This is Fucking Ecstasy

It comes at night and it can hit me even when I am at my most optimistic.

“I think I am going to bed.” She said.

“Me too. I am actually just finishing up typing the last thing I have to work on tonight and then I think I am going to call it an early night, myself.” This was at eleven at night and by my standards anything before one is an early night.

I finished my typing and immediately fell into a hole. I was literally happy and smiling less than ten minutes ago.

“What do you think you have accomplished? What do you think you have done?”

My face soured and I knew it was going to be one of those nights. The kind of night where my brain keeps telling me I am fucking everything up. Not in some sort of voice other than my own. It’s my own and no one knows how to better kick myself when I am down. All my supports had either gone out for the night, gone to bed, gone on vacation, or were just plain missing in action. I just kept telling myself not to get desperate and not to let things get out of control. Remember what your therapist said.

“Centre yourself. Place one hand on your stomach and the other over your chest. Close your eyes and tilt your head back. Allow you mind to go blan...”

“What have you accomplished?”

“...k. Slowly begin to bl...”

“So fucking proud of yourself, aren’t you? Look at what you have done.”

“...ock out anything that could possibly ha...”

“You are such a fuck up. Pathetic. You should just give up.”

“..rm you. Remind yourself that you are within your own...”

“You only hurt everyone around you. No one reads this shit anyway.”

“...mind. You make the rules and nothing c...”

“Boo-fucking-hoo, my life sucks, I can’t do anything about it. Waaaaaaa.”

“...an harm you there. Then focus on your bre...”

“Remember the shakes you had? Those pills came so close that one time.”

“...athing. Short, slow breaths, focusing on the in...”

“Remember how everyone felt? Oh boy no one will let you forget that one.”

“...haling and then the exhal...”

“You have put everyone you loved through hell.”

“...ing. Just keep repeating this until you are able to focus on no...”

“Look at what you have lost. LOOK AT IT!”

“...thing else other than the sound of your breathing...”

“And here you write all these things and for what? For healing? You are fucking useless.”

“...and how your chest feels as it rises...”

“You aren’t even that good. Resign yourself to your fate and just walk around like the fucking bum you are. You had your chance and you fucked it up.”

“And falls.”

“I fucked it up because of you. Stupid fucking brain.”

I woke up from my mini-meditation on the couch. The thoughts were gone and my head felt a thousand times lighter. The problem is that no matter how hard you silence it, the harder it wants to try and attack again. It will change its tone to the fantastic aspects of life.

“Hey, do you know how cool it would be if you had fifty billion dollars? Like, that is a good amount so that you would never run out. And just think of all the good you could do with it! Everyone would love you again!”

“I’m not falling for that one.”

“You are fucking useless and always will be.”

“Whatever.”

One of the drugs I had suggested for me was Ativan. “This is only to be used in case of an emergency. The way you make it sound you seem to be prone to some pretty crippling anxiety attacks and I want you to have something strong in case you need it. I warn you, though. Ativan is habit forming. You will only get 10 pills and no refills. You should never need more than that. Consider it something that you would break the glass in front of in case of an emergency. If things are crazy enough to break the glass, you probably need it.”

Needless to say, I haven’t been able to either pick up the prescription or even been able to get in touch with her since she left for a family funeral. I could call whoever is standing in for here, but by this point I am already sitting up at 1 in the morning trying to watch “Crank” to better appreciate how shitty it is, but I can’t stop thinking about everything.

All that I have ever done comes flooding over me like tidal waves. Some of the memories are even happy ones, but they only exist at times like these as a form of psychological torture to provide context for further self flagellation. Some are of things that were simple mistakes on my part that I paid dearly for or put someone else through grief. Then, like coming upon the final circle of hell, everything that I have ever done while I am surrounded by hundreds of disappointed faces.

I stop thinking that I am capable of being loved yet that is all that I yearn for. At times like these I pray for some sort of interaction that ultimately never comes. I shut down and begin to almost babble in the event that someone witnesses one of these episodes (which in truth can be staved off by the drugs I can’t fucking afford). Tonight, I took off my sweatshirt, freshly laundered and pleasing to smell, and clutched it as tight as I could as if it were a security blanket.

I got off the couch and shut the movie off; my train of thought was gone. I gripped the sweatshirt tightly and curled up in the foetal position on the part of the floor that was exposed hardwood. The intention was to have the cold wood caressing my arms and shoulders so I could snap back to the now, but it wasn’t happening.

Should I wake anyone up and tell them how I am feeling?

“None of them care, and besides waking them up is just an inconvenience to everyone anyway. It just further proves you are a fuck up.”

I rushed to the computer and turned it back on. I signed onto MSN and no one was online to talk to about anything.

“Because they are either sleeping. Or they are well adjusted and have social lives you dumb fuck.”

I quickly ran through the bookmarks for the number to the 24-Crisis Helpline that I haven’t needed to call in months. I fear this means my body might be getting too used to the depakote already. I tried several times to dial the number, but I am oh so tired that my vision is going blurry and I keep punching in the wrong numbers. I am now on my knees with the phone in hand listening to the busy signal drone on and on and on and on and on.

This isn’t the first time this has happened. Actually, only once after midnight had I ever gotten through and not had a busy signal. The woman I talked to last night said it wasn’t uncommon to not get through. She had her “regulars” that seemed to call every night for everything from suicidal thoughts to just being afraid of the dark.

Every sound in the house from the phone to the ticking clock in the kitchen two rooms away was amplified. As was the voice:

“Typical. Just fucking typical. You can’t catch a break can you? Take a hint. Everyone hates you and could give a fuck less whether you lived or died. Fucking pathetic piece of fucking shit.”

As corny as it sounds I ran upstairs for my childhood teddy bear, Matilda, but not even she could help me now. I had gone too far and the only options left were to act on the impulses to harm myself, give in to a delusional fantasy to make it all go away, or ride it out like a junkie in the first stages of trying to go clean.

It is now almost three and I am exhausted. I have ridden it out yet again. I think I am going to be OK. I know that what I just wrote is sort of tough to read, but I didn’t want to let this feeling go. I wanted everyone to know exactly what it is like. And more importantly, I wanted to put it into words once and for all.

Wishlist (Drug Money)

I was supposed to have a therapist appointment today, but it was cancelled due to a death in her family. My heart goes out to her, but part of me is still relieved that it has been postponed until later in the week. I could have seen someone else in the office since the meeting was ostensibly just to get some more prescriptions and not even a real session. Once I found out how much medication my doctors wanted to put me on, I was taken aback and filled with anxiety and conflicting feelings.

The laundry list of drugs (6 that they say I should definitely take in addition to my shot every two weeks, 2 that are in case of emergency, 2 that are interchangeable depending on the length and severity of any manic episodes I might have and 1 that isn’t even really a prescription since I can buy it for eight dollars over the counter at any pharmacy or health food store) is extensive, but the doctors did an excellent job explaining how they fit together and what each of them does. My problem isn’t with the vastness of the treatment prescribed since much of it has to do with the fact that there is so little choice in what I can take because of my depakote shots.

My problem is that it will ultimately cost me $447.25 to have all the prescriptions filled... each month and eliminating the 2 emergency drugs and the one drug I can get an infinite amount of sample refills for will still only save me about $120. That’s just Canadian pricing, too. In the states, I can expect that to increase to five times as much in the case of some drugs and I won’t be covered by any sort of prescription assistance programmes. I have never even had to pay that much money in rent in a given month let alone on medications I am told I need to stay sane and happy.

The price of such medications and treatment could be a huge part of why a majority of people with bipolar disorder do not receive proper treatment. These people, like me, are simply priced out of the market completely. Mental problems aren’t seen as a life or death situation even though depression can lead to a litany of heath problems from diabetes to cancer to heart disease to unhealthy weight gain and so on and so on. No one really pays attention to mental disorders unless it leads to some sort of an addiction or a suicide attempt. Even then it seems like help only seems to go as far as getting someone stabilised in an emergency situation and then letting them figure shit out on their own. Therapy can help, but it can only go so far. Once drugs are prescribed it is up to the individual to put themselves through even more stress in trying to figure out how the hell they are going to get everything covered.

My agent said originally that she would help me out with money for prescriptions if I needed it, and I do since I am now totally broke after not having any steady work in the past month (not for lack of trying every single day) and having to pay $45 every time I get my shot. I was even $4 short last week for my shot when I forgot the price was going up and neglected to include the hospital fee itself into my budgeting. I still got the shot since my doctor said she would cover the extra money. My agent, however, politely told me that there was no way she was going to shell out close to $450 for drugs, especially since she is already giving me a place to stay this summer and because nothing I have sent out over the past two weeks has sold yet and probably won’t for a few months at least. Even then, all the money I make would just go back to paying back everyone I already owe money to and then I would have to buy more drugs. In a severely fucked up way, it almost makes perfect business sense for me to become a drug dealer by selling my first supply of pills so I could afford two more sets just for myself. I would never do that because that is the dumbest idea in the history of dumb ideas, but it is still frustrating.

So now I have a decision to make before next Thursday as to what I can afford to take and what I don’t need. My agent said she really can’t afford to spot me more than $250 without having any steady work, and it seems like a pretty achievable goal. I’m just not a huge fan of having to make such decisions, especially when I am deadly serious about making this treatment work any way that I can.

Despite the lack of heavy medication, I do feel better these days. I just find myself slightly distracted and wondering where all the hours in the day are going. I took Thursday night through Sunday off to visit Jenna and partake in Toronto’s Doors Open festivities (reviews and thoughts on Doors Open can be found over at my other blog). Monday was kind of a blur and other than some heavy bathroom cleaning I can’t think of a single progressive thing I did other than reading books due back at the library the end of this week and making a to-do list that I did nothing with. Tuesday I attempted to write but was thwarted by both internal and external distractions. The new kitten at the house is pregnant and her constant whining for food during the day was bugging the crap out of me. I took off to the library where there was a brigade of small children running rampant through the stacks so I ended up just reading the newspaper and leaving. I attempted to write by the gazebo outside the library (oddly enough funded and sponsored by the Optimists Club) but other than writing outlines for this and my Doors Open entries I was distracted by watching about ten skateboarders enjoying the nice weather and one man chugging Listerine as he emerged from the pharmacy next door before hopping into his brand new pick up truck.

Doors Open was well worth the trip, and has been both times I have attended. I kind of needed the break, but lately more and more I keep feeling like I almost need more of a break; not out of laziness but out of need for some sort of cathartic release. Our first stop on Sunday morning, which we were slightly late for due to Sunday morning bus schedules, was a tour of a wall surrounding Toronto’s Centre for Addiction and Mental Health. I find it both sad and amusing that I identify with these people and that I understand the subtle nuances of how these people act after having been hospitalised along side many of the same types of people. A woman carried her two packs of cigarettes in a plastic bag with her name on it while waiting for the streetcar; the name to show the doctors and nurses behind the desk whose cigarettes they are since you can’t smoke anywhere in the building. Several people shuffled their way around the hospital grounds staring into space and trying desperately to go unnoticed. Some slept on the lawns of the grounds because they either don’t have any place to go or just because they don’t have the wont to do anything. A man who had suffered a head injury waited for a bus while wearing one of those things that looks like a cross between a bike helmet and a rugby helmet. I don’t know what they are called exactly.

The wall itself is the earliest example of patient/inmate labour in Ontario, built by patients to help keep them confined and away from the public eye. Portions of the wall were bricked up where windows clearly used to be because patrons of the CNE behind the asylum used to stop and gawk at the patients with disdain and morbid curiosity. The wall has interesting symbols and writing in places, including “born to be murdered” carved into the side of a maintenance shed incorporated into the design of the wall. We were told that the poorer and crazier patients were relegated to the back of the building where they were pretty much forced to look at the wall and the more well-to-do patients were located at the front of the building and sometimes had their families buy their way out of the hard labour required to build and maintain the wall.

Needless to say, the wall is now more symbolic than anything, but it is still a stunning piece of work when you consider how well put together it is. The wall has stood since the mid-1800s and with only minor damage to the western section of the wall because of adjacent buildings. It didn’t hit me until after we had left that had I lived in that time, I would have been in such an institution. I wouldn’t have had any freedom at all whatsoever except for maybe parole of the grounds since I was white and male, but that would only even come when I was old, feeble, and no longer a flight risk. It helped put things into perspective. Things could always be worse.

It didn’t depress me at the time thinking about it, but now as I struggle to create some semblance of a normal life for myself, one free of the dependence of others merely for survival, it all feels bigger than me. I can tell myself to keep fighting on no matter what happens, but at times it is hard for me to see them on anything more than just words in my head or on a piece of loose-leaf. I have come too far and fallen too hard before to give up now. There are so many things in this life that I want to be before I die. I just hope that one day, life will let me.

Untitled

In the past week I have written my heart out. I have written 118 pages of new material; original stories, essays, one poem, and criticism. I have written query letters and proposals in hopes of earning an advance from an interested publisher or at least getting some work from someone who doesn't accept unsolicited manuscripts. I proofread everything as closely as anything I had ever edited before. I looked at each individual word no matter how slight or necessary that might have been; making sure each punctuation stop sounded the way I wanted it to sound.

I finished the last of it today and sent it all off to my agent to attach cover letters to them and send them on their way.

I cleaned the house over the past to weeks to a point that I haven't seen it in a long time. That was a lot of work in itself.

I have a stack of blog posts in various degrees of completion. Most need quite a lot of work.

I have posted ads on craigslist for work every day to keep them fresh and current, making sure that they don't get lost in the shuffle under the hundreds of other ads that get posted when I don't seem to be looking. I don't know why I still try; I haven't gotten any offers or found any work on there in over a month. It is all I really have right now that even seems to connect me to the outside world other than these blogs. I am almost broke and after my medication session this week, I pretty much will be. That isn't even taking into account that I am probably going to be given prescriptions for more medication I won't readily be able to purchase.

When I finished all that I had been working on this afternoon, the sense of accomplishment and satisfaction was fleeting. I wanted to try to write about how proud I was that I had accomplished a massive to-do list just to see if I still had it in me.

I sat down to work on a blog where I happily recounted what I had done and to work on another entertainment related one that I got bored working on. I sat blankly staring into space and the words just didn't come to me. I proceeded to lay my head on the pillow and cry for two hours without realising how much time had passed.

I wanted so badly to be proud of myself. I want to be the best I can. Sadly, I won't believe I am worth much of anything until I see some results.

I took a long walk. Still nothing.
I took a shower. Nothing.
I am sitting here now and this is the best I could come up with

Artsarama

Yesterday I had an episode; an extremely prolonged one that lasted from the first waking minutes when I didn’t want to get out of bed until a mere matter of hours before I went to sleep, by which point I was too tired to be depressed or anxious. Despite it being the rare type of day where nothing at all went wrong, I still couldn’t shake how glum I felt. It was also the very rare day where I had nothing to be depressed about and I fucked it all up by busying myself all day to try and put my racing mind at ease but I ended up making myself numb and burnt out before shunning almost everyone entirely.

But I am happy to say that last night for a few shining hours I found comfort and joy. For a few hours I was able to lose myself in a room full of people and just simply be. I enjoyed one of life’s secret (and to some guiltiest) pleasures: the high school band concert.

My ex-girlfriend’s brother, Daniel, is in his final year of high school, thusly ending his tuba playing career. Over the course of the school year Daniel’s band only have two proper shows outside of competitions: a Christmas concert and the end of the year Artsarama shindig in the high school gym. I quit my high school band well before my senior year, but for the thirty or so students recognized for their achievements before their impending graduation I can imagine it felt a lot like how a student athlete feels at the end of their final game senior year. They truly loved what they did to stick with it for so long and they would probably never feel that way again.

I knew I was going to attend regardless of my mood or how awkward I still feel sometimes around Jenna’s family. Her father was going to be attending as well, making it the first time I had seen him since I broke up with his daughter. I wasn’t afraid he was going to chew me out in public or punch me in the face; he seems far too relaxed to become physically violent over something everyone is essentially trying to move past. I was mostly afraid of the potential for awkwardness and its accompanying silence, but as I said earlier, it was a good day where nothing even remotely off putting happened with the exception of a brownie-like abomination of a baked good that I ate during the show’s intermission that was 70% flour, 25% grease, and 5% miscellany.

Artsarama hadn’t changed all that much in the years since Jenna’s graduation. The individual letters on the wall behind the band were the same ones she had cut by hand years prior. There were technically 9 musical acts performing; ranging in age from a children’s choir with boundless energy that turned in a sweet and well sung rendition of “Hey Jude” to the various different sects of the high school band and choir. In addition to playing tuba, Dan decided to join the choir in his final year. On top of his musical double duty, he also remained after school to help set up for the concert and seemingly followed in the footsteps of his big sister.

Minus the brownie, the slightly annoying logjam of people trying to cram into the hallways during intermission, the brief power outage that the band managed to play through without missing a single note, and the ungodly awful version of Pink Floyd’s “Wish You Were Here” delivered by the least enthusiastic junior high school choir I had ever seen, the show was a great success.

I doubt anyone other than Jenna noticed that I was out of sorts, and even if she did she was kind enough not to bring it up in public. If we had time to talk privately later in the evening she probably would have asked how I was feeling. The doldrums really didn’t begin to lift until after the intermission.

Daniel always had a slight flare for the dramatic; especially when it came to concerts. Last year during the closing number, which is the same thing every year, Dan danced around with his tuba in the back. This year along with the help of some friends he took it to another level. First, in the middle of “YMCA”, Daniel became the native from the Village People with the rest of the tubas making up the remainder of the 70s disco fiends. The conductor, Mr. Sharpe, honestly did not see that one coming. And later, he contributed one final moment to cement his legacy in the annals of Clarke High School music history. Dan in the one in the white fedora:

It was a moment of pure unbridled joy. No matter how rotten of a mood you might be in, once you see a friend lead a dance along of small children, you just can’t stay upset.

It has been the high point of my week thus far.

Crossing Lines

My work hasn’t been on par with my own personal set of standards this past week. It’s funny how one little phrase can change your entire outlook if you let it get to you. Today was the first day I felt comfortable talking about it despite the fact that it happened almost a week ago.

This afternoon I wrote something scathing; a rant about what was said that offended me so greatly and on such a personal level that it left me in a state of shock that someone could have sunk so low. It was a thinly veiled reference inside of a snide comment that not only attacked people that I love and care about, but it was accompanied with a sneer you only see on the face of the most violent abusers; the kind of glare that tries to let you know where the power lies. It was said directly in front of someone who should have put a stop to it, but didn’t, and at no point did anyone mentioned in the statement that was made, myself included, deserve it. This wasn’t like having sand kicked in my face; it was like being bludgeoned with a bat and having my wallet stolen.

When I was done writing the four pages explaining why I was so upset I knew I couldn’t post it. It was far too personal and fresh for me to air here. Only four people know the whole story and three were there for it. I intend to keep it that way. It’s not a memory I am trying to repress. I can’t stop thinking about it long enough to forget it, which makes forgiveness impossible. The person who said it sure isn’t sorry about it in any way and probably doesn’t even think it was all that bad. No amount of ranting to anyone will change anything, either.

So if my writing this week is below your usual expectations for me please understand that not only am I super busy every day this week, but my ego and my heart have suffered crushing blows that only therapy and time will heal.

You know who you are, but I am still not entirely sold that you know what you said while you were talking out of your ass from inside your glass house But do know that you have won if it makes you happy to hear that. I’m through fighting with you. I don’t have the time, strength, nor patience to do so. I just hope that some day when you suffer real, true loss that the giant black hole in your chest where your heart should be still has the capacity to feel something, or else it is your loss and not mine.

72 Degrees with Thundershowers

It is rare for me to wake up in the morning and be stopped dead in my tracks by something. I usually go through the motions on a sort of autopilot: I wake up, clean up whatever messes the pets have made, go to the bathroom, make coffee, load the dishwasher, and get down to business at the computer. That is pretty much standard operating procedure around these parts and there is little to no variation unless I have to go somewhere or do something.

I have a feed reader that links me to the blogs that usually interest me. I go through each morning and cherry pick the stories I want to read or anything that seems to be slightly important. The stories pop up in several tabs and windows and I am usually done in less than half an hour. Today I woke up at 9. It is now quarter after twelve as I write this and I still have 15 tabs that have gone unread and chores that don't look like they are getting done any time soon.

I have been glued to my chair in awe and admiration for what I believe is the finest piece of journalism I have ever read. I am admittedly biased based on the subject matter, but I believe in my heart of hearts that every word I speak is true.

This past Sunday in the Cleveland Ohio Plains Dealer, they published a story called Beyond Rape: A Survivor's Jorney. The story was so long and complex, it had an entire special section in the newspaper devoted to it. The entire section was written and prepared (save for the editor-in-chief's introduction) by The Plains Dealer's former Arts and Entertainment reporter and critic Joanna Connors, but this is not a story of the film and theatre that she reviewed over the years and that I would normally gravitate towards in my other blog. This is a brutally unflinching look at rape and the recovery process.

I think the reason why it struck me so hard, other than it being well written, researched, and more powerful than any book I have read recently, is because I am going through something very similar to what Joanna has been through. This past weekend was the first time I admitted to someone I love that as a child I was sexually assaulted. It was one of the hardest things I have ever had to do in my life and I am still shaking over it and doubting myself for having done it.

I have alluded to it in previous entries, but I had dare not speak its name. I tiptoed around it in hopes that my saying something yet remaining ambiguous, I would find some comfort, solace, and piece of mind. It was on the tip of my tongue ever since I told my therapist. I wanted to shout it out to anyone who might care, but to this day I still live in fear of what others will think of me as I replay the memories of that afternoon in a dirty basement when I was seven years old and constantly remind myself of the unspeakable acts committed by a friend of the family whose face my mind has blanked out but my memory has narrowed down to two suspects. My father was the only man who knew who did it. After the incident it was never talked about, but I know it angered him. Now my father is dead and all I am left with are fractured memories of what happened coupled with severe pain and anguish that I have relived every day of my life without ever confronting it head on.

I beg and implore each and every one of you to read this story, even if you have read nothing I have ever written and never will again. This is an important story and an important topic that no one seems to cover anymore. Given the alarming rate at which women are raped people should be more outraged. This story will stand as a testament to people like Connors and myself that survival is harder than it looks for victims of sexual assault and how the crime doesn't just affect the victim, but everyone the victim knows and loves.

After reading the piece, I emailed the Plains Dealer and thanked them for all they have done. I encourage everyone who reads this to do the same.

Ways I am Becoming My Mother

-I love to cook, even when the results are terrible.

-I am always there to listen to a friend and offer a shoulder to cry on.

-I read voraciously.

-I am becoming a huge fan of James Brown and Frank Sinatra.

-I remember very little from childhood karate lessons now that I am older.

-I can turn anything into a joke be it appropriate or not.

-I worry about everything even if it is irrational to do so.

-I can break down in tears on the kitchen floor at a moment's notice.

-I am a liar.

-I am dealing with issues from my childhood that have crippled me today.

-I live with the constant fear that no one loves me and I will never be loved again.

-I know I have a huge heart with a lot of love to give.

Ways I am Becoming My Father

-I have become adept at fixing car troubles provided that they have nothing to do with a computer chip of any sort.

-I am unemployed (at the moment)

-I tend to drink cheap beer because I often can’t afford anything more expensive than Coors.

-I watch a lot more sports.

-I watched a political debate on television concerning campaign finance reform and I found it riveting.

-I routinely do the crossword in the newspaper.

-Every minor set back pisses me off.

-I am bipolar.

-I fear for the future.

-I feel cynical and cold.

-I am ashamed of what I have become.

-I have tried to kill myself.

Famous Unpublished Works #2

-Just once I want to wake up and not have something either (a) break or (b) go terribly wrong. It is almost a constant thing around here. Today it wasn’t much. The computer screen has gone inexplicably dark and the brightness control on the monitor has stopped working. For some reason it made me realize that every morning seems to breed some sort of crisis that causes me to have to go and practice breathing exercises to calm myself down. I don’t deal well with things going wrong immediately after I wake up. Luckily, today was a pretty easy morning because I had things to do.

-I had blood-work this morning. I should have remembered from all the times I tried giving blood that I should have had something to eat before I went. I didn’t and I nearly passed out. The only thing that didn’t, oddly enough, was my high blood pressure. It was so high I managed to fill up almost all six vials in front of me in near record time. I waited for close to an hour in the waiting room, mostly because I was early, but was out of the office only half an hour after my scheduled appointment time.

-I haven’t posted anything really serious in either blog this week, but it doesn’t mean I have only been writing frivolous pop-culture related columns. I have been writing serious things, but they have been of a more private nature; nothing that I really care to share with anyone outside of my most intimate friends and acquaintances. The story about planning trees was originally going to be posted here because it ended up being an incident that I was really angry about. The tone of the piece itself became so jocular, however, that I really had no choice but to post it in the other blog. I’m still as proud of it as I could be since most of the memories of the events have faded.

-In my last entry when I was explaining to everyone about the extent of my P!TSD. I said that my PTSD was rarely triggered by things that are media related. I think now that I am more cognisant of my problems, that is about to change. While at the library on Wednesday night I had two things trigger my feelings of despair. I looked at the back of a book on display as one of the library’s recent arrivals. I forgot the name and author of the book, but it had a shadowy figure on the cover in the crosshairs of a snipers scope. The first two words of the title were “Who is...” and was about an assassin. I looked briefly at the description on the back of the thin paperback and my eyes zeroed in on one sentence:

“(Insert titular name here) is a victim of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and is getting over the murder of his girlfriend ten years prior. He is sought after by governments for the way he coldly and emotionlessly kills...”

My heart sank reading that but when I saw the picture of the author I wasn’t surprised. He looked like an asshole; standing in front of an enormous swimming pool, wearing sunglasses with a fauxhawk and making a gun out of his fingers and pointing them at the camera with the sneer of a frat boy. I moved on from there and decided to kill some time reading the newspaper and read a story even more disturbing and triggering; especially the pictures that accompanied it. The story wasn’t wholly relevant, but the pictures told a thousand words; reminding me of the secret I am trying so desperately to forget and come to grips with from my childhood.

-The weekend should be a lot better than the past week. At least I have something to do over the weekend other than sit in my room and read a lot.