If I had the slightest idea where to begin...it wouldn't have taken me three days to come back here and do so. And if it hadn't taken until now, I wouldn't have all that I do to tell. I don't know where that leaves me. Typing the truth, at least so much as I know it. What else isn't new...
So, I've been living in this state of perpetual fear and confusion. I don't know how to explain surviving it; it's still eating at me, and I feel like I'm going to fall over and cry myself unconscious at any moment. I had an appointment today with the doc, a rather dreaded appointment - initially - and then a necessary one that took forever to arrive. I expected to walk out thoroughly beaten up as I did Friday, but he was cautious and gentle, so much so that when he said, "See you Friday?" I laughed. I told him I'd expected to be far more of a wreck by the time he asked that, similar to how I was when he said, "See you Monday?" - but added that I certainly didn't mind not ending up a total mess. He agreed to that, and I realized when he shook my hand that it was cold. I smiled, and I told him thanks and bye. He'd ended early, but I'd started to fall asleep. I mentioned confused and terrified; I didn't mention exhausted. How could I sidestep exhaustion given the circumstances?
So, Friday was hell. Truly. It was, like I said, an altogether eerie recreation of the day that the why-aren't-you-ok interrogations began. Since then, there's been a similarly disarming resonance of present circumstances with the beginning of my illness and the beginning of treatment for it. Sitting in the doctor's waiting room today, I felt like someone had swept all the time away. All the time separating me from when I first went there, unable to talk, unable to trust, unable to set myself free from any of it. I don't like remembering so strongly as that. I have a hard time believing that things have not really reverted, a hard time feeling secure. But all the fears and unanswered questions, all the confusion and secrecy, feel so familiar. I recognize a rather legitimate difference - that this is not an illness, this is not an unhealthy thing ... but even that just takes me back into a painful loop of processing - mainly a comparison between the attacks for and against ed glorification and homosexuality. It's a big deal that the latter isn't a deadly disease. But right now, I'm not in a place to understand concepts. I'm not able to debate or dish out rhetoric; I'm not even in a place to listen to it. I know there's a bigger world outside of here, but right now, all I know is me, and I'm all I can deal with for the moment. Much to my dismay, I'm (almost) completely unpinned by this. I want it to be fine, but it's not; it's not fine yet, and I have to learn why so I can change that... I want to change that, and I think I will, but I just can't believe how sick with stress I am.
(Sick with virus, too. Finally breaking down and seeing a physician tomorrow. Scared. Please, please let it be a simple "look at the disgusting virus persisting in inhabiting my mouth and throat" / "here's a prescription for an antibiotic" exchange. I don't know how much more I can handle.)
And this is after detox with the doc. This is after four phone messages in less than 24 hours, after two sessions in four days, after (take a breath, folks) - telling my mom. Yes, I completely lost my mind, and thank God for that. What did I tell her and how did it happen? I don't even know right now. I'm spinning, and I'm seriously grateful I didn't have that cola I was eyeing earlier. (Evil caffeine, evil!) It happened Saturday. I was home alone, again. I'd been home alone after the appointment Friday, crying and calling the doctor (three times), and then Saturday morning my mom had to work. I checked my e-mail and to my joyous surprise I had a message from Stacy, who so rarely ventures online. Mainly the message was good, and of course, having it was good; the confirmation that we're staying connected means a lot. She wrote a little of some confusion regarding her current position at Rogers; she's been going back and forth between a few different posts - one of which had her filling in for Dave during his occasional absences, and then (here's where I take a hit) pretty much full-time when he resigned the last week of January.
I lost it. Dave resigned? I don't know how to explain it. I hadn't cried all morning, but those words just went through me. First of all, the verb felt piercing. Dave does not resign himself to much. And I cannot handle my home deteriorating any further during this particular moment. And I just wrote him a letter asking that, even if he never writes a single letter back, he'll always let me have an address to continue writing him. Bizarre clairvoyance aside - I didn't write the letter because I expected it to happen now! I don't know if he got the letter, and even if he did, I don't know if he'll respond; even if he's fine with me writing him, I don't know that he'll go to the trouble to ensure that I can. And I'm freaking out about that seriously. When I found out Saturday, I called my mom. She was in a session, so her phone was off; I asked her to call me - I couldn't remember when she was getting home. A couple hours later, she called, but I didn't answer, and a few minutes after that she came home. She said the house was so quiet when she came in, she thought I'd called to tell her I was going to John's. I said something eloquent like, "Oh. No" and went to sit on the couch. She asked why I had called; I told her I'd been freaking out. She sat down eventually, in her chair at the computer, and something about the way she was sitting, facing me from a distance, instead of next to me, made it impossible to tell her. I tried what I considered the simpler crisis; I told her Dave left Rogers. I told her I write him letters all the time, and I'd just written him one asking that he let me continue even if he moved on... She didn't even know that I've been writing him; I've kept my relationships with Rogers staff-folk fairly private... so she had a rather difficult time understanding the magnitude of this situation. In my head, I started to think, "How will she ever understand the other thing if she can't even understand this?" though, in all fairness, she had far better grounds to understand "the other thing" than she did my feelings around Dave. She asked if that was the only thing freaking me out, and I told her that after Friday's session, I was just not up for anything else. She asked what had freaked me out in Friday's session, making it clear that I didn't have to tell her but I could if it would help; I kept saying if I had a way to know it would help I'd have told her. I kept trying to push the words out, but I just grew anxious. I thought about writing it in code on a scrap of paper or a napkin. Two scientific "female" symbols (paired), followed by a "female" symbol and a "male" symbol (paired separately), followed by a question mark. Or maybe the gender symbols used on restroom doors. I was having trouble breathing, and I kept asking myself if I really believed it wise to give her information before I could even *say* it. Wasn't that an obvious signal that this was premature? The stress was explosive, however, and I could not decide.
John came over and things did not improve. I struggled to keep my similar-to-in-illness feelings from pushing me into illness-behaviors. (Oh, wait. I can express a supper preference. I can claim my hunger.) John very much wanted me to visit him in his newly-livable apartment; he would settle for Sunday, but he really wanted me to go Saturday night. He refused to see any of the obvious points - I was exhausted, I was sick, I was stressed, I was in a crappy mood, I'm agoraphobic, I said no, and so forth. He kept pushing at it like I hadn't given him an answer, and I started to feel like I was dealing with a now outdated version of my oldest brother. I finally yelled something at him, and he withdrew like it was out of nowhere - which I'm sure it was to him; as I said *none* of my earlier remarks registered. Then there was this whole discussion of it being an "awkward moment" - which pissed me off even more thoroughly. Personally, I felt far less awkward than I had staying silent. I felt far less awkward having finally said flat-out how I was feeling, and I was pretty furious that this was considered good cause for everyone else to feel awkward. Honesty? Communication, if a little rough? Feelings? Fuck it. He went to have a cigarette, and Mom went to comfort me. I tried to tell her again, and again none of the right words came out. I dealt a card game instead, and we played. Later, John found her guitar (which is high class; he's always playing it when he comes over) and Mom went back to work on the computer. I sat down on the edge of our couch like I was at an appointment, elbows on my knees, and head on my palms. Then I curled up into a ball and tried to figure out how to blow off the necessary steam so as not to run full-speed into a sharp blade. A long while later, my mom came over and sat down by me. She coaxed me to talk with her. She even said that she "could hear it now and forget it later" - practically a direct attempt to console my "but if I tell her, she'll *know*! She'll be able to bring it up!" fear. I told her everything was just so messed up. She asked me what was so messed up. I said, "Me." She asked if my illness was acting up again, if I was actively eating-disordered and such. I said no. She asked what was messed up about me. I cried and shook my head. She held me and kept coaxing. She asked me to let her help me carry it. I thought of the doctor at the end of our session Friday, telling me I could leave some of it there. "A nice idea," I told him, "but not exactly reality." (He'd made the same statement earlier about my suggestion that we be allowed to choose which parts of ourselves existed.) Finally, I said (and even typing it is hard, "The doctor and I...we've been talking about...whether or not I'm...gay." I fell apart a little, and she held me that much more closely, saying things like, "Oh, Mary, oh sweetie," and then "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," a bunch of times. I could tell they were sympathetic sorries, and just as I was about to become worried by why she was sorry for me, she said, "You've been through so much," and I began bawling - because she'd said it just before I'd managed to get out, "I just want something to be normal and easy. Everything is always so hard." I couldn't believe she understood that, even before I told her. I couldn't believe she knew to comfort me not around the specifics but just the general truth that I had to go through something else, something more. I let her hold me until I felt like I could breathe again. She gave a few of her trademark speeches, which weren't helpful, but were almost comforting just because they're so characteristic ("if we could just let each other be natural, do what's natural instead of worrying about what's normal, then normal could be natural" etc)...and she told me how she loves me regardless, how everyone I care about will, and how she'll try not to be ok with this more quickly than I am. It was nice to hear the first one, even though it's such a stock response. The second I didn't so much believe; she doesn't even know everyone I love- she can hardly speak for them. The third made me laugh. I'm sure she's more ok with it than I am - right now at least. Few people aren't.
Sunday, I did go to John's, and we had a fairly decent visit. We're ok, as far as I can tell, no real harm done on Saturday. The visit exhausted me, though, as if I wasn't already exhausted. Then today I had the doctor and tomorrow I have the other doctor. I'm thrown by a continuous stream of active days. I usually only have a couple a week. And it's kind of a difficult week, even outside that.
But I read this really interesting article (thanks, s.) today that made a wonderful point about sexuality being more than sex - having to do with long term bonds and emotional intimacy and so forth. It was a very small point in the story, but I think it's what helped me most today. Because I can see wanting a girl to love, and I can see that being ok. (With me and with people who matter in my life.) At this point, I can't see sex ever being ok. (With me.) To hear that the doctor's talk of "relationality" might not be all code and euphemisms helped. As did the easier session today - focused on helping maintain his office as a safe place, as a refuge, which he says is most important; everything else will eventually come up and be worked out if I can keep coming and keep feeling safe. He said I had courage to tell my mom. And we talked a lot about Dave. He said there are ways to track the guy down, and I think if I need to call on his credibility as a doctor (as opposed to mine as a former resident) to help ease that process, he'll help. He said he was afraid I didn't only worry that having short-distance relationships would keep me from putting the necessary effort into my oh-so-important long-distance ones, but also that a relationship with me short-distance could overwhelm someone. I said certainly I was afraid of that. I'm afraid my illness will overwhelm people, and I'm afraid my obviously extreme attachment will overwhelm people. I'll need too much. He told me that as far as he could see, everything I do to maintain relationships, even in the midst of complete lack of response was a gift. He said I was tenacious, and that later in life, my loves might come to me and express gratitude for continuing on when they didn't respond - because they needed me so much then or because it meant so much or it let them come back into my life when they did. I sat, a little stunned, contemplating the replacement of "relentless" with "tenacious." Mmm. He said it was probably tough for me - to continue on despite all those silences which could exist for any number of reasons. I told him that the silences never seem to be about anything but rejection, even when they are. They are hard to endure. They are hard to continue despite. But loss, to me, is still infinitely harder.
I keep thinking of the dream where Jenna and I were set to talk in front of the entire school - the one where all I wanted was to know how she was going to conduct herself so that I could decide what to do for myself. I see now what a perfect symbol of the undefined she is, especially around sexuality. I didn't want to tell anyone the questions I was asking before I was sure it was necessary (before I was sure the answer was affirmative.) That same feeling of, "There are brutal repercussions here so if you're going to do this you better be damn sure it's necessary." But that isn't all of what I wanted. I said once that I wished I could just tell people that I was questioning, that I didn't have to wait until I felt certain and could come out or be straight or whatever the hell I'll need to do when and if I ever know. I think that's the kind of scary that makes sense to me. That's the kind of frightening thing that I can see logic in and choose to pursue despite my fear. As opposed to this overwhelming, sick-inside-feeling, terror of secrecy and isolation. It's a relief having my mom know. The first person (that I had to actually *tell* - in one sentence - the first person not to know via many, many vague references in therapy sessions or through my journal) knows, which makes everything easier, whether or not it makes any rational difference. And she's here for support but she's not pressing. And so many of the dumb things - the fears about if I say this, if I'm seen reading this, if I refer to this person, if I open this website - have disappeared. Saturday morning I wanted to box up all the "indications" in my life - the books, the music, the ideas - and throw them out. To cut off that limb of my personality, to choose which parts exist. I did once box up nearly all the food in our kitchen, preparing to throw it out so that I wouldn't have to deal with its presence. The correlation didn't escape me. I don't want to box things up now. And I don't really want to cut things off (just yet.) As I told the doctor in my third phone call Friday, I don't want to hate myself again. Ever. I don't want to make anything reason to feel that toward myself again.
So again I choose, and it's always love...
~me