peace for awhile. My new shrink, when he found out I expected him to maybe keep up with said dose, his solution was to give me thirty times the benzos I requested. I was leery, but who had the medical degree, amirite?

Well, as a result of this, I have six months worth of mostly empty memories, and the things I do recall were traumatic, to say the least. Maybe in a future chapter, I will discuss the sort of depravity one gets up to when you feel like a God given flesh, and you feel like it too. But for now, we focus on the future.

I lost many good friends. I was a mess. My stepdad, who grew up doing hardcore drugs from the sixties through the mid eighties, told me that he'd never seen anyone as far gone as I was come back through unscathed. Talk like that scares me a bit, because this man wasn't picky about who knew he did them, or whom he did them with.

So, I let go of benzos, willingly. On my terms. I flushed all the xannies, probably had an easy street value of a thousand, likely. Gone. Flushed all but enough of the kpin to parachute down on. Didn't want to quit all that just to die due to a withdrawl-induced grand mal seizure. Figured as much as I had been taking, it probably would've completely fucked up my shit.

I went back to my partner (who had decided that being ftm wasn't really for her, and that her dysphoria was mostly tied to being shamed all her life about her body). I don't think either of us intended it, but there it is. We went back to being friends during my recovery, and we were just so goddamned good together again. Since then, while we have had a touch of turmoil, it hasn't been nearly like it used to be. We are more patient with each other, more open about what we need and want. Like adults. This whole section might be a half-chapter of its own, and definitely a tale for later.

I didn't see another therapist since I got my last one fired for naked malpractice and HIPPA violations. Just another reason not to trust shrinks. Scum, most of them. I had one or two along the way that were worthwhile, but constantly moving homes assured I could never totally and implicitly trust one shrink. I finally saw one on October this year. Two months ago? Yeah. Proud of me, internet? Yeah, me too. My cardiologist is literally the best, he got me in to see this guy as a favor.

Anyway, I've changed cars twice since then. From that shitty Camry to the significantly less shitty 16 year old Acura. Didn't do any driving while I was "waiting to adjust" to those suicide slammers I was prescribed, and continued drinking on. Oh yeah, quit drinking among all that, too. I'm just fucking killing it over here, rockstar style.

But I will resist braggadocia (okay, maybe a little indulgence). But seriously, I couldn't have done it alone. Special thanks go out to A(rhymes with among kinda), J(sorta rhymes with heft), D(definitely rhymes with barrel), D(rhymes with rave, though he's never been), EJ (he would deffo know who he is, no hints needed 😉), and the best pair of male rats I've ever owned. And especially special thanks of epicness +1 to C(whom also rhymes with barrel). My heart of hearts, soul of soul. My sun and stars. Thanks for "getting" me like nobody ever did before. I <3 you.

So, here I am. How am I now? At moments bad, but getting better all the time, I hope. I've become more reclusive. To keep myself from outright agoraphobia, I set up a Dungeons and Dragons group almost as soon as I committed to recovery. Writing helps, and beyond this blog, my pen has been stilled by hopeless thoughts. Except for roleplaying games.

That group has grown and molded from just me, D, J, and C crawling from one outlandish setting to the next in my slapdash, seat of my pants storytelling into a Sunday night movie night, with almost double the cast. Its an even split almost, girls to guys, and we mostly watch bad exploitation flicks and so bad they're good trainwrecks. Somehow, I find contentment from this social arrangement.

Umm, my anxiety in public is worse now. With no benzos, all I got left out there is music, and if I forget my earbuds I wander into the gtocery store, immediately lose focus on my goals, buy the same thing every time (a hastily grabbed pepsi max and a bag of sour bears, my only weakness!), and leave the store. I emerge from my fog as I jostle my keys from my pocket to get into the car, realizing I forgot the cereal, the milk, and the bread. Oh, was I humming again? How long had I been doing it? The same fucking tune, oh you don't say. You're still a wreck of a man, Rev.

So yeah. I'm getting better, but I feel like there is a transparent wall of force between me and normalcy. The ability to work, to start a family. God, how I want that. We both want just one and done. Hope someday I can break through and realize all of these things as reality. For now, I shall dream.

-=-=-=-=-

And with that, I conclude this entry. With luck, I will be bashing out more screeds in the future, now that I have discovered the tumblr app. Thoughts? Questions? Maybe my next post will be an interlude. I need to figure out what the nomenclature for trigger warnings on here. I am totally new to the platform and am aware that there is some manner of acceptable decorum around these here parts.

Baby steps.

And if any of you mentioned above find this, I ask that you keep it to yourself. If you like, I would be happy to one on one you in regards to anything you might be concerned about. Please respect this, this blog is like personal therapy. Thank you.

[apostleofsilence]

Preface

What is this blog?  Nothing any of you give a shit about, probably.  But I'm a thirty year old man, jobless (and no, not looking for handouts), dealing with growing mental illness.They keep changing my meds hoping to find something that works, but so far that's been a no go.  Still working at it.  In the mean time, I thought I'd write about this mostly to keep myself rooted in logic and reason.  You see, I've been sick a long time.  But being as rational as I am, I reason my way out of things out of the ordinary.  Lately though....just not so much.  

Pretty much nobody else will ever read this, but for now I'm starting it to help me ignore the inanimate objects in the room that are very fucking clearly taunting me.  Yep.

For purposes of the blog, you may call me Reverend Copernicus, or Rev for short.  I did a bunch of terrible blogging when I was a dumb youth, and I figure that I might as well use the same online moniker for this.  Alright.  Here goes.