Strange, Strange Day

It’s been a bit of a strange day today. Maybe I am coming down from yesterday’s good mood. Maybe it’s because of the juxtaposition between enjoying watching the motor racing, keeping myself busy by ironing throughout the afternoon and feeling a bit off tonight. Looking back on the day now as I write, it’s almost like I have been seesawing through emotions all day.

I guess I have been feeling blah for so long that I am just used to feeling this way, of thinking this way. I popped out to Shell this evening to buy some items for Hubby’s crib tomorrow. Whilst at the service station, I caught myself thinking of the whole death thing. How I don’t like life. How I don’t think I would enjoy life even if I was to get off my butt and change whatever needed changing. How it would be a blessing when I am finally diagnosed with some fatal illness and how that couldn’t be that far away (surely).

I had similar thoughts this afternoon towards the end of the Bathurst race. I enjoy watching the race. It’s the one race of the year that I religiously watch. The invading thought connected with the race was that of how I would like to still be able to view the race after I am dead, sort of haunt it or something. How strange a thought is that!

Oh well, it’s back to work tomorrow I suppose. Unfortunately it is a student free day. I have been booked in to do the child protection training again. Great ... not! I hope I don’t have to sit through the same videos that they showed the last time I did the training. I don’t want to freak again and have to go racing from the room. Let’s talk of the ways kids self harm and what to do about it. Right! Fuck!

The Mountain is Calling

Man, I can almost smell those petrol fumes! This weekend I am reverting back to my petrol head heritage. Australia's greatest annual motor race is on at Mount Panorama in Bathurst, New South Wales. The mountain has come to life with the roar of the V8 touring car engines. I can't wait to plant my butt firmly on the couch tomorrow and watch the big race unfold. (Okay, well I'll probably do a little ironing in front of the TV too, but that's only because the lounge room is choking with unironed clothes).

I grew up with motor racing. When I was a kid, Dad would take my brother and I along to see the touring car races at the Lakeside and Surfers Paradise circuits. I grew to love watching motor sport live. I had my favourite drivers, like Peter Brock, Dick Johnson and Jim Richards (only because he drove a stunning black and gold BMW). Then the young drivers like Glenn Seton rose through the ranks. I'm still a fan of his after all these years and I am just dying to see him conquer the mountain at some stage.

Only one more sleep until the Bathurst 1000. Woohoo!

Motor racing aside, I've felt pretty good today. My only whinge could be that SH is still on my mind ... the whole everything has healed up and time to do some more thing. I haven't though, and don't think I will tonight because I'm going to hit the hay soon. As for the "unrealness", it hasn't been so bad today. I'm pretty much me and I've had the joy of staying at home today and not having to deal with the outside world.

Lucky Sevens

Time for a change of pace tonight. I've been tagged by James for the following meme, so here goes ...

Seven things I plan to do before I die:
(Damn, this is a hard one for me to answer considering where my mind has been over the last 18 months)

1. Go on a real dog sled ride
2. Visit Alaska and Canada (what better places are there to go to dog sledding)
3. See the Bathurst 1000 touring car race live
   
4. Do a beginners photography course
   
5. Live somewhere that is not the cesspit of society
   
6. Learn to be comfortable with my sexuality again (I threw that one in for Hubby)
7. Become whole / find a reason to live
   

Seven things I can do:

1. Touch type
2. Snore really loudly (according to Hubby)
3. Dissociate (apparently)
4. Whinge
   
5. Nag
6. Really listen (hopefully anyway)
7. Giggle a lot
   

Seven things I cannot do:

1. Ballroom dance (much to Hubby's disgust)
2. Sing really well
3. Debate
4. Keep a pot plant alive
5. Keep a nice, clean house
   
6. Reverse park a car
7. Pee standing up
   

Seven things that attract me to the opposite sex:

1. Someone who is not sexist nor racist
2. Someone who is spiritual but not religious
3. Someone who leans to the left politically
   
4. Well-developed upper arms
5. Well-developed chest
6. Someone who will go for walks with me
7. Someone who is a tad gritty on the surface but is a softy underneath
   

Seven things I say most often:

1. Shit, it's hot! (now that it is summer in my neck of the woods)
2. Bugger
3. Foul
4. Fuck (I guess I just swear a lot)
5. Ummm
6. Grrr
7. Drop! (when one of my furry kids is annoying me)
   

Seven celebrity crushes:

1. Patrick Stewart (from Star Trek Next Generation and the Xmen movies)
   
2. Sean Connery (I like old, balding men)
3. Hugh Jackman (gawd, this man can act!)
   
4. David Boreanaz (from Buffy and Angel)
   
5. Christopher Meloni (from Law and Order SVU)
6. Glenn Seton (Australian V8 Supercar driver)
7. Adrian Paul (from the Highlander TV series and latter movies)
   

Seven people who need to do this:

1. Joey
2. Mothy
3. Blogaholic
4. Gabbi
5. Anyone else
   
6. who wants
7. to take up the challenge

Therapy and Empty Threats

Ugh! Where do I start with this post? I want to write about therapy. What is it meant to achieve? What is its aim? How is it supposed to work? Does it really "cure" people? I've got so many questions about it. I'm feeling confused. I'm feeling stuck.

It seems so silly to feel this way about therapy. I've studied a whole degree which was centred around basic counselling skills and social welfare principals. I'm trained in crisis counselling. I've worked in the human services field. I've worked with counselling psychologists. I've worked with mental health nurses. One of my closest friends has an honours degree in psychology and given the right circumstances could easily become a doctor in the discipline.

I realise that my knowledge and skills are a far cry from those which are held by qualified psychologists. I realise my knowledge of psychiatry is non-existent. However, I don't think I should be as clueless as I am about this whole area given my background. It's confusing. It's frustrating.

It's been a little over a year since I first met my pdoc. I was in hospital for the first couple of months of knowing him. I started weekly therapy appointments with him at the beginning of this year. I spent another few weeks in hospital earlier this year. Yet, given all this time, what has been achieved?

Granted, the depression is gone, or at least well under control with the medication. I would suspect that the time that has elapsed has had at least some positive impact on the depression as well. I don't think I will ever be completely free of it though. For some reason it just seems to be part of my make up. I guess that is what they call dysthymia.

I don't get this "unrealness" though. What happened to bring this on? What is it? Where did I go? Why do I feel so ... odd? Where did my substance go? Did I ever actually have any substance at all? Why am I fake? Why do I wish that I could just fade away and be done with it all? Damn, I think sometimes I just want my pdoc to slap a label on me so I could at least look up a book about it or something; just to normalise my experiences. The word dissociation still doesn't make any sense.

I guess what is bugging me at the moment is my inability to engage properly in any type of therapy. Is it my fault? Is it my pdoc's fault? Can blame be laid in such a situation? My pdoc has indicated that I don't take myself and perhaps this therapy business seriously. I think he is wrong in this respect. I believe I do. Gawd, if I didn't take myself seriously I probably wouldn't be in this mess.

Rather, I think the problem lies in my inability to open up about any topic remotely connected to me. For whatever reason, I find talking about myself and my experiences intensely difficult. Could this "not taking things seriously" be some sort of defence mechanism that I use? Do I not count? That is the reason why I write this journal; to try to connect with myself. At the moment, it is only through writing that I can make any attempt to express myself, my thoughts and how I am feeling within.

Herein lies the threat. I am becoming extremely tired of existing in such a manner. If this therapy stuff doesn't work, what is the point of continuing (and I don't mean with therapy when I say this). There will be no hope left at all. I can't continue to just exist forever. Surely that is not what life is about. When I finally allow myself to face the truth that this is all there is and that there is no hope of a future worth living, then I hope that I will have the fortitude to do something about it. I hope I will be able to bring everything to an end.

Lost for Words

I'm bereft of words tonight. I don't know who was sitting across from my pdoc during today's appointment. It was one of the fake, empty me's. Damn, I've got to stop thinking about this "unreal" garbage. I'm driving myself nuts. It's just where I am at at the moment and I guess the whole point of writing this blog is to express what's going on in my head. I have to be true to it.

Anyway, that's enough from me. I'll let the following song lyrics from Linkin Park tell my story for tonight.

When this began
I had nothing to say
And I'd get lost in the nothingness inside of me
I was confused
And I let it all out to find that I'm
Not the only person with these things in mind
Inside of me
But all the vacancy the words revealed
Is the only real thing that I've got left to feel
Nothing to lose
Just stuck, hollow and alone
And the fault is my own

I want to heal
I want to feel
What I thought was never real
I want to let go of the pain I've held so long
Erase all the pain 'til it's gone
I want to heal
I want to feel
Like I'm close to something real
I want to find something I've wanted all along
Somewhere I belong

And I've got nothing to say
I can't believe I didn't fall right down on my face
I was confused
Looking everywhere, only to find that it's
Not the way I had imagined it all in my mind
So what am I
What do I have but negativity
'Cause I can't justify the
Way everyone is looking at me
Nothing to lose
Nothing to gain, hollow and alone
And the fault is my own

I want to heal, but I don't think it is possible. This is all that is left. I'm gone. All that I have left is this fake, unreal existence and the wish that I don't have to persevere for too much longer.

A Moment of Me

I don't know if I will be able to explain myself properly tonight throughout this post, but here goes anyway. Tonight, while I was talking with a friend on the phone, I finally had a moment of clarity. Towards the end of the phone call, the "real me" clicked in. "I" was talking and I knew it was finally me. It felt so easy to talk. It felt genuine. It wasn't just some bizarre fragmented bit of me trying to interact in as normal manner as that particular bit could. I was really me!

I know that the above paragraph probably sounds a little odd, but I guess what I am trying to explain stems from the past handful of days or so. I suppose that I have been a little out of it still. At work these past couple of days, and over the weekend whilst both getting organised for the wedding and attending it, I have been a tad lost to myself. I've just been an actor, muddling my way through different experiences. I've been the "professional me" at work. I have been the empty shell when at home, and I have been some sort of "trying to be social me" at the wedding.

I realise that everybody has slightly different personas depending on which situation they find themselves in. People do have professional personas. People do have social personas. People do have private personas. The problem is I guess, that I have felt so disjointed from one situation to another. When I arrived home from the wedding early Sunday morning, I knew that by taking my dose of Seroquel I would literally sleep all day on Sunday. I wondered for a short time if I should forego the Seroquel so that I wouldn't lose the entire day. Instead, I just took my usual dose. I wanted to blow away my Sunday. I didn't want to face myself that day. These past couple of days, I wished that I could just drift off to sleep the moment that I arrived home from work. I can't stand the difference between the (fake) work me and the empty shell of a me that I am once I am home. None of these me's are entirely real. They are all fake in their own way.

All that I have tried to explain above is why it felt like a breath of fresh air during this evening's phone with my friend when I suddenly felt like the real me again. I wasn't faking it. I was real for that brief moment in time. I was whole.

And so ends tonight's fantasy.

Weekend Update

Well, it's been a few days since I've posted, essentially because Hubby and I had a busy weekend. On Saturday we travelled into the semi big smoke to attend the wedding of my boss' son. It was a lovely wedding. The ceremony was held at the top of a coastal hill in a national park. It was a beautiful setting, made all the more special because of the significance the spot holds for the groom and his family. Only a few short years ago the groom's father's ashes were scattered over the ocean from the same hillside.

Now that the rush of the weekend is over, I am feeling sombre. Today turned out to be quite okay, but for whatever reason I decided to pick up my current weapon of choice tonight. I don't know why. It has been over a week since I've indulged in any SH so I just needed to do a little tonight. It's relaxed me a little.

It's time for me to retire to my bedroom though and watch a little TV before drifting off to sleep.