journey not recovery

In my previous post on object permanence ( object permanence or lack thereof ),  I discussed how impossible it felt for me to "hold onto" others; to grasp their image in my mind, to continue to feel a relationship, connection, and even realize their and my own existence. Out of my sight I could barely seem to clutch anything solid to tell me the other person was still there. I could not internalize them. Quick Note Piaget put forth the theory that children obtain "object permanence" at around the age of 4-7 months. At this stage children are able to learn that objects continue to exist even when not in view. The psychoanalyst Lacan said that between 6-18 mo the infant becomes able to recognize themselves as a separate entity, to be able to see themselves and hold onto a self-image. I couldn't grip this myself, the mirror was not provided well enough. This means drifting in the void, darkness around you. Reaching out in all directions can you see me am I here?  A...

It was a kind thought this nurse had for me: "You can't be the sick girl. That's not you identy. You are a strong kick-ass woman." I understand what she means and it made me feel good in some ways but she also missed something important:  I never been anything but the sick girl. Invisible existence because people couldn't ever understand. Sick girl was also at 18, in her first psych admit. In her 20s when sick girl found the trauma unit and it was where she lived, she never left, never out for more than a week before she would be brought back in pulsating red and blue comes back to stay months longer. Sick girl was quiet but she's spit out words at her intended targets which often ended up with them crying. Not sick girl  Sick girl was in her 20's and tucked into her bed at night by her favorite nurse, always assigned to her every shift she worked. Sick girl's nurse. Sick girl's doctor was a kind of God to her and Sick Girl's social worker was ...

There is a funeral for myself in my head. I'm not dead yet but they've brought wreathes and flowers and their prayers. It's too soon but also too late. My nightmares are my unconscious telling me over and over what I try to suppress, what I don't want to admit. They are clear as day and haunt me in my waking hours. Trauma is your body being taken over by someone else. They continue to live on there after it's over, making you feel culpable because your body unwillingly took part. I don't want to be my abuse, I don't want to live it every day. And I don't want to admit to myself what happened I won't say it aloud in therapy still. We talk around it. Body memories and flashbacks. I need a kind of exorcism of what took place, expell it from my physical self and my mind. Crosses and holy water, my body laid out, watch my head spin.

I've been hospitalized more times than years than I've been alive and many of those times were because I tried to die. Popped pills and frantic forearm artery spurts, and atrocities against myself I can't speak of in detail. But I have yet to have forgiven my survival, the sense of failure upon waking upnin Intensive care units, or the taste of choked- down charcoal on my cracked lips. The crushing disappointment of failing at the one thing I thought I was good at: dying. I am a suicide survivor in both my own attempt at taking my life and of my little sister's hanging in the basement. I understand the ramifications of suicide. But I also understand the desire. And I am not one of those who die to escape the pain while wishing they could love, not completely. I genuinely most of the time seek death itself. imagine getting high snorting suicide off the slit veins of your wrists. I keep running closer to the edge. Sometimes it feels as though I live for dying...

I believe forgiveness has its merits in healing for some, but I do not wish to forgive or forget. My body is a monument to hurt, to what was done to me, scarred and starved in revenge for His transgressions and Her not protecting me. The denial and hiding and making my truths sound like I am just a mental patient no one cared enough to ever visit. My skin weeps red, my bones hold the sorrow I want to be visible through my flesh. I want them to get on their knees and pray. I want them to ask for salvation from their sins, stigmata dripping from the palms of my hands in anguish. I will not forget. I will not allow it to ever be okay and I will not move on and let it go. What happened deserves justice for this continued suffering and loss of life. Let them choke on my ashes and fall upon my grave in devastation. But they won't. They breathe lies and denial. They swallowed me whole, my childhood emptied so early on. And I stumble on limping, I carry on not wanting to go on. My ...

Sometimes at heart I feel institutionalized, meant to live in institutions. That life is partially ingrained in me deep down. Whether the circumstances are good or bad, it is my comfort zone. The second I'm admitted anywhere have a flock of patient friends and there are staff who come in to chat and catch up. There are people who like me and seem to care. There are also adversaries and power issues that play out and I am constantly repeating and fighting. This cycle feels inescapable at times. It feels to be at my core. I feel like an emergency, a walking crisis stitched up strangling on my words. Strapped down screaming. I am always snatching failure from the jaws of victory, perpetual patient wandering the halls hidden in hospital clothes. I was told early on I would either die or live out my life in a state hospital. When I got to a state hospital it seemed fulfilled. It still seems wrong that I forced my way out of there, lying and battling and flying under the radar, ...

I used to not talk. I had the ability to speak but I lacked the words and the belief that nothing I had to say mattered or was worth being listened to. When I started therapy i sat mostly silent for whole sessions. When I was questioned about things I became so afraid of my reality, what I thought was real, being shattered in the light. I would skip sessions or else leave there feeling physically ill and going straight to bed in a darkened room, often missing classes. It's taken many therapists and a lot of years to learn to find words for things instead of acting them out. My therapist now tells me "Everything is important." I am learning that I have things worth saying that matter and deserve to be heard and listened to . However, I have yet to truly address my trauma. I was always an emergency, constantly, and not able to be safe, so talking about topics in depth was not really an option. Though I still react strongly to things and put myself in jeopardy, t...

I am a crime scene body, the chalk outline of a girl lost. Im a corpse that I drag around. If I were dusted for fingerprints I would be littered with them. But I'm not in any milk carton photos. I went missing before my mother's eyes; Maybe she wasn't even looking. Left in someone else's hands On me, Trapping me, Taking me over. I am willing to burn this body down for something better Something not already stolen Something innocent. I am a marrionette puppet, strings hanging from my limbs. I am abandoned house My bones turn to ash.

I haven't yet survived my life. What is survival if it hasn't been exactly voluntary? In mental health we speak sometimes about "resiliency." To me, that word means getting through something difficult and coming out on the other side. To me, it's not the same as strength. Instead, for me resiliency has not been a choice. I haven't made it this far because I have wanted to necessarily. I have endured pain, trauma, life-altering grief while being forced into hospitals against my will, hooked up to feeding tubes involuntarily when I wanted to starve myself to death, stitched back together when I cut an artery open, and had 911 called on me other times I've tried to end my life. Good luck? Rotten luck? Sometimes I can't be sure. But what I do know is that after all these years I don't feel like what people call a Survivor. I don't feel strong or really yet that I have chosen life. I feel I am living halfway, in a kind of Limbo. Alive but not ...

One of the many challenges of having both a severe eating disorder and mental illness is that nowhere seems equipped to deal with all of me. When I'm in treatment at an eating disorder unit there is little to no support for my PTSD, depresssion, or BPD issues. I often get placed in strictly psychiatric wards to deal with my dangerous levels of self-harm and suicidalityehile my lakv of eating goes barely dealt with. When I was put in Tewksbury State Hospital it was for the above SI reasons but I was also dealing with the constant starvation and weight loss that comes from having anorexia. It was easy for me to keep it quiet and let my cutting and scars overshadow everything else. That's what using gets the most attention for imminent risk and it can be frustrating. My disorder is often complicit in allowing this to happen in order to avoid the refeeding and weight gain process that comes from eating disorder treatment. I have never received complete treatment that encomp...