So This Is Why We Dissociate

So I am zoned to the universe on DXM in a beautiful angry orange sunlight place.  And I'm Like lets do this. This is wh we sissocdiate.  we let it go . or soething . idosn know ifi can type fast enough to get this all down.  I am in the moment of NO.  NO orange beautiful blasting out.   i want it to be  world where there3 is no fuckin g need for NO, but that is not the world we live in.  Orange is the New Black F*cksgiving  That is it.  They captured it perfectly.  its amazimg.  piper says you CANT HAVE ME, YOU COULD NEVER HAVE ME. or something like that.  she screams it out in a total seemingly dissociative state and then confirms it by having sex with Vause when she gets out of SHU.  And then the audience gets all excited about a  love triangle, lesbian sex, blah , blah.  BUT THAT IS NOT THE FUCKING POINT

THE POINT IS, THAT YOU DON'T OWN ME.  YOU WILL NEVER OWN ME, AND YOU WILL NEVER WIN.  I AM ME.  I LOVE ME.  I CLAIM ME.  I CLAIM ME AND ALL ME NEEDS TO BE HAPPY., not too much stuff.  But enough to be FUCKING HAPPY.  So BASICALLLY, FUCK OFF, WORLD,  I AM GOING TO BE A GREEN VEGETARIAN POET WITH A DRUM AND A GUITAR AND A TRUCKLOAD OF MATH AND  BASIC CHEMISTRY KNOWLEDGE AND i AM GOING TO LIVE HOW I WANT TO LIVE.  WITH BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE GETTING OVER THEIR PAIN BY PAINTING AND DANCING AND SINGING AND RUNNING...... and yoga :)  and I want to live a healthy life creating stuff? (dont know what yet) helping people figure systems out, because I am incredibly good at that.  I can figure a system like nobody's business.  SO.  LET'S GET FIGURING!!!!

i love you jeanette.

It's my official coming out party, damnit.

OK, so another fun filled weekend of DXM and drug induced dissociation.  And I have officially had enough.  I freaked at 11pm last night and called both therapists and left messages and was completely out of control.  Which is fine, if I weren't fucking HIGH.  Actually its fine even if I was high, but it's not what I want to be doing.  Summer did a great job of talking me through it last night though.  She also called me on the getting high.  I have to get the info when I am sober or it is tainted.  I have to internally communicate everyday and accept that I have D.I.D.  I have DID.  I have it.  I do.  It's time to finally fucking accept this.  It's over.  It's beginnning.  I have it. I have it. We have it.  We have it. We have it. :)

So who's here?  Gabriel, of course.  He's me most of the time.  Him and Victoria.  And Allison Lee.  And the little one with her cap of black hair.  And a little boy.  And a baby.  Gabriel and Victoria are groups.  Groups of parts?  Still working it out.  Allison Lee is part of Victoria.  I think.  She's the smiler.  Real smile.  Victoria is the Chesire grin.  But she does it for everyone.  We were doing the chesire grin at the beginning of therapy today.  We were so embarrassed about calling Ryan fucking high.  But he was cool with it.  I love him.  He is so good at his job.  Yay! I am going to miss him. 

Man, I got caught.

I am forcing myself to sit and write this.  This is like when J says she has to do things bit by bit, dragging herself inch by inch to do them.  This is that.  I don't want to write about this, mostly because I am not use to it, it is stretching, it is uncomfortable.  But it has to be done.  Now is the time.  It is time to write about stuff, when I am not fucked up.

I got caught on the phone last night with a new butterfly friend named E.  We were talking, doing the therapy story swap when she asked if I was high.  I immediately snapped as back to reality as I could, and said "there is absolutely nothing wrong with me."  So I lied.  Panic, then immediate shut down about that topic set in.  She let it go, so I guess she believed me, or she didn't and she just allowed me to lie.  But that is not OK.  She is also a trauma survivor and I cannot lie to her about reality.  It is absolutely unethical.  So I am going to tell her the truth today when we meet for the first time for dinner.  Yay, great.  I am a fucking asshole.

I've been mulling this over in my head every spare moment since it happened, and that's why I'm writing, because I need to process this BEFORE I talk to E, not WITH E.  I don't know her that well yet, and it would be innapropriate and unfair, and immediately fuck up our new friendship boundaries, and I don't want to do that.  So maybe I'm not the right friend for her right now.  And if she decides that, that would be fine, I have to be fine with it.  It does not mean I am a bad person, but just not healthy enough for her.  And I don't want to be perpetrating my crap on her.  It is not fair to her.

I'm also almost gleeful that somebody FINALLY fucking caught me.  I didn't know this, but I was waiting to be caught.  And this is where this stuff gets personal and vulnerable.  I think I am using DXM to test dissociation vs reality?  Like, if I can handle everything on DXM, then I can handle anything?  Or maybe, if I can handle life while on DXM, I can allow myself to dissociate in real life (in safe supportive setting)?  That's it.  I am so fucking afraid of appearing "crazy" or "out of control" or "not rational" that I have a major steel fucking door on anything that seemed irrational, which included allowing voices in my head telepathically telling me something.  So I shut that shit DOWN.  And I learned to concentrate.  CONCENTRATE. To the point of a laser beam.  So nothing could distract me.  And for the most part on the surface at least, nothing ever did distract me.  It worked.  Welcome physicist Civil Engineer.

But now through 3.5 fucking years of INTENSE fucking therapy with many different people, but mainly L, I have learned it is safe to let go.  If you learn when it's safe, when it's the right time.  Because it isn't always the right time.  But my problem was more that I NEVER let go, rather than letting go in the wrong places, which seems to be what is the problem for most other butterflies I've met.

And with DXM it is so easy to get to that open, creative sweet spot.  Without it I have to....  what .... I guess I have to concentrate, hah.  I have to let go.  I have to allow myself to be silly and make intuitive leaps that may not seem normal or rational.  And it is not being crazy.  It is being creatively co-consciously altered.  It is being a healthy butterfly.  Without drugs, and without being crazy.  It is NOT crazy.  People may look at me weird, but that's because they don't understand.  And I think that has been what I've been doing in therapy, learning exactly what dissociation is and isn't, completely and thoroughly, enough so that I could teach it to someone else.  And that someone else I was teaching was me. 



Wow.  OKay, so back to E. What is the gameplan?  What is enough and appropriate to tell her and what is a boundary violation to a new friendship?  OK. 1. Tell her she was right about me being high.  Validate reality.  2. Apologize that you lied to her, because you understand that invalidating a trauma survivors reality is extremely wrong.  3. Tell her you are working on it, and promise never to talk to her high again without telling her.  4. Tell her you are working on the problem, that you take it seriously, but it is not completely under control yet.  5. So, with this info if she thinks its not safe to be around me, I perfectly understand.  I am see-sawing trying to figure healthy out, and I'm going to even out eventually, I'm just not totally there yet.

If she wants to know what I think about it:
I think I can be a good friend to her.  I can watch my boundaries.  I will utmostly respect her path to getting better.  But I honestly don't know.  That's the truth, I don't know what's right.

What I don't need to tell her about:  why I do DXM.  My personal science experiment with DXM.  No talking about the creative sweet spot with her.  No talking about dissociation too much with her.  I can later, but not today.  We don't have enough intimacy yet.  We ARE NOT IN THERAPY together.  There is a difference, although right now I am having a hard time figuring out what that difference is.  She does not need to know every thought that is in your head.  You are not lying if you are not telling her every thought in your head.  That is not deceit.  That is technique.  Your insightlfulness can hurt people, including yourself, if wielded at the wrong time, just as if you were carrying around a sword, an epee.  Very useful tool, but you can't just slash it around like you've been doing.  Which is Ok, you are learning.   But really, you seem to have a talent that others either don't have or don't admit to having, and just like if you were an X-men, you have to learn to wield your power correctly.  Really, it is just like the laser beam eye guy.  Except you have to build your own glasses to control the beam yourself.  And you are.  Yay.  Cool, in this metaphor, L is Dr. X.  I'll have to tell her. :)

Cards, Cards, Cards

I had a wonderful day today, even though part of it was spent telling my group why I was a waste of space and should kill myself.  Hmmm.  Anyway, the rest of the day went really well.  Big confession time here, this is something I keep so compartmentalized from myself that it never even occured to me to put in writing:  I was arrested last year for shoplifting.  I wasn't booked or fingerprinted or anything, but I was handcuffed within the store, then given a ticket/paper that told me to show up for court.  I got a lawyer, paid him mucho bucks, and he's been on it since then.  Today was our trial date, finally, after lawyer stalled for a year on purpose.  His strategy was to continue the case forever, so that when it finally came to trial, none of the witnesses/cops would show up.  AND GUESS WHAT HAPPENED?  IT WORKED!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So I went to the courthouse today for the trial, and before it even got started the prosecution dropped my case because no cops showed up to witness!!!!  Yay!!!! YAY.

This is a second chance for me.  It's like the Goddess said, hey chica, wake up! when I got arrested, but she let me off the hook for major damage.  Now I can pay more money and have my record expunged, and I will be as pure as the driven snow.  Ha.   But I must work on the shoplifting.  I now have pretty much accepted that it is part of my whole trauma-liciousness.  It actually is on a list in the book Secret Survivors. Checklist to see if you have sexual trauma, and shoplifting is one of the choices.  That was quite a shock when I saw that, because it doesn't immediately seem to have to do with trauma.  But there's a correlation.  Weird.

Lara came back to group today to process more about her leaving.  I missed most of it because of court, but it was nice she came.  I am going to miss her so, so, so, so, so, so much.  Sad just thinking about it.

OK.  Good day!  I went to walk on the beach to celebrate my courthouse victory and it was nice.  I picked up a cool piece of coral I want to make into a necklace.

I am still sort of in love with -.  In love is probably not the write word.  In infatuation? In like?  I want to spend more time with her, and I can't because she's such a damn loner.  I miss her when I'm not hanging out with her, and we're just friends.  Ugh.  I don't know if this is romantic, or I'm just lonely and excited to have a friend who can keep up with me.  I don't think I really want to do anything physical with her, I just want to be around her a lot.  What is that?  A friend crush?

OK, time to finish my dang business cards.  I've been working on them for weeks, and I've got to take the plunge, finalize the design and order the damn things!  They will be ordered by tomorrow.  Yay.  Then the official Owl Tutoring will begin.  If I get 4 clients a week I would be overjoyed.  And I'm pretty sure I can get them!  Yay!

Taking the Long Way

So a pretty OK day today.  Got up just barely in time for the depression support group and was a few minutes late, but that was fine cause I got there before the facilitator.  The group sort of sucked- some woman (new just like me) came in and hijacked the group, talking about her daughter and how sick with mental illness her daughter was.  She said nothing about herself as a consumer.  It pissed me off, so I said something.  I'm really proud of myself because I said it fairly calmly and coolly.  I told her I thought that this was a group for people with depression, not a parent of someone with bipolar.  I told her that she hadn't said one word about herself, just complaints about a person who is just like me.  (she really did piss me off).  She paused for literally only 5 seconds, then continued on hijacking the meeting.  At one point I interjected again, and the group asked me to share, so I did. I told them about how I feel so lost right now, OMG.  I cannot remember what I said.  Wow, is this a dissociative moment?  I cannot remember, I'm guessing.  I think I talked about how I was unhappy with my life and how non-functional I am, but I can't remember.

Holy Shit!  This is the real deal.  A real proof moment.  I cant remember.  And I was angry at the meeting and I think the angry one was out.  Which is why I can't remember.  This is actually cool.  A real prove it to myself moment.  I am not making this shit up.  This is real.

Which is what Lara has been telling me for a year, but I didn't believe her.  (Well she hasn't really told me I'm dissociative, she just lets me see all the dissociation around me and asks me if it looks familiar.  And she asks me why I'm in group.  And don't I feel at home there?  Why would I feel at home if I didn't fit in, didn't have the same thing everyone else has?)

I'm sitting here trying to remember what happened in the group, but I can't.  Anything else I would write would be a mixture of guessing and fabrication, which I just realized, I think I do a lot.  Holy shit. Holy shit, holy shit, holy shit, holy shit.  The angry one was in group!  She's also the charming funny one.  The one that can kick your (and my) ass.   I don't know her name.  I'm pretty sure she's a teenager.  And she hates everybody.  Everybody except Lara and Dr. S.  But now she's hating them a bit because they won't let her back into group.  She want's to tell them to go fuck themselves.  Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha, ha!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I talked to my sponsor today for an hour about.  It was great talking to her.  She helped me a lot.  She understands how hard it is for me right now, and she validated me.  She knows it's hell at first.  Which it was last night.  I couldn't sleep because my inner voice just kept going over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over how bad the program situation is.  How much they all hate me.  How much I hate them right now.  How I am such a horrific, terrible monster because they need to protect groups from me.  At one point I grabbed my head and screamed stop!  IT WAS AWFUL.  I felt like I was going crazy.  That's when I called my sponsor for the second time, still not getting her, only her stupid answering machine.  But she called me back finally tonight.

I love her, love her as a sponsor, but I need someone who is in town more and who picks up their phone when I call (not always me having to leave a message and wait for a call back).  I guess I could have her as a support friend.  I can always call her, but get a sponsor who is in town.  This sucks!  I want R but I she's not perfect!  Ugh!  Oh well.  I guess maybe I'll ask N to be my sponsor.  We'll see.  She keeps not showing up for meetings, and I don't really want that.

I bought diphenhydramine HCL for sleeping (benadryl) tonight.  My body is a little leery of using it, but I don't want the shit going on in my head like last night.  I want to sleep!

OK, tomorrow I'm calling the volunteer place.  Yes I am!  And I will make three calls about Medicare D!  Yay.  I will do it!  I will, because I want to.  But if I don't, that's OK too, because I'm supposed to be being kind to myself and cut myself some slack.  It is OK if I am not super-productive awesomeness all the time :) 

Wow, I finally called my sponsor!

OK, so I finally called my sponsor.  But got voicemail, suck.  I actually wanted to talk to her, which is amazing.  Usually I pray for voicemail so I don't have to talk to people.

I talked to S a bunch today after the 3:30 meeting and she was helpful.  It was enough that she was spending time with me.  Some of the things she said I didn't understand or agree with, but again, her concern was enough.  She told me that I have to take action, and one of the actions I could take was calling my sponsor.  (So I did).  The other action she suggested was dealing with not being able to be in program for 2 more weeks and go back like a lady.  Um, the lady thing is not me, but I understand what she meant.  She meant go back as a centered adult.  Which is what I want to be: a centered, calm, dignified, bad ass adult.

It still hurts every day how I was treated by Lara and program.  It hurts, like physically hurts my heart.  I get a burning, aching in my chest and my stomach clenches up.  My heart rate races and I feel like screaming or crying.  I hate it.  I don't understand why they would want to do that to me.  But they did.  And for right now, I am sick of talking about it!

Because of S I stayed for the 5:30 meeting, and it was good and I shared.  I didn't mean to be, but I was funny and cracking everyone up.  It made me want to do stand up, like my hero Maria Bamford.  But stand-up is a lot of work and I'm tired right now.   Maybe I'll just be funny in my songs.  Or at least witty.

I called C today, which I had promised myself I would do before Weds, so yay for me!  He seems to be doing OK, and it was nice to talk to him.  I am worried about his reaction when his best friend dies (he has brain cancer).  I hope C can pull through.  Losing his mother and his best friend in a year is going to be very, very tough.

I talked to Carol tonight about our relationship (while at Chipotle, of course).  We do love the Chipotle.  Anyway, I brought up that I feel our relationship was not going in a direction I liked.  She depends on me for things, and I give her way too much advice and try to tell her what to do all the time.  Not good.  It's like I'm the one on high and she's down below me somewhere and that is NOT how I want to have a friendship.  So I told her I had to stop giving her advice, and that we had to stop talking about program together.  I fucked it up within 10 minutes and started giving her advice, but she caught me.  Which is awesome.  I don't want to be the one "in charge".  I want an egalitarian relationship where there are two adults both giving and taking.  I need to have radical acceptance of her and where she is right now, not how I wish her to be.  I hope we can pull this off, because if not, then I cannot hang out with her anymore.  I do not want to be the person I am now when I hang out with her.  So I have to be strong and be better.  NO ADVICE!  NO CARETAKING!

I'm going off to bed now, first to read a bit.  I just got the new Stephen King novel.  It makes me feel like a kid (in a good way) to be reading Stephen King again.  He's like a comfy blanket that feels and smells just right.  Love him. When he's good, which is not always, but he's good often enough.

Just Be. And a short description of a radical life changing event.

OK so I'm back again, writing.  I found my old LiveJournal from when I lived in Otown, and was so happy I had a window into my life back then.  So, I want to have a window into this time of my life too.  Thus the writing.

I am not sure when (or ever) I'll be done with going to group.  I have not been there for about 6 weeks ? I think, but I'm probably going to start back up this week.  I'm meeting with Lara about it manana 9:30 AM.  It was really nice to hear from her on Friday.  She called me to set up the meeting, and I told her how I felt- pissed off (when am I not?) and feeling extremely judged.  She told me I wasn't being judged, and that other people have had to write proposals to come back to group.  It made me feel better.  Also, she said she was invested in me :)

She's going to be gone from group for the next coupla weeks, so if I go back I will have my most recent (and recently loved) therapist in group as she will be taking over while Lara's on vaca.  Hmm, what to call this therapist?  How about:  Sharon.  OK.  So anyway I've been with Sharon since May and love her.  She is a great therapist, plus I got some raging transference going with her.  But THIS time I have a therapist who knows how to handle it.  She has talked with me hours about it, and the transference is going away.  I really respect and like her still though.  And if she weren't my therapist, and in a relationship, I would probably still want to date her.  Although she is a bit too much of a rule follower for my taste.

So I am lying around the house, avoiding leaving.  I know that if I continue to do this it will lead to depression, so I am going to go for my walk as soon as I'm done with this. 

Oh yes, for the past two weeks I have been trying to change my lifestyle around so that I will want to live.  I have been walking almost daily and doing yoga 3 times a week.  But I got tired the past few days and have not gone to yoga.  But that's OK.  I will go back.  Courage is getting up in the morning and saying "I'll try again."  That's a bastardization of a quote I love.  

Two weeks ago I overdosed on DXM and a bunch of things happened at once.  I incorporated myself if that's possible.  I convulsed for hours because of the memories I was having and probably from the DXM too.  But I've convulsed before completely sober, so I know it was because of the memories.  I wrote them all down as well as recorded them on my phone.  I then had a psychotic break and it was not fun.  I drove my car high.  I got my passport and drove to the airport and was going to fly to Colombia.  It is a loooooooooong story, but my brain just sort of short-circuited and it was not good.

But in all it was a wonderful experience.  Some might say a spiritual experience.  I learned that I loved myself.  That I can live.  That some truly awful stuff happened to me.  And that it hurt me, but I'm getting better.  It was wonderful.

And so this past two weeks has been living up to the health and love I felt that night.  So I'm taking care of myself- eating more healthily, stopped eating meat (because I find it morally repugnant but never respected my own thoughts enough to do anything about it, but now I do respect myself), started walking for 2 hours daily and started the yoga.  Plus going to meetings 5 times a week.  The yoga is very hard by the way.  I think I am intimidated and discouraged by how hard it is and how beginner I am.  Just writing this down makes me feel better about it though.  I am on my path, and right now I'm a beginner and that's why it's hard.  The teacher even said I was doing well. So there, other teacher who kept telling me I had to push myself!  As if I have EVER been easy on myself.  The problem for me is not going to be pushing myself, it is to stay kind to myself.  So it is OK I've taken a break for the past few days, and it is OK if I go back!

Speaking of taking care of myself, it's time to go for the walk.  I'm excited!  I'm excited to see Lara tomorrow, I've missed her.  I want to get better.  I have no idea what that looks like.  I have no idea what my healthy life will be.  I don't know what I want to do for a living.  Nothing.  But that's good, and I won't let anyone, be it my mother or the head of IOP guilt me into feeling otherwise.  It is OK if I'm not on the fast track to success.  I am allowed to just be.