Honestly, I was convinced that I had written my last entry other than a goodbye. I had made so many mistakes over such a short period of time that I was horrified. To make a sports metaphor, I was the player so trapped in my own head that I couldn't act. Instead of second guessing myself after the fact, I was doing so in advance. Don't write anything you might regret, John. Keep your mouth shut and no one will get hurt. I hope I don't come to bat in the bottom of the ninth inning with the bases loaded and two outs. Let it be the other guy. If he fails, I'll pat him on the back and compliment his courage.
What did I do to trigger these feelings? I'm still working on that to some extent. I can tell you this much. I am still hampered by wounds both old and relatively new. One of the worst things I did involved trying to manage limiting my grief at the passage of time. As much as I've written about accepting the fact that I will likely never be "big B better" again, I never accepted the fact that I will never be 25 again. There was this strange hope in me that the only thing keeping me from picking right up where I left off at 25 is the fact that I'm so sick. If only medicine could make one or two advances, I could have my life back just the way it was. Maybe that was true in 2001-2002 but it is not true now.
Things spiraled badly for me. All of the contracting is done but I have not finished paying the bill. I had believed that the bill was astronomically high so I decided to prioritize my homeowners' insurance. The homeowners' insurance was paid weeks ago and it won't be due for another little while. (I know the exact date but that's the sort of information one does not online.) Stamping "paid" on that was important for keeping my stress levels down since it was my first ever direct payment to them. Now, I'm stressing over paying the contractor despite the fact that he hasn't done anything to inflict stress on me. It's just an honor thing for now.
My mind locked down from accumulated stress a few weeks ago to the point where I failed to act decisively when I ran out of medication. Which medication was it? The irony police might come knock down my door soon because it was my anti-anxiety medication. It's okay if you just laughed out loud. In fact, I kinda hope you did because it beats getting the urge to throttle me. My doctors made a minor mistake by forgetting to prescribe a new 90 day supply of the stuff but I compounded the error by not reacting to it in a positive way. I've been getting the proverbial smacks upside the head from people because they know the ways I could have reacted better. There are resources at my disposal at need but my siege mentality gets in the way.
The amazing thing about my friends is the way some of them are there for me when I need them no matter what mistakes I made. An entire section about the costs of mistreating people was going to go here but it doesn't apply. A week ago, I thought I had alienated two very important friends to a hopeless degree. One of them contacted me a few days ago letting me off the hook and the other did so while I was writing this. The end result is that I'm sitting here back on my meds after another good night of sleep in bed and I am feeling blessed.
Let me give that thought its own paragraph. I have gone from feeling awful due to my own mistakes and being trapped in my own head to feeling as healthy as I get. I am back on the medication that I was out of and I expect even more improvement from that as it works its way back into my system. I had a good night's sleep in bed after a time of exhaustion. I feel like a movie character who has been through something terrible only to end up in a wonderful place. I'll go further. I feel like the fallen angel played by Nicolas Cage in "City of Angels" a short time after he shows up at Meg Ryan's door. Yes, I am aware that the Meg Ryan character dies of stupidity in the next scene but I trust Melissa's common sense despite the way I reacted in the car on the way home last night. It was over texting in the car but she hadn't done anything stupid. It had everything to do with the fact that I hadn't taken any anti-anxiety meds in ten days.
All I need to make this entry fit into the blog theme is to draw the overly obvious conclusion. I'm not sure how bad the Spanish grammar is but, as the kids might say, "Panic is muy no bueno."
Tuesday, January 28, 2014
Sunday, January 12, 2014
Pain Nightmares
It must be harder to lose your mind than I thought. From the moment I woke up from a few hours of being less conscious to when I couldn't stay awake any longer, I was in agony. I know how it works. As soon as the pain subsides (since it never truly stops), the brain goes into full scale denial. It couldn't possibly have hurt that much. You're making this up. You've always been like that. One of these days, I'm going to repair that damage that tears me up so badly. If I had a nickel for every time I heard that it doesn't really hurt, I might own this house. Wait! I do own this house so I guess abuse can be an investment strategy.
I'm feeling bitter today in case you haven't noticed. No, I'm not truly feeling bitter toward my mother and father despite the bit of humor at their expense. (Literally?) Today's bitterness is all about the pain. For months, I was getting by because I had gone on a schedule with my breakthrough meds like everyone with an opinion suggested. That left me with nothing to fall back on when the waves of pain hit last week. The worst part is that I believe quite honestly that stress has left me in tooth pain. It isn't constant and doesn't react to sugary foods like simple tooth decay should but seems to be the result of years spent trying to hold off the "care" of an orthodontist and then from gritting my teeth in pain.
Have ever been told that your jaw didn't sit right and contributed to how funny looking you are? I was told pretty much exactly that except the people involved weren't talking to me. I was trapped in one of those dental chairs while they talked over me. The symbolism is pretty frightening when you think about it. Kid is trapped with expectations of good behavior strapping him down while the adults decide that he isn't up to specs and needs to be modified. I had to wear this "appliance" in my mouth during the height of the cruelty years of the kids around me. The only reason that I escaped a second year of a second more painful device was that I practiced setting my jaw where they wanted it to go. By the time they got around to looking at it, the new position felt natural.
The only way to gain any pain relief these days is to find the original position that I was born in and try to copy it. I remember your name, Doctor, but I'm smart enough to not publish it. At the time, I was grateful that you decided to not put braces on me for fear of a shunt infection. Yes. I remember all the details.
And time passes...
Would you like to venture a guess what got me away from huddling with the pain and back to (semi-) productive living? I felt the overwhelming urge to write something and so I looked at the project that had most recently graced my desktop. The urge got stronger so I returned to the passengers and crew of the SS Zephyr. It was time to fill in what was going on with others while the heretofore main characters enjoyed the spotlight. How do human boys find the alien girls they met while boarding? They find them completely mystifying, of course, and enjoy being mystified. What about their father? He's the most shocking of all when he approves of his daughters' romantic decisions.
I know. It would never happen in real life which is part of what makes writing fiction so much fun. SF is fun because I enjoy taking the exotic and showing just how normal it can be. Would you say that the lives of children and adolescents have changed in the last 150 years? That's a trick question because adolescence as we know it is a product of expanded car use in the 20s and, more importantly, the 50s when TV added another layer of confusion to the question by inventing the teenager. 150 years ago, teenagers were adults working long hours dulling their brains in the factories and fields. They were also having children of their own. Children having children is nothing new.
As you might have guessed from the cynicism, the pain levels are creeping back up. I just wanted you guys to know that I'm not dead yet. (Thank you, Bek Oberin/Ricky Buchanan. I very much hope you're still "Not Dead Yet.")
I'm feeling bitter today in case you haven't noticed. No, I'm not truly feeling bitter toward my mother and father despite the bit of humor at their expense. (Literally?) Today's bitterness is all about the pain. For months, I was getting by because I had gone on a schedule with my breakthrough meds like everyone with an opinion suggested. That left me with nothing to fall back on when the waves of pain hit last week. The worst part is that I believe quite honestly that stress has left me in tooth pain. It isn't constant and doesn't react to sugary foods like simple tooth decay should but seems to be the result of years spent trying to hold off the "care" of an orthodontist and then from gritting my teeth in pain.
Have ever been told that your jaw didn't sit right and contributed to how funny looking you are? I was told pretty much exactly that except the people involved weren't talking to me. I was trapped in one of those dental chairs while they talked over me. The symbolism is pretty frightening when you think about it. Kid is trapped with expectations of good behavior strapping him down while the adults decide that he isn't up to specs and needs to be modified. I had to wear this "appliance" in my mouth during the height of the cruelty years of the kids around me. The only reason that I escaped a second year of a second more painful device was that I practiced setting my jaw where they wanted it to go. By the time they got around to looking at it, the new position felt natural.
The only way to gain any pain relief these days is to find the original position that I was born in and try to copy it. I remember your name, Doctor, but I'm smart enough to not publish it. At the time, I was grateful that you decided to not put braces on me for fear of a shunt infection. Yes. I remember all the details.
And time passes...
Would you like to venture a guess what got me away from huddling with the pain and back to (semi-) productive living? I felt the overwhelming urge to write something and so I looked at the project that had most recently graced my desktop. The urge got stronger so I returned to the passengers and crew of the SS Zephyr. It was time to fill in what was going on with others while the heretofore main characters enjoyed the spotlight. How do human boys find the alien girls they met while boarding? They find them completely mystifying, of course, and enjoy being mystified. What about their father? He's the most shocking of all when he approves of his daughters' romantic decisions.
I know. It would never happen in real life which is part of what makes writing fiction so much fun. SF is fun because I enjoy taking the exotic and showing just how normal it can be. Would you say that the lives of children and adolescents have changed in the last 150 years? That's a trick question because adolescence as we know it is a product of expanded car use in the 20s and, more importantly, the 50s when TV added another layer of confusion to the question by inventing the teenager. 150 years ago, teenagers were adults working long hours dulling their brains in the factories and fields. They were also having children of their own. Children having children is nothing new.
As you might have guessed from the cynicism, the pain levels are creeping back up. I just wanted you guys to know that I'm not dead yet. (Thank you, Bek Oberin/Ricky Buchanan. I very much hope you're still "Not Dead Yet.")
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)