Tuesday, January 22, 2008

Faking til I make it- NOT

I've crashed, I've hit bottom as low as it is going to get short of one other thing. 

I am truly a pathetic creature. 

 
 But this was (and still is) the first time in my life that I realize that my life is so existential and there is no purpose, no meaning no hope. No fucking hope. 

The things in the past which scare me more than anything, my mother finding me, and the worms weren't important. If I wasn't Jewish I would ask to be creamated, but they don't do it. 

Bottom was easy in AA. I talk about it freely in meetings. Bottom was waking up on the floor in a pool of vomit on Sept 26, 1996 and freaking out because that is how Janis Joplin died and I didn't want to die. Checked myself into state rehab that afternoon, after going to an AA meeting and getting the address. Dealt with 2 days of DT's chained to a bed with plastic sheets and left there while beasties and other things tried to crawl on my arms, legs, invade my vision. I was restrained so I wouldn't try to claw them, or remove the IV in my arm. After 2 days they tried to feed me, keep food down and get me better. After 4 days they sent me home with a copy of the Big Book, and a list of AA meetings. I went to everyone, hanging out in a 24 club going to as many as 8 meetings a day. After 30 days it was easy. Want a drink? Think of where it took you. I don't miss it to this day. 


But this time, it's been occuring since August, and gotten worse since November. I am so acutely paranoid right now I don't know what to write. It's like Holden Caufield-don't tell anyone anything because then you will miss them. 

I've been too honest with my friends on line and in real life, and it's too much for them. I understand. I had a friend die normally and I was the last person he ever spoke to. I had a friend in college who suicided, and I was the last person he talked to. I still have guilt over these two.  

I have a few friends I love, really outright love, the type where I would give them a kidney if they needed it love. And they are backing off now. I don't blame them, who wants to look at the train wreck milliseconds before it happens? Some people get spun by looking at the wreck on the highway. We want to look, but when they are covering up the poor sod who was killed and you see it's someone you know.....that's different. 

I have a couple of choices. Intense outpatient therapy ( which I am going for).  Another 2 week hospitalization, this time at Carrier. 

Or a 3 month stay at some type of private hospital. If I do that I will no longer have a cat, among other things. It's the last resort. The cat and my friends are the only things keeping me sane and alive right how. Actions speak louder than words. I gotta get better so I am a better friend to my friends, and I gotta get better so I don't loose Holly. 

So next week starts a totally new drug regimine, where among other things, I believe my lithium will be replaced with Lamictal. Anything to get better. Anything to keep my friends. Anything , and everything to keep Holly. The other hospital isn't an option til after Dad has his surgery and we know he is OK. 

I don't want the 3 month hospital stay, I would loose my apartment, have to put my stuff in storage, give Holly away. And cash in my 401 to pay for the thing. I won't have any retirement money left at all. And I would do it for my friends, for my mother and father. See I do love them. I don't tell them that enough, maybe it's I am afraid they will think I am a lesbian or something, or the 2 male friends I have in my life will interpret it the wrong way. I don't know. 


When I was 4 years old I use to think there were beasties and the boogeyman who lived under the bed or in the closet. I would run out the room when my mother was listening to the radio and "Puff the Magic Dragon" came on the air. My father would leave the nightlight on, shut the closet door and stay with me until I fell asleep, but not before he checked under the bed for monsters. 

40 years later, the monsters still exist. They are in my mind, eating at my brain, letting the gray matter decay, wither, as it starts to collapse apon itself. 

I haven't been this scared since I was a little girl. This is bottom, it isn't going to get any worse ever, other than the few people I know who have backed off won't come back. Ever. 

To me that is something worse than being dead. 

4 comments:

Nunya said...

well then, off to the hospital you go! if you feel you need to go, then you definitely need to go.

take care of yourself, no one else will.

good idea to try the few week stay over the few months stay. i hope you find it helpful.

susan said...

thank you!

You are right about no one taking care of me but me. I appreciate that thought today.

+PHc said...

Don't lose Holly. Hospitalization that isn't going to require losing your apartment or Holly sounds good. But as bad as you are right now, it wasn't long ago at all that you were doing well, and it really can come back up again.

Some SPCA's have foster caregivers for other reasons - like if an animal is considered not-yet adoptable for behavioral or health reasons. If you need longer hospitalization, find out about the foster cat care options that might be available to you.

When I was hospitalized, I wasn't expecting to be. I was sent from what I thought was a regular doctors appointment in a police car to emergency psych first, and I was crazy about what was going to happen to Sophia because she has kidney failure and requires infusions. I usually leave a couple days food out for her when I go out anyway in case of earthquake or something happening to me, but they said "Animal Control" was going to come get her! NO. My bother and his wife ended up coming from Dallas to stay in the apartment with her. I don't remember what happened about the infusions.

But you are Holly's friend you don't want to give up on. So Whatever you need, find out all your options for her, so you won't lose her.

Yes take care of you. Taking care of her is for taking care of you.

+PHc said...

Hope you're doing OK. I checked my email. I'll check it again. Just thinking about you, and wishing you well tonight.

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