Got pretty damned scared that I am going to die last night.
I’m just so sick. I feel dizzy almost all the time. My diabetes is way out of control and my sleep apnea is totally untreated. I have a huge untreated hernia and I get sudden sharp pains and other weird sensations on my legs all the time. My feet have been part numb and tingly for years. And I am so very, very weak.
In short, every inch of my body is fucked up and I am terrified that all these health problems are going to do me in before I can get them fixed.
I don’t want to die. I’m not done yet. I don’t want to go. I want to stay here with my friends and hang out and have fun together. I want to play video games and listen to YouTube videos about cool topic. I want to keep trying to get sane.
This life of mine ain’t much but it’s all I got and I wanna keep it.
I don’t want to go into that long dark room.
Saving my own life is going to be a hell of a lot of work, and that’s problematic to say the least because part of my depression is balking at anything that requires sustained effort and giving up on anything that seems scary or difficult or too much like work right away.
What I really want to do is surrender myself to a higher authority. Humbly confess my total incompetence in the face of reality and beg them to run my life for me because I am clearly not capable of doing it myself.
I wish I could just check myself into the hospital and tell them “Test absolutely everything, because I cannot be relied upon to self-report accurately. My state of mind makes my perceptions far too unreliable and I have no frame of reference for being healthy any more. Please fix me anyway. ”
Not an option, unfortunately, at least until I become super rich and can check myself into an American luxury hospital.
That sounds so nice. The ultimate in oral retentive retreat from reality. Surrender myself to a bunch of people dedicated to making me healthy.
For money, true, but the public health system can’t afford to invest that much in my care and tends to treat one problem at a time too.
That might not be enough. I mean, I am sure that as a system they will do everything they can do to keep me above the ground and give me all the opportunities to get my various ailments treated, but I might not have what it takes psychologically to get all that stuff done and I don’t know what to do about that.
I wish I could just run away from it all. I keep fantasizing about that. As if by taking off running I could somehow escape my problems and start off.
That doesn’t work when the problem is bad health. After all, no matter where you go, there you are, all full of disease and on the verge of total collapse.
And it’s all so unfair. I have done the best I can within the limits of my mental health and yet, here I am, damn near dyin’.
At least I have the fear now. Hopefully that will propel me to right action.
More after the break.
Scary from the Smart
I think I am starting to figure out one of my more vexing personal mysteries, why from my point of view I am this easygoing, sweet, accessible, approachable guy but from other people point of view, I can be extremely intimidating and hard to deal with.
Unsurprisingly, I think my sky high IQ is the key component. I think that when I pay attention to someone, it can be like being in the spotlight.
And not just any spotlight. The kind they used to spot planes during the Blitz.
And so even though I am being pleasant and friendly and (in my mind) harmless, people can’t quite relax around me, and that makes them either consciously or unconsciously want to avoid me.
And this is true even if I have legit charmed, entertained, and engaged them. Even if they walk away thinking I am one heck of a guy (and they’re not wrong), it still might have been exhausting and bewildering to them because they have never dealt with someone like me before and they are not used to interpersonal interactions of such intensity and vibrancy.
Obviously, my charisma and presence is a factor too. All three things come together to form the high beams of my attention.
I can only imagine that I have accidentally caused some confusion in people because of the cognitive dissonance between “wow, what a cool guy” and “I really don’t want that to happen again any time soon”.
And the thing is, I am always “on”. If I am around others, show’s on, and I am working hard to impress, amuse, and so on without trying or even knowing I am doing it.
It’s how I deal with the world, I guess. Perhaps if I had not had such a socially isolated childhood, I would have developed a more sturdy and nuances social strategy than “charm everybody always”, which definitely has the flavour of an extroverted toddler to me. One who has just realized that smiling and waving at people can get them some very pleasing positive interaction.
That’s probably what I was like when I got raped. That would explain a lot.
I don’t really see a direct solution to my intensity issue. It is simply not in my nature to turn down my flame. I got to shine, shine, shin.
But I could, I suppose, tune it a little. Make its light a little warmer, a little friendlier, a lot less alienating and a hell of a lot more inviting.
First I think I would need to get past a lot of very old, very deep, very nasty issues that make me want people to STAY THE FUCK AWAY.
That’s probably another thing that makes it stressful to be around me. Mixed messages.
How I wish I could take a pill and flush out all the bad mojo inside me.
Instead, all I can do is write it out of me.
Thanks for helping with that.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.