Isn't It Ironic.

Eyes fixed, head down, her rage and bitterness fueled a pace close to a run as she walked away from my desperate calls in town today. My eyes burned as I watched the dark dufflecoat hanging off a painfully thin frame, grow smaller and smaller.

She is angry with the unfairness of it all (as she sees it).

Much of my life (over half) has been spent embroiled in her destruction.
Forced to watch her desperate attempts to starve herself to death.
Forced to listen to the cries of my family, as they witness her withering body, her protruding bones,
angular agony.
Forced to look into the inward turning eyes of a father, driven to weep, hollow, heavy sobs,
my eyes swim, and I shake.
Forced to watch the hand wringing desperation of a mother
a face broken, the smash of rejection clattering within,
and I writhe at night, tearing at my sheets
Forced to watch a beautiful little sister, rock on her bed
silent tears flooding the channels of her bitten lips,
and I, a pinball.

Forced to watch a sister
starve to death
I wanted to put
DNR on her bed
I wanted to hold her
until she was safe
I wanted to beat her
until she couldn't hurt us anymore
I wanted to make her suffer
as she had made us
I wanted to take her pain
and live it instead
I wanted to love her
I wanted to kill her
I wanted to protect her
I wanted to hear her
I wanted to be loved by her.

Now?

Nothing.

I believe that, at some point (and I know the point was somewhere during my second or third severe bout of clinical depression) a part of me died.
I no longer feel specifics.

Today she told me I was anorexic.
She told me I had a problem.
She told me it wasn't fair that I could lose weight while she had to go to hospital for five days a week and be forced to eat.

And I stood against the freezing cold in the city centre, trying to draw myself in, as I watched her disappear, willing her to look back, just once.
And I looked at the people circling my axis, and wondered if they would feel the black residue if they walked through the point where all the words had spilt; I wondered if an air space could hold a decade's pain for just a moment.

The agony of the irony is somewhere, and it is too much to bear. Too much to allow. Too much to deal with any other way than to put it on my skin and watch as it runs out.

Balance? What's that?

I have binged.


It could have been worse I guess... I could have eaten forever.

I COULD have eaten hundreds and hundreds of chocolates.

I hae put on a pound and because of that, tonight I have felt as though it's all pointless.

It's all or nothing with me.

Black and white.

On or off.

Solid ground or thin air.



I hate this feeling. The sensation of being too big for my body; the feelings of loss... and paradoxically, of gain.



I haven't written lately. Partly because I have just been too busy, and partly because, although there has barely been a day when I haven't wanted to put something down, I have felt unable to give sound to the internal metal clashing of swords drawn to kill.

Unable to give sound to the clenching and wailing and writhing of the child trapped in my rib-boned cell.

Unable to give sound to the throat choking tears, which flow rapidly down hidden cheeks, brushed away with the backs of hasty, humiliated hands.


My therapist recogises the fact that I can't take much in... I can't allow much to touch me.

I'm just learning this.

When I find words, I'll try to work it out a little more.

Warning.

If you could see beyond the iron,

the posion spikes, curling wires

the skin ripped red and white

gashed, gnashed, wept upon

in fury, in agony, in hatred

raw, numb nothing

numb

nothing



You think your kindness

your prayer, your touch

would soothe

would stay

would answer.



Ha!



If you saw beneath my skin

Your lip would curl in the corner

and then twist,

Your tongue screaming in surprise

expecting citrus sweetness

sucking, now curling,

rancid overflow of bitter scorn.

Your hand would scream

scaulded, scabbed, scarred

whipped away, withdrawn

revulsed, repulsed

spattered with acrid pus of greed,

of need.



Inside,

I am putrid

How can truth exist

in such decay?



Stay away

I will infect those

who refuse to stay

on the outside.

I am afraid

that if kindness doesn't kill me,

Me will kill kindness.

Black Holes

Why do we travel?
Why do we go on journeys?

To get somewhere, right?

Yeah.

Most journeys we go on, we have a pretty good idea where we're headed and what it might look like when we get there. At least, we have some idea inasmuch as we have impressions of the world which allow us preconceived ideas, pre empt, imagine.

But the inner journey isn't like that.

For starters, speaking for myself, I have no idea where I'm heading, or if a destination even exists.
I can't even tell at the moment, whether I am suspended or falling, such is the density of the darkness and the numbness of my skin.
I have no assurance that gravity is still operating in this space. I don't know if there is any ground.
I need ground.
Ever been in a lift when you don't know if it is moving or not?
I just don't know.

It's all too much of nothing at all.

Those blueprints we have of how things might look when we reach the place we are journeying too..?
They're not there and I've lost the only image I had that I was sure of.

Another thing is that everything is in shadow. It's black or grey and every shade in between, but things are more indistinct than ever.

It's so dark and so disorientating that I don't understand how I will ever know where I am, let alone where to go.

I am even doubting the existence of myself at points.

Ode to a Willow

Winter Willow

Icicles dripping with golden ink
The spindly branches of willow
Bow to kiss the frosted grass.
The primrose white, winter sun,
Mindfully unrolls select rays,
To reach through Christmas mists.

Tiny hollow drip-wells engraved,
In the crunchy carpet below
The graceful willow's weighted curves.
Puntured by stark silhouettes,
The watercolour horizon,
Is drowning in tints of dusk.

And while we're on the subject...

...I was amused to find this when I was trying to find an Ikea image!

Thought I'd share it.

Therapy cancelled today.

Self harm woke me this morning, my legs screaming.

Lots of tears behind a big smile.

After A Therapy Break

Puzzled, slightly distressed and completely confused by the way I felt as I sat in my therapist's room on a Monday after a two week break, I desperately searched the web for explanations as to why I felt so angry and yet so empty; why I was overwhelmed by the pointlessness of the journey I have apparently, embarked upon.

Note: I say "apparently" because much of the time, I feel as though I am either going round in ever widening circles, further and further away from myself or her, or I am crouched close to the ground with my arms over my head trying to protect myself from whatever it is that I think I probably went into therapy to find.


Monday's session was a proper Ikea session.



For anyone who hasn't had the pleasure of being acquainted with the Swedish Store, allow me to explain that before you start out, you browse your dog eared edition of last season's Ikea catalogue, which has been sitting in your bathroom for a while now, and draw indecisive circles around various images and measurements, asterisking various Wooden Finishes at the bottom of the page.

On arrival, you circle the building, attempting to park in the closest non disabled space in the car park, you have a list of specific items that you are looking for. You are not intending to be in there for a long time, and have no intention of getting trapped in The Marketplace looking at funky striped tumblers and plastic gadgets which open your beer when you can't be bothered to use your fingernail.

The overwhelming yellowness is positively dazzling as you step inside the open plan monstrosity, and as you pick up your mailbag style carrier, you cannot help but feel the brightness of possibility and the hope of a better future (which, obviously, lies in that new set of drawers (6 drawer Tall Boy, pine).

On paths bearing some resemblance to the yellow brick road, determined to go straight to the section you need, you follow the polished laminate aisles through a dense forest of plastic, something like metal but not quite (is there a name for that?) and MDF.

After twenty minutes, having been distracted first by the cheap rugs and then by novelty lighting, you become aware that somewhere in you chest, there is a ball of weariness, impatience and exasperation at the fact you seem to have arrived back at the entrance twice and still haven't found what you are looking for.

You continue to search, with increasing desperation, and eventually, following what feels like the death of all the good things you had ever carried within you, you see something that may be vaguely close to what you wanted when you left your house (but may well not be).

When you get home with your TV (I did say it may well not be related) you pull it out of its box and having lugged it and pushed it and pulled it and edged it into the small space you have designated, you take the annoying little black twisty thing off the lead and plug it in.

Or you would plug it in.
If the plug would reach the bloody socket.
But it doesn't because it's bloody well from Ikea.

At which point, you may do a variety of things (the most sensible of which would be to move closer to the socket).

In my own, rather pathetic case, I leave the room, continue to function as though I haven't even heard of Ikea and then, at some point later that night, I lie in bed unable to stop crying.


So.
Metaphors aside, this week I desperately searched the internet for a reason as to why I felt like never going back to therapy after the break.

What follows is an extract from a Google book that I found, which I suppose I am posting here
primarily because at some point or other, some other Ikea victim may come looking for some reassurance that they are not alone in their experience of therapy after a break...
The extract is taken from a book by Maria Luca called, "The Therapeutic Frame In The Clinical Context: Integrative Perspectives.

I'm not entirely sure whether it's ok to quote here or not... But I'll take the risk and hope for the best.


It explains a little... or enough... to have made me feel just slightly reassured that at least breaks are a little bit important.

I'm not mad for feeling strange after one.

"Why does the practitioner want it to be acknowledged that the breaks might
become upsetting for the patient?It is because growing feelings of dependence upon the therapist arc in danger of being exposed around the holidays so that the
therapist will be most at risk of losing patients at break times. It is surprising how patients who deny the importance of the break might miss the last appointment before a holiday or the first session back after it. This makes them the`leaver' and not the `left', and lessens the impact of painful feelings of being abandoned by the therapist during the vacation. It is my experience that after a vacation my patients seem to be all over the place, and I often feel like Little Bo Peep who has lost her
sheep! An average entry in my diary at this time
would be:

It's the middle of the first working week after my summer holiday. I've had two 'no-shows', with no telephone calls of explanation, a couple of moved appointments and two calls to check that it is indeed this week that we return. Three people have returned saying that they feel they have managed the break so well that they no longer feel the need to continue the therapy."

Now. I'm not saying any of this relates to me... I'm sure as hell that I don't feel 'dependent' or anything like it...

But I have come back feeling as though it's pointless and I don't need it.

I've said more than enough but, if you made it to the end, I wanted to say a huge thank you to those who have written to reassure me.

Hearing your own experiences and your wisdom really helped m this week.

Thank you.

Therapy Break Over

In the instant that I reached for the unreachable branch, my arms shuddered and muscles tore down the blades.
Knives seared through my neck and my shoulders and I let go and fell to the black sea.
The unbending branch, stark against the whitened cliff edge, continued to point spindle fingers West, as if reaching for the orange sun favouring the far horizon.

Generally people seem to be upset when therapy breaks appear and I can understand that.
I can understand the feeling of isolation. The dread at having to face things alone. The thought that, even if you do talk, you won't be heard for the duration of the break.
I understand all those things though I haven't really felt them over the past fortnight.
Neither have I experienced the profound sense of relief that a minority of people express at the idea of having a break.
In fact, I didn't really think about it too much.
Not very much.

I suppose it is in keeping with most things in my life.
I feel the aftermath more than the event.
As I sat outside her house this afternoon, I didn't want to go in.

Fifty minutes.
What do you say after two weeks? There's nothing at all there.
It felt... pointless.
Empty, but ironically because it felt so full of nothingness.
Inexplicably angry.


I wanted to kick out as I left.

"Yes... an OK holiday"
"No, I didn't feel much about my sister".
"Yes I spent a lot of time at the gym".
"No people at work didn't make any more comments about my weight today".
"Yes New Year's Eve was positive"

I lost my voice today. More, there just didn't seem any point in using it.

All wires and no plug.

She was positive about a part of the holiday I'd managed well.
It felt as though she only wanted to hear good things.
I only gave her good things.

It's a waste of time.
I can't even be honest with myself here, let alone with her there.
I feel like giving up.
I am unreasonably angry that she couldn't see what I couldn't show.
I'm too scared to even begin to think what it is that i couldn't show.

In that room, there was nothing in me today that could be expressed with words.

Is this normal after a therapy break?

Long December

And it's been a long December and there's reason to believe
Maybe this year will be better than the last

These words were going round my head as I stopped the car to take this picture on the eve of the new year.

The countryside was breathtaking as the rays of the winter sunset sliced through sharp trees to spike the cold, crisp grasses.


I wanted to thank everyone reading for the kindness and support you have given so patiently since I dipped my toe into the blog pond.
You guys rock.

For each and every one of you, I hope that this year is better than the last.
x