Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Whatever!
I have been doing a lot of good work in therapy. I am getting better daily, and then a day like today happens and I feel as small and bad as I ever have. I fucked something up, forgot something important, which I have been doing a lot since menopause, and really angered someone. I was threatened. I was criticized and attacked at the very center of my being. I was basically told I am pathetic and a loser who needs to get a life and grow up. Ok, fine, I do need a life and to grow up, but not the way this person meant it at all. Her words were spiteful and hurtful. I’ve never said I am a mature, well balanced person. Indeed I know I am socially lacking in development, needy, nerdy, depressed, distracted and distractible, lonely, and a lot of other things. I know I have a long way to go to be a functioning person in society. There are actually people who meet “me” and see a very confident person, blah, blah, blah. But that person is not me. It is either an alternate personality, Moe, or the persona I adopt to look unafraid when I am actually so anxious under the surface that just about anything will make me cry or blow up in anger. I guess what I am trying to say is that I may certainly be as fucked up as this person said, but I have never claimed to be anything else. I am fucked up and I make mistakes, big ones, often. I drive people away from me. I have no filter. I do and say things I shouldn’t. I talk to the wrong people about the right things. I hide my true thoughts and feelings because they are too bizarre. So I am all of those things, but I am also a person, with feelings, and thoughts, and a heart. I have a great capacity to love. I do things for people I hate doing because I am afraid to say no. I am a work in progress. I am not the fake that this woman said I am. No trained therapist can be fooled by a fake. My disorders, multiple disorders, are real, as real as my eye color. I can change my life, my reactions, I can grow and learn, but I can’t stop being me. I can’t make memory any better in women in menopause, it sucks having Swiss cheese memory. I literally forget what day of the week it is, which is what I did today; I thought it was Sunday because I don’t remember having a Sunday this week. I didn’t set an alarm. I stranded this woman and it pissed her off with good reason. In what universe does the phrase, “I was wrong, I am sorry,” actually work? No matter how many times I say it to anyone, I just get further lecture on how I was wrong, and what my wrongness cost them. In cases like this one, I often get a lot of unsolicited criticism of who I am, what I am, etc. I take comfort in the knowledge that she is an angry, mean spirited person, making her a kind of ugly you can’t see in a mirror, and I am not.
Friday, November 19, 2010
Free Write/Ramble
I act out, fly off the handle, dissolve into a mess of “I can’ts” and drive people crazy, or drive them away. Being told to stop when I am in the middle of the melt down does not work because at that point I am unreasonable and do not believe I can stop. It also makes me feel worse about me, driving me deeper into the feelings of “I can’t do anything right,” and, “I am a bad person.” I feel like crap knowing my actions and reactions are hurting other people. Reminding me of this in the middle of it all doesn’t make me feel less like shit, or more like stopping, in fact it is the reverse. When you tell me you don’t like my poetry, the ones that hold me together by taking the power out of the thoughts by putting the dark thoughts into public words, I feel like I am a failure as a writer. When you say “Maybe somebody will buy your book…” I again feel like a failure. I feel as if my poetry is rotten and won’t be identified with or useful to anyone. But the point of the poems is to bring the dark thoughts and hurtful things to the surface, to show others who think the same that they are not alone, to let the world know we feel these things all of the time and keep going anyway, these are my points. I hope someday to write poems more of hope and less of my process, but I am in my process, I am not at the end of it and it brings out all of the dark to get to the light. For me there is a light, burning from within and without. It comes from me, from the Is, from all living things. I just have a lot of dark, painful, hurtful, fucked up shit between me and being in the light all of the time. I live in the light as much as I can, but for years of living in the darkness, the light is uncomfortable, bright, burning and feeling dangerous. I feel exposed in the light; funny how the cure for feeling exposed is to expose all the dark, all the pain, all the nastiness to the light and air, and to others. I don’t want others to know how often I let myself be victim. I already feel at fault for all of the bad that happened to me, but to expose that to others is just too dangerous. And yet here I am, exposing; my autobiography, my poetry, my secrets, all coming out for others to see. When I relay this to others and am believed, I am relieved, it is freedom. When I am disbelieved or questioned, I want to crawl back to the place where I never tell, where telling brings punishment or death. I don’t want to live in that fear. I don’t want to live with the feeling I am a freak for my memories, for the awful things done to me. I know some of the stuff I remember is beyond common understanding, but that doesn’t make it untrue or me a liar. When I am called liar, it is like a huge door shuts and no more can come out without hours of time with those who believe and understand. They give me safety. One gives me fear. I walked out of a life with a family because the fear and the memories couldn’t be contained anymore. I lost a mom, a nephew, a daughter, and more. I am alone in the world save a few friends and a niece or two.
Freedom
This poem is totally raw and unedited because I allowed it to flow. This is my voice and those that share space in my head. I like it. Maureen
They write, and I write.
They talk, I listen.
Their words, through my hands.
We write, I write.
Who writes? I don’t know,
And it doesn’t matter,
Not now.
Writing comes
From somewhere inside us,
In ways no one taught us.
Words, strung together
As only i/we can.
And they write, and I write,
And we write through
My hands.
You see the words,
Credit me,
I credit us.
Writing is escape,
And writing is forbidden.
We write the same,
In our head,
With the other hand.
Once their voices
Were part of mine.
Now they find their own,
And we write, they write.
My hands used
To tell the untellable,
And give up the secrets.
We write
Freedom.
They write, and I write.
They talk, I listen.
Their words, through my hands.
We write, I write.
Who writes? I don’t know,
And it doesn’t matter,
Not now.
Writing comes
From somewhere inside us,
In ways no one taught us.
Words, strung together
As only i/we can.
And they write, and I write,
And we write through
My hands.
You see the words,
Credit me,
I credit us.
Writing is escape,
And writing is forbidden.
We write the same,
In our head,
With the other hand.
Once their voices
Were part of mine.
Now they find their own,
And we write, they write.
My hands used
To tell the untellable,
And give up the secrets.
We write
Freedom.
When Do I Tell People
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
That I have people
Inside me
To help out
To protect me
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
That days have shapes
And colors have shapes
And plushies talk
And cats do too
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
When small voices
Come out of me
Southern voices
Many voices indeed
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
That I see the world
Through filters
Of hurt so deep
Imagination can’t reach
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
Medications hold steady
A ship that rocks
And tosses thoughts
Twisting perceptions
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
That mental illness
Is not a death sentence
Nor is it contagious
Nor are we dumb
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
I am just like them
Living in the same world
Seeing from off center
What they see as well.
What do I tell them?
That I have people
Inside me
To help out
To protect me
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
That days have shapes
And colors have shapes
And plushies talk
And cats do too
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
When small voices
Come out of me
Southern voices
Many voices indeed
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
That I see the world
Through filters
Of hurt so deep
Imagination can’t reach
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
Medications hold steady
A ship that rocks
And tosses thoughts
Twisting perceptions
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
That mental illness
Is not a death sentence
Nor is it contagious
Nor are we dumb
When do I tell people?
What do I tell them?
I am just like them
Living in the same world
Seeing from off center
What they see as well.
What Poetry is and What Poetry is Not
Poetry is not literal. Poetry is not the voice of the poet. Poetry is not prose. Poetry is figurative, imaginative, symbolic. Poetry is a voice, an idea, a thought. Poetry is thought provoking and open to interpretation, many interpretations. Poetry is shorthand of emotion and idea. Often in the words of a poem a reader feels or sees his or her own emotions in the words or images of the poet, and assumes that those feelings are the feelings the poet intended. It is not possible, without asking the poet, to know what her intentions were.
Interpreting poetry is not something that is taught enough, or well enough in school. People often have no idea what the purpose of a poem is. Many are written for effect, some tell stories, some are just pretty, all are visions, not of the poet, but of the reader or listener. Poetry really should be heard and not read, though reading allows one to see the words in connection to one another. How to read poetry is a lost art, to know how to read the punctuation, the enjambment (or even knowing what that means,) is to truly know poetry.
One reads into the poetry what one wants to, and then all too often blames the poet for the feelings it brings up. Poetry exists only as words, symbols on a page without meaning until the reader or listener infuses their own thoughts and feelings into the words the poet put on the page. While it is true that the meaning is there for the poet, the poet allows that the readers will make their own meaning from the words. The recipient of the poetry does not, cannot know what is in the head of the poet at the time of the writing, nor can that recipient ever truly understand the poet’s vision, because the poem is seen or heard through the filter of the recipient’s life experience, emotion, thought, etc. It is unfair to blame the poet for reactions to the poetry, to the words, because the words are only words, and have meaning, and feeling only through the filter of the one looking at them, or hearing them. This is true of all writing in a way, but poetry most especially because the poet writes the way he or she does so that the words can be interpreted by the reader. The goal is to stir feeling, to create thought, to provoke, to be a catalyst in the mind of the reader. If poetry were meant to be taken literally or at face value, it would be prose. In creating poetry the poet looks for words that stir, that have more than a denotative meaning, more than a dictionary definition, the words are chosen for their connotative meaning, the feelings they bring out, the associations. . I am thinking of an example of a word, suicide, it brings up different thoughts and feelings for every person who reads it. For some the process of writing about it is a triumph because they are writing it and not doing it. For others saying it takes the power out of the thinking it. For others it is the contemplation of the darkest place a soul can go. Others have lost loved one to suicide. Sometimes suicide imagery, like the suggestion of a saber being too dull to slash a wrist,
The walls are sooo high
And the finely honed saber
I had when I began storming
Your citadel isn’t even
Sharp enough to
Slash my wrists
It isn’t about the wrist or the slash, it is about the saber and how dull it is. A person with dark thoughts on her mind will see the image of the slashed wrist and not the saber dulled to uselessness by attempts to break down defenses of another. Or is it about the slash and the wrist? It is about whatever is in the mind of the reader, but blaming the poet for what is in one’s mind is foolish and childish.
It is also a mistake to assume that the poet is feeling the things that are written on a page. The poet may be writing from a different voice, a different perspective than his or her own. The poet chooses a voice, a persona, and writes from there. The voice of the poem, the feelings, the words, are not always what the poet is thinking or feeling, indeed they are most often what the poet think someone else might feel in a situation or about a thing. A poet writes from her own voice, and she writes from other voices, it really makes no difference though because, again, poetry means what it means to the reader, not what it means that matters, but what it means to you! It can be assumed a poet is being negative when for him the poem is a triumph of positive imagery.
Interpreting poetry is not something that is taught enough, or well enough in school. People often have no idea what the purpose of a poem is. Many are written for effect, some tell stories, some are just pretty, all are visions, not of the poet, but of the reader or listener. Poetry really should be heard and not read, though reading allows one to see the words in connection to one another. How to read poetry is a lost art, to know how to read the punctuation, the enjambment (or even knowing what that means,) is to truly know poetry.
One reads into the poetry what one wants to, and then all too often blames the poet for the feelings it brings up. Poetry exists only as words, symbols on a page without meaning until the reader or listener infuses their own thoughts and feelings into the words the poet put on the page. While it is true that the meaning is there for the poet, the poet allows that the readers will make their own meaning from the words. The recipient of the poetry does not, cannot know what is in the head of the poet at the time of the writing, nor can that recipient ever truly understand the poet’s vision, because the poem is seen or heard through the filter of the recipient’s life experience, emotion, thought, etc. It is unfair to blame the poet for reactions to the poetry, to the words, because the words are only words, and have meaning, and feeling only through the filter of the one looking at them, or hearing them. This is true of all writing in a way, but poetry most especially because the poet writes the way he or she does so that the words can be interpreted by the reader. The goal is to stir feeling, to create thought, to provoke, to be a catalyst in the mind of the reader. If poetry were meant to be taken literally or at face value, it would be prose. In creating poetry the poet looks for words that stir, that have more than a denotative meaning, more than a dictionary definition, the words are chosen for their connotative meaning, the feelings they bring out, the associations. . I am thinking of an example of a word, suicide, it brings up different thoughts and feelings for every person who reads it. For some the process of writing about it is a triumph because they are writing it and not doing it. For others saying it takes the power out of the thinking it. For others it is the contemplation of the darkest place a soul can go. Others have lost loved one to suicide. Sometimes suicide imagery, like the suggestion of a saber being too dull to slash a wrist,
The walls are sooo high
And the finely honed saber
I had when I began storming
Your citadel isn’t even
Sharp enough to
Slash my wrists
It isn’t about the wrist or the slash, it is about the saber and how dull it is. A person with dark thoughts on her mind will see the image of the slashed wrist and not the saber dulled to uselessness by attempts to break down defenses of another. Or is it about the slash and the wrist? It is about whatever is in the mind of the reader, but blaming the poet for what is in one’s mind is foolish and childish.
It is also a mistake to assume that the poet is feeling the things that are written on a page. The poet may be writing from a different voice, a different perspective than his or her own. The poet chooses a voice, a persona, and writes from there. The voice of the poem, the feelings, the words, are not always what the poet is thinking or feeling, indeed they are most often what the poet think someone else might feel in a situation or about a thing. A poet writes from her own voice, and she writes from other voices, it really makes no difference though because, again, poetry means what it means to the reader, not what it means that matters, but what it means to you! It can be assumed a poet is being negative when for him the poem is a triumph of positive imagery.
Saturday, October 23, 2010
tree house
The tree house, haven to all, is where I hang out when they summon me. This is the place each comes to give me news, memories, greetings. It is the place where they can connect and use my body to their own ends. This tree house is really the hub of all activity that concerns me. I have a campsite in my head, where they live. They all meet in each other’s tents or in the comfort/rocking chair tent to spend time with each other, but they come to the tree house to see me. I never even knew there was a tree house until I drew the campsite and it arrived in the drawing. The sign below does not bear the name Maureen, it says “Moe house.” Weird because I keep seeing Moe, looking exactly like me except smiling and laughing and being unafraid. Why doesn’t she just take over, or meld with me? Her name is down below, but my mind is the one in the tree house being filled with more crap than I can deal with. So much is coming at me so fast, and I can’t get all of it out to talk about it. I feel overwhelmed and ill equipped to deal with everything. I need a way to deal. I need a way to process the insanity. It’s going to take hours of journaling and hours of talking to get this shit out of my head. I am drowning and I can’t reach out for fear of rejection. I make many acquaintances and few friends. Friends mean connection, I either connect too much, too hard, and drown others in my need, or I shy from any true connection. In the tree house the alters connect to me and I want to run, climb down, hide, but for me once I am there, the trap door slams shut and I am there until I hear and listen to all he, or she, or they have to say. I always wanted a huge tree house, one I could actually live in, but now that I have one in my head, and it is filled with memory bombs, I am not so certain I want one anymore.
Rainbow Umbrella
Rainbow umbrella
I see rainy days
When you folded
All the colors touch
When you are open
Lines divide all
Rainbow people
I see every day
When you are open
All the colors touch
When you are closed
Lines divide all
Rainbow ideas
I have every day
When I am open
All the words touch
When I am closed
Lines divide all
Rainbow people
I live with today
When I am open
All their worlds touch
When I am closed
Walls divide all
Rainbow umbrella
I see rainy days
A mind became open
All the words I touch
With eyes half closed
Ideas just fall
I see rainy days
When you folded
All the colors touch
When you are open
Lines divide all
Rainbow people
I see every day
When you are open
All the colors touch
When you are closed
Lines divide all
Rainbow ideas
I have every day
When I am open
All the words touch
When I am closed
Lines divide all
Rainbow people
I live with today
When I am open
All their worlds touch
When I am closed
Walls divide all
Rainbow umbrella
I see rainy days
A mind became open
All the words I touch
With eyes half closed
Ideas just fall
Why Is It That I Know Who I Am...
Why is it that I know who I am, what I am, and I love me, know I am good, kind, loving, generous, decent, and then at the same time I am insecure, unsure, afraid, and constantly making mistakes? How am I both of these people, the confident one, and the lost one? I’m torn, confused. I wonder if these are alters of me, or sides of me. I wonder if I’ll ever triumph over the dark side, the small side, the insecure side. I don’t want to be her. I am not her. I know me; I am smart, funny, capable, and cute as hell.
I sometimes don’t recognize this person who is living on the outside of me like some kind of costume I can never take off. I want it off. I want me to show, to shine. Look at me, I am perfect. I am happy, carefree. I skip, I play, I am; Freedom. There is nothing wrong with the me I see, the me I think I am. But then there is the me that wants to be out, to be seen, not for attention like some think; no, not attention for me, for my pain, but attention for the pain and suffering of so many who didn’t survive. I survived. I am alive because I am strong and perfect and because the love of The Is, the light of the Universe is in me and I am unreachable by the nastiness of the world.
I sometimes don’t recognize this person who is living on the outside of me like some kind of costume I can never take off. I want it off. I want me to show, to shine. Look at me, I am perfect. I am happy, carefree. I skip, I play, I am; Freedom. There is nothing wrong with the me I see, the me I think I am. But then there is the me that wants to be out, to be seen, not for attention like some think; no, not attention for me, for my pain, but attention for the pain and suffering of so many who didn’t survive. I survived. I am alive because I am strong and perfect and because the love of The Is, the light of the Universe is in me and I am unreachable by the nastiness of the world.
MJ poem
Pendulum swings
Big & little things
In our moods
In our minds
What feels so normal
So alive
Medication dulls
Creativity destroys
Cemented in place
Cracks
No medication
Isn’t there
Nothing holds
Flying, racing
Thoughts
Emotions
Confetti on the
Wind
A gun looks
Good
A mind shot through
Alone or taking hostages
Along the way
Big & little things
In our moods
In our minds
What feels so normal
So alive
Medication dulls
Creativity destroys
Cemented in place
Cracks
No medication
Isn’t there
Nothing holds
Flying, racing
Thoughts
Emotions
Confetti on the
Wind
A gun looks
Good
A mind shot through
Alone or taking hostages
Along the way
Strange the World
Strange is the world inside my head,
I wonder if one is called Fred.
Whirling boys versus swirling girls,
Pitter patter, like scurrying squirrels,
Run around my brain, up my halls,
Down my stairs, and around my walls.
This one feels guilt for liking dick.
Oh my god, that’s so sick!
Some make others feel even worse,
Come to save? Or just an evil curse?
Others try to fix every tiny thing,
Quick with a kiss for any sting.
No two eat the same, have similar likes,
All enjoy scaring me with memory spikes.
I have to listen, I hate asking inside,
Who owns this feeling, who just cried?
Talking to them makes me feel nuts,
Facing this tribe takes a ton of guts.
Some days I haven’t got any of those;
Too bad this is a door I can’t close.
Not just any old swinging door,
Oh no, it’s a trap, in the floor.
Don’t climb my tree, enter the house,
Once inside, Snap! Trapped like a mouse.
Memory bombs fly at my head,
Still wondering if one is called Fred.
This is the stuff I packed away,
Never thought it would return this way.
Many voices calling me at once,
They know about me; I’m the dunce.
How many live here in the zoo,
I’ve no idea at all, do you?
Revelations of names, dates, places,
Times, and in the mirror, new faces,
All come at me daily, twisting thoughts,
Like I’m the target and they take shots.
It is strange to live in the world, and in my head.
I wonder where they go when I am dead.
If I have one soul, in one body, alive,
Explain the existence of the alter hive.
I can’t explain them though I understand,
Bitch trying to describe, ain’t DID grand?
What is the point of this twisted bunch?
Saving my mind maybe? Just a hunch.
If I could lead a tour around the halls,
I would point out the crumbling walls
That once separated me from them,
And show the twisted flower stem
Of memories, violations, acts of pain,
That brought the group, to my disdain,
That helped survive that which destroys,
Leaving me to have the girls and boys
Living in, standing in, taking abuse
For the me who couldn’t. What’s the use?
The tour could never show the glory,
The wonderful invention, the real story
Of how they saved my tiny soul,
And in pieces they kept me whole.
Strange the world inside my head
Still wondering if there’s a Fred.
I wonder if one is called Fred.
Whirling boys versus swirling girls,
Pitter patter, like scurrying squirrels,
Run around my brain, up my halls,
Down my stairs, and around my walls.
This one feels guilt for liking dick.
Oh my god, that’s so sick!
Some make others feel even worse,
Come to save? Or just an evil curse?
Others try to fix every tiny thing,
Quick with a kiss for any sting.
No two eat the same, have similar likes,
All enjoy scaring me with memory spikes.
I have to listen, I hate asking inside,
Who owns this feeling, who just cried?
Talking to them makes me feel nuts,
Facing this tribe takes a ton of guts.
Some days I haven’t got any of those;
Too bad this is a door I can’t close.
Not just any old swinging door,
Oh no, it’s a trap, in the floor.
Don’t climb my tree, enter the house,
Once inside, Snap! Trapped like a mouse.
Memory bombs fly at my head,
Still wondering if one is called Fred.
This is the stuff I packed away,
Never thought it would return this way.
Many voices calling me at once,
They know about me; I’m the dunce.
How many live here in the zoo,
I’ve no idea at all, do you?
Revelations of names, dates, places,
Times, and in the mirror, new faces,
All come at me daily, twisting thoughts,
Like I’m the target and they take shots.
It is strange to live in the world, and in my head.
I wonder where they go when I am dead.
If I have one soul, in one body, alive,
Explain the existence of the alter hive.
I can’t explain them though I understand,
Bitch trying to describe, ain’t DID grand?
What is the point of this twisted bunch?
Saving my mind maybe? Just a hunch.
If I could lead a tour around the halls,
I would point out the crumbling walls
That once separated me from them,
And show the twisted flower stem
Of memories, violations, acts of pain,
That brought the group, to my disdain,
That helped survive that which destroys,
Leaving me to have the girls and boys
Living in, standing in, taking abuse
For the me who couldn’t. What’s the use?
The tour could never show the glory,
The wonderful invention, the real story
Of how they saved my tiny soul,
And in pieces they kept me whole.
Strange the world inside my head
Still wondering if there’s a Fred.
Ask Inside
Ask inside,
Ha, ha, ha,
As if I could do less
Every decision
Every thought
Every move
I make
Discussion, argument
Inside
Each opinion
Shouted out
Those who care
Some are silent
Cacophony
Voices
With faces
Voicing opinion
Voicing resistance
Disobey
Argue
Choose differently
Hear the roar
As all who
Disagree
Fling their thoughts
Into my thoughts
Put their voices
In my mind
And mouth
Who needs a
Conscience
When you have
A team
A system
A committee
To debate every
Damn decision
Ad nauseum
Ask inside, ha,
Why, when they
Voice everything
Every
Little
Thing
So next time
You ask inside
Ha, ha, ha,
As if I could do less
Every decision
Every thought
Every move
I make
Discussion, argument
Inside
Each opinion
Shouted out
Those who care
Some are silent
Cacophony
Voices
With faces
Voicing opinion
Voicing resistance
Disobey
Argue
Choose differently
Hear the roar
As all who
Disagree
Fling their thoughts
Into my thoughts
Put their voices
In my mind
And mouth
Who needs a
Conscience
When you have
A team
A system
A committee
To debate every
Damn decision
Ad nauseum
Ask inside, ha,
Why, when they
Voice everything
Every
Little
Thing
So next time
You ask inside
Fantastic
I am getting better,
Edges are tightening,
Solidifying,
All is going well.
Fantastic!
What are you
Doing these days?
I go to therapy
Four days
A week,
It is helping,
Lots.
Fantastic!
How do you
Get by?
Very well
On
Generosity,
Charity,
Tutoring.
Fantastic!
What about you?
I’m practicing.
Practicing?
Learning to say
Fantastic
Instead of
Bull Shit!
Edges are tightening,
Solidifying,
All is going well.
Fantastic!
What are you
Doing these days?
I go to therapy
Four days
A week,
It is helping,
Lots.
Fantastic!
How do you
Get by?
Very well
On
Generosity,
Charity,
Tutoring.
Fantastic!
What about you?
I’m practicing.
Practicing?
Learning to say
Fantastic
Instead of
Bull Shit!
I Don't Want To Be Fucked Up
I don’t want to be fucked up anymore;
I don’t want to be any more fucked up
But layer by layer the fucked up
Fucks up my layers and layers
Of screens and protections,
Projections on screens.
This is really me, I swear to you!
I swear, is this really me?
I haven’t a clue about this shit;
Shit for years I’ve been given clues.
They seek help to be known,
Had I known, I’d seek help.
I hide them away from everyone;
Everyone knows even when they hide.
People think it’s untrue, denying
Untruths because I think it’s untrue.
Denial a fault deadly left all alone;
Alone I’d be dead denial at fault.
They came here to save and protect;
Protect me? Save me? I’m good here!
Truly I am, just look in my eyes,
Eyes in the mirror, truly which am I?
I don’t want to be fucked up anymore;
I don’t want to be any more fucked up.
Therapy “they” say is creating all this;
Creative therapy this makes go away.
How do I manage to hold others in?
Hold on, it’s me the others manage.
Where is the release valve, deflation’s tool,
Deflating the very essence of me, or we?
I don’t want to survive just to live;
I don’t want to live so hard to survive.
Thriving is better, allowing growth.
Growth is better, allowed to thrive.
Where is the answer hidden inside?
Inside is the answer I’ve hidden.
I didn’t create them on my own.
The brain owns their creation;
All by itself it built these walls,
Walled in, all by myself built,
Unknown to my mind in part,
In parts my mind is unknown.
If this is the way a brain survives,
Then surviving is a brain thing.
Damn lucky for me I have smarts!
Smart ass me thinks, lucky be damned!
I don’t want to be fucked anymore;
I don’t want to be any more fucked up.
I don’t want to be any more fucked up
But layer by layer the fucked up
Fucks up my layers and layers
Of screens and protections,
Projections on screens.
This is really me, I swear to you!
I swear, is this really me?
I haven’t a clue about this shit;
Shit for years I’ve been given clues.
They seek help to be known,
Had I known, I’d seek help.
I hide them away from everyone;
Everyone knows even when they hide.
People think it’s untrue, denying
Untruths because I think it’s untrue.
Denial a fault deadly left all alone;
Alone I’d be dead denial at fault.
They came here to save and protect;
Protect me? Save me? I’m good here!
Truly I am, just look in my eyes,
Eyes in the mirror, truly which am I?
I don’t want to be fucked up anymore;
I don’t want to be any more fucked up.
Therapy “they” say is creating all this;
Creative therapy this makes go away.
How do I manage to hold others in?
Hold on, it’s me the others manage.
Where is the release valve, deflation’s tool,
Deflating the very essence of me, or we?
I don’t want to survive just to live;
I don’t want to live so hard to survive.
Thriving is better, allowing growth.
Growth is better, allowed to thrive.
Where is the answer hidden inside?
Inside is the answer I’ve hidden.
I didn’t create them on my own.
The brain owns their creation;
All by itself it built these walls,
Walled in, all by myself built,
Unknown to my mind in part,
In parts my mind is unknown.
If this is the way a brain survives,
Then surviving is a brain thing.
Damn lucky for me I have smarts!
Smart ass me thinks, lucky be damned!
I don’t want to be fucked anymore;
I don’t want to be any more fucked up.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
They Work for Me
They Work for Me
Is it possible,
Could it be,
That someday
I will be me?
What are the odds
That day will come,
If not just one
Out of many, some?
Funny thing to live
In this group,
Who’s who
In the crazy troupe?
Some show up
Then don’t come back.
So damn many
I can’t keep track.
If I made this up
And they were fake,
Probably a list
Is what I would make.
Some who outside show
And who some don’t,
I never see or hear.
Let me in, they won’t.
Why are some a part
Of my conscious mind,
Fully loaded so to speak,
And others hard to find?
I still lose bits of time.
If I called them “friend,”
If I acknowledged,
I thought that would end.
They come in,
Out I go.
Some notice,
Few know.
I fool myself to
Think I have control,
But truly who
Controls a soul?
They seem to know
Times they should hide,
And when to show,
I’m along for the ride.
Oh gee! And gosh darn!
Shouldn’t I be thrilled
Riding such a coaster?
But couldn’t I be killed?
Why do I hate
Certain ones?
They hate me,
And kick my buns.
Tricksters all,
Using me as pawn
To fuck with people on
Whom truth won’t dawn.
This isn’t me,
But rather a host
Of alternates,
I’m just a ghost.
Tricky they believe
Themselves to be,
But the trick is
They work for me!
10/13/10
Is it possible,
Could it be,
That someday
I will be me?
What are the odds
That day will come,
If not just one
Out of many, some?
Funny thing to live
In this group,
Who’s who
In the crazy troupe?
Some show up
Then don’t come back.
So damn many
I can’t keep track.
If I made this up
And they were fake,
Probably a list
Is what I would make.
Some who outside show
And who some don’t,
I never see or hear.
Let me in, they won’t.
Why are some a part
Of my conscious mind,
Fully loaded so to speak,
And others hard to find?
I still lose bits of time.
If I called them “friend,”
If I acknowledged,
I thought that would end.
They come in,
Out I go.
Some notice,
Few know.
I fool myself to
Think I have control,
But truly who
Controls a soul?
They seem to know
Times they should hide,
And when to show,
I’m along for the ride.
Oh gee! And gosh darn!
Shouldn’t I be thrilled
Riding such a coaster?
But couldn’t I be killed?
Why do I hate
Certain ones?
They hate me,
And kick my buns.
Tricksters all,
Using me as pawn
To fuck with people on
Whom truth won’t dawn.
This isn’t me,
But rather a host
Of alternates,
I’m just a ghost.
Tricky they believe
Themselves to be,
But the trick is
They work for me!
10/13/10
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Just because I haven't posted in a long time
It is truly amazing how the Is is working in my life. Call it God, Goddess, the Is, no matter, the Higher Power, the creator is making a big difference in my life. I walked out of a life I hated, full of fear and anxiety, full of feelings of inferiority and self loathing, to become homeless. I never thought homeless would be an adjective that described me, but it does in a sense. I am now blessed enough to be living in a transitional home for a year if I need that long. I have some really great friends. I have someone special taking care of my kitty for me until I can take care of her myself again. I found a church where I can believe in my own way and not feel llike I am doing something wrong. I have food enough, a roof over my head, gas generally comes to me when I need it. But the truly best part of all of this are the services of therapists, social workers, and agencies that have come my way. My needs are being met. I am working through the tough stuff a little at a time.
I am coming to terms with the fact that I do indeed seem to be multiple. But every time I think this is it, I accept them, then someone new shows up or new memories are transferred from them to me and I get all wigged out and start thinking it’s all crap and I made it all up. But today, right now, I know that there is no way I made it all up. I am not the only one in denial, my family denies, my friends do not accept, and I am now certain of which are the really good friends. There are so many people in my head, so many that friends have seen and not known who they were dealing with. How do I convince anyone that I am not lying now when I have lied and created falsehoods to hide my inner selves from others forever? How do I make this real for anyone? Those of you who are accepting of me, all of me, thank you.
I thought all of my alters were created during childhood trauma, but in making a Power Point slide show of faces, Big Mikey showed up and on further investigation of who he is, when he came to be, why he is here, I found out he came when Buddy died. He came to be the brother I lost in a sense. I’m feeling really weird about him. He says he is Mikey grown up, but how is that possible? How do I have two with the same name? And why is there a big Reeny too? Big Reeny came when we when we graduated Cerritos College and had no idea how to procede, what to do, where to go.
I came up with this the other day, you might find it confusing, but it makes perfect sense to me. “I just had this crazy idea that I don’t exist, that I have never existed, that I have been trying to exist, to prove to others I exist, all the while never believing I exist, and because I don’t believe, I don’t exist!” Chew on that for a few minutes.
I am coming to terms with the fact that I do indeed seem to be multiple. But every time I think this is it, I accept them, then someone new shows up or new memories are transferred from them to me and I get all wigged out and start thinking it’s all crap and I made it all up. But today, right now, I know that there is no way I made it all up. I am not the only one in denial, my family denies, my friends do not accept, and I am now certain of which are the really good friends. There are so many people in my head, so many that friends have seen and not known who they were dealing with. How do I convince anyone that I am not lying now when I have lied and created falsehoods to hide my inner selves from others forever? How do I make this real for anyone? Those of you who are accepting of me, all of me, thank you.
I thought all of my alters were created during childhood trauma, but in making a Power Point slide show of faces, Big Mikey showed up and on further investigation of who he is, when he came to be, why he is here, I found out he came when Buddy died. He came to be the brother I lost in a sense. I’m feeling really weird about him. He says he is Mikey grown up, but how is that possible? How do I have two with the same name? And why is there a big Reeny too? Big Reeny came when we when we graduated Cerritos College and had no idea how to procede, what to do, where to go.
I came up with this the other day, you might find it confusing, but it makes perfect sense to me. “I just had this crazy idea that I don’t exist, that I have never existed, that I have been trying to exist, to prove to others I exist, all the while never believing I exist, and because I don’t believe, I don’t exist!” Chew on that for a few minutes.
What is it Like? a poem
What is it Like?
What is it like?
You want to ask,
To wear so many faces
Like a costume and mask?
The things I don’t know,
The memories they show,
Make living with it,
Feel like shit.
Memory is tricky,
Feelings are strange,
They’re them, and they’re me,
Kind of an inner exchange.
We feel like we’re faking,
Others time we are taking,
We don’t need to pretend,
We made them up in the end.
So we wonder is this real,
All of these people I wear?
The ritual horrors of childhood
They came to share.
Always there have been
Those around, sort of kin,
With people inside
That they also hide.
How we find one another
Is the same as with magnets.
We sort of clump together,
We, the wounded sets.
Fist you ask the question,
Then say it is all suggestion.
You just will not see
All the pieces of me.
This is not fun for me.
It is not fun for anyone one.
Tell me why you think
I would create for fun?
In essence the mind did
Create the others in my kid
To protect me from pain
I could not contain.
I have wanted to blow them
Out of my head with a bullet.
I want to bleed them from me.
They just want an outlet.
Years of being me when they
Want recognition one day
Has made them all celebrate
Being free even though it’s late.
You don’t have to believe me
But if you think it’s shit,
Don’t ask me to tell you
About it one little bit!
What is it like?
You want to ask,
To wear so many faces
Like a costume and mask?
The things I don’t know,
The memories they show,
Make living with it,
Feel like shit.
Memory is tricky,
Feelings are strange,
They’re them, and they’re me,
Kind of an inner exchange.
We feel like we’re faking,
Others time we are taking,
We don’t need to pretend,
We made them up in the end.
So we wonder is this real,
All of these people I wear?
The ritual horrors of childhood
They came to share.
Always there have been
Those around, sort of kin,
With people inside
That they also hide.
How we find one another
Is the same as with magnets.
We sort of clump together,
We, the wounded sets.
Fist you ask the question,
Then say it is all suggestion.
You just will not see
All the pieces of me.
This is not fun for me.
It is not fun for anyone one.
Tell me why you think
I would create for fun?
In essence the mind did
Create the others in my kid
To protect me from pain
I could not contain.
I have wanted to blow them
Out of my head with a bullet.
I want to bleed them from me.
They just want an outlet.
Years of being me when they
Want recognition one day
Has made them all celebrate
Being free even though it’s late.
You don’t have to believe me
But if you think it’s shit,
Don’t ask me to tell you
About it one little bit!
Monday, August 2, 2010
Friends
This will never be read by the people I want to read it, but I am going to write it anyway. I made a choice to survive, and more than survive to thrive. The choice meant walking away from one of several abusers, and a parent who claims she didn’t know about the abuse, but I know she saw evidence of it, so her insistence is denial. In making this choice I had to decide when and to whom I let loose my new phone number and location. I was told certain people were asking around about me on behalf of my family, family told me this. It turns out they were not seeking me on behalf of my family; I was given false information to make me lose more friends. It has indeed lost me friends. So has an error in interpretation of something I said a while ago concerning one of my cats. I asked someone about what to do with my feral kitty when I was about to take a job as caretaker of an elderly woman. The job included being able to bring my kitties with me, but the feral one needed someone more patient than I to take care of her. My question was misinterpreted so that when I did leave the family and leave my cats behind because I could not live with them in a car, the person I had asked was certain I meant to be mean to my cats. I never meant for bad things to happen to them. I had no idea I was leaving when I did it. Violence was erupting in the household and I had a small window in which to pack my car and flee. I left behind my precious kitties and a whole lot of other important things because they would not fit.
For the friends who don’t understand what I did, imagine being hurt repeatedly by someone, getting a break from it, and then seeing it coming your way again; would you stay? If you had in the past, but it turned out badly, would you stay? If you had grown a spine in therapy, and had the support of loving people, would you stay? I couldn’t.
I am sorry I have lost friends, and certain family. I regret that there is so little understanding from those who have claimed to love me. I am not the same person now. I am stronger. I am lonelier. I see more clearly what is and is not important. Today a shower that I can linger in because no one is waiting for me to get out so she can get in is a blessing. People who love me enough to bring me small gifts of change, gas, food, anything a homeless person might need, are indeed the generous and wonderful ones. A friend who fosters my cat while I wait for shelter plus housing assistance is one of the most wonderful friends I have.
Any friend who can forgive me my hasty departure, and trust that what I did was the right thing for me and everyone else, is truly a good friend. Nothing I have done was done lightly. Nothing I’ve done was done to hurt anyone, not even my messed up family. I did what I did to save myself from a hell I had lived in off and on always. I am done living in hell. If you are still friend, I am grateful, if not, thanks for the time we did have.
For the friends who don’t understand what I did, imagine being hurt repeatedly by someone, getting a break from it, and then seeing it coming your way again; would you stay? If you had in the past, but it turned out badly, would you stay? If you had grown a spine in therapy, and had the support of loving people, would you stay? I couldn’t.
I am sorry I have lost friends, and certain family. I regret that there is so little understanding from those who have claimed to love me. I am not the same person now. I am stronger. I am lonelier. I see more clearly what is and is not important. Today a shower that I can linger in because no one is waiting for me to get out so she can get in is a blessing. People who love me enough to bring me small gifts of change, gas, food, anything a homeless person might need, are indeed the generous and wonderful ones. A friend who fosters my cat while I wait for shelter plus housing assistance is one of the most wonderful friends I have.
Any friend who can forgive me my hasty departure, and trust that what I did was the right thing for me and everyone else, is truly a good friend. Nothing I have done was done lightly. Nothing I’ve done was done to hurt anyone, not even my messed up family. I did what I did to save myself from a hell I had lived in off and on always. I am done living in hell. If you are still friend, I am grateful, if not, thanks for the time we did have.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
I Am Not Leaving My Mom
I Am Not Leaving My Mom
My mother is not well; among other things she has had a stroke, stints in her coronary arteries, and mysterious blood loss. I am trying to get on my own feet and out of the house. I am catching a lot of flack about trying to get out of the house at a time when my mom is going to be eventually come home. Try to understand that if I cannot stand on my own, what will happen to me if my mom passes away? I must be able to stand up and take care of myself. I do not want to be penniless, homeless, and dependent on others. It is not wrong for me to be thinking of taking care of myself now because if I can’t take care of myself, I can’t be there for, or take care of my mother.
I am not leaving my mother. I will still be here to take care of her when I am needed. I plan to share the care of our mom with my brother. I would never just walk away from the woman who has supported me my whole life, and especially for the last 5+ years since I had to move back in with her. She supports my decision to get on my own feet. She supports my decision to follow my heart and get my MFA.
My mother is not well; among other things she has had a stroke, stints in her coronary arteries, and mysterious blood loss. I am trying to get on my own feet and out of the house. I am catching a lot of flack about trying to get out of the house at a time when my mom is going to be eventually come home. Try to understand that if I cannot stand on my own, what will happen to me if my mom passes away? I must be able to stand up and take care of myself. I do not want to be penniless, homeless, and dependent on others. It is not wrong for me to be thinking of taking care of myself now because if I can’t take care of myself, I can’t be there for, or take care of my mother.
I am not leaving my mother. I will still be here to take care of her when I am needed. I plan to share the care of our mom with my brother. I would never just walk away from the woman who has supported me my whole life, and especially for the last 5+ years since I had to move back in with her. She supports my decision to get on my own feet. She supports my decision to follow my heart and get my MFA.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
I AM NOT STUPID, are you listening Dad?
So many years ago I finally shed the label of stupid that I felt both of my parents, but especially my father, had put on me. I shed it and I knew myself to be smart, very smart. Then a few days ago my father and I are talking and he is going on about smoking, bugging me about it, pissing me off, making me more determined to smoke, and he says that smoking makes me stupid. Now he doesn’t say I’m stupid once, or even twice, but four times he says smoking is making me stupid. And there I was, that eight year old who felt useless and stupid and incapable of anything. I was lost again; I lost hold of who I know I am. It hurt, oh God did it hurt. I had to go and talk to the Is to ask why, why would my father want me to feel bad about myself?
I am so tired of feeling bad about myself. I begin to feel better about me, I make progress and then the word stupid can pull me back to a place I no longer want to be or even belong.
Do you want to know what I think is stupid, staying married for over 30 years to a woman who treats everyone like shit, who makes you choose between her and your oldest daughter, who is so awful verbally and emotionally to her own kids her son’s suicide note says he hates her. That is stupid. He is stupid to stay with her. I think he feels as bad about himself as he wants me to feel about myself. The difference is I realize I don’t feel good about me and I am taking steps to change. I have changed. I reject the labels of shame, and other negative labels that my father and my family have placed upon me, fuck them. I am smart, I am pretty, and I am capable. I’ve been stagnating someplace safe, but I am working to change that as quickly as possible.
I am changing my life now and every minute.
I am so tired of feeling bad about myself. I begin to feel better about me, I make progress and then the word stupid can pull me back to a place I no longer want to be or even belong.
Do you want to know what I think is stupid, staying married for over 30 years to a woman who treats everyone like shit, who makes you choose between her and your oldest daughter, who is so awful verbally and emotionally to her own kids her son’s suicide note says he hates her. That is stupid. He is stupid to stay with her. I think he feels as bad about himself as he wants me to feel about myself. The difference is I realize I don’t feel good about me and I am taking steps to change. I have changed. I reject the labels of shame, and other negative labels that my father and my family have placed upon me, fuck them. I am smart, I am pretty, and I am capable. I’ve been stagnating someplace safe, but I am working to change that as quickly as possible.
I am changing my life now and every minute.
Suicidal thoughts
The title might make you think I am feeling suicidal right now, I am not, much. I want to write about a couple of things related to suicidal feelings, first is that I have realized that I have done something similar to what my mother used to do, tell people that I am thinking of it hoping they will save me. The second is that on some level, at all times, I am somewhat suicidal. I think about death a lot. I feel like escaping my life so very often, if people knew how often, I might be locked up forever.
I do not like my life, my past, my present, and what my future looks like from here, of course no one really knows what the future holds. I want to escape all of my debt. I want to escape all of my fears and anxieties. I want to escape my compulsions. I want to escape my alters. I just want to be myself, free of the baggage I have been dragging around for so long.
But, and this is a big but, if i leave this life, I lose friends, I lose the family I have chosen for myself. I would lose so much that is good in my life.
I am working with, and sometimes against, a therapist that specializes in the kind of things I think and feel, with PTSD, DID, OCD, and anxieties of all kinds. I have faith that she can teach me to overcome the crap and get on with my life.
I have realized that one reason I feel like I am still living my past is that since my brother moved in with us, I have been afraid I will do or say the wrong thing and set him off causing the anger and violence he holds just under the surface to come out. I am basically afraid he is going to hit or beat me, which is what I grew up with, never knowing if Dad was going to hug or to hit. Being afraid sucks and so far I haven't learned how not to be afraid.
It is not surprising really that I think of death so often, it seems like the perfect escape from this life I am so tired of. My other escape is going to therapy, doing what I am asked to do or try, going to group, and sharing with others like me. I have a very hard time letting go of my brother's suicide. It affects much of what I do and feel.
I do not like my life, my past, my present, and what my future looks like from here, of course no one really knows what the future holds. I want to escape all of my debt. I want to escape all of my fears and anxieties. I want to escape my compulsions. I want to escape my alters. I just want to be myself, free of the baggage I have been dragging around for so long.
But, and this is a big but, if i leave this life, I lose friends, I lose the family I have chosen for myself. I would lose so much that is good in my life.
I am working with, and sometimes against, a therapist that specializes in the kind of things I think and feel, with PTSD, DID, OCD, and anxieties of all kinds. I have faith that she can teach me to overcome the crap and get on with my life.
I have realized that one reason I feel like I am still living my past is that since my brother moved in with us, I have been afraid I will do or say the wrong thing and set him off causing the anger and violence he holds just under the surface to come out. I am basically afraid he is going to hit or beat me, which is what I grew up with, never knowing if Dad was going to hug or to hit. Being afraid sucks and so far I haven't learned how not to be afraid.
It is not surprising really that I think of death so often, it seems like the perfect escape from this life I am so tired of. My other escape is going to therapy, doing what I am asked to do or try, going to group, and sharing with others like me. I have a very hard time letting go of my brother's suicide. It affects much of what I do and feel.
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