Sojourns into the past

So, 2010 is coming whether I like it or not. And of course, a new year brings with it reflection on the years that have passed. A mental inventory of successes and an even longer one of fails. One trys to look towards the new year coming as a 'fresh start' or a 'place of hope'....one usually fails miserabley. One of my particularly stupid new year habits is to read back over journals. I started this yesterday evening, and have continued to do it at the expense of my assignment which really needs to be completed. I read 2009 journals, I read back over all the posts in this blog, I read back over email correspondance with my therapist. It is helpful, in that it gives an interesting perspective on the ups and downs, and turmoltuous emotions of the year. It is unhelpful, in that it helps to solidify what an unholy mess I have actually made of the year.

Whilst on a roll, I read back through journals of previous years, back through to the break-up of an abusive relationship and a psycho stalker neighbour in 2008, through to hospitalisations and a complete lack of direction and purpose in 2007, right through to what I guess I was looking for all along, the overdose in 2006. Why? I'm not sure. Maybe because I'm looking for signs to see how close I am in reality, to being back at that point? Maybe as a self-reprimand... see what can happen if you allow yourself to go there, see the damage you could do? Maybe, just maybe, because when I woke up from that OD, days later in the ICU, I was PISSED that it hadn't worked... and ever since that day, I have been silently raging against a world that would keep me bound here through obligation and 'doing the right thing', against my will. Maybe because I always knew, that one day I would be back in this place, but this time, fate or bad timing would not 'save' me. Some snippets from that year... there was not much written until May, towards the end of my hospitalisation, because you to the damage I did to my brain, I had to relearn reading and writing.

May 2006

 The scariest thing is I don't know what I have said to people in my delerium induced state. How honest was I? I have the vaguest of memories of somebody (Psychiatrist? Doctor? Nurse?) doing some kind of assessment and asking if I would try to do it again. And me, answering "Yes, but next time I will go to a motel in some far off town where nonone will be able to stop me". Is this memory real? Did I say that? Will they ever let me out of their sight again?

*I found out later that this conversation did take place, in front of my mother no less. How's that for confidentiality, only applies when you are fully concious, I guess.

June 2006

I can't stand the way that everyone stares at my walking stick and walking frame when I leave the house. After months in the hospital, I have become so institutionalised and agoraphobic, I don't want to leave the house anyway. It seems surreal. I am supposed to be dead. I am not supposed to breathe this air, or feel this breeze. But if I am ever to get out from under the magnified gaze of my family, Y**** (My Case Manager at the time) and Dr B, I have to make myself go out and pretend as if I am getting better, that I am happy to have this second chance. And in reality, its my karmic punishment isn't it. I am a heinous, selfish individual who put my family and friends through this hell, and I deserve this walking stick... its my Scarlett letter, a big red C for Crazy or maybe an S for Selfish Ingrate.

September 2006

Back in hospital again. Being told that I have choices. Sure, I have choices. But from where I'm standing none of them look particularly good. What you are really saying is I don't have a right to make a choice. Isn't choices about weighing two options (death vs a life where all facts indicate nothing much is going to improve) and deciding between them. I see the other choice, life. I just don't much like it. I did your CBT, your EMDR and every other little letter you through at me. I took your drugs, and did your rehab and occy health and speech therapy. I've kept your stupid safety contracts, and followed your inane crisis plan. And guess what? In the dead of night, when it all comes over me again, it means sweet, f*ck all. So don't sit there on your pedastal and judge me for the urges I am trying hard to fight against, not because I wan't to but because my family and friends would bind me here with promises and emotional obliagation and guilt. Just give me the drugs, keep the blades away from me, and let me get through this the best I can.

Sounds a lot like me now in 2009, huh? Except I think I'm a little less angry and a little more resigned, or maybe they just forced me to swallow any anger I did feel eventually. So what has this little sojourn into the past taught me? A) I've been here before, and I can get through it... or B) Who was I kidding? Nothing has changed, not one god dammned thing! I don't know.