My day today has been absolutely horrible. It started with several nightmares from last night. One I don’t remember in particular, but the feeling behind it had to do with a show my mother was watching before bed. It was on inmates serving life-sentences. I remember telling my mom that I don’t know how they do it, life without parole. I would off myself before I’d spend my life in a cage. So one nightmare, like I said, I don’t recall specifics, but the feeling was about me in that situation. A hopeless, endless situation where I just wanted to die. After that, an even worse nightmare plagued my mind regarding my one and only happiness. Ryan. My nightmare took the form of my worst fear. Not my worst fear, I suppose. But one of them. Before I go into that, let me breifly recall an actual conversation of Ryan and I from several months back.
At one point, around December, I actually pitched the idea of an open relationship to Ryan. I was lonely and hypersexual, not to mention this was the first time I started getting stoned every day, so my judgement was not at its peak. I basically was asking for permission to cheat. I hated myself for it but it was the start of a perceived 6-month separation and I was starting to literally lose my mind. There is no excuse and I’m not defending it. This is just what it is. I’m ashamed, but it is what it is. I can’t take it back, no matter how much I wish I could. It was, of course, roundly rejected. Ryan couldn’t imagine being with anyone else and I knew in my heart that I couldn’t either. I was blinded by hypersexuality and arousal. And I had offers. A man who openly invited me for a friendly fuck. I knew if I cheated on Ryan, I would never forgive myself. Once a cheater, always a cheater. I’ve believed it since I started dating, and I still believe it to this day. I never did, fortunately.
My nightmare placed Ryan and I in a high school, for whatever reason. Same relationship, but we were together. Well… there was this girl. Mexican, petite, not amazingly pretty but well-off. They were friends and I could see it becoming more. I saw the way Ryan looked at her. I remember finding him cutting class to be with her. We argued. I asked why he was with her instead of being in class. I screamed at him that he was WITH ME. We were TOGETHER. “You’re my fiance! Why are you with her?!” I remember. He asked me. He looked me in the eye and asked for an open relationship. I’ve never felt words cut so deep. I saw him look back at her. His eyes glowed with her image. And I woke up.
The problem with dreams and nightmares is that, even though you know they’re fake… that they’re all in your head… they feel real. And this felt so terribly real to me that it shook me up pretty bad. The only fortunate thing about the recent events is that it’s somehow brought Ryan and I closer. I realize how much he really puts up with and deals with because he loves me so greatly. And feeling that faith be shaken by such a horrible scene that my brain cooked up for me to sleep on… The knife cut deep. I felt myself losing more of my sanity as each day passes. I feel like I’m getting worse, not better. I immediately started obsessing about meth again, craving so badly that my brain scrambled to think of someone, anyone, that I could buy off in Oregon. I briefly concocted a plan to contact my ex, who use to transport drugs and is very well networked, and beg him for a hook-up. It was a long shot that I was preparing to take. And I probably would have tried… if I had a car. Since I’ve been with my parents, nearly attached at the hip to the point that I cheer everytime I’m alone enough to even fucking masterbate, I’ve been without my own transportation. I knew this plan was flawed, and even if I got far enough to get a hook-up, I’d never make it to him/her without my parents noticing something. This whole thought-process just broke my spirit to nothing. I hated that I felt trapped in a prison. I didn’t want to go on the cruise, I didn’t want one more second with my parents. I just wanted drugs. Meth. Meth will make it all better. Meth will help me regain control, somehow. Meth will either make it all better or destroy me from the inside-out. I was ready, prepared to swallow the bullet. And with each desperate thought, I felt myself losing control. By the time my mother got to where we were going, a flea market to spend the afternoon with several other family members (who I did NOT want to see, only further infuriating me) heavy-lifting items in and out of trucks, I was at a peak. I walked in, made a few smart remarks and walked out. I walked a lap around the small parking lot, crying behind my sunglasses, hiding behind my hoody and headphones. Finally I tucked myself into the backseat of my father’s truck (which had tinted windows) and started to fully lose it. I hated myself for being so weak and I was so consumed with shame that I just cried and cried for hours. My diagnosis flew through my brain. That was my life-sentence. Borderline was, is, my very existance. Again, shame and self-pity shrowded me and I let my hoody swallow me. I cried and cried until my eyes felt raw, then cried some more. I asked myself again and again why God hated me so much to sentence me to a life of pain and self-hate. What did I do in a past-life that was so horrible that I deserved this? That question consumed my brain for hours. Why does everyone else get it so fucking easy and I struggle with even the simplest tasks? Why am I blessed with a peaceful night’s sleep only once every two to three weeks? WHY AM I LIKE THIS?? The idea of being officially diagnosed with Borderline and Bipolar II felt sickening. Something I’d been waiting for my whole life was now becoming the bane of my existance. A few weeks ago, I wanted nothing more than to be diagnosed. I wanted an answer. Now I have one, and I’m again unsatisfied. BPD is not like Depression. People get Depression like they get the flu. It comes and goes. Borderline is a personality disorder. I was born this way and I will die this way. This is me.
I was so angry. My family members (consisting of my mother, father, brother, grandmother, two cousins, and one cousin’s husband) moved all the heaviest items by themselves. I was locked inside my head for hours. After checking the time, I realized that Ryan would be home from work soon and frantically sent him a message on Facebook, telling him I was having a bad day and begging for a phone call. Within 30 minutes, my phone buzzed. Ryan. Thank God. Or somebody. It wasn’t fast enough to keep me from hurting myself. Nobody knows that though. While I was still in the backseat just before my dad came to get ready to move the truck across the city in transport, I broke a plastic hanger I’d grabbed from the floor and rebroke it until I found a sharp-enough point. It wasn’t sharp enough for a cut, but I was able to reopen a wound on my wrist that had been pretty-well healed-up. I immediately felt a calming sensation about me.
Talking to Ryan worked surprisingly well to calm me down. I originally got worked up again as I asked him the questions plaguing my head for the last few hours. But after about forty minutes of crying on the phone with him, we started to actually talk. I don’t know how it happened, but before long, I was laughing with him over his brother’s stupid antics and Oakley’s typical nonsense. I was excited that I’d see him in seven short weeks and felt closer than ever before we hung up. I built up the courage to help my mom finish packing when we got back to the flea market and our family made plans to meet up at Olive Garden for a family dinner with my brother’s girlfriend involved. (Total, it was myself, mom, dad, my brother Cal, and his girlfriend Gina.)
It was a nice dinner. I shared a dish with my father and was good about eating fast and making my normal trip to the bathroom to purge. My purging was not as good as it normally is and I would have done more but the restaurant was really busy and people were like LURKING in the fucking bathroom. I saw a lady in the stall next to me stop to pick up pieces of paper off the floor with tissue and there was a lady who just hung out in her stall for several minutes, doing what sounded like nothing. Normal bathroom users I can typically handle. But this was a revolving door of bathroom LINGERERS. I did the best I could and got most of it, I think, since I hadn’t gone completely crazy at dinner anyways. I threw up until my throat burned with bile and managed to quickly wash my hands and face when the restroom was temporarily empty.
Moreso than my eating habits, my interactions with my family, specifically my brother, is what took my attention during dinner. Like I wrote above, his girlfriend was able to come, a rare treat for us. I enjoy her company. I’ve only met her a handful of times since my brother and I are not at all close even though they’ve been dating for years. My relationship with my brother has been nonexistant until just a few weeks ago. After my parents used him to get ahold of me when they couldn’t, he started getting back into Facebook right as I was using it more to vent. I was starting to lose control and everyone on my FB was an observer of the madness, whether they liked it or not. I think this started our recent bonding. He started getting more and more interested as time went on. I felt him watching me from afar. I was worrying him, another rarity in our relationship. Since I’ve been home, my mother has talked to him, I assume, about my illness and struggles. She said she did this for my benefit so he can try and “understand me”. Understanding was not the issue that drew us apart so much as selfishness. On both halves. We just chose our own lives. His being around and wanting to start a relationship has me thinking about our interactions to an almost-obsessive level. His raised eyebrows have always been an indicator of an over-the-top remark. He’ll narrow his eyes to a glare at me if I bring up a subject deemed by him as “too much” or “touchy”. (For example, I’m getting married. So marriage has been on my mind and I’ve asked his intentions of him and his girl. I like her. I want to see him settle down. I want us to have something in common. But it’s too much for him. He won’t talk about it.) I’ve started to really break down my relationship with my brother. I’ve come to the conclusion that we have nothing in common… I feel awkward around him. I feel like I need to watch what I say because it may be too dark or disturbing to him. Being someone who’s felt censored much of her life, I don’t like the idea of having to be around people that I need to be careful about what I say. I want to be myself. I want to say what I say, do what I do. And I want them to love me anyways. If this disorder takes over my life, as it’s been doing, I need to know that the people I associate with are strong enough to handle it, especially when I’m not. And I just don’t feel close to Cal. He’s a stranger to me. When talking to my dad on the way home, I realized why. I don’t know anything about him. I know the basics. His major in college, his job, where he lives, who he’s dating. I know he took a trip to Yellowstone, although I can’t recall how recently. What else do I know? What’s his favourite food? What does he do in his free time? What do him and Gina like to do together? I’ve never been to his house. I’ve met Gina maybe four times and they’ve been dating for… started just before David and I, so 2007 sometime. What is that, like five years? I know he wants a dog, but I don’t know what kind. He didn’t know about Oakley until tonight. I don’t even know if he knows that Mimi is mine. I don’t fucking know him. It’s no wonder I’m so nervous around him. I’m anti-social. I don’t do well with new people and he’s essencially a “new” person in my life. It’s a weird feeling. Having such a close family member that you know nothing about. We’re blood and this is what we’ve become. I’m ashamed of what I’ve become. He doesn’t know how to deal with me. How are we ever supposed to be family? And since when does something ever work out like it does in my head? I keep thinking that if we can establish a friendship, maybe our kids won’t have to be so alone. Maybe we could be a fucking family, for ONCE. He’ll settle down eventually, and with my parents planning to help Ryan and I move back west, I was hoping to rekindle that relationship. But I’ve now realized that this is impossible. There’s no relationship to rekindle.
Just Me - Raw & Uncensored 