So I'm still in the psych ward, but things are looking up a bit, I guess. I got accepted to M House, so I'm going there next Monday at 1. Which means I have to stay here till then -- but I can get a pass basically whenever I want one, so at least I can get away sometimes, you know? I'm going to go visit my friends at school tomorrow, I think. I haven't seen them since the Friday before I got admitted.

They just called a level 2 code white on one of the units. Code white, for those who don't know, is the code for violence. I've been surprised by how few have been called, especially on my ward, which is one of the acute care wards. There have only been three, and they were all within the same week, and all on the same guy. He was manic and refusing to take meds, but he was also certified, meaning involuntary, so he had no choice about taking them. They threw him in TQ all three times. Apparently that means "therapeutic quiet". You know, one of those little rooms with nothing in it but a blue gym mat -- or, actually, in his case, not even that. Just a tiny, freezingly cold bare room. You come out, essentially, when you quiet down.

Ah, the tales of the psych ward. Honestly, mostly I just keep to myself a lot in there. Keeps me away from most of the chaos. I prefer that.

Anyway, at least I'll be out of here somewhat soon! I can't wait. Hospitals generally suck, even though I have to admit that I did get some decent help here. My psychiatrist really knows what he's doing, and the inpatient psychologist is pretty good too. Hopefully I'll write more about my assessment with her later, but for now I have to go check in at the ward.

Toodles!

To make a long story short: I'm in the hospital, and the only way I can get on blog sites is via my phone. I can check my email on the library computer, though. In fact, I have to head there very soon (it opens again in about 10 minutes).

Also, my parents have told me that I am not allowed to come back home, so now I have to find a place to stay. One suggestion they've made to me is a place called M House, which is like a therapeutic group home. The average stay is usually about 3-4 months, and they have individual and group therapies as well as life skills training groups, etc. I still haven't decided if I think it will be a good fit for me, but I think I'm closer to the side of putting in an application and seeing what happens. They have to do an interview and stuff anyway, so it's not like just applying would get me accepted right away, you know?

Anyway, gotta go. Peace out.

Honestly? I just want to die. I'm so tired of everything.

fighting horrible thoughts, again.

fuckshitfuck.

Found this in an old entry and wanted to do it again... so here it is!

Hello I am

adult, alien, artsy, big sister, blonde, butch-liking, caring, cat lover, chapstick lesbian, child, complex, confused, cousin, curious, cute, daughter, different, dreamer, dyke, eclectic, family-closeted, female, female-born, femme-ish, femme-liking, friendly, gay, genetic woman, girl, girl lover, hypo-sexual, intelligent, introvert, LGBTQ, lesbian, lesbo, lezzy, little sister, Ms., me, monogamist, multifacetted, nerd, not sure of myself, odd, out-ish, passionate, passive, philosopher, pro-choice, pro-gay, progressive, quiz whore, right-brained, sensitive, sexless, she-geek, suicidal, survivor, treehugger, trustworthy, virgin, weird, whole-brained, woman

Who are you?

So, well, I'm still around. Have been spending a fair amount of time wishing I wasn't, but whatever. I saw the on-call counsellor on Monday, and I'm talking to my own psychologist tomorrow, so I suppose I'll be okay at least until then. Or something. He's probably just going to hate me for wasting his time when I already saw someone on Monday, but I don't fucking care anymore. Even if he does, it's not like I don't deserve it, in my own mind at least. I am self-centered lately and think that my own horrible opinions of myself and my life are gospel, and everything else is a lie.

I have come to the realization, via the observations of a friend, that I am not actually in any sort of "real" recovery and probably never was. I just spent the better part of two years hiding and masking and creating more layers so that I could "cope" and "live a normal life". Turns out that when I get super stressed, and then maybe don't engage in as many behaviors as I had been doing before, all those layers start twisting and turning and pulling off. I start becoming that thing I never wanted to be -- the thing I tried to remake myself NOT to be. Emotional, with innumerable mood swings; alternatively terrified, lethargic, and self-destructive; and always, always needing more than anyone could possibly give me.

The biggest problem, though, is that as time has gone on, I've become very jaded about recovery in general. I don't think I can ever live the kind of life I actually want, or ever receive the kind of attention from other people that, at my innermost self, I feel that I desperately need. So clinging to behaviors seems not like any sort of childish or manipulative or even destructive thing to do, but rather the only way I actually CAN live in this world the way people seem to want me to. As a part of it, contributing, acting and seeming normal. As a nice person, a good friend, a stable daughter, a sister who doesn't echo the crazy you are trying to get over within your own self.

But the facade is slowly starting to come apart. And, predictably, so am I. (I just wish real predictions were as good as retroactive ones.)

I have no idea where this is going, or even where it can go. It could continue by keeping me in a downward spiral, leading to lots of horrible things. Or maybe it could be some sort of road that leads me into actual, true healing of some kind. But even as I write that second possibility I don't think that can actually happen. I am too broken, and I've been broken for too long, for it to be able to be fixed. It's starting to all work itself into the way my personality, my whole self is shaped, rather than being something abnormal that is controlling me and making me crazy. It seems to be trying to work its way from parasite to symbiote. And I'm letting it. I find it comforting. I like having this one avenue towards fire and chaos that other people can't take away from me, no matter what they do to me. In fact, negativity would probably just feed into it, rather than taking it away. I like having something that not even stubborn insensitive parents and well-meaning friends and poverty and being a total fucking failure can take away from me. I could get to the bottom of the deepest barrel and still have it. At the bottom of that barrel, I would be able to sit there and think, "At least I can still be good at one thing." In some strange, fucked-up way, I would win.

Shields.

Sometimes I also wonder if I want to recover at all, which may or may not be another reason that I never truly did. At one point I really think I wanted to recover, and even had some hope that this could happen. Again, I've gotten rather jaded since then. So many psychologists, so many different people and treatments, and here I sit, still like this, still the same as ever. They say it's insanity to keep doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. I don't even WANT to keep doing it.

I am tired of all of it. Physically, mentally, emotionally -- I'm tired. I'm tired of therapy, of school, of my family, even of my friends sometimes. Really, really motherfucking tired.

I don't know how to deal with this anymore. I wish someone could just come scoop me up and magically make all this stupid shit that is my life go away -- change it all into something that's actually liveable, that is worth living through. I can't think of another way to make anything liveable. Which means I'm running out of options.

One way or another, something is going to have to change, and soon.

THIS POST COULD BE TRIGGERING. You have been warned.


I'm in a state of mind right now where reading about some other girl's struggles with wanting to off herself (I think) on a certain LJ community, a girl I don't even know, is ridiculously and absolutely triggering.

Let me be honest. I have been having the worst OD urges possible -- last night, and now they seem to be starting again tonight. I think I just want my life to go away. And it bothers me that I can post how hard things are in a forum I frequent and have almost nobody comment, and someone else can post the same thing on another community and everybody actually gives a shit about her. I know that sounds incredibly attention whore-y of me, and who knows but that it might be in some respects. I want someone to get a fucking clue that NOTHING IS OKAY AND I AM SO FUCKING FED UP WITH THIS SHIT. So maybe it's not being an attention whore so much as... I wish that if more people knew about it, maybe one of them would know how the fuck to fix it, or say the right thing to make me okay again. Make me functional. But maybe that can't actually happen.

The counselling center tried to call me this afternoon at around 3, and I can't think of a reason they'd do so other than that they want to cancel my appointment for Monday. My appointment LAST Monday didn't go ahead, either, because apparently it wasn't even in the schedule -- and even then the receptionist said he almost certainly would have cancelled anyway, because he was in some sort of Very Important Meeting. I am getting rather tired of this bullshit. Maybe I wasn't exactly acute before, but things are clearly way worse than they have been, and I really think I at least need to go and talk to someone. I guess it's the on-call counsellor for me on Monday. Let's just hope it's not someone horrible.

I need to think of something to do tonight instead of pills, or even cutting. I'm supposed to go putting up posters tomorrow for an art festival I'm volunteering for, and it would NOT be cool if a cut came open and bled all over my clothes while I was walking. So there needs to be something else. What can I do???? Fuck me, man. I should not be trying to think of ways to self-destruct. And yet I can't seem not to think of it these last couple of days.

I don't even know why I'm writing this here. You're all just going to think I'm doing this for sympathy and "omg baby feel better" comments. But I think that what I said above stands. I wish someone here could really truly HELP me, but I know they can't, not like a professional could (and really should, I guess), but I just need somewhere to vent, or a lot of somewheres to vent. And maybe someone has been through this too and can understand. I don't know. I don't know what I want. My brain is starting to try and extend itself in about a thousand different directions all at once.

fdjslkf;djsfkldsjafkldsf;jsflk;dsjfdsj;lafdjlksa;jf

I can't handle anything without bulimia lately.

I feel like my mood is generally going to shit, and my life also.
I hate school this semester. With a passion.
I want to be anywhere but here.

And I don't know what the hell to do to make anything better.
In fact, I don't think I can.

I have realized... that I still think extreme thinspo, or at least a lot of it, is beautiful. I still think bones are beautiful. I know, beyond a doubt, that many of the girls in the pictures that I have been looking at were sicker than sick, and I've been sick myself, and I'd never wish that on anybody. I also don't think super skinny is the only kind of beauty out there. But I still can't help thinking that extreme skinny is, nonetheless, so very delicate and fragile and lovely.

Maybe I am still sick, at that. For still thinking things like this. For wishing, even among my opportunities and chances to grow and change and become better as a person, that I could go back to my old smaller body. For wishing that I had the liberty to starve myself down to that delicate and fragile weight. For wishing I could be the one taking these pictures, only of my own self.

I don't really know what to think of my own head, sometimes.

A bit stoned still. I seem to be one of those people who gets the munchies while stoned. YAY! So far I ate junk food at the friend's where I smoked (I bought it and ate most of it before the MJ, though), and then when I came home I ate some chocolates from upstairs, and THEN I went to my pile of binge food, which I actually haven't touched since a bit before Christmas day for an actual binge. Apparently I still had a whole pack of Snickers bars in there, although I had thought I only had the remaining Kit-Kat Chunky. So I had a Snickers bar. I fucking love Snickers.

MJ kinda... slows me down. But I discovered tonight that it doesn't actually make me happy -- it's just a great high when I'm in a good mood. Tonight I had some of my mood-swingy shit because my friend got "annoyed" at me over essentially nothing, so I went from happy to kind of sad/lonely/something. Dysphoric, maybe. I was still really slow and sloggish and didn't want to focus my brain on anything and concentrate, but instead of happy underlying it, crap did. It kind of makes me feel a bit like when I'm in one of my extremely irritable depressions, which used to be fairly rare until recently. These days I seem to get irritated or mad a lot. I'm not really sure why.

Well, I hope this all made a bit of sense. Hopefully my writing isn't ridiculously bad while stoned.

I can still feel my muscles trying to relax themselves.

Things I want to do this year:

- Get fit
- Get admitted to the psychology program (it'll be about time)
- Get the best grades possible in my courses
- Find a GOOD job for the summer... not just some shitty fast food stint that makes me want to claw my eyes out


There are other things that I'm afraid to write down, because I'm afraid I won't keep them. I'm scared about keeping them, and I don't know if I even can. So maybe they should just stay within myself for now.

Actually, I don't know if getting fit will be possible, either. But I guess we'll see.

I've fallen and I can't get up.

Ate somewhere around 1000 calories yesterday when I was aiming for 500, which makes me really pissed at myself. Oh well. Today I can b/p later if I need to, so HOPEFULLY I can stick to my 500 fucking calories and NOT screw up. *mutters angrily at self*

(Note that my 500 cals doesn't include anything I b/p on. I figure that even if some calories get left behind from a b/p [and not many will if I do it right] I can still lose weight on 500 cals plus b/ps with good purges.)

It's interesting how obsessed I'm starting to get with this again. Interesting, like watching someone pull their own fingernails off... but still, it is.

Today I am ridiculously and utterly wiped... shopping for an hour with my mom and sister took all the energy I had. I just had a two-hour nap/doze, and I'm still really effing tired.

Also, I can't really b/p tonight, because my aunt and uncle are coming over to play cards (I didn't ask, but they usually play cards) with my parents, and some girl who was recently in the hospital for anorexia is coming over to hang out with my sister. So all of them will be occupying two floors, and I'm not sure I'd be brave enough to use the shower to purge when the relatives are here. The funny thing was that I didn't even really want to b/p today, so it might actually work out. I'm so fucking tired that I don't really have the energy to b/p anyway.

I had forgotten how much this food restriction thing will drain your energy really really fast. I think my body is trying to make me rest or sleep a lot to try and conserve energy, since I'm not giving it that much through food. It's probably also trying to recover from the three b/ps of yesterday.

My main focus, and a lot of my thoughts, center around one thing lately: I have to lose this weight.

I finished making my 1/2 bagel with cream cheese and coffee, and I had just picked it up to leave the kitchen when I felt the oddest kind of vertigo. It was like there was something buzzing on the left side of my head, and it kept trying to make me lean to that side. When I walked a few steps it felt like my body was trying to make me walk sideways.

I can't figure out if I'm just dehydrated, or if maybe my electrolytes are fucked a bit these days, or what. I always seem to be tired or dizzy or orthostatic. I'd be more likely to say dehydrated, since I seem to have issues with hydration these days, but I get scared about potassium and shit. Last day or two my heart's been doing weird things, like beating REALLY hard and fast in the shower, or seeming to randomly speed up or get stronger for a couple dozen seconds. But then I think that maybe my anxiety's just being a bitch again, and starting to give me new-old physical symptoms. I don't know.

I'm probably going to Wal-Mart in the next hour or two, to shop for the rest of my Christmas presents, and I've been looking up the lowest-cal sandwiches on the McDonald's website, because I know I'll probably go there for a tidbit after I'm done. Surprisingly, the regular hamburger is one of the lowest-cal options, at 250. The grilled chicken snack wrap is also the same calories. I think the next lowest options were some other kinds of snack wrap... maybe the ones with breaded chicken, etc? The caesar chicken one was okay, too. Apparently the grilled buffalo chicken wrap is 240, but if I eat that thing my mouth will burn off. So I guess it's either a chicken wrap or a hamburger for me. I'll decide which one I feel more like having when I get there and have shopped for awhile. Or something.

I am scared of healthy eating, intuitive eating, eating to maintain my weight. I do not want to be this fat anymore, and I'm terrified of the idea of getting any fatter. So it really doesn't feel like I have that much of a choice anymore about keeping track of my food, counting calories, etc etc. I feel that if I do not do this NOW, I never will. And I'm very afraid of the idea that I will never ever get this extra weight off me. I need to get it off me.