That’s how I wish to be. Naked, without my armor of cold grey metal, fearless and friendly and open to the world, and ready to embrace the sunrise and let it thaw me out.
There has to be a way for me to lower my defenses and let the sun shine in.
Today was Therapy Thursday. I had a turbulent but not entirely unproductive session.
It was good in that I was more emotionally real with Doctor Costin than usual. I managed to express how I really felt, deep inside.
It was bad in that he, of course, could not really handle it.
I was “looping”, which means I kept circling around and returning to the same point : that whatever mental substance lets people do things is missing in me and without that substance, no amount of advice does me a damned bit of good because it all relies on me having enough of that substance to do something new.
And if that’s the case, forget it. The best driving instructions in the world are worthless if the car is out of gas.
And without gas, you can’t get to the next place to GET gas, can you?
And I kept going around that point. I told him about how hard it is for me to feel hopeful. This, after he told me that I have to do whatever I can to make myself happy.
And I quite truthfully told him that I had no idea what that would be and that it was hard for me to believe that anything I can (or rather, would) actually do will make me happier.
That’s an important distinction. There’s lots of things I “can” do in the sense that there’s no demonstrable reason why I cannot… except that I am all out of gas.
So fuck what I “can” do. Because whatever it is, I won’t do it.
I can’t. But I can’t possibly prove that to anyone.
Oh, and he suggested putting me on a new antidepressant.
And I was like, okay, I am open to that.
But then he said that I would have to go off the Paxil first.
And I said, “Um, no. If I go off the Paxil I will become suicidal. I have been taking it for 20 years. No way going through withdrawal from that would leave me alive. ”
He was worried about side effects of combining meds. What I wish I had said to him was that there MIGHT be side effects to adding a third medication (I also take Wellbutrin) but there would DEFINITELY be side effects of going off Paxil.
We left it at that.
I may have overstated my case out of shock at the notion going off Paxil. I don’t know for sure that I would be suicidal.
But it would still be one hell of a risk.
It hurt me to hear that he had given up trying to get me to do things. It hurt even though I had just told me why it was useless to do it.
I felt like he was giving up on me, and I told him so. He said he wasn’t giving up on me, just on telling me to do things.
A fair point. But it still fucking hurt.
And I know I have frustrated many other people to the point of giving up on me as well. My mental illness has my mental strength behind it, and that means someone would have to be able to out-argue me in order to reach me.
And that’s impossible. Because nobody can out-argue me.
Not my family, not my teachers, and not my therapist. No wonder everybody abandons me sooner or later. Who can put up with that level of frustration?
But where does that leave me? Alone and abandoned, as always.
I am truly my own worst enemy.
And I don’t know what to do about that. How do I deactivate my defenses?
This is not some kind of hobby fight for me. This is how I perceive the world.
I guess if I am ever to be better, I will, of course, have to do it all myself.
Fuck the world, man. Fuck it.
More after the break.
Brand new wings
That’s what it’s going to take to get my out of my mess.
I am going to have to leave logic and sense behind and go where I need to go without waiting for the right road to be built.
I will need to make non-contiguous progress. Instead of doing what I usually do (because I do it so well) and following a series of logical; leaps to my destination, I will have to learn to skip directly to my destination without any need for connecting steps.
And once more, we are back to what amounts to magic. Or faith. The subject of a leap of faith came up in therapy today. And as usual, I internally scoffed at the notion.
But I am warming up to the idea. Why should I fee obligated to follow the rules of logic and analysis when they are no longer working for me?
I don’t follow rules. I am the maker of rules. I pick and choose which rules to follow because I know that rules are made and can be unmade, or made anew, because to me they are just machines.
And machines are judged by their output. Results. Nothing more.
So if playing by the rules results in an unhappy and broken me, then fuck the rules. I invoke my unlimited right to change the rules in order to produce a better result.
Time for me to stop following the well paved highways of logic and go offroad.
And if that doesn’t work, fuck it, I will fly.
It doesn’t have to make sense and I don’t need to justify it to anyone. Not even myself.
This is my world, and it follows no rules but my own.
Time to test my brand new wings.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.