A dark walk home.

I went to bed extremely early last night. After waking up to find myself asleep on my couch at 9 pm, with my notes falling off my chest and on to the floor, it seemed the only reasonable course of action, you know? Anyway, at some point I heard our front doorbell ring. I struggled back into consciousness long enough to stumble to my door, make sure it wasn't someone important (aka, Ryan), and head back to bed.

This morning, Steph told me about our visitor. It was the resident from upstairs, the dark-haired one that we never normally see. She came and knocked last night and asked if she could come in and talk to us. I guess she was sort of stumbling around what she wanted to say, and Steph came right out with, "This is about the new neighbor, isn't it? Is he bothering you too?" and the girl was like, "Yes, he is!"

Our street has been having a pretty high turnover lately. It's a very short one-way street, just across from our main classroom and the rest of the Loma Linda campus, and we recently had a new family move in about halfway down. They consist of a big black man, who spends all day every day fixing cars, his mean white wife (?), and his little boy who roars all the time, regardless of small matters like neighbors who are trying to study. Anyway, if his wife is in evidence (and usually screaming at him), he pays us no mind--but if not, he calls at us as we walk home.

"Hey, ma. Hey, why won't you look at me?"
"Hey, girl, you make me scared riding that board so fast."
"Hey girl, what's your name? I said, what's your name? How do you keep your hair so pretty?"

If we don't answer, or pretend not to hear him, he keeps yelling at us until we're almost to our front door. When he was trying to talk to me yesterday, the last thing I heard before I shut the front door was, "Why won't you motherfucking answer me?"

Steph and I were talking about how we always pretend to have a phone call when we walk home, or how we walk on the far side of the street, or try not to make any noise if he's got his head down under the car hood, so he doesn't realize we're there. Neither of us ever make eye contact. She told me that the girl upstairs was telling her that, last night, her boyfriend walked her home and told the man to stop talking to her. He got cursed out for his  trouble.

Our landlord is a really nice older man who genuinely cares about all of us here, and I was going to ask him this afternoon if he would anonymously talk to the neighbor and ask him to stop. And that might do it--but then again, it might not, because I don't really think he's going to care that he's making us uncomfortable. Because he's going to feel that it's his right to talk to us from his own house in whatever manner he wants to. Because, unfortunately, that's rather how our society functions.

It is absolutely ridiculous that we should be pretending to be on the phone, or hiding from him, or acting like we don't hear him, in order to feel safe on our own street. I think that as women we incorporate this kind of stuff into life everyday because we know if we don't, we can get hurt really badly. Killed. So we have support groups and we plan about the best ways to avoid the wrong kinds of attention, the safe places to go, the times when you have to make sure to stay in pairs. It makes me think of the quote, "Society teaches women how to avoid rape; it doesn't teach men not rape."

And, while we're not talking about something nearly so extreme, I'm sick of it. Not on my street. I'm tired of being nervous and uncomfortable, I'm tired of having the way I walk or how often I've been home commented on every time I walk past, and I'm done with being afraid, because that's all the planning and strategizing is doing--trying to compensate for fear.

I'm considering how best to do this, but I may just talk to him myself. I'm not sure the best way to go about it--still deciding. I mean, that guy seems to get angry really easily, and even though he's big and fat and probably slow, I'm really small. So if Carter does talk to him, and it doesn't work the first time, I'm filing charges. Enough.

I couldn't even tell you.

My skin is torn, right down near the edge where it and and my nail came together in a once-perfect fit, edging around the white half-moon and the blaze running through it that is uniquely mine. It hurts, but I rub at it again, distracting myself from my discomfort, my worry, and the disjointed flow of my words as they describe the inner twists of my mind to a perfect stranger.

The beginning panic is mostly gone, now, taking the first chunk of cuticle with it. I don't know what I was so afraid of--what I'd hear, perhaps? That I'd break down and cry in that small office? It's not like me, I know, but then again, none of this is--or didn't used to be, at any rate.

They say that around 40% of medical students experience a major depressive episode at some point during their years here. They also say that, if it's happened once, chances are extremely high that it will happen again.

There is a specific period in my past that doesn't have many memories. I've tried to find some, but I just recall being...dark. Tired, all the time. Hopeless, and completely alone. Someone very dear to me recently described it as a kind of anger--if your life is good, even great, why should your mind tell you otherwise? It's not logical, not reasonable, it can't be talked around, and that made him furious. Me, it just makes me more tired. You can only argue with yourself so much before you stop believing what you're saying.

I notice a bit of blood under the nail of my left hand. We're talking about possible mental strategies to use to combat my negative self-talk--I wonder, is self-talk part of the psychobabble?--and I'm perking up a bit. This is why I came, after all. I hate acknowledging that I might actually have a problem; I'd rather chalk it up to laziness, or lack of efficiency, or timing my sleep cycles wrong. But the idea that someone could help me change how I look at life, and that this could go a long way to solving my problems, that was an idea I could have hope for--a great deal of it.

Then he said, "You seem like your head is in the right place--owning your problems and such--and I don't think counseling is going to do you much good, although we'll certainly meet a few more times. But here's an appointment for a psychiatrist, and we'll get you started on an antidepressant tomorrow."

You don't know what it's like to hear that. Depression carries such a social stigma; somebody recently compared it to being diagnosed with an STD. If you announce that you have heart failure, nobody is going to give you that funny sideways look and say, "Riiiight..." If something goes wrong with the body, you fix it. You may get sympathy for it and, if you're lucky, somebody will bring you warm soup and bread to eat while watching movies from the comfort of your oh-so-shnuggly bed...perhaps that's just my own immediate fantasy. But if something goes wrong with your head? People get really uncomfortable, really fast.

It's more than that, though. It felt like something in me froze. What? Medication? Can we not talk about this first? What about the side effects? What is it going to feel like? Are there other options to try? Is this really the first step? I don't even know you, and you're saying I need to start a series of meds that will last indefinitely? Do you even know how I feel about medication?

I tell him I'm not entirely comfortable with the idea of drugs and he seems to shrug it off. I realize I need to quit playing with my hands--my thumb really hurts now. I know, I know I'm showing significant discomfort with the idea, and while I'm not doing it on purpose--it really is freaking me out--he doesn't pick up on it.

Our time is up, and he ushers me out of his office. I decide to wait and take my concerns to the person who would actually be writing the hypothetical prescription, so my questions will hold until tomorrow. Yet as the day has worn on, predictably, I've been unable to focus my attention for too long without it coming back to the session. I should feel relief, right? That there's a plan in place, that I'm going to feel better, focus better, sleep better, eat something, anything. That I will stop losing weight, that I won't struggle so hard to be happy when I'm stressed; that I will learn to cope with stress in a way that's healthy.  Even if I don't decide to go on meds, I can learn to focus on being strong in areas I'm weak. These are all good things.

It feels sick, though; and devastating in its own way. It feels broken--it feels shameful. Less. Empty. It feels like tears that I'm too tired to care about.

It feels like something I wish nobody else knew. Especially the people closest to me. Which is odd, writing about it here. But I needed to do something. I don't think I would have been able to sleep tonight if I hadn't gotten it out somehow.

Our first set of tests for second year starts tomorrow. I'm not ready for them--hellishly unprepared is a better description. What with my lack of concentration and various illnesses in the past few weeks, I'm seriously asking God for miracles on my behalf. For now, all I can do is sleep and study more in the morning.

Rebel Light

The rebellion begins quietly as the evening ends, just before the day is submerged into the coming night. Have you ever noticed? The tangible moment as the sun begins to touch the horizon...and suddenly every speck of light, every ray of brilliance grows in intensity, revolting against the coming dark and painting each surface, each shadow and blade of grass, each tired face, each piece of dandelion fluff in shades of gold that glow as if the entire world is on fire. And that moment, when the light manages to turn back the encroaching dark completely, that moment seems to last forever.

Challenge

I'm back. But where do I start? Lost inside my own head, batting aside the words and phrases that scatter around me like leaves in a fickle wind, the words that used to come easier, settling butterfly-soft into the back of my hands before sliding out of my fingertips into whatever form I chose to release them. Nobody really knows how to begin anything, the first time, but harder still is to begin a second time, with the benefit of having seen. Instead of forging ahead, blithely unaware of rocky ground and deep water, it seems safer to pick a cautious path, walking lightly and hesitating, although I would love to charge ahead, make up lost ground and dash gleefully past where I was and on into new areas. So. This careful treading and picking my way and wishing back the ground I've lost instead of taking it back myself...isn't doing me any good. But I'll treat is like the first days of summer, when I toss my shoes into a dark corner to hide until fall comes, and run barefoot out into the world. It's easy to pick and choose my way, avoiding the rough patches and sharp places--but if I do that, my feet will never toughen. It's only by choosing the challenges that I'll stumble and wince my way into the freedom to run where I will.

Again

I hit something tonight. Hard. It felt really, really good. So I did it again, and again, until my hand hurt. How one individual can be so unhappy based on the swirling of a few extra hormones is beyond me.

Stethoscope

*
I'm staring up at the ceiling, listening to my heart beat. It sounds loud in my ears, the surge rising and falling in time with my breathing. I'm sure I'd look ridiculous to a passerby, lying completely still in a sprawled heap, the stethoscope running from my ears to my own chest.

It's midnight again.

It's good to know that there is one thing about me that is relatively constant, that won't shift with every changing mood, something that will always be sounding in my ears every single moment of my life. Steady.

Do you know what it's like when your own body betrays you? The moment your heart begins to skip furtively, erratically, and every cell and nerve catch their breath and freeze, focused on that faltering beat, willing it onward, ever onward, until it continues as it ever did.

Emotions do that, too.

They trip me up. There's that same rise and fall, these colors that stain everyday life and make it rich and vibrant, and the tide that carries them. Highs and lows, they're all familiar.

But emotions aren't always welcome. Some are ugly enough to make me catch my breath and freeze, willing them away, ashamed at them, rejecting the dark nature of such things. But you can't do that, can you? Emotion doesn't work that way. You can work with it, and around it, and sometimes reason it down to something manageable. But you cannot reject it altogether.

I've spent enough time wrestling with myself in dark playgrounds and shadowed roads to accept this. It sounds right, somehow, but every once in a while I find myself right back on those swings, in the dark, struggling. Waiting for something. And probably -sighs- dramatizing this just a bit much.

So. It's past twelve on a Friday night, and I'm tired, and it's too quiet. Lately I've been something of an insomniac...still waiting, I suppose.  I tend to make my surroundings fit what I feel, and this time of night just about does it. Everybody has their own demons, and this is when mine come out to play. But, I think I'll fight it tonight. After all, I've got a good imagination, and I might as well put it to use.

*Caution--content may be disjointed and sloppy to to intrusion of stethoscope between keyboard, fingers, and brain.

Mood

Days where I go to bed feeling the hours were wasted. Days where I feel useless, stuck in a script I didn't write, and lacking the initiative to redesign the parts I can change. I feel scorn for myself, on these days.

Just down, tonight. Unhappy, dark. Yes, dark--that's a good way to describe it. After days without people, nights without sleep, mornings without excitement, and sleep without dreams, I'm darkness and restlessness. I'm a nightmare waiting to saunter through the fractured fragments of the next few hours. I'm dissatistifaction and anger simmering over the last chapter of a book I've been looking forward to reading, and raging with the feelings it evoked. I'm a deep hunger to connect and see, be seen, be heard beyond the superficial. And I'm solitary, matching my surroundings to myself.

I am all of these emotions, and more beyond naming. And at the end of it, I am simply tired, and unwilling to fall asleep alone in an empty room.

Purple

Roses are red, violets are blue

(except they’re not—they’re purple)

I've started to write a poem for you

But nothing rhymes with purple

Unless you go with slurple,

Or chortle, turtle, warble, girdle

Or a slew of other rhyming words

(But this is getting quite absurd)

I would have rather much preferred

To not begin with purple.

Six months with the same blue-eyed guy that still laughs at me, loves me, and makes life better in his own unique way. These are the first few lines of something I tried to write for our anniversary (how strange, to be saying that!), and let me tell you, it goes downhill from there. But I enjoyed myself. ;)

Sunrise

It's difficult to give yourself permission to feel grief.

My grandfather died this morning...well. A lifetime ends in a few shallow breaths in a dark room, sleep fading into night as the sun rises. He was so unhappy these past few years...but every time he said goodbye to me, he always told the story about the first time he held me on. "You were only this big, Lissy, just this big, right on my chest."

Grief is so conflicted, and complicated. How much of it there should be. What it should look like.

Anyway. I was struggling so hard with it, and how to express it, and even what it was. I didn't realize what I was lacking until Ryan found me and wrapped his arms around me--almost, gave me permission to feel that loss, let it go. What an odd and beautiful feeling that is.

Ah, grandpa.

Up

How to start.

I'm so out of practice with writing, it seems, that it takes a good five minutes of contemplation to figure out how to put my thoughts in order. I think I'll start from the middle, if you don't mind. The end will come along soon enough, and if we find a beginning, so much the better--but I'm not going to worry about it.

Being up at 11 pm is pretty terrible, for me. Especially during test week. Today wasn't bad at all, really--I actually finished a 117 question test in about an hour and a half, so my first of the triad was over pretty quickly. However, the headache it left me with is sort of like herpes in that it is the gift that keeps on giving. (Actually, that was a terrible example, especially since I have a housemate whose worst fear in life, after contracting AIDs, is picking up The Herp by accident. I share her disinclination towards it, but the phrase popped into my head and...my fingers kept moving).

Back to the headache, which is why I'm typing in my bed instead of sleeping in it. I don't know why these things happen--one minute I'm answering question after question, starting to relax because I'm guessing well (and no matter what they may say, med school success is based on your ability to guess), and the next...well. Next, I suddenly realize that I feel like I've got my head trapped in a vise.

A two hour nap didn't help. Dinner didn't help, and opting for two (not one, but two) caffeine packed Excedrin, four hours ago, has left me with a raging headache and a lack of ability to go to sleep.

Incidentally, I overhead someone the other day philosophizing on the reasons why people claim to have headaches. I suppose it might be hard to empathize, if you've never had one in your life, but it was an eye-rolling moment to hear him claim that migraines are fallacies created by weak-minded people with low pain tolerance. I dunno, buddy--let's take a drill to your teeth and a hammer to your temples and see how you react, eh?

I suppose the end of this is that I don't know what to do. It's past miserable, by this point. I've tried distractions, like talking to Ryan--I've tried reading, but I can't see straight--watching TV, but it hurts worse--and sleep eludes me. And studying is impossible.

Perhaps I'm building empathy for people with chronic pain, because I can't imagine if this were an everyday thing. They try and teach us how to do that, here--how to understand people by putting yourself in their shoes. I don't think you can, really, unless you've experienced something similar. It's not something you can fake or simulate, and I don't think you should. But with pain, at least, I shouldn't have a problem.

The distraction isn't working. I'm going to try sleeping again...I'm so tired. I don't understand why these happen, but nothing is helping...-sighs-

Goodnight, all.

It's sort of fun being back, circumstances aside.

Stay tonight

I cry myself back into sleep
Where dark crows circle, and snow falls deep
And even lonely gray clouds weep
Along--and I am theirs to keep,
In restless, silent, icy sleep.

Words fail. I don't want to be this person.

Words

She stared down at the pen in her hand.

Why this morbid delight in destroying myself? Why the sick, twisted pleasure in pushing my body past driven and into hurting? Why? Why am I doing this? It's almost demonic. 


I think I do it on purpose, somewhere deep inside. Punishment, though for what I don't know. Maybe rebellion against my own limitations; maybe a perverse enjoyment of cruelty.


I stare bleary-eyed at the girl in the mirror, swaying with lack of sleep, lack of food, and dare her to stay awake just one more minute. You can do it, you have no limits, no boundaries. You are stronger than everything, even yourself. One more minute.


Just one more.


She dropped the pen beside the crumpled sheet of paper and walked away.