I Don't Know Who I Am

I came across an interesting little article while doing some reading on bipolar. You can read the full article HERE. The jist of it was that people who have what is known as "early onset bipolar disorder" tend to have no sense of self or identity. They use a lot of big words and medical mumbo jumbo, but from what I understood of it I can totally see this in myself. I was diagnosed with "manic depression" at the age of 13 and put on antidepressants/anti-psychotics meds.

One thing that I do that pisses people off is copy them. I take on mannerisms of the person in front of me. Maybe they pronounce words in a particular way or have some unique hand movement when they talk. Without even realizing it, I just start doing it too. I can do it as well as the person. Even mimicking accents, I am from the south and use to have a very pronounced southern accent. If you met me today, you would never be able to figure out where I am from based upon my speech. People think I am making fun of them, but in reality I think I subconsciously just pick up traits I see in others. I often don't know what is acceptable. What is me. What is bipolar. What is normal. I have no idea about acceptable social boundaries. When are people just being "polite" vs. being "honest". I have no idea what reaction is expected of me when I am around people so when I see someone doing something and people aren't flinging poo at them I just do that. At least this is the explanation I have come up with.

For a very long time I honestly didn't even realize I was "crazy". I accepted my behavior as "normal". Even though my life was in constant chaos and turmoil I blamed others. The father who abused me. The mother who abandoned me. The ex who broke me. I blamed everyone around me. I took no responsibility for my life or my actions. Since I have started to realize that I do have a problem. A fixable problem. Maybe it can't be taken away totally but it isn't just beyond my control. I can change me. I can be a better me. Since making these realizations, I have been slowly figuring out what is me and what isn't. Slowly taking on my own traits. I still feel the pull to be "like others". To copy them. To just do what they are doing, but now I try to pull back whenever I feel this. To take a moment and figure out exactly what it is I want. What I actually feel instead of just copying what I see from the person in front of me. 

The hardest part of finding me is realizing the life I have now is not necessarily the life I want but the one I am sort of "stuck with". I love my husband, but I feel suffocated at times. I want to do so much and if I just walked away from him, I could do every single thing I wanted except I don't really want to walk away. There are parts of my life with him that I want, but there are parts I can't stand. I feel torn between running and remaining. Finding the balance of a life that was created inside of chaos is extremely difficult. Maybe once I figure out who I am and what it is I want then the answers will become clearer, but for now I am still searching. Still figuring out what is me and what is the reflection of another.

Poison Ivy

When I was about 10 or 11, I went to visit my mum. It had been months since I had seen and I hated visiting her but since it was summer I got out voted by the adults who felt that I needed to spend time with her. She lived with her boyfriend who was also a drug dealing gun trafficker. Real upstanding role model. He had a son from a previous relationship who was about two years older than me. We went to the same school but since he was two grades ahead of me we didn't hang out much. Merely smiled and said hi if we happened to pass each other in the halls. Neither of us really wanted to have to explain to our friends how we knew each other. It was an unspoken understanding and we both kept our end of the deal.

However that summer we both were there and attempting to make the best of it. One Saturday night our parents (my mum his dad) went out leaving the two of us alone. There was no A/C in the trailer so we were sitting on the front porch. The porch light glowed behind us as we chatted about school, parents, and not wanting to be there. Suddenly a car sped past. It was a black thunderbird. It didn't go far before it stopped. We could see the red of its brake lights. I remember Junior saying, "Wonder who that is" as the car slowly reversed. It stopped right in front of the house. It seemed like eternity but I am certain only seconds passed as we sat on the porch squinting through the darkness at the figures huddled in the black thunderbird.

That was when three figures exploded from the car and we were bombarded with loud bangs, but mostly I just remember the ping ping sound the bullets made as they ripped through the front of the trailer. I was frozen in place. Fear and the ping ping sound would not allow me to leave that spot.

I most likely would have died that night if Junior hadn't been there. I remember him grabbing my hand and screaming "Run". At his command, my feet unfroze and we ran. Through the night, through the darkness behind the trailer, through the woods, through the fields of corn, through the poison ivy and down a sloping hill. The entire time we could still hear the ping pinging of the trailer and voices coming closer so we ran.

I don't know how long we ran, but suddenly Junior stopped. I slammed into him and he dragged me down behind a tree. He placed his finger upon my lips and pulled me close to him. There under the moon behind a tree surrounded by weeds and creatures of the night we sat and waited.

Eventually the pinging stopped. We heard tires squeal, loud voices, and after what was probably only minutes the bouncing beams of flashlights slicing through the night. We didn't move. I remember my teeth chattering as sweat poured down my face. Junior held me tighter. The bouncing lights danced on all sides of us. We didn't breathe. Finally a voice called out, "Junior, it's your dad. Where are you guys? Are you ok? Come out. They are gone. It's ok now."

Junior was skeptical. I remember his hot breath against my ear as his lips whispered "stay here don't move I'll be right back" and he disappeared into the night. He backtracked, up the hill, behind the bouncing lights, behind the voices, behind me. After he gone as far as he dared go, he finally stepped out into the night. I prayed he would come back for me. The bouncing lights fell upon his face and it was his dad, his uncle, and a friend of theirs. His dad hugged him, asked if I was ok. Junior said "Yes one sec I'll go get her" and he walked to our hiding place and helped me out. I remember holding his hand so tightly but he didn't complain.

My body was almost convulsing I was shaking so hard. His hand in mine and his arm around my shoulder we walked back to the trailer. Back to the ping pinging. As soon as we reached there, I phoned my gran. It would be a year before I visited my mum again. That would a decision I would also deeply regret.

Freak Show and Inspiration from a Dead Guy

I had intended to talk about how I was part of a freak show today, but then I visited Haven's blog because that is how I start my day each day, and as always I found something amazing. She is doing this 30 day challenge thing called Trust30

#Trust30 is an online initiative and 30-day writing challenge that encourages you to look within and trust yourself. Use this as an opportunity to reflect on your now, and to create direction for your future. 30 prompts from inspiring thought-leaders will guide you on your writing journey. (I copied this from her blog)

Now I most likely oh who the hell am I kidding I will not follow the rules I am certain, but some of the prompts really spoke to me. I have joined quite a few places that have writing prompts and usually after just a few prompts I feel bored and uninspired. Fruit and letters to my 16 yr old self are not what I consider inspiring. No offense to those who are inspired by such things, but they do nothing for me. Yes my g-spot is hard to find and yes I know where it is. 

So the second I saw the writing prompt for today I knew I had to do this because it literally gave me goosebumps, my heart started beating faster and I felt a sudden urge to just "create". The prompt for to day is:

“Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could.”

What is one thing you can do that would make today worthwhile? What’s stopping you from getting started right now?

(Author: Jessica Dang)

Now I realize there are questions there but psfht yea whatever. I want to talk about the quote because holy hell me do I ever need to learn how to do this. Each day I beat myself about what I should have, could have, or ought to have done but didn't. I never see how much I truly have accomplished. I never see how much I have done and how far I have come. I only see how far I have left to go. I only think about how far I could have got if I had pushed a little harder or worked a little longer. No matter how much I do it is never ENOUGH. I should have always done MORE.

This is really something I need to work on. I need to start seeing the things I accomplish. I need to start acknowledging them instead of demeaning them. Belittling them. I would not belittle it if another person did it so why do I belittle myself? 

I really have to accept that I am human. I have limitations. I cannot move mountains even though I belittle myself for not being able to. I need to accept that this is life. I need to let go of that imaginary siren that beckons to me from the darkness. I need to just be. Right here. Right now. Be the flawed me that I am. Just be. 

So what is one thing I could do today to make today worthwhile? Just breathe.

I Just Might Have a Life

So I haven't been around much the last few days. There has been a lot going on. Jigger is preparing for his trip so there were embassy meetings and medical exams. Then there was the whole fridge fiasco which is fixed now btw. I know you all have been dying of anticipation to know if we had got it fixed or not so yea it's fixed. You can relax now. 

This is Jigger's first real trip and I think I am more excited about it than he is. I mean he is very happy to be going, but I love the whole process of traveling. Seeing new things, meeting new people, learning new cultures. I love the smells, the sounds, the whole sha-bang. I am so excited that he will get to experience it. It is definitely something that he never even bothered dreaming about because he considered it such an impossibility and now he is doing it. 

This is also a very strange new feeling for me. Being happy for someone else especially when they are doing something I want so very badly. I would literally chew off my arm if I could go, but sigh I am unable to. Stupid ass visa. 

Ordinarily I would feel cheated and I admit when I first found out I couldn't go, I could feel the pain of loss and rejection beginning to seep into me. But I forced myself to be "happy" for him. He deserves this just as much as anyone else and hopefully one day I will get to go too. At first the feelings were forced and not genuine, but now seeing him starting to get excited about going, I really do feel happy for him. I don't feel that pain of loss. I don't feel like I am being cheated or forgotten. In some ways I feel like I am also going. I can feel it through him and that is definitely new for me. 

I am not quite sure what to do with these feelings. They are very strange and foreign to me. I think that is something a lot of people don't understand. People think I don't want to be happy, but since I have never truly known "happiness" or "calm" whenever those feelings come I honestly get scared by them. I don't know what they are. I don't know if I can trust them. I have become so attached to my pain that anything that tries to take it from me I push away and that includes the feeling of "happiness". The pain is the one constant in my life of chaos. The one thing I could always count on being there. In some ways, it has become my "security blanket" and the thought of it being taken is as traumatic to me the same way it is traumatic to a two year old who has to wait for his/her blankey to be washed. 

So I am just sort of riding this new found feelings. Trying to get comfortable in them. Trying to enjoy being with Jigger and spending time with him because he will be leaving in a couple weeks. 

I actually am starting to think I might miss him when he is gone. Just a little.

I Shit You Not

A few of my USA friends have mentioned the heat and that they are "hot". I laugh at them because they have no freakin' clue what hot is. If you don't need to do this, then it is not hot where you are. A little background info so that you can truly appreciate the situation.

Towards the end of last summer our fridge died, but during the winter it's no biggie. We don't really use the fridge for much of anything anyways other than keeping water cold, and during winter that isn't an issue so we weren't in too much of a hurry to replace it. We figured whenever we found a good deal then we would. So a couple months ago, my BIL* who owns a fridge/AC repair type business came across an almost new fridge and told us we could have it for basically next to nothing. Of course we said "gimme" and since then have had a wonderful fridge until three/four days ago when it decided it did not want to work. 

So we called a local repairman who fixed it but that lasted less than 24 hrs. That is when my husband called his BIL to ask him about the fridge. Well his BIL lives in another city kinda far from us and said he couldn't come by til next week. So for the last couple days we have been managing without a fridge but it's hotter than fuckin' hell here and drinking water that could literally be straight from hell it is so hot does little to nothing to quench one's thirst. My husband calls said BIL back and leaves a msg. He calls while my husband was sleeping and talks to my MIL. He gives her instructions on how to temporarily "fix" the fridge so that it will work until he can come to repair it. 

This is what I found when I woke up. IShitYouNot:

There was this:

sitting behind our

 I asked my husband why there was a FAN sitting behind our FRIDGE. He said this as if it was the most logical natural thing in the world. Apparently according to said BIL the fridge might be getting too hot and to put a fan behind it so that it could get cool. That would keep it working until he can get here to fix it permanently.  (although in defense of the fan, the water is frozen solid)

So now at this very moment, we have a fan sitting behind our fridge on high, cooling our fridge so that we can have water that does not taste as if it is from Hell itself. So if you don't have to put a fan behind your fridge to keep it cool, then it's not really hot where you are. 

I swear when I moved  I thought I would be leaving behind redneck solutions. I could not have been more wrong. Sigh.

* Said BIL is my husband's sister's husband's brother and if you can follow that, then you have more white trash in you than you admit to

Riddle Me This

(This was a draft I found in my drafts folder. I wrote it back in March. Just found it today thought I would hit publish so I did. Suck on it)

One of the hardest things for me is being misunderstood. I am not sure if I am different because of bipolar or if I have bipolar because I am different. Either way, I am different. However I am content in my difference. I would be happy in my difference if other people would accept that I am fine without being like them. I don't need to wear the latest name brand. Forget wear it. I don't even know it. I don't need to be bought things on "days". Forget bought things, I don't even remember what "day" it is. Just because I don't remember the day doesn't mean I don't love them. It just means I don't think love is contained within a "day".

It's funny to me how people are told to "be themselves", but when I am myself, people seem to get offended. Why is this my problem? You told me to "be myself", but people don't really want that. They want cookie cutter happiness. They think only their happiness is real happiness and unless I act just like them then I cannot possibly be "happy". So I do what they want and pretend, but then I am not really happy, and my insincerity shows. Then people get upset with me because I am not being sincere but instead being fake.

I don't understand what it is people want. I don't understand why it is that I am the crazy one when it is them who can't make up their fucking minds about what they want me to do. Which is why I don't give a furry rat's ass what they think and just do what I want instead. Of course that could explain why I have so few friends. I don't need to smile like the Joker to be happy. Did you ever see Batman smile? No. So why in hell do you people want me to be the Joker when I so obviously have perfected the Batman no smile?

While I would like to think their concern is out of care and love for me, it really isn't. It's their own selfishness that causes them to want me to be "happy". They don't care if I am truly sincerely happy. They just want the appearance of their definition of happiness so they feel better. So they can have their own little make believe Gotham.Except Gotham doesn't work like that and neither do I.

It really is possible to be happy without owning heels or makeup or jewellry or insert other girly thing here. So just let me be.

The Time G.I. Joe Saved My Virginity

Yesterday I wrote my reply to the Studio 30+ writing prompt and it brought up so many memories that I had simply just forgotten. I mean I have had some AMAZING shit happen in my life. Shit that most people only dream about.

When I was 12 going on 21, a movie was filmed in the city I am from. No I won't tell you the movie's name because I don't want none of you stalking me because I know you would. I am just that freaking awesome. So yea. Anyways my mum was manager of this motel and the movie crew/stars rented one whole section of the motel out and were staying there. The movie was being filmed a short ways away. The motel was a trucker's motel. If any of you are from the south, then you must understand what I mean by "trucker's motel". 

For you yanks, let me explain. The motel sat just right off the interstate and had a truckstop next door to it. There was a side of the motel that was only rented "by the hour" for "trucker's use only". In case they wanted to bring their "girlfriend" who got "paid by the hour" over for a few drinks. Do you see where this is going?

Ok so back to my movie. To say that I was star struck would be an understatement. I was a preteen from the boondocks where the most exciting thing that happened was  when the Dairy Queen started staying open past 7 pm on week nights. 

The only actor in the movie that I knew was Bob Orwig. He starred in Platoon for those of you that don't know. So his first day there I set about acquiring his autograph which I got after only 45 mins of surveillence. When he met me I was very much 12. Ripped jeans, pony tail, flip flops, black t-shirt, and I giggled when he winked at me. 

However later that night at the production crew party, I looked nothing like my 12 year old self. The make up, tank top, mini skirt, and knee high black leather boots with a six inch heel concealed my age but very little else. The fact that I was already a D cup didn't help in convincing people I was jail bait either. The stunt coordinator was a Brett Michaels look alike. I decided that he would be the one to take my virginity. He was more than happy to oblige until G.I. Joe stepped in between us and removed his tongue from my throat. 

For the next couple weeks, the crew was pretty busy. Something had happened and they had fallen behind on production, but then 4th of July rolled around and the producers gave the crew two days off. They also bought $500 worth of fireworks and my Brett Michaels wannabe was determined to break the seal that had not yet been broken. 

I had never seen so much alcohol in my life as I did at that party. You name it and it was there. The haze that floated above the motel was not due to weather. Did you know that if you inhale enough second hand pot smoke, you can get just as stoned as if you actually smoked it yourself? Fact. 

My mum had disappeared into someone's motel room  hours earlier. Some didn't even bother to use a room and were fucking in the weeds or their cars. I was into my 6th Budweiser and was more than happy to let my Brett Michaels lookalike slide his hand up my thigh. 

5 more minutes and this story would have ended differently. I don't know where he came from, but out of nowhere, G.I. Joe appeared, pulled Brett Michaels wannnabe off of me and told him, "Dude she is 12 fucking years old. Do you not understand me?

She is T-W-E-L-V-E!!!" 

The Brett Michaels wannabe looked at me slightly confused. His pot filled brain trying to process this information and do the math to determine if indeed 12 was too young. After a couple seconds, his pot filled brain won the argument with the bulge in his pants and I spent the rest of the night sitting on the hood of a black thunderbird drinking beer with G.I. Joe and watching fireworks. 

That is how G.I. Joe saved my virginity. True story.

Avenging Hereafter

Trigger Warning: There are references to sexual abuse and child rape in this post

I believe in the hereafter. I have no choice but to believe. For if I did not believe then the world would be even madder than I and while I live in a brain of madness, I refuse to live in a world of it. My father is the reason I believe in the hereafter because I cannot live in a world that allows a man to rape his daughter and that innocent child go without ever seeing justice. 

My father escaped justice in this world, but the thought of his eternal punishment brings comfort to my heart. I know some people might say "it is best to forgive and forget, to turn the other cheek", but those people have never had their father slide his hand up their strawberry shortcake nightgown. Those people do not know how suffocating the stench of stale beer can be. Those people do not know what it is like to have your entire being stolen from you. To be forever changed into a creation that is not of your own making. To forever be altered. To forever be stained.

In my world of hereafter, my sufferings will be avenged and justice will be carried out. I will not be disappointed. There will be no judge to bribe. No lawyer to pay off. Justice will be done and once it has been carried out, then maybe just maybe I will be able to find forgiveness for myself and that little innocent girl that I once was will finally be able to know what it is to love and to be loved. 

Maybe.

This was for a Studio 30+ writing prompt. The prompt was justice and forgiveness.

They Must Be Lying

I have noticed recently that the voices in my head do not like being "praised" or told they are "good". I have never really known what to do when someone complimented me. Does saying "thank you" mean I am conceited? I never know what is expected of me when people say "wow that is amazing". What do they want from me? I just don't know.

Until recently I never realized how much I degrade and belittle myself. Mostly because there was no one really to "praise" me. Jigger doesn't count because he is married to me and therefore subject to torture should he not say nice things so his nice things don't count. It's my world I make the rules and change them as I please. 

I have been doing some freelance work and the people I have been working for do nothing but compliment my designs. Which is odd for me. I instantly think "they must be lying, why won't they just tell me the truth". I constantly say "if you don't like it, please tell me. It won't hurt my feelings. I know I am not that good". It's bizarre hearing such compliments and I don't think I realized how little I thought of myself until these last few weeks when I started doing this design work. 

I have always said things to myself, but before I had no proof that the thoughts were wrong. I was a whore. I was/am a bitch. I was all of the negative things my brain said I was. I was doing those things. I had no reason to doubt the thoughts in my head because they were true, but now I am not so sure. Don't get me wrong I don't think I am Picasso but maybe I am not the horribly bad person I have told myself I was my entire life. 

Honestly I don't know. I am afraid that I am going to sabotage this path I have started on because that is what I always do whenever anything good comes near me. I destroy it. Rip it to shreds because I don't deserve "good". Then I distance myself from those who think good of me and surround myself with those that degrade me because that is what I deserve. 

At least that is what the voices say I deserve and I am their slave. Sometimes willing. Sometimes not, but in the end, they usually get their way. They know the real me. The me I hide from the world. They know the truth. The people who say "good" about me don't know what I have hidden in the closet. If they did, then they wouldn't say those nice things about me. 

When I first met Jigger, he asked me why I told people about some of the things in my past. I replied, "it makes it easier to weed out those who are fake and those who have potential". I mean if I tell you and you stick around, you're either as sick as I am or someone I can trust. I must test you to find out which. Jigger just looked at me like I was speaking Klingon or something.   But in my mind, it makes sense. Why invest six months or a year of my time and life in being "friends' with people who in the end are just going to leave. If they are going to leave, then damn it leave now. Don't waste my fucking time. 

Trying to figure people out is like trying to solve a crossword puzzle in Japanese except I think I could figure the puzzle out before I did people and I don't even speak Japanese. 

My brother, you love her
But don't give up your instincts
Hang onto you know what
They'll be gone fast as you blink

They're trained to seduce you
Suck you dry quick as they can
They bite down, reduce you
Now you're barely a man

Oh my God
How could You deny the flood
That's flowing through You?

"liar - korn"

Rambling Thoughts

I have many demons, skeletons, or whatever you prefer to call them hiding in my closet. Things that would make some people run for the hills to get as far away from me as possible. Things I am not proud of and things I regret deeply. Things that most days I would love to forget and pretend they didn't happen. Things that I bury deep down inside of me. Things that I keep hidden in the dark so people won't see the "real" me. The ugly me. 

I make myself pretty. I show the world a pretend version of me. One that is likeable. One that people want to be around, but it's not the "real" me either. Truth be told I don't know what the real me is. I don't know if I will ever put my puzzle pieces together so that I can finally see the image they make.

I look at other people and they seem to have it all put together. They know exactly what they want and who they are and where they're going. A part of me wishes I were like that, but another part of me thinks it would be boring. To know everything. A part of me says there must be "more" than  "this" or is "this" really all there is? 

Honestly I don't know what the answer is. I know I have spent years searching for some magical land that would make me feel "whole", but it doesn't exist. It's just a fairy tale. It's not real. After I married Jigger, I gave up on that magical fairy tale land of completeness. I stopped searching for it and a strange thing happened. It found me. I didn't have to go anywhere or do anything. When I finally stopped running, I realized that part of me that was missing, wasn't really missing after all. I had just hidden away in the darkness and forgotten it was there. All this time I had been running around trying to find it and it was behind me the whole time. I just never saw it because I had been searching for it in all the wrong places. If I hadn't met Jigger, if he hadn't made me stop, then I would have probably kept on looking in the wrong direction and I would have never found "peace". 

I am still not whole. There are still parts of me that are missing, but I am closer today to putting my puzzle together than I have ever been in my whole life. It's all because I stopped running from the demons hidden in my closet. I opened the door. I turned on the light and I faced them. I looked them right in the eye and accepted that they are a part of me, but they aren't all of me.

Glass Houses and Stones

It takes a LOT to make me distance myself from people. I can overlook most things. My house is made of glass so I tend to pick and choose when to throw my stones. How do you know when enough is enough? When the person has crossed that line and it's time to separate yourself from them? This is probably the hardest thing for me to do. I have done so much shit in my life. Hurt so many people. Who am I to judge anyone or say that what anyone does is "wrong" and I don't want to be associated with that? 

This is the situation I find myself in at the moment and I truly just don't know which direction to take. On one side I am angry that I have been put in this situation because I shouldn't have been and on the other I think it's really none of my business so I should just look the other way. But I just don't know. If it were an "acquaintance" then I would have no issues walking away, but it is someone I care a lot about so I just don't know what to do. I have so much already going on that no one knows about and now this is dumped on top of it.This always happens. Every time I think I have found someone who will be there. I mean truly there. Regardless of the shit I pull, something always happens and I lose that person. Jigger always says to me that "a person is known by the company they keep". He asks me "do I know want to be known as "that"? 

Honestly the answer is no. I don't. but that doesn't make it hurt any less.

Mending the Fences

Jigger and I rarely argue. We both are extremely low maintenance people so usually things tend to just float on by. However, when we do argue, we do it loud and proud. It usually is started by some extremely ASSanine event such as "keeping the bananas in the fridge". In reality, though it really had nothing to do with the bananas actually being in the fridge. 

Because Jigger's upbringing seems very "normal" to me, I sometimes forget that he also has his own issues. He was brought up in a very strict home where certain things were expected of him once he came of age. Marriage. Kids. Carrying on family traditions. None of which he actually did and the ones he did, like marriage, he did them in a way that totally went against his family's teachings. He has spent his whole life feeling rejected by his family. Feeling unloved and unwanted simply because he chose something different for his life.

So when I whined my little girl whine the other day, he exploded not because it really mattered where we kept the damn bananas, but because he felt I was "rejecting" him. I get that. I have major rejection issues. I ask him constantly "do you love me". My ears crave hearing the sounds even though he shows me in a 1001 other ways my ears still need to hear that sound. They need constant reminding. Constant reassurance that he is not going to leave. I need this much more so than others do.

It has been 3 years and in that time I have never really explained to him how deeply I have been effected by my past. I just expected him to know and understand something he had absolutely no way of comprehending. With this last argument that started on Sunday and has finally burnt itself out today, I really opened up to him and explained how I felt without accusing or screaming or calling names. Well initially there was some accusing, some semi-screaming, and a bit of name calling, but definitely not on the level that I usually do. It was a definite first. He learned something about me and I learned something about him through this whole process. I learned that when he says to "forget" my past what he is really saying is that "he is not like the others". That he won't hurt me the way others before did. He didn't know how to put it into words and I am so sensitive and don't talk about it, so he just was expressing it the only way he knew how. Instead of really asking him what he meant, I put my negative self-depracating spin on it. 

It's taken nearly 4 days and a ocean of tears to get there, but at least we have made it. Better late than never. 

Ohh and today Jigger brought home some bananas with him. I didn't ask him to buy them, but he knew I was out. Guess where he put them and I didn't even have to ask. It's his way of saying "I love you" without the words.

Because I want this blog to be a sort of documentation of my moods, triggers, reactions, etc, I guess it only fair to include the shitty part as well as the awesome epiphanies. The shitty part is that I have been cutting daily for the last week almost. I don't really know what started it. Jigger actually hides the razor blades he uses, but I know where he has them hidden. I use them then put them back. He has no idea. I had pretty much gone for almost two months without really doing anything, then suddenly the other day I was like a junkie looking for a fix. Yesterday that thought really hit home as I was sitting in the bathroom sliding the blade over my arm I realized that this must be what it feels like to shoot up. I never have, but I have seen enough people do it and the look on their faces and the way they react is very similar to how I think I feel afterwards. I don't know why I do this. I don't want to but whenever I get super stressed and it is more than I can handle, I instantly revert back to this behavior.

You're the one that I live for
And I can't take it any more
I love you
I need you
What can I do to make you see
You're the only one for me

"i love you - faith evans"

Just Don't Do It

Whatever you do, Do. Not. Put. Bananas. In. The.Fridge. It's not worth it

I have sort of been MIA the last few days. I didn't really trust myself as to what I would write if I did post. I thought it best to just say nothing at all until I had some control over the shit that spews forth from my facehole. I use the word "control" very loosely. 

As idiotic as it sounds it all started because I like my bananas in the fridge. I don't like them room temperature and mushy. Like many other things I prefer them hard and firm, slightly chilled to the touch. Apparently others though consider putting bananas in the fridge equal to murdering baby seals so to say that my last few days of being "better" got shot to hell is an understatement. 

Somehow at the end of it all, I am still the crazy one? I just don't get it. The moral of the story? Just don't put the fuckin' bananas in the fridge. It's just not worth the 3 days of hell you will have to endure because you like bananas chilled. Learn to pick your battles. This one is just not worth it. 

This shit is bananas
B-A-N-A-N-A-S
(This shit is bananas)
(B-A-N-A-N-A-S)

A few times I've been around that track
So it's not just gonna happen like that
Because I ain't no hollaback girl
I ain't no hollaback girl

"hollaback girl - gwen stefani"

Make Up Your Mind

Conversations that take place inside my head:

1.)Don't look at me. Don't look at me. Please don't look at me.

Why aren't you looking at me?

You're NOT looking at me! Why the fuck are you not looking at me? Don't you love me? Why are you ignoring me?

2.)Don't talk to me. Don't talk to me Please don't talk to me.

Why aren't you talking to me?

You're NOT talking to me! Why the fuck are you not talking to me? You don't love me that is why. Why should you love me? No one can love me. I am unloveable. 

3.)Don't touch me. Don't touch me. Please don't touch me. 

Why won't you touch me?

You're not touching me! Don't you love me?! Of course not. No one can. Who would want to touch me? I am untouchable.

I use to have this argument over and over with an ex of mine. We would argue and I would scream at him to leave. Then he would start to leave and I would stand in front of the door and beg him to not leave me. It made no fucking sense to anyone. Not even to me. I didn't love him. He was abusive, cheating, and many other things, but I didn't want him to leave either. We developed a sick relationship that "worked" for both of us. We lived together as husband and wife. In front of certain friends, we were "married". Did all the normal things married people do. Then in front of others we were "roommates". We simply shared a house. He did his thing and I did mine. He had many girls on the side. I didn't care because he was close but not too close. He was there but not so much so that I felt "suffocated" by his presence. 

In the home, I did all of the "wifely" duties. Cooked. Cleaned. Sex. Then on weekends he would go out with his girlfriends. Movies. Dinners. Motels. I would go out with my friends. Visit relatives. Whatever I felt like doing. We lived separate lives but were together. In my crazed brain, it all made sense. It was the perfect solution. Until it wasn't.

I often wonder how long I would have stayed if he hadn't become friends with a guy who had a 15 year old daughter. She's his wife now. It was more than I could handle. Messing with his best friend's kid. It was too much for me. Too close to home. Brought up too many memories. I told him to choose. Her or me. Want to know the funny part? He chose me and then I walked away. I didn't want him. I left. I divorced him. Something sick and twisted in knowing that if I had wanted him I could have had him, but I didn't. It gave me a feeling of power and control.

The day he married her, he showed up on my door step. Wanting to know if we could work something out. I shut the door in his face.

Life's funny like that sometimes.

Make up your mind to explore yourself
Make up your mind you have stories to tell
We'll search in your past
For what sorrows may last
Then make up your mind to be well

"make up your mind - alice ripley"

Your Crazy is My Normal

This post is a bit of a ramble. I just needed to work this out and the only way was to "talk" it out with myself. If I keep the thoughts jumbled in my brain, they just stay jumbled. The picture never becomes clear. By slowly pulling each piece out and putting it into place only then can I see what it is my brain is trying to tell me. However, if you continue forward, you do so at your own risk. Don't say you weren't warned.  

I wrote a post the other day about being TOXIC. I have had a lot of thoughts arise from the comments that I received. Those comments helped me to start to see things a bit more clearly.

You see struggling to fit in. To be "normal". It is tiring. Exhausting. For every step forward there are 10 back. For every achievement there is a sacrifice. After fighting for so long sometimes you just think "Is it really all worth it?"

I mean if I flip out again. Jump off the cliff. I won't know  what the hell  is going on around me. I won't feel it. It won't affect me, but it will affect all of those around me. Those who care for me. My love for my family and friends keeps me from jumping. At the moment, I am in "control", but I know that control can slip out my grasp at any moment. If I let my guard down for one second, then I will let go, but holding something that tightly for so long is tiresome.

It's a vicious circle. It doesn't end. It's not that my life is boring. It's just sometimes I don't want to have to "be on guard". The only way that I can "relax" is to "let go". That is what I desire. I don't think I even realized it until I read the comments on that post. That is when it clicked for me. When I realized that it isn't the TOXIC that I crave. It's the just EXISTING. There is a sort of freedom in that darkened haze that is extremely intoxicating. At the moment, I am stable enough to make the choice to not go back there because that "freedom" that exists there isn't really freedom. It is more of a prison than the "normal".

I see Jigger's family. His nieces, nephews. There is laughter. Love. Disagreements. Normal. I would give anything to be able to fit into that. I crave it so much, but no matter how hard I try I just can't. The closeness is suffocating. Every time I reach out and try to bring them close to me I start to feel claustrophobic. I can't breathe. I panic and pull away.

I live in limbo between normal and toxic. If I step into normal, then there are constant reminders that I am "different". It is in my face 24/7. If I step into toxic, then there is a time where I don't stand out, where I blend in. A moment where I am the "same". Even if that moment isn't real, it still exists. That is what I crave. That moment of just being without having to hold on. I guess there is still a part of me inside somewhere that still hasn't accepted that this is my life. For as long as I breathe, this is how it will be. Constantly alert. Aware. On guard. It's strange sitting here reading those words. There is that sense of calm that exists in the toxic. I think I might like it here in limbo after all.

I'm lost at sea Don't bother me
I've lost my way
I've lost my way

" in limbo - radiohead"
 

Conversations with My Inner Self

Lately I have been all about finding "me". I don't know what "me" is. I am searching around. Trying out new things. Some fit. Some don't. Taking what does, trying a different size on what doesn't. It's very strange to be physically one age, but another both emotionally and mentally.

I have also been trying to stop myself from manipulating and mimicing. It's an extremely bad habit of mine. Maybe by putting it out there I will be able to catch myself before I get too lost. It's so easy to just be things I am not. People like the person I am not. I can be the person they want me to be regardless of who or what that person is. It's so much easier than just being "me".

How do you be something you have never been before? It's being poor your whole life and suddenly somebody goes "you're a millionaire". While that sounds great, but if you have been poor your whole life, you know nothing about managing money. You will go out and buy shiny things, and then a few weeks after becoming a millionaire, you will be poor again. Why? Because you didn't know how to be a millionaire. That's why.

This is the circle I find myself repeating. Being "me". Then being what others want me to be. Then trying to be "me". Whatever the hell "me" is. Most people say just be normal. Whatever the hell normal is.

Normal for me growing up was alcohol, drugs, and avoiding being shot at by my father and/or my mother's boyfriends. No thanks. No normal for me.

Sometimes I feel so lost that I check the backs of milk cartons just to see if my face is there. I am usually surprised when it isn't. I don't know when this journey started. Somehow I missed the beginning and now I am stuck in the middle. Either go forward or backwards. Both choices suck eggs, but at the moment I am trying to go forwards. It is unchartered terroritory, but I am a trekkie so I boldly go where no man has gone before.

Little girl
I wish you well
Until we meet again
My little thirteen year old me

"Conversations with my 13 year old self- Pink"

Apparently I wrote this 10 days ago, but for whatever reason I never published it. I was just looking at my edit posts page and noticed this draft. I don't remember writing this, but it's spot on so I thought I would just publish it. I would assume I wanted to add something and that is why I didn't publish it, but  something shiny must have come along and I forgot.

Toxic

Why is it we ,or well me I guess I should say, crave toxicity? When my world is settled, why do I crave jumping off a cliff? I think about some of the things I did in my past and even though they caused me such terrible pain and loss, I miss it. I miss the excitement, the fast pace, the adrenaline rush. Sneaking around, trying not to get caught. Being quiet when a certain number appears on the caller ID.

The rush. The power. I LOVED it as much as I HATED it. There are times I find myself looking up old pics on the net. Remembering what I did there. Being a part of it all. There is a small part of me that longs for that. Yet I know none of it was real. It was poison, but I crave it.

Sometimes Jigger notices. The sparkle in my eye when I talk about certain things or see an old photo. It hurts him so. Makes him feel inadequate. He can't understand why I still have a longing for that life. I don't understand why I still do. He takes it personal and it isn't. It has nothing to do with him. I am not unhappy and truth be told I would never leave my world now to return to that life.

But yet there was something powerful and magical about being out in the desert late at night. The roar in my ears. The smell of burnt rubber. Why can't I just be fucking normal? Sigh.

I'm addicted to you
Don't you know that you're toxic?
And I love what you do
Don't you know that you're toxic?

"toxic-britney spears"

Not a Man

I have been reading this book "Not a Man". It is an extremely good book. I am about half way through it. The middle part is quite boring. I think the author added alot of unnecessary things, but I can be a bit ADHD/ADD/easily distracted by shiny things so it could just be me.

The book is about a boy named Shuki. When he was 9 or 10 he was kidnapped from an Arabian slum and sold to a wealthy arab man as a bed boy (sex slave). After he had been with the man for a few months, the man had him castrated so that he would be a eunuch and "stay beautiful forever".

Shuki realizes if he is to have any chance of survival, then he must please his master and wait for his chance to escape. Which comes when he is 16 years old.

I really identified with the main character, Shuki. I don't know how the author was able to capture such intense complex emotions that are often felt by people who have been sexually violated, but she did an amazing job of it.

Even when Shuki is assaulted and raped, he takes it as part of his lot in life and just moves on. Even when he has to use his body for sex, it's a moment in time and he just moves on. He totally disassociates himself from the act of sex and wants nothing more than to be loved. He substitutes the sex and pretend love of men for real love because he knows no one will ever want him for how he truly is. He is damaged goods and the best he can hope for is the pretend love he gets from paying men.

I get that. I have done that. For about a year I was "kept". I lived in a very posh part of London with a man who flew in for his job on Monday morning and flew back out on Thursday afternoons. He paid for everything. He had an account that I was to use for food or whatever I wanted on the weekends while he wasn't there. I didn't have to do laundry or cleaning or really anything except be "available" when he wanted to fuck Mon-Thurs. He was nice. We went out dinners, sight seeing, the beach. I knew it was fake even though he constantly told me that he loved me. I would just reply "thank you". It wasn't real. His wife didn't know. He had 3 daughters back home and I use to wonder if he ever thought about that. That I was someone's daughter, but I was damaged goods. It seems that once you're broken, it doesn't matter who else steps on you.

Thanks to my father I learned very early that sex had nothing to do with love and everything to do with power. Thanks to my ex I learned that I could use that power to get what I wanted. There was nothing Pretty Woman about it. I never met a Richard Gere. I never took that much advantage either. I took just enough to survive. The absolute bare minimum. Somehow in my twisted mind that made it ok. Made me not "paid for sex". Not a "whore". Not a "bitch on the side".

Because I was introduced to friends. Because I was taken out. Because they said "I love you". All of that made it palpable. On the surface anyways. Underneath it was festering until it would fester over and I would start cutting.

I was living with that guy in London when I met Jigger. I told him the truth about my situation. I think he felt a bit sorry for me. We became best friends. I confided all of my secrets in him. All of the darkness he knew, and after knowing all of my darkness, he asked me to marry him. I said yes and then two months later we married. Two days after I moved out of the guy's apartment.

Jigger is not an ordinary man. I am sure if I searched this world over I won't find another like him. He respected me when I didn't deserve to be. He loved me when I didn't love myself. He cared for me when I prayed for death. He has been my rock. Without him I am certain I would have been dead by now. Either self inflicted or just driven totally mad.

This book has brought out a lot of memories and feelings I had sort of pushed aside and forgotten. It has taken me to places I had hoped to never return to, but I am glad in a way I have gone back to them. I can look at them objectively. I can see myself in this boy, doing the best he can to survive. He was damaged but it wasn't his fault. He was shunned and made to feel ashamed because of what had happened to him, but somehow through all of that, he survived. I can really identify with that.

Good vs Evil

(source)

I do not fit in is an understatement. There is an image or stereotype of who I should be, but I don't fit that image. Is it possible to be able to make a sailor blush and not be evil? Is it possible to like music and not be the spawn of satan? I don't know the answers to these questions. I know the things I believe in say it's possible. I try to force myself into that little circle that I am suppose to but no matter how hard I try I just can't seem to fit. Every time I fail to push myself inside I hate myself just a little more. Criticize myself just a little harder. Berate myself just a little longer. Cut myself just a little deeper. Hate myself just a little stronger.

I have to be all of the things I am not and it has always ended up badly. I tried being good but that didn't work. I tried being bad but that didn't work. I can't be me because I don't know who I am. Searching for a place of belonging but when you don't know yourself, how do you even know where to search? When you so deseparately long to just belong somewhere anywhere, you start to see a place for yourself in every place you look. Even though that place isn't real. Then you force yourself into that image and people like you. Love you until they realize the true you. Then they hate you despise you.

I was lucky. I found someone who didn't want all of the bullshit. Who just wanted the pure truth regardless of how awful that truth might be. I was so afraid of what would happen that no matter how hard I tried to be truthful I just couldn't be. Then that caused war. Which only confirmed my suspicions that if he found out the truth he would leave me. This is only half of the truth and he gets so upset by it. How would he react if he knew the whole truth?

What my messed up mind couldn't understand wasn't that he was upset over what he found out. He was upset that I hadn't told the truth. It took a long time for me to figure that out. A long time for me to be able to trust him with the truth. With all of my evilness and ugliness and dark secrets. There are still secrets though. Things I can't make him understand. Things that he may never understand, but it's because he has never worn my shoes. Never known anyone who did. I don't blame him for not being able to do everything. I use to blame him but not anymore. I have come to realize that no one person knows everything. He did all of the things he knew to do and he gave me a piece of a beautiful treasure and it's up to me to find the other half.

I don't know that I will ever truly a find a place that I belong, but for now I have found a peace I never knew before. A place where I can just be. A place that is just for me.

So open up your heart
Help me understand
Please tell me who you are
So I could show you who I am
(Stop Standing There- Avril Lavigne)

What Do You Want To Be When You Grow Up?

It is only recently that I have started thinking about a career vs a job that keeps me from starving and living on the streets. Of doing something I might actually enjoy vs something that pays the bills and I dread going to everyday. When I think back, I realize I never had any real dreams of what I wanted to be when I grew up. I just wanted to survive the next day and in survival land there is no time for dreams, for plans beyond the next five minutes. My life was constantly changing. Being dragged from here to there whenever my mum felt the urge to be "motherly".

While I have written my whole life, I never considered myself to have any talent whatsoever. It never once occurred to me that just maybe I could be *gasp* a writer. No one ever took interest in my work or what I did. Some because they didn't care, some because they didn't have time and others because I didn't let them in close enough to know that I could put two words together let alone write a whole story.

Reading the comments from various places where I have posted my stuff has made me stop for a moment and say I just might be able to do this. It is also something I can do when my brain doesn't want to cooperate. You see when you have a "job" and you don't do said "job" the way your boss wants you get fired or when for no apparent reason you suddenly burst out into uncontrollably sobbing while in the middle of performing said "job" you get fired or if you are unable to face the world because you feel like your insides are boiling and your brain is attempting to overthrow your hold on reality so you call in for the 5th time that month you get fired. Holding a job while being crazy is a difficult thing to do. Explaining to your boss who you're talking to when he catches you in the middle of a debate with yourself is not easy. Making him believe that you are not crazy is almost impossible.

So now being 33 25 I find myself dancing with the thought of pursuing a career as a writer. I find myself looking at ways of how to improve my writing. Places I can share my writing and get feedback. Looking into all of the different avenues where I could write professionally. I actually feel kinda grown up. This is a new feeling. It feels like living. Planning. Hoping.

It also scares the hell out of me and I find myself doing things that could potentially destroy all of the hard work I have done over the last few weeks and months. At times I am my own worst enemy. This is something that no one can understand. Hell even I don't understand why I do this. Why I sabotage myself, but I do it. I wish I didn't do it. I am getting better at catching myself before the damage is too great. Before too much damage has been done. Before I have gone too far. I don't know if I will ever be famous or make a "career" from writing, but I do know that I will continue to write because I have found that for the first time in my life I have something that I love and actually want to do. Who says an old dog can't learn new tricks.

say what you really mean

when your ambition calls you

for what use is there in praying

if you only hear what you want to hear

"as i lay dying-the sound of truth"