update

Doctor says I am a complex case, probably because of many traumatic (small 't') incidents in my past, including during infancy, which has shaped my emotional and physiological responses. Because talking is not helping - I am too emotionally clammed up, too repressive, and the probably traumatic memories are so far behind in my childhood (all conclusions mine) - we are launching me into EMDR. I bought a book and read about it. It simulates REM - rapid eye-movements - that occur during sleep, during which we retrieve and process information (hence dreams). During REM simulation, historical information that is wrongly processed causing my off-balance neurologic and thus my depression and panic disorder, can be re-engineered so that I can coax my brain into performing correctly. Sounds like psycho-babble, but those of you who read enough into psychological disorders will probably know what I mean.

Because of the skin rash I got from my mood-stabiliser I had been taken off from it, and went back in time. Depression is painful again and more so, sleep disturbed, appetite lost, energy even more far-gone, sadness a daily affair, and I hardly talk. I am now on an NaSSA alongside the 3-a-day SSRI I have been taking for more than a year now. I sleep better now. Hopefully my meds kick in soonish and I can progress in my EMDR therapy.

My dad wishes he has the money to send me for the magnetic version of ECT (article outdated) which currently is only approved in the US and some parts of Europe. It sounds less scary than therapy that would induce painful memories. But avoidance is part of the problem I guess, so I am bravely going into my second year of psychotherapy with hope that I will get better. Borrowed hope, in any case - from God himself, from J, from my mom and dad. It is far better for me to die, but for them, far better that I live and recover. So I am going on.

This is what my disordered panic feels like.


Struck unenergetic,
Frozen in malfunctioned
evolutionary instinct.

Adrenalin pumping -
ward against danger -
Heart-stoppingly so.

Proned, hushed,
Then perhaps - safety
or lack thereof maintains

gibberish

I am in an extremely warped plane of reality, as if I have phased out of this plane yet I am still here, a stone marker to the location of me. Reality is gibberish to me, and I zone out and distance myself from everything just so the gibberish quietens. I lose myself through living vicariously in-game, or else I lay back in silence, reading. In any way, I tune out from this world.


The world has let me down, of course. I have no energy, am often frozen in fear, each task a weight. I have no desires save lately for a cup of coffee affogato. I have no feelings, else I feel so immensely pained and saddened. My daily objective is to try and get better. It has been a long time, and I am still trying, trying to allay my symptoms, think introspectively, allow my feelings blah blah blah I am tired of trying not to be tired and depressed. I am toeing the line the tide makes that threatens to sweep me away.


Everything just converts to gibberish because everything is meaningless. The Bell Jar. Hshouyre wyouhnpods tyounlsoptn yuo wyour opf suihrh xxxxxxxxxxxx.


Is life so bad that I have to feel this sad, this scared? No, my brain is just malfunctioned. If I lived in the seventies, I would be given ECT straightaway, no questions asked. Instead, now I have to figure out the gibberish while tuning it out, the touchy-feely way. Go through it, get through it.


It has been a long time, I am tired.

(meanwhile)

My voice has gone.
The sky is total-black,
Starless, without hope.
Dreams are illusory
landmarks of a flat earth.

Everyday is a stride into
normalcy, for me an
endless recovery process.
Getting out of this paralysing
crevice of pain, pain, pain

Meanwhile gnawed away by
My Enemy, pain in its darkest

Ensuing pain. Pockets of light
Slightly but thankfully
alleviate. Hallelujah!
I subsist today and a
tomorrow (maybe).

Will you understand this
pain's grasp on me?
Or do you live idyllic
On a round earth
with mundane ambition.

My eyes are too dry
For welchschmertz,
My dreams I have left
(for now, save faith)
Meanwhile I just want

Release from this gripping pain.

reappearing

Ardent apologies for having dropped off the map of the blogosphere for a moment.

I have been immersed in a few things, mainly, the Wrath of the Lich King expansion. Gaming takes up most of our evenings now, although now that we are max-level and pretty decently-geared with items from end-game content, we are slowing down just a little bit.

I am currently reading the beautifully-written "The Years With Laura Diaz" by Carlos Fuentes. Its language is musical, beautiful, evocative; the story captivates. Before this I was reading Orhan Pamuk's Snow, which while cleverly written, is darkly lit with shootings and an ongoing battle between secularism and fundamentalist religion. A bit heavy, a bit too academic. Both books are in the strain of my style of reading, that is of stories of different cultures in different times.

My depression symptoms have become worse lately. Hard to believe it is so because I am here writing, talking about gaming and books. But in little pockets of time I become once again gripped by the pain and physical grief almost close to what I felt the beginning of this year. I have lost my appetite. It takes me excessive amounts of energy to do anything. My sleep had deteriorated. All these are possibly for a number of reasons: Firstly, I am no longer on mood-stabilisers - they started to give me rashes. Secondly, I am no longer employed by PLM in Batam for the moment because they are having financial difficulties: yet another career movement failure for me. Also, talk-therapy has reached a dead-end with me, because I am so unable to feel, so overly academic about my emotions, that talking is not working. I am starting a new type of therapy next month, and am now on an additional antidepressant at night to treat my sleeplessness and the works. In the meantime I am distant, unenergetic, hardly hungry, sleeping away my pain.

As I write this I feel a physical pain in my chest again, like that of my recurring panic attacks. Lately these pains in the chest come alone with shivering and unstoppable tears, and an intense, heartbreaking sadness. The moment I start to feel at all, as I now write this, the pain that I push away daily with sleep and recreation resurges. Some say, don't brood, don't think of depressing things. I do precisely that, and it becomes my downfall. My indifference like a breaking dam to a river overflooding in the rain, I unknowingly take the advice of ignorant people of the 'Don't think sad things' breed, ignoring the water that is pushing against me, until I have no choice but to flood in pain every so often.

Now I need to do something about this pain in my chest that writing these words have caused me. But I will write, still write. To quote Fuentes in Laura: "Look, Laura, you write alone, but you use something that belongs to everyone, language. The world lends you language, and you return it to the world."

recentries

Some changes to my life just so you don't need to wonder what I have been up to:

Batam gig is temporarily RIP because they have financial problems keeping me. I would be focusing on my completing my TESOL course till the end of the year while still keeping in view my opportunities there.

Which means, I have more time to play World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King expansion which was just in last Friday. J and I talk little else but about WoW now, unless we are not talking much, which is when we are playing side-by-side in my room. My room is now not a bedroom with computers but a LAN shop with a bed for occasional resting and a bathroom for occasional washing up.

I had a nice 29th birthday dinner today with my parents and J.

headache

Like a semi-permanent hair dye, only it doesn't cover grey but rather makes my face turn a tad greyer. I have a headache almost everyday for a week now, it follows me on and off during and in between my daily activities. I vaguely remember GPs like to call some headaches 'tension-headaches'; I also get headaches as a symptom of my gastric problems. For whatever reason, Panadol is the current available, and affordable, answer.

right

It is a recurring problem. Most people's efforts at trying to cheer up people suffering from depression, usually either not work, or make things worse. So, please stop. Until you understand what depression is about, really and truly. It is a medical condition which exists biologically in the brain, marked by chemical imbalances. It is not a moment of sadness when you fail your test / break up with your lover / your dog dies.

Telling us we are 'depressing' is not helping.

Asking us to do the usual cheery things - and firmly believing these will correct the brain dysfunction, sadly untrue - such as getting a pet, growing a garden, having reunions with friends, taking up a new hobby.

Your suggestions at cheery-uppiness may not be what makes sickness better.

You have failed. Try again.

Any wonder now why I keep some friends in close contact range and avoid others?

Then again, apart from flawed suggestions that make things worse, socialising does not make me happy. It in fact is an activity of great stress for me. Thinking of going to any place with a lot of people can generate a panic attack. (Last Saturday I had a major panic attack before going to church, to the point where I kept puking non-stop thereafter, and couldn't even get up to go have dinner with J's family). Ditto most other huge events. Being with the people I love the most in my life are already draining energy out of me like crazy, even though I love being with them. Having to oblige to spend time with people who I don't love as much will entirely exhaust and break me down.

This is also why I keep contact with only an intimate circle of friends I love. My lover, my closest friends, my parents, my gaming friends.

What will work: just accept that I will be like this for a while. If I could help it, I wouldn't choose to be sick now, would I? And if you care enough, please read up on the disease.

memories with strangers

"It's funny how you spend so much of your life with one person, and after a breakup the person becomes like a total stranger to you." This said by my favourite Jap boy Kamenashi Kazuya, on their band's talk show.

I totally agree with what he said. Sometimes it still feels strange that the special ones I connected with so deeply and exclusively once, giving my all, my love, are all now complete strangers. Be just months, or precious years. Sometimes I still have residual imaginary conversations with C, or L, or even H. Things I should have said, or conversations that might have taken place if it was still us. I remember what was endearing to me about them, and as memories, they still are. Their names are still silently on my lips. All the memories, in a permanent repository until finally forgotten.

It breaks my heart just imagining if J ever became a total stranger to me in the future. All the shared tears and laughter, tenderness and comfort, made with him, suddenly disconnected. I know it is not likely to happen, but visualising its possibility wears me down. So I shan't think it.

That's the problem with falling in love voraciously like I do. Too many memories with too many different people. I am not a big enough repository for all of them. I regret everything I ever did to hurt the men in my past, and I carry this guilt with me still and ever.

I hate birthdays. To me, they are cliched, pathetic attempts at being happy, but none of it is real. I thought about throwing my own 'Last of the Twenties' birthday party, seeing that I will only be turning twenty-nine once. But somehow the reverie that ought to come with celebrating seems to dissipate. I don't need an excuse to spend time with people I like to spend time with.

2 a.m.

Not sleeping yet.


Not that I am not tired - I am always tired - but that little pocket of time between lying down on the bed and actually falling asleep, is a tad scary. Scary because I am alone, unactivated, and it becomes awfully quiet. Suddenly I have to face my ever-present horrifying fears and pains, which I successfully keep at bay until this pocket of time occurs, by then which I have no choice. And so I look at falling asleep at night, with disdain.


Last week I had a panic attack during this pocket of time. Because I had no choice but to feel, a culmination of my lifetime's emotions came into one explosive grip of panic. I froze, my heart pounding, my hands and feet clenched, and barely breathing, I couldn't move. Which meant I couldn't get myself my medication. J was already long asleep next to me. But it was in the middle of the night, and he had to work the next day. If it was C, waking him would cause more anger and pain than any comfort or help elicited. But I had to remember this was even-tempered J, who told me time and again to call him for help whenever.


After what seemed like a whole rotation of thoughts on whether to wake J for help, I decided to, but I couldn't make a sound, nor move. I summoned up all my energy to speak; it came in a few laboured whispers which finally woke him.


"I am having a panic attack..."


Jolted by the emergency, he got up and said, "I'll get you your medicine." I swallowed my tablets whole, just on my saliva alone. Shushing me to sleep and soaking up my tears in his arms, I felt better eventually, and yes, I suppose I finally managed to fall asleep.


It's 2 a.m. now. Let's see how tonight goes.

bathrooms

Bathrooms are interesting places. Intimate, even, when you inspect a close one's bathroom to see what it's like. To know their habits: loo roll placed over or under the tube? What kind of toothpaste? Toothbrush overly worn and used, or an electric snazzy type? Does she shave or epilate or tweeze or wax or use hair-removal creams? Is she really into her hair (some bathrooms have a whole shelf rack of product meant only for hair)? Does he wash his face with a cleanser proper? And, when you open a bottle of shampoo that your lover uses, you realise, 'So this is why she smells so good.'

A guy I once knew noted that I was 'hygienic' (or similar word, cannot remember because it is years ago) because he noted my bottle of Vagisil. Feminine cleanser is interesting to talk about. Not every girl uses it (why?!) and those who do, seem to intrigue men, that we take care of our bits so delicately. I was amazed that, one day when J was clearing out my loot from my shopping bags that day, and automatically placed the newly-bought bottle of Vagisil in the bathroom where the old one used to be. 'How did you know this belongs here!' I gasped at him, shocked. He's a man! He is supposed to not know details! Men shower with a bar of soap, even for their bits! But, he knew. He said he knew that was what I used to wash myself. This guy amazes me with his attention to details about me.

I feel happy when I see a small collection of cleansers, soaps, shower gels, shampoos, dental care products, on my bathroom shelves. It feels so pampering to use Estee Lauder or similar to wash your face with. I am usually too lazy to condition my hair nowadays, but when I do, digging into my mini-tub of Pantene's hair mask feels luxurious when rubbed into my hair.

The presence of an extra toothbrush and shaver and a manly facial cleanser (Loreal) on the shelves also reminds me that I have a lover who spends a wonderful lot of time at my place. Looking at these things when I use the bathroom makes me think of him, whatever he may be doing outside the bathroom at the moment - gaming, sleeping, or et cetera manly activities.

Reading Prince Irwin's blog post on his bathroom made me pleasantly visualise what his bathroom is like. The products he uses, whether the toilet bowl is splattered with dried pee on the sides or whether it is spick-spankingly clean. (Sorry Irwin! Just wondering).

Most boys' bathrooms that I have visited are usually rather unsavoury, you see. Usually shared bathrooms, so the personality of the boy under inspection is really quite hard to tell from the bathroom. Shared bathrooms usually mean that the products used inside are often bought and replenished by the non-male users of the bathroom.

Do you also realise that everybody has different peeing rituals? A man friend of mine pees so softly, I wonder how he does it (sitting down?), even though I am right outside in the kitchen while he's in the bathroom. Some people wash their hands with the hand soap, others claim that a mere second spent under the tap means your hand (singular) is washed. I like to flush the loo with the seat cover down. I scrunch up my loo roll and use lots of it. And I buy three-ply embossed loo roll, nothing less will do.

And oh, reading material. C's bathroom had loads of in-loo reading material (mostly the sister's) and they ranged from Time to Reader's Digest. I love those loos with Archie's Comics! Ara has those in hers.

I trained J to conform to my bathroom-usage rules in my house. He already has some savoury habits, such as lifting up the seat before peeing. Actually that was his only good habit when he came. I have collected all the theorycraft of male toilet-usage rules and imbibed him with them. Wiping mis-cues off the bowl, wiping self so I don't have to wash pee-remnants off his boxers when I do the laundry, washing hands with soap etc. Sounds gross, but boys are hugely gross! They think they are clean when they actually aren't, most of the time!

Digressing from bathrooms there, apologies. But boys are really dirty, I sometimes wish I could date girls instead.

Shared girls' bathrooms are lovely. When I go on holiday with my best girlfriends Enid and Shuyi, we have a whole host of lovely cleansers, masks, perfumes, lotions, make-up etc etc that line our bathroom interior. It is just lovely lovely lovely. I feel so close to them when I know their favourite products.

Funny how I could actually write a whole post on just bathrooms. Inspired by Prince Irwin, really. And yes, I also scrimp on the toothpaste till I have no choice but to get a new one. Ditto the toilet paper.

What Your Cute Monster Says About You

You are a vibrant, vivacious person. When you live, you live as wildly and loudly as possible. You are very bold. You are willing to stand up and be a leader. Your inner demon is intensity. You have a tendency to let your passions take over. People think you're cute because you're fiery. When you get worked up, it's charming.

The Cute Monster Test

tuala artistik

So J brought back a grand bale of fresh green towels from his reservist training. To make them a little more feminine I decided to embroider some pastel flowers on them...

(Sorry I don't have a digi-cam, so these pics shall have to do):










Yes I actually have a sewing basket...













Close up of the flowers, pretty ain't it.












The towels are still too green IMO, as I have a colour scheme for the male-female towels in my bathroom. Mine are pinks, his are cool colours. This one shall be an anomaly.

Now what to do with the rest of the bale of SAF towels...

anhedonia:

loss of joy or interest in activities

I gain very little satisfaction from things I supposedly like to do. If I don't do them I will be extremely despondent, like my work, or my hobbies, or spending time with J. But doing them does not make me extremely satisfied either, in fact, I hardly feel anything near satisfaction, joy, or whatever those positive emotions one should gain from doing something enjoyable.

While I am able to draw enough energy to do some of these supposed interests sometimes, other times they are extremely arduous even though I am meant to like these activities.

Hence there is very little emotional motivation to do them again. Or at all.

But I do try anyway. Like we do the things we all have to do, such as washing ourselves and brushing our teeth.

Just imagine though, if the activities that are meant to bring you extreme pleasure, feel like the washing up after dinner or clearing the trash.

I always thought anhedonia simply meant the lack of energy to do things that one loves. But even when you're med-up and energetic enough to wash yourself sometimes, pleasure might still feel like a chore - you just are more able to carry it out.

And that includes my work in Batam. No matter how long I have been desiring such an opportunity, no matter how much I love doing something this meaningful. In out, no pleasure. But not doing this would kill me eventually so I have to do it eventually, just like we all have to go to the toilet everyday.

psychosmatic sleeplessness

I can't sleep because the upper right side of my back hurts when I lie down, either way. Even though I am exhausted and med-up. I also cannot help thinking too much when I lie down, of things exciting to come or of dreary trivia or of sweet things. I get worked up in my heart and mind and my body cannot rest as it should at this time of night. Yet I am really sleepy.

I have repeatedly rubbed my right shoulder and back with massage oil before bed but it is still there. Not a bruise, for it is uncoloured, not my lungs, for I am still breathing and regular breathing does not hurt it. Not a lump in my breast because I cannot detect any. This pain just remains, and hurts only when I sneeze, hiccup or lie down. If it is a muscular pain I have no idea how I strained it.

I read up on psychosomatic illnesses, and aches and pains are somewhat a symptom of depression. This sucks. I also hate the ever-present tiredness, and the fainting spells I get sometimes.

So many ailments I fear to resume my regular workouts, which strains on my physical stamina as a whole. I have to change tack, go swimming instead, with J. Out comes the anti-cellulite / firming gel I need to use to not cause disgust to the other pool-users when I disrobe.

I have always been sickly and I hate myself for that. For whatever I do it makes little difference to my health.

Later when I return to bed to once again try to sleep, the quiet will shrill itself into my head and keep me awake. That and all my thoughts. I just hope I don't wake J with my sleeplessness.

excerpts

Inspired by The Golden Notebook, and partly obliged to update worldsuponwords more often, here are recent slips of writing from my notebook dated since end September.



Nowadays I hate to dream. Most of my dreams are manifestations of crude non-reality. Irksome and disturbing. Sometimes I get meaning and ideas from my dreams, but not lately. When I am awake these dreams are even scarier, like hallucinations waiting to happen. I lie down, unasleep, and they happen. While I am wide awake.

---

"Ultimately, the bond of all companionship, whether in marriage or in friendship, is conversation."
Oscar Wilde.

---

Everyone has a string of failed loves in their lives. I'm glad to know I am not the only one, an anomaly in the human trend.

---

I find myself having a lack of expression: where description should form, I am vague. Momentous pleasures become plain. Poetry disappears. Street language suffices -- I feel like fuck, damn.

With a lack of expression writing becomes boring for my potential reader, therefore I ache when I write. I foresee what I write here will be boring to the end. How I wish I were a filmmaker, it would be easier to convey in the instant what I mean to express.

I think of constantly reading - and I try to improve my fluidity of word-expression. It hardly helps. I fanatically assume that the books I read will sublimate naturally into improved writing of my own.

A writer probably ought to be a far deeper examiner of what she reads - or experiences - than that. I skim through my reading the same way I skim through how I feel. For years I suffered the self-tyranny of repressing my emotions, allowing them little audience in my life. Thus I fall sick with depression.

Right now I realise this, and so constantly try to allow myself to feel. I ask myself, How do I feel? Oftentimes it is nothing, as I am not used to this exercise. But when I really try to release the stranglehold of my will upon my feelings, I realise the emotions I feel.

Like right now:

I feel anger, one that transcends into sadness. And then since holding on to these feelings is unfruitful, I try to let them go.

---

gloomy late afternoon

It seems like I am reveling in the quiet of the late afternoon rain outside, but in fact I am simply in a daze. The quiet makes me lonesome, yet I am unable to keep myself occupied to the point of distraction. Every task seems to require more energy than I can conjure up, even reading, which I cannot sustain for more than a page or two.

I see Slinky curled in her basket, and I microwave some cat food to feed and keep her warm. While waiting for her food to cool, she sits before her bowl, staring out the kitchen window looking at the rain fall.

I make some hot chocolate in a bid to keep myself occupied, and I try to wake J for some too, so I would no longer feel lonely, but he remains asleep.

There are so many things I could do: some form of work, exercise, shower, ironing, cleaning, watching a DVD. But I can't bring myself to do any of them, it is pointless and too much to surmount even as single tasks, even if as recreational activities. I could go back to sleep but even that feels painful.

The rain has stopped. Dinner time approaches and thus a sense of forced normalcy returns. I push the gloom back with a cigarette and hopefully, find some energy to wash myself before dinner.

books again!

A lot of you know I love collecting and reading books. Some of my most beloved books are outstation, meaning I have lent them out eagerly to friends, to share with them my loves. Sometimes I wonder if I should buy them again, to replace the books on my shelves, because it is hard to lend out books expecting they will eventually return.

This is a list of books that are currently outstation:

Rachel's Holiday by Marian Keyes
Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami
Shantaram by Gregory David Roberts
We Need To Talk About Kevin by Lionel Shriver
Bridget Jones' Diary by Helen Fielding
Prozac Nation by Elizabeth Wurtzel
Sputnik Sweetheart by Haruki Murakami
A Million Little Pieces by James Frey
Sons and Lovers by D H Lawrence

These books have been lent out because they are great enough to be shared, so much, that I often press books into the arms of guests at my flat. I know some will never return, and to have a piece of me in the lives of others who I might seldom, if ever, see again, it remains like a physical evidence of our lives being shared for a part. It comforts me that I will not totally be forgotten.

At present, I am actively reading Doris Lessing's The Golden Notebook, and Joyce Carol Oates' The Tattooed Girl.

I picked out Doris Lessing because this book of hers is award-winning, a must-read book of all times. I relate to it because her protagonist struggles with her intellectualism and her pro-communist affiliations. Her friend and her are also feminist, which makes it a trend before their time.

Joyce Carol Oates is a name I picked out on the back of another book I was reading, as she penned off one of those reviews other authors often do as part of the marketing of that book. The fact that we both at one time shared a common interest in the same book, endears me to her writing, that I believe I must also enjoy, since we both have something in common already.

Great way to find new authors to read, by the way: searching for names on reviews for the books you already like.

postmortem on second week of teaching

I'm back! As per my usual Batam-Singapore schedule, I spend Thursday night to Sunday at home in Singapore.

In Batam, I live in a house with my own room. Sparsely furnished with a mattress, a clothes stand, and a stool that makeshifts as a table. There are windows, and one ceiling light, and essentially needed air-conditioning. I have no internet, no TV, no refrigerator in the kitchen, and no hot water for showers. I live out of my backpack, with my things mostly on the floor (all over).

Spartan as it sounds, every time I reach my bed there on Monday night, I feel a peace and quiet as it were a sanatorium. There is nothing to do there in my room except read, work, drink coffee, smoke, write and sleep. It is all very peaceful.

Teaching in the school there is finally becoming easier. I am easing into their pace and standard. I pop some beta-blockers before I start my prep work and my teaching. The kids and the teachers are enjoying my lessons and my training respectively. Soon I will be teaching the Bible school students English too, and possibly pop by to the other centres on the other Indonesian islands for a visit some time soon, to see what else I can do.

The only thing hard about being there is being without J. I also fear that if I get a bout of serious depression or anxiety, no one there will know what to do. I am well and truly alone there. No internet means no Skype, and phone bills cost a bomb. SMS is cheaper on my Indonesian SIM card, but that means no J's voice, only his words. I am glad to come home to him every Thursday.

Today, I am going to do Singaporean things: shop, eat at nice cafes, drink coffee at Starbucks or similar, dress nicely (welcome home to sleeveless tops!), have dinner and drinks and nice restaurants and pubs with friends, and enjoy cool air-con wherever I go. Hurrah for Singapore! Now if only the streets would be less crowded...

real me

You can only be yourself up to the point where the real you will hurt someone you love. After that, grace and basic courtesy steps in to make sure the relationship remains civil and alive.

The real me however is an angry cat. I am perpetually angry and upset, but behavioural standards and societal obligation makes me a different person than who I really am. Between the real me and the civil me, is a great disparity.

This is partly why it is so tiring for me to have to talk to people. Whether I am a good conversationalist or not, whether I am able to communicate to people from all walks of life or not. I may be able to charm and flirt with anyone and everyone, but that is probably not really me. Apart from inherently depleted energy levels because I am sick, being with people is so extremely tiring.

That it stresses me out. The prospect of an evening obliged to be spent schmoozing with groups of people, even friends, stresses me out that much, I have a panic attack, and I blame myself for being weak like that, which of course only accelerates the anxiety.

I have tried so hard to be an efficient networker, charming acquaintance, loving friend and adoring lover, and succeeded in most places. But the reason behind my being so, is because no one will accept me for who I really am, which really is quite otherwise from the above. I have lived concealing my anger and hurt for twenty-over years that I am sick from it now, bursting at my seams, and now you know.

But yesterday J wrote me the sweetest note ever in my notebook:

Jian <3 Elaine for what she is and not what she is trying to be.
This is the reason why we got together.

restraint. resignation and formalities

Silent voices
in my head
Running in
all vectors.
Screams -
I can't let out
for too much
Restraint!


Eventually it all welled up in me, bounded by my restraint. Some time this week my pain let itself loose from within me and it hurt so much I started drinking from very early in the morning. After breakfast and meds I opened my bottle of scotch. It is sacrilege to mix single malt whiskey with anything other than ice or water but by lunchtime I had six glasses of Glenfiddich mixed with green tea to wash it all down. I just wanted to remove the pain so much. My body started to feel lighter from the tension I had been having since Monday's panic attack. I started dancing in my room to Giles Peterson, tossing my pain away. But it remained inside me, finally exploding from deep within the recesses of my soul in shouts and cries that I could no longer restrain. It hurt so much, so much, I took out my Swiss army knife and whipped out both the small and the big blades, and cut, cut, cut, to try and cut the pain out of my body. I never cut this hard before. I haven't screamed this much in a long while now.

Everyone keeps saying: two steps forward, one step back, but that is still progress. My steps forward are tiny. Like formalities I go through because I am obliged to try and recover. I cannot deny that I have a sense of resignation about this. Like Murakami says in his running journal: his body had reached a point where it became resigned to the weariness of the distance run, that each step forward and every swing of his arms became like formalities his body had to go through. That is me. In another analogy of taking steps, Dr. K said to me yesterday, 'Take small steps. Then when you feel comfortable with one step, move on to the next level of discomfort, try something else.' Sounds just like how Murakami trains for his marathons as a running novelist. But honestly, I feel that my depression-marathon may never end until I die. I will just keep going and on till then. Two steps forward, one step back.

This week is a series of related step-backs. I am thankful for Fluanxol (my short-term, tide-over medication), so that I can stop stepping back so much and hurting everyone around me. My body is tied to a buoy and a weight at the same time, this way I can continue showering myself, talking, eating, and do some non-strenuous hobbies, even though my depression is mightily weighty, seeping out of me like the blood from my cuts. (This is how resignation speaks for itself.)

I am thankful for J who is now asleep after a hard week of work and dealing with my crises. I was about to turn in tonight too, after reading. But I just felt like writing. Granted, I don't have much material to write about, save myself. Even with this limited material I still fill notebooks at the rate of about one in three weeks. I don't know why I have so much to write about.

If I really wanted to do my formalities justice, I should write about that one fact that my doctor keeps asking me to confront. As I open a new notebook, maybe tonight I finally shall be able to face this ghost of my life proper, resigned or not.

voice

On Monday morning while I was preparing for my Tuesday classes before I had to leave for Batam that night, I had a major panic attack. It was catastrophic because my anxiety ended up lasting pretty much for two days or more. When it happened I tried not to hyperventilate, lest I faint, by doing some Mona-style deep breathing. I called J, who asked me to rest and not think about Batam for a while, to read a book instead. I picked up an Archie comic, took a X*anax, had a cig, and then when I calmed down, I realised I couldn't talk.

I would have called my doctor immediately but even if I did I wouldn't have any speech ability to explain anything over the phone.

I waited for J's meeting which was nearby to be over, and then he came over and called Dr. K for me, explaining the situation according to what I had written on paper. I was barely speaking above a whisper, which even then caused me great amount of effort. Dr. K prescribed me to take a dose of 2 X*anaxes. When I came to, I regained my voice.

Obviously, I couldn't make it to Batam this week.

J scheduled an outpatient appointment for me at the hospital the very next morning. By then, I was able to talk and move, but my chest hurt. Like it does after I strain my chest muscles after playing, say ball games or lifting too much weights.

I told Dr. that I suddenly had an information overload in my brain and then the attack just started. Even though I probably would have been able to do my work on time. Or even if I hadn't prepared myself up to the standards I wanted, I would have been able to do teach the classes okay if I had gone to teach just the same. Dr. gave me beta-blockers to help me function in doing my work so I wouldn't get an attack the next time I am trying to do my work.

While I am now resting, my depression has gone back to normal: I resumed my fits of crying for no reason or at the slightest emotional disturbance. I have become unsociable, cut myself off online communication, and resumed sleeping a lot. My room is in a mess. Last night I cried while watching OC online, not even because it was a sad episode; I was merely waiting for it to upload. J woke up and comforted me, but I was in a mildly catatonic state, not talking, only answering yes-and-no answers, filled with I-don't-knows. I felt like my tears were coming right from the depths of whatever is left of my soul. I took my usual nightly meds, and more X*anax, had a cigarette, and tried to sleep, crying onto J's face while he waited for me to calm down. Then the worst of the night was over.

I know I shouldn't think about giving up my career that has barely restarted, but while I am away out of the country, not being able to talk to J (phone bills hit the roof already, and no internet therefore no Skype), and my mom officially moving back to JB, it is too much loss to take, accompanied by my serious lack of incompetence at work. I feel loveless, alone, and hugely incompetent. I seriously don't think I can do this job, but I am trying anyway, every day, every week. Despite the fact that I truly believe I will not do an excellent job. I am like a machine that still tries to run even thought its internal system has already failed and is still undergoing inconclusive and extremely slow, possibly hopeless, repairs.

I am beginning to hear things in my head, not audible voices, more like whispers in winds of every direction. I say things like, I want to sleep on the outside of the bed near the door, so I know when people go out I will know, even though there is only J in the room. I feel like screaming so much, but restraint and concern for my neighbours stop me. I feel like dying because I will never get well, killing me would be an ease on everyone's time and finances.

I just want to rest. I don't know how long I will take.

bland

Inspired by Irwin's comment on my previous post, I reread The Bell Jar yesterday. I remember how the first time I read the same book, I felt the protagonist to be really normal: her thoughts, actions and especially her feelings. They seemed to be perfectly bland, why would anyone feel it was an epitome of depression and sadness? Maybe Sylvia Plath wrote that way to mimic the 'sour air' she wanted to convey about the bell jar. Or maybe her thoughts to me were normal because I felt the same way and no one feels strange staring at themselves in the mirror, seeing the same image morning after morning.

Frustrated this morning because of my ongoing flu' symptoms and even more so my bad night's sleep (skipped my Lorazepam; bad idea) I lay in bed, dazed, feeling bland. I cannot answer questions like 'Why am I unhappy,' or 'What makes me happy, because my answers nowadays are exceedingly bland. If I could forever remain in my home which is my asylum, I would feel safe, but bland. However I could do things I liked, like writing, reading, watching films, and Jian: all doable in my own home. I would be in a state of equilibrium.

But happiness is an elusive feeling. Peace I know, excitement I know, safety I know, love I know, but happiness? I am supposed to be happy, being on meds, moving along nicely, having J as my companion, having my dream job. Sadness has eluded me nicely; happiness too. Hence the daze, the blandness, and the desire to just remain in my own asylum. It is tiring to live life in a daze, with trying sleep, drained of energy, easily stressed like a hamster loose on a city sidewalk, and clueless about what I can do to make me happy. Do do do do do dodiddonedodododo. I am tired!

boiling pot

Sometimes I feel that my medications are like a lid on a boiling pot, while my efforts and reinventing myself to disincline away from my depressive habits, are like blowing the fire on the gas stove that which this boiling pot sits on. The fire needs to be turned off, the pot cooled, washed and kept - Impossible.

While I feel some semblance of normality now and have been for a while, I still feel debilitated enough that any goal-orientated effort is extremely depressing and strenuous. I motivate myself somewhat by writing and praying copiously enough to expunge all my crazy thoughts, relevant or otherwise. It works! Like treading water in the sea during a storm, I manage to stay afloat from time to time. It is tiring, and feelings of death and hopelessness cannot help but float by sometimes, it is open sea after all, treading water for so long can make you delirious.

I have come to accept that I will always be sick. With that acceptance comes the fact that since I will always be this way, I should stop waiting and working so hard to recover before I make something out of this meagre life of mine. Since I may never recover I might as well restart my career fully, now, else it is never.

We all have to stop thinking I will necessarily get better. I have to accept my tears, I have to accept the numbness and pain, I have to accept my bouts of recluse, I have to accept that it will be harder and more effort some to do things than it would be for normal people, I have to accept that sleeping and waking will be difficult, I have to accept that I will feel sad for most things seen and unseen, I have to accept that I will always need to ask for help whenever I feel anguish enough to want to die.

A persistent boiling pot that cannot be shut down, I will just have to keep watch over it so it doesn't boil over.

On the Threshold of Eternity

On the Threshold of Eternity.

In 1890, Vincent van Gogh painted this picture seen by some as symbolizing the despair and hopelessness felt in depression. Van Gogh himself suffered from depression and committed suicide later that same year.

refuge, stress and a daze

Writing has become my source of earthly refuge because it is here that I can retreat into my world. Not even my closest loved ones can interrupt me safely from this haphazard ritual of mine, without being lashed out at by me for being taken out of the flow of words that come forth, be it on paper or on the computer. When I need safety from my crazy mind I write, as long as I can find the first words to form one phrase within me. When the words don't come I feel an anguish that translates into a need for a crutch in some kind of imbibed substance or in angered shouts. Sleep is probably about the only other activity that can provide a similar sense of safety; this probably explains why, apart from a true physiological lack of energy, depressed people sleep a lot when they finally can.

I feel anguish and therefore a need to write because even though my dream is finally coming true again - my going to Indonesia to work on my humanitarian career - it is fraught with fears and insecurities that stem from me and myself alone. It should finally make me happy, finally, after sabbaticals and rest from work that has not been satisfying because it is not what I truly want to do. I need to raise funds and while I have a salesperson's persona within me, she seems like a ghost of the past that hardly seems like me at all. I am also not the best Christian around to be raising funds for 'missionary work', because while my work is missionary, I am nothing close to what that term represents in terms of character and an image of being above-board. I am torn between two countries because my ties are still here, yet I want to be immersed in my work there. And my resilience to stress is still so low I cannot comprehend how I could have endured any form of work stress in the past. I should be able to do my job, because the Elaine that people have known all along will excel, even those who barely know me feel that way. But that Elaine feels like a shadow to me, running then on strength unknown and probably supernatural. Wrung to my depths as I am right now, I am a corpse with a weaker ghost within, seen by all as an Elaine at rest and able to rise up to become the best in her field once again. I have doubts of that so severe that I feel anguish.

I have always relished the challenge of stepping outside the 'comfort-zone' but right now instead of being excited by the challenge I feel a want for safety so much, even the thought of living in an asylum gives me comfort. I am far from having to live in one but my flat is like my asylum, with every comfort that I need here in material and in persons I love. The challenge to step outside my comfort nowadays, which I do try to, eventually and despite all, still brings about stress and I get upset enough to have to rely on my emergency Xa*nax, Slims, and alcohol where possible. All this for a little bit of stress. And as usual I am also sick (eczema and just the 'flu) which is how stress chooses to manifest itself in me. (Although probably the 'flu is more because I took the public bus that day, sick people everywhere in a contained, unhygienic space. Public transport makes me sick, literally. It also makes me very stressed but that is another story.)

I don't know how I can overcome this and this conflict within me is what drives me to seek refuge in my writing. My body is rejecting my fears by creating this anguish and this 'flu which goes against my primal and heavenly instinct to serve the poorest people who are in greater need than I am. I am a fusion of vision and fear, of a shadow of the past and a ghost of the present. I am able and unable. The greatest battles are fought in the mind. When I am weak then I am strong.

Conflicting states of being result in me being in a daze sometimes, like how aquatic confluences create silt and flotsam. I try to function as normally as possible socially, with my medication giving needed energy to. I know I will likely breakdown in embarking on this job in Indo but I am going to do it anyway. Thus the daze. I try to not be my past workaholic-perfectionist self which plans everything down to the T, but yet I feel that inadequate if I don't. Thus the daze.

Amidst all I guess I will keep writing.

writer's agoraphobia

From reading Amitav Ghosh's The Glass Palace, I intrinsically realise a flaw in my writing. One of the book's characters mentions that she finds it hard to write of the world outside, having to exit her inner world to observe the workings of the world beyond. She finds it terrifying, intrusive, violating, to enter a house that is not hers, in a way that classical writers do, writing about streets and other public places beyond the domain of their private lives.

I suppose she means that it is scary to enter into a world that is not yours, that perhaps this world might reject you, or you might reject this same world you enter. How she feels parallels the way I live, subconciously, as I seem to only write of what is in me. I write based on internal inspiration, and while I can tweak my sensitivity to inspiration, I have yet to fully master 'Zen and the art of motorcycle maintenance' as it were in the book of the same name. I am not a master of my machine if I cannot take it further than my own neighbourhood.

I write observational accounts poorly, preferring to relate my response and thoughts to the event, rather than the sensoral details of the event itself. If I simulate the process right now of entering an event I would like to relate, and forgetting my own inner world for a moment, it feels as if I am losing my moorings and slowly am floating out into the open sea, to be lost until found again, if ever.

I used to think that the reason why I dislike writing reportorial accounts of events is because they are cliched and uninspiring. Like newspaper articles with staccato sentences reeking of a job merely needing to be done and nothing much else. My passionate opinion in me rules over the blatant facts of the world, for facts can be found on the bottom of any news channel, but opinion seeks to change and inspire, something of a higher intelligence.

Yet it is also true that I do indeed find it scary to write about an external collection of facts that have nothing to do with me, afraid that I might misrepresent it, or inadequately report it, denying the world of real, vanilla truth. I have to learn how to step out, eventually. Even the Impressionist artists once studied the Classical works of realistic representation, before they painted what themselves saw instead.

dislike

J read my 49 dislikes and felt perturbed that many of his quirks are on that list (cannot find it in my blog archive, not sure where it is). Some of those things matter less to me now that I am less irritable and less angry. I cannot remember what was on that list but I am going to write a fresh one nonetheless. My dislikes are more like stress factors to me, small circumstances and traits about places and people that stress me out.

1. I don't like sick people coughing, sneezing, sniffing or blowing their nose in public places. I start to feel sick and wish I could Lysol them down.
   
2. I don't like taking public transport not only because of germs but because they smell weird and are crowded. People tend to look strange, wearing strange clothes, speaking in strange accents and language, and they tend to jostle into me and come too close such that if I move my arms just the slightest, I will come into - ugh - contact with them.
   
3. I don't like purple. It makes me feel sick.
   
4. I don't like people who share my table at public eating places to slurp their food. It is absolutely gross. Eat quietly FFS! No wonder no one is having their meal with you such that you have to share my table.
   
5. I don't like posers who think they are so glam so cool so hip when all they are are just actors.
   
6. I don't like civil servants unless they are my friends already in which case they are the clever exceptions to a profession fraught with stupidity.
   
7. I don't like Hong Kong drama serials and other similar Asian soaps - they absolutely make me upset and I could get a panic attack just be persisting at watching any.
8. I don't like matriarchal Cantonese aunties.
   
9. I don't like mainland Chinese. They disgrace they entire Chinese race. I would sooner visit India even though I don't like crowds.
   
10. I don't like public speakers who cannot speak proper English. Step off the rostrum and attend some toastmaster's classes please!
11. I don't like floaty animals in water known as aquatic life. I like to remain at sea level and not under... the thought of having floaty animals near me in the water creeps me out.
    
12. I don't like women who cannot even be bothered to put even a sliver of makeup when they go out, work or pleasure inclusive. It's utterly disrespectful for anyone who has to look at them.
13. I don't like eating leek, spring onion, lady's finger and brinjal.
    
14. I don't like replying text messages and answering the phone very much unless it is critical.
    
15. I don't like exercising in gyms; outdoors or in my own home is best. Gyms are crowded, unisex, and sweaty...
16. I don't like watching sports on TV very much except for soccer.
    
17. I don't like reading the local newspaper. In my own opinion it is not a complete accurate picture of the world. (To be honest it makes me angry to read or hear from it. I truly, truly believe we need independent journalism in this country but it is not to be.
18. I don't like fruit such as mangosteen and dragonfruit.
    

That's about it. I guess I am less irritable now, hence the supposedly shorter list. One day I shall be even more at peace with the world and its smelly public transport receptacles of coughing people...

power

"Power unchecked leads to moral tyranny."

William Blake, as quoted by Tracy Chevalier in Burning Bright

This statement, that I just read from the aforementioned novel, had me sit up, alert. It stirred up the political in me. I remember reading from George Orwell's Why I Write, saying that one of the four reasons why writers do what they do, is because of their political opinion. By political he did not mean necessarily partisan or political revolutionary, nor dissension of any kind. But he meant that all writers are political in their opinion, always taking a point of view, or the other point of view, or preferring to stand in the middle - that being in itself a point of view.

I am definitely political in Orwell's sense of the word. I respect democracy and the justice it represents. I abhor elitism and present-day aristocracies, disguised in forms that may no longer be recognisable. Working on closing the income gap is close to my heart, which is why I choose to work with the poor and serve them, for them to achieve their hierarchy of needs. Power should be checked by justice and the ongoing right for others to choose. I desire principle and character over the economical and the material. Tempting man with the material makes him selfish, inspiring him with your character makes him emulate your principles and follow you. All these statements of belief apply between people anywhere and everywhere: in business relationships, in our leadership of others, in our acquaintances with people, in our extended families, in our friendships. It doesn't even have to relate to the government. Being political can really mean nothing in one's take on partisan politics.

Which is why even though I just like to write a lot here, a political statement like Blake's, really made me sit up. It made me take out my pen. It made my heart beat faster. It made me think about the crazies in the French Revolution and how the people must have felt, both the royal family and the commoners alike. No one should be killing or imprisoning anyone just because they represent an ethos or an echelon of society abhorred. It would be similar to the Myanmar government house-arresting Aung San Suu Kyi simply because she stood for democracy, or the jihad-ists killing themselves and others along it simply because they needed to make an anti-American point to the world. Power unchecked leads to moral tyranny. Be it whether the power is held by the ruling party, the people, or terrorists. It is all one and the same.

books!

The past couple of times I went into a bookstore to find materials for my teaching, I got hijacked by books on sale that I could devour myself. I have ended up taking entire duvet days just reading, and have already finished two books since Tuesday.

I remember when I stepped into Times at Marina Square, which I found after some calls to their office and some hobbling around, heavily laden with shopping, I felt such a surge of comfort. It was like an invisible air curtain that I stepped through at the bookshop's doorway, blowing comfort, safety and relief, telling me that I am in a safe haven now, at my favourite public place.

While bookshop aisles sometimes give me my claustrophobic stomachaches, stores these days are thankfully more spaced out, and a weekday crowd is less menacing, if not inviting for their shared love of books.

I intended, and successfully managed, to get some children's stories for my classes. After paying for them, at which I had happily flaunted my discount card, I got hijacked by the 3 for 2 book displayed, and promptly selected three books to pay for and bring home eagerly.

I am happy that my voracious reading appetite has returned.

still scared

I am still scared, but moving along with shreds and bursts of my inner self that seems stronger than I think it to be. Sometimes my new work seems easy, my ideas and ability to work on them somewhat reminiscent of my former capabilities, even if the work is new and foreign. Other times I keep thinking of how I can postpone my going to Batam, how I can start later and do less, because I feel I am not going to make it in time.

Today my small burst of work came from seemingly nowhere: I thought of the two shirts I bought for my dad and how I will see him later today, and suddenly I felt happy at the prospect because I hope he will like them. Then I got going on my computer while sharing my chair with Slinky, simply typing away at my work. I am not one for forming analytic patterns but it seems I got today going because I thought of small things I will be doing with or for my loved ones. Small enjoyments.

I feel like I have spent most of my working life in a mental breakdown, being in this depressive episode since maybe late 2006/early 2007, till now. This episode seems so much worse than my first one, my first episode seems merely like a bad stomachache. I know I cannot break down again, which is why it is vitally important for me to get better, to deal with all of my residual emotional issues that stem from my childhood. Doc says we still have 'so much to work on', and though it has been more than half a year since I started psychotherapy, all we have been doing is 'moving from crisis to crisis'. (I agree).

I hope I work everything out, and these niggling fears I have of work will not hinder me from doing what I love, which is still first and foremost, serving the basic needs of those who need it most.

I am now very fat E

takut

From being in a confused hardcore-recreationalist/workaholic state I am in a limbo they call procrastination. I have shit-loads of things to do before I leave for Batam again in September. But apart from dumping my clothes in the washing machine and taking out my notebook to plan my to-do list, I have done nothing. Na-da.

I am afraid of work. Takut. I am afraid I will not do well. So I procrastinate. Yet I know I should not be over-indulging in my gaming/sleeping/watching of films and playing with J. So this morning I sit stunned after I make him breakfast, while I smoke and write here. Stunned. No amount of coffee seems to jolt me into motivated action.

I have been having frustrating dreams of small irritating non-fictional events. Like yesterday, I dreamt of a room full of people talking at the same time, stressing me out. I scream and cry in my dream from the stress of a situation like that. I wake up feeling irritable, so much that I scream out loud, so much that I need a X*anax to calm me down. I sleep again after. Another day is gone, nearing my time towards 1 September.

I will be gone for three to four days a week by then, living in Indonesia. I need to get my lesson plans and classroom material ready by then, and yet while I know I can do it, I seem to also feel like I cannot. Hence my confused state.

Like Jesus said before he went to the cross, "Let this cup pass from me..." because he was sorrowful to the point of death for having to be betrayed and crucified. Yet he wanted Father God's will to be done. So he prayed

My work is my ministry, supernaturally fuelled, God-led. I shall go. Even if I am not fully recovered, I shall go. The best players play hurt.

I can't seem to find a balance between pure rest and recreation, and workaholism. My pending return to full-time work (almost) scares me and even though I try not to give my 200% I still feel stressed out and I know not how to be good at my work yet enjoy my life in terms of my hobbies and friends.

sekarang balik, tapi akan pergi ke Indonesia lagi

Excuse my broken Bahasa, but I really like Indonesia, and Batam is the gateway for me.

Alas, I am not a camera person; I have no pictures to document this second reconnaissance trip I just returned from. Only thoughts, words, and a decision.

I will write more soon, meanwhile, I need a rest.

i'm coming

I nudged my room door ajar and saw him through the crack. He looked worn out, inside and out. He had his Tag Heuer glasses off and was wiping his face, and was dressed in his work garb as he was for the entire day.

"You look shack," I said to him, myself just freshly out of the shower.

"Of course, it's Monday."

But I knew it wasn't just the Monday blues or the heavy Singaporean heat that made him look more tired than usual. J smiles even when he is sleepy.

He tried to sound cheery. "So, tell me everything that happened today, I wanna know!"

Today was a defining moment for my career. I might really be spending most of my every week in Batam, Indonesia, very soon. For how long, and for how semi-permanently, the plans are still unfolding.

I am excited. I worry about having to keep paying for this flat. I wonder about how much I will earn while I will save lots staying there. I think about Slinky. And I think about J.

"Don't worry, I will take care of myself," he says.

His countenance remains torn. I tell him he is acting really strong and supportive about my dreams, but I know inside he will be lonely without me. My words cut through his heart, because no matter how he tries to remain brave on the outside, I read his heart and mind completely.

There is a peace in my heart about J.

There is a definitive unction in my heart about going to Indonesia.

I just have to believe that God will allow both my career and my lover to co-exist as they never really have before.

useless

Too awake to sleep, too sleepy to be fully awake - that is the state I am now constantly in. I am sometimes too unwell, too tired, to fulfill obligations. Small setbacks send me drinking, and while I no longer drink to oblivion or knock myself out with medication, I control my angst and bitterness with writing and cigs. At least I am sober and calm.

On Tuesday I received my rejection letter from Brit Council regarding my course. My 'Language Awareness' and 'Written English' is not up to par.

But I am still going to that school in Batam for a reconnaissance trip next week.

I just hope I stay awake enough, and have enough energy to actually do anything useful again. The old E is a figment of the past and I am not even sure if she really ever existed, anymore.

What if I stay broken down forever, however hard I try? I have been scaling this rocky path for so long that even Chaco sandals will wear out on terrain like this.

I can't even go back to remove the ghosts in my past, because my relationship with my parents is my ghost. I can't bring up the ghost with them, because it would drive the ghost even further forlorn. The root of my depression is even more depressing than depression itself.

delusional

I suddenly have this feeling that everything is very unreal. Suddenly I am doubting that whatever companionship I have experienced in the couple of weeks was a fabrication on my part, a figment of my imagination. I can find physical clues to prove me wrong, but I could have bought and placed those clues myself all over my room. I have a feeling I really made this guy up. Like in that Audrey Tautou movie ( was it A la folie? Pardon my French).

I am not even sure I am real. Everything seems delusional, only instead of making up things that aren't there, I am under the pretension that I am making up things that are actually, probably, really there, but I don't believe my own sense of reality. Does that make any sense?

Probably not. I probably just cannot accept when good things happen to me, I believe the bad but not the good, which is why I make bad things happen all the time, at least I know those are real.

J, you are too good to be true.

short stories on love

I often feel like the woman at the well. Every relationship ends eventually, until the idea of marriage, after trying it five times, becomes too much of a chore. She turns cynical and merely lives together with her current man instead.

I also often think, that the men that pass through my life, go on to greater things. Behind every successful man was one woman in his past, and I am that woman. They move on, and I am still here, merely one of the many jewels in their crowns, but at least they are now kings or on their way there.

My love life is not a novel, but a collection of short stories, strung together by common themes. I make all my men feel insecure - my past, my mistakes, my charm. I neglect them while being in my own world, unable to pick up that phone just to check in. I am either too independent or too depressed. I am too much like a man in so many ways: I don't like to cuddle very much, I am not clingy, I cannot play my computer games and talk to you at the same time, I don't like to be disturbed at work, I give solutions to problems I listen to, and I like to zone out and be by myself sometimes.

My charm is very short-lived. For the past ten years men have fallen in love with me, and come alongside me, but we are unable to stick together because I do not have what it takes to be a sticker. I feel very special each time, but I know I would never be the last girlfriend, even though I know they would never forget me.

I don't like short stories. Beginning a new story again and again is tiring and I have less to give each time. Eventually I do end up loving that someone properly. But that story might end anyway.

the thing about younger men

They are usually the one to say "I love you" first.
They are emotionally available.
They aim to please.
They don't see the mechanics of making love but rather the intimacy and pleasure of it.
They are more willing to cry.
They let you be the one to make them feel secure sometimes.
They allow you to inspire them, and gaze at you when you speak.
They believe in hugs, not reasoning and shouting.
They speak gently, not harshly.
They respect you.
They haven't given up on love.

Get yourself one today.

Winter Sleep by Olivia Lufkin

It keeps coming back to me
I remember this pain
It spreads across my eyes
Everything is dull

Everyone's smiling, they're smiling
It pushes me far far away
I can't understand
Everything is blue

Can you hear me out there?

Will you hold me now
Hold me now
My frozen heart
I'm gazing from the distance and
I feel everything pass through me
I can't be alone right now
Will you hold me now
Hold me now
My frozen heart
I'm lost in a deep winter sleep
I can't seem to find my way out alone
Can you wake me

I know when I let it in
It hides love from this moment
So I guard it close
I watch the moves it makes

But it gets me, but it gets me
I wish I could understand how I
Could make it disappear, make it disappear

Anyone out there hear me now?

Will you hold me now
Hold me now
My frozen heart
Kiss my lips and maybe you can take me to your world for now
I can't be alone right now
Will you hold me now Hold me now My frozen heart
Please make it all go away
Am I ever gonna feel myself again?
I hope I will

falling in love sensibly

Is it actually possible to fall in love without visions of falling into fields of flowers, or of lights in the skies; or of feelings you get in a dream-like state, while quivering, and wanting to kiss the person madly?

I have only been in love like that twice in my life. It scares me to have to ever feel like that once again, probably because when that happens I end up losing the person in the end anyway. My fear of loss has penetrated me that much. While I am an emotive person, my steely exterior gives little away if I can help it, and I often look away and no longer into a person's eyes. I make humour out of everything and talk of serious issues looking into the distance. I am intimacy-phobic because I am phobic of loss and abandonment. I hardly want to quiver in a person's presence again.

Flowers, lights and quivers don't last anyway. Love is innately sensible. Right?

I can skip the falling in love madly part and go straight to loving a person madly. I lose the person usually anyway, but at least that way, it is easier to forget when he goes. I know that sounds really cynical but I am certainly no Jennifer Hudson in SATC wearing a LOVE keychain.

I don't dare to delve anymore into my emotions because it only opens the floodgates of pain that I have felt for twenty eight years of my life. I still feel fear being neglected and abandoned. I still feel regret for losing the only two people I ever fell in love with madly in my life, the flowers and lights and quivers I felt with them. Falling in love is a sad thing.

How am I supposed to fall in love senselessly if I think this way? Like my doc says, this is not the real me, I am not being authentic if I only think, and no longer feel. From today, I will try harder to let my tears come, and to let my heart go.

But I am so scared.

friends... or not

It is nice to talk serious stuff with someone - philosophy, spirituality and the like - and not feel tired out by it. Intellectual conversations spiced with witty banter, yet with honesty and a lack of frivolity about life, these things in conversations make a friendship even more meaningful.

Group conversations tire me out more. I can talk with someone one-on-one for a much longer time. Recently most of the people I spend time with outside of the virtual world, i.e. Real Life, are my gaming buddies. They are mostly guys. I like talking to them in a group and one to one, one being more tiring than the other, but our common interest draws us together and it is more fun than it is pressurising to be with them, compared with other groups of friends.

Sometimes it gets unclear; Platonic relationships are hard to define, with so many male species of friends in my circle now. So many seemingly implied actions, mixed with emotional (and recreational) intimacy, it is hard to interpret if they want friendship only, or more. I love my girlfriends because our intimacy has no such barriers, but of course, my girlfriends are high-end achievers in their careers and very busy, so it is not often we have bonding sessions of intimacy. Hence most of my emotional intimacy is derived from my more available friends now, unfortunately male. So the lines get a bit unclear.

Especially in this day and age. What actions imply an intention to create a more-than-friends relationship? Times are cheap; even after two friends, say, have sex together, it could be nothing more than just a recreational activity that two friends indulge in together. Things get confusing and I hardly want to be a part of such grey activity. But even other things can get misconstrued: sentences such as "I like talking to you," "I can't sleep without hearing your voice first," "You have beautiful eyes," and other seemingly unclear intimate statements that wouldn't be unclear if it were a girlfriend. What do you mean when you say such things to a sex that you might be attracted to?

Especially with men, not boys. Boys lay their feelings on the line more easily; I could get more success with asking, "Are you in love with me?" and things turn black or white far sooner. Men don't let their emotions betray their actions, acting calculatedly and are far more able to see woods for the trees. Which makes me just another tree - nothing special really. That aside, with men it is far harder to guess their intentions because very little emotion is on display and these emotions may or may not be authentic of love or similar. They play the girl-game like a chess event. With this generation of men I really am not sure sometimes and I cannot really ask for fear of losing a friend.

So the game of implications and implications continue on. Is it just me?

Platonic friendships were easier when I was younger. I was one of the guys, and I knew that, and they knew that. Times then were more black and white: physical contact that buddies do not indulge in, simply implies interest in a more-than-friends connection. This connection is clear, it is a love relationship with intention to eventually marry. No such things as fuck-buddies, flings or just-for-now relationships. While I am still very boyish, it is sometimes harder to been seen as just one of the boys nowadays. The rules have changed, and I am older and I guess more womanly no matter how many male-traits I still have. (Fats perhaps?)

In the past it was classic knowledge to not lead someone on if you are not interested the way he is. You don't invite a guy back to your place for coffee because coffee means sex, so unless that isn't your intention you don't extend that kind of invitation. I don't think such courtesies are very relevant nowadays. Maybe because people are lonelier now, they like the company and attention even if they don't want to love the other person back now, or ever. They want to fill the gaps and voids in their lives. Love has become impossible to them and hence activities of love indulged with someone passable, will suffice. We live in cheap times. I admit I have fallen.

Thus I have framed this poem up in my room to remind me:

Be not afraid,
You should never be
abandoned.
- Neglected
Fearful of loss
For loss brings
gain - in love
gain - brings loss
in dignity.
You are greater -
than you - imagine
I love you all the
same - he should
too.

i know what i want for my 29th birthday...

embracing my curves

I guess the reality is that I have to learn to embrace my new curvy self (thank you pre-pre-menopause). I am becoming pear-shaped. I look like one of those nudes in French paintings, those that are muses for famous artists, full of fat globules everywhere but still seductively lounge on European sofas for their artists to paint them.

waiting

I am hoping to get into British Council's CELTA course - basically a professional certificate course like TOEFL, TESOL etc. - but it is all a waiting game right now. Application is in, but I might not necessarily be called down for a selection interview, or I might not even get through the interview! This course intake in August is the last for this year.

My plan is to go to Batam, Indonesia, as a start of my new career. Other doors might open up in Phnom Penh, Cambodia. But everything is a waiting game right now. Patience, my mother would say.

I don't feel very keen on a lot of other things right now, yet I know I need to stay occupied. But my concentration span is not great and daytimes are not really times of my peak performance. I sleep most afternoons and come alive at night.

I don't feel melancholic enough to write much either, uninspired that I am. I try to turn my creativity into playing and singing on my guitars. I try to spend time with people. I try to watch dramas online, go for gigs, watch films. I am reading Sense and Sensibility. I game when I need to. And then I sleep whenever I can.

I can visualise my heart racing when I am back in the flow of this world. I am not sure if I can still think and act and be the person I used to be when I need to be. I fear I might act like I have ADHD, unable to concentrate and stressed out with too much stimuli.

A beer would be good right now.

What should I write?

There is a lot I have inside me that have no words to. Pulling and tugging that come to nothing. I want to shout all about nothing. Like a deflated air bag inside of me, leaving only its skin, wrinkled like my face is getting. All you can sense in words are anger and anguish at face value.

I still cannot really answer that question: what will make me happy.

The answer is still nil.

written from this afternoon until long after the sun set

I came out without a notebook and pen to town and really freaked out in panic. It is scary to have words and no paper to park them on.

So I hopped into Muji @ Paragon and got these.

I am now sitting at Coffee Bean Paragon to park these words.

Waiting, for the emergency 'tiding over' meds to kick in.

They haven't yet, really.

So I will keep writing.

It is a lonely day, carrying this sickness, without company.

I just want someone to snuggle up to and hug. Is that so hard to find? Even a girlfriend will do, but they, my girlfriends, are busy.

I just want this pain to go away.

It is not easy. Eventually it may become so. But I don't know how to get there! Nothing seems to help right now.

I don't want to be banished to JB. I will be even lonelier than before. I know I will die there.

I don't want to go anywhere. It is lonely everywhere. Just a matter of how much.

Come on meds, tide me over.
Tide me over. Tide me over.
Tide me over. Tide me over.
Now.

The pain has become beyond white. It is now ashen. My heart has been broken down by pain. Slowly. It will turn to ashes.


Tide over. Tide over. Tide over.

Tide over. Tide over. Tide over.


There is a leaden weight in me, like a despondency, that I carry around. I am almost desperate to have it removed. I don't care if I die in the process.

I am running out of words like I am running out of tears. I am giving up on the idea of having some companionship. I am tired of hoping I will be fully recovered, functioning, and fulfilling my dreams one day. I am tired of all this and of carrying around the deadweight in my heart.

When is this going to end?

I am too much of a burden for anyone, even people in combined strengths. I am like the injured soldier they should leave behind.

I don't want to be here anymore.


I am no longer thinking it is possible to live without pain in this world, in my heart. I am one of the worst patients ever. Maybe I should be hospitalised. I should be injected and zapped to get me cured. My mom doesn't even seem to get the extent of my suffering. I am beyond repair. Like a brain-dead patient on life-support. I should be killed. It is not feasible to keep me going, alive like this.


I feel so lonely. But my loneliness is too big a burden for anyone to bear, even me. I will be lonely forever.

Tide over, tide over.

My loneliness and sadness is too big to bear. God, you have to let me see the reality of what you already bore for me on the cross.

Tide over, tide over.

I want to wake up and feel no more pain when I do.

I want to feel no more pain.

Take away the pain, please. I am not as resilient as I need to be to get out of this alive.

Kick in, meds, kick in. Tide me over. Tide me over. Kick in. Kick in.

I want to wake up with no more pain. I want to die. Take me away from here. Separate this pain from me. Take it away.

I want to wake up with no more pain. Take this pain away.

The pain is metathesizing greatly. Kill it kill it kill it. I want to die. Kill it. The pain is me. It's mine. I need to die to kill it. I want to die I want to die I want to die.

Cut me up so I no longer exist.


Neglect caused this. Abandonment caused this. Loneliness caused this. Lack of affection caused this. I am pain, caused by everything that is no one's fault.

How am I supposed to extricate all that is wrong with me and make it right so I can function and walk again? It is an impossible task for me, I am already burdened by this overwhelming pain.

Tide over, tide over.

Even if the pain goes away, my fears won't.

"Liver, you have got to metabolise the meds and work for me and take away this pain."

Take away this pain. Go away. Go away. Extricate yourself from me and go away. I need you to leave.

I am alone. Well and truly alone. I have lost all my defenses and my independence. I have no ability to rise above the storm. I am the casualty; in every storm and flood there must be some who take the fall. I am one of them.


--

The meds kick in.

killing the pain

I went to confide in my Mom. She gave me ultimatums. All I wanted was a hug, but I didn't get it.I tried Slinky, but she barely reciprocated. Afterwards Mom apologised for pressurising me. X^anax calmed me down. Crying helped a bit. After a post-dinner session of gaming, I feel empty again. After tonight I am not sure if I need to take my doctor up on his offer for an emergency prescription tomorrow morning. I am irrational and unlovable. I need to stay away from tall buildings so I won't feel like killing this pain. It feels like nuclear energy that is soon growing all white and ashen with a murderous explosion that will kill me. I am running out of tears.

Staying awake in the day makes me feel like shit. My mom persuades me every day to find a fun job to do, like working in a shop. What makes her feel that is fun for me? I will not be able to bear it. The thought of working in a confined space, with people coming in and out, makes me want to well up and cry. I will fear work every day, not even dressing up will help me overcome the dread I often feel about going out of the house. I don't know how to change her mind that I am not ready.

Doctor says that maybe I need more time for the new higher dose of Tegradol to kick in. I have to wait. If I feel down for more than three days it is significant. Today is day three. After today if I don't feel any better I need stuff to 'tide me over'. I am tired of feeling useless and being useless. I don't want the tears to return.

This is bigger than me. You know that right?

I don't feel like doing anything: gaming, watching DVDs, reading my new books and magazines. I just want to sleep and stop crying. Or cry until everything is okay. But I know it won't be okay.

pain, reloaded

I want to write myself in to oblivion. I want to write until I no longer exist. I cannot write to make money or prove a point anymore, I can only create words that are welling in me, shouting to be put on paper. I can only write to soothe my crazed mind, a mind that fills with anger and sadness and hopelessness. I only want to not exist, that is why I write. I want to write away the pain. I want to write.

Time stabs at me as it ticks by, it stabs at my meaninglessness. I want to not feel pain, but time pains me at my lack of achievement and lack of ability. I want to not live anymore but it is too tiring to try again, too expensive, too painful to re-live the pain. I just want to go away into the hardboiled wonderland of dreams and sleep to never wake up. I don't even want to feel calm, I just want to no longer feel, or be.

Doctor will probably tell me I need to re-increase one of the mood stabilisers he just brought down the dose for me. This pharmaceutical yo-yo brings me back to my sense of normal, which is really shit indeed; my normal is shit, my normal is pain, my normal is all the anger of my twenty-eight years, my normal is sadness tears and hopelessness.

I just want the clock to hit eight. Hit eight, hit eight. Then I can pretend to be the party hostess I have to be and want to be, and drink myself to oblivion. I just want to not feel like me anymore. Me hurts like hell.

Frustrated - with life as it is, with life I cannot achieve. I am not good at what I do: I do nothing much, and I suck at what I cannot do. Words cannot articulate how worthless I feel in this world. My anger from yesterday may have dissipated in my decision to force-sleep early, but it has precipitated into a hard numb dull ache in my chest. I am not rooted in reality, but my weakness eludes reality for me. Writing gives no respite, nothing probably will. Everything is about alleviating my sadness and anger.

This anger is probably residual from everything that has happened in the the twenty-eight and a half years of my life. I am feeling it all beginning now, right now. I am ploughing on with little idea of what I will plant after I till this infertile land.

I am a nightmare to whoever loves me.

This Charming Man by Marian Keyes

I am in the middle of reading Marian Keyes' new book, This Charming Man. I have to say its superb literature. For one, Marian has married four writing styles through the voices of four women, all linked to topics of politics and domestic violence through the same man. Four stories, yet not short stories that leave you hanging for the ending, yet one superb story. No regrets following one of my favourite authors.

funk

I am in an emotional funk because I tried to pay some bills at the machines and they just kept screwing me over. Technological infrastructure riles me when I am functioning normally but this peeving has slaughtered my emotional health for the day. I feel off-balance and there is so much anger in me caused by the bill-paying, it has not abated long after I have solved (partly) the issue. What is it about even daily chores that anger me so, so much? How am I suppose to withstand the stresses of the daily world if I cannot even remain normally calm and just a bit peeved for a short while? DVD, reading, bubble tea and cigarettes later, I am still angry. But I hardly have the heart to rant about it and spoil anyone's day, so I eat my anger up, and keep it within me like nuclear energy waiting to be exploited by ill means. I am so angry. All I want to do is sleep the day off but I am not sleepy enough to sleep properly. I don't feel like watching my DVD anymore, nor reading, nor gaming. I am angry and upset that I am angry. This anger is crazily knitting up my chest and heart and all I want to do is surgically extricate it from the centre of my being. Maybe it is time to go back on my x*anax. This is a fucked up world and for me with no longer any shit-taking capacity, even more so. I want to be a non-living thing.

after the rain

It is a really sleepy noon. Rain has fallen to the ground and cooled the urban earth. My windows are open and the breezy after-rain smell is wafting through my day curtains. High on sleepiness and nicotine I have a coffee to set the balance, but it is not working: I would rather be asleep amongst my pillows.

Pillows are no substitute for a man. They are soft and smell of me. A man would have hard legs, full of warmth and damp from heat, and he would smell of him. The feeling of having someone to hold is hard to replace, something you cannot really achieve with pillows, girlfriends, or fantasies.

Companionship and mutual care are the first two things that often happen before our hearts get warmed. Undivided attention, conversations, love in actions. These things make you wonder for more and miss the times when you did have more.

But the maybes and mistakes always spoil everything. Creating a haze that mirrors the rainy sky, making you wish for more breeze, more rain! Yet hoping the skies will clear up for blue. All the wishing and wanting for both ends of the stick.

I have finally switched on my air-con again. The heat even after tropical rain, is becoming unbearable and sticky once again. The day curtains continue to let the cloudy light in, and I burn candles to create a romantic atmosphere for one, for now.

The Heart of the Matter using Jag's acoustic guitar

Not really my best attempt and my fingers were hurting. But I love this song.

new skirt!

the good side I am trying to remember

He was supportive of my ambitions.
He understood that I had to work in close proximity with my ex-boyfriend.
He supported me financially where he could.
He brought me to nice places to dine and holiday in.
Also bought me the Ferragamo bag I love.
His parents accepted me as part of the family.
He washed the dishes and tried to help me with laundry.
He fixed my lightbulbs and other handymen type of household affairs.
He was my IT man.
He was clean, didn't snore much and had very little vices.
My parents liked him while it lasted.

I guess they all had their good side. So here is C's, just to be fair. But I really don't mind losing him at all, anymore.

"it's coming down to just a drizzle now"

I think... my cocktail of meds is finally almost optimal. I feel normal. I still feel phobic. But I think I can get there.

Depression is like a ghost that takes you over, like a mugger on the street. You react because you had to. Then, when it is over... life resumes... it almost is like you never got mugged except that you are now wiser on the streets.

I no longer feel very poetic, nor do I write a lot in my notebooks.

But I no longer feel tired talking about myself. I no longer feel tired all the time, even without coffee. This, is truly amazing.

I am finally the chirpy person I should be like my doctor said his patients should by now.

It has been about one or two weeks of normal. I am still phobic and easily angered and stressed. But my depression is lifting and my energy is returning. I think I am coming back from the dead, fatter and more talkative, with more energy.

I really thought I would never get better. Eventually I am sure I will be given something to help me conquer my fears and stress and anger. As for now, meds, Slims and Corona save the day. And for that I am already thankful.

I kept asking God the same thing over and over this year: why did you put me through this shit?

He finally replied me loud and clear: Because the devil wanted you and I said he wouldn't be able to, even if he tried.

People say that you need to have faith in God et cetera. But I think God's faith in us is even more amazing sometimes.