Because If You Tell Someone, You Know You Won’t Do It…
we’ve just moved to a new city, my boyfriend and i that is and i’m at home tonight on my own because i got my period and i dont feel like socialising with new people on the first day of bleeding from the vagina each month (these same people invited us out last month too… they must think i hate them). at least, thats the most obvious “disease you can see” answer to why i’m at home alone on a saturday night. the other reasons, well they’re the ones you cant see. they are despression, anxiety, insomnia and suicidal thoughts.
i’m really really struggling with myself at the moment. i know i’m in a downward spiral and that its possible i will get worse before i get better but i dont know how much worse or how long or if “getting better” will mean getting medication. i’m totally horrified that i could need full medical treatment for this but i’ve given friends that same advice and its worked wonders for them. i dont know why i’m so against it. maybe i do just like feeling like this. but i dont.
tonight before my boyfriend left to go to drinks with people (i cant call them friends. i dont know them. are they his friends. i dont know. could they be my friends. i dont have friends. i have some people that have always been my friends but i suck at making new ones and i suck even more at keeping in touch with the ones i have.) he hugged me and tickled me. i dont know why. i’m not ticklish but sometimes when he does it i giggle because it does kinda tickles and its fun. but tonight i cried. i started sobbing. sobbing and laughing. then more sobbing. big fat tears that i couldnt stop. this happens more often than i care to admit. i cry. i cry a lot.
when i go see my acupuncturist she asks me a lot of questions about my body and how i feel. then she asks me about my mind, my emotions, my general wellbeing. and i tell her. i tell her how many days i felt good. how many days i felt crap. i dont tell her about the days that i think about stepping in front of a bus. or the ones where i wish i didnt have to get off the tram. that if i just sit there all day instead the day will pass and i can either go home or just keep going somewhere else. i dont know where else. i dont know if the acupuncture will help. i know that seeing someone every week no matter what its for will. an appointment to keep. something i cant cancel.
a few weeks ago i told my boyfriend that i used to cut myself, the soles of my feet, hidden. i think we were looking at post secrets?? it was a passing comment, we didnt discuss it. i dont think i’ve told anyone before. i stopped doing it about 7 years ago. i used to keep a blade beside the bed. i would cut and cut and cut, slicing layers of skin off till they started to bleed. or until just before they would bleed but it would still hurt. when i was 22/23 we moved, i threw away the blade and everytime another one would be purchased by someone in the house i’d throw it away. i couldnt have them in my house. i still cant.
it was last year that i started thinking about busses and trains… stepping in front of them more specifically. waiting on the platform, toes at the yellow line. at the back carriage end of the platform, where the trains are still going reasonably fast. on platforms where trains dont stop, they just speed past. busses on corners, at lights when they’re turning, coming up the hill, keeping speed up to make it around without getting the red light. here… i dont get the train and the trams go slowly enough that i dont think the same about them. but i still see a bus once in a while and remind myself to step back, not forward.
i’ve started not sleeping again. at first i put it down to my boyfriend keeping me awake but its not that. i can sleep beside him even at his loudest. i just dont. i lay there. i make a fuss when we go to bed, play stupid games, beg him to have sex, anything so we stay up that little bit longer. then i lay there. i get up sometimes and play xbox or read. sometimes i go have another shower. i try and stay off the internet because i know that makes it worse. i can sit here all night and wait till the sun to come up then i’ll go to bed. thats what i used to do. back when 2 hours sleep was all i got each night. i’m trying for 6 hours at the moment. i’m getting 5. on the weekends i get 12. sometimes 14. then a nap. i could spend all weekend asleep and i’d still be tired on monday morning.
i didnt leave the house today. i didnt speak to anyone other than my boyfriend. i havent spoken to anyone since tuesday, maybe wednesday. i dont answer my phone, i dont even look at it, its on silent now. i havent gotten phone credit so i’m not listening to voicemail. i leave the house 15 minutes before work and i’m back here 15 minutes after. i sometimes think of coming home for lunch but instead i go to a cafe thats so busy no one sees anyone else and there are big tables that i can sit alone with the paper and my headphones in.
i think i will leave the house tomorrow. for a little while at least. and i will talk to people. i will seem normal. i will interact. i will function. i will be thankful that my boyfriend knows me and what is going on inside my head much of the time. that he loves me. that my close friends will do all they can. but i know i need to do something. that this cant go on. i need to get help. i need to sort this out. to find ways to make it stop because whatever i’ve been doing for the last 30 years… its not working as well anymore. the cracks are starting to show. plates are falling, i cant keep on spinning these sticks on my own.
Originally written May. 20th, 2007 at 12:42 AM
September 25th, 2007 at 8:25 am
Hey, I do that appointment making thing too. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve stayed alive SOLELY because I made a commitment to show up somewhere, anywhere. The doctor, the dentist, the counsellor; the who doesn’t really matter. It’s the idea that I’m expected to be somewhere at a particular time and if I’m not, someone might worry. It works, and eventually, after weeks and months, and sometimes years of living like that, suddenly you realise that you’re living for other things as well. A movie, a coffee with a friend, a good book. It does get better, but until then, the appointment thing is an excellent strategy for staying alive.
September 25th, 2007 at 12:11 pm
Really, if you are feeling this badly, you should certainly think about medication. It sounds like you are getting worse and not better. I mean, I understand your aversion to medication. I always felt like it was good for some people, but not me. I always hated taking pills, even aspirin. But when I finally got into that suicidal spiral and knew that I wouldn’t make it home that day from work, I knew I had to get help. At that point, I was so desperate for a change that I’d have done anything the doctor asked me to do. In the end, I feel so much better that I’ve realized taking a pill is a very small price to pay for normality. Really, it only takes a second out of each day to do, and the rewards are so great. I’ll even admit that I had to take a few antidepressants before they discovered it was actually bipolar disorder and not depression, but I felt a change in my mood within just a few days. But I do feel like I got my life back and I can actually enjoy myself with family and friends instead of that dark cloud always hanging over me, threatening to take over. I can get through routine day-to-day activities without suicide crossing my mind even once. I mean, the fear just isn’t there. It’s not like I’m just controlling it, but literally these things just don’t occur to me anymore. Every now and then I’ll get a flashback and remember something, “Oh, I remember I couldn’t do this before because I’d be afraid of ” and I’m so glad to not have to worry about that anymore. I hope you are in therapy, too. If not, there are support groups everywhere for people with depression. I know it’s hard to motivate yourself to do something when you feel like that as I had a hard time myself, even if it was something I knew was for my own good. But you need to make a change in your life and it might as well be one that can really make a difference.
September 25th, 2007 at 1:21 pm
Please don’t step in front of a bus or train. My mom saw a man do that when she was 6 and she still has PTSD about it.
Don’t kill yourself in other ways, either. But I’m just sayin’
September 25th, 2007 at 1:29 pm
Sweetie, meds…get some. It’s a disease, you have a chemcial imbalance, it’s not normal to feel that way. It feels so good to feel good again, even if it means I take 2 pills a day for the rest of my life, so fucking what??? it’s a pill, it makes my brain function like other people’s brains do naturally and they don’t even realize how lucky they are…
September 25th, 2007 at 4:31 pm
Like CJ and Beca said– there is nothing wrong with you– a chemical imbalance is not your “fault.” You are not a bad or weak or defective person because you have a chemical disorder. It’s a sheer miracle that all that DNA gets up and walks in the first place– things are bound to get a little messy. Think of it like diabetes– you’d take your insulin every day, right? There’s nothing to be ashamed of, and lots of little moments of beauty to look forward to.
I don’t pretend my life is happiness and light now that I’ve gotten my depression properly dxd as bipolar, but I am better able to get out of bed every day, do the work thing, laugh at jokes, call my friends, and appreciate a random beautiful thing that may fall into my day. Wishing you the same, soon.
September 25th, 2007 at 6:06 pm
Once you try them and they work, you will wonder why it took you so long to do it. You will look back on all the pain and wonder how you ever lived that way.
I’m not saying going on the meds is easy. I cried my head off when I made that decision, and I’ve had a few bad reactions to ones that I’ve tried, and that certainly hasn’t been fun. But I know I need to be on something. And I’m not giving up.
I just wanted to let you know that it’s not as scary as it seems, and once you go there and start talking about it with people, people who may not even be your friends (yet), you’ll discover just how many others out there have felt this way and have had to make the same difficult decision.
Much love to you. Please get some help. You don’t need to live this way.
September 25th, 2007 at 8:28 pm
Response to comments:
I have been taking Lexapro now for about 120 days and have been regularly participating in therapy with a psych that is wonderful.
I agree being on meds IS NOT easy but it sure as hell is easier than feeling the way i did before taking them.
And as much as I thought about suicide it never occured to me that I might actually follow through with it. It was the idea of harming someone else by my actions that always stopped me.
Thank you all for your support!