it wasn't really incest

I have a Global Politics midterm I should be studying for, and I instead mapped out my pseudo-family tree with Jessi while we made plans for an Epic Night of Epic next year. It was fun.

I'mma gonna go read about theoretical foundations of global politics, the Cold War, and International everything. I'm back in Saint John for a few days tomorrow, which should also be entertaining and cayute because I'll see my nieces and it will be excellent. :3

it may snow for 90 years, it may snow forever

So back in my hometown, my friend Chris used to orchestrate an all-ages coffee house type deal and it was fairly excellent. At the first one I attended, The Fedoras played, with Andrew Mazerolle as the lead singer. Without being creepy, Andrew Mazerolle in general--including his solo work--was one of the more memorable acts from these coffee houses. I also asked him if he needed a hug one time and he said no and it was totally not awkward. I was just-barely-16, and a little socially awkward.

Here is some Andrew Mazerolle from back in July at Backstreet Records in uptown Saint John.

quaint song about the Irvings? Yes please.

the execution of all things

"I do this thing where I think I'm real sick
But I won't go to the doctor to find out about it
'Cause they make you stay real still
In a real small space
As they chart up your insides and put them on display
They'd see all of it, all of me, all of it
All of the good that won't come out of me
And all of the stupid lies I hide behind"

I somehow managed to lose about 4 hours to the never-ending vortex that is the spiraling thought process of my head. That's 4 hours where I could have been productive and studied for a mid-term, done research, or started to write any one of the three papers I have due the first week back after March Break. I probably could have done anything else, instead of cry for no reason and paint my nails as distraction and write (which turned into scribbling on the page like a 2-year old, because sometimes there are no words and that's a little terrifying). I probably could have done something other than push-ups and sit-ups and the trauma releasing exercises that Alex gave me, and I probably could have avoided calling Fin four times in some desperate hope that he would turn his fucking phone on. I think I need to take a hint and let things go and stop worrying that he'll find someone else because whether he does or not, he doesn't want me and there's nothing I can do about that.

So, focusing on me getting better would be a plus. If I could stop feeling like a fool and an idiot and like I should've known better, I would appreciate it. If my brain would stop telling me I'm a fucking idiot fucking slut fucking whore fucking failure, I'd be grateful. Maybe that's just me.

From Pamphilia to Amphilanthus

When night's black mantle could most darkness prove,
And sleep, death's image, did my senses hire
From knowledge of myself, then thoughts did move
Swifter than those most swiftness need require.
In sleep, a chariot drawn by winged desire
I saw, where sat bright Venus, Queen of Love,
And at her feet, her son, still adding fire
To burning hearts, which she did hold above.
But one heart flaming more than all the rest
The goddess held, and put it to my breast.
"Dear son, now shut," said she: "thus must we win."
He her obeyed, and martyred my poor heart.
I, waking, hoped as dreams it would depart:
Yet since, O me, a lover I have been.

-- Sonnet 1, Mary Wroth (1621)

and did I, did I

chris says:
god damn it lisa
can't you tell when someone is trying to let you down easy?

Lisa says:
I've never had to.
So apparently not.

chris says:
That's what he's doing.
He's saying
I don't want to be with you
But I don't want to hurt you

Lisa says:
And why is it so difficult to say it directly?

chris says:
I don't know
Because that's part of the not hurting, I guess
I've never understood why people do it
but I'm more forward than most people

Lisa says:
how do I get out of this?

chris says:
You are out of it
There's nothing going to happen, even if he gets his life sorted



I do love me some painful honesty, particularly when it's from a friend I've had for four years.

Lots of thinking and lazing about today, which I suppose makes up for the completely academically-unproductive-but-still-busy day I had yesterday. I went to the market with some girls in my wing, we had brunch at Cora's, then I went downtown with Kat and Meredith and bought 2 dresses and a necklace and it was nice. Got a little drunk last night, talked with Jessi for a few hours and then she made me paint--which I think I'm going to talk to Kathleen about next time, because painting felt really, really good. It felt right. I haven't done it in years but I should start up again...I think I know what I'm getting myself when I reach 30 gold-star days.

I think the dinner party idea that I had initially needs to be scrapped anyway, things with Fin are volatile and I don't really know what I'm doing but he's not on my facebook friends anymore and I don't think he's noticed yet. I'm tired of bending over backwards and worrying that I'm doing something wrong or that I'm out of line when all I want is my friend back. That's really all I want: someone who calls to invite me down for the night, who will go for a walk with me at midnight just because, someone who seems to enjoy spending time with me. He gets so tense it just seems like he's not enjoying it, and I'm not enjoying it because I'm upset and collapsed on the kitchen floor or curled up on the couch and it's just messy.

"When you're bathed in light
And when your body bursts wide open
Do you start to cry--
Not 'cause you died, but 'cause you die still hoping."

How a day filled with good classes, mild weather, nice shoes and seeing oodles of friends can result in being curled up in bed for half an hour trying not to cry and repeating don'thitdon'tcutwon'thitwon'tcut, I'll never understand. But the counter is at 9, so I'd say it's still a good day.

Mendicino, CA

So, I pretty much have the best friends on the planet. Went to Findlay's last night, and save for one rough patch with some crying and talking, it was a rousing success. Hurray for delaying gratification and respecting boundaries and myself. Dude, I am super excellent.

Also, have a gold star system with Kathleen, each day I don't cut is a gold star day. I'm on day 8.

Why my life is excellent: in light of recent events and me being all morose-like, my friends Jessi and Meredith decided to cheer me up. They did so by ambushing me in one of the academic buildings, blindfolding me, walking me back to res and making me dress as a superhero. I then had to save a teddy bear from Meredith's clutches, and there was running willy-nilly around my residence and running into my Philosophy prof while Meredith was headbutting me with a teddy bear and it was wonderful. There was also a photoshoot, and Jessi took 500 pictures and it was pretty excellent.

Today is a good day. Dear future self: keep the past 24 hours in mind if you ever feel like you need a reason for living.

Post Script: image taken by Findlay, features Dom and I.

hit with a brick wall of hypertension for no apparent reason? grab your best friend and go for a run at midnight when it's snowing! clearly the most productive thing to be doing when you need to read 3 acts of a play, write a comparison of the love in said acts, read an article and write an annotation.

but my skin is still intact in it's entirety, so maybe it's worth a late night.

My roommate is fairly excellent and somehow managed to stumble upon this wonderfulness online. It made me smile.

I'm back in Fredericton and I was somewhat productive today--not as productive as I could have been, but better than I've been before. I came back to res to people playing Rock Band and getting hugs from Meredith and I did laundry and realized I had missed it, in a way I probably wouldn't have missed it last semester.

I started on the homework Kathleen gave me--answering questions relating to the self-care without injury manual that I have, looking through the first session. Getting stuck on the question "How has self-injury affected your life?" and then realizing I'm stuck because it's not necessarily a question I want to answer: it's made me secretive with the people I care about, it's hurt those around me, it makes me feel like a burden more than anything, I feel like the first thing people see when they look at me is damaged (once they know, at least). It's destroyed relationships in the past--friendships, romantic relationships.

It's sometimes felt like it's the only thing that's left, and I'm sort of just realizing that maybe it feels like that because it drove everything else away. I just did it because it was so much easier than actually fucking dealing with what was in my head, and it was a method of self-preservation that I knew would destroy me but I did it anyway. And I'm only just seeing how much of a struggle it really is: this isn't like when I stopped for two years because the urge stopped. This is fighting off wanting to slice up bits of my body just because I can, because I want to and because it's easier to focus on that than to focus on everything else. This is combat, except I'm fighting on both fronts.

On the non-meta front, I ordered pizza and read philosophy and was a typical teenage girl today.

"Writing as betrayal, writing as revealing, drop the mask, the reserve, writing as truth, write down the pain, don't reveal the pain of loss, cry, hold it in, have a breakdown, don't show anything" -- Kathleen Spivack, writing about Elizabeth Bishop's poetry

A Better Son / Daughter--Rilo Kiley

it wears her out

I am back in my hometown for the weekend. I'm sleepy, my room is being painted so I'm in one of the guest bedrooms, and my brother is home (which is not a good thing, actually). But I've been allowing myself to relax and not worry as much as I normally do. There's just always something going on in my family, so it's kind of dramatic. Hence why I keep the whole counseling/relapse aspect of my life to myself.

But I went shopping with my sister today, and told her I relapsed in October and was seeing a counselor in Fredericton. She suggested talking to someone with a degree (I'm currently talking to a psych student, actually, not a shrink), making an appointment with my doctor, etc. See if I need to be on medication, try and figure out what's wrong with me.

I love my sister. I love all of my family, but I really love my sister. She's sarcastic and blunt and just really, really straightforward with me. Makes me realize how dramatic I'm being when I don't even realize I'm doing it. She also calls me a retard and I call her a perfectionist and it's all lovely.

Interesting fact: we were discussing my whole support system, she asked what happened with Fin (I hadn't really mentioned him, which is a bit of a change from when I was home for Christmas*). Said he wasn't really an option in my support system, her response was "Oh...what happened? Does he have a crush on you or something?"

I'm pretty sure she's the first person to ask that, not the other way around. After setting her straight ("No, I have a crush on him, and he sort of had** one on me and things are really complicated right now") and we shopped a bit, conversation ambled back over to the Fin situation. I told her that other than officially being a couple, we were a couple last semester: I have told no one in my family this, and prior to actually telling her I had every intention of keeping it that way. I think some things just need to be shared with family, sometimes, and my parents already have enough to deal with and wouldn't really understand the situation.

After giving her the Coles Notes version of why Fin broke things off, she asked if he'd ever been in a relationship before ("Yes, his last relationship ended badly.") Trying to explain how Fin is one of the most social people I know, but sometimes this can come back to bite him--really friendly, but also pretty damn flirtatious*** and sometimes doesn't know other people's limits because he basically has none. Doesn't seem to understand consequences, sometimes--I didn't mention that to Ang, it just popped in my head.

Sidenote: I'm pretty sure this whole situation is overcompensating for not understanding consequences before. I don't know, all I know is he ruined a really, really good friendship and let it get messy and hurty and complicated and really awkward. Know what? Not my fucking fault. I didn't do anything wrong.

Upshot: "It sounds like his social development is even more awkward than yours." --Ang

*To give you an idea of how much I talked about him, I was home all of six hours before my mom asked "So, Fin...is he a friend, or more than a friend?"

**(has? I don't really know if I can say that, since he doesn't let his thought process go there)

*** First time we kissed, I had a boyfriend. It was at a Wet/Dry in September, and we ended up dancing, and kissing. I didn't find out until December that he had also kissed two other girls earlier in the evening. Furthermore, when he and I had our thing last semester, he also started to be particularly flirtatious with a girl in his English class just because he could.

Why am I so enamoured with this boy, again? oh yeah, because he's an amazing person and I've never met anyone like him and he's ridiculously chipper and gets happy because of kitties and doesn't want to kiss too much when it's the first snowfall because he's nostalgic for his grandparent's house in Ontario and it would feel wrong to be kissing there. And he's ridiculously optimistic and somewhat naive but still amazing and really a fantastic, fantastic friend. And writes poems that make you think of mental institutions but it's really about airports--and on that note, has the most eloquent description for airports I've ever heard. And he does little things that make me heart go pitter patter, and it's kind of ridiculous because I've told my heart to stop reacting like that but it's not listening to me. And 'cause he doesn't give up on me even when I'm really, really just acting childish--crying and sobbing and hitting and being a general wreck and he just holds me because he knows it's really all he can do until I'm me again. And because I love him, a little bit.

I'm tired but I don't want to go to sleep. I'm worried about what I'll dream about and what I'll think about when I'm forced to slow down and the only thing required of me is breathing and living and existing.

"There is never a sudden revelation, a complete and tidy explanation for why it happened, or why it ends, or why or who you are. You want one and I want one, but there isn't one. It comes in bits and pieces, and you stitch them together wherever they fit, and when you are done you hold yourself up, and still there are holes and you are a rag doll, invented, imperfect...and yet you are all that you have, so you must be enough. There is no other way."

- Wasted, Marya Hornbacher

I am going to live and be grateful for this day and each day to come. I'll be a better daughter and a better friend and a better person and I'll recognize that I need to take care of myself before I can take care of others. I'll wait for this hole in my chest to get smaller, because I know it will eventually. I can hope a relationship comes out of it, but I won't expect one. I'll stop waiting--ok, that's a lie. I'll try to stop waiting, and I think that's all I can ask of myself right now, and that's really all you can ask of me too. I've got all of these resources available to me and all of these people who I know care about me and it's just a matter of applying said resources and asking for help when I need it and recognizing that I don't need to be punished for small and really, rather trivial things. I don't deserve to be punished. I'm actually not a bad person, and I care about other people and I think I need to care about myself a little bit more than I do currently.

here I am, a rabbit-hearted girl

So remember that set time span I was talking about yesterday? Ended up not happening. Thoughts started spiralling and going from what-the-fuck-is-wrong-with-me to Findlay-doesn't-want-me to oh-my-god-why-am-I-not-dead to oh-my-god-I've-gotten-no-work-done to fuck-fuck-fuck-what-if-I-fail-what-if-I-have-to-leave-what-if-they-can't-fix-me. And then there was just a steady stream of failurewhorefuckingbitchstupididiot, etc.

Then it ended up that it was 12:30am, 'whore' was cut into my stomach, and my brain would not leave me alone. I went to visit Alex, talked with him until about 2:30. My brain finally let me go around 3:30, and I slept.

Called counseling services early this morning (8:30 kind of early). After some discussion and a lucky cancellation, I was able to get an appointment with the same woman I'll be seeing on an ongoing basis. I now have a contract I have to adhere to--no suicide attempts between now and my next appointment--and a list of things I can do if I really, really am scared and feel like I'm going to hurt myself. I have a list of people I can call and Fin is not on this list.

I've been having about a 3 week, I think things are more around a 6 now...maybe a 7, sometimes. Saw Fin and spoke to Fin at dinner and was sort of able to forget for a bit that everything hurts when I'm around him and how seeing him isn't really good for me right now, then he left with Mark and I remembered...Oh yeah.

this is a gift, it comes with a price

Relic from last semester, drawn by Fin and I the night of the Parenti Debacle. We won't talk about that.

I'm giving myself a set limit of time when I can think about it. Outside of that time span, it's not allowed in my head. I'm pretty sure that's the only way I can get through this semester still intact. I feel like I'm not Lisa anymore.

What my ears have been hearing a lot of lately:

Lungs, Florence and the Machine
Swift Feet for Troubling Times and Beacons, Ohbijou
"Satellite Mind," Metric
Batten the Hatches, Jenny Owen Youngs (particularly "Bricks," "Woodcut," "Porchrail," and "From Here")
I've been listening to some Motion City Soundtrack--guilty pleasure from my early adolescence.

Yesterday started off as one of those Needs-To-Die-In-a-Fire Days: I got back from my friend Kat's room (she let me sleep over because I wasn't exactly in the best of shape and I needed someone in the room) to find my roommate who I hadn't seen all weekend freaking out and crying.

Things sort of got progressively worse. Left Soc--not actually sure why, just knew I needed to leave Soc and get out of there because things felt off-kilter and helter skelter and not good. Global Politics was worse. I have no idea what happened in that class, quite honestly. All I know is I got a hug from Ginger Beard at the end of it and then I'm crying on him and I don't know why.

Philosophy was acceptable. I sort of have to take notes, so I was at least a little engaged, so that helps. Things got incrementally better after that: hung out with friends, did three assignments (hello productivity, where have you been?), talked. I think as long as I keep busy, I'm ok.

Then I tried to sleep and burst into tears so I went to go to Alex because he said if I ever felt the 3am type of crazy, his door is always open. We talked about the Fin thing and creepy fanfiction and a little bit of politics and it was nice. He walked me back to my room and made sure I got into bed and that I was ok and I am really, really thankful that he's a friend.

Really, I'm just thankful for my friends.

flashback of a feeling

I have a Soc assignment to write, and Crim assignments to do and I have to read the first two acts of Twelfth Night and formulate some sort of response based around love. I have to start writing an explication of a Mary Wroth sonnet that's due in a month. I have to do reading for Global Politics and work on a group presentation in that class that's happening later this week, and I need to do my essay proposal. I've probably got things to do for Philosophy that I'm forgetting about. All I can manage to do is stare at my wall and my ceiling and watch the clock. I'm sick of being and sick of living and working and I forget why I'm doing it and I am so, so tired of myself. I just want to not have to deal. I want to leave and go away where no one knows me and I don't have to worry about work and assignments and drama and breakdowns and infants and toddlers and family and punching concrete and whether or not I'm crazy or just really pathetic and whether or not I'm driving friends away by being too much too much too much even though I feel like I'm dismantling my support system one by one.

I am so fucking tired. Just let me sleep.

On the plus side, my wing is planning nefarious acts.

why I'm wary of self-diagnosis

Because if I were to believe Wikipedia's quoting of the DSM-IV, I am way too close to the characteristics of BPD for comfort.

1. Frantic efforts to avoid real or imagined abandonment. Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5
2. A pattern of unstable and intense interpersonal relationships characterized by alternating between extremes of idealization and devaluation.
3. Identity disturbance: markedly and persistently unstable self-image or sense of self.
   
4. Impulsivity in at least two areas that are potentially self-damaging (e.g., promiscuous sex, eating disorders, binge eating, substance abuse, reckless driving). Note: Do not include suicidal or self-injuring behavior covered in Criterion 5
5. Recurrent suicidal behaviour, gestures, threats or self-injuring behaviour such as cutting, interfering with the healing of scars (excoriation) or picking at oneself.
6. Affective instability due to a marked reactivity of mood (e.g., intense episodic dysphoria, irritability or anxiety usually lasting a few hours and only rarely more than a few days).
7. Chronic feelings of emptiness
   
8. Inappropriate anger or difficulty controlling anger (e.g., frequent displays of temper, constant anger, recurrent physical fights).
9. Transient, stress-related paranoid ideation, delusions or severe dissociative symptom
   
   I know that something is wrong with me, and I'm not supposed to be feeling the way I'm feeling. I recognize I should be happy and I'm really, quite honestly, far from happy. I get excited, I get hyper, but I don't know when I was really just content. But BPD is a serious, serious, serious mental illness that doesn't go away, it's only managed. Just because I fit more of these then I would like to doesn't mean I have it. Plus, it's not even diagnosed until an individual is at least 18, unless the symptoms have persisted for over a year in adolescents. So I'm just, just over that cut-off mark.
   
   Plus, really, me? I'm pretty sure that this is the sort of thing that if you're looking it up online, you don't have it. I'll probably look at this a week from now and feel foolish.
   
   ...I'm still scared, though.
   

When I was younger, about 13, and attempting recovery for what would be the first of many times, my best friend at the time (Monica) and I had a system. In my personal message on MSN, I would post the number of days I had gone without cutting, and if it went down to zero--well, you can guess as to what that meant.

I've been keeping that counter in my head. Today, it went from 16 to 0.

My productivity consisted of napping for an hour. Go me.

unicorn horn bullet shooting

I have a picture of a bullet shooting unicorn that Ginger Beard drew in Global Politics. I somehow managed to write a 1500 word assignment in about 3-4 hours last night, and yet still make it fairly acceptable--I actually think it's a pretty decent paper. I hope my Crim prof thinks so too, it's worth 25% of my mark.

I am able to talk to Findlay about Hitler lemons and not cry and we have established boundaries for physical touch and this is a very good thing.

I think I've been all superhighsuperlow with emotions this past month, but I've been evening out in the last week or so. Also a very good thing.

lemon party with findlay

because my life does have great bits, too

We had a guest speaker in Crim. He was an ex-con and talking about how deterrence doesn't work and people can't change unless they want to change. I approached him afterward to see if there were any (any) volunteer opportunities available through the group he was with or any similar groups (the group he's with, Bridges of Canada, is actually faith-based and I'm not exactly religious, but I just am so frustrated with seeing my family torn apart, I feel like I need to do something to help somebody).

And then I had lunch with my mother, and that was lovely. And my sister is pregnant! And my two youngest nieces were hanging out together yesterday and were adorable! And my sister is pregnant!

Then I got a winter coat that was regular $160 for $30.

And English was wonderful, I said that Robert Herrick was a dirty old man and my prof thought that was a rather humourous (if not always apt) way to describe him. A girl in my class approached me afterward and said she agreed with me, that reading his poems felt like reading an advertisement for Girls Gone Wild. I then quoted Chris, who once said Herrick's poems could essentially be summarized as "Get thee in my trousers, wench." My prof loved that.

I'm such a nerd.

sitting in silence and staring at ceilings or peeling the paint off of things to confide

So. This is productive, right? ...right? You know, fuck it, it's not destructive so I really don't care if it's productive.

Also, interestingly, I was perusing the participant's manual of the group that I can't go to--I still get a manual because, well, why not? Anyway. It talks about twisted thinking, and their relation to emotional problems, and while I identify with most of them in some way or another (...that should probably worry me, shouldn't it?), holy moly do I identify with 'Jumping to conclusions.'
Jumping to Conclusions: You make a negative interpretation even though there are no definite facts that convincingly support your conclusions. Further divided into a) mind reading: you decide that someone is reacting negatively to you and don't check and b) the fortune teller effect: you anticipate that things will turn out badly and convince yourself that your prediction is an established fact.

Let's focus on Mind Reading. I have an example:

I call Fin. He doesn't answer. I assume that he is fed up with me, wants nothing to do with me, thinks I'm weak and pathetic and just wishes I would stay out of his life.

Reading that over it looks a little unbalanced. Er. That's not good, is it?

"I want a pink dragon." "I want one of those, too."

So my interview went splendid, until we all realized there had been a snafu and that the group I was able to go to was actually the group that had been cancelled due to lack of interest. Due to the fact that I can't go to the group that's available because I have class at that time, and I'm just on the waiting list (Urgent though it may be, a waiting list is a waiting list) for personal counselling, I do feel a little stranded on the road to recovery. I'll tough it out.

But I still managed to somehow have a solid, good day? I'm sort of confused as to how that happened.

A stranger opened my orange juice for me this morning, which was actually just really nice and one of those "People are inherently good" moments, despite what my cynicism may tell me. Sociology was tolerable--I got to talk about Russian history and de-Stalinization and the Cold War, so I was happy.

Global Politics--I got all excited when explaining MLA citations. Fin said afterward that I was a little hyper, like I had realized that I probably knew the most out of anyone in the room in MLA citations and I talked really fast to get it all out.

I do tend to talk quickly, I'm always worried someone will get bored with what I'm saying so I feel like it's necessarily to say it quickly so I can get it all out.

And Philosophy--fun. Descartes and pink dragons and ended in the best way possible: comparing Descartes to the Dr. Seuss book Horton Hears a Who. Major, major awesome points.

And lunch with Fin--with guest appearances by Ginger Beard and Kassi, who are both amazing people. Somehow a good, solid conversation, the likes of which I've not had with him for awhile without crying so I was really pleased. And we talked about buying Germany and changing their foreign policy so that they just throw rocks at France. This is why I love my friends.

And I was productive and got an assignment done and wrote a quiz and it was a really solid, decent day.

And I am 39 seconds into (500) Days of Summer and already in love. I love indie films.