Tuesday 14 January 2014

Battling instability

So, back before I created this blog, back before I met kitten, back before florida happened... I was a mask. Or several, really. Marina didn't exist back then. What existed was a person who could not feel emotions because the trauma from being raped multiple times when she was ten made her cut them out of her. Total apathy. Laughter? False. Crying? Only physical pain, and incredibly horrible pain at that. Excitement? A facade. Sadness? What sadness? What fear?

The only thing I genuinely felt for at least three years of my life, was loneliness. Not your normal loneliness. It was like this all-encompassing hole of nothing swallowing me and making me see, every single day of my life, that I was completely, totally alone. That no one I knew understood me or would ever understand me because it was literally impossible for them to do so. So I made masks. I faked emotion. I was never happy, never sad, never angry, never upset, never scared.

Until I hit sixteen. See, I got a real bad case of walking pneumonia when I was fifteen, and was on a regimen of a narcotic cough suppressant to help keep me out of the hospital. Unfortunately it started bringing back memories of things, some good, some bad, that had happened to me as young as 3. I woke up from the dreams confused and befuddled, and convinced that they couldn't have happened to me.

Until I started asking my mom about them. And sure enough, every single dream I brought to her attention was something that was a memory. Of course, some things, like being raped, I didn't mention and didn't want to accept that had happened to me. Unfortunately all this culinated in an explosion. Very shortly before I hit sixteen years old, my masks broke, failed me, and I started feeling things again.

Can you imagine the agony emotions were to me after so long without them? Especially when, the moment I started experiencing emotions, I was experiencing severe bipolarity? I swung wildly back and forth between suicidal depression and dangerous mania. I felt anger so bad that I almost broke my sister's arm in a fit of rage. I was completely unequipped to deal with even normal emotions at this point of my life, and instead of even getting the opportunity to get used to it I was thrust into completely unpredictable instability.

Of course, eventually I learned to deal. Yeah, "dealing" included cutting and other forms of self-injury, "dealing" included becoming a kleptomaniac and thrill-seeker. But at least I wasn't succumbing to the suicidal thoughts any more (I have actively attempted suicide at least three times in my life, and listlessly attempted to waste away more times than I can count), and at least I had an outlet for the extra energy my mania gave me rather than allowing my anger to take control of me and hurt people.

No, it wasn't right, but it was better than what could have happened. It was better than what happened in florida, where I was abused, molested at knifepoint, raped, homeless on multiple occasions, had to steal just to survive. Just to eat. I've gone three weeks eating only one very small meal each week. I've never had to sleep on the street but I couchsurfed on the couches of total strangers for a month and a half. I let my boyfriend use me and his best friends abuse me, and repeatedly left somewhat stable situations in order to be with him, only to be kicked out weeks later.

I've been completely disconnected from any means of possible help and only by the grace of the divine managed to escape that hellhole with my life intact.

And that hole never went away. No matter how many friends I had, no matter who I loved, who I got into relationships with. Until suddenly it was gone one day and I realised that somehow it was kitten, the one person I actively pushed away and tried to avoid getting into a relationship with, that filled it.

The problem is, I'm not used to it being filled up. All those bad habits of pushing people away when I get into unpleasant moods, for their sake and mine both, they still exist.

What do you do when habit tells you to push someone away even though you know that it wont fix the problem? What do you do when even though you want to tell someone to stay, you order them to leave, and they have no choice but to obey you because you don't give them any other choice?

More importantly, how do you break these habits and form healthier ones?

I feel very lost and torn right now. I don't know what to do. I've been through so much shit in my life, more in my 27 years than most people experience in 90, and all my friends come to me for advice and I can help them just fine. I always have the right answers.. so why can't I find the right answers for myself?

I don't know what to do, and that's a really hard thing for me to admit.

Sunday 5 January 2014

Updates!!!

Counselling appointment last week went well. My counsellor is proud of me and thinks I am making good progress. I filled out some of my CBT forms and he said it was very clear that I am putting a lot of effort into my therapy and he is glad that I'm trying so hard.

This week I have case manager and an appointment with my new pdoc. Nervous about both things for some reason. The new pdoc I can understand but not so much the case manager because even though I haven't gotten the goal done I have legitimate reasons for it. So idk. On that note, my medicine has been working wonderfully and I haven't had to up the dosage of my xanax again so far, and I haven't been experiencing unpleasant side effects for any of my medicine and I've not been missing doses of the meds I take regularly. So YAY!

My kitten has exams this coming two weeks and also a paper due shortly after the last exam. This is actually great timing for us getting back into the swing of things! When we first started veering more towards 24/7 it had a lot to do with her schooling and study schedules and such, so this is familiar territory for both of us and I am getting the hang of it again. It's different to what she had to do in college, but not too much different. It might be weird but I feel most comfortable with punishment as a part of our dynamic - not physical punishment very often; mostly things like being banned from games or telly, being ignored, having to write lines, etc. Sometimes I'll make her flick herself in an unpleasant way to discourage a negative behaviour but it doesn't happen very often.

As far as other things go, the sexual side of things is going well I think. I am trying to find a balance between enough sex and not too much or too little. Though I think for my kitten it is a rare day when there is "too much", but still. Some days I'm just not in the mood when she is and it leaves us unbalanced. I think it's a carryover from being aysec for that month and a half or so. I'm still getting my libido back and some days it just blanks out. But I think so far I've done a good job of making sure her needs and wants are met to the best of my ability.

So, progress! Things are going much better than they were a month ago. :)

Oh yes, The Watch has been used several times since the last post even going as far as two days between uses and not having to use the script to retrain the trigger, but we haven't had a chance to use it in several days so I have a suspicion that next time I'll have to retrain the trigger. We'll see though, I suppose I'll have to write another post about it once I get the chance to use it on kitten. ^_~