Some way, we're still together, and that, as far as I can tell, is what causes all this pain. Or no, it's slightly different; it's the fact that some way we're still together, and we can't admit that simultaneously with admitting that in some way we're apart. And by we, I mean I - I can't admit it. As the doctor said today, it's about the ability to hold up two seemingly discordant truths at the same time and put the confidence of belief behind them. To not feel beaten down by complexity and paradox, to not break ands, at the same times, and neverthelesses into dualities. Understanding that two facets don't have to mean two choices, don't have to mean opposites, don't have to mean one or the other. It's both. You're gone and you're here, and I miss you so much and you're always with me. Endless shapes with infinite sides, morphing and changing and turning and confusing my poor little human brain - not to mention heart. If I can learn to look at life without that pressure to choose, to really understand that most often, what is true does not make sense, I think things will progress for me. I think that will help, significantly. If I can keep my exhaustion and my desperation from turning feelings into absolutes, I'll be calm the way I was today - sitting in the doctor's office, slowly, gently forming sentences, feeling rational but not defensive. I can't do that every time, of course; somewhere I must break down. He said today too much water can poison a person; we decided I'm safe from that, by virtue of my many tears. I can't quit crying, but I liked the calm today. Even as we moved into touchier subjects, I could hold onto it. I could feel myself a thread, running through the course of certain events - a theme - and I could look at them and feel without feeling desperate.
Earlier that morning, I'd stood in the shower, crying because I had the water to cover the sound (and needed that) - and wishing that just for ten minutes or so, I could be God, and God could be a writer. I would be God, only for ten minutes, only long enough to rewrite some very important parts of the last few years. Revise. I don't need to detail what I'd do; it's an obvious replacement of pain and loss with peace and connection. I don't usually want that power, but I did for a few minutes today. And then I went back to me again, back to Mary who can't revise the world, and I didn't feel overwhelmed, the way I so often do. Threaded through all the difficult truths, the experiences on the edge of death, I could feel how sad, tremendously sad, and wrong it was, but I didn't feel hopeless, like Friday, or even personally attacked, the way I sometimes do (and have a right to, I assume.) I just felt tremendously sad. We all have our areas of experience; mine...one of mine...is loving people very near death. And in being so near death so often, I have experienced it as well. Not as often, but...I have. And I didn't feel today like that was unfair. I think it's legitimate to feel it's unfair, and I doubt I'm finished with the feeling, but I didn't feel that way today. I felt like this is the way that life has gone; this is who and where I am, and it hasn't gotten easier, I haven't grown callous, I haven't found a way to deal with it any better than I did the first time. Yet. I know now that I can survive. I know now that I can live through it. I know that I won't quit loving because of loss, and I can't quit losing because of love. Maybe, I started to accept that; maybe that's what I felt, for those moments. It felt peaceful, and adult in a way entirely different from the horror I generally associate with that word. It felt kind, like leaning against someone, like a loose embrace.
Of course, it's always easier to avoid the desperate-wanna-be-deity track when the danger-of-the-moment has been averted. Of course I'd want to know when someone was in peril if someone was in peril - I'd want to know at the exact moment... but it's easier to roll with the punch if there's a blanket of "but it's all going to be ok now" to help. Yes, I did hear another horror story today; yes, I did cry and feel the fear of what happened and what almost happened. Yes, it was wrapped in the blanket of "but it's all going to be ok." Still. That doesn't change the sadness. It doesn't change the stakes. And it doesn't change the reality of holding all those pains in front of me and feeling, but still feeling safe. There's still success - there's self - in that ability.
I told the doctor about the other success of the weekend - the accomplished mission during which the application of several new tools proved seriously helpful. The successful trip into the outside world. I told him about coming home and the small smile I couldn't shake, the feeling of contentment, the fact that I don't have the usual desire, the usual voice saying, "Ok, well, you did that; now go do everything there is to be done!" I feel rather inclined to stay here, actually, but not so much out of fear as from the sense that this will work, is working. The consistency of walks (broken by the weather - he insisted that excuse was legitimate, even if my mom and brother - crazy they, are - took two walks yesterday), the small changes in habit, the reinforcement of knowing I have power, have say, in every situation... All this will work. I'm so convinced of it (in the sort of way that I'll still manage to forget and feel desperate at some point) that I hesitate to do things I feel I probably could. I don't want to mess up the slow progress that serves me so well. It's why I didn't do anything (except therapy and walks) outside the apartment until Saturday, when I really felt it necessary that I pick up what I needed. Even when I wanted to do something, I didn't - because I wanted to keep myself safe, not dive in before I learn how to swim. Hell, at this point, I'm still checking the depth of the water. (And metaphors aside, I can't swim, so we're going to be pretty careful with anything even figuartively swimming-related.) Even today, when we ended up discussing - of all random things - the mess of my room and how to over a period of time, instate a set of habits that will keep my room clean, starting with just one and very simple, I walked away wondering if I was "allowed" to clean up as I'd been intending. Of course, I decide the rules; there's no real issue of permission, but today the trust in all of it's so strong that I hardly want to mess with it. Mess with it. Mess with the mess. Yes. I told him it seemed like a rather silly topic, compared to what we normally discuss, and considering that we aren't exactly pressed for serious issues. But he said learning how to instate habits this way in a fairly neutral situation could help as we instate them in more stressful areas. And besides, I can't handle clutter in my head and in my room. He understood that so well, he said he couldn't really understand how my room managed to get messy. Hearing that amused me, considering I've had a reputation for my messy room since the dawn of memory.
It's been a really interesting few days, which is bizarre to say, considering I've updated here fairly regularly. And yes, a lot of the weekend sucked. Friday's frustration returned Sunday; my brother's stayed with us for several days now, and my mom's attended him so closely, I've felt depths of injury and anger return from the past, from before things started to get better. Yes, I've been really pissed off a lot of the time, and that's hard. I had an extremely difficult time leaving yesterday's last entry up; it's one of those "how I feel in one moment" or "what I show myself at any given time does not cover my entire personality or being" lessons. It's ok to write a really pissed off entry about how I need space from my brother and I'm feeling hurt by my mom and wait awhile to say that I think my brother is one of the most rocking people in the entire universe, and my mom - on top of being my mom - has become a really great support, even though it's currently faltering... I think she'll return to the pre-December mode eventually. I think she'll catch back up with who she was becoming, and things will move forward again. I like forward; it's a good direction.
Of course, in the 24 hours since I posted that entry, I've been given all sorts of reason to discuss the other side of it - the I-love-them side. I've felt ashamed, sorry, guilty, and downright ridiculous for what I've said... and I've felt just as frustrated as I did when I was writing. I haven't had a great deal of space to rest and contemplate lately, and it's made things difficult. Life continues on even though I haven't looked at it, and before I know it, I'm overwhelmed by all that's happened without giving me time to sift through, organize, and try to understand. Still. Last night, when I left that entry, I went into the living room to sing with my brother while he played guitar. We know pathetically few songs that met the criteria (things we both knew that could be translated to guitar) and amusingly, the only song we really made it through with some gusto was "Blister in the Sun." (And my mom was sitting there, and I enjoyed it.) We sang a few of John's songs, but not as many as I would have liked, and he managed to play "Silent All These Years" which meant that I got to be Tori Amos for three minutes or so, and it was amazing. My voice was working; I played with the timing, personalized it...John was playing, and I was singing, and I felt like a superstar, just like I always knew I would. I also felt severely idiotic for having written anything other than, "my brother kicks ass and is a rock star." That said, the frustration and the reasons for the frustration have not disappeared entirely. And even the explanation I received today, which happens to also be the blanketed punch, which I realize now I've been waiting for, didn't entirely erase my ill feelings. The doctor made certain of that. It doesn't matter what's going on; I should not stop having parents just because someone else is not ok. I should not have to be the most-not-ok to receive care and understanding, to receive attention even. And I know my mom is trying, and I know John feels badly about it all. It's just one of those complex realities I'm trying not to choose between. It's "I totally understand" and "This is so wrong!" being true simultaneously. Feeling true simultaneously.
I'm just going to type the words now. I need to just do that. ... My brother John nearly died last week. Stressed by rumors that he would lose his job (which he did, but it was a horrible work environment, and it's going to be better now) he turned to one of his coping methods that has always scared the shit out of me: alcohol. It's not that he's ever been drunk around me; I don't know how to explain why I was afraid. Maybe because he wasn't drunk. Maybe his tolerance for it, and the ease with which he leaned on it. Over the course of a few days, he seriously overdosed on alcohol. He experienced terrifying and painful responses, and - like me in my eating disorder - responded to them by drinking more, what he calls "the exactly wrong thing." Thank everything that is good in this world and beyond it - he finally called the doctor and told him honestly what was going on. The doctor prescribed some pills that John's taking a few times a day, and he promises that there won't be any permanent damage. In return, John's done drinking for a year, and possibly for the rest of his life. I can see in his eyes why he doesn't even crave it now. I have a memory inside me that can guess. For that, I'm really grateful; I'm glad he's done with drinking...I'm glad I don't need to worry now. But to know that this happened, that for the third time in his life my brother almost died, and for the second time I didn't even know it was happening, really scares me. I started thinking about last night, and how it never would have happened. I thought about how much I would have given, if things had gone the other way, to have him close enough to irritate me. I did cry when he told me, although I didn't feel free to do as much as I needed. I didn't want to add to the guilt he's already feeling, but I was still mostly honest (I didn't hold it all back) and made it clear that it would not have been ok - I would not have been ok ... I told him I was so, so grateful that he told the doctor. It's the truth...
Afterward, he talked about how he felt, in some ways, like he finally understood - just a little - what it was like for me when my eating disorder was so rampant. It hurt a little to think about that, to think about my illness, the sadness that came up...and it hurt to know that I'd "scared the shit out of" John. He told me what he did when he first found out I was sick, something I'd never heard before. He walked away from his desk at work, just walked away, and this older woman - in her 40s, I think - asked where he was going, and when he didn't answer, she followed him. (He didn't realize it.) He went to the parking garage and sat on his car, and she found him and he told her what was wrong. I could feel it when he told me; I could see him, and I wanted to apologize. I am sorry, but what could I have done? And as I told him, I was scared, too. The doctor presses that in some ways I might have been more scared than anyone.
I said that - about being scared - and I said that I didn't really understand it back then. I understood it, but I couldn't make it real. I didn't even believe I had an eating disorder until after I was at Rogers; I kept waiting for it to just go away. And even though I understood the threat on my life, I didn't understand what the reality of that was until Tracy died. I told him that and he said - his voice so low and true as only John's can be, "God, that was so sad." And I remembered, how he didn't say much the night I found out, and I knew it was because he was feeling too much of it, not because he didn't care. I remembered the song he wrote for Tracy and for me... He said he'd seen the pictures of her on my wall - "You have a few pictures of her on your wall," he said - and he's started to feel like he knows her. "It seems like...she would have been a nice person to know." I told him that's true. I told him how she was bright and kind and wonderful...
And then he went outside to smoke, and I went into the shower and cried. Not as hard as I would have guessed. Not as hard as I would have written, if I were God, and God were a writer. But I cried. I thanked my Grandma because John gave me good reason to believe, as he does, that she's been "the angel on his shoulder" through all this. I can't imagine the number of people my grandma's looking after...But then, she did manage to raise fifteen kids. She's probably doing alright with it. Better than probably. I'm sure she is.
After the shower, I felt better; I know I'm not done feeling around it, but today has been oddly calm, like I said. When I was getting ready to leave, I thought about what I wanted to say at the doc's, and I knew I wanted to tell him the story I remembered near the anniversary of Tracy's death - that she made a poster out of something he told me - and I thought about bringing Jenna's letter. But I didn't want to bring the letter that dismantled me, the letter from her illness. I wanted to bring the letter she wrote when she left Rogers, the one that's from her, to me, in love. I wanted to show him that one, if any. And I think that's what's changing for me now. I want to know more fully the way that Tracy's alive, the way that my grandma's alive. I feel the pain of coming so close to loss, and still respond - genuinely - with thank you. Thank you for getting help; thank you for staying with me. Working so hard, telling me - thank you. I don't think I ever mentioned that when I sent Dixie a card following the news of her hospitalization, I sent a thank-you card. In it, I wrote that the get-well-soon vibes were obvious, of course I wanted that, and I knew she knew it. What she might not know was how grateful I was to her for fighting what I know to be such a difficult fight, for not giving up, for taking steps to get help for herself, for being in my life, consistently, for our simple friendship and cool love. That's where I am right now. That's the angle of the facet of the shape of the moment in the light as it's moving just now. Relaxed, somehow. Like the worst has come, again and again, like it's not something to protect myself from, the way I've driven myself crazy trying to do. Like it's a matter of being able to hold the love, regardless. To feel and not be swept away by feeling. To lose truly, to understand the loss, and still not lose myself.
And to love, love, love, like I know that I'm home. I am home. I am home. Like I know that what I'm searching for is who I am and all I want is what I have and what can be made from that. Like I held onto every scrap of love ever shown to me, and I can make an educated guess, based on my inability to let go when I've tried...that I very much have held onto every scrap. And oh, what I will sew from it...
~me