I am very scared by all my health issues.
Which is probably a good thing.
I feel like I am trapped in a burning building and desperately searching for a way out as flames roar and timbers crack and the heat makes me sick.
But the building is my body and there’s only one way out of that and that’s death.
And I’m not done yet, god damn it. I can’t die before I get to live. I have so many things I want to do once I overcome my depression.
My depression, of course, is eagerly awaiting my death. Like a cartoon wolf with a napkin around its neck and a knife and fork in its hands waiting for the prey species protagonist to come out of a cave, it can’t wait to finally finish killing me so that all this ridiculous bullshit can finally be over.
Oh, how it loves that word. OVER.
Because it’s the part of me that drives me to escape things rather than deal with them. It is the anxiety portion of my depression that ramps the fear up to a million in order to overwhelm me and makes me forget everything except getting out of the situation by the shortest possible route, long term consequences and my self-interest be damn’d.
It’s the fear of that goddamned wolf that keeps me cooped up in this life that is far, far too small for my expansive awesomeness. It’s what keeps me glued to this fucking computer in order to drive out thoughts of it.
Like I am trapped in a tiny cabin in the middle of the woods and there’s a psycho killer hunting me outside and all I can do is watch TV and tell myself “Don’t think about it, don’t look out the window, don’t stare at the door, just watch the TV and forget the danger you are in. ”
I know the danger isn’t real. But that doesn’t help, because I know it will continue to FEEL real and that makes it real enough to ME.
When the conflict is between what you feel to be true and what you know to be true, emotion will win most of the time. Even in a hardcore rationalist like myself.
Because it will always be easier for reason to create an illusion to justify the emotion than it will be for reason to overcome emotion.
It doesn’t matter if there’s a wolf out here in objective reality.
The one in my head is more than enough.
More after the break.
A Fresh Summer Breeze
Story time! Into my childhood neighborhood moved Doctor and Mrs Beer. They were from South Africa and moved to my small town so he could practice medicine. Dunno much about the Doctor, but SHE was a pill. Very snooty and tended to looked down on others. That is SUPER incompatible with the culture of Prince Edward Island. Reverse snobbery is strong with us. So she was NOT WELL LIKED in my neighborhood. Ergo, when she decided mint would be the perfect plant for the borders of the little walkway in her front yard, nobody told her it was a bad idea. Well, of course, the mint kicked the shit out of her grass and took over. Her lawn was nothing but mint from curb to porch. Every time my brother would mow their lawn, it made the whole neighborhood smell minty fresh. Given that in the summer it usually smelled of rotting kelp (think salty farts), it was quite the improvement. She, of course, was mortified. We, of course, loved that.
another facebook anecdote
Not much to add to that.
If this keeps up, I’m going to end up writing a memoir.
I’ll call it “Memoir of a Very Boring Man”, just to pique people’s interest.
Back to fear
Winding all the way back, let’s talk about my being scared about my health.
I really don’t want to end up in the hospital full of tubes and tied to the bed to keep me from pulling out said tubes.
Because that would be what it took. Given that I am so leery of having anything covering my face and restricting my breathing that they have to use the minimalist oxygen mask on me, the one that only plugs into the nose, tubes down my throat are seriously not going to happen if I have anything to say about it.
It’s not something I can control. This is a deep down terror brought on (I think) my decades of untreated sleep apnea.
Smothering repeatedly in my sleep many times a night for thousands of nights has had a psychological effect on me.
It’s like some kind of horrible tortuous experiment.
So if I woke up and I had a tube of any kind down my throat, that fucker is coming out even if it kills me. The fear response would be too strong. I wouldn’t even be a conscious sentient being at that point.
Who knows, though. The right drugs might keep me mellow. Yay, drugs.
Still, Tubed Fru is my nightmare scenario and I am terrified of the prospect. I am freaking out a little just thinking about it.
And that’s good, because maybe I can use that fear to prod myself into taking better care of my health.
One can only hope. It’s a special kind of deeply personal despair to know exactly what you should be doing for your own immediate self-interest and still not being able to make yourself do it.
The emotion is there, somewhere. In theory. But it cannot penetrate depression’s thick oppressive blanket of numbness in order to produce action.
Might as well be shouting into a dialtone. It works just as well.
But maybe anxiety can actually help me for once. I’m going to treasure and protect and guide this flame off fear. I’m going to nurture it and help it grow big and strong and potent so it can save me from myself.
I am my own supervillian, it seems. I put myself into this melodramatic death trap and I am the only one who can get myself out of it.
But I am tied to the railroad tracks. I know the train will kill me if I don’t free myself and get out of the way, but my hands are literally tied.
Right now, all I can do is hope that medical science will be able to fix whatever happens to me before it kills me or leaves me in a state worse than death.
Either that, or the province hires someone to watch over me and make me behave.
Some foxes don’t do too well in the wild.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.