So yes, My quest to use this as a drop-in clinic, whenever I've had a bad day, should tell anyone curious enough to read, that I've not had a bad day since christmas..
M'eh, I say, M'eh.
and it's not that I'm not motivated enough to actually write on it, either: I sit infront of a web-connected PC almost 14 hours per day (through choice, obviously), typing mostly.
After over-analysis mode kicks in, I come to the idea that maybe I'm in denial about just how bad the days are, and flatly refuse to type here, knowing it takes a really bad mood for me to vent - and I hate to think that I've had bad moods.
but I kinda have.
My girlfriend and I are fighting often, not every day, not every week, but it's taking a toll on me. I can feel a familiar exhaustion coming - the exhaustion that lets you wake up every day at the same time, work the same way, with the same enthusiasm, go to sleep at the same time at night.. It would even allow you to perform the same workout at the gym, the same day-to-day physical tasks withou becoming overly fatigued..
It lets you do all these, but at the same time, it allows your mind to enter that almost-dreamlike state, where it's tough to find the usually-available line between reality and imagination. In essence, you find things wrong with you that aren't really there. Your mind is so weakened, that when you of course try to logic your way out, and you don't find any evidence to the contrary, a little bit of adrenaline to make you feel real fear over it. It now becomes an almost-real issue for your mind, and body maybe, to deal with; after all, diseases come from nowhere.
OCD, offshoots of it have been in my life so long, I can't help thinking that all decisions are just reactions to tiny little bits of ocd we store for future usefulness..
.. I believe that Humans evolved from lesser organisms, Lesser in the sense that they are less complex (or have less complexes?). I don't mean lesser in terms of morals, or ethics - While that could be argued, there's always a dickhead right around the corner fully willing to stand on a soapbox (usually in front of friends who won't argue out of politeness, and usually only when an appropriately stimulating image passes infront fo them), and declare in that all-knowing tone : "...and we think we're so advanced...."
Fine - y'know what, they're entitled - humans regularly fuck up.
My mind can't help dismissing the bad stuff that humans are responsible for, like nuclear weapons, atmospheric pollution, over mining, child labour, hunting animals to extinction - all the bad stuff.. Instead it goes to Particle accelerators, Moon landings, Language, visual art, Musical art, linguistic art.. ..
... getting back to the thrust -
Lesser animals - Animals that one time only had adrenaline to guide them, to fuel them for the escape. Small mammals that got a jolt of adrenaline when they saw a massive reptillian shape in the darkness..
we have this trait, too.. only it's other things in our culture that take the reptillian form - stuff like bank balances, mortgages, cars, when we see that item on ebay we've always lusted after, and there's only 5 minutes to go, AND IT'S A REALLY GOOD PRICE!!!!!!..
*JOLT*
.. and we buy it, and it feels great for a moment, and the after-purchase wave of guilt and stupidity washes over you..
it also backfires, doesn't it.
Some years ago, I had a big reaction to this adrenaline, fear-system..
it's known as H-OCD.
OCD as I undertand it, is the situation you find yourself in, when you can't find closure on something.. anything..
Most know it as the hand-cleaning thing, or the light-switching-off-thing..
when the sufferer can't know for sure that the light is really off, or their hands are really clean. So waking life becomes an ongoing excercise in checking... making sure..
Through circumstances of my own engineering, I had spent a weekend with an old university friend, I'd invited her to my house for the weekend, and she came.. I was thrilled - I quite liked her at uni.
we had a lovely time in and around town, in our house, in restaurants, cafe's..
I remember she had a bad cold that weekend..
Out on a walk, one morning, we encountered an old tutor of mine, who assumed we were boyfriend and girlfriend - on asking me if this is so, I answered.. "erm..... I guess so..."
I don't fully know why, Latent desire maybe, she still was fairly lovely, and we'd had a great time.. when we said goodbye to the tutor, I felt my hand being held, in the nice finger-interlocking way - the first time for me - at what... age 25.. ? - LOLZ.
ahem.
yer, so - we returned home, she would leave my city that morning, driving back to hers.
a little later after this, maybe a week or two - she wanted to return, so we organised her return.. we had talked about starting a relationship between the visits, I wanted to see how things went - I wasn't convinced, really... but it was my first go, so maybe this was normal..
she came, and we had a pleasant first afternoon - had a meal, sat close to each other, playing monopoly with other friends, then it came time for sleep..
She was to sleep on the floor of my room, but after complaining about how uncomfortable it was, i said.. "well.. you could sleep up here, and I'll sleep down on the fl........".. "OK.."
she climbs into my bed at the same time as me, and we continue talking about things..
we kiss - and kiss, and kiss, and kiss.. in truth, my first kiss of any consequence..
kissing became harder, more passionate.
our behavior didn't get anywhere close to hardcore, (through choice, obviously) but.. y'know.. it was intense for me.
that week kinda came and went - and during it, I knew pretty surely that I didn't 'love' her, I didn't even desire her any more.. and so shortly after she returned, I told her I didn't feel anything like she did - and the brevity of it was all too.... well.. brief. a week-long fling.. somethin like it anyway.
after this experienc I started questioning things, Why didn't I fal in ove with her, why didn't I find her attractive enough to keep a relationship going, why this, why that, why didn't I love another desperately beautiful woman in my life...
Might I be gay? -
*JOLT*
.. over the next week, I began understanding things... things about time and its linear nature.
Things about myself, and what my imagination is capable of convincing me of.. The big moment for me was that, while talking with a gay friend that week, I remembered the surname of one of his gay friends - ... *JOLT*
It was just.. unrecoverable - i remember looking past my monitors at work, through the window, wondering what I did to deserve this pain.. I panicked for the whole day -
I couldn't go home, sick, because that would mean having to admit this to someone..
No - it's here.. here in work - I need to work, and get past this.
days past, the mood didn't go away,
i started analysing my life to this point, thinking about old loves, women I would have given my life for.. wondering if they were all fake, if those loves were all lies - wondering whether it was just what my culture had taught me to lust after, rather than what I, Me, wanted.
I went to see a film that weekend with a friend - Team america - World police..
the whole thing was great, until the 'suck my cock' scene.. even fucking puppets - i was going out of my mind.
Then I started wondering if I was attracted to my friend!? - a guy I'd known for 7 years up to that point.. it got worse, I started questioning fundamental relationships in my life
wondering whether I found my sister attractive, my mother, my dad, my boss, people, men, women, drivers of other cars, while commuting to work, men in the gym.. -
I was so tired.
I was lost, and noone could help - I thought I was alone in suffering this (a common symptom associated with ocd).. I was embarassed by it...
I didn't go to the gym, didn't go to friends' houses for fear of fancying them, didn't spend time around my family..
I washed my car nearly every day one week, because it took me outdoors, away from people..
I went home from work one day, told them it was a stomach flu.. and stayed off, the next day - February 14th..
I was sat infront of my laptop that morning, and I wanted to test myself, test whether my emotional compass had any reliability.. The numb feeling is also common - I fully apreciate why people self-harm.. although it didn't come naturally to me during this period.. in fact, didn't come at all.. not even hitting stuff
I sat there looking at the screen, looking to msn, and I think back 2 years.. back to when I was as deeply in love with a woman, as I've ever been.. I bring up my msn privacy settings, and re-add her to my list, and send "Hey...." to her.
I look at the bit of msn that tells you when they're typing - and my god, it tells me she's typing.
*JOLT*
She didn't know it was me to begin with, .. we talk and talk and talk .. - for days it seemed.
I wasn't in heaven; talking with her was totally a reaction to my ocd dose, and depression, but it felt great anyway.. but, most importantly - I was totally intimidated by her, totally nervous about talking to her again, and so my compass was working.
.. Another reaction to the depression was to get in touch with that girl I'd spent new years with.. I thought maybe that giving it another try was gonna snap me out of it.., so I visited her a week later, with something to prove to myself...
I have never known guilt like it - all that weekend I couldn't snap out of it.. couldn't deal, at all.. I knew being there was a mistake, I knew I'd hurt her, I knew I didn't feel anything real for her.. I returned home after that weekend, miserable, depressed, sad, upset.. As it happens I was even more sure I didn't love her, or even fancy her.. and as such, I avoided her totally after it, hurting her immersurably.. more importantly tho - I was deeper into this OCD..
I had tested myself against a female, and failed totally, I didn't love her. and that's what I guess I lost then, I lost all faith that I'd find love. doubted everything before that I had identified and believed to be, Love..
Failure and panic -
HOWEVER
i kinda made it my mission to get over this - Love was beautiful, but it was for now, lost - and I wanted love back.
i began reading up on depression (the overwhelming pressure not to admit i was in a depression was a big hurdle)..
then searched for stuff like.. "worried that i might be gay",
then "worried might gay"
then "worried gay depression"
.. eventually I found a forum about ocd where other sufferers collaborated to pull each other out of their respective, depressing doorways..
This thing had a Name!!!! - it had a name I could point to, and say .. THAT'S WHAT I HAVE!
firstly it was a condition, a known one, that people deal with!!!
secondly, I wasn't alone - this is monumentally important..
I found accounts of people suffering this -
one guy who had suffered for it for 16 years..
FUCK THAT!
.. as I sit now, I remeber part of his account/story - basically - his 16-year olng battle boiled down to simple conversation with the last of many therapists..
"would you go on a date with another man?" "NO.. absolutely not....!!..."
"so you wouldn't ever sleep with another man?" "... NO -.... !!.. "
"so why are you allowing this to still dominate you - " - " ...because ....... I don't know for sure.. ! "
"listen.. this condition can't be finished with a test.. you can't get closure because of a test - I remember a guy coming to me with a complex about AIDS - he truly believed he had aids.. "
"... but there's a test for that.... i mean... he can know for sure!!...?"
" absolutely, he can. but tests don't matter for ocd, it's about relaxing the emotional muscles so that the ideas can just come and go"
like a breath of fucking fresh air -
not only does it ultimately boil down to your own belief in your own preferences..
but it's just a matter of time.
at least it was for me..
CBT - exposure therapy - getting used to that which you fear, not meaning much to you..
granted, it opens the door for getting over things easily - things which one might not want to.. like love - you don't want to get over love quickly.. Love should be important, and significant in life.
conveniently there's a gay guy working where I do - and a transexual.. the exposure therapy bit would be fairly easy.. I'd just talk with him..
I'd spike, occasionally - and return to that forum - but the gaps got bigger between visits..
the spikes got fewer, and further between..
I started a new relationship - perhaps too soon after the ocd.
We've been together since then - almost 4 years, but it's a bit rocky..
I'm thinking it was in part a reaction to the depression, another woman-test..
over analysing..
.. as it turns out, there is another woman in my life - and it's that Star that my compass could align itself to, in that cloudiest sky, 4 years ago..
I believe I love her, and I want to see her..
everything she says to me, invites me there. but I'd have to give my girlfriend up to go..
and there are absolutely no guarantees.
about anything.
12.
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