10/31/12

Hallow



It's Halloween. How fitting to feel glum on this day. I'm miserable and can't even motivate myself to walk to the kitchen to get my hand-full of pills that promise long-term comfort. I keep telling myself I just need good sleep, but for that I have to wait for an oxygen giving machine and I'm tired of waiting, and feeling totally screwed. So I wait and tell myself it will get better, and the thing is, it probably will, but only for a bit, and really am I just slowing the inevitable? Right now it all feels like shit.

---

A poem and an excerpt from the book The Art of Struggle written by Michel Houellebecq:

Mid-Afternoon

Gestures half-form, then end up in suffering
After walking a bit you'd rather go home
To sprawl in depression and lie on your bed,
Your body of sorrow's heavy with presence.

Outside it's hot and the sky is magnificent,
Life puts the bodies of the young in a spin
And nature calls them to the rite of spring
You're alone, haunted by the image of nothing

And you feel the weight of flesh, and loneliness
And you don't believe in life on this earth
Your worn-out heart flutters and struggles

And makes your limbs go heavy with blood,
You've forgotten how people make love,
Night falls like a sentence of death.

---

I am not serene
But I am at home,
Angels are holding my hand
I can feel the night falling.

10/30/12

the depths


Thinking and sending lots of good thoughts to everyone on the East Coast right now. Don't forget to donate to the Red Cross or other reputable charitable organizations. It's so important to help where we can, even $5 or $10 dollars will make a difference!

Things are hanging in around here by threads. I'm exhausted but should get my CPAP machine for my sleep apnea in a few days. Of course I am feeling melancholy to all hell. But I am trying my best to not panic and remember that most of the depression is based in my lack of deep sleep so it should get better soon. It's still hard though, really hard.

Anyway, things will pan out, I think.

Love, C

10/27/12

you


Remember when we got married? Your clothes were more expensive than mine. My $20 dress and bright red hair and our happy nerves all bunched together. My favorite was our little dance in your parents living room and smiling up at you.

I've been trying to think of the happy moments in life. Good things have happened to me. Mainly you. Also our home, our puppies, and that we can afford therapy and healthcare. It's those things that keep me bound up in some jittery way of life.

I love that I have way too much nail polish. Loads of shoes (even though Cricket ate my favorite pair yesterday). I have books to last me years and all the tech-y gadgets I can imagine. I watch the same disney movies every night while falling asleep and you don't act sick of them (although I'm sure you are). You let me overload the living room with my desk and art space. Our house is full of collages of what I love, and things I have made. Our bedroom is deep green and pink with pink party poms hanging from the ceiling, but you don't mind much--because it's me.

You like me. The few-freckled mess of a girl, with new and old scars, lots of moods, enough pajamas to clothe a small village (and I wear them constantly). You don't need me dolled up, I don't have to act for you.

I'm scared of you because you really love me, and I don't know how to take that. Because no one has really loved me for exactly who I am. You don't want me to change. Nine years later, and I still can't comprehend your love for me, sometimes that hurts and keeps me from being myself. I feel in trouble when I'm with you because this is too good to be true. Life is too easy in regards to you, it's unsettling.

Anyway, just thought I would say.

xx, C






10/26/12

thinking


It's been an up and down day. I feel unwanted, ugly, stomach sick from anxiety. My back is still hurting and I'm so tired I have yet to bathe.

I blame myself for everything that doesn't go right in my life. I take it all personally. I blame myself for my depression, for our inability to have a baby, for all the nonsense my illness puts R through.

I'm really frustrated and mad that my life has turned out this way. That I am twenty-eight and have nothing to show for my life other than that I am still living. It's devastating to fight with all I have just to stay here. I thought things would be different. I thought once I grew up my bleak childhood trauma would just melt away, but that isn't how it works. My past was really screwed up, so I have to restructure everything, including the way I think.

It's difficult not to feel like a burden through all this. I have to get help from people. I don't think people understand how hard it is for me to ask for help. That I have to be at rock-bottom to ask for anything from someone. I ask for a lot, because I have been at rock bottom for years.

So I hold on. And I have orange daisies and pumpkins, this doesn't make anything feel better but I can pretend. I pretend a lot. I tell people it will be okay when I really don't think it will. But I don't want to freak people out, I don't want to show them how desperate I am.

I am more honest on my blog than I am in person with anyone other than my therapist. Most people I know personally read my blog so they read how I am doing, but I rarely speak to them about it face to face. It's too hard to say aloud how bad things are. It's easier to just type and keep it at arms length.

And then I just keep going. I take my pills, paste on a smile, and force myself to move like a marionette.

C

10/25/12

Halloween-time

source
I don't think I am going to dress up for Halloween. My whole life I have only dressed up three times for Halloween. As a child we weren't allowed to celebrate the holiday*, and now that I'm twenty-eight dressing up seems kind of silly.

So this Halloween R and I are going to go get cocktails and then come home and watch a horror movie or two, and eat Halloween cake (which I will bake that morning). Should be fun.

If I were to dress up I would be a kitty cat, or a circus character (not a clown), or a zombie bride.

---

*instead of celebrating halloween as a child, I would be sent to church and watch a "documentary" (the same every year) about how devil worshipers abducted children and sacrificed them on halloween. Crazy right? (Just one snippet of my wacky childhood).

10/24/12

...and then I bought a book about Mermaids

mermaids

This morning I went to a bookstore and found this book about mermaids, it looks lovely and I was so excited and just had to buy it. I also found two books of poetry from new poets, one translated from French (I love seeing the poem in French on the opposite page of the translation). So even with a back ache, I am moderately happy.

Now I am bundled in a blanket, watching Alfred Hitchcock's Dial M for Murder on Netflix. I love his movies. It's cloudy and the candles are lit even though it is only noon and it feels like Autumn, and that fall-time inspiration has hit...finally.

C



10/23/12

so...


I hurt my lower back pretty bad. I keep getting spasms when I stand up and move around. I went out and bought a heating pad and am taking a bunch of ibuprofen.

The rough part is I am starting to have energy so I can do things again, but now I have to discipline myself to sit around all day. It has been a rough few months but I'm hoping this will be the last of it.

I have a lot of ideas for my Etsy shop Birdy and B. Hopefully I will feel better so I can get things moving in the right direction again.

What have you been up to darling?

x, C

10/21/12

hiding out


I've been really hiding away these days. I rarely email, blog, or see people other than Ronald. It's due to the exhaustion and depression which only continue to make life feel unbearable.

I'm trying to just rest and remember that things will get better one day. It's not an easy thing to believe at times. So I eat candy corns and watch Cinderella bundled in blankets, a sweater, and thick socks because the Autumn chill has finally hit (hooray).

This is going to be a hard week. Wish me luck, loves.

C

10/19/12

break


At this moment I am feeling alright. It has been so long since I've felt alright, even for a minute, so this is a huge relief.

I want to enjoy this moment and also get a lot of things done. I want to create, to clean, even to do laundry (you should see our laundry room!). We'll see if this feeling lasts long enough for me to get a few things done...

xx, C

10/18/12

"Life is rough so you gotta be tough" Johnny Cash


I'm still here. Things are still not getting better. This is horribly discouraging.

I got a CPAP machine for my sleep apnea. I hate it but it does put me in a deeper sleep. The only thing is it is making me ten times more tired rather than helping me feel rested. So I have slept most of the days away since I got it because I am so exhausted. I didn't think it was possible for my exhaustion to get worse, but it has.

Also the suicidal thoughts are still here if not getting worse. It's really scary as I have had to choose several times between calling Ronald for help or acting out on the impulse. So far I have chosen help, but it is a really frightening position to be in.

The next thing we have to decide is if I should receive ECT treatments (electroconvulsive therapy) for my depression. If I go forward with it I will have to be seen by several psychiatrists to decide if I am a good candidate, and spend time in the hospital (up to a few weeks), plus the treatment itself is scary and I would have to go through up to a dozen or more individual treatments. I'm so scared of this but I guess it is better than not getting well.

This is honestly the worst time I have had since childhood. It's really, really scary. I truly don't know if I will come out from this.

Thank you all for sticking around in my absence and for you encouraging thoughts and comments.

xx, C





10/15/12

pups


This little pup ate my blueberry lip balm while R and I were on a date yesterday. We knew it was her and not the other two dogs because her beard smelled like blueberries! So her new nickname is Old Blueberry Beard. She is feeling very pirate-ish.


This little Cricket tore apart an entire memory foam pillow while we were gone for 20 minutes this morning. She tore it into little tiny pieces...


This gigantic adorable pup Amelia hasn't really done anything wrong. She does like to burp in our faces though, which is pretty gross.

---

In other news things are still hard. I have some doctor appointments today so I hope we make some progress in my treatment.

How are you?

Love, C

*update* since this post, Cricket ate one of the cushions from our $800 Ikea couch. Lovely... :(

10/12/12

rough


Thanks for all the sweet and encouraging comments during this time. You all are the best!

Things keep going. It's almost the weekend. I've been trying to sleep the depression off. It isn't really working but at least it gives me a rest from how bad things are. Today I'm going to try to sweep the floors, make the bed, and do a load of laundry. It will be a huge success if I can get these things done.

It's so cold and autumn and dreary out. I absolutely love it. It makes my heart beat just a bit faster which is a good thing.

xx, C

10/11/12

life goes on


When I think of how many years have gone by with me holding on by tired fingertips I get sad, anxious, and overwhelmed. This isn't living, this is just surviving. And I'm tired.

So I listen to music and think about Autumn. I imagine things being better, I imagine hope and doing something I enjoy. Having room for good in my life rather than being full of this illness muck.

And here I am, and I'm alive but not well, and my heart hurts so bad I can't find words.

xx, C

10/9/12

crumple


So I have fallen apart. Yesterday I told my doctor/therapist that I didn't feel safe and needed to go to the hospital or be with someone at all times. We rushed around calling Ronald to leave a meeting for work and called my sister to pick me up. I hate being so low that I need to be with people every second, it makes me feel like a failure, like a burden. But this is how it is.

Today Ronald is working from home. I have some medicine to take throughout the day to mellow me out. I still feel horrible. But I'm here. And that's something.

xx, C


10/7/12

doomsday


Last night I had a dream I was alone. Ronald didn't exist and I was back in my childhood land of abandonment. I kept asking the few detached souls around me where Ronald was, but they had no answer. It was a real triggered nightmare.

I am so afraid of being abandoned. It's one of those strong guttural emotions that settles in the lowest parts of my stomach and makes me sick, like charcoal. Things didn't pan out for me as a child, things weren't safe. So I carry this same 2, 3, 4 year old panic that things won't work out or will fall apart even now.

This all makes me sad. It's so hard to grow up and get rid of these old tattered patterns. The thing is I'm sad. I'm empty. Nothing fills for long. There are moments of feeling like it will be ok, but those rush away from me scared. I don't know why. I know that is a trademark of depression. I know this has plagued me my entire life. But that doesn't make it feel better, instead it makes it feel more real and legitimate.

See, I start to believe there is no hope for me. Really, I've believed that for a long time. But I hold onto things (like a knotted down balloon string) and Ronald is one of those things. He is actually usually the only thing. He needs me so I stay. But he is not permanent. He can't be with me forever. He is a human and he will die. So I am rotted and rocked with the fear that he will go away and with him my reason, my grip to this world. It's scary.

I don't want to die but so much of me wants to not exist. I don't know how those two emotions can co-exist but surprisingly they do. So life goes on like an old wind-up toy, and I wait and keep.

C

10/5/12

First feeling of fall


It finally feels like Autumn here! It's cloudy and cool and the curtains are billowing in and out like sheer lungs. It's lovely.

It hasn't been an easy few months. I have been beyond exhausted and sick. I just did a sleep study last night to see if it is sleep apnea, and I hope it is that since we can't find anything else wrong. I seriously feel like if I keep going on this way I will die from lack of energy. This has been one of the hardest things I have ever dealt with, and on top of that my depression is really accelerating and adding to the exhaustion.

So we'll see what happens. I hope to feel a little better soon.

xx, C

10/4/12

Morning puppies

Silly Cricket.
Isabelle looking like she is about to kill someone. ;)
Bashful Amelia.

10/3/12

walking-in


Today is the third day of Ronald being out of town. He is in Pennsylvania and I miss him a whole horrible lot. Luckily, he will be home tonight!

I find it especially hard to sleep when he is gone. Even though Amelia our black lab lays on his side of the bed, it still feels cold.

I'm hoping to get some chores done today. I'm almost out of clothes due to not doing laundry. Sometimes it's hard to be a grown up, even with simple things.

I'm feeling very failure-ish this morning, unmotivated, and lonely. At least I have three of the cutest/sweetest dogs to keep me company. And the expectation of seeing him tonight helps too. :)

xx, C


10/2/12

October


Well it's October, which makes me happy.

1. the coolness in the air.

2. turning leaves

3. Halloween

4. sweet Autumn candy

5. watching classic horror films

6. pumpkins

7. wearing sweaters and leggings

8. boots

9. drinking hot coffee

What do you love about October?

xx, C