I'm so burnt out from seeking out medical care, but like. There isn't exactly another option. And the doctor is kind of strong arming me into ketamine therapy which feels like playing russian roulette wrt whether or not it will kill this personality, further fragment me, or bring back the first personality that might not be able to cope with all this.
Things feel truly dire. Like this might not be survivable.
But I'm also afraid that it is survivable. At least if this kills me itself, it takes the choice out of my hands and I don't have to choose to live like this.
Well, shit. The Treatment Resistant clinic is really strong arming me into ketamine treatments. The thing I really don't want to do because I'm afraid it will kill me. Or at least this version of me.
But I guess it doesn't really matter that much, right? I'm not supposed to be here, so if it brings back the original version but kills me, it's still a net good, probably.
Well, shit. The Treatment Resistant clinic is really strong arming me into ketamine treatments. The thing I really don't want to do because I'm afraid it will kill me. Or at least this version of me.
But I guess it doesn't really matter that much, right? I'm not supposed to be here, so if it brings back the original version but kills me, it's still a net good, probably.
I've been listening to The National on repeat for the last week, which makes sense as yesterday was one year since I broke up with my ex.
I had flown out to visit them, and there was a moment where I was sitting in their basement alone after we had a difficult conversation, where I fought against my nature and was honest. I put on some music, deciding to listen to Trouble Will Find Me all the way through, and sat there realizing I was going to break up with this person.
Shortly after that, after dinner together, they had me try on part of the sweater they were making for me, and I desperately, tragically wanted to tell them not to bother, that there was no point.
Everything I love is on the table.
Everything I love is out to sea.
[They are the reason I went to sea, which was a huge turning point in my life. We later met and worked together on that boat, then it was while I was on a different vessel that we started dating. The sea has figured heavily into the progression of our relationship.
I have only two emotions,
Careful fear and dead devotion.
I can't get the balance right.
Before going out to visit them, I was working hard to get over my difficulties with authenticity and being honest about my struggles. I had the mindset of not talking about my struggles with those I care about because it didn't make me feel better, and they wouldn't be able to help, and would hurt them, so it felt pointless.
Despite my fears, I opened up. They told me I need more friends, even offering to type up a guide on how to make friends. I couldn't find the words to make them understand that when I'm in pain, I want to be alone. Not to be selfless and suffer in silence, but because it hurts more to be in pain around other people.
They also told me, immediately after I talked about my fears around it, that they would get me institutionalized without hesitation if they thought it would save me. There was no discussion about where they thought those lines were. I became afraid of opening up more, because how could I know what was going to make them carry that out? After fighting so hard to be honest, I still found that I failed to find the balance of careful fear and dead devotion.]
You keep a lot of secrets
And I keep none
Wish I could go back
And keep some
[There were some things I overlooked early in our relationship. Like how I always felt I was talking too much about myself, only to later realize that no matter how much space I left, or what I asked, that they were rarely very open with me. As time went on, it felt like I barely knew them and they knew everything about me. After that final conversation, and after our breakup, I desperately wished they knew less.
You tell me you're waiting
To find someone
Who isn't so hopeless
I was afraid they would misinterpret things I told them, have me locked up over a trip to the coast because I mentioned I'd thought about dying there once. They got upset because I poorly worded my explanation when I warned them about the trip. I tried to frame it as me coping with my own paranoia, that it was a 'me' issue, but said it wrong.]
[This song was stuck in my head after the conversation, which led me to listen to this album. Because everything in me was telling me that sitting in that basement, the next meal, the last night together, was the last time.
This is the last time
Jenny, I am in trouble
Can't get these thoughts out of me
Jenny, I'm seeing double
I know this changes everything
The thoughts I opened up to them about had been a part of me for far longer than I'd known them, but I knew that saying it had changed everything.]
[This song hit me like a bolt of lightning in that basement. I was in physical pain from pushing my limits the day before, having just been told that if my partner thought I had pushed that hard on purpose, they would have broken up with me right there. The frustration and self blame I felt, that my pain was ruining everything. The glimpse of the future I got of our relationship, sitting quietly inside so as not to cause myself pain, them watching me like a hawk for the first instance of discomfort to call any future outing off.
Graceless
Is there a powder to erase this?
Is it dissolvable and tasteless?
You can't imagine how I hate this, graceless
I'm trying, but I'm graceless
I don't have the sunny side to face this
I'm trying, but I'm gone, through the glass again
All of my thoughts of you
Bullets through rotten fruit
Come apart at the seams
Now I know what dying means
I am not my rosy self
Left my roses on my shelf
Take the white ones, they're my favorite
It's the side effects that save us
It wasn't a life I could live with, it wasn't a love I could accept. I convinced myself that it was simply an issue of incompatible healthy boundaries. Only recently did my therapist convince me that an ultimatum like that was unhealthy.]
[And this one left me breathless. The line I'll never be anything you ever want me to be was a kick to the ribs, sinking in my realization that all the effort I had put in to be so, so good, so open, the kind of partner they deserved, and none of it would be enough. Because the way my body and brain fail aren't something they're okay with, and I so badly wanted to be able to talk about the failures of my brain and body without them telling me how to fix it or deal with it.]
I'm having trouble inside my skin, I'll try to keep my skeletons in
I'll be a friend and a fuck-up and everything
But I'll never be anything you ever want me to be
I keep coming back here where everything slipped
But I will not spill my guts out
I don't want you to grieve, but I want you to sympathize, alright
I can't blame you for losing your mind for a little while, so did I
I don't want you to change, but I want you to recognize that I
It'll be easy to cover, gather your skeletons far inside
It'll be summer in Dallas before you realize
That I'll never be anything you ever want me to be
[The week I visited was busy. We wanted to make the most out of the time I was there. I knew it would be a lot, but I wanted to meet the people and see the places that made them who they are. By the end of the week, I was fighting exhaustion and anxiety. I didn't want to lose any of our time together to my sickness.]
I survived the dinner
Then the air went thinner
I retire to the briars
By the pool, it gets so loud
If I die this instant
Taken from the distance
They will probably list it down
Tunnel vision lights my way
Leave my little life today
It wasn't like a rain, it was more like a sea
I didn't ask for this pain, it just came over me
Well, I love a storm, but I don't love lightning
All the waters coming up so fast, it's frightening
And everybody was gone
I was staring down the street 'cause I was trying not to crack
I was solid gold, I was in the fight
I was coming back from what seemed like a ruin
I couldn't see you coming so far
I just turn around and there you are
I'm so surprised you want to dance with me now
I was just getting used to living life without you around
I'm so surprised you want to dance with me now
You always said I held you way too high off the ground
You didn't see me, I was falling apart
You said it would be painless
A needle in a doll
You said it would be painless
It wasn't that at all
[I'm not sure I ever got past Pink Rabbits before I went up so we could have dinner together. Both Hard to Find and Learning are fitting to listen to a year later, looking back and seeing how abruptly sour the relationship turned over the course of that one conversation, and thinking about how much more constricting things could have slid if I had stayed.
No one'll hear all your crying
'Til you take your last breath
But you will learn
To mind me
And you will learn
To survive me
At the time I had gone out to visit them, I was working on a quilt for them. In my family, my grandmother gifts newlyweds a quilt for them to share, and I doubted that would ever happen for us, so I took it into my own hands. I debated what to do with the half finished quilt. I had designed it for them, dreaming of it on our shared bed. I wanted to finish it, but I couldn't keep it. So I kept working on it. As I worked on it, an unfortunate thought popped into my head- what if I stitched a curse into it. I wondered what the curse would even be. I didn't want them to hurt, but I wanted them to learn. The curse became: may your next partner be healthier than you. I'm not sure I really believe in curses, but it turns out it doesn't matter to the curse. Shortly after I finished the quilt, named it Sanity Gap, and sent it to them, an almost perfect mirror of what happened to me, happened in one of their new relationships. They told me about it without a hint of irony.]
I'm also going to send a thank you card to the pharmacy manager. After I called the third time, (I think it was the second time I spoke to her), she started sounding kind of pissed off, but not at me. Pissed off like, "this person should have had their meds two weeks ago what the fuck". Before ending the call she gave me her name and told me she'd get me taken care of.
One day later and change, and I've got my meds. Idk what computer demons she had to battle to get this done, but she did it.
Drove 4 hours to help my grandmother in the garden (not that she needs the help, but it's something we like to do together)
But ugh. I can't keep up and I'm butting up against being disabled more than I usually do. Planting marigolds and nearly blacking out over and over, and like. Knowing exactly what I need to do with my body to complete the task, but fighting for my life.
Going back inside and napping for hours, completely wiped from things I used to do all day.
And I haven't planted anything since [redacted] left, my confidence is shot. It's not a difficult thing to do, but it's all new sensations for me. Fucking weird.
My grandmother's also nearly 80 and has been farming and gardening forever, so I'm always worried about seeming lazy to her. But I also don't want to tell her I'm disabled.
Ugh I'm so tired. Spent a lot of time yesterday shopping at thrift stores for kitchenware etc for the new place, then spent today packing, mostly books. It's more exhausting than I want it to be, choosing what to bring and what to leave for now, since the place doesn't have a lot of storage. Moved like, 3 things to the car :/
I also spent a while taking dark things off my walls to avoid people snooping.
Ugh I'm so tired. Spent a lot of time yesterday shopping at thrift stores for kitchenware etc for the new place, then spent today packing, mostly books. It's more exhausting than I want it to be, choosing what to bring and what to leave for now, since the place doesn't have a lot of storage. Moved like, 3 things to the car :/
I also spent a while taking dark things off my walls to avoid people snooping.
Ugh I'm so tired. Spent a lot of time yesterday shopping at thrift stores for kitchenware etc for the new place, then spent today packing, mostly books. It's more exhausting than I want it to be, choosing what to bring and what to leave for now, since the place doesn't have a lot of storage. Moved like, 3 things to the car :/
I also spent a while taking dark things off my walls to avoid people snooping.
Talking with my therapist about whether or not I'm evil/something evil happened. Like, in a way I feel evil because I accidentally killed someone (or something? I wouldn't exist if someone hadn't died) and it feels important to take accountability for that. But also, it feels completely wrong to view myself as just as much a victim in this scenario as [redacted]. I hate hate hate thinking of it like that.
