Warning: Rough Road Ahead

Things I Want 2. Love.

“If there is no love in the world, we will make a new world, and we will give it walls, and we will furnish it with soft, red interiors, from the inside out, and give it a knocker that resonates like a diamond falling to a jeweller’s felt so that we should never hear it. Love me, because love doesn’t exist, and I have tried everything that does.”
Jonathan Safran Foer

I cannot say for sure that I grew up without love but nor can I say I grew up with it. Love was an abstract concept in our house and I believe that I was taught from a young age that it didn’t exist; not in the romantic sense at least. Actually, not in any sense that was regularly expressed, I suppose…not according to the information contained in Emotion Regulation; Skills Training Manual for Treating Borderline Personality Disorder, Marsha M. Lineham below.

Love is one of the six core emotions and the Action Urges associated with love are supposed to keep us open, curious and active. Love Communicates to ourselves and others that we are valued and that our needs are being met. Love Motivates us to move towards people and maintain our relationships.

Prompting Events for Feeling Love include when a person gives you something you want, need, or desire, a person does things you want or need them to do, you spend a lot of time with a person, you share a special experience together and you have exceptionally good communication with them.

Interpretations That Prompt Feelings of Love are believing that a person loves, needs or appreciates you, thinking that a person is physically attractive, judging their personality as wonderful, pleasing, or fucking fantastic (ok, I made that one up), believing that a person can be counted on and will always be there for you.

Experiencing the Emotion of Love occurs when you are with someone or thinking about someone and you feel excited and full of energy, your heart rate increases, you feel and act self-confidently, you feel invulnerable, happy, joyful, exuberant, warm, trusting, secure, relaxed and calm. You want the best for a person, you want to give things to a person, you want to see and spend time with a person, you want physical closeness or sex.

Expressing and Acting on Love is demonstrated by saying I love you, expressing positive feelings towards a person, eye contact, mutual gaze, touching, petting, holding, hugging, cuddling, kissing, smiling, sharing time and experiences and doing things that the other person wants or needs.

After-effects of Love include only being able to see a person’s positive side, feeling forgetful or distracted, daydreaming, feeling openness and trust, remembering other times and people you have loved, remembering other people who have loved you and remembering and imagining other positive events.

I grew up with very little physical contact and I often wonder if this is why I crave it so much now. What I did grow up with was money. I don’t mean that we were rich…far from it, but my parents made sure our direct needs (not wants) were met. In my teen years, when we weren’t quite so poor anymore, I knew The Father loved me because he would buy me gifts. You know, like, A Pony. Or, a 16.3hh ex-racehorse on which I used to compete in equestrian eventing.

Several years ago, a friend bought me a book called The Five Love Languages. It’s too Christian-y for me in some aspects but the general concept, that people have different ways of expressing and understanding love hit a nerve and I learned that my way of understanding love is through physical contact and my way of expressing love is by giving gifts. This makes a lot of sense to me in the context of my childhood.

Although I feel capable of feeling love, I’ve never felt capable of feeling in love; not in the romantic story/movie sort of way…and yet I still wonder if it is real. Is it possible that Ryan Gosling and Rachel McAdams’ characters in The Notebook had some kind of weird connection that could be maintained for the length of their lives? Is it possible that real people can feel this way?

I don’t usually watch these types of movies because I find them completely irrational, illogical and emotional. Even romantic comedies typically bore the pants off me. I only watched this movie for Ryan Gosling’s beard. And yet.

…It left me with some sort of empty feeling. Like I was missing out on a great big adventure.

I love my friends. I know that. I love them and want the best for them even if it hurts me, and even if I’m incapable of expressing it to them.

But romantic love…trusting someone with everything…is such a foreign concept because my observations have only shown that you will be disappointed. You will be abandoned.

You. Will. Hurt.

Not just a little sting, or a pin-prick from a needle. Not a scratch or a bite or a cut or a slice.

A wide, open, infected wound; that will never heal even when it finally closes over. A wound that in all possibility, could, kill you.

Why would I expose myself to that?

Why would anyone expose themselves to that?

And yet they do. Day after day after day. Which means there must be some reward. There must be some benefit.

There must be something I’m missing.

Is it worth it, to be so vulnerable as to let someone else have that sort of power over you…?

It must be.

And…

So…

I think I want to find out.

(But I don’t)

I don’t know where or how to start…but I want to find out.

Things I Want 1. My Own Space.

The sunlight streamed into the glass-walled studio as she stretched into trikonasana, the warmth of the sun heating the room gently as she practiced. On one side of the studio, her sewing machine sat at an antique table, surrounded by swatches of fabric and sketches. On the other side, low shelves held books about art and architecture and on top of the shelves, paint brushes stood at the ready in old, empty glass pasta sauce jars. An easel sat with a half-finished painting in the corner.

This is the first part in a series about Things I Want. Because…if I don’t know where I’m going, any road will get me there. And…as it happens, I do actually, have an idea of Where I Want to Go and What I Want.

Contracts are about to be exchanged on the house I own with The Ex Husband; once the house is officially sold, the divorce will be finalised. It has taken longer to find a buyer than we’d have liked in the poor market conditions and I am hoping this sale actually goes through. We’ve had two previous offers fail due to the buyers’ inability to raise finance. It’s been such a long, drawn out process that I’ve felt for the longest time that I would never buy again.

However, with the imminent sale, the tight rental market and the still currently poor market conditions, it now seems possible that I could buy something where my mortgage repayments would be the equivalent of standard weekly rental and I’ve been thinking more about the sort of space I’d like to live in.

I suppose I’ve always had ideas about what I want, however deeply buried they may have been, and it’s only now that I’m looking for myself and not with a partner that I’m able to let those slowly rise to the surface and work their way from dreams towards possibilities.

I’ve never lived alone, you see. I moved from my family home into apartments with friends in North America, into flats with friends in Australia, into homes with the Husband, into Our Home. Only, it never actually felt like home. The decision to buy that house had been made by The Father and although I’d initially rejected it for a number of reasons, he had insisted. I will not make that mistake again. I will not buy something that does not feel right because someone else thinks it’s a good investment. It wasn’t. Not financially and certainly not for my mental health. When I moved out of there, I moved in with flatmates and now, unofficially (although legally) with The Boyfriend.

But I do want my own space.

I want to be able to repaint when I feel like it. I want to hang pictures without having to get the agent’s permission to put a hook in a wall. I want to have my cat without the concern that he’d need to stay hidden. I want to be able to write poetry on the walls and play Opera really loud.

I Want.

I want an inner-city terrace house by the beach, or at least within walking distance. I want a little farm-house on a few acres where the Dog can run around and chase the Horse. I want a fireplace. I want rambling gardens and a veggie patch. I want freshly brewed coffee in my kitchen in the mornings. I want light but I want to feel cozy and tucked up at night.

I Want.

I want room enough for friends to visit. I want solar power, grey water and a self-contained sewerage system. I want sand to be tracked into the hallway and a BBQ on the back patio. I want candles in corners and fairy lights scattered through trees. I want my piano and I want to be able to play it at 3am when I can’t sleep without having to worry that I will wake the neighbours.

I want to feel safe in my house and in my own skin.

I Want …to feel… Home.

PS – This point of this song is entirely unrelated to my post, but it’s Mumford and Sons and it’s called “Home”. So you’re stuck with it because I like it

I’ve Got More Qualities Than Guys Like

Reblogged from In A League of Her Own:

He’s looking for something in a girl. Some quality or qualities he has made up in his mind. (You name ‘em, guys!) He’s been searching so hard to find that girl with those qualities. He’s glad he’s found “those qualities” in you.  Problem is, he is only capable of seeing you for what he wants to see in you…oh! those qualities…those qualities he’s been searching and searching so desperately hard to find in a woman!! And he’s found them in you. My point is this, Readers: SO WHAT if he’s found “those …

Love is blind…until it’s not. I’ve got more qualities than guys like…or are able to handle. And that is fine by me!

High School

These guys are in high school. This makes me feel (really) old and reminds me that I’ve done nothing with my life worth mentioning…or at least nothing that I have wanted to do.

I suppose, all that means is…it’s time to start.

Time Out

I’m having a night off. I mean, technically I’m not, because I’ve written this…but my body and my mind are exhausted. I have been thinking a lot, and will be posting over the next few days about Things I Want.

Tonight though, I’m going to take some time out, have a scalding hot shower, wrap up in my fuzzy blue dressing gown, have a quiet cigarette and hopefully a long, unbroken sleep.

I’m feeling a little like this but I’ll be back soon.

Love.

Nat. xo.

Oh, and have this too…just because I love Sarah, and Outkast!

Losing Time and My Mind

I blacked out tonight; not as in passed out…just…lost time. I can’t remember the last time this happened although I do know it’s happened before. I think I lost about 10-15 minutes but I’m not really sure. It’s not a lot of time but it’s still enough to worry me.

Apparently I unpacked some groceries but I have absolutely no memory of this. All I know is that I came home with a bag containing a bottle of diet coke, some olive oil, six eggs, lettuce and some parmesan cheese and when I went back to the kitchen they’d been put away. I was home alone. I don’t know how long I was in the kitchen or how long I was not in the kitchen.

I wonder if this is an effect of the overwhelming emotions I’ve been experiencing and my attempt to deny or suppress what is going on. As a result, I’ve pulled out my homework on Emotion Regulation from the Skills Training Manual for Treating Borderline Personality Disorder by Marsha M. Lineham.

I am currently reviewing the Model for Describing Emotions which explains the process of an emotional experience:-

There is a Prompting Event which leads to your Interpretation of said event, causing neurochemical changes, facial and body changes (muscles, nerve signals, heart rate, temperature etc), sensing and, ultimately, an Action Urge. This may or may not lead to some sort of Action being taken, followed by the After-effects.  It is also possible that the after-effects then create a prompting event of their own, causing the cycle to start again.

Tonight, I am both Angry and Sad. I am not really sure which one came first; they seem to have been cycling all day which has been exhausting. I don’t know if they are both primary emotions, or if one was triggered by the after-effects of the other.

Anger: The Action Urge prompted by anger is to lash out or attack and communicates to others and ourselves that our needs are not being met or a desired goal is being thwarted. It can also communicate to others to respond to your needs either by ceasing unwanted behaviour or providing requested behaviour. It motivates us to act and to be assertive. Problems can arise in the way it is expressed or when others’ intent is misinterpreted.

Sadness: The Action Urge prompted by sadness is to close down and hide away and communicates to ourselves and others that something important has been lost. It communicates to others that you need help. Sadness motivates us to acknowledge the needs and losses in our life, to withdraw and nuture, and also may release endorphins through tears.

Prompting Events for Anger: may include being insulted, not having things turn out the way you expected, being threatened with or experiencing physical or emotional pain, or having an important/pleasurable activity interrupted, postponed or stopped.

Prompting Events for Sadness: may include not getting what you want and believe you need in life, losing a relationship, thinking about losses, being separated from someone you care about and value, being disapproved of or disliked, not being valued by people you care about or being powerless or helpless.

Experiencing the Emotion of Anger: might involve feeling incoherent, out of control, extremely emotional, tightness or rigidity in your body, anxiety, discomfort, feeling like you are going to explode, or teeth clamping together.

Experiencing the Emotion of Sadness: might involve feeling tired, low in energy, wanting to stay in bed all day, pain or hollowness in your chest, feeling empty, difficulty swallowing, breathlessness, crying or whimpering.

Expressing Anger: may happen by verbally attacking the cause of your anger, criticising, brooding or withdrawing from contact with others, frowning or not smiling, gritting teeth, or clenching hands or fists.

Expressing Sadness: may happen by frowning or not smiling, sitting or lying around or being inactive, a slumped or drooping posture, withdrawing from social contact, talking little or not at all, giving up and no longer trying to improve.

After-effects of Anger: include a narrowing of attention, ruminating about the situation making you angry, depersonalisation, dissociative experience, numbness, or intense shame.

After-effects of Sadness: include feeling irritable, touchy and grouchy, blaming or criticising yourself, appetite disturbance, indigestion, depersonalisation, dissociative experience, numbness, shock, anger or shame.

So what good are emotions? (I’ve been asking this for years!)
Emotions communicate to, and influence others. They also organise and motivate action by saving us time to act in important situations so that we don’t have to think everything through, and strong emotions can help us overcome obstacles. Emotions can also be self-validating by giving us information about a situation and signalling us that something is happening but when this is carried to the extreme, emotions may be treated as facts (e.g. if I feel incompetent, I am / If I get depressed when left alone, I shouldn’t be left alone / if I feel right about something, it is right etc.) Alternately, I am more likely to act in the opposite – discount emotions and analyse analyse analyse instead.

So why am I angry and sad? This morning I felt insulted by someone I really care about. I felt that I had not been understood, that information had not been relayed correctly, and as a result, I was losing a relationship. The part that hurt the most was when they said they did not care if they upset me or not which was followed by a “joke” about my feeling suicidal. I considered this person a friend, I’d like to still, but friends don’t intentionally hurt each other, or not care if they hurt someone, do they?

I initially wanted to lash out and be as hostile as I felt they were being and I thought about a number of awful things that I could do or say that might hurt them…but I didn’t (I don’t think) because they are too important to me. Instead, I shut down…I could not focus at work and spent a lot of time on the floor of the shower in the locker room…even to the point that I completely dissociated tonight for a period of time.

I know that I need to learn to accept these emotions as they come and to sit with them and understand how and why they are happening so that I can work through them. I know that it will hurt. I think I’m going to be ok with that.

I saw this on PostSecret tonight…

I know they said “hide”and that doesn’t mean they are jealous of people who don’t feel at all…but I think my issues stem from learning to “hide” my feelings from such a young age that now…I can’t even find them myself sometimes. I don’t want to not feel and I don’t want to hide. I am jealous of the other side…but I think I can learn.

I’m going to spend some time over the next few days thinking about the life that I actually want…like…if someone handed me a million dollars, say, what would I do with it? Where would I live, how would I work, who would be in my life…because I can’t just keep surviving…and if I don’t have a direction, I won’t go anywhere.

My Delirium

Late night waiting by the phone
Tonight waiting for an answer
Heartbeat drumming double time
I need one more chance to be near you

Still hanging on (for what)
Can’t operate (fired up)
I won’t eat and I won’t sleep for you yeah
No rest till I (get through)
Coz I’m holding out (for you)
Am I the only one who’s insane

Hey! You’re playing with my delirium
And the longer I wait the harder I’m gonna fall
Stop! playing with my delirium
Coz I’m outta my head and outta my self control

Still here in this quiet room
Deep in delusion sending me over
Outside watch the world go by
Inside time stands still as I wonder

Still hanging on (for what)
Can’t operate (fired up)
I won’t eat and I won’t sleep for you yeah
No rest till I (get through)
Coz I’m holding out (for you)
Am I the only one who’s insane

Hey! You’re playing with my delirium
And the longer I wait the harder I’m gonna fall
Stop playing with my delirium
Coz I’m outta my head and outta my self control

(I won’t eat and I won’t sleep for you yeah)

Hey! You’re playing with my delirium
And the longer I wait the harder I’m gonna fall
Stop playing with my delirium
Coz I’m outta my head and outta my self control
Hey! You’re playing with my delirium
And the longer I wait the harder I’m gonna fall
Stop playing with my delirium
Coz I’m outta my head and outta my self control

Sanity is Only the Madness of the Majority

Oh, how suddenly she slipped!
Look, how furiously she fell!
The whitewashed hum has become
An insistent, persistent bell.

Walking towards the end of the breakwater yesterday, I was unprepared as she approached from behind and grabbed at the hair that was swishing around my face in the heavy winds. Her dainty fingers stroked it away from my left ear and I felt her salty breath on my cheek as she leaned in, wrapped her arms around my chest in something resembling more of a choke than a hug and whispered I wonder what it would be like to drown?

She stood behind me stroking my face for a while, and together, as the sand spat and stung like a million tiny needles piercing my skin all at once, we watched the swell rise and fall while she kissed my ear with the prospect of how nice it would be never to be found.

I left the end of the breakwater soaking wet. I’d been toe to toe with the edge as waves rolled up and crashed over my head. Yesterday, she was just a whisper. Today, she’s pounding.

I have noticed the slide; the soft slopes slowly getting steeper under foot but I wasn’t prepared for the crash off the cliff that I experienced today.

It’s been a strange day. A strange 24 hours, really. I’ve had random song lyrics popping into my head, everything from Paul Simon…we work our jobs, collect our pay, believe we’re gliding down the highway, when in fact we’re slip slidin’ away, slip slidin’ away, slip slidin’ away, you know the nearer your destination, the more you’re slip sliding away…to Red Hot Chili Peppers…how long, how long will I slide, separate my side, I don’t, I don’t believe it’s bad, slit’n my throat, it’s all I ever had…but they have all had a similar theme. Or, at least, I have a way of translating these songs into the theme that’s in my head, which is…

I’m ready to leave. Now. I am. It’s quite a simple feeling.

But wait! Please. Don’t panic; I’m not going to kill myself despite my overactive imagination, fascination with blood, or desperate desire to no longer live. It’s just a feeling. It will pass. All I’m saying is, it’s strong right now; the strongest I’ve felt in about a year and I think this is important.

Surviving Anorexia talked a couple of months ago about this thing called Anniversary Phenomenon, where a particular time of year can be triggering because other things happened at the same time in previous years. Certain thoughts and feelings may surface around special, annual or seasonal times of the year because there is a connection with our past.

January has been, the past two years, a horrible time for me. I’d not thought about it much this year because I was feeling better, stronger, and happier. But now I’m not. And there are reasons and circumstances and feelings for that, but I think partly, my crash is connected to the time of year.

January is typically less stable for me; my boss is away for the entire month so I don’t have his grounding and understanding at work, I’m usually coming right off a period of heavy project work, meaning loads of overtime and possibly mild hypomania, it’s also the period of time where I was forced into treatment two years ago by a friend who suggested that if I didn’t go willingly, that there were other ways it could work.

All this means is that potentially, my wanting to do nothing but lie in bed and stare at the wall for the next three weeks may simply be a cyclical pattern that I need to break somehow. Perhaps this is also my body’s way of slowing me down naturally and bringing me back to some sense of balance and middle-ground. I just hope that I can stop the slide if it becomes too much.

Sometimes
We speak too soon
Where silence should have lingered longer

Sometimes
We withhold words
When something should have been said

Sometimes
We forget we are already dying
While we wait to live

The Hard Road

Sit. Smoke. Sit some more. Smoke even more. Too much.
Eat. Purge. Eat some more. Purge again. And again. And again.
Walk. Salt spray licks. Sand whips. Wind. Fall. Waves. Wet.

Soaked. Drenched. Smile. Salt. Sand. Smile. Walk. Stop.
Dog. Love. Walk. Cry. Run. Run. Run.
Eat. Purge. Purge. Eat. Purge. Again. Again.

Sleep.
Maybe.
Please. Sleep.