2017 blogs copy and pasted into 60 some pages

 

this is 5 years old
















    


Writing this feels like trying to eat a plate for dinner that’s overflowing with food. You want to eat it all and get it over with, but there’s just so much to digest and shit out that the task becomes daunting. I have so much shit I want to say, and nothing but ample time to say it, but writing it right now, feels nothing short of overwhelming. I apologize in advance for any grammatical or syntax errors as I barely paid attention in grade school English class, and never quite made up for it. I also apologize for anything that may be taken offensively or triggering, that is not my intention. I guess let me start my first blog post, and hope for the best.

I just got back from a leave of absence from my stay here in Michigan. Leading up to the LOA, I thought I had figured out how to maintain a consistent feeling of being content, and no longer had to deal with anxiety. I was fucking wrong. For lack of a better description, I was anxious as shit at home. I consistently felt like I hadn’t changed enough, that I wasn’t progressing enough daily, like I was fucked and going to be stuck in Michigan for a lot longer than I ever wanted to be. It was kind of a nice wakeup call in some respects. Being anxious as fuck showed me I still have road to pave, and there’s still work to be done. I’m grateful for feeling like ass on my mini vacation. Jumping from one social interaction to the next, never really shaking the anxious ghost over my shoulders, showed me that despite all my efforts over the past three months to progress… there’s still work to be done.

I’ve kind of come to an understanding that consistent happiness does not exist, and the idea of maintaining a constant feeling of elevated being is either the result of mania or drugs. No one can maintain that elevated feeling of happiness, it’s just unrealistic. Instead we work towards a feeling of content. Content is the real happiness in daily life. For me, maintaining that feeling of being content is much like balancing a spinning plate on some sort of pole. If you aren’t periodically nurturing the balance and spin of the pole, then the plate falls and shatters. If I’m not consistent with a few elements of life, then shit falls apart. Previously in life, when the plate has fallen and shattered before me, I’ve danced on the shattered pieces and then wondered why the fuck my feet are bleeding, and then proceeded to cry woe is me. Now I focus on maintaining balance and spin of the plate of life. I keep the plate balanced and spinning through proper eating, exercise, creativity, therapeutic musings, and a variety of distress tolerances. Sadly if the plate shatters, I still have a tendency to step on the shards, and scream FUCK, but I’m working on quickly picking up the pieces, getting a new plate, and getting the spinning balance back at play. All that is fun to be aware of, but my biggest issue is forgetting the simplest things in life. Forgetting to balance the plate, forgetting my life is in my control, or at least my reactions to life, forgetting that I alone must maintain myself through the right sources. I forget the simple elements in daily living that can help me on the path towards consistent feelings of being content. That’s actually one of the reasons I recently tattooed the words “Don’t Forget” on my thigh. It serves as a constant daily reminder to not forget all the little things that go into the balance and spin of the plate. To not forget the little things in life, and all the things that lead into it.

 

I’m just going to treat this post as the blueprint for the inevitable posts to come. For those who don’t know I suffer from Bipolar 1 disorder with psychotic features. With that comes a whirlwind of side effects. I often think I was misdiagnosed, and I’m secretly a bipolar 2 kid in disguise, but that’s just because it’s been years since I’ve had a manic episode. However… when I did have a manic episode… it truly was a manic episode, and it reared its ugly head and forced its way into psychosis with no end in sight. I’ve been struggling for the past four years to get my life back on track, to no avail. I’ve attempted suicide, I’ve been institutionalized, and I’ve done just about all I can to throw my life away. I’ve been so lost, scared, alone, and angry for so long now that I can’t remember my life before all of this. I remember being an asshole as a teenager. I remember some extreme trauma from my early teenage years. I remember never feeling content long enough to think I could ever consistently be okay. My life went downhill when my trauma resurfaced around 10^th grade. As a result of the resurfacing I slipped into a major depression for a while, masked my sadness with assholish teenage antics, and substance abuse. I’ve been kicked out of the house, kicked out of a friend’s house, and forced myself to lead a life that would eventually lead to myself snapping as a human being. I pushed myself so far to the edge, that instead of jumping, I crumbled up into a ball and let myself slowly die inside. This all sounds very melodramatic and bitchy, but I can’t begin to describe the life I led the summer of my 19^th year. I become an agoraphobic for a month. I couldn’t leave the house. I developed three extreme anxious ticks, and I became a hermit who just downloaded an endless stream of mixtapes off of datpiff. I eventually shifted out of my agoraphobia and was able to leave the house at night, and that’s when the mania began. I Think I’ll save all this for another day. I really don’t want to sound like a whiny bitch who wants the world to feel sorry for him, but I have so much pent up. So much that I want to share with the world, so much that I’ve held in for so long. I am the clog in the drain of your sink, and on top of me is a sink full of water, forcing itself down on me, and its crushing me. It’s a crushing weight that I want to alleviate, and I want to work through it here. I’ve been in therapy literally since I was three, and to no avail. I want to take part of my recovery into my own hands and put it into writing and put it out into the world; In the hopes that it will help me, and potentially others in the process. My problems have plagued me for so long that they’ve bled into my creative world. Every story I write now its riddled with mental illness and depression, the music I love is miserably depressing, I can’t escape my problems, and now I’m going to force them out into the world. I’m sitting here in my bed in Michigan at what will be my last stop on the road to recovering listening to title fight, the whiniest white boy band I could probably be listening to right now, and one line sticks out to me “I never wanted sympathy, I just wanted to be something”. I just want to rid myself of all this fucking water on top of me in the sink, so I can crawl out of this fucking hole and feel the warmth of life on my face. I want to remember a life before the one I know now. Thank you for reading this far if you have, and sorry for being a whiny little bitch, I’ll stop apologizing for it eventually, but as first posts go, I have no idea how this will be taken. There’s a lot about what I’ve done, and that’s been done to me that I can and can’t say, but we will see what the future holds.

Well, that was a fucking blast to write. I basically gave a Destiny style plot of my issues (get it), and worked myself up more than I helped myself, but I think in order to get everything out, I’m going to suffer a bit. I just want to balance and spin a fucking plate to be content. I forget that before I can only focus on that, I’ve got to kill off the demons that are constantly coming at me, trying to knock down my pole and plates. Either way, life goes on, and I’ll be fine. I’m going to go enjoy the rest of my day and farm virtually, because real farm work sucks ass, and smells bad. Except gardening, that’s pretty dope.

Ps. Play Stardew Valley… its so dope… you just run a farm… plant crops... sell shit… and make friends with the towns people… its such a positive little game… such a nice alternative to brutally murdering things.



                TWO

Michigan Pit Shtick

 

I’m anxious as fuck today. I didn’t sleep well last night, and it doesn’t help that I have to use my CPAP every night to even get some semblance of normal sleep. I’m not quite sure what direction I’m going to take this today. I wasn’t even going to post again so soon, but I’m fucking feeling weird, so I figured now is a better time than ever. I kind of just want to cry, and have a stream of letters and vowels run down my face until they form a river of words that flows down the current into a lake, forming this post. That sounds corny as fuck, but I think this is going to be a whiny ass post. I have a lot of shit I just want to put out into the world, so I can get it out of me. I’ve held a lot in over the years, and although I’ve told a few people, I haven’t told enough people to help alleviate the power my shit holds over me. Letting go of the past is such an obscure, abstract concept to me. How the fuck are you supposed to let go of something that you don’t have a grip on? Something sinister that is actually holding onto you, suffocating you, holding you back. How do you loosen its hold? I’ve always thought that talking about the pain you feel, letting it out of yourself, takes away the power it holds over you. It loosens its reigns, relinquishing you from its control. I was really trying to avoid bitching about my life in a post for a while, but I think it would really help me today, and ideally it will help whoever decides to read this. Even if it just helps you feel less alone, or helps you feel like everyone really does go through some shit, I don’t know, I just want to help people in my quest to help myself.

I can think of a few things I’ve done in life to deserve the suffering I’ve endured throughout my life, but the things I’ve done to warrant the pain has always been a result of some other sort of pain. I was never one to just be an unwarranted fucking cunt for no reason, despite what some may believe. Sometimes it felt like I was just born into being a sad dude. Which is funny, because I have an amazing life for the most part; I’m bright, well loved, financially stabled, attractive to some degree, well intentioned, and I don’t know, I just have a lot of really good things going for me, oh, and I’m stupid lucky.  That’s what confuses me. The universe clearly loves the shit out of me, but for the longest time it just felt the need to endlessly dump shit on me, and I felt the need to help dig a hole for myself and that shit, which I would then bury myself in. Once I was neck deep in a self made hole full of life’s stupid bullshit, I started to suffocate. To drown in the whole I dug for myself, and allowed life to fill with self loathing and hateful events. My family loves me, my friends love, strangers love me ,at times I love me, but for the longest time, all I could see was the negativity in me, in life, and in the fucking hole full of shit that I was living in. Yeah, life wasn’t always the most gentle with me, and I’ve been in some situations that would warrant my actions, but it took me up until now to realize that, the universe only gives you what you can handle. When life gives you lemons, you suck the shit out of them and make a funny face, and endure, because that’s what life is all about, enduring, and progressing forward.

                I have literally been in therapy since I was three years old. At that age you do what’s called “play therapy”… you basically just play with a therapist as they lure your little ass into a sense of security so they can finagle some questions out of you. My therapists name was Mrs. Suzanne, and she had a dope ass mini sand box that I used to fuck with heavy. I have no idea, if I’m being honest, as to why I was in therapy at that age, but my Mom used to say that if a three year old could be depressed… I was the embodiment of it.  Also my parents got divorced around that time, and I guess that has quite the unforeseen impact on sensitive little kids like myself, as that’s the only reason I can see as to why I’d be depressed at such a young age, that or a weird early onset chemical imbalance. I eventually stopped seeing Mrs. Suzanne at some point, only to then see the school guidance counselor a lot. I never really did well in school, if I’m being honest. It never really tickled my fancy. Why would I want to do what people tell me to do when I have free will and can literally do anything I want? Why would learning my ABC’s be appealing? Seemed like a stupid idea to me at the time, but I wasn’t the brightest in my early years. Again, for lack of a better description, I basically didn’t give a fuck about school from the get go. My mom practically bribed me to pass kindergarten with this dope ass Yo-yo, and of course I took the bait. I never really had problems in elementary school. There was some light bullying with some anxiety sprinkled on top, but nothing life ruining. Kids would make fun of my cloths, shit like that. I did run away once from the cafeteria. The kids at my table were chanting “All, his, fault” at me because I was the reason we weren’t allowed to watch some college basketball game. That was p shitty, but I just ran outside, and then went straight to my art teacher’s class room, where I calmed down. I can’t think of any real hiccups I had in life when I was in elementary school other than the fact that forced learning wasn’t appealing to me in anyway. My mom thought I had ADD, or some other issue, and so as I graduated from 5^th grade and onto middle school, things got exciting.

When I was in middle school, I had a lot of friends, a lot of girlfriends, was literally stuffed in a trash can more than once, and I had such bad acne that I accidently scorched it off my face. It was pretty typical stuff. Lots of pretending I could skate, pretending to fit in, to be normal. Nothing really impacted me directly in middle school; it was kind of all under the hood shit. Trigglypuff sighting incoming so beware; I did have one life altering event go down when I was in middle school. I was molested by a psychiatrist I was seeing at the time. I saw him twice, and hid the events from my conscious mind until I was in 10^th grade. At the time I have no fucking idea why I didn’t tell anyone, or why I left his office and didn’t utter a single word as to what happened in there. I pushed what happened to me then out of my mind for a good three years, until 10^th grade. After that incident my anxiety started getting bad. My grades got even worse. I started acting out, and just in general being a little teenage asshole. My mom knew something was wrong, but she had no idea what it really was. I wasn’t even aware what it was. I just knew I wasn’t okay. When I lived with my mom I spent a lot of time just sitting in my room listening to The Used, Linkin Park, Underoath, depressing shit like that. I used to write short stories about this chipmunk named Ace who was a detective with some dope ass tools at his disposal. Damn, I really can’t convey the sweeping wave of emotions you feel at that age. You’re high, then you’re as low as you go, then you’re high again. Life was good; I was just an angsty white kid from the county. Yeah, I was molested, but as far as I could tell I wasn’t even aware of that event until 10^th grade. The only real issues in my life were battling with my mom, and her ridiculous punishments, and just dealing with all my teenage feelings, and the meeeeannninggg (someone will get it). I was sad though, but my life wasn’t in danger as a result of the middle school sadness, I wasn’t really digging myself a deep hole yet. I was kind of just playing in the sand at the beach. Digging holes for the fuck of it, and then filling them back up, because it was all just in jest. Nothing was real yet; life isn’t real when you’re still in middle school. In 8^th grade I got sent to live with my dad because I had runaway, had been acting out a lot, and was constantly fighting with my mom. She figured a little male authority in my life would be a good thing. Dear god, it fucking was. I like to think I peaked in 8^th grade. I have no idea what the fuck happened, or what I did, but everyone seemed to love me in 8^th grade. I made a ton of friends really fast, I sifted through girlfriends like Pokémon cards, and I was just on top of the world. My MySpace game was on point, I was going to local concerts constantly, things were fucking phenomenal. So middle school was a hot mess of weird feelings.

*Ring Ring* *Ring Ring*
 “Hi, its high school, and I just wanted to give you a call and let you know that everything you thought you knew,  is wrong, and however good you were feeling, it’s over. You’re about to feel like shit, and honestly, it’s kind of going to be all your fault, you’re just too young to understand that it doesn’t have to be.
*Click*

Fuck man, high school FUCKING SUCKED. Like yeah I was decent at it, like I had friends, and girls liked me, and I was cool to some degree, but 9^th and 10^th grade were hell. By 11^th grade I was on the verge of just becoming a giant fucking asshole, but that was just how I chose to cope. I realized I had a chip on my shoulder, and I was testing the waters to see if anyone dared knock it off. By 12^th grade I was at odd future shows chanting “Kill people, burn shit, fuck school”, I had fallen truly off into the asshole end of the pool, and I fucking loved it. There really is something freeing about being a fucking dick and not having a care in the world about others. Honestly, if my life wasn’t oh so humbly shattered at 19, I probably would still be an asshole, but I don’t know. My girlfriend has saved my life in more ways than she’s aware, but I digress. Fucking 9^th grade was like crushing up pills of anxiety, and ripping mad lines before the start of each day, and then riding that anxiety high throughout the entire day (that’s a metaphor for just being super anxious btw). Everyone was so fucking big, and I was so small, so insignificant, and so alone. As my first year in high school progressed, my friend count decreased, and I can actually remember one kid saying “What happened to Diggs, why doesn’t he talk anymore”. I couldn’t exactly tell you what happened. Maybe this girl Becca broke my achey breaky heart? No, not that. Maybe it was the thick ass lines of anxiety I was snorting? Not that either. What the fuck ruined me in 9^th grade? I still don’t know what it was to this day. Despite how I was acting around to my peers, I spent the entire year slowly crumbling on the inside. I became addicted to World of Warcraft, and spent a vast majority of my time on there, because well, life’s easier online. Can’t you tell? You are after all, reading about my life online. 9^th grade began my descent into true depression. I alienated myself form half of the friends I made in 8^th grade, I was a dick to the good friends I had, I was just becoming this distant person, I stopped living in the real world, and began a life on the internet. By the time 10^th grade came around, I don’t remember much, outside of each day dragging. The anxiety was gone, but the depression was here to stay. Each day was like slogging through a quicksand that constantly followed and surrounded me, dragging me down to its depths with each passing moment. I am almost certain that to a vast majority of the people in my life, I seemed fine. I am the best and acting normal, but really I’m not. I slept through high school, read comics during, or daydreamed myself out of it. One night in like March or something, I was up late venting to my Mom. Something in my life was wrong. Something was so very fucking wrong, and I didn’t know what it was. I asked her if a doctor was supposed to have you undress in their office, their personal office, a psychiatrist’s office. I asked her a few more questions around the events that transpired with that doctor, and the molestation. Those events I had hid from myself for three years became a reality. I was a victim of molestation now at age 15, the years prior I was as well, but I had disassociated the events so heavily that I hid them from myself entirely. I somehow decided I needed to move back in with my mom. I had sunken into a deep depression at my Dads house. I always feared he thought it was him, that he was the reason for me feeling that way I felt, which was never the case. Something was wrong with me internally, I wasn’t okay, I wasn’t whole, and hadn’t been for some time. The root of all my problems, my anxiety, depression, lashing out at others, it was all part of the seed planted by the psychiatrist. I’ve written a few short stories about him and that incident. I think I’ve even written a script and a couple film treatments. The characters are always Thom Trout and Doctor Fisherman. Anyway, I told my mom about the doctor, I remembered roughly what happened with the doctor, the puzzle pieces finally showed up on the table and began to fall into place. I then lived Spotlight to some degree. I had to talk to the police and lawyers, and it turns out, there were twelve other boys that had been molested by this doctor as well, but they were too unstable have a valid testimony. I was the puzzle piece that would help spell out a giant fuck you to this doctor. I was patient B in the court case. I along with several others helped get his medical license revoked, and subsequently ruined his life as he knew it. Looking back I wish I pursued further action, but I’ve made my peace with those events, to some degree. So again I moved. Now going back from my dad’s to my moms. Being the new kid, who was kind of the old kid, but still new? Everyone knew me as Emily’s boyfriend. What a swell title that was. I don’t know which high school I hated more, but I came into my own at Dulaney. I forgot to mention that in middle school I saw two therapists, Mrs. Suzanne for a second outing, and one guy who literally told me nothing was wrong with me. He claimed I was making things up for attention, little did he know, there was much more at play inside me, brewing deep within. Now in 10^th grade I went to therapy for the fourth time to see my boy Bernie. Bernie was an ex hippie, turned priest, turned monk, turned social worker. He was chill as fuck, and brought mindfulness into my world, and helped me begin meditation. I saw him for the remainder of high school and into my college years. In 11^th grade I discovered 4chan, and the fun ability to troll on facebook. I was basically a raging fucking asshole. I’d start fights online with people, just too then give them my address and tell them to come fight me. I knew no one would ever step up to the plate and actually come for me, but I still put out the offer. I was just a toxic little asshole. I was angry at the world. I was lost, and scared. I was alone. No one really ever helped me deal with being molested. I was kind of just left to my own devices. So I looked around me, saw a shovel, and started digging myself a big hole, because all this shit that I had around me had to go somewhere, and I wanted to go with it.

Everything that’s gone wrong in my life is to some degree, my fault. Yes, there are clearly some variables at play that, are in no way my fault, but my reaction to them is my fault. It’s not my fault that the adults around me left me to my own devices to deal with something as daunting as molestation. It’s not my fault that I was molested. It’s not my fault that I have a chemical imbalance. It is however my fault that I’ve been dug myself into holes for years, and then cried victim until my lungs gave out. It’s my fault for not doing more on my end. It’s my fault for turning to the wrong things to take away my pain. Kind of don’t want to quote that Heroin Kills video we all watched in high school, having never touched the stuff, but one element of the video sticks out to me at this time “I DID THIS TO ME”. I alone reacted to my reality the way I did, and handled it as poorly as I did. Looking back now, I don’t except myself to have handled it any other way, but with the gift of hindsight, I can see where I went wrong, and I can mend the wounds I and others have inflicted. I never had much to gripe about in my childhood. Yeah there was heartbreak, loss of friends, anxiety, and even molestation, but for the most part, I was really fortunate to have a solid upbringing.

                Typing this out now, I feel like my actions and feelings as a teenager were moderately unwarranted. I don’t think I went through enough to warrant being as sad and anxious as I was, I don’t think I had the right to be as big of a dick as I was. I don’t think I had it as hard as I thought I did as a kid. I always thought I had it hard growing up, but I didn’t. I had one major event, followed by rippling side effects, and that was about it. Everything else, everyone went through. We all hated high school. We were all anxious. We all had teenage heartbreak and friend loss. None of us really knew that we were truly in control of our reality, but we were. I’m sorry if I hurt you when I was younger, or took too much from you as a kid. This post wasn’t what I thought it would be, and still isn’t as detailed as I’d like it to be, but I think for now, it’ll do.

THREE

Cause and Effect

the best often die by their own hand
just to get away,
and those left behind
can never quite understand
why anybody
would ever want to
get away
from
them

 

 

It was late October, maybe early November. I wasn’t really taking my meds and I wasn’t minding my substance use. I was inhaling caffeine and stimulants in fast amounts and coming down hard on the regular. After months of this, and years of an intense depression, I snapped. I was at work, playing out a normal day, everything seemed fine. I asked a coworker if he was always tired, his response wasn’t what I wanted to hear. It left me to ruminate on my self-hatred, and my overwhelming feelings of displeasure towards life. I walked out of work, and proceeded to go to my girlfriends to get my things from her place, then go home and sleep the pain away. I got in an argument with her when I arrived; I beat my head with my fists in contained anger. I left her place in a worse place than I had entered. On the drive home, I took a backseat to my life. Something took the wheel and started driving, and it wasn’t me. Time halted, and I was stuck in 11:30am for the next few days. My depression drove me home. He guided me to my closet, dressed me in my favorite attire. A hollow squad long sleeve, and olive canvas twill pants, with stance sugar skull socks. He sat me down in my chair, gathered all of my medication in front of me, and then whispered something in my ear. What he said to me, I don’t remember, but he picked my hands up and used them to open up the lithium bottle, then the zyprexa, the lamictal, the  abilify, and then urged me to take as many as I could. I watched as he spoon fed me a handful of little orange pills that read 221 on one side. I began to swallow pills until I was just throwing them up, and then picking them out, and swallowing them again. I don’t know how many I swallowed, but it was enough to make me comatose. Between my freaked out girlfriend, and worried coworker, my mom reached me just as I slipped into a coma. I actually was able to stumble into an ambulance, lay down, and answer a few question, before ultimately slipping into a sound comatose sleep. The next thing I remember was waking up screaming, six people holding me down as I struggled, and one unlucky doctor struggling to shove a catheter up my dick. He was successful , and I passed out again, waking up hours later in a hospital bed, now learning that I had to live with the fact that I was unsuccessful at killing myself.

For a long time, like all of 2016, I was just waiting. I was waiting for my suicide gate to lift, waiting for my chance to feel ready to give it another shot, to successfully take my life. I was angry with myself for not being able to successfully kill myself. How was I so shitty at everything, that I couldn’t even successfully kill myself? I spent all last year trying to push myself over the edge, to reach into the depths of my depression, and pull from it, another attempt. I hid this from everyone. On the outside, I was fine, a little sleepy, but I just appeared lazy. I was wasting my life away, waiting for the next moment. I told myself when I was like 18, that I didn’t want to live past 23. Ever since I was 19, my life has been a long fucking streak of just depression and low level substance abuse. I’ve been miserable as fuck. I never wanted to live this long, and I had plans to ensure that I would succeed at my goal to not live to see 23. After surviving my suicide, after living out most of 2016, I am finally ready to live. I am so ready to live. I want to pick my shattered plate, my plate that’s full of all my fucking functions, and put the pieces back together, one by one, and live. I’m really trying to avoid just droning on being suicidal and depressed, because I am not in a good place right now, and being suicidal is too easy to slip back into. It is a self conclusion in one simplified motion. We have no choice in whether or not we want to live, but we do have the choice to die. I am philosophically inclined to accept suicide as a logical aspect of life. We had no choice in existence, so it only makes sense that we would want to control when we wish to give it up. I don’t think I will ever escape daydreaming about suicide entirely, or that I will never think about it again, but for the time being, I just want to live. I want to leave my Michigan pit, and get back to life. I want to live the life I’ve always wanted to live. I want to be free of my mental setbacks, and the hiccups I’ve encountered along the way. I may live with the idea of suicide for the rest of my life, but that doesn’t mean I have to let it ever dictate any aspect of my life ever again. Never again will  I give the reigns of an entire year over to it, and allow it to drag me down to the fucking pits. At the top is a Bukowski poem someone once showed me. I always think I have it figured out, until I read it again after a long while. No one understands suicide, because it’s a personal venture, that is personalized to each individual that undergoes its experience, both living and dead. You can fantasize about suicide all day, and not be suicidal, and you can be fine and happy one moment, and the next want to die. There are no rules to this game. Everything is personal, and entirely up to the person living. No one will ever understand why I wanted to leave a family that loves me, friends that love me, coworkers that care for me, and a life ahead of me ripe with potential, no one but me will know why none of that was appealing to me. I’ve been through a lot in life that is my fault, and a lot that isn’t, and I wanted control, and the power to end it all, in one fell swoop. I remember telling my step sister about my attempt, and she said something along the lines of “Why would you ever not want to see your beautiful niece grow up”, and I just thought to myself, “No one ever entered my mind”. Suicide is an entirely selfish act, and anyone who says otherwise is wrong. When I was ready to die, when I was swallowing all those pills, I was only thinking about myself, about my pain, about what I’d been through. I never once stopped to think about anyone else at all. Looking back on it now, the idea of not being selfish has been the only thing that has stopped me from doing it again. In 2016 , I found myself with a bed sheet tied around my neck, and hung a top the corner of the door. Before I took anything further, I just sat, and thought. I thought about everyone. I thought about how everyone would handle this. What would happen to my family, my friends, my girlfriend? I knew it wasn’t going to be a full attempt, because I was too present in the moment. I wasn’t being selfish in its entirety. I untied myself, and lay on the floor crying for a while instead.. Thinking about everyone else, something I hadn’t done before, and it helped, sadly. There were times I’ve harbored anger towards people in my life for loving me, because I knew they were keeping me from killing myself. Looking back now, with 20/20 hindsight, I am truly grateful for them, because if I didn’t have the love of all the people that feel it for me, I would certainly not be here typing this up today. There’s this song called Selfish by this band Daylight and the chorus is “Only reason I’m still alive, can’t stand to ‘see my mother cry, I’ll suffer through, only reason I’m still alive, can’t stand the tears in her eyes, I’ll suffer through”. I used to yell the lyrics in my car, I’d yell them until my voice went hoarse. As fucking corny as it is, old daylight and title fight helped me a lot. I released a lot of repressed emotions in my car to the tune of their music. Nothing feels better then being physically tired from yelling along to melodic hardcore music in your car, where no one but you can hear you.

 

If you’re feeling depressed or suicidal, talk to someone, tell someone, don’t hold it in, and don’t follow through with it. Someone is literally always there, whether you realize it or not, someone is always there.

 

 

 

Good Music for sad people

Title Fight - Shed
                                         Floral Green

Daylight – Sinking
                              Jar
                              The Difference in Good and Bad Dreams
                              Dispirit

Lil Ugly Mane – Oblivion Access

 

 

FourFOUR4

"Often the reason that people go from neurosis into psychosis is that they see that spaciousness and synchronistic situation and how vast things are and how the world actually works, but then they cling to their insight and they become completely caught there. It has been said, quite accurately, that a psychotic person is drowning in the very same things that a mystic swims in."
— Pema Chodron ~ The Wisdom of No Escape ~ p. 76


Emerald Chicken

Are we the sum of our memories? I suspect a happy man, or at least someone who is content, would say not. Personally, I think I have become the result of my past. A series of events I've deemed shitty have become what rules me, at least to some extent. I live in my past shit that’s happened to me. From event with the doctor, struggles of being a kid and the heartbreak that comes with it, mania, psychosis, suicidal ideation, and really just anything negative I’ve gone through. I think I truly have let my past dictate my present, and ultimately, my future. I actually just spent like an hour talking to one of my best friends. I kind of talked myself in circles, but I kept insisting that I needed to talk about my past. That answers lie somewhere in my past. A key is somewhere hidden in my past, a key to the door of the future. That is to some degree, most degrees, bullshit, but I’m still not over the thought. I’ve been through so much random shit in my life, and after having a psychotic break, I feel like some elements of my past deserve to be combed for answers, but what answers? What the fuck am I looking for? What the fuck do I expect to find in my past? I think I’m looking for closure of some sort. When I was manic, I thought I was reaching enlightenment, that enlightenment was a tunnel, and at the end of the tunnel was light, and I was inches away from the end of the tunnel; constantly walking towards the light. I thought I was ready to shed my former self, to free myself from the shackles I’d bound myself in and become the self loving person I’d always wanted to be. Whether or not any of that is true, I wouldn’t know, I had broken away from reality at that point. Shortly after coming to this idea of enlightenment, I was hospitalized for a psychotic break, so to some, those were just manic musings. However, to me, I honestly believe I was at a point in life where I was able to start over and love myself. I am currently pretty damn convinced that if I relive those events in therapy that I will somehow remember what I used to think and feel about being free of my past, and I will magically be able to be happy, or at least allow myself to love me. That was kind of a leap. Let me explain. I was convinced I’d understood enlightenment. I wholeheartedly believe that was just basically a result of the mania. I do however believe that the thoughts and feelings leading up to that are attainable without the mania. I am thoroughly convinced that through reliving the events of my past, primarily what happened between the ages of 19 and 20, with a dash of some prior childhood events, I will be able to let go of my past, and finally be able to love myself for who I am, radically accepting myself. Is that a ridiculous thing to think? Am I chasing ghosts? I very well may be, but for the time being I think I am going to continue chasing them. I can see the revelation of beginning to accept myself, just barely, in those manic posts. Sure, there is a fuck ton of hatred in those posts, but if you look closely, I think I could see some semblance of self love. Maybe I’m delusional, I don’t know, my only goal currently is to love myself; to learn consistent self affirmation. When I was 19, I was ready to die. I had a near death experience with a coworker, I had PTSD, agoraphobia, panic attacks, mania, psychosis, I went through a lot and through all of it I was broken down to my most basic functions of existence. Through everything, the thing that stuck out the most, I just wanted to be myself; to unabashedly be myself, bells and whistles included. I don’t think I’m going to chase these ghosts in me free time, but I think at least for a few therapy sessions I’m going to continue chasing them. They’re like a bad itch that I can’t help but scratch, each stroke hoping the bother will fade away, but I doubt it ever will. I think I’m searching for a closure I never really will get. I don’t know. I just went through a lot, and in the end, lost my mind in the process. I had a goal when I went into construction. No one knows about it really except for me, and maybe my girlfriend. I wanted to break myself down. I wanted to see how much stress I could take before I snapped. I wanted to prepare myself, because afterwards, I was going to leave my life behind, and go the route of Alexander Supertramp. That was my pipe dream at nineteen. To tramp and lead a life totally unshackled by anything. I broke myself down, and as a sick punishment, became so shackled to society that I doubt I’ll ever live a life free of medication and shackles of some sort. I can think of a few reasons why I deserve this punishment, but that’s all in the past. I did this to me, in every possible way. I think there are a few answers to questions I have, buried deep within my nineteenth and twentieth year, whether or not I get those answers remains to be seen. All I can do now is progress forward. Up until this point, and in therapy, I will have lead a life where I am the sum of my past memories. As for the future, my life will be just that. The future; forward ever, backwards never.

 

 

Homeward Bound

                I’m sitting here annoyed as fuck, listening to the Suicideyear boiler room set on youtube. One of my housemates pisses me the fuck off. They’re rude, crude, inconsiderate, immature, annoying, and just the fucking worst. They came into my room today, and reminded me of something. Through all my hospitalizations, and ventures into institutions of sorts, one thing that’s always been mine, has been my room.. Stay the fuck out of my room. It is my fucking zone, and it is the one place I can go to hide. Even at home too I guess, my room is always my oasis, but especially when my home is away from home. When I was in Pratt for the first time, one of the literal first things I did was manically decorating my little baron room. The room consisted of a bed basically nailed to the floor, a dresser made of  wood, and a bathroom. No handles or door knobs on the doors and dresser. In the bathroom I had a shower right next to my toilet. I had to press a button that would release water in a piss poor pour for thirty seconds before shutting off. There was no furniture, and the glass on the window was thick as fuck. The room was basically suicide proof. I think if I really wanted to try and kill myself in a room at Pratt, I would have to use bed sheets and the corner of a door, and even then, the whole being watched constantly thing kind of ruins that. I’ve spent a little over a month in rooms like these at Pratt. Suicide proof hotel suits for the damned and suicidally wicked is what it was like. Back on topic though, the first thing I did, stepping foot into the young adult wing of Shepherd Pratts crisis unit was decorate. I ran to the crafts area and grabbed the biggest paper I could find, some crayons, and I made some posters. The paper on the inside of my door read “BASED IS HOW YOU FEEL INSIDE, HOWEVER YOU DO IT, STAY CREATIVE”, now I’m sure that’s a Lil B quote, but I took it from the intro to Based is How You Feel inside Badbadnotgood track. On the front of the door I taped a piece of paper up that said “I’m not like them, but I can pretend, I think I’m just happy”, I thought I was faking my mental illness if I’m being honest, it was a weird time. My point is, the first thing I did when I lost my home, was make a new one. I made one in the most unlikely of places. Every time I’ve gone back, I’ve decorated my room with quotes, magazine pages, and drawings. I spent a good three days there, my second term, ripping out pages of gorgeous women in Vogue, Elle, Harper’s Bazare to make a portfolio of hot girls; I would later just hang them up on my wall, and no, there was no ulterior motive behind that. I just wanted something appealing to look at. My third term in Pratt, I added onto that idea. I had quotes up, girls, and then basically anything from the magazines that was aesthetically pleasing. I made Pratt my home for the time being, and whenever someone fucked with my home, I lost control. The first term I was there, this big ex ballplayer was there with me. I don’t remember his name, probably for the best, but he was so far gone from reality that he was a scary and unpredictable dude. He had threatened me one night, and approached me in this really weird threatening manner, it was weird as fuck.  Another night during group, he started going around to everyone’s room, stealing little things from them, and keping them in a shopping bag. He stole all my posters and quotes, and wore my Diggs wrestling sweatshirt around. I was sitting in the  group room, and I just see the words “Diggs” walk by from the other side of the windows, just outside of the room. I fucking lost it. I thought my reality was breaking down. I didn’t understand how I was there in the room, and my shit was out there. I started beating the ground and crying, I just snapped. I ran out of the room at started yelling something, I forget at this point, but I remember being on the floor in front of the med station, just crying and hitting the soft paneled floor with my fists. I got all my shit back and went back to my room and just cried. My shit was invaded. The one space I had left to claim as mine wasn’t really mine. This place wasn’t a permanance. Everything else of mine had been taken away from me. All I had left attached to my life was whatever was in the room, and whatever I made it. This sounds kind of bitchmade, but when you are institutionalized, life changes. You’re broken down, and essentially are treated like a child. I am super attached to whatever room I sleep in for long periods of time, or places I consider home, and the first door on the left, of the left hand side of the young adult wing was mine, for two weeks. Anyone who fucked with it, fucked with me and my mindset.  I had attached myself to this room, to this place that was just temporary, Through all my ventures into institutions, and living in rooms that weren’t mine, I’ve grown a little too attached to things that aren’t mine, and things that are just temporary. I don’t really know where to take this thought if I’m being honest.

                So I set out to write this post all about how, when I go to places to get help, I get really attached to the rooms I stay in. Through writing this, I realized that I get overly attached to something that isn’t a permanent variable. My room could be change at the drop of a hat. I could have many different rooms in just one stay. Fuck dude, I actually had two rooms in one stay at Pratt. How the fuck did I forget that. I said some unsavory things about my roommate, and it scared staff, and they moved me somewhere else. I think the point of this post is for me to realize, that no matter where I go, I bring home with me. I bring everything with me, and maybe that’s not always the best thing. When I went to Pratt, I made myself at home, a little bit too much at home after a certain point, I got so attached to a room, that I fucking freaked out when someone else walked into it. I got so attached to a room here in Michigan that I lock my door at all times because I’m paranoid someone’s going to come in and do something. Maybe that’s okay though, some people aren’t to be trusted. I digress; Home is where you make it. You can make anywhere your home, and you can bring your problems anywhere you go. Moving doesn’t mean your problems go away, they follow you until you solve them, that’s why they’re a problem. I’ve made my home in places where some people would be unable to. My home right now is in some group home in Michigan. I live upstairs in the coldest room in the house. I have a Donnie Darko poster on the wall, a Tetsuo shrine, a bulletin board full of shit, and little quotes everywhere. I can make myself at home wherever I’m at, but can I solve my problems wherever I’m at? I’ve been unable to solve them at home, maybe I’ll be able to solve some here.

                The Suicideyear set just got to a remix of Slipknot’s Left Behind, and I think that’s a fitting place to end this post on. As fucking fruity as that shit is, I’m going to leave behind all the negative shit I intended to harp this post on, and instead take something positive out of this. Home is where you make it, and you can’t leave behind your problems when you go somewhere new. Fuck this feels like it doesn’t connect at all, but I don’t think I give a shit at this point, I’m just glad I wrote something. My Google calendar says I was supposed to be reading for the past hour, but I’ll settle for writing this jumbled mess instead. Seriously though, my housemate is an asshole.

 

Linkin Park

When I was about ten or eleven I discovered Linkin Park. I remember seeing the video for One Step Closer and thinking, holy fuck; I want more of this in my life. I was in the kitchen at my dad’s house when I first was introduced to them and the video for One Step Closer. It was on MTV 2 or whatever channel Fuse used to be. It was mid day and I was just killing time in the kitchen, eating and watching music videos. I sat on a stool in the kitchen, and when the video came on, I became curious as fuck. The TV was this little old white box, and as soon as the video started, I was hooked. The video opens up with a bunch of would be punks walking down some random alley, where they stumble upon Linkin Park, and then One Step Closer begins to play. The video was not only sonically pleasing as fuck to my tween angst, but the ninjas, early 00’s aesthetic, and just pure edge of the band was overwhelmingly appealing to me. I had to fucking have whatever album this song was on.  I was at target with my mom when I first saw Hybrid Theory on the shelves; the album One Step Closer was on, and their only album at the time. I tried to get my mom to buy it for me, but she took one look at it and the title of the tracks on the back and decided it was too inappropriate for a kid my age. I went to my dad’s house later that week and obviously get him to buy it for me. Finally I had Linkin Park’s first album, the one with One Step Closer on it. I remember sitting in the living room downstairs at my dad’s house, sitting in front of the fireless fire place, CD player in front of me and Linkin Park quietly playing through the speakers. Papercut was the first track on the album. I remember listening to it and thinking, holy fuck this is so dark. I felt like a bad kid just listening to something so heavy and dark. A door opened up in my life, a door that had never existed before that point in time. I had finally found a source of music that made me feel a certain way. I was too young at the time to understand why the sound and lyrics of Linkin Park sat so well with me, but from Papercut to Pushing Me Away, I was a fucking fan of Linkin Park. It helped me process feelings I had never realized I needed to process. I would spend a lot of time alone in my room just endlessly listening to Hybrid Theory. I know all of the words to most of Hybrid Theory. Linkin Park was the first band to strike a chord within my angsty little kid self that would echo throughout the years to come. As I got older, my love for them just grew. Meteora would come out a few years later, and somehow was just as good as Hybrid Theory. Linkin Park is really basic lyrically, both in rapping and normal vocals. There isn’t any deep sub-textual meaning to their early stuff, but that was the appeal to me. Everything was so easy for me to grasp as a kid, so easy for me to relate to as a kid, and eventually as an adult. Meteora and Hybrid Theory are on my top ten albums of all time. I discovered them as a tween/teen and fell in love instantly. It was the perfect blend of catchy, but hard music, while still managing to be relatable and digestible for someone as simple as me at the time. As I grew older, I could see why people hated them for being “edgy”, but fuck that. They helped me a lot as a kid. They said things that I didn’t know how to say as a kid, and as an adult they helped me brush some dirt off my shoulder. I spent the first few months here in Michigan running to the first like 6 tracks of Meteora. Their music is simple, but that’s the best part of it. Anyone who’s ever had any sort of mental issue can easily relate to their music. Learning what I learned today about Chester’s life, I understand why Linkin Park was the way it was in the beginning. He was molested and abused pretty heavily as a kid, he was heavily addicted to drugs, and just had a really bad life for a while, and the creative result of that was basically Hybrid Theory, Meteora, and Minutes to Midnight. As he moved on from all the dark shit in his life, Linkin Park “sold out” and became the unappealing poppy indie shit that it is today. I don’t like their new stuff, its just not appealing to me in any way. Their first three albums will always hold a special place in my heart, the first two especially. Listening to them now, I can still relate very heavily, as I’m currently in the midst of a crisis of being myself, and thus feel the feels. What really hits hard about his suicide was the fact that like me, he was molested, he struggled with substance abuse, and depression. Yet on top of all that shit, he had millions of dollars, a wife, multiple kids, and a career where he could be creative for a living, but that wasn’t enough. If he could justify killing himself, when he had all that going for him, what keeps me going? I share a few life struggles with him, and I’ve survived a suicide attempt,. Why am I willing to live, despite not being a millionaire, husband, father, musician, and a beloved figure, yet he wanted to die? I feel like I said that in a confusing way. He had so much going for him that I don’t and he still killed himself. Everything in life truly is relative. This man helped me throughout my childhood unknowingly, and his music continues to do so, yet life wasn’t enough for him. It truly does show you that everything in life is relative, and you don’t know what those around you are going through. What I am taking away from all of this is, love everyone, because you never know who needs it. Some people hide their struggles; some people are at their ends wit without you even being aware. When I tried to kill myself, I went to work that day, I was acting pretty normal, and I just snapped. I walked out of work, and quite literally went home and attempted suicide, pretty much out of nowhere. No one can stop someone from doing this, not if they truly have their mind set on it, but you can help prevent it. Listen to the people around you. Don’t listen to respond, really listen to people.  Don’t be selfish, love thy neighbor, we’re all in this fucking shitty ass world together. None of us know what the fuck is going on or what comes next. I’m tired and not articulate enough as a writer to truly put into words how much I love Linkin Park. Chester Bennington’s death is the first celebrity death that I’ve cared about. I listen to music for lyrics, and then instruments or beats. His lyrics hit home with me and being able to put meaning to the source of them just add more attachment for me. I don’t think he could have died in a worse way. Rest in peace dude, this is corny as fuck, but your music meant a lot to me, and still does.

 

“To quote one of my favorite Linkin Park Songs

“I want to heal,
I want to feel,
What I thought was never real
I want to let go of the pain I felt 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”

 

Relatable

Dumb

What direction am I to take with my life after I return home? I think I’ll go back to my old job, see an old friend or two, but for the most part, I’ll lead an entirely different life. Will I go back to, and finally finish school? Will I work a 40 hour week and look for a full time job, and finally fucking move out of Mommies house? I’m not skilled in any in aspect of art. I’ve been told that I’m a good writer, I have an eye for pictures, and that I can edit a video quite well. All of those compliments have been nice, but all of my art has basically happened on accident for the most part, if I’m being honest. I have never put forth much effort into any one area in my life, other than running away. I’ve spent countless hours either sleeping, playing video games, watching movies, getting fucked up, and basically doing what I can to avoid living life. Living life just means fucking doing something. Learning a hobby, learning to fucking do something. Starting out sucking ass at whatever task it is at hand, and over time growing as a person, as I guess a hobbyist or whatever, and learning as you go. I think when I get home I will try my hand at living. I’m kind of trying my hand at it now. I’m drawing at least once a week, even if it is just these stupid little cubed robots I call Bum Bots. I write a blog post every now and then, sometimes I post ones I like better than others. Eventually when I stop being a fruitcake I’ll get around to teaching myself fruityloops, and ideally make some form of music, god only knows what the fuck I’d want to make my own music sound like. I thought that when I finally returned home, I was hoping to lock myself in my friend’s house, and force ourselves to brainstorm some sort of creative ideas for us to work together on. I found out recently that he may be going to live across the country before I even get home. That kind of sucks, I spent my years running away from living life with him, and missed tons of opportunities for us to work creatively together, and now it’s up to me to do shit on my own. I think that’s honestly for the best though. I need to learn to grow the fuck up and do things like a fucking adult. Start something, and see it through, bruises and scuffs all present. For now I’m making shitty photoshopped images on paint, drawing fucking robots, and writing weirdly personal blog posts. For now that may be enough. I’ll naturally grow from here, into new things and new avenues. Soon I’ll be making shitty music on top of all the other stupid shit I’m doing, and ideally after a few weeks, months, or years, I’ll get good at doing something I enjoy. When I get home from this Michigan pit of wellness, I’m going to revamp my old life with the vitality I’ve gained the past few months. I’m going to find a way to live a life I’m cool with, while still being able to grow as a person constantly. As long as I’m living life,(which for me is being creative in some way) and can support myself and live healthily, I think I’ll be fine with whatever happens after I get home. I don’t know the exact directions my life is going to go after I return home, but I know it will be a healthier one, and a more creative one.

Sleep Apnea

 

                I have a weird relationship with sleep. Have you ever had sleep paralysis? I first had it in when I lived in the Dodworth apartments with my mom. I remember being trapped on my stomach in my room, and someone in all black, face included, was watching me in the doorway. I couldn’t move, I was asleep, but I was somehow awake. I could see myself laying on the bed, face down, unable to move. I could feel a presence behind me, I couldn’t see it, but somehow I knew it was there, dressed in all black. I thought I was being robbed. I couldn’t move. I remember paranoia drowning me, I remember struggling, thrashing wildly, trying to break free. I couldn’t move. I was trapped on my stomach in my room while someone watched me from the doorway. That was my first experience with sleep paralysis.  I eventually kind of just woke up, and was like… whoa… what the fuck. Waking up from sleep paralysis is like being forced into a bathtub and freezing cold water. It’s just like a total system shock, and it takes your breath away. For a few moments following waking up, you’re just taken aback; kind of blown away by what the fuck just happened. I didn’t know what happened until it started happening a lot more years later. I have a weird relationship with sleep.

                I started getting sleep paralysis all the time whenever I would sleep over my girlfriends. I think it had something to do with my sleep apnea and pre-bed throught process, I don’t know for sure. I would just kind of wake up and be unable to move, but I was able to see a blurry reality around be. I would always struggle to move, but as I struggled the world around me would sort IT of stutter. There was almost always some sort of being present. I couldn’t always see IT, but I could feel IT. IT felt like some sort of unknown figure reaching out, feeling Its way up your arm, from wrist to elbow. IT was reaching for something more than what my body had to offer. Whatever the fuck IT was, IT always felt malicious. I was almost always afraid when I would wake up when I was asleep. I would struggle in bed next to my girlfriend. I’d try shaking my body, flailing my limbs to try and hit her, yelling as loud as I could, I just needed her to wake me up whenever I was having sleep paralysis. I need to be woken up. Something has to fucking save me. Something was always in the room with me while I was asleep, and IT didn’t feel good. In the end, I never woke her up.  Though, in all my thrashing and screaming, I would eventually wake myself up, gasping for air, happy that it was over. I don’t think I’m articulate enough to describe the fear one feels from the being present in sleep paralysis. I think the best thing I can describe it as is IT. IT does not want to do anything good for you and IT does nothing but make you feel as much fear as you can possibly feel, as your trapped in a room paralyzed with IT. I’ve been able to break free from the paralysis a few times, and turned it into a lucid dream probably  three or four times. I can’t sustain lucid dreams long at all, even when I slip right into one outside of paralysis. When I break free from the paralysis and start lucid dreaming, IT has quite literally come for me, more than once. One night in particular stands out to me. I had just gotten out of the hospital, and was dreaming. I was having sleep paralysis, and I was at home at my mom’s when it happened. I broke free from the dream and thought I woke up as a result. I was afraid, IT scared the fuck out of me, and I had a tendency to wake up from a dream in a dream. I know all of this sounds really farfetched, but I have a weird relationship with sleep. Anyway, I woke up from sleep paralysis into a dream, and I woke up from that dream into another dream, and this happened like three times, and finally I thought I woke up for good, and was like HOLY FUCK, I NEED TO KNOW WHATS REAL. So I got up out of bed, walked towards my mom’s room, and started banging on the door, crying, begging for help. I needed her to confirm I was awake, that this was real life, right here, right now. She opened the door and started belittling me. She was saying I was making everything up, and that I just needed to go back to bed. I remembered hearing all that and thought to myself, something doesn’t make sense. While my mom was talking to my I started to look at the world around me. Everything was suddenly much brighter than it should’ve been .The world started to stutter and melt around me, I woke up gasping for air. I was still fucking dreaming. I had to fucking talk to someone in real life. I needed to know what was real at this point. I had gone through like four layers of bullshit dreaming, and I was scared. I got out of bed and walked into the hallway to go to my mom’s room again. The hallway was dark, and the only light was coming from my CPAP; a little blue light behind me in my room. I got maybe halfway to my mom’s room, when all of a sudden; something from the darkness behind me grabbed me by both legs and dragged me backwards into the darkness of my room. IT dragged me towards the little blue light of my CPAP. IT said something to me, but I can’t remember anymore. Mind you I was lucid dreaming this entire time. I was awake and alert, and I fucking lived that shit. I have never been more scare din my entire god damn life. I finally woke up, and fuck getting out of bed at that point, I fucking called my mom on the phone and made her come into my room. She came into my room and talked to me for a little bit. I was done dreaming, and after like thirty minutes of talking my mom had calmed me down. I don’t have sleep paralysis anymore. I don’t know why it’s gone away, but after I stopped fantasizing about some dark shit before bed, it kind of just disappeared. I do however have really elaborate big budget dreams,  weird small scale dreams, I have lots of dreams.

 

 

                I have a weird relationship with sleep. Right now it’s the dictating factor on whether or not I have a good day. I have no conscious control over the amount of real sleep I get sometimes. For the most part I’m in bed every night before twelve, and I wake up around eight or nine every day. I almost always get between nine and ten hours of sleep a day, but that’s not the issue. I can knock myself out for eight, nine, or ten hours a night, and still not get enough sleep. I have sleep apnea, so even when I’m sleeping, I’m not always sleeping. Instead of sleeping, I’m constantly waking myself up multiple times a minute, but I’m almost never aware of this. Every now and then I wake up a few times throughout the night, but I just assume that’s normal. I never stop to think that anything deeper is wrong. For the past like month and a half, I’ve been depressed as fuck. I had my meds increased, I’ve been in therapy, I’ve being doing DBT, and I’ve been doing everything that should equate to some semblance of feeling content. Everything was going right on the surface, but something wasn’t right beneath it. I just wasn’t sleeping at night. I have severe sleep apnea, and every night when I’m ready to go to sleep, I have to strap myself into a fucking mask connected to a machine. I seriously look like a less masculine version of Bane, the Batman villain. The mask feeds air into my mouth/nose while I sleep so that when I snore (struggle to breath) air gets forced down my throat to open the passage so I can breath, because when you stop breathing in your sleep, your brain wakes you up. My apneas are severe, so I wake up multiple times a minute at the peak of my, I don’t know, apneas? I don’t know much about it to be honest, but I know I have a severe case, and that when I got tested, the longest I went without breathing in my sleep was about a minute and some change; shits scary to know that you can go a minute of not breathing in your sleep and not even know about it. I almost never know when I have issues when I’m sleeping. Like I said, sometimes I wake up at night, but I usually chalk that up to too much coffee or something. I have a weird relationship with sleep. My CPAP has been fucked up lately. It’s been off its rocker the past month and a half, and I don’t think I’ve been getting good sleep at night, and as a result I’ve been having a shitty fucking time. I’m going to go to sleep tonight and hope that my CPAP does its job, and that I wake up tomorrow feeling rested. I think my tinkering with it two days ago, fixed whatever has been wrong the past few months, but I’m worried it won’t work. I go to sleep not knowing if I’ll wake up feeling good or bad. My day tomorrow is going to be dictating by events that go on tonight that I literally have no control over. All I can do is wait until I see the doctor and have my machine adjusted. The past two days have been wonderful. I’ve tinkered with the settings, and I’ve had two days of just happiness, and I’m almost certain it’s because I fixed the machine. I still have this shadow of doubt, that somehow it could all go wrong throughout the night. I go to bed tonight with only the best in mind. Sleep is the final piece in this stupid ass puzzle of my happiness, or at least some form of sustainable contentment.

I have a weird relationship with sleep. It is my savior, and my downfall. I have spent months in bed depressed, waiting for my life to end at any moment. Going to bed each night, hoping that this will be the last time I have to go to bed. That this will be the last time I put the god damn CPAP on. I have spent time hating the idea of sleep, manically desperate for some activity to keep my awake. Sleep is everything and nothing, and in the end it’s all about moderation. I look forward to sleep tonight. I look forward to whatever adventure it takes me on for the eight to nine hours of time I give it. I hope that I don’t have too many apneas, and that tomorrow brings another good day, and that my weird relationship with sleep comes to a close. This post only scratches the surface of the type of shit I’ve dealt with over sleep. I have a weird relationship with sleep

While you’re Back Home

where am i

 

I want to hang myself naked upside down. I’ll hang by each one of my toes; hooks in each toes from descending order by size, big ones first. I’ll surely slide out of the hooks and on onto the floor because I'm too heavy to hold my weight on such small hooks. When my body hits the floor, I'll curl up into a ball, but only for a second. After that second, I'll get up. I'll get up and start yelling. I'll yell until my voice goes a mile past hoarse. I'll yell until my throat starts to bleed, and the blood starts to gurgle as I continue yelling. I want the blood to fill my throat as I yell. I won't let any of it out. I'll hold it all in. A throat full of vibrations and blood, just pulsing. I want my face to burst like a cherry. Throat still vibrating, blood still pulsing, I want to explode. My head  will explode. My eyes will burst out of my skulls first. They'll hit the walls, bouncing off and landing on the floor next to my destroyed toes. My teeth will pop out next. Each one popping like a kernel; bouncing off the room like unloaded bullets lit on fire. My nose will pelt forward, straight into the wall, where it slowly falls down; soaking in the scent of wet concrete. My ears will burst horizontally from my skull, smashing into a door and a shelf. I can't hear anything over the echoes of my gurgled yelling. After each of my my features bursts off my being, only then will my entire face stop echoing yells, and totally erupt. What's left of my face will cave in on itself, sending blood upward; like that scene in The Nightmare on Elm Street with Johnny Depp. It’ll rain down on my limp body because instead of letting shit out, I held it in for a little bit too long. My fucking head will fucking explode and my toes will be ripped to shreds.

 

where am I?

is my state manic?

is my state depressed?

is my state leveled?

is my state unhinged?

am i in the state of maryland?

am i in the state of michigan?

what state am i in?

if i could get in a car and drive for hours i would

 

 

 

*tunes radio to 11.1.93*

 

i break mirrors with my face in the united states

 

*tunes to 1.11.93l*

 

I'M SCREAMING AT A ALL

 

RED, I'M SEEING RED

 

*tunes to 93.11.1*

 

SPIT IT OUT

 

*turns off the radio and uses tor browser on an android*

 

FEAR OVER PRIDE lil boy

FLOOD YOU CAN'T HIDE lil boy

FACE OF A WOMEN lil boy

TEARS OF A CHILD lil boy

burn thru it burn thru it

 

*puts the phone down and turns the radio back to 1.11.93*

 

"you must've been out your head"

 

 

 

where am i?

 

If every house were made of matchsticks, and every car a matchbox racer, I'd burn them all. I’d watch the plastic melt into one indistinguishable mold. I’d look closely at the matchstick houses burning slowly. Watching each ember eat away at the home it resided in..Happiness is the last thing I'll see today. Content is a distant friend of indifference. I'm not content anymore.

i'm not indifferent.

i'm displeased.

dissatisfied .

disappointed

dispirited

desolate

dysphoric.

 

i don't want to be here

i want to be there

where you are

that state

your state

not my state

this state is not mine

 

where am i?

 

EDGELORD

Why am I so desperate to get back to a life that I tried to kill myself to escape from? Does that make sense?

 I’ve been picking, my scabs again.

 For the past 24 hours, I’ve been constantly feeling my eyes rolling into the back of my head. Like a bad wave is washing over me, ripping my head back with it.

Yesterday I wrote a post on here that mimicked my writing when I was manic. I literally turned my feelings of dysphoria into a gory little paragraph. It was meant to be a visual representation of how it feels to hold everything inside until it boils over; until it pushes you to your limits. I think my grammar is really subpar sometimes.  I just had a really bad time yesterday. I was really alone, angry, and sad. I have been living life in a very exemplary fashion. I eat a balanced diet, exercise daily, practice creativity, cook, work on relationships, participate in groups, take my meds, I just do everything I’m supposed to be doing to be “happy”. For whatever reason though, that wasn’t enough yesterday, or today.

Last night, after a shitty AA meeting, and a long, brooding drive home, I was just fed up. I wrote a weirdly depressed post on here, and then proceed to have one of the darkest pre sleep thought processes ever. I haven’t had to deal with suicidal ideation for a few months. Last night was different. In about a matter of, maybe four minutes, I had formulated an almost full proof suicide plan here at Rosehill.

 I would use my dresser or chair in my room as a means to lock myself in my room from the inside; to barricade myself in. With my door unable to be opened for at least ten minutes, I’d break open my window with a T-shirt, and I’d cut open an artery with a shard, and bleed out. I’d probably go for the carotid arteries, something juicy. I was almost certain that if I did it late enough in the night, when staff was least expecting it, when staff was at its weakest; I’d succeed. They’d have to break the door down by brute force, move the dresser out of the way, and bandage me up; all before I bleed out.

As I lay there in bed, trying to fall asleep, this idea came to me. It did indeed take about four, maybe less, minutes to devise this plan. I then fantasized about the idea until I fell asleep. I use suicidal ideation as a comfort sometimes. It’s like an old friend. One I don’t see often, but he always has a solution to any problem I have. He’s an easy fix to any predicament I may find myself in. He gives me intricate thought, and elaborate but twisted fantasies. I was plagued before bed last night by my old friend, but also comforted.

 Today when I woke up, I was just sad. I went about my day as if everything was fine. I acted as if everything was okay. I went to my volunteer site and worked for two-ish hours. We followed trails in the woods, cutting down any foliage we saw blocking the trails. It was boring, and gave me time to brood on the thoughts of the night prior. Thoughts I didn’t want to have, but couldn’t help but indulge in. I got back from the site and proceeded to physically exercise, go to yoga, then to process group. In group I shared everything. I told everyone about how lonely I was, how I spent the night thinking of elaborate ways to kill myself. How I was so alone.

Did I mention how alone I felt out here in Michigan, no real friends or family in sight, trapped in a house full of mentally ill addicts. Yeah, I’m surrounded by people constantly, but I’ve never been so alone and alienated from everyone I’ve ever known in my life. If you’re reading this, we probably don’t talk, and if we do, it’s what, maybe once or twice every few weeks? I’m fucking lonely.

 Anyways I had to leave process group twice. The first time was because I was going to cry. The second time was because I was crying. I cried for the first time at Rosehill today. I sat on the front porch smoking a black Marlboro menthol 100 listening to BROCHAMPTON’s song Lamb, and cried.

“This ol sky
if I die
I hope I’m no random guy
someone out there they will say
he is mine, he is mine”
BROCKHAMPTON – Lamb

I was just so alone. I realized, like really realized, that no matter what I do sometimes I’ll just be fucking sad. I’m bipolar, and I think that’s just a reality of my life that I’ll have to face, that some days, I’ll just be sad and upset for no real reason

. I’ve been living my life as best I can, but sometimes that’s not enough, and I think that’s going to be okay. When I feel down, when I feel up, when I feel any type of way,the best way for me to constantly live my life, is as if I’m feeling the best I’ve ever felt. To live as if I’m constantly a work in progress and as if nothing is wrong with me.

“Act as if” has been my mantra for the day

Act as if nothing is wrong. Act as if every day is meant to be lived to the fullest, as if every moment you get, is the last, and best moment ever, despite how fucking terrible it may feel.

Carpe Diem
fuck it
Carpe Noctem

 

 

POEMS

Kissing with your eyes open

 

My eyes roll back into my skull

Trying to tunnel down into my mouth

Where they make attempt to burrow out from in between my teeth

Escaping the things they'll one day see

My ears fold inwards

rolling up like carpets

sliding down the shaft that connects them to the innards of my head

They too run in fear of things not yet overheard.

My mouth will grows wider

and wider

until it beaks itself in half

working as hard as it can

to never speak the horrible things it will  eventually speak

I'll see, hear, and say horrible things

Eventually

 

Thicc

 

One day soon I'll be able to see my penis when I look down

For now the view highlights

My gut

 

Witheld

 

As my head implodes

Bursting from internal overload

Thoughts and memories

Will fly

Leaving behind

A thicc boy with a shattered skull

And no mind to hide behind

 

Just once

 

If I keep writing

Day in

Day out

Will something click?

Will I find a means to an end

A road never twisting or turning

I could write a line about blah blah blah

Yerning

But in the end

This shit is still forced, contrived

Underdeveloped

Rushed

it's still shit

 

Where am I?

 

I'm not in the state of Maryland

I'm in the state of Michigan

I'm not in a state of depression

I'm not in a state of mania

Where am i

Where will I be in two months

What state will I be in

I'll be in Maryland

Ideally

But

What state will I be in

 

Our Father

 

In meetings

At the end

We say the serenity prayer

We gather round

Lock hands

pray

Each time

I find myself

Holding on

Tighter

&

Tighter

To each person

By my side

I'm alone here

But never there

 

Dr. Fisherman & Thom Trout

 

I was molested

As a kid

He was my psychiatrist

He convinced me to

Lay on a couch

&

Strip

I did

He touched

Me

Did I get hard?

I don't remember

Would it matter?

Does that event matter

At all?

Does the past

Dictate

The present?

No

I wasn't molested

Until

I had to talk about it

To

Lawyer's

Police

My family

I was just a kid

Until I had to talk about it

I was just a kid

My life changed forever

Because

It became a reality

 

Holly peach

 

I knew a girl

Banana blonde tips

Hiding behind her palms

Dimples covered in shadows

Orange peels lining her teeth

Her name was hallelujah peach

She was sixteen

Mysteriously young

See Lux Lisbon

Words slurred sober

My name was written on her underwear

My finger wrapped around her lace

My guide through a city

My guide down an unexpected road

This banana tipped blond

A dream girl

But

Dreams fade

&

 

Reality returns

 

Tonight’s the kind of night that going for a drive would help. Cruise around and listen to music. 

Vibe out.

 

I don’t have a car,

 so this will suffice.

 

*gets in fake car*

 

 

 

*puts cd in fake car stereo*

 

*Track 1* 

(Wolf)

 

Odd (I'm not yet a man)

 

Future (Still not of a boy)

Wolf (This my only joy)

Gang (Now let's parade in gold)

 

*Track 2*

(Wulf)

 

I'm pushin pedals in the dark

 

I'm ridin fast real far, yeah

I don't know, where to even go but I'm still goin there

Gas on E but that don’t matter I’m still rollin’ man

 

*Track 3*

(TF)

 

Spent my life

 

Trying to make everything right

Hypernight

Widened sight to make me realize

 

*Track 4*

(RK)

 

At large COMIC, at large COMIC

 

COMIC falls, COMIC's dead, COMIC

COMIC, COMIC's alive

 

*Track 5*
(Father)

 

Why can’t I cry $$$

 

Instead of tears

Roll around in brand new gear

Hella ammo, no more fear

 

*Track 6*

(JM)

 

And at the driving range

 

You shouted fire away

I started feeling strange

Thought of taking my life

And then I told you so

I fucking told you soooo

 

*Track 7*

 

 

 

*Sound starts cracking*

 

But blue  I  need

 

*Sound splits into a skipping noise*

 

to rest

(Krule)

 

*CD starts skipping, songs become unplayable past this point*

 

 

 

 

Still Boring’

I’m so lonely.
I live in a house full of people, constant staff, but I’m so lonely. My term in this state is slowly coming to an end. I go home for a week or so in two days. When I come back, I’ll have a month and some change left on my bid. My mom wants me to do some transitional living stuff, but I just want to come home. My life in MD wasn’t anything to write home about, but it was still my life. I’m worried that I changed too much. I’m worried that I haven’t changed enough. I’m worried about the future. My life ends and begins in mid October. I’m so alone here. I’m barely speaking to one of my housemates. I shared some shit in a process group that offended them. That was not my intention. I just wanted to kind of kill the bad vibes and shit in the house. I noticed we were feeding off of each other’s issues and I wanted that to end. I don’t remember exactly what I said, but I wish I hadn’t said it. I’m so fucking alone. Everything else about my life is amazing. I’m content as fuck, I’m cooking, cleaning, exercising, being creative, volunteering; I’m doing everything right, but I’m still lonely. That’s my biggest hang up right now. A house full of people 24/7 and I’m alone. I just want October to be here. I want to go home, to start my life again, and be with my girlfriend, my family, my friends, and my world. I’ve learned a lot here. I’ve learned what kind of relationship I want from a therapist, DBT skills, mindfulness, routine, structure, basic life skills. I’ve learned and grown so much in the past 4ish months. Now I’m just waiting. Waiting for life to end and begin again, to start anew. I think I’m just in a totally different place than my housemates. Different place, and just generally a different type of person, but it’s funny because we are all so similar. I don’t know when I changed, or how I got here, but I’m gucci as fuck right now. I’m just lonely, and I don’t think that will change for some time. It’s almost over. Home stretch. I’m doing more work now than I ever have before. I’m sprinting for home, counting every second as it passes. It will end soon. Soon I will be back, but for now, I’m lonely.

 

Gay

I have a weird relationship with sleep. I don’t know if you know me, but if you’re reading this I’m going to assume you do. I’m a weird dude. I’m just kind of out there sometimes. I do my own thing a lot, I’m just fucking weird. This is all going to sound like bullshit. I know very few people, almost no one in person, who has gone through these weird sleep gymnastics I go through. It sounds ridiculous and absurd, and just unreal, but I assure you, I’m not making this up. I’m just a really really active dreamer. I have crazy grandiose dreams that are either big budget extravaganzas, or intimatly woven stories about a life I will never lead. I’ve had horrifying nightmares where I wake up from one nightmare into another, into another, and into another. An endless loop of waking up from a nightmare into more and more nightmares; each time plagued by some sort of negative energy present from within me. I have been through some terrifying sleep paralysis nightmares. Paralyzed in a waken state, watching my surroundings, screaming, thrashing, begging to wake up, to free myself. As I’ve thrashed and cried out, something dark from within me is always present with me, watching me. I have had lucid dreams where I can fly. I force all my bodily energy upwards, and my body takes off. I soar through the air, until I start to question how I’m flying. Then I fall, waking up when I hit the ground.

 I have a fucking terrifying relationship with sleep.

 I haven’t had sleep paralysis or endless loops of dreams since I’ve been in Michigan. I thought I was having really boring lucid dreams since I’ve been here, but that wasn’t the case. After yesterday I was kind of pissed off that I’ve been having the same lucid dream over and over, never fully being able to control anything. So I asked some questions and did some research. This is when I stumbled into this astral projection shit. I realized I’m astral projecting, not lucid dreaming. That sounds fucking weird, but it’s what’s been happening. I’m not going to be possessed, I’m not going to get lost in the dream world; nothing detrimental is going to come of it. I’m just going to end up becoming more of an active dreamer than I ever was. Apparently astral projection isn’t just some bullshit plot device used in the movie Insidious to scare the shit out of you. It’s apparently a state of dreaming that’s new to me. To keep it short and sweet, it’s basically an out of body experience, but while you’re asleep. It’s a lucid dream state that you can’t fully control. You can’t fly, you can’t make shit appear, and you can’t do whatever you want in the dream. You have very limited control of this dream state. You can walk around what is called the “astral plane”, whatever the fuck that is, but you can’t truly control it. It always starts with a series of tingles or vibrations all over your body. I always have the choice to indulge the feelings, or push them away, but I always go with the flow. I follow the sensations, and after the three pulsing vibrations, I wake up, but I’m asleep. I awaken within a dream world, a lucid dream state of sorts. I don’t really know much about it, but I’ve gotten a good bit of feedback about it, and done enough research to know that this dream state is not a lucid dream per say, but is instead an “astral projection”. When this happens to me, I wake up; I get out of bed, and kind of just stumble around. I can’t always see. This is called “astral blindness”. Things have been clear a few times, but recently things are generally dark, and I can’t see for shit. I can get the general idea of what’s where in the dream because the world around me is exactly like the room I sleep in. I don’t wake up in some random dream world because I wake up in what is basically the house I live in. That’s how I know this isn’t a lucid dream. It’s happened probably ten times since I’ve been in Michigan. It’s always in Baker house, it’s always me getting up out of my bed, stumbling to my door, either opening my door, or waking up. If I make it out the door, which I’ve only done three times, the house is always different. My room is the only general house concept that is static in the dream state. I’m always in my room, door closed, in my bed under the covers. I always wake up into it the same way. Get up from the bed, let the sheets fall off of me, stumble to the door, sometimes fall on the floor, I don’t really have much control in this state yet. It kind of feels like I’m drunk, never standing up straight, never having full control over my motor functions, but always being vaguely conscious that I’m awake within a dream. I have no idea what I’ve been doing to cause it, but it keeps happening randomly. I always allow it to happen. Now that I’m aware of what’s happening I’m going to try a few things, but first I want to address something. I’ve felt a very negative presence within these astral projections more than once. The presence is very similar to the feeling one gets from sleep paralysis. The negative presence I’ve felt within this state has been emotions from within me. There is no ghost in my house, no demon in my bedroom, no supernatural phenomenon at play here. The only demons and ghosts I know of are the ones I keep locked deep within me. The types of things I’d stumble upon while deep within myself. I can only imagine that “astral projection” is just a sort of in depth exploration of self. I don’t want to do a ton of research on it because, it’s a fucking dream. There is no real solid science to this stuff, it’s too abstract. I know that if I feel a negative presence in any dream state that it is simply some negative feeling I harbor within myself. That’s all it’s ever been. The thing I’ve felt during sleep paralysis was just my negative energy, the same applies to this feeling or presence I feel during an lucid dream state, nothing more, nothing less. If anyone is reading this, I apologize. This is trailing off into something weirder than I ever imagined, but I want to continue. This is an avenue that I feel I need to explore through writing. I want to process all of this because if it happens again, I want to be prepared. You can’t imagine what it feels like to be in a lucid dream state and feel something there with you. Now that I know I’ve been doing this astral projection shit I want to prepare myself for when it happens again. Yesterday when it happened, something really dark poked me awake. I’ve seen a little kid curled up in a ball by my doorway once, I opened my eyes to look at him, and he came at me. That was singlehandedly the scariest experience I’ve had here in Michigan, and it was during an “astral projection”. I realize I keep randomly putting it in quotes, that’s because I can’t believe I actually believe this is really a thing. I SOUND RIDICULOUS.  Now that I’ve gotten that out, back to what I was saying. These maleficent presences I’ve felt across a variety of dream states are nothing but projections of me, my dark feelings. I think I’ve been feeling them constantly within my dreams, at random intervals, because I need to address them. I don’t know what they are, or how to address them, but I think there’s a reason I’ve only had one type of lucid dream state while in Michigan. I’ve literally had the most explorative dream state there is, astral projection. I naturally have had regular dreams here too, but I’ve never “astral projected” anywhere else but here in Michigan. I think it’s because while I’m here, I’m doing a lot of emotional work. I think I’m supposed to work on exploring this dream state, addresses the demons, the dark harbored emotions I meet in my dreams. This shit sounds so fucking ridiculous, but I think its happening for a reason, and it’s fucking terrifying. Maybe I don’t have to confront this shit within a dream state, but it’s a sign that maybe I need to address something within my waking state, I have no idea, but something within me has to be addressed, and its literally coming at me in my sleep, scaring the fuck out of me in the process. So if it happens again while I sleep, the next time I astral project, I’m going to stand my ground. I’m going to focus on control. I’m going to focus on my body, my muscles, my self control, work on me being before anything else. Self control is above all else, in dream state or waking state, self control is the key. Once I have self control, everything else will fall into place. If anyone is reading this, I’m sorry for this being so out there, but this helped me a lot. I am also now terrified to go asleep, but I will. I will confront my demons, both during wake and during sleep. I will work on self control. I will watch as things fall into place, as I gain self assurance.

 

Stupid Gay

Today I had an hour long conversation with a staff member here at Rose Hill. It started out just as us talking about music; a lot of rap and R&B came out yesterday. Wiki, Lil Uzi Vert, XXXtentacion, Action Bronson, Daniel Ceaser, PARTYNEXTDOOR, Miguel, ASAP Mob, and probably a few more, all released music yesterday. We probably talked for an hour about music.

We generally talk about rap, but today we landed on something different. After getting on the subject of Michael Jackson, we stumbled on to topic of trauma. At the ripe age of 8 or 9, MJ was singing about passionate love and romance. These are concepts and events that a child doesn’t understand. Writing and singing songs about love and romance; making albums dedicated to these themes is most likely traumatizing to a child. From there we got onto the subject of general life trauma. He proceeded to tell me that trauma can stunt growth until it is addressed. Michael Jackson never had his trauma truly addressed. He actually probably just had various forms of trauma pile on top of him until he became the man he we know today. You can see the effects of his struggles in the person he became. Further into this tangent of the discussion, I began to apply this idea of trauma to my life and others. I looked at events of my life, traumatic events, and dealings that after they happened, I became to stagnate, stuck in a specific state. Where was I for so much of my life? I was a late bloomer at a variety of ages. Divorce is traumatizing for kids. Bullying is traumatizing. Sexual abuse is traumatizing. Mental illness is traumatizing. I’m only applying this to myself, but trauma is relative. Everything is relative. Racism is traumatizing. So much of what the average person experiences is traumatizing. We are a race of generally stunted people because we are dealing with events in our lives that we are either ill equipped to deal with, or too immature. Not everyone struggles with these problems as much as the next, and not everyone has the same degree of trauma as others, but we all suffer from it. We all struggle in a relatively similar manner, a manner in which we are generally unaware of; a deep seeded struggle from within. The root of the problem is called “the root” because its buried deep within. You really need to be introspective and look within yourself, within the negative events in your life, and really indentify what went wrong where and why. It’s different for everyone, and no two people are the same, despite having similar issues. These problems aren’t a lifelong sentence, but for many, they seem that way. No matter your gender, race, illness, nationality, background, and everything else, events of your life shape the person you become. Everything about you plays into who you are, and what you are allowing yourself to become, whether you admit that or not, it is entirely up to you. I may be stepping into deep water here, but it is of my belief that we are the sum of our pasts, but only until we make the decision to be a result of the present and the ideal future self we wish to be.

This is the part where I stop talking about the general gist of trauma and life, and start talking about myself.

 I was always a late bloomer. I’ve always had problems growing, and when I struggled with it, I really struggled with it. But when I was growing, I grew at exponential speeds, but not always in the right direction. I struggled as a toddler. I was in therapy by the age of three. My parents were divorced and constantly fighting when I was young. That was traumatizing. I then went on to constantly struggle in school. To never truly give a shit about it; to stagnate in what would otherwise be a vital period of growth. As a child, without any outside help, I was not equipped to deal with a divorce or anxiety. I internalized them and they manifested into what I became as a kid. I developed a lot of social anxiety, troubles in school, and the inability to really grow at an early age. Before I had a chance to come into my own, another event happened. Drowning out the previous struggles, muffling their problems and adding to their strength; I was molested by a psychiatrist. I went from a long rippling event into an even larger splash in the pond of my life. I struggled even more. I had a year where I blocked it all at, but it came back stronger than ever by the time I reached high school. I became depressed, anxious, isolated, alone, scared, slow, and stuck. No one came to my rescue to help me deal with it. A teenager, or a child, or a boy, is not equipped to deal with sexual abuse, I definitely wasn’t. Before anyone came to my help, they made it worse. I had to relive my trauma, I had to stop it from happening to others. I had to go to the authorities and stop the doctor who hurt me from hurting others. I talked to my family, police, lawyers, therapists, all in an attempt to help others, but never myself. It did nothing for me but made things worse. I went from having a weird event in my childhood, to becoming a victim of child molestation in what felt like an instant. I began developing the core belief that I was a victim. I still hadn’t dealt with the trauma of divorce, or bullying and their ripple effects. Instead, I had more traumas to add onto my pile of shit. I began to act out, to get high, but never to a real life ruining degree. I experimented with a lot of drugs, I’d skip class, sleep all day, drink too much, lash out at others. I would say awful things to good people. I began to hurt those around me because I couldn’t help myself. I thought I was above everyone else because I thought no one else knew my pain. How could they? Surely if they did, they would help. I wanted to hurt and torment those around me because I wanted to know how they’d react. How they would handle trauma. Like I said, trauma comes in many forms. Bullying is a type of trauma, depression, anxiety, suicidal ideation, homophobia, sexism, racism, self harm, all traumas. I was hurting others because I was hurting. No longer was I internalizing my problems, I was expressing them. They were coming out in the most toxic form possible. I was a blight on many people’s lives, but many people I know wouldn’t think so. Suffering was normalized. My actions weren’t registered by others for the severity that they were. People would just say I was weird, funny, just Justin. I stopped stagnating as a result of my trauma and began to grow from it. It manifested in negativity, in a way that would ruin my life for years to come. I began to subject myself to the most toxic things I could find. Online I would watch the most fucked up viral media I could find on forums like /b/ and sites like motherless. The only one I remember by name is shoveldog.gif. I was lashing out at in a public setting as well as lashing out internally in privacy. I would give people my address online and tell them to come fight me. I would say awful things to anyone who dared annoy me, and then I’d give them the opportunity to come do something about it. No one ever came for me, but they really and truly should have. Behind closed doors I became obsessed with violence, pain, and suffering. I had stopped stagnating from trauma and began to grow. Later in high school I went about life. I got into Odd Future. The most fucked up rap of the time, with lyrics like “kill people, burn shit, fuck school”, “Rape a pregnant bitch and tell my friends I had a threesome”, “Play a song, invade her thong, My dick is having guts for lunch, as well as supper, then I’ll rummage through her ruptured cunt, found the mustard, nosey neighbors know that somethins up”. I became the teenage embodiment of negativity, and I found outlets that normalized it. I looked to Odd Future artists, Death grips videos,  and movies like Irreversible and Salo to find comfort in my negativity and internal rage, to make me feel like it was normal. I began to get control of my overwhelming negative emotions. I began to suppress them, I compartmentalized my demons. They shifted into a deep depression.  I graduated high school, did a semester at CCBC, got my heart broken, was kicked out of the house, moved back in, and went into construction.  By this time I had minor traumas on top of my negative growth. I thought by handling my problems with a negative outlet, I was dealing with them. It didn’t click until today that I was so wrong. I never truly stood back to look into my past until today.

 

Don’t get me wrong, I was no school shooter, I wasn’t devoid of happy emotions, but I was consumed by bad energy. After a certain point in time, malcontent became my normal state. Trauma had caused me to grow into a societal monster. Through never dealing with the major traumas of my past, I had developed into an angsty teenage demon. I would say whatever to anyone just because I could. I was wild, but it soon came to an end. Keep in mind that whatever you read here isn’t the full breadth of the negative things I’ve done to people. I’ve got a pillowcase full of demonic candy that I’ll never share with the people of the world. They will continue to literally haunt me in my sleep until I’m finally forced to address them, but it won’t be in a forum such as this.

After a year of concrete demolition, I snapped. I spent an entire year as a grunt; a lonely, quiet, but still angry, peon. I caught concrete cores, moved slabs of concrete, drilled holes, moved equipment, filled tanks, and helped an eclectic group of broken men get through the day. I spent the entire time of my grunt work career hating my life. I was worthless and to me it felt like everyone around me felt the same way. We were a league of unextraordinary no so gentle men. I felt like no one gave a shit about me. I had a girlfriend, friends, a loving family, but I had never been so alone. I’ve been a child of divorce, bullied, depressed, suicidal, molested, and anxious, but nothing was worse than how I felt in 2013 doing construction. I was at the lowest point in my entire life, and no one wants to fucking address it. “It’s the past; the past is the past, focus on the present”. No, fuck off, my life went to hell in a hand basket in 2013 and it’s because my traumatic events peaked, and I was so overwhelmed that I got pushed into a manic, and then psychotic state. Following a very depressing, stressful, and anxiety ridden jobsite in DC, I snapped. I couldn’t stop crying at work. My partner was bipolar and he was manic as hell. He was super unstable, angry, disgruntled, and stressed. He freaked me the fuck out, and I broke my back trying to keep that man happy in any way I could. He snapped one day and punched another coworker in the face, and that was when I started to get anxious and stressed as fuck. I was in a 7 story apartment complex, and I was constantly looking over the edge. I would flirt with the notion of a self conclusion in one simplified motion (ty sc). I had to quit. I spent the following months as an agoraphobic with constant panic attacks. I developed three anxious ticks. I would squint my eyes in pain, shake my hand nervously, and rock myself back and forth, all too just remain calm. I was like my physical body couldn’t handle what my mental state was going through. I did this in isolation constantly. I hid it expertly from my roommates and family.  I had to appear as normal as I could. I didn’t leave the house for a month. I eventually left to go home and go to therapy. I eventually got drunk enough to leave the house, but only at night. I’d get smashed playing quarters, or I’d get ripped as fuck. Nights turned into drunken bouts of fun or long baked sessions of cruising around College Park. I’d longboard for hours listening to Ethelwulf and Chief Keef. I smoked so much weed it’s amazing I didn’t become psychotic sooner. I was constantly online. I was always on Tumblr. If you go a few blog posts back you can see the manic posts. The manic nature of them, the toxicity they are laced with, the loss of self. I fell apart and took my mind with me (ty lum). I had finally drowned in my own negative indulgences, and because of the mania, the speed in which I drowned was sped up. I was in a car speeding down a tunnel of darkness; racing towards what I thought was the light. I was convinced all I knew was pain and suffering. I thought the only way to live the justly was through pain. I saw connections in the world that I hadn’t seen before. I quite literally transcended conventional thought through the mania. You can argue with my that it was just mania, but mania is almost quite literally a true break from conventional thought. To everyone around me, I was just a little out of it, but internally I was losing all sense of self, I was drowning. Everything I held in for so long, every negative thing I indulged in, fed myself with, it was drowning me. I was losing myself to the negativity. I was no longer Justin; I was the sum of every negative event and emotion that I had ever felt. I was my trauma in its most vile form. I was coherent enough to fool my roommates for a while that I was fine. It wasn’t until the night that I moved out that I think they began to notice something was wrong. I thought I was able to read people’s minds, but I don’t mean literally. I was just hyper-vigilant and very aware of every single thing around me. I was reading body language, tone of voice, enunciation of words, everything that a person does to express themselves. I began telling them who I thought they were in a nutshell. I don’t know if I was right or wrong, but I was slowly losing my grip on the material world, the mania was taking total control. I was speaking in metaphors and puzzles that they brushed off as just me being weird, but to me was the only way I could communicate my mind. I was doing mental gymnastics just to process everyday functions. Why I would eat food had to have a reason behind. If I sneezed, I had to know why and what caused it. I hung on every word and ever little bit of information I took in had so much more meaning that it really did. I spent two months working in DC, three months living in College Park, and the entire time falling into the depths of insanity .The night I moved out of my apartment in College Park it was at 4 am. I silently moved shelves, a desk, clothes, cabinets, everything out of the apartment. I moved all of my stuff out of apartment above the bike shop in secret, in the dead of night, while everyone slept. Four roommates slept silently as I snuck out, I stuck a note on each one of their doors with a few words of wisdom, and moved home.

 I got home around 6am and just sat in my car. I was afraid to go in. After two hours I finally went in. I moved half of my stuff in, but left it in the halls for two days. I was losing my grip on reality. I thought I could see enlightenment. I thought of enlightenment as a tunnel, and at the end of the tunnel was a light. I dawned on me what my goal in life was. I had to be myself. I had to unabashedly be me. I had broken myself down, as a man, a person; a human, and was ready to rebuild from the ground up. I was ready to be me; to be the version of myself I deep down always thought I could be. I was convinced that the reason I had spent the past few months going insane was so thought I could lose all sense of self in order to gain a new state of being. I was ready to love myself; to overcome my trauma, to finally deal with my negative emotions and move through the pain. No one understood this but me. To everyone around me, I was just manic, I was psychotic, I was out of my mind, but to me, I was ready. I like to think that if I was never hospitalized that I would have survived and healed a lot sooner than I did, but I’m not so sure anymore. I think I needed to suffer some more before I could see the light again. I think the next four years were necessary, that the suicide attempt had to happen.  I was so deep in the mania in 2013 that I lost myself in my journey towards an ideal self. I quickly stopped sleeping, speaking coherently, I became enraged, lashed out aggressively, spoke in constant metaphors and puzzles, I lost a stable version of myself.

 I reluctantly agreed to go to the hospital after an argument in the kitchen between me, my mom, step dad, and girlfriend. I went to the hospital with them. Upon arriving at Shepherd Pratt, I went directly to the receptionist’s desk, pulled up a chair, and sat right in front of it. I put my feet up on her desk and proceeded to glare at her. I agreed to come to the hospital, but I didn’t agree to be the easiest person to deal with. The staff attended to me quickly. A security guard came out and I was in intake within minutes. The following thirty minutes are a blur. I remember having an essay on mental illess in one hand and a copy of Primal Fear in the other. I remember being convinced that all my problems could be resolved by reading and watching the two. No one listened, and I got angry. The essay was on mental illness spreading from person to person, and the defining moment of Primal Fear *Spoiler Alert* was when we find out that Edward Norton was faking his illness the whole time for attention. At that point I was gone. I thought I caught the bipolar from my partner in construction and that somehow I was so good at feigning sick that I had everyone fooled, and I didn’t need to be hospitalized, I just needed some time alone. I got lost in the angry in a very short period of time during Pratt intake, and was quickly hospitalized. I had added more traumas to my already stockpiled list of various traumas. I was medicated, sedated, and sent on my way after some time.

I spent the following years of 2013-2015 just indulging in my illness. I fell deeper into a hole of negativity, but this time it was more controlled. I got into movies drenched in darkness like Ichi the Killer, I Stand Alone, and Enter the Void. Along with the movies came music from artists like Death Grips, Bones, Daylight’s early work, Title Fight, and just in general, stuff that fed into my deeply rooted sadness. No longer was I looking at gore and torture or the horrors of the world. I had become mature and refined in my negativity; my self loathing. It became more suppressed. No longer was it externalized, it become internalized once again. I fell into self harm, extreme sick fantasies, chronic suicidal ideation, and at the end of 2015, a suicide attempt; I continued to add more and more trauma to my life.

Again, trauma comes in all shapes and sizes; it truly is all relative.

 By 2016, I was paralyzed. My stagnation reached an all time high. I could bathe, eat, socialize, and go to work, but nothing else. I became a shell of a man. I faint glimmer of the person I once was. I was just waiting. I wanted to die, but I wasn’t strong enough to try suicide again. I waited, I was biding my time. Waiting for the moment for the door to open and for my chance to run through it; I wanted to die, but not yet. My doorway to death opened twice between 2017 and 2016, but I never walked through it. I stopped wanting to die, I wanted to live. I wanted to live bad enough that I had to do something about it. I spent all of January-April waiting. I was waiting to go into a treatment program. I spent April-August healing, waiting to feel better.

Here I am now; ready to start my journey into life; to finally heal the trauma, to go into the light of positivity. I’ve come to believe in a power higher than myself, and that happens to be the flow and harmony of the universe. I can see now that the universe loves me. I’m alive to this day, not because I’m lucky, but because the universe wants me to ride my wave out. I’m not going to pretend like I’ve dealt with a lifelong of various traumas in just a period of 5 months, but I am now ready to truly tackle my demons. Trauma has always been my problem. I am bipolar and I do have sleep apnea, but those issues are under control. It is not time to deal with trauma. It has taken 5 months of truly concentrated work, but I’ve finally got the tools to successfully live my life. My energy is going to shift from being entirely negative to positive. Fuck bad vibes. Great art often comes through suffering, but you can’t do shit with that pain if you’re too sick to see it through, and I’m not talented enough to ever accidently do something. I want to be an overwhelming force of good energy

I want what Uzis’ got

“I got a colorful aura, like I got neon guts”

Everyone experiences trauma, it is a beast of many forms. You may or may not be aware of it, but I am almost certain every human has dealt with it. Some can handle it quite well, others struggle. Life goes on, the universe gave you what you can handle, the flow of things is endless, and it has its purpose. Trauma needs to be addressed more often than it is. I’ve been in treatment for mental health for 5 months, and it wasn’t until today that I realized, trauma has been a many tailed beast in my life. If you’re having a hard time in life, if you’re stuck in your ways, reflect on your life. Think things through, address your past, question your present, and truly reflect. Everything happens for a reason, whether it’s for a good reason or a bad reason is another story, but things are all connected. No amount of suffering is small, it truly is all relative.

 

Friday 9/15/17

 

I’m starting your letter tonight, and its going to be the first of the batch. I’m sure  you are going to mind, but try to not get to hung up on any grammar and syntax problems, school was never my cup of tea. We just had a conversation outside for a few minutes between you, Corey, Lindsey, and I. Corey left, and the conversation continued. Ultimately nothing I say here will have any immediate or profound effect on you. I can’t make you think any thought or do any action with through my own words. What I can do is attempt a little trick I learned from Christopher Nolan. The plan is to incept some sort of idea in your mind that in turn will blossom into something beneficial to your life. Self affirmation, understanding core beliefs, honesty, and commitment are all the skills you need. Getting better is bullshit. It will in the end all seem obvious and dumb, but on their way there won’t make any god damn sense.  You didn’t get to where you were in a few hours, days, or weeks. It took years of living to lead you up to the very moment you are reading this. You’ve been at recovery for a long time now, and you are most likely aware of all of this, but I just wanted to start this with all this shit.

                You need to write, a lot. You need to journal until you can’t anymore. I do it through blogging, I suggest you do it however you feel comfortable. Write what makes you feel anger, hate, love, distrust, write about bad events in your life, map out your emotional journey up until this point. Once you’ve got yourself mapped out in writing in front of you, relax. When you can step back and see yourself outside of yourself, the first step has already been taken. When I started the blogs, I had no direction. My only goal was to write my experiences out and share them with anyone willing to listen. I love social media. I love the idea of people getting to know me through a controlled and contained environment. So I took to blogging and posting it on facebook. I think my entire emotional journey up until a few weeks ago has, for the most part, been written about in my blog. Obviously you can’t write every little thing, but write what you think matters. If you think it matters, then it does. If that means you have to write a short novel, then so be it, it’s entirely your journey. I guess I didn’t write about the highs in my life, I focused on the lows. I looked at the writing as a means of sucking out the venom. The words typed acted as a vacuum to suck the venom out of my life, which I would then dump into Microsoft word and organize into sentences. Suck out the venom as coherently are you can. Organize your life in writing. Look at what could have been traumatic. So many things in our lives are traumatizing that we aren’t aware of. A girl in 4th telling me that lacing up my skate shoes was gay was traumatizing. I spent the rest of my life investing stupidly in nice shoes. Look for every single potentially traumatizing event in your life, and how you handled them. For me, I handled them with anger and hate. It may seem odd to you now, but I used to be an asshole. I’d call kids out; I was a racist little cunt. I’d pick fights with kids online and then give them my address and tell them to come fight me. I internalized and suppressed my trauma, my emotions, and it came out in a truly venomous fashion. I’ve said shit to people that no one should ever repeat, but no one ever came to my house to fight me. Look at what’s happened to you, and how you’ve handled it. Did you handle it the right way? Was there deeper meaning behind how you acted when and why? Does this compute? I won’t know. By the time you read this, I’ll be states away and unable to respond for some time. You need to suck the venom out, spit it out, and write with it. See what comes up as you did this. In one afternoon I wrote 9 pages single spaced on trauma because I had a good conversation with Oscar. I came to realize so much through writing that single post. I’m like 21 posts deep in my blog. If you want the url its channelegnaro.blogspot.com. That being said, I can’t emphasize how important is. You can process all you want in your head, but ultimately it’s still you inside of you. You’re bias because when you think on thoughts, you’re the only one in control. When you put stuff into writing, it becomes more objective than if you were to hold it all in. It’s also just a very cathartic experience. You said you were going to do some writing tonight, so hopefully that continues and this is all something you’ve heard or done before. I’m going to go mug farmers in a game for a bit and revist this letter in another week or so. Peace.

5555
I wanted to stop writing stuff for this blog. I wanted to stop talking about myself, to believe I was “recovered’. Tomorrow marks exactly a month since I’ve been home from Michigan; since I’ve left my treatment life for my real life. Things haven’t been going the way I wanted them to. They’ve actually gone as bad as they probably could. I may be over exaggerating; I am over exaggerating, but I am miserable. I’ve not been as sober as I want to be, I barely exercise, I eat out, I don’t have as solid of relationships as I wanted, I have the same job that drove me crazy at one point, I feel empty and useless, everything feels fucking wrong. I have these reoccurring nightmares of my trauma where I am no longer the victim; sometimes I am, but now I am also the aggressor. Can you imagine what that’s like? To have an incredibly visceral dream of such a traumatic event where you are the one inflicting the trauma on others? I have violent and constantly negative intrusive thoughts that no one can help me with. I thought everything would come so easily with my return home. That somehow everything had been fixed, that I was finally done my journey to recovery. I knew that wasn’t the case on some level, but on the surface I very much so wanted to believe it that. I had a lot of fail safes in place in case this happened. It’s taken about a month for things to get bad enough that I need to go through and activate each one. To reset my life again, but this time include what I spent six months learning. About two months ago I was in an NA meeting and I wrote a letter to myself in case something like this happened. I was in an amazing place when I wrote it; I wasn’t unreasonable happy, I was just pleasantly content. The letter was a reminder that I could feel this great again; all I had to do was work for it. I worked towards being happy in a fake life, now it’s time to work towards being happy in my real life. I think that’s where I have gone wrong. I have just expected happiness, or feelings of content to come naturally. That all I needed to do was to change a few simple things, go back to some old patterns, but ultimately not change much, and everything would be right as rain. I was wrong. I have to constantly work towards feeling content. If being content in life is like balancing plates on a pole, then I have to maintain constant vigilance to assure myself that the plates don’t fall. If they are to fall, it is my duty to myself to be aware of this; to clean up the mess, and to then proceed to get a new plate and get back to balancing. Nothing happens without effort. Nothing worthwhile in life comes at ease, and if it does, you should seriously question it, but that’s just my belief as I’m writing this. I hate that instead of working on one of the various ideas for a short story that I have my first writing venture upon returning home is this. I have a lot that I need to work.  I have a lot that I’m ashamed about, now I have the drive to pick up the shattered plate shards. Because for the past few weeks I’ve been dancing on glass and pretending like it doesn’t hurt.

“isolation caved in”

                For someone with lots of people in their life who loves, cares, and is willing to help them, I am incredibly alone. I don’t exactly give anyone the chance to help me feel less alone, and that’s the problem. I’ve convinced myself that I’ve given everyone an equal chance to help me and that everyone has come up short of assistance and that I truly am alone. Because I often feel that I am the only me in the world, I am doomed to be alone as a result. Being around people can be exhausting, but it can always be the most enervating experience ever. I swear I’m an extrovert trapped in an introvert’s body. I love attention. I love people. I love being entertaining and making people laugh. I, for some reason, like to think that I dislike most people. I’m convinced no one really has anything of use to offer me, and if they do, they do it indirectly. I am so lonely, and it is my fault.

 I realized a few weeks ago how heavily invested in the online community I am. I am always on the god damn internet. Whether its facebook, instagram, snapchat, or reddit, I am always online; plugged into the world. For someone who works so hard to be alone and alienate themselves from people I have deemed useless to me, I so desperately seek attention and connection from anyone who’s willing to show it online. I use facebook as a sort of social fishing game of sorts. I throw out a lines (posts) baited with lyrics, funny phrases, trailers, songs, albums, anything to hook someone in and talk to me. I have no idea why I’d rather interact online than in person. I think it has to do with how incredibly uncomfortable I am with myself. How I truly dislike who and how I am in person. Online I am free to be me without any sort of blockade set up by my psychical self? I am not sure really. I am desperately reaching out for some sort of connection in a virtual medium where I feel most comfortable interacting with others. A medium where I am not myself, but somehow convinced I am as genuine as possible.

 I cut back on social media like two weeks ago. I deleted most of my instagram, stopped using snapchat and facebook as much. I realized I was just putting my life on display to a degree that I was not in control of. That’s the weird thing though… considering I post this blog online and it is truly the most open source of information about myself that one could find anywhere online, but the difference is its entirely intentional and guided in its purpose. For instance, posting a picture on instagram of myself with my CPAP mask on with in a dark room smothered in covers with a caption beneath it reading “isolation caved in” is somehow more disturbing to me than me writing a 3 page blog post about being molested. When I went through my instagram deleting everything, I could see a trend. Looking at the dates of posts and the general content of the posts, I could tell how I was feeling at that point in time. I had been telling the world how fucking unhappy, self loathing, bored, and awful I was feeling all the god damn time, and I wasn’t aware of it at all. There was a month long period where I posted the same three pictures with the caption “I fell apart and took my mind with me”, and during that month I was breaking on all sides. I remember posting those and writing that caption, but I never gave any thought as to why. It was just something I felt like had to happen. I had to express this overwhelmingly bad emotion I was feeling, and this was an easy method that was a sort of knee jerk expression. I just kind of posted random stuff online either for fun or because I was struck by a specific emotion at a certain point in time.  Rather than drawing it or writing about it, I formulated it into a social media post. I was leaving a detailed bread crumb trail behind that always led into a description of my mental states. The lyrics, the images, the videos, it was all connected to feelings I felt I had no other method of expressing. I did not like having this candid map of my mental state on instagram, so I deleted everything but stuff I found entertaining. I stopped posting on facebook except for when I wanted to bookmark something like a video or song that couldn’t save with my pocket app. I’ll use snapchat when I’m bored, but I generally just goof around on that now. For a while my only goal online was to be as entertaining as possible, to be as ridiculous and funny as possible. Somewhere along that line, I don’t know when, I got lost and began to use it as a way to express myself. Expressing yourself through social media is like using drugs because it makes you “creative”. It is just dumb and reaps instant benefits. I got further lost in myself, in my loneliness, in my alienation from the world, and I think my use of the internet is somewhat to blame for that; at least my use and function with it is.

 I am still alone; nothing has changed except for the fact that I’m less active on the internet and indirectly open about it. I don’t think I’ll stop being lonely for a while, but I think it will change. I am working on being a person in the real world again, but it is not easy. I really dislike myself. I work at a job where I am constantly interacting with people, making phone calls, doing intake, constantly being forced to watch myself interact in person with people. This sounds silly, but this is weird for m

The mind is like a muscle, you have to exercise it, otherwise else it will remain weak. This can be applied to the intellectual realm as well as the mental health realm. I’ve had a weird year so far. Almost a year ago I returned from a 6 month experience in a small town in Michigan. I learned how to be happy in a stress free environment, an environment that was entirely detached from the life I created up until that point in time. Upon my return home, stress was introduced, and I drowned. I’ve been through three jobs, depression, paranoia, a suicide attempt, a forced hospitalization, and now I’m experiencing happiness. I stopped doing this blog because I didn’t like writing about myself and my problems. I stopped because I felt I had run out of things to offer. The mind is a muscle, and if you don’t exercise it, it gets weak.  Those who suffer, in turn become the strongest.  You can meditate, exercise, eat healthy, and remain sober, but if you aren’t maintaining the right mental exercising or chemical balance, you will continue to suffer. That’s very preachy of me to say, but that is the conclusion I’ve come to understand. I was finally put on an antidepressant for the first time in ten years, and I feel alive again. I can look in the mirror and not feel disgust, I can read and enjoy it, I want to do so much, and I want to live. My dreams have been filled with the people of my past, I’ve been processing all my past experiences and actions, and reflecting on the now. There is a difference between working out the mind, and drowning in it. You can swim throughout your thoughts, but you do reach a point when you are no longer swimming and you’re drowning. Generally this is referred to as ruminating. I lay awake every night in bed for 1-2 hours ruminating over everything about my day and my actions in the hopes that I will find an answer to a question I have either not asked, or don’t need to have answered. Many times we look for answers to questions that don’t need answered. The answers to our world are often times right in front of us, we simply need to understand, but that takes a lot of work. Exploring the mind is a double edged sword, it’s as dangerous as it is beneficial, and often I find that I am at my most peaceful when I am not exploring it. I have done enough work in understanding myself that often I just need to experience the moment, for the moment is the only thing that’s ever happening to us. It is important to understand the distinction of exercising the mind, and dwelling on it. Beating yourself up and focusing on the extreme negativity that is so easy to feed yourself, is dwelling. Thinking over and over again about an experience that could have gone differently, focusing on changing the now, wanting to change a feeling, is dwelling. You should not change your feelings, trying to change a feeling is not a positive exercise, a feeling is a feeling for a reason. Sit with your feelings, understand them, but don’t hang onto the thoughts that are tied to them if the feeling is negative. The exercise that comes with sitting with the negative feelings is understand that its okay to feel scared, lost, unhappy, and just in general, bad. You can sit with a feeling and not drown in it. Once you are okay with feeling how you feel, you begin to  train your mind in being okay with negative feelings and being active in experience them and being one with them instead of reactive and feeding into them. Express the feelings, feel the feelings, don’t try and change them, they are what they are for a reason. If you need medication, therapy, whatever you need to be okay with understanding and sitting with feelings, do it, they are there for a reason. I learned that when I focus on trying to change a feeling, I drown in it. Go read a book, books are a wondrous gift to mankind and there are hundreds of years worth of information at the tips of our fingers just waiting for us to explore them and aid us in our journey in life. After I tried to kill myself this year I decided I was never going to try again, I got out of the hospital and went back to life as I lived it before I attempted. I continued to cry almost every night before bed, at work, and in my car. I started to fantasize every night about hanging myself on tree outback because you really can’t fail when you hang yourself, once it’s done, it’s done. I’ve cried more this year, than every other year of my life combined. This year I’ve been experiencing my feelings instead of running from them. It’s been a fucking bitch, it’s been hard, it’s been too much, but now it’s okay. I’m going to start writing again, I have a short story I want to write about three doors. Each door has a Latin word on it. One is for heaven, hell, and life. I’m going to explore three philosophies behind each door, hell will follow nihilistic views and absurdism, life will follow Taoism, and heaven will explore philosophy in some sort of general terms, the kingdom of heaven will reside within the explorer itself. I read the book Dune and I fucking loved it, I read Jitterbug Perfume and it opened my eyes to the beauty or mortality and the horror of immortality. I’m reading a book that’s basically a discussion with the mythologist Joseph Campbell and after that I’m going to read Moby Dick. I’m going to practice learning to fucking structure a sentence and how to manipulate words through proper grammar and punctionation. I bought a skateboard so I could make myself active outside of the gym, and in turn meet new people. I am ready to live life, but it all came through chemical balance, working the mind, and learning to let feelings be feelings.  This post is all over the place, but I’ve got a family dinner right now and I just wanted to write before I left. I’m not going to read it over, I’m just going to post it. Ideally this was helpful in some way. Go read Dune.

“Today I thought about killing you”

I work in a series of group home for predominately schizoaffective people. I’ve spent the last six years of my life in and out of hospitals, doctor’s offices, and even a residential facility trying to aid me in my endeavor of stability. I don’t have a hard life by any means, I had some trauma as a child, divorced parents, moderate anxiety, but nothing to warrant the way I act now. I am a fail son, or at least that’s how I feel. I’ve cried on more days this year than I have any other year in my entire life. I punched my best friend in the face; I tried to kill myself two weeks ago, I don’t know why I can’t grasp the basic guidelines of adult life. Where am I going wrong? I work in a place where I’m consistently putting on a happy face and giving advice to people who are handicapped by their mental illnesses, where as with mine, I’m fully functional. I am never manic and not even really depressed. I generally sleep 12-13 hours a day, but I don’t think it’s out of depression, I just am so lazy that I don’t want to get out of bed, or that’s what I lead myself to believe.

Waking up is like going from a purely blissful state of being and then being thrust into ice cold water full of emotion and outliers you have no control over. In reality you have absolute control of your reactions to the world, there is just the illusion you create that you have no control. When I take showers I often find myself turning the nozzle to make it as cold as possible to prepare myself for abrupt states of change, but it still doesn’t help me wake up earlier, nothing does. Working 4 to 12 isn’t good for the lazy, but I’m not entirely sure if my routine is based out of laziness or depression. My job bounces between helping and taking care of people, to extremely long periods of playing runescape and reading books. Sometimes I’ll have weeks where I do nothing at all at work, I basically just get paid to sit and read, which I’m obviously okay with I guess, but at the same time it sucks. I have no purpose aside of living for the sake of it, no deep passion, no deep intent. I don’t place enough worth in the relationships I have with others and that puts me at fault, because life is all about relationships. I have a long term girlfriend, friends, and a loving family, all of which I throw away by the way I treat myself. A huge culprit in double think, I want to be alone as much as I don’t want to be alone, there is no balance. It feels like my world has been on hold my entire life, like I’ve just been standing by on hold listening to elevator music and toying around with whatever is in the room while I wait to get through to the person on the other line.

Sometimes I have bad days or even bad weeks, but they always bounce back, but they don’t matter anymore. I’ve been doing this for so long that I know what to do, how to do it, and when to do it, it’s just a matter of doing it. I either need to put down the fucking phone because I’m holding for something that’s long gone, or I need to start smashing buttons until I get through to an operator.

7-8 hours of sleep
exercise
purpose
read
work
purpose
purpose
relationships
healthy food
don’t imbibe negative things
meditate
purpose
exercise
purpose

 

 

 

R.I.P Brandon Gibbs

 

 

 

2017 POETRY

This will be something eventually

 

Something is always something

Very rarely, if ever, is something nothing

Except maybe a black hole

There's always exceptions to the rule

Rules must exist

Rules must be broken

The earth continues to spin

 

Loose leaf lilac lovers

The power lines aside the road flow up and down as the car floats onward

 

Kill your feat, it's taking you away from us

 

Delta baby - worker class, hates intelligence

 

I enter a room with my nose

 

Sometimes I get hard when my gf cries in front of me

 

Dum surfer

 

Baker blues

 

I drink the coffee to drown the smoke

I smoke to cough down the coffee

It's never ending

A constant back and forth

On the porches at baker

The house of illnes

Addiction here shifts

It becomes

Caffeine and nicotine

 

 

5 minutes

 

Why smoke?

Slow suicide?

No

It gives me purpose for 5 minutes

I have one clear cut goal

Smoke the cigarette

Relax &Think, Reflect & Process

A toxic meditation

But a meditation none the less

Inhale, Exhale

A toxic process for 5 minutes

One simple goal

Inhale, Exhale

 

Eyes

 

What do you think when your eyes roll back into your head

Why do they roll back

Is it anger? Disgust? Humor?

I can feel my eyes rolling back

But I feel none of the above

No

Today they roll back because they are alone

They alone have seen my day

They alone will see my tommorow

They alone see my world

My eyes roll back out of loneliness today

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Solipsism

 

You ever look around and ponder

Everyone you see has a life

Their own thoughts, desires, dreams

Their own life

Everyone's an individual

Not just you

You may only know you

But there is an entire world of you out there

Someone who's not me just had a baby boy

Someone who's not me just lost her virginity

Someone who's not me just killed a child

Someone is anyone & anyone is someone

Sometimes its easy to forget that you're not the only one that truly exists

Don't forget

 

Where am I?

 

I'm here right now

Present in the moment

The cars hum by

The nearby night crickets have started their evening conversations

The trees flow steadily in the distance

Where am I, While you're back home

I'm present right now

The bugs sound off around me

Humming sweet nothings to one another as time crawls by

Birds tweet quietly as their day comes to an end

A motorcycle chugs on in the distance

Where am i

I'm sitting outside of a church, waiting

I'm still right here

I'm mindfull

 

Lilac lovers

 

Suicide is only a stones throw away at any moment

An old friend I've become too familiar with

A frog in the middle of the pond

No one but I alone understands the relationship

The frog croaks on as I skip stones

The pebbles ripple through the water

Disrupting the frogs endless croaking

Lilly pads shift accross the waters face

Another stone is skipped

The frogs croak is drowned out in a plop as he fall in

My old friend is now nowhere to be seen

A relationship only I understand

He will resurface eventually

But for now he floats beneath the surface

 

Halloween

 

I've a Pillowcase of demonic candy I'm not sharing

Secrets better yet unspoken to the world

Candy on Halloween that I keep to myself

It's not for you, it's for me

I share a lot of sweet tasty things with the world

But I've got a pillowcase full of bitter sweets that will forever remain mine

At least for this year's halloween

 

Milo

 

I'm stressed & Overwhelmed by feelings I can't shake

I want to Flourish in the lag time

But I remain stunted from the moment I wake

This moment won't pass, this lag time

This pause is key, but shouldn't exist

not while I wake

I sit and pass the time trying to rhyme

Avoiding the urge to inhale & exhale

I'm missing the buckets, lacking the s. l. i. m. e

Emotions trapped deep inside a crevice

The present should be mine

It's never to late

I will Flourish in the lag time

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Murph

 

At the starting of the week It's only monday

Dj shadow structured the day

Time spent wasted drowning in a snow drenched sleigh

Anxious as fuck I can't get out of myself

I need to break down the bales of hay

Bed my pen

Create my routine

Flourish as time idles

I can feel the time slow on as I rewind

Moments turn to minutes

Turn to seconds

Back to hours

Crawling backwards to old times

Old ways, old patterns, old routines

I don't want to be here anymore

But where am I?

What state am I in?

I'm still in michigan

Somehow trapped in Maryland

Fight the quicksand, Slug out of the pit

Tar dripping from my pits, Slime falling off my sides

Where am I?

I know what state I'm in

I'm in a new state, a new maryland

My land

Still stuck in Michigan

 

UWTB

 

The wind blows inconsistently across self

I feel an absence of the universe within

Its grip released, I float

Motionless in air, suspended in limbo

I float aimlessly as life speeds around me

Never once stopping to ask me

Are you coming down?

Never once stopping to remind me

The universe still flows for me

It's only when I flow against it

That the dueling flows suspend me in air

In a lifelike limbo

 

emotional roller coaster with pipe dreams

 

I hold onto these pipe dreams

Dreams of tunnels that  I can see the light at the end of

Dreams that are meant to be just that

Dreams

The universal will to become is a powerful thing

Human will, desire, passion, all powerful things

I lack several and make up for some in an abundance of others

My eggs are sitting, waiting in a basket

I was never any good at finding them in easter

 

For now happiness is the dry side of a spit cup

 

This book is a tree

Each page a branch

Each word a leaf

 

I need a place to hide

Can I call you home

 

How long does boyish charm last

 

Bernard Marx & Helmhotz watson

 

I often wonder if others are like me

Am I exceptionally unique

Or am I just part of a whole

Just human and intricate to a t

Do you ever find yourself staring out the window

Thinking about thoughts past and present

Focusing on the moment as it glides by

Somehow we're part of a whole

But individuality plays a part in each of us

Working Title: Patient B
Logline: Thommy’s life is thrown into psychological limbo after a childhood experience
Concept: Mysterious skin meets Enter the Void

Synopsis: Tommy Trout had been made fun of in school by popular girls. Around 7^th grade Tommy experienced memory loss as an entire day’s events blacked out in his mind. He went to the psychiatrist one day and never quite left. Years later, after plenty of therapy, Thommy saw through the darkness and realized what happened that day at the psychiatrist’s office. Thommy was going to the doctor for issues with ADD. Upon entering the doctor’s office, alone without any adult’s presents, he was instructed to strip down and put on a medical gown. After removing all of his outer cloths, Thommy paused and asked the doctor if he should remove his underwear. The doctor responded with a nod and a flick of the wrist. Standing there completely nude beneath a loose hospital gown, Thommy awaited further demands from Dr. Fisherman. The doctor asked Thommy to sit naked on the couch. The doctor stood up and glided over to the exposed Thommy Trout. After 15min of Thommy sitting on the couch being questioned by the doctor the doctor instructed Thommy to lie back on the couch and lift his medical gown. The doctor proceeded to touch Thommy underneath his hospital gown. During the middle of this process neon green stroking lights began to flicker throughout the room. The door to the office swung open and a dark figure was standing there. It motioned towards Thommy for him to get up and follow him. The doctor quickly stood up and placed his foot on Thom’s chest and said “Not yet, I’m not done” and motioned back at the figure, denying it of what it wanted. The figures eyes opened revealing them to be red, and a voice whispered into Thommys ear “Close your eyes now, Thommy Trout.” Thommy closed his eyes and was blinded by a white light. Thommy felt the doctor grab him, and pull him. Thommy shot his eyes open and the doctor was gone, and Thommy was sitting up on the couch fully clothed. A tall dark orange alien stood in front of him with a medical license in his hands. The license read “Miguel Frontera Fisherman M.D” The alien pinched the side of the license and it was set ablaze. The fire grew and encompassed the whole room and Thom shut his eyes and shielded his face. When Thommy opened his eyes he was in the kitchen with his mom and she was touching the side of his face in the same fashion that the alien was. Years following Thommy would develop a series of self destructive behaviors. Now 27, Thommy cuts regularly, and one night cuts too deep. Blood pours out of his wrist and a voice whispers “Not yet, I’m not done”. Thommy shuts his eyes, and quickly reopens them. He’s back in the doctor’s office again, exposed in front of a kneeling doctor Fisherman. Thommy screams and kicks the doctor in the ear, and runs bare into the lobby where his mother sits reading a book. Thommy screams and Mrs. Trout can tell by the look on his face and the state of his body what just happened. She reaches into her purse and grabs her sidearm and rushes into the doctor’s office. She shoots the doctor on sight, and his body slumps over. Thommy closes his eyes at the sound. Upon opening his eyes Thommy is in the car, his mother’s hand on his head as she speeds away.

 

I’ll miss you, but believe me, I’ll move on.

fata organa

 

n. a flash of real emotion glimpsed in someone sitting across the room, idly locked in the middle of some group conversation, their eyes glinting with vulnerability or quiet anticipation or cosmic boredom—as if you could see backstage through a gap in the curtains, watching stagehands holding their ropes at the ready, actors in costume mouthing their lines, fragments of bizarre sets waiting for some other production.

 

"Often the reason that people go from neurosis into psychosis is that they see that spaciousness and synchronistic situation and how vast things are and how the world actually works, but then they cling to their insight and they become completely caught there. It has been said, quite accurately, that a psychotic person is drowning in the very same things that a mystic swims in."
— Pema Chodron ~ The Wisdom of No Escape ~ p. 7Top of Form

Bottom of Form

Top of Form

mal de coucou

 

dictionaryofobscuresorrows:

n. a phenomenon in which you have an active social life but very few close friends—people who you can trust, who you can be yourself with, who can help flush out the weird psychological toxins that tend to accumulate over time—which is a form of acute social malnutrition in which even if you devour an entire buffet of chitchat, you’ll still feel pangs of hunger.

daguerrologue

 

dictionaryofobscuresorrows:

n. an imaginary interview with an old photo of yourself, an enigmatic figure who still lives in the grainy and color-warped house you grew up in, who may well spend a lot of their time wondering where you are and what you’re doing now, like an old grandma whose kids live far away and don’t call much anymore.

mimeomia

 

dictionaryofobscuresorrows:

n. the frustration of knowing how easily you fit into a stereotype, even if you never intended to, even if it’s unfair, even if everyone else feels the same way—each of us trick-or-treating for money and respect and attention, wearing a safe and predictable costume because we’re tired of answering the question, “What are you supposed to be?”

Memento mori