Bethany United

I'm trying to find my complete self - the combination of all the masks I choose. I want to say I have solid self-esteem, but I'm not sure I even have a solid self. I'm ready to find out.

[moodmassacre]

Have we already talked about how unhelpful it is that I can only Like and Follow from this main blog? My deepest apologies for all the people who come here after I've flooded their ~themed~ blog with notifications and then this blog is uh, not on theme. Side blog problemz.

[moodmassacre]

holy crap, I feel like I've been white knuckling and urge surfing for weeks, and I had another craving just now so I decided to actually write out the days on my calendar so I could see the progress I don't want to lose. It's been 11 days. I've been sober for 11 days. Not even a full two weeks.

Jesus Christ. I've had so many cravings that it felt like I'd been hanging on for way longer than that. That's both validating that this is a good move for me but also discouraging that it's this goddamn difficult.

My body and budget need this to be day 12, and tomorrow day 13.

My brain is screaming "fuck it"

but if my brain had good ideas, we wouldn't be here eh?

[ezekieltobiasfletcher]

I can work toward change without making my present life a waiting room.

[moodmassacre]

:O :O :O

[moodmassacre]

I remember watching in judgement as the dry blue chalk of it skipped and tugged across her eyelids, never pulled taut enough for an even line. I wondered why she bothered with the swiped layers of clumping, spiked lashes. She ended up looking the same, but clumsier and more fragile, like she was worse off for having tried, for painting on clear signs of her denial, her clinging, her lost battle with time.

I'd watch her mother do her own version of the futile routine, flipping and twisting and fluffing a round brush through the sparse wisps of hair she could see, fretting and shaping while the back stayed limp, thinning, unseen and untouched. The leaning into and away from the mirror, the application of armor that seemed so transparent to me. Why bother? They didn't look transformed, only like they were trying and fumbling, and the effort seemed embarrassing to me.

But now here I am, mid thirties and skipping my own dried-out twist-up liner across thinning skin that doesn't glide like it used to. Open mouthed and meticulous as I flick and wiggle the wand across blackened lashes that do nothing to distract from my dulling skin, stubborn scars, setting scowl lines.

I'm perpetually preoccupied by the new lines on the backs of my hands. I stare and squint into the mirror, wondering what I look like past the dysmorphia and arrested development. I miss the shield of straightened and dyed black hair, the camouflage of baggy pants draped in chains, the forced confidence of stomping around in platform boots. I was young and powerless and loved the assertion of making myself artificially and defiantly bold.

Now I'm meant to finally, authentically, be (b)old and powerful - finally having arrived to adulthood - and I'm a fraud. I have no skill beyond surviving. I'm here and that is truly it. I never grew into an adult wardrobe, adult authority, adult career, adult community, adult talents. I am horrified and mortified that people in their early 20s aren't my peers. I read the bios of 40 under 40 and feel everything in me start stinging and burning.

I failed to launch. I have arrived in Montauk, hoping to meet Future Bethany so I can be saved, healed, delivered into the destiny of my potential. I was supposed to be capitalizing on my past now, using the angst as grist for my resilience story. I was supposed to be wise and securely confident by now, able to embody and integrate all of this violent life that has crashed through me. but I'm not, I can't. I'm weak, trembling, skipping chalky eyeliner across skin that isn't mine, desperate for armor that can get me out into the world and doing the work I'm meant to do, living the life I worked so hard to preserve.

I thought if I could keep myself alive long enough, I would learn how to fit myself into the shape my soul screams at me to be. I know what I value, what calls to me, what would make life worth living. I know what problems I want to have, what's worth fighting for. I just can't do it. and I feel like I'm running out of time.

I don't want to be the next woman in a line of broken women. I don't want to think of my mom and grandmother as broken women. I don't want to believe or even perpetuate the option of someone being broken, myself included. But I'm not getting better. I'm not getting better and I'm so scared that the dreams have been delusions. I'm watching my peers move on without me and I feel fully flamed out, washed up, wasted.

I feel like I've allowed myself to get worse so I have an excuse for not being better. My SI is worse, drinking is worse (though I'm at about a week sober today), ED is worse, social life is worse, job performance is worse, finances are worse. I worry my only comfort now is in helplessness, in crisis, in weakness. I do not know how to be strong, hold space, take risks, and be in the arena. I don't. I don't know how to do any of the goddamn things I've spent the past 15 years studying in order to get bettter. More often than not, I hear horror stories and recognize myself more in the villain than the hero. I am the problem. I spot it because I got it.

I've lot the point of this post. I'm aging and I thought I'd be different by now and it seems I'm worse. I want to give up so badly but all this damn research indicates that I still have total agency and hope and goodness and blah blah blah. I have good days. But I'm losing my hope. and my collagen apparently.

I'm embarrassed. This isn't who I wanted to be. It's not cute or a gritty backstory anymore. It's not even that horrifying of a backstory - certainly not bad enough to justify this level of self-imposed disability. This is the life I've built, with the choices I've made, and the cumulative effect of years of avoidance and excuses. It's not a good look. I know I'm not stuck but it sure does feel that way.

I look like an idiot in this makeup. I'm faking it and fooling no one. I want a fucking gold medal for pushing through. The only impressive thing about me anymore is how many times I've kept myself alive, but that's only impressive if you omit the first half of the story where I'm the one who pushed me down in the first place. I wanted more by 35. I feel like a child. I'm having a bad day. I have a lot of bad days.

But whatever. Onward, forward.

[moodmassacre]

bwdta

It felt wrong to go to Ireland without you.

[moodmassacre]

i keep dreaming about you, and even there i'm terrified to see your face and be seen by you. i keep thinking about how you were right about me, right about everything, and kept loving me through my contempt and distance anyway. i think about the promise you asked me to make.

i don't feel good. there's no point thinking about it, or talking about it. but i don't feel good, and i keep dreaming about you, and i promised.

[andremichaux]

Look, no one gave me the idea.

BROOKLYN NINE-NINE | 5.04

[vollzeitherz-deactivated2026012]

as you get older, you start realizing that you are not always right and there’s a lot of things you could have handled better and many situations where you could have been kinder and all you can really do is forgive yourself and let your mistakes make you a better person.

[absolutegibberishandnumbers]

jokes to make after failure that aren’t self-deprecating:

I’m the best to ever do it

Nobody saw that (best if said loudly)

No one’s ever done it like me

I could be President/they should make me President

Behold, a mere fraction of my power!

The public wants to be me soooooo bad

I’m an expert in (thing you just failed at)

How could this have happened to god’s favorite princess?

Nothing ibuprofen and a glass of water cant fix

I’m being sabotaged

[sesamie]

learning that addiction is a progressive narrowing of the range of things that make one happy was kinda life changing for me. i apply it to everything not even just addiction i am always checking to ask if i am narrowing my range of happiness or widening it

[argumate]

always good to check whether your coping strategy has become something that needs its own coping strategies

[moodmassacre]

Laughing with delight and texting people at the three minute mark, slack jawed and re-texting at the 30 minute mark, then sobbing most of the way through soon after. Sober this time though. Remember Anyway in that cafe, after our first time in therapy together, our last time ever together? You sent me Orange Juice but I moved on, heard him in the Ozarks, wove him into my wallowing, and I'd forgotten. But then suddenly you were there, and it was my hometown, and a broken dad, and a broken body warring with a broken brain and all the broken open weeping that I've done so often in crowds, so often in this hammock, so often. Am I doing it right? Is this just how it is? All the mess and heartache and nostalgia and beauty and terror. All the missing, all the embarrassment, all the grief. The loss and the fear and the love and oh my God always the sobbing, damn. I've nearly bitten all my fingernails off again. I surmounted another hurdle at work. I traipsed home along curbs in the sun, listening to Jamil Zaki remind me how deeply I believe in kindness. The birds are singing. My fridge is full. My photos look like I'm happy. I can't imagine I am. Are you?

[ezekieltobiasfletcher]

Now is now. Next time is next time.

[moodmassacre]

I needed a downtime evening so I randomly scrolled through Prime for a movie and chose Brittany Runs a Marathon for a silly comedy choice. Ended up full body heave-sobbing myself into a nosebleed at the end so that's interesting. To be fair I am halfway through a very large custom cocktail I made for myself so some of that's probably the alcohol, but also. I think I struck my own nerve with that one.

[moodmassacre]

Because we don't talk anymore

i went on a day trip with my grandma yesterday so obvs we broke into as many catholic churches as possible. One of them had a book shelf, some free and some donation based, and we know I love stealing from a church but I actually put a $10 in the suggested donation box because I'm trying to hashtag grow.

I thought of your promise again last night and Spotify DJ played me Testimony this morning and I know it's not your thing but I need it and this is one way I'm not needing to keep my promise so I accepted the nudge and got out the books and pamphlets this morning to read with my coffee

I immediately started craving a pencil, as I do, and realized I'd need a bookmark too so I grabbed one from my bundle on the bookshelf. IMMEDIATELY guffawed because it's one of your few Lemony Snicket ones I haven't tossed out of ache, and at first glance I thought it said "the newspaper story you're about to read is all lies" and that's hysterical to me and I can hear your laugh and I'm laughing through the tears

but then I realize it actually says "the newspaper story about you is all lies" and now I'm really bawling because I got my feelings hurt pretty bad last night with my family (it's easy to lacerate a bruised fruit - the nail slices right in and suddenly it's all disgust and rot amirite?) but I think even though we don't talk anymore you might still like me. I know you still love me, in the way we will always love each other and I almost take for granted except it keeps saving my life, but knowing you probably actually still like me and respect me, even when you hate me and are so angry with me that your bitch notes tear through to the next page, you still see me and like me and know my family doesn't see me clearly. and God I need that.

So I'm gonna keep reading my catholic propaganda because I need some Gregory Boyle and Pastor ... (oh no I don't remember your dad's pastors name and I deleted it from my phone and now I'm panicked I might not have kept his funeral bulletin I don't wanna forget I'm all clementine frantic I didn't mean to erase you) in my life

[moodmassacre]

because we don't talk anymore

I did think about you on your half birthday. I did think about the promise you asked me to make, that I'd call you before doing anything permanent. I really really loved hearing from you for my birthday - thank you for the Meg and AG content.

I had a dream last night that you'd moved on. You were bed sharing with some girl named Chloe and y'all seemed close and solid and it was brutiful. Even in the dream, I knew I had no right to the pang in my chest because I'd rolled out of her bed and arms that very morning.

You were in her dream the other week - you were touching me, pulling me, trying to lure me to you and she thought I was uncomfortable with it but wasn't stopping you and wasn't letting her step in to help. She told me you represent distance in her relationship with me and she's not wrong. Do I only miss you because you aren't here?

Bonus Dad was able to fix my hard drive and I'm so glad I didn't lose my pictures of BabyCat but I'm also so so so glad I didn't lose my pictures of you, our life, the few we took of us.

Bo was right: I hope you're happy.

[ezekieltobiasfletcher]

When you say, "I love you," what do you mean?

"I love you" is shorthand for a great deal of my thoughts, emotions, and actions. In no particular order other than what is falling out of my brain right now:

I feel your gravity in my chest.

I feel lighter when I'm around you, and I still stay when the space between us feels heavy.

I've added you to my starred contacts so that I can pick up the phone if you me call in the middle of the night.

I will drive you to and from the hospital for your colonoscopy.

When I see things that make me think of you, I take a picture of them and send them to you. If it is something that would make a good gift, I buy it and then save it for your birthday or an appropriate gift giving holiday.

When I'm near you, I allow myself to feel your emotions.

I accept you; all of you. Even the parts you don't think I can see.

I want to help you shoulder your burdens.

I celebrate your joys.

When I don't hear from you, I want to at least know that you are okay.

Love is an action word.

[academicblorbo]

"if you are over 30 on Tumblr the mental illness won" "the aging fanbase of Tumblr" motherfucker if you are over 30 and have been here the entire time it means the mental illness didn't win we are still alive WE MADE IT