Via Getty Open Content
Dear Internet,
I woke this morning with Not So Great Thoughts, which have been intensely plaguing me for the last few days. This morning, however, they seemed much more intense and even scarier than what I’ve become accustomed to. On the days it is harder than usual, I try to remember it will get better at some point. I fight to breathe for those days when things became clear and I don’t feel like I’m swimming underwater.
So, then, I will force myself to get up and put together a regime. I got out of bed and immediately took a shower before I even consumed my first cup of coffee. After TheHusband and TheDog woke and did their morning constitutionals (not together!), TheHusband came down with me to the kitchen where we baked for numerous hours. Golden Yellow cake (for trifle), lemon squares, banana bread, and corn bread (for the stuffing) were made. As the baking began to wind down, TheHusband heated up last night’s dinner for our mid-afternoon lunch and we planned for the rest of our week. My mother-in-law is coming for a week between christmas and new year, so the house needs to be cleansed, food for our holiday and regular meals needs to be prepped or bought, things need to be done that I cannot keep putting off.
At some point, I randomly started crying between pulling out one item from the oven to the other. “The crazy?,” TheHusband asked. I nodded. He said, “Do what you need to do.” And I just held tight to him in the middle of the kitchen while the crying subsided.
Much of my mental exhaustion comes from the sheer pull of energy to have something that resembles a normal day where just doing things is not some herculean effort. I keep trying, desperately, to not let this thing run my life but it is incredibly hard not to let myself just slip under and let it all just flow away.
On December 23, 1996, my grandfather passed away. It is his death, and then later my father’s, that shaped much of my life in unexpected ways. This is why the month of December is always hard to struggle through because whatever terrible thing befalls me it always happens here. Once I’m on the other side of January 1, things become slightly easier.
Yesterday was the solstice and we did not celebrate but I’m thinking that maybe next year we should. Start traditions, which I’ve been badgering TheHusband about for years now, create something for us. Make our own legacy. Because after the solstice has passed, the days I know are getting longer. I watch the times on the sunrise and sunset drift farther apart. The Earth has started its rotation to spring and Mother Nature will soon swap her snow shoes for muck boots then into sandals.
And so it goes on.
x0x0,
Lisa
Tag: Mentally Healthy
Preface
Via Valenciennes, Bibliothèque municipale, ms. 320, fol. 72r
Dear Internet,
The other day I received two unexpected gifts from the same person. The first was the admission that thanks to my writing, this person went on to seek mental health assistance and now treatment on their own. Secondly, in thanks for simply being me and giving them the courage to seek help, this person went to my Amazon wishlist1 and bought me the bundled ebook version of the first four books of George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Fire and Ice series, or as the rest of the world refers to it by its rightful name, Game of Thrones.
Floored by this person’s generosity, I thanked them profusely for being so kind. This person’s gentle heart and reasons for sharing with me paralleled into the increasing visibility of my journal. Daily keyword tracking shows I’m getting a lot of traffic from organic searches by those looking for answers on drug interactions, bipolarism, ADHD, and everything else related to the crazy.
This seems like a perfect time then to write a preface to the blog for if my writing my experiences can help someone else seek professional help, then I need to make sure they are clear on a few things in regards to my own experiences. This post will be in the main nav bar for easy access.
I am Bipolar I/II (depending on which doctor), with ADHD, moderate anxiety, and a side of Borderline Personality Disorder for extra flavor. While I have been diagnosed since my late teens, my most recent professional confirmation came in 2005 and 2012.
I am what is commonly referred to as high functioning, which means that while I exhibit many of the extreme symptoms of my afflictions, I have coping skills that allows me to function, more or less, with little interruption.
In December of 2012, I decided after nearly a decade of being off any kind of medicating drugs, to start the drug treatment again for bipolar and ADHD. If you are a fairly new reader, and you want to see what someone is like within the throes of bipolar, start here and go forward for a play by play look of my last year as I live blogged it all. If you want to hop around, the subjects in the right sidebar gives you the breadth of the crazy as well as my other non-crazy interests.
This journal is not a journal of bipolarism, but I do write a lot about my gifts. Please keep that in mind.
In March of 2013, I decided to stop hiding behind the journal as the only outlet on the discussion and made the conscious effort to being open about my disease.
I am drug free not because I choose to, but it is because I cannot tolerate drugs. I have been on a wide breadth of various bipolar and ADHD drugs on and off for years, all well documented on this site, and none of them work for me. I am what my medicating therapist calls, “a peculiar case.” Simply put, my brain chemistry does not allow for metabolizing of most commercial drugs for anything. For example, most SSRIs take 2-3 weeks to metabolize and for the effects to show up. In me, I metabolize the drugs within days of ingestion. This becomes problematic when addressing doses for stabilization. I also have the unfortunate luck to get all the rare side effects associated with that particular drug.
Drug interactions are typically listed on the drug’s bottle. If not, use a reliable health site such as the Mayo Clinic for more information.
If you are taking medication, take the medication as directed and do not skip a dose. Do not self-medicate unless it’s for an extremely good reason such as when Adderall makes you psychotic like it did for me.
I do not dispense individual advice nor do I recommend you seek your medical treatment from the Internets. Mental health, in particular with afflictions that have cross symptoms, can be triggered by reading others experiences. I also do not frequent forums, while some find them useful and supportive, I find they tend to trigger my anxiety.
Websites that I link in regards to mental health advocacy or support are ones either I have used or have vetted as being legit. There are a lot of schemey sites out there looking to exploit the mentally ill. Using common sense and asking yourself the usual “Who/What/Where/Why” should give you the foundation of whether or not a site is legit. Remember, if you cannot find an about page or if the person is not willing to share credentials about their expertise, keep the fuck away.
Part of managing this disease is creating a supportive network and self-soothing routine for when you go into crisis, whether that crisis is manic or depressive. Make sure your partner, parents, siblings, and close friends know that you are doing this for yourself.
Those who are bipolar tend to also be heavily anxious, so it is even more important you create an on demand self-soothing items / routines in your skill set. This can be anything from having a favorite sweater around, to reading a particular passage from a book, eating a piece of chocolate, and the list can go on. In short: Anything that gives you comfort, bring you down, and give you peace is what you’re looking for AND can be easily accessible. Additionally, when you go into overly anxious mode, also have tools to cope such as TheHusband and I sing the 12 days of Christmas – backwards. Usually I do this when I cannot take Klonopin (the one drug that does work for me) immediately for some reason or the drug is taking too long to kick in. Another routine is five things taste, touch, sense, hear, see. You do a round of each item, finding five that fit the description, and keep going until your calm down.
Almost every encyclopedic entry on bipolar will mention a mind/body connection, that one way to help alleviate the pain of the disease is to eat right, cut out caffeine, and exercise. Even mediating can be boon.
If you think you are bipolar, hie thee to your general practitioner to get a recommendation for a medicating therapist. Bipolar is nuanced enough chemically that almost all those who are gifted with disease will have varying symptoms and medication needs. This should not be treated by your GP.
In addition to a medicating shrink, make sure you have a talking shrink as well — sometimes it can be the same person. You will need someone to monitor your drugs as well as be your touchstone that this is a chemical fuck up in your brain and you’re not a terrible person.
There is no known national bipolar foundation, though some exist in on a state level. If you are unable to get to your GP and are in crisis mode, call the national suicide prevention line at 1-800-273-TALK (8255). I have used similar services in my past which have gotten me to the next day.
Keep a journal of your moods, to track when you’re up, UP, UP UP and down, down, down. Also figure out your triggers and prepare for them. Like, when I get manic, I compulsively shop. Case in point: I own 250+ tshirts. Putting together a systems of checks and balances in place has helped me from spending thousands. I also know that any caffeine after 12PM means I could be up until 4AM. Keep a list. You will find some friends are toxic, some music sets off your mania, and watching a film about old people will send you into depression for days. Know your triggers and avoid them as much as possible.
And it’s okay to have a terrible day or several terrible days. You know these days will pass and in the great words of Stephen Fry, it will be sunny one day. If you can make it through one day, and then the next, it will get easier.
It does get easier.
I believe in you.
x0x0,
Lisa
1. Yes, I do indeed have nearly 20 wishlists under the main wishlist title, neatly sorted out by categories. TheHusband thinks I’m insane and Beth thinks I’m adorable, but I did this because I needed to separate out various works based on topic. So this organizing is for my own edification, not for people to peruse at except for TheHusband who shops from the Holidays and Lisa-mas Gift Ideas Wish List to get ideas on what to get me for gifts.
This day in Lisa-Universe:
May The Lemon Be With You
Dear Internet,
Yesterday, my irritableness got worse as the day and evening progressed. TheHusband helicoptered all day, “Are you okay? Is something going on or is it just the crazy? I love you – here, let me hump your shoulder.” I wavered between telling him to fuck the right off and then shortly after, clinging to him like a wet blanket and then pounding my fists weakly into his chest.
“Why are you doing that?”
“Because isn’t that what all maidens in distress do?”
“It’s definitely the crazy.”
Before it got terribly late, and the dog had been taken care of for the evening, I popped a full Klonopin, snuggled under my warming blanket, and started main lining the second season of Miss Fisher before falling asleep. I have to be careful when I take a full dose, for it knocks me out cold and depending on how exhausted I am, I have been known to dead sleep 10-14 hours before even beginning to stir.
Whatever I was expecting the drug to do, it did it for a little while but this morning when I woke, my teeth were grinding and I was on edge. This is fairly unusual since Klonopin tends to reset me, which of course sets the pace for the rest of the day chock full of anxiety. It is a good thing I am heading to my shrink, Dr. P., this afternoon.
It was a year ago this month I went back on my bipolar meds and then started up on the ADHD drugs, while live blogging it all. For nearly a year, until I went off the Lithium again 2.5 months ago, my emotional life was in a constant state of flux. In addition to the flux, I felt so fucking defeated when the ADHD drugs would not work as promised. But I was not surprised. I had been down this road before a decade ago and I remember swearing I would never do drugs again and yet, here I went and here they were.
And here I am still struggling.
Today marks the fifth day since I’ve left the house, which is not as depressing as it sounds. We have been bombarded with snow for nearly two weeks, the accumulation probably between 2′-3′ and more is coming this weekend. TheHusband and I, neither of us keen to be out in this near blizzard like conditions, were dutiful enough to get two weeks worth of groceries together to keep us going during the time. I promised food posts and images, but i kept forgetting to take my camera with me as we cooked. But let me assure you, everything has been delicious.
Presents have been trickling in from friends and family, which has been cheering me up. The winner of Christmas this year may be my friend Val who sent me a traveling lemon, which I can wear on a chain and is a reference to one of my favorite radio shows, Cabin Pressure. My Mother-in-Law sent us books, a new crock pot, and this Hark! A Vagrant viking tshirt. You can never go wrong with buying me a t-shirt.
I have not worked on my book project in several days, of which I am not trying to get too stressed about. I keep reminding myself that while it is a lofty goal to cram a novel in 3.5 weeks, even just by the amount of work i’ve done already is far ahead anything I’ve done before.
Now it is time to leave the house for the day. Wish me godspeed!
x0x0,
Lisa
P.S. My guesstimates were not too far off on snow accumulation – since December 8, our area has gotten 22″ of snow.
a place to call home
Dear Internet,
My list yesterday of 50+ shows to keep you entertained while waiting for the next season of Downton Abbey / Miss Fisher turned out to be a huge hit. Cheers everyone! I’m glad my obsessive television tendencies were finally put to good use! Maybe I should start a “IF YOU LIKE, YOU WILL LOVE” feature because surely, all of this information should go somewhere.
Like the rest of the world, except for apparently Miami, I’m buried under a million feet of snow and ice. It has been snowing steadily since the weekend and if my weather desktop app is to be believed, there does not seem to be an end in sight.
Today marks the half-way point of December (It is also my half-birthday! Happy 41.5 to me!), we have not even hit the longest day of the year and I am already tired of winter. Kate and I were talking about taking off for a long weekend somewhere where we can pile on the 50SPF, drink fruity drinks with dangerous amounts of alcohol in them, and go swimming in blue oceans. And no partners allowed – no husbands, no boyfriends, no whiny dogs OR kids. We just may need to make this happen.
This week has been awful for many of my close crazy friends and that has been making me feel helpless, as I watch them struggle with their own diseases and I cannot help them. My own anxiety has been setting off like crazy at the tiniest of changes and moods. I’ve been having anxiety attacks at the most random of places, and at the most random of times, namely all fast beating of my heart that makes me feel like my chest is about to explode. Sometimes the beating is so hard and fast, you can see my shirt move or the pulse visibly quickens at various pulse points on my body. The attacks come on quick, there is no warning, and then leave just as if they never happened.
I am grateful they have been short lasting, for when they are prolonged, I tend to get exhausted quicker and immediately go into protect mode where I want to cut off all contact with the world, something difficult to do when at work. I have not been taking my Klonopin as often as I should have done, even when the first attack hit on Monday. When I had one today while randomly discussing something benign with a friend, all I wanted to do was take a whole pill, which would have promptly knocked me out. I need to score my pills for anxiety emergencies because this unnecessary insurmountable stress will just keep getting worse.
Friday at roughly 4PM is my last work day for the semester and I do not have to be back on campus until January 8th. TheHusband is already off for his holiday vacation and does not have to back until January 6th. We have absolutely no glorious plans other than my mother-in-law who is coming to visit between the 25th and 1st. I have stocked up on jim jams, tea, and will be sure to keep comfort food around me. My goal? To do absolutely nothing but wallow in my own filth, drink lots of tea, do old lady crafts when the mood strikes, watch more hours of the telly, and stuff myself silly with chocolate and treats.
x0x0,
Lisa
This day in Lisa-Universe:
mondo bizarro
Pig, East Asian Museum, Bath, England, 2008.
Dear Internet,
Every week, like a dependable clock, I make it to Dr. P.’s office to talk about what is going on inside my head. Even if I do not feel like going, this is my weekly touchstone so I force myself to go because on occasion, a lot of occasions I should add, I am not a dependable narrator of my own life. I felt totally fine Thursday morning. A little manic in the brain, but nothing I felt like I could not handle. My plan was to wrestle over some ideas I had brought forth earlier, which we did, and then head on my merry little way to work for the day.
[It should be noted he tutted my fears of not having grown as a person. As he explained it, we will have similar feelings at 15, 25, or 55. How we react with those feelings are the strength of what moves us forward as human beings.]
Instead of taking the right fork off of Cascade Road to head to downtown, I took the fork to the left to head home. In the short drive from his office to that point, I had triggered myself into some kind of hyper mania mode in which I tried to drive 60 MPH on a residential street, Google a question on my phone, and make a phone call all at the same time. Coincidentally, none of the events are related to the other. Thankfully, I had caught myself right when this started, threw my phone down to the passenger foot well and put forth all of my effort into driving. My head had started pounding and I felt like I could not think behind the next breaths worth of words. I was snapping in and out of forgetfulness of what I needed to do (stop at the light, slow down, do not hit the car in front of you, put the phone down).
I needed to get home. Now.
Once I was safe, I called in sick to work with the complaint of a migraine which was not that far off from the truth. The spinning of thoughts and the need to do all the things at once can happen with the speed of a whirling dervish. At times, the incredibly intense headaches start pulsating so hard, there have been occasions where I have felt faint or sick.
After coming home and unpacking my work stuff (God. What a waste of war paint.), I grabbed a big cup of tea, the heating blanket, took a Klonopin and read for most of the day in bed. I started and finished one book and put in another 100+ pages split between two others. I knew if I looked at any electronics, the mania would intensify. Case in point: I had nearly $500 in my fab.com cart with the intent of purchasing before realizing what I was doing and putting away my iPad. Shopping, aimlessly shopping for no other reason then to get stuff and spending money, is another symptom of my mania.
As the afternoon ticked on and thanks to the Klonopin, my mania began to subside. I started feeling better, not immensely better, but better. The world started coming into focus a bit more, I did not feel like I could barely speak, and the steady stream of tea and print books filled in the missing bits of the puzzle.
The dog snoozed at my left hip, I dozed in and out of sleep myself and around 5PM, I was feeling strong enough to sort out some afternoon chores. If I could make it through those simple tasks (unload and load the dishwasher, wrap a few presents, get food stuffs ready for tomorrow), I could give myself permission to read, write, or do whatever for the rest of the evening.
Edited note: Morning interlude. Dinner last night was pizza, which I greedily consumed after eating Benadryl and Lactaid before the gooey cheese hit my mouth. An hour after dinner, while I was writing this, the Benadryl kicked in, coupled with the effects of the earlier taken Klonopin, I almost fell asleep with my hands still moving over the keyboard. I kissed TheHusband goodnight, who yelled as I left his office to not forget the bocce ball tournament in the morning with the ladies from the home (his joke on my age). I shuffled down to our bedroom, set the alarm for 6AM as I had to be at work at 7:30AM this morning, took my contacts out, set the heating blanket on 3, turned on Miss Fisher’s Murder Mysteries, and was asleep before the blanket had warmed and the opening credits were done rolling.
I woke this morning on time and feeling fantastic. Not mania fantastic, just regular fantastic. But sleeping for nearly 10 hours, in a lovely drugged effort that allows for no brain interruption can do that for you. I have been rebooted, for the moment.
I edited this piece before publishing to clean up the debris from the night before. Writing when I’m manic, even subdued, reads as if I am concocting my own language. Words are out of order, incorrectly used, or are missing altogether, punctuation has gone to the wayside, and my word retrieval is fucking awful. When I am depressed, it is the complete opposite – suddenly I’m laying it thick like T.S. Eliot and Hemingway copulated and I am a product of that copulation.
Welcome to my inner world.
xoxo,
Lisa
This day in Lisa-Universe:
Rex Totius Britanniae
Me, 1974-75. And pretty accurate view of how i see the world today.
Dear Internet,
It was pretty easy.
I grabbed some hair, measured what I wanted to cut and using the scissors bought specifically for events like these, cut my hair.
I ran my hands around my head, measuring and eyeballing what needed to get cut and what was going to stay. I kept this up until my hair, combed wet, was nearly dry and then stopped. Once satisfied with my work, I jumped in the shower and shaved the rest of my body. A hairy body is the sign of not being in control, and we can’t have that, now can we?
I could make the argument the impromptu cut I got at a chain salon a month ago, now having grown out resemble a mess, was to blame — and that would, at some level, be true. But cutting my hair is just one of the many fail overs I use to soothe whatever fire is in my head.
I can’t control what is going on in my brain, so cutting my hair is one of the myriad of ways I assert my own control over my person.
I will take control. I have control. I am in control.
Since I had disclosed the sads had returned two weeks ago, their manic cyclic behavior has been taking a huge toll on my mental health in addition to my personal and professional lives. It is taking every bit of my energy to not fuck shit up, to not let important things lapse, to not let this thing, whatever name I want to call it, rule over me so completely.
The cycles in the past have been pretty prolonged but this time is different. They have returned with fierceness that is humbling and often catching me unawares. I can be high for hours and then down shift into depression within a blink of an eye – it hit so hard while grocery shopping last week, I felt like I was going to faint from its sudden impact. It lifts for a few hours and then BOOM, we down shift again into another bout that can be and will be as dark as its brethren.
Drugs would have smoothed this out, sure. But the drugs don’t work when you can’t tolerate them and they, in my case, make things worse. At least here — in this space — I know that it will lift at some point. It will, as Stephen Fry says, get sunny one day.
Here are some obvious things about the weather:
It’s real.
You can’t change it by wishing it away.
If it’s dark and rainy it really is dark and rainy and you can’t alter it.
It might be dark and rainy for two weeks in a row.
BUT
It will be sunny one day.
It isn’t under one’s control as to when the sun comes out, but come out it will.
Stephen Fry
Even though the world looks dark, and I would do anything in this moment to rip my skin from my body in order to not be me anymore, I know this will pass. It will get better.
It has to.
x0x0,
Lisa
This day in Lisa-Universe: 2010
The Bell Jar, the book cover, and mental illness
Dear Internet,
Earlier this year, there was a brouhaha all over Facebook and Twitter about how “disgusting” and “sexist” the new UK version of the 50th anniversary cover for Sylvia Plath’s seminal work, The Bell Jar. Here is the offending cover:
There are obviously several “chick-lit” cover tropes in play:
- Stock image of a woman applying make-up
- Vintage coloring scheme
- “Girly” cursive font
Given this context and novel’s content, everyone and their sixteen cousins are in a tizzy about the nature of this cover:
“If Sylvia Plath hadn’t already killed herself, she probably would’ve if she saw the new cover of her only novel The Bell Jar.” via Jezebel
“How is this cover anything but a ‘fuck you’ to women everywhere?“ via Dustin Kurtz, marketing manager at Melville House
Awesomelycomicallyhistorically inapprop’ via Andy Pressman, graphic designer (in response to Kutz)
“The anniversary edition fits into the depressing trend for treating fiction by women as a genre, which no man could be expected to read and which women will only know is meant for them if they can see a woman on the cover.” via Fatema Ahmed, London Review of Books
“Insult to women everywhere” The Independent
Ms. Magazine, Salon, and The Guardian also weighed in, but kept their content more neutral, while Chicago Tribune and Huffington Post UK wrote the usual knee jerk reactions you would expect for the sole purpose of link baiting.
Interestingly, the controversy was never addressed in publications with consistently reputable book coverage, such as the New York Times, USA Today, Washington Post or Slate. What’s even more interesting is the cover was released in October of 2012 and only in the UK. A few souls bemoaned the inappropriate nature of the cover at the time, but it did not become WW III until someone at Jezebel decided to get their tits up about the topic. At which time, it became a feeding frenzy of OH EM GEE, WE MUST AVENGE SLYVIA PLATH.
So there is that.
Here is something to think about. No professional writer, blogger, or Internet commentator of note, made ANY kind of comment in the defense of the cover as a representation of the mentally ill, or fuck, did not make a single noise that it was recursive against the mentally ill. No, no, no – it was all about feminism, how Plath got jacked out of literary respectability because of the lurid colored cover and the overly female image, and her work has now, so say them all, been degraded to some emo representative chick lit that completely belays her importance.
So isn’t it funny that when it comes to someones idea of what a graphic designed cover of mental illness could look like, we decide to reject that notion on the basis it is disrespecting our vaginas? I mean really?
And listen — can someone put Jezebel out of their misery because they have become a hyperbole unto themselves? I do not get how it is seemingly appropriate for them to rail against the man in regards to feminism while seemingly having zero problems making insulting and stereotypical commentary about mental illness in the same breath. So sayeth my comments to the article:
“I’m varying degrees disgusted/ashamed only a small number of people called out the fact Tracie is an insensitive and obnoxious asshole for making disparaging commentary about mental illness and suicide. I tried to commit suicide when I was 17, my mother attempted twice in her 50s. Maybe next time we’ll just come to you for suggestions next time we want to off ourselves since you seem to have all the answers.”
What’s next, Tracie? Commentary likening Sylvia’s use of gas to kill herself to that of the Holocaust? Maybe somehow tie it in into ” exacerbated by the suffocating gender stereotypes”?
As a woman, who is bipolar, I don’t see the cover as “adjusting her make-up” or as some tricked pony of a color scheme to get more readers, or some flippant visual remark that the story is “chick-lit”, or being oppressed by the man for my gender (as you stated so eloquently).
What *I* see is what I see everyday in my OWN mirror: A woman with two faces. The public one I have to keep adjusted lest my illness be known, and the private one that is wholly different. The cover actually says A LOT about how much women need to carry more than one persona just to survive on a daily basis, even before the mental illness is added in.
It seems to me, that most people crying out “This is sexist bullshit!” or “That it’s an insult to women!” have never dealt with or experienced mental illness, which is far more stigmatizing for a woman.
And that fact has not changed in 50 years. Me, in response to the Jezebel article
So we come now, nearly a year later. We continually don’t want to talk about or disregard any representation of mental health in the media, even if that representation is wrong or misguided, if it goes against something else we place a higher value on, such as women’s rights.
But you can’t sacrifice one for the other. In an attempt to do so only reinforces whatever tropes and misguided notions exist whether the outlier is mental illness or something else entirely. And to reject a book cover under misconstrued ideals of what feminism looks like or that it is a rejection of contemporary ideologies — and remember, the baseline of what feminism is is the right to choose and portray our own lives — is just as hurtful and hateful as the projections everyone is attempting to claim the book is representing.
You cant’t have it both ways.
xoxo,
Lisa
This day in Lisa-Universe:
somewhere in her mind it’s always raining a slow and endless drizzle
Primeval rain, via Popular Science Monthly Volume 4, circa 1873 – 1874. Courtesy Wikimedia Commons.
Dear Internet,
Friday afternoon, I had a Google Hangout meeting with various and sundry about a project we’re all jointly working on when it came to light one of the members of the group, whom I had been pretty friendly with up until that point, revealed the reason for her sudden turn of taste in me. What that revelation boiled down to was I am not letting others shine in the project. But she couldn’t really clarify what that meant but that her only recourse was to remove herself from within my company. In addition, friends of hers were apparently upset her name wasn’t credited on my professional website where I gave a brief summary on said project, as in my list of names, I list those I recalled at the time of the writing as a beginning contributor and as there were so many, threw the rest under “all the other awesome people who were there” list because I honestly could not remember everyone who was involved.
At least, I think that’s why she was upset because I never really got the gist for her sudden cold shoulder to me. She even acknowledge she couldn’t really articulate it, so I’m piecing together what I pulled from that conversation. When I finished the call, TheHusband, who heard the entire exchange from his office, restated my summary in much the same language. He said if he were me that he would have told her to grow a pair and if she wanted to get credit to actually start becoming the face herself of the work we’re doing if she’s so damned concerned with recognition. I just shrugged, rewrote the pages in more neutral language, and emailed her the updates.
When TheHusband and I were out running errands later that night, I was gripped with a wave of depression so heavy I stumbled in my tracks when I realised what was happening. A fairly painless event of grocery shopping took on the guise of fight or flight, of which I desperately trying not to abandon our cart in the middle of the aisle and get the fuck home so I could surround myself with things that could not hurt me. We had to do this thing, it had to be done this night, and if I could make it through the rest of the trip, I had an entire week where I had almost no responsibility with anything and I could start to protect what was becoming a very vulnerable self.
Sleep did not come easy Friday night as my mind running in a million paces.
Saturday morning woke up very cold and very bright. TheHusband and I had plans to finish some of the major house cleaning that was still hanging around our necks that morning and relaxing before the Doctor Who 50th anniversary party I was planning for a group of local friends. When 2PM came and went, three of the twelve invited showed up, two had declined and the rest never bothered to tell me either way. And if there is anything that can make one feel incredibly unloved and alone is when hardly anyone shows up to your party or even bothered to let you know they were not coming.
So you can imagine, coupled with the events from previous day which I had not quite shaken off, where this is going.
After the guests had left several hours later, and I did have fun with the people who were here, I made the mistake of checking various social networks and seeing huge Doctor Who themed parties being thrown over the world. At that point, as I flipped through the images of happy faces across the globe, I felt the loneliest I’ve felt in a very long time.
I spend a lot of time, too much probably, thinking about my relationships with people. To some, like TheHusband who constantly marvels I know people around the globe, when I say that save for him, how lonely I am at times, he doesn’t quite get the grasp of the depth of that loneliness. When we moved back to Grand Rapids, I told him that those who were my very best of friends when I moved away several years prior were no longer, he thought I was being some kind of cynical fool. But many of those friendships were formed in specific cultures and when the structure of that culture is taken away, the relationships often do not stand. I’m not saying all of those people I’ve met have disappeared, but a good many have gone on with their lives such as I’ve gone on with mine. Cycles happen and I’ve long accepted with the exception of very few, no matter how hard I try to make some of these relationships work, they are all really transitory.
The story that opened this piece was told not to shame the person whose concerns to her were very real, but because I needed a concrete example of something that happens on a fairly regularly basis with me. Much as I said to the male friend who was standing next to me while I was being sexually harassed, “Now you know.” I said the exact same thing to TheHusband when the meeting ended on Friday to illustrate the kind of behaviour I often deal with from others. It was not that he never believed me, he knows who he is married to, but again just as with my loneliness, he hadn’t grasped the extent of what people expect from me versus what they want from me.
Let’s be clear on something here: I do not think I’m some kind of special snowflake deserving of special treatment. What I do think is that I’m a pretty self-actualized human being who happens to be bold. Boldness comes in a variety of flavors and my particular strength is that I have zero problems being upfront with you, shooting directly from the hip, making a lot of noise when I need to, or calling you out on your foolishness. It is surprising the number of people who would rather have you tell petty lies to make them feel good then tell them the truth. It is also a flabbergast of moments to realise the level of superficiality of many in the human race and their entire existence is based upon the one they have concocted to make themselves feel good. Additionally, I have zero political prowess and that fact alone has hurt me many, many times as I refuse to play reindeer games to soothe various beasts.
I often tell people I am not everyone’s cup of tea, and I’ve long came to that realization in my early 20s and for my entire adult life, that’s the code I’ve lived by. I’m not here to please you and I am also not here to be your personal bitch, to be called upon when you need that bold voice only to be thrown back into the dark when you’re done with them. As this has become a reoccurring event as of late, of that too, I am done.
People who are like me – there is a high price to pay for our boldness and while we are often publicly lauded for being the face of the cause, we’re privately punished for being ourselves. I cannot tell you how many times I have been told to change or tweak my personality because I did not “fit in” with a culture or a group, that it would better serve those around me if I toned it down a bit, or if I was not so blunt or some other attempt to turn me something I am not under the auspice of fake helpfulness. I’m not saying I’m above change or that I am perfect, I am saying I am done with society’s expectation that as I walk to the beat of my own drummer, I need to move my round peg ass into the square hole.
Here’s the thing most do not understand – bold people are often the most fragile and their boldness is a protective measure. Many bold people I have met, in addition to myself, find it natural to be the bull in the china shop as it is who they are, but that energy required to be who they are drains them. Not only do we tend to be more fragile, but we’re almost the most in the need of support. Being bold can quickly weaken you if you’re not careful, and drain you if you are careless.
If we’re friends on Facebook, as of this writing, I’ve deactivated my account. I have a private account I’m using to manage pages since several projects require it, and if we were friends on that particular account, I’ve unfriended you and made it as private as Facebook possible. This has not been something done in haste, but the events from the last couple of days finalized the long thought reasons for me to finally acknowledge the account needed to go. Frankly I’m tired of putting myself out there only to be rejected by the same people who expect me to continually support them or be the face of a particular cause because no one else wants to do it. I’m also very angry that a group of people whom were to be my allies, in the month since my I was publicly sexually harassed, 90% of them didn’t bother asking me if I was okay. And when you know at least half of them read your site, to me that’s telling of who you really are. Whether that’s your intention or not, your actions speak much louder than any words you could possibly have to say to me. I did not want to do a flounce, but I do think a brief reason was necessary if you went looking for me and saw I was no longer there on why I left.
If you want to stalk something on Facebook, this site has its own page.
For most of you, much this won’t affect how you read or see me on site. I’m still going to be on Twitter, but perhaps just not as much. I’m still going to be writing here just as often. But there is an intimacy associated with Facebook that isn’t even available anywhere else, regardless of how many layers I peel back as I write on this site. I need to reign in the control of what the world can see and Facebook was the first to go. At least here, in my sandbox, I’m forcing you to come to me and not the other way around.
I’ve also decided I’m shutting down publicly and openly discussing my projects, librarianship or otherwise, until they are finalized or complete. There have been too many recorded instances of my work being lifted and passed off as someone elses or lifted and touted that it’s open source therefore a free for all or lifted and not even giving me AND the people who worked with me credit.
I’m done being bullied by you Internet, go pick on someone your own size.
x0x0,
Lisa
The art of judging character or telling a person’s fortune from the forehead or face
From Bibliothèque Nationale de France, Paris, via Wikipedia.
Dear Internet,
I woke Sunday morning buried under the covers and clinging to TheHusband. With my penchant to sleep late on weekends, to make up for the shortened sleep cycles during the week, I was surprised to find it was barely 9AM. The clawing fear of sinking deep again has abated for the morning, but hangs over me like a terrible rain cloud. It was not helped when as I was preparing for bed last night, I remembered I was teaching a college-wide class this week and needed to finish the prep work, thus my anxiety shot through the roof.
After getting out of bed, and spending several hours of catching up on newspaper reading, both this weeks and past editions, TheHusband and I began the yearly house cleaning. We’re having friends over this weekend for the Doctor Who 50th Anniversary, then the following weekend is Thanksgiving which will mean people will be coming and going all weekend. With the addition of my mother-in-law is coming between Christmas and New Year, we could not procrastinate any longer.
In the past, we’ve divided up the housework one to two days, which is overwhelming for two people in a house as large as Throbbing Manor. TheHusband’s recommendation this year was to break it up into chunks, and pace it over a week, and we decided to start in the Rumpus room in the basement and work our way up.
The Rumpus Room and other rooms in the basement were to get a once over on Saturday, but we ended up not getting to it so we tacked it on to today’s work. Within a couple of hours, we had swept, vacuumed, mopped, dusted, and sorted the Rumpus room, foyer into the Rumpus room, stairs and landings down to the basement, the upstairs pre-foyer and foyer, first floor living room, solarium, and dining room. Monday is the kitchen and downstairs bathroom, Tuesday will be the stairs and landing connecting the first and second floors, then Wednesday will be our bedroom and respective bathrooms. Thursday I’ll be on campus for roughly 12 hours as I’ve organized an author’s reading so no cleaning, and I’m off on Friday. So whatever we don’t absolutely get done will be done on Friday and allow for any other errands I need to run.
We were done with Sunday’s bits within a few hours, which beats the usually 8-10 hours it takes us to get the whole house down, giving us time to do whatever else we planned for the rest of the day. The one task I’ve been dreading all week is responding to my mother, and after much discussion with my shrink about it, opted to send her a decline to her dinner invite for Thanksgiving. I wrote something along the lines that I appreciated the thought, but we must respectfully decline and perhaps another time in the new year. Maybe I’ll be up for talking to her then, maybe I’ll be up to sorting us out, but not now. Not here. Not because my brother is desperate for our family to be whole.
As I paid bills, and did a few other administrative tasks, I kept an eye on the weather – ready to run down to the basement, the dog under my armpit, at the very last minute if need be.
Grand Rapids did not get the brunt end of the storm band as some areas did, but the wind was obnoxious and the rain, sometimes mixed with hail, pelted against the house. TheHusband predicted the storm would passed us by quickly, which it did, but several hours later we’re now getting the second wave. I’m grateful we didn’t get hit hard, and it seems no one I know across the storm’s path were in trouble. Many blessings were sent to the gods and fates for sparing us today.
I fretted, as I always do, about the safety of the house – did shingles get ripped off in the storm, did a leak spring up, did something happen that I may not have been aware of? TheHusband tutted my fears – the house is made of brick and has stood for 90 years and will probably stand for 90 more. He then pretended we were one of the three little pigs and the wind was the big, bad wolf. TheHusband huffed and puffed, and the house did not fall down.
xoxo,
Lisa
with nuts
Courtesy of Wikipedia.
Dear Internet,
It is said eating chocolate causes the brain to release endorphins, the chemicals known to make us feel good. I have concluded this is a lie as I just ate half a thing of brownies and I’m still in a murderous rage.
Somewhere between dinner and shopping Saturday evening, a conversation triggered my mood and I spent the remaining time out with TheHusband in a kill zone. A hushed argument in the middle of the bakery, a near silent 15 minute drive home (he was breathing very loud!), and an even quieter rest of the evening couldn’t shake this whatever it was I was fuming on about. Because honestly, I don’t even know.
I knew my good run of a somewhat semi-happy existence for the last month was coming to an end late last week when I started to feel the clawing pull of the sads as the week wore on. It seemed no matter how much I fought it, brief thoughts flicked across my mind that I don’t want to be here, everything sucks, I need to leave, no one loves or gets me, and the whole world can go to hell. I wish there was one event or fuck, several events that tripped me this week but there was actually much good news and excitement (some of which I cannot reveal just yet) so I’m chalking it up to my moods flipping again.
This is how the disease works, without warning the mental anguish swims against your skin, the rapid train of thought in its varying degrees of self-hatred and self-doubt become your daily mantra. The easy willingness to give up on what you’re working on or for because somehow it will make your life easier (it won’t) and will save you from potential ridicule (the only ridicule is in your head), and of course the ever present sads that seem to always cling close to your brain like a child hugging a teddy bear.
It is during these days, the struggle to remain upright and living becomes harder and physically exhausting. Just putting myself together to get through the day is sometimes the best victory I can ask for.
x0x0,
Lisa
This day in Lisa-Universe: 1997