Wednesday, July 30, 2008

My head a-splode

Well, the good news is that there's a shiny new (used, but still pretty new) highway-worthy car in the family now! The bad (or good) news is, I don't know how to drive it yet. But J has confidence that he can teach me to drive a stick, and I suppose it'll be a good thing to know. The good news: road trips! The bad news: other people planning road trips for us (No reason you can't go here and there now!) Sometimes I feel like a target for pushy suggestions. I know I'm indecisive but geez, the more people insist that they know how to spend my free time better than I do, the more likely I am to stop listening to their suggestions. Harumph!

I've been highly sensitive and irritable lately (surprise!). The last week especially, I just felt agitated and mean for the most part. I don't like that feeling, the dark thoughts that I have, the wanting to push everyone away. It reminds me very much of behaviors I've seen in my family - and in myself before I got help for depression - and I know how much it sucks to be on the other side of that. Just another reason to stay "on the Z" as now is a really bad time for me to play around with adjusting medication. (Also, OMG RARRGH1!!)

8/1: I wrote this the other day, and I think there was more to say but I'm just going to post as is and move on.

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

Blurred

Well... hi.

I'm sure I don't need to tell you that I'm not exactly an optimist, but I thought I'd been doing pretty well just going along with life pretending things are okay lately. Well, maybe pretending isn't quite the correct word - it's not that I don't ever feel happy and content with things. It's just that when I do start feeling all carefree and happy and whatnot, there's always this nagging feeling in my stomach, these awful thoughts in my head that want to ruin everything... "Hope you're having lots of fun being all happy and careless while other people are down and out and suffering and doing a lot more than you do, you selfish bitch." Because there has been a lot of sadness and suffering - in my family, even - and it's not that I don't feel it, and hurt because of it, and panic about it at night. But it's that I feel somewhat numb to it all, not knowing how to deal with it has led me to retreat to my bubble because I don't know what to do. I don't know what to say. I don't know how to make it better. But I also realize that my being numb isn't helping anything.

The weird thing is, he was diagnosed with cancer while awaiting his sentencing. If you believe in God or karma or some sort of higher power, do you think that the timing of this is no coincidence? The cancer may have saved him - at least temporarily - from prison time, but it certainly isn't a trade-off that I think anyone would choose. Do you feel less bad for someone with cancer if they're also a repeat offender that hasn't seemed to want to turn their life around? That doesn't seem right either. It's hard to separate the two things, and it's confusing to try to separate the two personalities I've seen in him. Can you just forgive someone who hasn't asked for your forgiveness? I think in this case I should.

I suppose it's just part of life, part of getting older, but it's these life/death thoughts that give me panic attacks more and more often. I'm terrified of seeing loved ones getting old, getting sick, not being there. I'm terrified of myself getting old, getting sick, not being there... but with the way I've been living, it seems as if I've been pretty scared of life too. I don't know. Existential crisis? Let's not.

So, that's the condensed version. On to less heavy topics next time.