Something is setting me off inside, but I'm a very controlled mess.

Between planning a mutiny in therapy, and threatening abandonment of both my body and whoever or whatever manufactures hypochondria and/ or illness, it's been a bad night. When I finally felt my body shut up its stupid whining, I felt a little guilty and asked Jenny to tell me what was going on. Jenny is the body connection. I think she serves as a connection to other things, too, but that's a whole other blog post. Anyway, Jenny can't talk. She communicates with songs (among other things - whole other blog post). When I ask her a question, she drops a song into my head. So... I did it - I asked her. "So... Jenny, what's going on. What say you?" The bit that dropped into my head was, "I think we're alone now, the beating of our heart is the only sound." So what does this mean? I had already successfully abandoned my body? Of course, I did what Jenny expects me to do, and I located the video and the lyrics. I posted the lyrics after the video. The words made me cry right away. Not really, though. I mean - sure, water came out of my eyes for a minute, and for a split second it was a good thing that I was not standing on top of a tall building, but outside of that - I didn't feel too much. Now I just want the song to shut up. I'm thinking I should go to bed soon. That's hard when I am alternating between leaky eyeballs and the urge to grab my ball bat and start smashing the hell out of things. I have no idea what's going on, but I don't think I can keep my therapy appointment for Wednesday. I am NOT a happy fucking camper and there's no telling what could happen. I don't like that. It doesn't seem smart or safe to me. It just doesn't.




written by Ritchie Cordell
Originally recorded by Tommy James and the Shondelles (1967)
Also recorded by Tiffany (1986)

Children behave,
That's what they say when we're together,
And watch how you play,
They don't understand,
And so we're,
Running just as fast as we can,
Holdin' onto one another's hand,
Tryin' to get away into the night,
And then you put your arms around me,
And we tumble to the ground,
And then you say,
I think we're alone now,
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
I think we're alone now,
The beating of our hearts is the only sound.
Look at the way,
We gotta hide what we're doin'.
'Cause what would they say,
If they ever knew and so we're,
Running just as fast as we can,
Holdin' onto one another's hand,
Tryin' to get away into the night,
And then you put your arms around me,
And we tumble to the ground,
And then you say,
I think we're alone now,
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
I think we're alone now,
The beating of our hearts is the only sound.
I think we're alone now,
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
I think we're alone now,
The beating of our hearts is the only sound.
Running just as fast as we can,
Holdin' onto one another's hand,
Tryin' to get away into the night,
And then you put your arms around me,
And we tumble to the ground,
And then you say,
I think we're alone now,
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
I think we're alone now,
The beating of our hearts is the only sound.
I think we're alone now,
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
I think we're alone now,
The beating of our hearts is the only sound.
I think we're alone now, (alone now)
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
I think we're alone now,(alone now)
The beating of our hearts is the only sound.
I think we're alone now,(alone now)
There doesn't seem to be anyone around.
I think we're alone now,(alone now)
The beating of our hearts is the only sound.
I think we're alone now,(alone now)...
Lyrics from: www.lyricsworld.com

I have a tendency to stop talking when I don't feel heard.

I got on the subject of wanting to quit smoking in Wednesday's therapy appointment. My therapist told me about a quit drug called Chantix. I told him how a relative of mine took Chantix, quit smoking, and then went and hung himself out back in the shed. Then the therapist went on to tell me more about Chantix. Then I told him cold turkey has worked the best in the past, but smoking seems to stun my brain and past quits have brought up issues with terrifying and partial recall of dissociated material that I don't know how to handle alone. He told me more about Chantix. I LOVE talking to the wall. I fucking LIVE for it. (Here is where I make the jack-off motion with my hand. You people miss SO MUCH in not being able to see me when I'm on a bitter and sarcastic rant. I swear I must have some Italian blood in me somewhere.) In the end, when it sunk in that I was not interested in the drug, he relented only to tell me that as much as I don't want to hear it, the present moment is the medicine to cure what ails me. I'm begining to think I'm whipping a dead horse. I don't know what else to do to be understood. Words are all I have.

I ran out of smokes Thursday morning and declined to buy more. There was a lot of anxiety. It was there before that, but quitting ramped it up a little bit. I had a couple of panic attacks in my sleep. I took a half of an anxiety pill. Even though I have a VERY impressive stockpile, I don't like taking them and I almost never do. I need them ALL in case I ever become deathly ill since I can't visit doctors anymore because I can't get past the medical trauma stuff. In spite of all of that, I thought I was handling things well during the quit attempt (because I was so dissociated in response to the bullshit). Long story short (it has to be short - the long version was sucked up into the ether as it was happening) - it all seemed to break down Saturday when I caved.

Saturday I sat down to fix my tax issue. This may take a while. Seems the I R Ass doesn't let people change the filing status in the way I need to if the deadline has already passed. They don't want people to be able to stop them from stealing if they are late in discovering the evil intentions toward those who mistakenly decide that the government has a benevolent attitude toward the concept of marital togetherness in the financial arena. I had to actually pull up the amendment form to find that out about changing the status. It was not revealed in the preliminary search for info. I will be calling the tax payer advocacy service Tuesday. This is really very ridiculous. And sad.

Let this be a lesson to me to trust my instincts. I had always filed separately until I started to get guilt tripped from various societal factions about 'what a marriage is about'. You know this feeds my anti-social paranoia, right? That was another topic in therapy. My therapist learned some strange facts about me on Wednesday. Things that he has never known in the three plus years I have been with him.

1. I am still a registered republican and listened to my instincts not to change that.

2. Hypochondriacs should not smoke, but if they do, raises in sin taxes might piss them off enough to make them quit.

3. I used to serve on the local republican executive committee until I resigned after the birth of my youngest daughter.

4. Though I am not a big gun fan in real life, me and my mental shotgun used to donate time and financial support to our local 2nd amendment club. Because I want the freedom to change my mind. You know - right before I move my family to Montana to live in a bunker.

5. I worry about civil war and the collapse of civilization. Only the fittest will survive. I really should quit smoking.



I think I'm going to have a cigarette and go to bed.

And, for old time's sake, let's not comment about the cigs. Let's pretend they are the terror of trauma memories and we're not supposed to mention them because no one can really help us handle it without throwing drugs or the present moment at us when the going gets tough and upsetting. We wouldn't want to upset anyone. That would be so... not the present moment. (And present moment fanatics, please line up to lick my pits - and have I mentioned that I don't wear deodorant because it's unhealthy? Whut. It won't be so bad. My sweat smells like chicken noodle soup. It does - I swear it.) Please excuse me while I go vomit and please leave a comment about the weather. Seriously. The weather. Because everyone knows that even the most distressing of neuroses and addictions are more acceptable than seeing, feeling, and (gawd forbid) sharing the full horror of the truth with another human being when you can't bear it without help.

I already posted this letter once, now lets see if I can keep from deleting it again.

I was getting pretty depressed and now I have been running like crazy to 'get things done'. Yeah, man. I got A LOT done. And I have more to do Monday. I've been running. Now I will have it here on my blog and I will know more about what I've been running from when I hit the wall. And so will all of you. Until then...



(Dear Dream Mother,)

Okay, I can write the dream now. I fell asleep on the couch and dreamed that I was in my parents' living room. My father came home. I was confused about why he wasn't dead. I found out that he had never died and had been alive all along. This scared and confused me and filled me with dread. I was afraid of him, but I was also afraid about the fact that I had thought him dead when he had really been alive. I thought I was losing my mind again. How could I have not known that I had been living with my father for years unless I was insane? To make things more confusing, I realized I felt love for my father. On the other hand, I was also afraid of him. I was just plain afraid. I started to have a panic attack in my sleep. I thought of you and wondered if you knew that he was alive. I thought perhaps I had 'sometimes known' and had spoken to you about it during times that were no longer available to my consciousness. And if not, I imagined how hard it would be to explain to you that I had been living in a delusion for so many years after 'imagining' his death. I tried to look at my father and figure out whether or not I could trust him to be safe. I didn't know what to do and I was even more afraid. I went to find my mother in the dream. She was sleeping, so I woke her up. I could barely talk because I was so afraid. She was nice to me and not hideous (that's how I know she was you). I don't remember what all I said, but I whined out some thin little words to explain. I don't think I explained very clearly, but she did know that I was terrified and that it was because of my father. She was nice about it, but all she did was say something to the effect that she was sure everything was somehow okay. Then she went back to sleep. It wasn't okay. I was in the crying place. It leaked out into reality and sort of woke me up a little bit for a minute. The crying was real. I tried to be all the way awake and not asleep. That trapped me for a minute in one of those night terror thingies. But I was too exhausted to fight and I went back into regular sleep and the dream. My father was still there and I was trapped with him. I had to convince myself that he was okay and not anyone to be afraid of. I told myself that I must have made up wrong things about him. I told myself that he was nice and would be good to me and that it was good that he was alive. I decided that I had been wrong about him the same way that I had been wrong about his death and that it was okay for us to just pick up where we left off. So we went out for coffee. Then suddenly, instead of having coffee with him, I was working as a waitress in the coffee shop and I was waiting on him. He was the only customer at first, but he was very demanding. Then other customers started coming. I was trying to hurry with my father's coffee, but I needed to find a coffee cup. I went to go look for them. I saw two shelves. The top one was labeled "tea cups" and the bottom one was labeled "coffee cups". The bottom one was empty, and I knew my father would disapprove of me bringing his coffee in a "tea cup" from the top shelf. The "tea cups" were not really tea cups. They were shaped funny and they were larger than what I knew the "coffee cups" would be had there been any left on the shelf. (I think I know what the shape of the cups represented and it makes me want to puke.) I became overwhelmed and customers were waiting. The manager came to get me. She could see that I wasn't able to do the job I had been given, so she brought some others to replace me. I thought she was going to fire me, but she said she just wanted me to take a job in the back with the paperwork instead. I wondered if my father would miss me, but I didn't think he would as long as someone brought the coffee. At first I was a little sad about that, but quickly realized that the paperwork job was a promotion. Then I woke up. (Husband) and (youngest daughter) were there looking at me. They said I had been mumbling and moaning and whining while I slept.

I'm not okay and I'm afraid to go to sleep.

I have a problem that I'm not sure how to explain. It's about therapy. Something is up and I don't know what it is. Not only do I not know what it is, I don't know how to even try to find out what it is. It started with the absence of email. I, the email pest, suddenly stopped emailing the therapist two weeks ago. I haven't sent a single email since. Not one. He's not away or anything. I could email him half to death if I wanted. At first I thought it was a good thing that I stopped emailing and I mentioned it to him, too. I thought it was progress. In a way it is because I don't need him in the same desperate way as I have before. And also (and this is probably the big piece) because I don't fear abandonment by him anymore because I don't think he will ditch me. I think there is something else here, too. My first clue was when I mentioned this little phenomenon in the last appointment. He asked me what I thought had changed and I told him. What I said is definitely true, but I could feel the presence of something else, too. The inner chatter started, but I squashed it. Then I had a dream that implied to me that I am hiding from him because I dread being 'sick'. I dreamed that I didn't feel well. I had a flu or something, so I went to bed. Strangely (or not) my bed was on the ledge of an uppermost floor in a high rise apartment building. It sloped a bit toward the street below and it was very narrow. I was holding onto a small post that was affixed to the building and I could not fall asleep because I was afraid I would let go and fall to my death if I did. Then I got up and went to a doctor because the illness was bothering my stomach. I did not want to go, but I was afraid not to. The doctor said the trouble was really coming from my mind, but I needed to stay in the hospital for a while anyway. I was relieved that I was basically okay, but I wanted to get the hell out of there in the worst way. I ended up in a shopping mall where I had an appointment to get my hair done. There was another woman waiting there, too. She had a little kid with her and she started talking to me about the woman who was supposed to do my hair. She called her Mrs. So-And-So (same last name as my therapist). She was going on and on about what a nice lady she is and then she started talking about the hairdresser's husband and what a great therapist he is for children and how nice he was to her own kid who just happened to be his client. It was my therapist she was talking about. She called him by first and last name. I hate sleeping. It's too confusing. More beer, please.

Hey, Dream Pestilence! I heard you, now fer chrissakes shut up! Just please SHUT UP and leave me alone before you drive me to do something insane like threaten you with a razor blade or a lighter. I could keep one of them under my pillow and get revenge when you wake me up, you know. Don't push me that far. Ya wanna drive me crazy? I'll show ya crazy. Don't. Push. I fucking heard you and I'll tell the therapist, but you need to back the fuck off now before I lose it on you.

I have no idea why I am compelled to prattle on, but...

I spoke with the therapist Saturday. I guess I really do like him and trust him because I actually told him something that I didn't tell the Internet first. Frankly, I wanted to ignore it, but you know how therapists are. They ask questions. May I just preface this by saying it's been nightmare city over here? Yeah. Only this time it hit below the belt. I hate it when my nightmares get so desperate for the attention of any non-drunk brain cells that they stoop to using my children to represent my child-self in my nightmares. Pass me that beer, eh? Anyway, it was the littlest in my dream. She was afraid to sleep because of someone she called 'the invisible man'. And because of what he would do to her when she was sleeping. Actually, I can't recount it again. I'm sure you get the point, eh? Nightmares suck. Though I haven't felt anything about this one, I know intellectually that if I did have feelings about it, they would be horrible. How's that for detached?

In other news, I did the weekly shopping in the middle of the night at the 24 hour WalMart. (Yes, it was pre-beer. There are some things I would just never do.) I like it when there aren't people all around. Unfortunately, they are moving everything around in there, so I had to talk to people to ask where things are because I would have been quite a long time left to my own devices. At least the employees are very nice in there. Talking to people is less icky that way. It was still icky, but the ick factor was all mine. It's my voice, you see. To be precise - it's my accent. I hate it when it pops up. And it's almost always in public when I am struggling to talk to people when I really don't want to. What the fuck is that about? I think it's about being a fake. Or not. After all, I did speak naturally with that accent until I moved from the South US to the Midwest (where that sort of thing was frowned upon). After that - there was magic. My accent was suddenly gone. Just like that - the moment I knew it made me 'unprofessional', I dumped it. *Poof* All gone. And I never missed a beat. Unless you count the panic attacks. So was I being fake when I was talking in the store or was I being myself? I don't know. I'm not good at figuring out that kind of crap. "Will the real Lynn please stand up?" Uh... I don't know if that's such a good idea because I don't understand the question. I DO understand what I'm afraid of, though (and it's obviously not impaired liver function). I'm afraid the little girl or the teenage girl might take over. That wouldn't be good. I know because it has happened before and it lasted too long. Long enough for mail to stack up in dusty piles around the house. Long enough to tank my credit score. I could go on, but I won't. It sucked, okay? It caused trouble. I don't like trouble. Those two don't do the laundry and the husband ruins clothes when it's left to him. They don't make good lunches for my children and they SUCK at bookkeeping. I can't have that kind of shit going on, you know? I forgot what the point is here, so I'm going to bed.

A Post to Answer Comments from the Previous Post

Actual post time - 6 AM Wednesday, April 1, 2009

I appreciate all the comments about how it is just too embarrassing to talk to a therapist about sexual things. I couldn't agree more. I've never been able to do it, either. This time, I took a chance, but it wasn't when I called him during the meltdown. All I could do then was cry and tell him how very afraid I was. I told him I was afraid of the nightmare. Very, very afraid, yet so tired and needing sleep. Now I am only getting by because I'm alternating between dissociation and a beer buzz. I'm not complaining too loudly, though. It's not the healthiest way to cope, but it's what I have at the moment. It allowed me to bank the gross receipts, pay my bills, clean up around here, and get a very respectable start on the mountain of laundry that piled up while I was down. Still, this is not a long term plan. I have to DO something. I decided that it might be wise to take a chance and let the therapist in. I let him right in to the real middle of the mess. I had to stare down Rambo to get him onboard. He is the protector, so he saw the misery and the danger in not having help and he protected by standing down. He was very encouraged by the therapist's reaction to the emergency, so he's with me. Anyway, here's how I did it and I'll let you know how it turns out. I told it in this email:



Thank you for not leaving me. I was able to put together a little bit of peace and get myself together somewhat. I've still been bothered by bad mental images, though. The same images have stalked me from time to time since I was about ten and I know that the really bad nightmare I had was about that. Those things come from the same place. They are the same thing. I thought I could handle the actual material by myself, but something happened tonight that makes me think it might be smarter to say something to you about this stuff. I didn't want to because it is very, very embarrassing and I can only write it to you. I don't think I could actually tell you out loud, so thank you in advance for not being one of those stodgy types who doesn't do computers.

That nightmare was very deeply disturbing. I could not see the face of the bad person in the dream, but he made me think of my husband. Their personal areas looked nothing alike, but I thought of him because of what the man was doing. I have a problem that no one knows about (except for my husband). It is a sexual problem in that intercourse is difficult and sometimes not physically possible because... I think it is because I'm afraid even when I don't know I'm afraid, even when I think I am relaxed, so my body tries to protect me by not letting it happen. There is something that helps with this situation, and that is what the bad person in the dream was doing to me. But that person was rough and mean and frightening. Then in the days that passed after the nightmare, I became very sick and upset because of the images and also from thinking that the only way I am able to have sex with my husband is to first repeat something horrible that someone did to me. I got sick and tired of being tortured by that nightmare and the sickening thoughts and fears that came with it, so I decided to do something about it. I had sex with my husband because I needed to know the difference between things with him and the horror of the nightmare and the images. I got my answer. The difference is my husband is a gentle person who loves and respects me and he would never, ever hurt me like that. It's not the same thing as the bad images because my husband is not willing to hurt me to make it possible to have sex. The bad person was and did. It helps me to know the difference.

This would be a happy ending, but it wasn't the ending. Something happened between the time that I became able to have intercourse and actually doing it. All I did was lie next to him for a minute and hug his arm and it happened. Things suddenly got all changed around for me and I felt very different. Small. I felt very small. And I just wanted to hug the arm of the person who has sex with me without hurting me so much. Well, there was no way in hell I was going to have intercourse feeling like that. I was able to get out of it without frustrating him or hurting his feelings, because I spaced out, but the shower spaced me out more and the kitchen smelled like the grandparents' kitchen and I almost threw up. The majority of me was right here and struggling to stay, but I sensed the stragglers. I had a brief flash of something and then I went numb. I can't remember what it was anymore. Since 'magic' usually comes back to bite me on the ass, I figured I had better tell you exactly what is going on in case I am not with the program by Wednesday.

**Drunken Blogger Alert**

I am such a shitty friend. I can't really get my act together good enough to comment much of anyplace. I have been able to fool my family fairly well, though. With clean laundry, yummy lunches, smiles and hugs... funny thing is... the smiles are not fake for my kids. I am delighted by their very existence. Mine is troubled, though. Ah, well... such is life, right?

I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know why I cannot turn off the shit in my head. I can't seem to resolve it or fix it or make peace with it... I want it gone. I guess that explains my little indulgence in the carpet-bombing effects of good beer, eh? I sincerely hope I will not have a hangover when I wake up. That would totally suck ass. Anyway... I'm not happy. But I guess anybody who reads here has already guessed that.

I don't know what I will do tomorrow. I can't seem to work through the problems that are pushing at me right now... and then there is the matter of the therapist. Tomorrow is our last appointment before he leaves for Hawaii. As much as I want him to go and relax and be free, I also need him. Jesus this guy travels a lot. A regular fucking globetrotter. Yeah, he knows I need him. Trouble is, I also need to protect myself. The Old Problem I had with the therapist, in which he rebuffed my desperate teenage girl... he did that while vacationing in Hawaii. I guess I am so fucking fucked up that he knew I needed help even though he had scheduled a vacation, so he told me to call him for appointments while he was away. It went quite poorly to say the very least. I don't know what I should do. I want to talk to him while he is away, but... it feels risky. I don't like that. I like to contain my risk taking to my trading accounts (and occasional beer blasts - all hail Ye Powerful Irish Liver and Kidneys - and hope they're as kick ass as they seem).

Oh, my dear Internet... I don't know what the hell to do. If I bring this up, will he say something dumb like, "You don't have to take care of me."? Will I say something dumb like, "Well it seems that someone should have when we had Our Old Problem."? Yeah. Maybe I should have just known that it might be inappropriate to expect to be able to really talk to him while he was vacationing. Maybe I should have anticipated that I could get hurt depending on a situation like that one. Well for cripes sake I had no idea that was going to happen. Now I know it could. I feel that I need him, and I also feel the need to protect myself. But I don't want to hurt him. He is being very sweet about this. But he was sweet about it last time, too. Until I was scared and needy during that appointment while he was on vacation.

Voice number one - "Aw, come on. Have a heart. You know how much he regrets having hurt you. He hasn't done that again. Don't try to shut everything down now. That's not good. You need help and you know it."

Voice number two - "Who, me? You want I should set myself up to be trampled? Ha! I think not. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me. Besides, there's no way in hell I'm going to pay actual money to walk on eggshells on the goddamn telephone. Fuck that. That's stoopid. I'll figure out a way not to hurt him over it, but I'm sure as fuck not going to hurt me over it, either. Sorry, baby. That ship's done sailed. Bon voyage, ship of fools!"

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