“ Are we there yet-the planet from which you came?” I asked.

“No.We have almost a month of travel-four seven days in my ship before we arrive in the Sol System

and the planet is called Terra.I was born on it,but,I don’t come from there.

I was one of a hundard embryos

that were sent to Terrra from Cygnus Three to be allotted to a couple

,emplanted in the female partners womb and born to be raised by duty parents-to vary the genetic population

of Terrra-you don’t understand,do you? Never mind,lets just say I was born on Terrra,but,not of Terran stock and leave it at that!” she explained,then sighed when she saw my look of bewilderment at her words.

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I can tell my family is having trouble pretending to be at ease with the boyfriend I brought home for dinner. Although they're not crazy about me being gay, it isn't the fact that Steve is a guy that bothers them. It's the fact that he is, in fact, Death.

My sister won't stop staring. I give her a warning look, but she doesn't notice.

"So, how come you don't look like... yunno...?"

I know what she's thinking. She had expected a skeletal creature in dark robes carrying around a scythe, but Steve looks like any other guy. She's always been preoccupied with crass stereotypes, which is a polite way of saying she's kind of racist. I know Steve isn't easily offended, but I'm piqued on his behalf.

"God, Jenny, how can you be so ignorant?"

Steve smiles patiently. "It's okay. I'm supposed to look like a regular guy. I couldn't get anything done otherwise, you know what I mean?"

Jenny almost smiles. "Like when actresses wear big, floppy hats and giant sunglasses so they can go out shopping without being harassed."

"If it helps."

Steve makes eye contact with me for a moment, and I smirk, knowing he's finding her insipid but doesn't mind playing along to placate my family.

"Would you like some more bread, Steven?" asks my mother, ever the committed hostess.

"Thank you, I'm fine, Mrs. Prendergast. Everything is delicious, by the way."

Mom smiles stiffly. Usually she would say, "Please, call me Gail," but she doesn't want to get too familiar with Death.

Dad gets up to fetch himself a second beer from the fridge.

"So, how do you, like... do it?" Jenny asks.

There are several awkward exchanges of glances around the table before Jenny blushes and bursts into giggles, covering her cheeks with her hands.

"I meant the death thing!" she says shrilly. "Not, like... 'It'."

"Jenny!" I snap. "Don't be rude. He might not want to talk about work at the dinner table."

Steve defuses the tension with another patient smile. "I don't mind too much. I just don't want to put anyone off their meals. I know not everyone feels comfortable talking about these things."

Mom and dad frown but say nothing. Jenny continues to stare, embodying the very definition of morbid fascination.

"It's only a touch," Steve says.

I have to hide how much it excites me when he talks this way. He's so blasé about it, his tone so soft.

"I know instinctively whose time it is to go, and I just have to touch them. Nature takes its course."

"Nature!" dad mutters.

Everyone looks at him. He scoffs and leans back in his chair.

"I don't know how you can do this kind of work in good conscience."

I stuff my mouth with spaghetti, stifling away the instinct to rush to Steve's rescue. He doesn't need me to defend him.

"I understand how you feel, Mr. Prendergast," Steve says, ever the gentleman. "I don't necessarily love what I do. Nonetheless, I perform a necessary function. I do what I am meant to do, and trust me, you do not want to live in a world without death. People who wish they could live forever fail to understand the true implications of eternity."

I reach beneath the table, giving his thigh a comforting squeeze. Steve is the only immortal being I've ever dated, and I know it can be a sensitive subject for him.

"There's no life without death, dad," I chime in. "You know... balance of the universe. Light and darkness. Yin and Yang. Life and death. They need each other in order to exist."

"Sounds like a lot of new age hippie-dippy crap to me. But, what do I know?"

Dad had spoken similarly when I'd first come out of the closet. As if being gay were some modern trend, and I was just trying to be edgy. I reflect his sour look back at him. "It's not 'new age'. It's been a universal truth as long as life has existed!"

"Brandon, don't argue with your father at the dinner table," mom says.

Everyone eats in silence for a few minutes.

"So, if it's touch," my sister continues, as if no time had passed since he'd answered her question, "how do you not kill people if you're like, shaking hands, or... uh... yunno, just... touching? Like, does it ever happen by accident?"

I notice the uncomfortable glance she gives me, and I turn to look at the clock on the wall, needing to focus on anything other than the concept of my little sister thinking of me having sex, or dying, or both.

Steve just smiles in his usual charmingly patient way. "There are no accidents with these things. At the heart of it, I'm merely an instrument, a personification of a natural function of the universe, like the wind, the tides, the phases of the moon. I cannot kill by accident, any more than I can choose to spare someone. While this power seems, in a literal sense, to be in my hands, in a much broader, more figurative sense, it's entirely out of my hands."

Jenny seems to be growing bored with his explanations, but I love the way Steve talks. He's so articulate, and so clever. I'm looking forward to this meal being over so I can drag him away and jump his bones.

"Anyone care for dessert?" mom asks once we've mostly cleaned our plates. "I don't have anything ready, but I could throw together a fruit salad."

"No need to fuss," says Steve, taking my hand beneath the table and squeezing. "I was planning to take this guy out for ice cream tonight."

Dad sighs and leaves the table without further comment. Mom says something vaguely polite and clears the table.

Steve drives us to my favourite ice cream place. We get a nice secluded parking spot behind the building and get a little handsy as we kiss.

"You're a saint to put up with all that," I assure him between deep, slow kisses. "It was like the world's most ignorant game of Twenty Questions."

"Come now," he chuckles, kissing my nose and squeezing my ass. "I've been around a while. I've seen everything. That was nothing."

He's so patient, so mellow. Immortal beings are totally my type.

We hold hands as we walk to the front door of the ice cream place. A guy standing outside smoking mutters something about faggots, and blows smoke at us. I cough. Steve pulls me close to his side in a protective gesture, but he gives the man a tranquil smile.

"Those things will kill you, my friend," Steve remarks, nodding at his cigarette.

My grin as we walk through the door is so wide I can feel my cheeks ache.

"MIKE!" Rosemary and Regan screamed for joy. "YOU'RE ALIVE!"

Mike fully woke from his sleep and looked around. This certainly wasn't his childhood bedroom or Oblivion that he dreamed. This wasn't any place inside the Archangel Citadel. He was in a hospital room, somewhere in Paradise. His armor was removed along with his shirt. No scars or marks were left on his bare body. The magic of the archangles worked a little too well.

Rosemary and Regan jumped onto their uncle's bed and hugged him. "OW!" Mike groaned as he felt their small knees ram his gut, where the wound would have been. It may have been healed but he could still feel some pain from it.

"Sorry," Regan said. "Did we hurt you?"

"No, it's fine." the archangel coughed. "This is a good kind of hurt." it still hurt but he gladly ignored it. The sight of his nieces were enough to ease the pain. Overjoyed he wrapped his arms around their bodies and hugged back. "Ha, it's good to see the both of you. How the heck did you get here?"

The door to his hospital room automatically slid open. "Mike!" Gabi entered the room followed by her fourth brother Uriel.

"Gabi! Uri!"

Gabi and Uri ran and hugged their oldest sibling around his neck. Once they let go, Gabi lightly rammed her fist into Mike's shoulder. "You jerk," she cursed. "You had us worried."

"Thank g-goodness your alright, Mike," Uri stammered with joy. "I came as soon as Gabi n-notified me."

"Oh that reminds me," Rosemary reached into her pockets and pulled out the disc that contain MARI inside. "You probably want this back, Uri. MARI was a big help."

"So you've already met, huh? Figured that's how you got in the citadel." Mike then said. "Guess that means we gotta change the security codes, again."

MARI's body took form on top of the disc. Her attention was directed at the bedded archangel. "Greetings, Michael Sunday, Archangel of Justice. The Champion and Savior of Paradise. The Slayer of the-"

"Nice to see you too, MARI," Mike interrupted. He cared not for any of the titles people have labeled him in the past.

"I am pleased to know your injuries are in full recovery. My apologies that I could not aid in your conflict with the fallen angel. I am not designated for combat protocols."

"Speaking of which, whatever happened to Abbodon?"

"Gone." the third-born sibling Raph entered the room. The Gravely sisters watched as the hulking man slowly approached Mike's bedside. Both sisters hopped off to give the third archangel room to speak with his sibling. "We never found her body. It's likely she survived this ordeal as well. We've managed to round up at least seven members. The rest are dead. This whole thing was a cluster-crap. Over forty casualties. Most were civilians. Plenty of property damage. And then there's you..."

Raph stood there, still scowling at his brother like earlier. He then leaned in and hugged around his brother's neck, much to the surprise of everyone. "We almost lost you, big brother." he whispered sorrowfully.

Mike was quiet. It had been a long time since his brother Raphael did that. He could only respond by patting his brother's back while he continued embracing him. "It takes a lot more to take us down."

Raph finally let go and grinned, another action that he rarely did. "Damn right."

"Swear!" the sound of Regan's voice made the Archangel of Virtue flinch.

Raph turned his head and noticed the two mortal children standing by. Both were staring at him with fear and awe. "What?!" the archangel growled.

"You're our uncle Raph, aren't you?" Regan asked him.

"It's Raphael. Don't call me any of that 'uncle' crap."

"Raph, play nice." Mike groaned, irritated once again by his brother's behavior.

"And I know exactly who you two are. You're Lu's brats, right?"

"Step-brats!" the eldest Gravely sassed back. "And yeah, you're definitely him."

"Lu said you're cranky a lot," Regan commented.

Rosemary's and Regan's eyes then directed at Raphael's left bionic arm. "Whoa!" Rosemary said. "Dude, you got a robot arm. That's so cool!"

Raph finally had enough. "Alright, let's finally address the two elephants in the room. What are these humans doing here? A better question: why are they still here? An even better question: how did they get here?"

"Calm down, bro," Gabriel tried to ease the tension. "It doesn't matter why or how. They're here. So just deal with it already."

"Well they can't stay here. They don't belong here. Get rid of them."

"Not until they've both received a full check out." everyone faced the doorway and noticed another angel enter Mike's hospital room. "It's company policy, of course." Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, Uriel, and MARI immediately recognized the strange woman that entered. Rosemary and Regan—on the other hand—gasped at the sight of the latest visitor. White coat, flawless golden skin, pinkish red long hair, lively pink eyes, and the most friendliest smile they met today. It was her. The doctor from earlier. "Nice to see you all here," Cassiel Odinseye greeted. "but I wished it was under better circumstances."

"Any excuse to see you is good for me, hon," Gabi said after she wrapped her arms around her girlfriend. The archangel then kissed Cassiel's cheek, which made the doctor giggle. "By the way, Cassiel, this is-"

"Rosemary and Regan... from Valhalla, right?" Cassiel winked at the mortals. "I think we've met already, haven't we?"

Both Rosemary and Regan blushed and smiled. They realized their lie from earlier did not fool her. Nevertheless, Cassiel was still happy to see both of them again and to see that they were safe.

"Were you briefed about them?" Mike asked his doctor.

"Gabi told me the whole story," she answered. "Every little detail."

"Can't keep anything from my girl," Gabi confessed, much to Raph's annoyance.

The angelic doctor pressed a series of buttons, which activated a holographic computer. She took a scan of Mike's chest and tapped on the transparent keys of her device. "You were extremely lucky, you know." Cassiel addressed. "That blade went right through you and the combined Healing Touch from the whole council was enough to repair your wound. There appears to be no signs of any internal damage. However I would recommend to the Council not to take that chance again. It was luck that your organs were not mish-mashed while they performed this procedure."

Mike chuckled. "Hopefully we won't have to. And as long as we're here, I would like to finish the trial."

"B-b-but Michael," Uriel muttered. "You're still healing. You can't possibly-"

"Hey if he wants to continue, I'm fine with that." Raph snapped at his younger sibling.

"Then allow me to interfere," Cassiel interjected them. "As you're doctor, I think it's best that you withhold any sort of trials until we know for sure you're 100% better."

"No. I'm fine," Mike said. His chest still ached from his vanished wound but he ignored it again. "We need to finish this now."

"You sure about this?" Gabi asked.

"Yeah, I'm sure. Gabi, Raph, inform the rest of the Council. We'll finish the trial here. Besides, I got two people they should meet in person. And can somebody please get me a shirt?"

#sinsofthefather #fiction #fantasy #comedy #horror #angels #heaven

Autumn morning glowed dimly over Brimstone as Rosemary and Regan walked together to their school. Their house wasn't too far. Only several blocks down the road of Milton Avenue. So it was safe for them to walk by themselves without the escort or supervisions of their parents. The day was good so far. Partly cloudy but still warm for the sun to shine on. Dressed in their light, wind jackets the Gravely sisters crossed the many streets hand in hand, carrying their backpacks along the way.

While they walked Rosemary stopped her little sister. Something moved by their feet. Another shadow. It didn't appear to belong to either of them. The sisters looked behind them yet nothing was there. Was that a friend that ran by, they wondered. Was that a neighbor? A biker or runner? A stranger, perhaps?

There was a sudden chill in the air. Their small bodies trembled from the cold; or perhaps fear swept through them. Cautiously the Gravely sisters continued walking at a much faster pace.

The girls noticed it again. It wriggled through the grass like a giant, flat worm. The shadow was following them. They hurried as fast as they could to get away from the stalking shadow, but it zipped by without them noticing. The girls haulted when the shadow moved in front of them.

Out popped a figure from the shadow's spot. The girls jumped and fell on their bottoms from at the sight of the ambusing figure. They fearfully shook and huddled together when they recognized the figure. Black hair, red suit, black suede shoes, pale skin, poiny goatee, and gleaming red eyes. It was their stepfather. It was the Devil, Lu.

Cornered and trapped, the Devil pulled out two lunchboxes behind his back and told them, "You girls forgot your lunches in the kitchen."

#sinsofthefather #fiction #comedy #fantasy #horror #devil

I spent a few evenings witnessing the comings and goings of night court and I smell a contridiction.

In a court of law, I hear judge after judge tell each defendant that, "ignorance of the law is no excuse". Citizens are required to know each and every law and stand ready to defend themselves against all charges, all without training.

In every class I have ever taught (high school, college, adult learning), the initial premise begins with the students knowing nothing. The onus of knowledge transfer falls solely upon the instructor. If the student will not learn, fails to learn, or fights against learning, I have to develop individual educational plans, attend professional development seminars, and create a syllabus that addresses the student's needs.

Permit me to recap.

In the court room, a defendant stands alone in front of the law, in front of people who are experts in the law. The defendant pays for their ignorance with fines and jail time should they not possess all prerequisite knowledge.

In the classroom, a student stands in the class in front of people who are experts in their subject. The student pays for their ignorance with review, extra instruction, sympathy, and empathy.

When I encounter an ignorant person, I do not fine or imprison them.

When I encounter an ignorant person, I cure them.

People pass by me all the time. They judge me right away. I see it in their fleeing eyes as they walk past me, their path curving slightly to the side, away from me, so they avoid getting too close, thinking maybe I would grab their ankle and burp out a dirty joke about banging in a staircase or munching their pubic hair. They think I don’t notice that deviation, that half arc detour around me. Maybe they don’t even notice it themselves, their body performing an unconscious, self-preservation automatism. They think I’m a drunk and an idiot and a loser. That I probably smell like old sweat and cheap wine, some of it probably regurgitated on my lavish, torn “S’life is good” printed t-shirt and forming a nasty patch of reddish puke. Why is “s’life good” anyway? Why is that spelled out on a t-shirt? They must wonder that too, those who risk a glance at me. Well, I never knew. Sorry to disappoint. This t-shirt doesn’t make any fucking sense. That’s why I love it so much. The walkers are right about some things though. I am a drunk and a loser, and I spend my days sitting on my steps, chain-smoking Viceroy’s, a bottle of tequila never too far, ready to serve, hidden behind my always opened apartment door on Gordon Street, Verdun. But I’m not an idiot. And I know how to watch. I see these people as they would never imagine someone could. If they possessed the ability to sit behind my eyes, at the wheel, driving my brain around, making sense of what my strangely wired optic nerves perceive… they would either go insane or become desperate, hardcore addicts tearing their eyes out begging for more. Maybe that’s what happened to me a long time ago. Both these things. But my vision is my main perk now, it had to become a perk, so that I wouldn’t die too fast and could learn to appreciate it for what it is. My ride to both heaven and hell, paved with colorful schematics of people’s core, their drive, the essence of what it means to feel. More than that, what it LOOKS like to feel. Anybody’s turning point can become my fantasy, my drive. My design, in whatever way I shape it inside my head. They paint it for me as I watch them, some of their vapor I could blissfully die for.

Not one colorful body passed by me today. Shame. Really boring. I know they often look the same: gray and bland and uniform. Static and unwavering. Of course, they feel. I can see fluctuations and small color variations, a narrow range of shades, usually. Shapes form and shift around their shells, but the movements remain inherently slow. Passionless. And it is passion that feeds me. Still, I need to stand watch, so I don’t miss a gem, a rarity, a being bright enough to allow my brain to rejoice and feast for days on the nebulous torments of its entrails. I’ve only seen a handful of these treasures in my life, each one of them transforming me, turning my brain into an ecstatic, overflowing jar of pleasure and pain, a sweet torment if I'm poetic. It'll all worth it, so damn worth it, and the booze helps. It fuels my gift, allows it to reach out much farther. Amplifies the shapes and the colors and the waves, makes them burst out in pulsing spirals of vivid emotions, stronger than the deadliest white waters and just as dreadfully beautiful. I know, it sounds like one of a drunkard’s many excuses to get high, but just watch me not give a shit about what the empty passersby think of it.

This morning I caught a glimpse of an attractive shape. He/she was walking on Wellington, too far to my right, not engaging in my little street. I was disappointed, but it still got me hung up for a good couple of hours as I tried to relive what I saw, piecing together my own personal imagery of that person’s emotional landscape. Usually, I can make out genders, but this one was undefinable. Or rather, it was in transit. Changing. The color turquoise, filling up the body like a life bar in a video game, covering more than two-thirds of the shell. Appeasement. He/she recently acquired a certain sense of security regarding their own future. But it still showed fragility, hiding beneath a constantly renewing will, an indispensable strength without which his / her whole sense of self would crash against walls of glass, cutting everything inside until only shreds of tissues and bloody strips of skin remained. I saw impatience, too. A mind starving for self-completion. It looked like a wavering whirlwind spinning around itself, its solid core hard as a diamond encased in a shell of sticky water, flowing in languid concentric circles, steadily picking up speed. I was comforted by that vision. I think everything will be alright for that person, given just a bit more time. I cannot say that for everybody, unfortunately.

I remember Crimson and Gemini. Whatever happened to them I’m dying to find out. I haven’t seen her in three weeks. She was coming out of Gemini’s apartment with the one I named Steady, her boiling insides flaring around her core, her raging heart’s arteries branching out to the rest of her body like an overloaded highway of exposed nerves, stripped bare and raw, desperate to connect to just about anything that could stick. That’s why I named her Crimson. She’s always burning, consumed by her thoughts, her feelings, her rage and her love. Always red as blood, fighting for and against both pleasure and pain. Maybe she’s not that different from me. That’s what I thought the first time I saw her. Maybe she will become me, eventually, when her insides finally melt.

Three weeks ago, she looked like the painting of a car crash a second away from happening, sketched by a bipolar precog doing his best to illustrate what the wreck could look like when the metal would stop shrieking, when the fire would burn out, charred carcasses frozen in grotesque postures and devoid of flesh the only traces of life remaining. But the crash hadn’t happened yet. It may never happen. But for the very first time in my life this day, I saw patterns and shapes reach out of someone’s shell. Her turmoil extended outside of her body, fumy volutes of red and orange vapors bursting out and floating around her like a coating made of helicoidal twirling flames, dying and getting reborn fractions of seconds away from each other in a fascinating dance of passion and fear, their colors and shapes entwined together like chromosomes.

I figured out what it meant then. Her turning point was nearing. No, more than that. She was standing on the edge, and it was all but a small matter of time before she jumped and either break all the bones in her body or conjure a cage able to contain the inferno that licked her balance away piece by piece. Insanity and destruction, or a temporary comfort paved with the illusion of stability, the howling dark never too far, prone to creep out of any road she would walk… I only needed to watch her internal makeup for a second to figure that out. The repeating nature of her emotions. But temporary relief is still a relief, right? A cage she could build, yes, a cage an intense enough fire could melt away, again.

When she left with Steady, her vaporous flames still reaching out to Gemini like a thousand ghostly arms clinging to the edge of a lifeboat in a vein but hopeful leap for solace, I realized that she wasn’t the only captivating one of the group. I got too busy with her to notice Gemini’s colors and shapes. He quickly went back inside his apartment, but I could still see inside him as he leaned against his door, both his minds telling him to take opposite actions. The dichotomy in him was brutally visible, two people in the same head, the border between them bright and sharp as a triple coated sushi knife. No blurriness whatsoever and clear as day, I could see that. He was something entirely new. They both were. Now, two gems in the same day, I oughta have been dreaming, or gotten way too high on tequila to make out reality from fantasy. That’s what I thought to myself then. The intensity of them would knock me out for days, but I didn’t care. I couldn’t pass that up, so I kept on watching, boozing up like a sink so I could better see and sniff and suck in every detail, every color, every shape of emotion they oozed out for me.

Without surprise Gemini’s colors were antithetic. Light green to the left, the darkest shade of blue to the right. A creature of extremes if I ever saw one. At this very moment, his twin minds were screaming at each other. The dark blue one won’t let him feel his own self. The other wanted to feel too much. I saw both heads biting the other off in what could only be a perpetual cycle of mutual destruction, opposite forces pushing and pulling on the same rope, each side never letting go, never granting the other a break. Gemini’s heads were eating each other as he slouched down against his door, pushing out of him one after the other, screaming, biting, dangerously stretching the boundaries of his shell like distorted clay demons throwing themselves against the membrane of the underworld, wailing for freedom in anger and agony. He’s not looking back at the one he just let go of. He probably still feels Crimson’s vapor, but the conquering part of him only wants to make it disappear. The defeated one desperately aches to inhale it until it fills every cell in his body.

I remember he made me want to smash my bottle of tequila on my own head. And on his. But I couldn’t blame him for whatever he was unable to let himself express. At that moment, I knew he had no choice but to force both his selves to feel nothing at all, using the best tool man has created for himself. The same tool I use, for a different purpose. I also knew he couldn’t tear himself apart forever, and one way or another, one of his heads will have to take control, for better or for worse. Right there and then, I saw the latter as a more probable outcome. He wasn’t on the turning point yet, then, but he was walking closer and closer towards his edge. I hope I see him again. And her. Reminiscing has made me sleepy, and I need to get back in while the memories of the one I baptized Swirl are still fresh on my mind. If I do it right, these will feed me for days.

They both walked out of his apartment around 11pm. I was still lurking about, waiting impatiently to get a better view of them and find out whether or not their colors had changed since that time two months ago. I hadn’t seen them get in, and I was only gone for five minutes. The timing sucked alright this evening. And apparently, not just for me, if I relied on what I was seeing in front of me then. Gemini looked calmer, and Crimson’s dense layout showed patches of light yellow overlaying her usual redness. I saw it then. He’s on the turning point too. I see something building up inside of him. A future. Something beautiful, I think, solid, able to resist Crimson's destructive fires, contain them and why not, tame them. The timing is not right yet though. Not quite. Just a little longer.

I see people on their turning point is part of my skill. The best part. I see conflict riddling their body and mind, erratic current and waves of dissonance crashing against each other to annihilation. Over and over and over again. It always looks different, but it always feels the same: brutal, beautiful, intoxicating. It can be horribly deformed and painful. It can be as gorgeous as the sky. Different brushes, different paintings, all of them cherished and etched forever inside of my relentlessly hungry brain.

I wonder if Crimson and Gemini will ever show their insides to each other. Even I can’t see that. Still, their passion has quenched my thirst.

Let me start by saying in the grand scheme of things, I was never that far gone, I can only discuss my experience, my perceptions and my conclusions from my own personal experiences. This doesn’t mean I have any answers for other people, and it doesn’t mean I pretend to know what my actions caused to my close family and friends. All I can do is give my thoughts, feelings and emotions on my experiences and people can take from that whatever they would like.

Pity Party

I have suffered from Anxiety and depression since I can remember, I was an anxious child and I was diagnosed with it when I was 17-18. It is quite a difficult thing for people to understand that have never experienced it, but surprisingly enough, it is the most on the rise issue with people in today’s society. I honestly think anti-depressants and anti-anxiety medications are given out far to freely as an easy fix, and although they assist they don’t give people the skills to deal with the problem, they just mask the symptoms of it.

I don’t know why I developed OCD when I wasn’t even old enough to know what it was, I remember checking under my bed, under the pink cloth over my side table and making sure my window was shut from before I even know how old I was when I did it. I remember an over whelming fear of death when I was too young to even comprehend what the cycle of life was all about. I used to lay in bed as a child and when trying to sleep I would get this intense feeling of nothingness that I still get to this day sometimes but now I know what it is, that would be my first experience of what I now know is a form of a panic attack and anxiety. I would be interested to know what would cause this reaction in a child, but with the hindsight that I now have I can look back over my life and recognise these types of symptoms from a really early age and notice that perhaps anxiety and depression can be ingrained into a person from a young age. Interestingly enough, I don’t have a lot of childhood memories aside from anxious times, my first memory is of a nightmare I had when my parents were in South Korea when I was approx. 5.

Hindsight is a funny thing now that I have hit rock bottom and come back from it and got the help I have probably needed for quite some time.

Do I think that medication for people with my form of anxiety and depression should be given out at the first signs of issues…… no. I think had I have had the education on the actual ‘disease’ at the time it would have made a huge difference to my life dealing with my anxious and depressed tendencies.

The problem with anxiety is that you will go to the doctor not feeling right, or when panic attacks start and they will give you medication. What they should do is educate the person on what causes their anxiety, what makes it progressively worse, strategies to manage it and then medicate. Medication has its place, but not until you understand what is happening to you.

Instead when I requested to go off medication I was sent to a councillor, which was helpful, but it still didn’t give me any understanding. It first taught me how to manage the particular type of panic attack I was experiencing. And this in turn stopped the panic attacks, because the shear fact I knew what to do when I started having them makes this issue halve.

For me, education on anything that is an issue for me, makes it easier to deal with. With a breakdown comes a solution, in the form of a 10 week anxiety course that would teach you enough about anxiety that I could educate others. The first thing I learnt in this course was that I by no means had a bad case of anxiety, not to compare is a good thing for anxious people, but mine wasn’t debilitating, I could function normally when I wasn’t trying to self-medicate it. Some people don’t have that luxury and that becomes a whole separate issue.

Comparison

It is difficult when you seek treatment for any sort of mental illness not to compare yourself with other people who are also seeking treatment. First you feel a sense of guilt “what do I have to complain about?” “These people actually have real problems!”, you question why you are the way you are with none of the tragedy that other people have had. Then at first you want answers, you want to know, I haven’t had traumatic events in my life, why can’t I deal with my emotions like a “normal person”.

That is what it comes down to, my anxiety worsens when I don’t deal with my emotions. When I don’t talk to anyone, when I don’t express myself, and when I make assumptions about how others are feeling about me.

I may not have had any real tragedy in my life, beyond the normal struggles and being human, money, relationships and general life. It is the way that I have always dealt with them that was the issue. I don’t like talking about myself, I don’t like expressing when I feel bad and I don’t like confrontations in relation to myself. I’m the one at dinner that listens to everyone else and doesn’t mention myself unless asked. I’ll answer questions vaguely

On the flip side, the interesting thing is, I don’t mind confrontation in relation to anything I believe in, or my morals and certainly if I need to go to bat for anyone I love. But when it comes to confrontation in relation to myself or my feelings I used to shut down. Someone hurt me to the point that I didn’t know how to process it I would cut them out of my life completely “they are dead to me”. I think this is the way I dealt with my betrayal or hurt. It only happened a couple of times but it was when I genuinely felt betrayed and hurt and that someone had broken my trust so badly that I didn’t know how to process that sort of emotion without spiralling into a depression. I didn’t want to talk about it, I didn’t want to discuss it, I was mad, I was angry, I was hurt and that was it. Rather than deal with it in any way, I didn’t deal with it at all. I believed that worked for me, in hindsight again, I was setting myself up for a massive fall. It took years but eventually my burying any feelings or any shared emotion, my avoiding being hurt resulted in years of pent up anger and distrust and depression coming down on me like there was no tomorrow. It was like, the only way I can describe it is that I felt like I had been wound so tight for so long that once that string started to fray with the slightest part of vulnerability I unravelled faster than I ever expected.

Avoidance

Writing this experience and what I want to put down and now being educated I am a little all over the place, now that I sit back with a clear mind and actually think about things, it is probably a lot easier for me to see where my mental state went haywire and possible reasons why. As I say I am no psychologist, all I can say is what I went through and why I think I dealt with things in the way that I did.

I have been questioning why now, why did I decide subconsciously at least to unravel at this time. I guess in the last three years I have had a lot of changes in my life. I have never really dealt with change well in general, so I’m not sure why I am surprised with the events that occurred. Since I was a teenager I have been determined to never be hurt, this stems from being hurt as a teenager I suppose. Everything is amplified when you are 15 or 16 and think you have such adult feelings. I do remember the hurt, which wasn’t fun and probably set me up for the next ten years of my life with any type of relationship. At the time I felt betrayed, hurt and angry and I vowed to my little teenage self that I would never ever let anyone make me feel that way again. A little dramatic but if we haven’t realised at this point that emotions seem to be amplified in my brain, then at the time I thought my world was crumbling around me. I don’t recall discussing this with anyone, I may have but I just remember feeling a determination to never let anyone get close enough to be able to do that to me again. I suppose that is when I decided that I didn’t want to be vulnerable to anyone, I didn’t want anyone to see any cracks and I didn’t want anyone to be able to get to me. I didn’t want anyone to defeat me and to make that happen I stopped letting people in. I stopped showing vulnerability because I believed at the time this would prevent me getting hurt. And that’s how I lived in relation to others, I had my close friends who if I did want to talk was always there for me, but I had no interest in letting anyone new in. Or even opening up to them or my family in the way that I probably should at times.

I had a string of one night stands, never a real relationship, I would pretend that is how I liked it, when really the one thing I now think I was craving was some form of intimacy. The problem was by the time I was 21 I had ingrained the don’t let anyone in phase so well in my mind, that when I wanted to let people in, I didn’t know how. Then I found a way…… inhibitions are always lost with alcohol.

My relationship with alcohol

I’ve never had a particularly great relationship with alcohol. First it was fun, the normal teenage stuff, then it was going out and having nights at clubs and pubs and social events. All fairly innocent stuff really, did I probably always drink to get drunk….. yes. But who doesn’t when they are 18.

My unhealthy stage came probably when I realised that I could use it help me sleep and manage my OCD.

I had always had problems sleeping, just one of those people that went to bed and couldn’t switch my mind off from thinking, catastrophe situations, worrying about people, about life, about death, about things that are out of my control but seemed to want to haunt me as soon as I crawled between the covers. Things that would seem so petty during daylight hours, seemed like such big things when the lights were out. Even as a child I had never been a great sleeper but as I got older I suppose the need for sleep was greater. I needed to get up for work, or I was tired and please let me sleep. Which after the anxiety education only makes things worse, one of the best pieces of advice I got in relation to sleep is don’t go to bed to fall asleep, just go to bed. Going to bed saying I need to sleep, I need to get up in X amount of hours, makes everything ten times worse, when I started going bed to just relax and read, or be on my phone and once I was tired turned off the light or did some relaxation, my sleep got 100% better. As soon as the pressure to want to be asleep is removed for someone in my situation, the want to sleep sets in. To be told relaxing in bed is just as beneficial to the body as physically sleeping, something in my mind switched and I realised my want to sleep outweighed my need and I was preventing sleep when pressuring myself to sleep. Ironic really.

But that is beside the point, at the time with both the lack of ability to sleep, plus the added pressure of my OCD, whereby it would take me 30 minutes to actually get to bed, I wanted a quick fix.

An example of nightly routine for OCD during the peak of it, check windows, turn off power points, toilet, brush teeth 3 times, mouth wash 3 times, check door 12 times, check oven and grill, make sure correct doors were unlocked, open wardrobes to make sure nothing inside, check under bed, strip bed to check for spiders, scan entire walls for any spiders and then turn the light out. If this was interrupted I had to start again, if I was having a particularly anxious night I would need to do certain parts of it multiple times more, and sometimes things would slowly add to it.

This sort of routine sucks the life out of you, then by the time you finally get to bed and you want to sleep and you can’t. The hardest thing to deal with for me and the OCD is I knew how ridiculous it was, I knew that the world wouldn’t end if I didn’t do it, but if I didn’t do it I was anxious and I couldn’t settle until it was done so it was ultimately easier just to do it. It’s a difficult thing to describe, its unsettling, restless, no sense of ease, the easiest thing I can liken it to is when you have restless legs. In that you don’t want to move your legs but you have the over whelming urge to for no reason. This is what would happen when I didn’t do my OCD routine, and it got to the point where it was just easier to do it, or it would just make everything worse. Alternatively, I found another option to when I just couldn’t be bothered, or just wanted to sleep, or everything just got too much.

Alcohol, if I drank my OCD stopped and my inability to sleep disappeared, so when I was just sick of it all and still not understanding any strategies to help with it, and instead being offered medication or put up with it, I found something that worked.

Starting out and for years I drank to sleep, or I drank to unwind, or I drank to go to bed without having to spend half the night checking things. Some nights I just wanted to have a break, I wanted to be one of those people who just went to bed and went to sleep, not someone who stayed up later than they should just because they literally couldn’t be bothered going to bed because the process was just to exhausting, and not in a way that would help sleep anyway.

The drinking never really became an issue until I would be going through some emotional issues or some depression and then it would get a little worse, and then it would be ok, it probably spiralled up and down for some years. But to the point where I somehow mentally associated alcohol not as a means of relations or a means of social fun, but more of a means to deal with a mental issue. The first mental issue it helped with was OCD and sleep, then depression and my now inability to express my emotions and not letting anyone in to the little fortress I had built for myself. That in hindsight wasn’t a fortress at all, it was just a really lonely place to be.

Diagnosis

I was diagnosed with self-medication, not alcohol dependency, which I think is predominately correct. Although at the point of stopping I don’t think I would have been able to do it on my own, every time I tried I felt nauseous and did feel the effects of withdrawal.

The only way that I can explain the difference between my relationship with alcohol and perhaps other people’s relationship with it, is the reasons for drinking. I wasn’t drinking to relax or be social, I was on occasion but ultimately my reasons were unhealthy, I was drinking to avoid, or stop feelings, or sleep, or dull emotions I didn’t want to deal with, or because I was mad and didn’t want to talk. But I also think sometimes I used it because I wanted to talk and I didn’t know how, and that is where another facet of it came into things. It enabled me to be open, it enabled me to express myself, even if sometimes in an unhealthy way, or an over exaggerated way, I just wanted to express myself and my feelings so bad sometimes that I would drink in the belief that I could do it that way. Because a few drinks down and I am a lot more comfortable discussing issues and it is why at some points and towards the end of my drinking when I did drink I was getting so angry, I was getting so emotional. I think I was using it as a way to want to express myself, but once I got the alcohol into me I didn’t know how to control the pent up emotions that I hadn’t been dealing with whether they were small and petty or not, I would get to the point where I wanted to explode, and I wanted so badly to talk but didn’t know how to. I didn’t feel like I had the ability to for whatever reason and if I drank I could.

Initially this tactic probably worked, have a few drinks and everyone sees I’m more chatty and open. But when you get to the point where after years and years of refusing to feel vulnerable and starting to feel so vulnerable with the combination of years of using alcohol to fix things, and using it when you have needed to talk or cry, a pattern starts to emerge.

It wasn’t so bad when I was by myself, as I would just have my Friday drinks and head to bed, everything started to change when I started to date, I started to have relationships, and my cosy little world I had built started to change, but my way of dealing with things didn’t.

Change

I think that the big issues came for me when I moved in with my partner. Not because I wasn’t happy, just simply that everything changed and that although at the time I thought I was good, I thought I was dealing with everything well and my OCD even got 60% better, my mental state probably suffered.

Saying that makes it sound like I was unhappy and that couldn’t be further from the truth. I was scared. Really scared.

I had met someone who I loved, and I don’t think I had ever genuinely loved anyone before. And with love comes vulnerability and I think this is the feeling I couldn’t pin point at the time but thinking about everything that was probably the start.

I went from being myself, my happy little bubble, seeing **** a few times a week and having my own routine that I have had for 10 years, I thought I was going in leaps and bounds with my relationship, and I was genuinely happy. Then he asked me to move in, and perhaps it was a little early for us but the opportunity came up and I was far too old to be living in my parents flat so it was a great opportunity.

What I didn’t realise at the time was what would come next, and I didn’t realise it when it was happening, I only recently realised what sparked the whole entire downhill spiral.

I was always pretty open with Brad, more than I probably ever have been, but not when it came to my past, not in relation to not letting people in and not in relation to giving up my vulnerability. And he was very much the same which was perfect. We knew each other’s routines we knew so much about each other, but until we moved in we never really knew a lot of personal stuff about each other. And this is probably what I began to struggle with.

I went from being at home, cooking when I wanted, parents looking after me, money to waste, to paying rent, living with someone other than family, let alone a partner, cooking, cleaning, washing, and ultimately trying to be the Martha Stewart I for some reason believed I should be. I don’t know why I thought that, **** certainly didn’t think it, but I never asked him, I just assumed that this is the role I should be doing. I essentially got married, over night and I was by no means ready for that.

I wasn’t ready emotionally. I thought I had to be this perfect girlfriend, this perfect house keeper and this perfect perception of what I thought it should be. I wanted to be my mum, I thought that is what I should be. In hindsight I didn’t have to be anything, **** certainly didn’t expect it, but at the time I thought he did. I was putting so much pressure on myself to conform to all these 1950 ideals I had on myself that I completely lost the plot, and I lost myself. Then what is insane I see now, I started to resent him for it. I started to blame him for turning me into this person because in my mind I had made the assumptions that that is what he wanted me to be. He doesn’t care…… But being the way I had been for 10 years, I didn’t talk about it, I didn’t say, “can you cook tonight”, I didn’t bring any issues up, I just kept resenting all the changes I had made and felt like he had made none.

I sold most of my stuff to move in, I cut my money down to pay to move in, I did this, I did that, but what did he ever change. What I see now is it had nothing to do with ****, although granted he could communicate more, but how can I blame him for that when I didn’t do it. He would annoy me with the slightest things and I wouldn’t just go hang on, just back off, you are being annoying, leave me alone. I would just leave it; I would be so passive. Then I would let everything build up. When if I had have just said 2 words or anything and stood up for myself, and just stopped being so passive aggressive, they would be non-issues.

In my mind I was scared, I felt like I had sacrificed everything, that it was all about him, but I never told anyone, I never mentioned to anyone, I certainly never said anything to **** and when I eventually brought little things up over time after letting myself explode he would generally fix it. He hated to talk out issues but he does if I actually bring them up and not assume he won’t discuss anything.

The huge changes and my pre conceived ideas of what a “housewife” should be were about to set me up for a massive fall. And when his brother moved in is probably when I started to unravel a little. Because now I wasn’t just trying to be Martha Stewart I was stuck in the middle of a family that I didn’t know well and I just smiled and nodded, his mum came more often, his brother was always there, I was cooking for three and this is when the melt downs slowly started. And my fear, vulnerability, mental ideas and bottling everything up started toppling over. In hindsight through mostly no one’s fault but my own.

In thinking about it now, I believe that what happened was with selling everything, and with starting something new, rather than embrace in, mentally I felt like my whole identity was stripped away and I was struggling to be me. In all the changes instead of taking with me a sense of self, my sense of self was in my surrounding, in my routine, in my OCD and when I took away the surroundings and the belonging and even the OCD to some extent, I had nothing left. I didn’t know who I was anymore and I didn’t really know or understand my place. I knew I wanted to be with **** and I knew I wanted everything to work out, I loved him and I loved being with him, I couldn’t imagine being with anyone else. But I know longer knew me, I know longer knew who I was or who I wanted to be anymore, I didn’t know what I had gotten myself into and I was struggling to find my place. I stopped being me and tried to be who I thought I should be. There were still pieces of me, I still enjoyed life to some extent but I didn’t have an identity anymore, and the person I was trying to be and thought **** wanted me to be and probably who I wanted to be, wasn’t me. I lost myself completely. I wanted the happily ever after without the journey. That combination, plus anxiety and depression and no ability to express emotion to others, the pressure I put on myself, and no one actually realising anything was wrong because I was so good at hiding my feelings from other and putting on the happy face or overting other people’s attention elsewhere I was able to get away with it undetected. I think that is when it all went to shit. And with hindsight…. It was no one’s fault but my own. I now had so much to lose, and felt like there were no fall backs. I was lost and although I didn’t want to be any place than with ****, he was becoming the brunt of my resentment and it was all about it head downhill. I didn’t know any other way to deal with my feeling of isolation that I created only for myself, I was on a downhill course that was unavoidable.

The Clinic

After I admitted to having an issue, which I find funny as I sit writing this now, I think about if I would have had the opportunity for this help if I had not of started abusing alcohol like I did. I honestly don’t think I would have, so essentially I had to become an addict to get the help I needed with my anxiety and depression. Bit of a sad situation there really. What does that say about all the other people who don’t have access to this sort of help?

Luckily for me I have always had health cover and that was something that was great for me at this point. I was covered for the hospital stay. I guess most people would be concerned about going into this sort of facility, but by the time I had come out and said “I am not ok”, I already felt like a huge burden was taken off my shoulders and so the first time in a long time people were taking me seriously. I had a problem, and it wasn’t alcohol, that was what I used to deal with the issue that no one probably ever took as seriously as they should have.

I think when it comes to mental health a person really needs to have developed some sort of ailment to actually get the help they need. It shouldn’t be this way, I suppose it doesn’t help with people like me that I don’t like to talk about it, but at this point I had seen doctors, I had seen therapists, no one actually wanted to address any problems, no one wanted to bring anything to light. Even my family in some way would prefer to hear she is abusing alcohol, rather than she is mentally ill. Which brings me to my initial psychiatric evaluation, self-medicating anxiety and depression.

I didn’t fight going to “rehab”, which they don’t call it anymore, they call it a mental health facility or some rubbish, but let’s be fair you can call an apple anything you want but it’s still an apple. I was looking forward to it, I was exhausted from all the admissions and the pity party I was having for myself, and the lies and the worry that once I finally got it out there I was so relieved that I was literally exhausted. No one would leave me alone because of the cutting, so I was constantly with people and I genuinely just wanted to be alone, and I knew as soon as I got into that clinic I would get to be alone for the first time in a long time.

You see a doctor and you see a psychiatrist and obviously the first couple of days if you have been abusing anything you start detoxing. The first day detoxing my anxiety was through the roof, they take your blood pressure and heart rate a couple times a day, to check you levels of anxiety and at the same time question if any symptoms of detox, i.e. headings, nausea and for those worse than me some times hallucinations and vomiting. That first day my heart rate was through the roof, he took it with the computer and then he took it the old fashioned way because he thought the computer was broken. Needless to say I got my biggest dose of Valium that day, and I went back to my room and slept like a baby for 3 or 4 hours.

Detoxing isn’t fun, I only had a mild case with the nausea and shakes etc., my hardest day was probably the day before I went to the clinic because what my family and **** didn’t know was that I had already started detoxing and I felt awful, probably again why I wanted to go to the clinic, least then people told me what I was experiencing, I just thought I was dying!

Everything is searched when you go in, to make sure you don’t have drugs or alcohol or anything that you will hurt yourself with. I never really understood why anyone would bother going unless they actually wanted to get better, but what I came to realise was not everyone had a choice to be there. Which in its self is fairly pointless, because the one thing I definitely knew was that there is no way that I would have got help until I was actually ready to do it. It would just be pointless and a waste of a good spot for someone who actually wanted it. Although I do feel for people with the same issues that I experienced, who are wrongly diagnosed, or who are their own worst enemy, you need to support them, but they have to make the decision to get help. They need to say it is time. Otherwise you might as we bump your arse against the moon. It gets to the point that you are so lost, and tired, and shameful, yet admitting to all of the shame, and lies and being a mess just seems so much better than living through another day of the insanity.

The first day of my stay I just settled in, had a look around and just relaxed really, it was nice, a little daunting not knowing what I would find, but everyone seemed very friendly and being a private health facility it wasn’t as daunting as what I think a public system may be. I had my own little room and all meals were provided. The daily groups were not ‘compulsory’ but what’s the point if you’re not going to commit and it was encouraged for the benefit of the treatment it was important to go. Which I did. I took them all and didn’t miss one. I enjoyed them. I enjoyed the whole experience, I started to realise how lost I had been, and started to find myself again.

Being on my own and meeting new people for the first time in years and not only that but people who had problems just like I did. The sense of community. The support and companionship. I was happy there, which is a strange thing to say, I started writing again, I had time for myself, I didn’t have to worry about work, or life, I just got to think about me for the first time in a very long time, if ever. There was no judgement there, no one asked anything of you, if you needed something you could get it 24/7. It’s a strange feeling, particularly with someone with mild OCD, a complete feeling of safety I suppose. But at the same time gaining back my independence, I had never been alone, when I think about it I always had the option of being with people. I never lived alone, and I didn’t really enjoy staying by myself because of my OCD. But being in a secure environment, by myself, was new, it was exciting and strangely enough it felt like where I needed to be.

No sooner had I arrived I had to leave, and at first I was looking forward to it, but as the day got closer, the more apprehensive I became, I hadn’t been home since I left not even to visit which the nurse thought was strange. That really scared me.

I would recommend the clinic to anyone, the program is amazing and gives you everything you need. It is tough at first but once you get over the initial hurdles it becomes a safe place that you don’t really want to leave. Sometimes even these days when I am having an anxious moment I remember the nights I was in my room, just completely relaxed, writing in my journal, being nothing else but myself. Sleeping when I was tired, no responsibility, my only mission was to get myself better. This at the time is what I needed, but it also poses a problem I think for people and even myself when you leave.

Myself and the majority of the people in the clinic are there because they struggle to deal with their emotions or they self-medicate, or they are a risk to themselves or others. But the majority end up back there, they go multiple times, if not for the rest of their lives on and off. I don’t really have any desire to do that, because I would prefer to be mentally well than be dependent on being unwell. I was only there for 8 days but I certainly came to understand a little bit of the word “institutionalised”.

Institutionalised

My stay in comparison to anyone elses was small. I think it was probably one of the smallest stays they have had. I kept being asked, is this your first time? I kept thinking, yes, and it will be my last time.

When I was released from the centre it is very daunting going back to “real life”. Because “real life” was the problem to start with. You have just spent the good part of a fortnight being taken care of, all meals, making friends, in a sense in a reality that isn’t real at all. Which again is ironic considering the reality I had upon going in there was not a real sense of reality, yet the way they treat it isn’t really a true reflexion of reality either, in fact it’s the opposite, it is a safe place with no responsibility, it is for an anxious person with issues beyond mine probably more addictive than any substance they could take.

I noticed not only during my time at the clinic, and my time in my anxiety course that people became reliant on the program. For instance, when I came out everything wasn’t great to start with, it was a real struggle to go back to a life that was no different to what drove me in there to start with. I think people and the clinic probably underestimate that. It isn’t a quick fix. You come out to the same issues you struggled to deal with when you went in, it is just hoped that you have been able to gain the skills to deal with it better.

This is a really strange feeling, because you come home and everyone seems to expect everything to be ok, you have done your time, you have detoxed, you have your medication everything is changed for the good. Don’t get me wrong it is, and you have been relaxed and had your counselling, but it is very difficult to break a habit of how you have spent the last 10 years. There is no overnight cure and 8 days isn’t going to make everything better. It is certainly going to help, but it took me 10 years to become this version of myself, it isn’t going to take 8 days to undo it and just suddenly become my “best version of me” like Oprah would probably like to describe it.

You have everyone’s eyes on you, either waiting or expecting for you to suddenly have a drink or for you make this miraculous recovery. Then when you do make a mistake or you decide I need this out again, because that is how you have done it for so long. The human brain doesn’t just switch over like that. The pressure to succeed whether placed on yourself, or that others have placed on you is probably more annoying than it is helpful. Because everyone’s version of success is different. Everyone’s perception of recovery is different. For some people I was recovering from alcohol addiction, which I don’t think is the case, and maybe that is some denial on my part. I was recovering from using alcohol in an unhealthy way and inevitably becoming dependant on using that way to deal with it. Do I think that I am better off not drinking, yes, did I fall off the wagon a few times and disappoint everyone, yes? But then I realised, this is my recovery, and unfortunately I’m not perfect. I won’t change overnight, and feeling guilt for minor mishaps I wasn’t going to apologise for. The lying is what I would apologise for. If I hid anything sure. In the grand scheme of things, I had done really well, I chose not to go back into the clinic. Not because I didn’t want to, because I did want to, why wouldn’t I. Maybe on the occasions I did drink because subconsciously because the idea of it was so enticing. I do think I would have benefited had I have stayed a few days longer, but at the time they didn’t feel I needed to. But once you start going back you are setting yourself up, it is far too easy to get used to that place and that would make dealing with life out of the clinic a lot harder.

You have your hiccups in the road, but you need to take responsibility for your actions. I stopped being so passive and don’t bottle issues with ****. He is a sarcastic person and I was taking it personally, now I can give as good as I get. I don’t take everything so personally and I don’t allow him to be condescending the way he can be sometimes. I pull him up on it and he doesn’t realise he is doing it. This clinic is a great place, it was the best thing I ever did, but it is not the be all and end all. It is not the cure. It gives you the tools to be the cure. Learning how to use those tools isn’t easy, and when everyone thinks your all better, you have a turn. Mental Illness doesn’t have a quick fix. This is what people need to realise. Addiction is also a mental illness, along with anxiety and depression. A person can be given the tools to make themselves better, you help them deal with the symptoms, to understand their feelings better. But if I have had this since before I could understand what it is, what makes people think it will ever go away? It may lay dormant, I may be happy and content, but it will always be there. Why wouldn’t it be? I think realising that there is no cure, that there is only management and not letting it win, is one of the biggest steps. Accept it, make the changes, stop using it as an excuse, communicate, recognise the triggers and the symptoms and live.

No one likes a pity party…. There will be bad times …. but if you rely on outside sources to cure you, you will always be in the dark. Educate yourself, look within yourself. You can talk it out, you can get support, you can get therapy, but YOU are the only one who can make YOUR life better. The sooner you realise that the happier you and your anxiety will be. Because at the end of the day, what’s the worst that could happen? If it isn’t death, then is there really anything to worry about?

I was never really into the whole self-harm thing, at school there were a few little teenage things but I never really had the urge to do any. I have probably only had 2 stages of self-harm, the first was when I was 16 and was going through a bit of a troubled time. I have no idea where the idea came from but I wasn’t happy with myself, I was probably depressed and anxious and for some reason I decided to bruise my rib cage. I remember it, not so much doing it, I think at the time I just started hitting and didn’t stop until I was satisfied. It was the next day that I probably realised that I had probably done a little more damage than I had intended to. I remember because we had P.E at school and I couldn’t run or anything because my ribs were so bruised. I went to the bathroom to have a look at the damage and the bruising was fairly bad. But that is really the only time I ever recall doing it up until recently.

It really annoys me when people confuse cutting with other things. It isn’t an attention seeking thing, because I never wanted anyone to know. I didn’t want anyone to see it, and I certainly didn’t want to talk about it. It brings a certain shame because people don’t understand. It isn’t until you talk to someone else who has done it that someone actually gets it.

It also is in no way any attempt on a person’s life, I have never had suicidal tendencies. Probably because A) I’m scared of death, but also because I think it is one of the most selfish things to do. I don’t believe that life can ever really get so bad there is no way out. It may feel fairly shitty sometimes, but to kill yourself is a complete cop out. It makes all your loved ones wonder what they could have done and don’t even start me on anyone with children that do it.

So for me, cutting was never suicidal, it was never attention seeking, because to be honest I would prefer that no one had ever found out. It probably is however one of the hardest things to try and explain from my break down point of view, particularly from the perspective of other people. In my head I understand it, but it is very difficult to try and explain.

Doctors first ask if I was under the influence at the time of doing, and I was, but that wouldn’t have changed anything, probably just gave me the confidence to do it. I would have done it sober at that point and did.

I think for me it was about control. A lot of people say eating disorders are about control, you feel like your life is out of control and the only thing that you can control is food. So you do it in a way that is unhealthy just because you can. I think the cutting started when I felt like my life was so out of control and at the point I had shut down so much that I didn’t feel like I could feel anything. I felt so bad and mentally not with it and I didn’t know why. I didn’t know how you fix it and I didn’t understand why.

Cutting was a release. I knew why that hurt, I could physically see the outcome of that. I bled.

I was hurting anyway; my mental state was in such a place that I had no control but there was no physical sign of anything. If you fall over, or you hurt yourself you have a bruise or an injury, I felt severely injured, but I had nothing to show for it. It sounds strange writing it now, and it would read strangely to someone who has never had those feelings. People hated that a trivialised it when I first started doing it, but it really wasn’t a big deal for me.

The best way that I can describe the feeling is that in a world that seems to be crumbling and getting to the point where you are so over it that you just want to feel a pain that you understand, instead of constant pain that you can’t explain, it is the ultimate release. The human body is a funny thing I suppose, when you do hurt yourself your body turns into a fighting machine, it heals itself, it releases emotions, endorphins and adrenaline because of the “fight or flight” mode. So for someone that is experiencing mental issues, like I was at that point, my body wasn’t doing me any favours, I wasn’t physically hurt so I wasn’t getting the kick. It wasn’t until I physically harmed myself that I felt that my body switched to this mode, even if just momentarily. I felt better for it. I could feel again. It was a rush I suppose.

Would I recommend it to someone having problems….? probably not, did help me at the time. Yes, it did. Not only did it make me feel better at the time, it ultimately led me to realise that I probably needed help. A 30-year-old hanging out giving herself multiple superficial cuts to make herself feel better, clearly isn’t someone of a sane state of mind. Maybe it was a cry for help, I honestly don’t know, I do know that is wasn’t an attention seeking thing, because I to this day would have preferred no one knew.

The thing I probably found most interesting is how flippant my therapist and doctor were about the whole thing. It is obviously a lot more common than many people realise. Which is sad really, what sort of day and age are we in that this is normality. What does that say about the way people are living and the pressures of everyday life. At what point did society become a place where people had to resort to self-harm to get through the day. When did we all start shutting down, internalising and putting so much pressure on ourselves to conform to what we perceive is what should be. Life really shouldn’t be so hard, and I guess I just wonder why we make it that way. At the end of the day we are alive, so aren’t we all winning? But on the flip side I suppose we get lost in what we should be doing, we should have money, work hard, be educated, buy houses, housework, cook, have children, maintain the “social norms”, I suppose when you’re doing that you lose living and just start being. Cutting makes you feel alive again.

I watch documentaries a fair bit, and I really enjoy the docos on tribes and isolated communities. Just living an honest life, poor as anything, I don’t want to be poor, but at the end of the day wouldn’t we all be a lot happier if we lived more simple lives. I think people have somehow lost the important things in life, to trying to make their life have some sort of meaning. You always hear people say “on your death bed you will never wish you had more money, or spent more time at work”.

Ultimately I have never really had any huge career ambitions, I never wanted to make work my life. I don’t think that is because I’m lazy, what I do do I do well. If you’re going to do something, don’t half arse it. But it’s never interested me, making huge money, going up the ranks, going to uni. I work to live; I don’t live to work. Never have and never want to. Is that smart? I don’t know…. I just wanted the family, in hindsight maybe I should have gone for the money, because as yet I haven’t got the family as I intended. I guess that is the interesting thing about life, you can set out to do anything you choose, but you can’t control what chooses you. Maybe everything does happen for a reason…. Maybe there is an entity up there that is having a good laugh at all of our expense. I think once you realise that you control your own destiny, you control how people treat you, you control how you treat people and you control your short comings and how you deal with them, you really don’t need to control cutting anymore.

Ultimately you control your mental state. Don’t allow your mental state to control you. This is a big lessen us crazy people need to learn. Don’t be a victim of ourselves. At the end of the day we all run out of people to blame, and when we have a long hard look in the mirror, we really have no one to blame but ourselves.

In such little time love can go from being a bright red heart shaped balloon, on a string floating by your side to a ball and chain around your ankle. From a valentines day card declaring love to a "Dear John" letter. Love can be fickle and fleeting or it can be strong and enduring. Like the weather love can be very changeable, from a cool refreshing breeze to a rapid devastating tornado ripping through your life. It can be the glue that keeps everything together, or the very thing to tear it all apart!

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