Friend or Foe//Foend

There comes a moment when you’re walking down a lonely street, and you hear a whisper. A sound carried in the breeze, you tell yourself. No one is calling your name. Wind and leaves. The trees are not speaking to you.

But when the winds grow stronger, they cease whispering. A small misinterpretation? a whirlwind surrounds you, “Follow me. I have something to show you.” You feel the tug on your arm. Your sense of touch and sound overwhelm your eyes. You cannot see that there is no one there.

You take off running. The wind is strong, but you are stronger. Everything inside your mind and soul compels you to turn and follow. The blood rushing through your veins signals fear. You turn to face your enemy. It seems kinder now, somehow.

If it wants to show me something, let it. Maybe it is a friend.

Ignoring the sweaty palms, racing heart, and inner paranoia screaming in agony, you turn back and start running with the wind. Leaves flutter around you, dancing through your hair before landing solemnly beneath your racing feet. This feels right. Anxiety leaves, and purpose floods in.

You follow your guide, twisting around a tree, turning on the next street; you barely avoid being hit by a car, but that doesn’t stop you. You keep going.

Finally, you stop.

You look around. Your surroundings are unfamiliar. “This game isn’t fun anymore. I want to go home.” You look at your watch. You should have been at work 5 hours ago. What did you do again? Paper. You remember paper. Or maybe that’s just the rustling of leaves.

The world is a different place when you follow your demons. When fear becomes friendly, your views begin to shift. Your new friend places itself firmly between you and your view of reality. Sitting still as a statue, she cuts you off from who you are. But what if this is you? Might as well embrace it and settle in, because you are about to call this place home for a very long time.

Only Change is Constant

In the past few weeks, I have:

-moved into my first apartment(not my first rental)

-stopped exercising

-picked up 40 extra work hours per week

-discovered my rats recently developed tumor(likely cancerous)

-fallen out of love and back in love with my boyfriend about 3 times

-relapsed back into self harming

-began blogging again

Warning: Random Ramblings Begin Here–Read At Your Own Risk.

Some of these changes are or can become a major part of my life’s direction. Other changes are minor–appearing for only a time but will ultimately become memories that incite emotion without affecting my day. However, the way things are going, it seems emotion is the only thing that can affect my day. Emotion or lack thereof.

I keep looking forward to school. School means something else to do. School means progression and learning. School means I don’t have to stay up all night alone and lonely and contemplating new methods of entertainment. But most importantly, school means therapy. And therapy means I might have a chance at recovery. Not from self harm. Not from the symptoms. But recovery from a disorder that only this therapist has dared to diagnose correctly.

But what if I cannot be cured. What if my motivations are not derived from emotions, but from the lack thereof. I did not self-injure because I felt; I self-injured because I could not feel. The lack of feeling is the most dangerous; it allows me to complete actions that emotions like fear or anticipation would otherwise have me avoid. How can you fix not feeling?

I ask that, but I have done it before. As much as I blame my emotions as the key culprit of my negative characteristics, I once learned that regaining their influences is a slow, but necessary to life process. Either way is a battle, but one way of life is better than the other. Emotions or no emotions? Ultimately, the choice matters not. Ultimately, I will be where I need to be at the time.

The present is perfect.

The present is the only moment I have control over.

The present is my stronghold.

The present is my downfall.

 

 

Dream Sisters

We were at camp. This was not an ordinary camp, however. While the trees blew in the breeze, and the camp was full of life in the form of bugs, it was also full of death in the form of humans. Our camp counselors were trying to kill us while we were also trying to kill each other. Like I said, this was no ordinary camp.

Like with any other dream, I had memories. Memories of people I loved dying. Memories of grieving with those who had lost someone precious in camp “games” as well. These memories did not teach me anything; they simply set the stage for what was about to happen.

Two girls, sisters but nameless, developed a love for prosthetic limbs. A love that ran so deep, it caused one of the girls to lead a mission to remove my limbs so they could enjoy the pleasure of fitting a prosthetic limb on another person. I had a feeling they would settle for a foot or a leg, but what they really wanted was my arm.

Needless to say, I ran. I ran fast. I ran to the main building and let every person and camp counselor know that these girls were trying to remove my limbs outside of games and combat. They allowed me to lock the door and encouraged me to call security to put a personal guard with me. Those steps made me feel a little safer, until the guard could hardly defend against them and the door mysteriously became unlocked time and time again.

Once they got in, which did not take very long, another girl came up and joined them. She was less interested in prosthetics, however, and more interested in turning things upside down, particularly tubs and things she could turn into tubs. She got to work on her next project with the help of the prosthetic twins and created a rather large pool designed like an upside down exhibit displayed in the corridor of the main camp building where I was hiding. I cannot remember whether or not they got to me. I do remember the counselors and guards trying to talk them out of it. I think their counsel may have helped some.

The dream never ended the way it should have–with closure. I do not know whether or not I got to keep my appendages or what happened to me or the other girls after their failed or successful mission. But thinking about this dream, I realized that these girls were like the everyday struggles I face now. Sure, no one is trying to take off appendages to appease their guilty pleasures. However, I feel like there is someone or something inside me trying to take a piece of me away. I have a name for it (or her, as I call it), but maybe there is more than one there. Maybe there are three–one leading the operation to take parts of me and my life that I love away, one that is following but mostly just watching and enjoying that exhilaration of a fight, and one that is less threatening and just wants to make upside down exhibits into pools. Yet, I am afraid of all of them. I don’t want to lose myself. I don’t want to fight. I don’t want to be trapped in any type of prison–even a pool.

I just want to run away.

 

And run I did.

 

Random Rationalization

Physical pain doesn’t take the mental pain away. It emphasizes it. Feeds it. Tells your mental pain that it is real and gives it the ammo to kill. Mental pain gets negatively validated with the physical pain. Eventually the mental pain gets hungry, lonely, it needs its food and validation. It needs its pain to be pain.

Monkey See, Monkey Poo

I don’t know why I crap on everything in my life. All that I know is that crapping can feel so, so good.

I have no self control. That seems to be the source of all of my problems. I had no control over when I quit self harming. I got in a fight with a friend and suddenly my emotions told me it was possible. I had reason. I had resolve. I had the ferocious anger of energy backing my attempt to quit. I didn’t decide to quit. At the time I was actually getting pretty bad in my habit. Somehow in some crazy way I ran into a make-it or break-it wall that determined my future, completely out of my control.

I don’t know if I have control over my relationships either. I might feel slight sexual attraction to someone or simply feel lonely. If I fight for the person, they run away. If I do nothing, eventually they date other people. Furthermore, if I avoid someone that I do not like, they seem to come to me and sometimes even beg me to go out with them. However, if I am alone with a person or have not recently gone through something that made me momentarily absolved from any pressures to pursue any kind of romantic relationship in my life, I seem to say yes to everyone. I say yes to their questions, I say yes to their unanswered questions, and even when I say “no” in the bedroom I can’t quite say it loud enough that a person right next to my face can hear me. That’s not just them ignoring me, it was a whisper so quiet than I am not even sure I actually made any noise. I hate myself for not being able to say no.

However, one of the most prevalent threats to my appearance of self control may very well be food. Food has a hold of me like no other creature, person, or inanimate object(s) could on this planet. After researching and reading books, my only conclusion is that I am trying to use food to fulfill some void within me that I cannot pinpoint due to my unusually lucky and happy life. I have everything. Parents that love me, a brother I get along with, a boyfriend who also happens to be my roommate, best friends all over the state (and in my hometown), a job–not a summer job though, I’m still trying to find one of those–and I successfully passed what will probably be the hardest term of my college career. But I can’t stop eating. And when I try to do everything I can–dieting, not dieting, exercising, listening to my body, staying positive–none of it works because I can’t stick with any of it. Indulgence is my craving, deprivation is my answer, and failure is unfailingly the end result.

This poem doesn’t rhyme?

I’ve rerealized my thirst.
My body longs for a beating
That my heart constantly provides.
The thump thump thump
The strum strum strum
Against my heart strings of life.

I’ve a desire to run far,
My love must sit there silently,
While I stare quietly with my pleas,
The weep weep weep
The hush hush hush
Against my heart strings of life.

On and on I tumble
Dancing to avoid a next failure,
But the atmosphere smothers success
The pull pull pull
The push push push
Against my heart strings of life.

I will reach the hill and climb,
Put one foot in front of the other,
Never looking back to old mistakes.
The up up up
The climb climb climb
I fly with my heart strings of life.