Divisions and Precisions

Crazy

So. The weekend was good. Gaming was fun, if I did run a bit long, and afterwards I spent a great deal of time hanging out and talking with Dawn and Jason and Jo and Eric. Sunday was good too. I spent most of it reading Tribe 8. I'm amazed by it. If you're looking for a new and decidedly original RPG, check it out. Seriously.

Then I woke up this morning.

The voices I carry with me were loud and active and strident this morning. I think I've talked about this before. We all do what psychologists like to call 'self-talk'. My self-talk is usually compartmentalized into different aspects of my personality. I've mentioned this before. With everything that's going on in my life right now -- and everything that's not going on in my life right now -- those voices were berating and angry.

"You're worthless."
"You're a fucking genius, and you're wasting it doing nothing."
"You're a fraud, and everyone's going to find that out."
"Why are you even bothering?"

And perhaps most frightening of all:

"What's the use? What are you living for?"

I'm much, much calmer now. I was hysterical inside until about 2pm or so. I took off from my desk several times to go cry in the bathroom, insides twisted and aching. These storms are old, familiar sensations of mine, and they're often overreactions to things that are going on in my life. Molehills turn into mountains. All of a sudden everything in my life gets put under a microscope, and it all looks like shit. Nothing seems worthwhile. Everything about my life seems to be empty and wrong and stupid until I work myself up to such a pitch that it seems like I should just die and get it over with.

It's what psychologists call 'suicidal ideation'. I wasn't going to try, definitely. I've never seriously tried. It's hard to explain. It's a power sort of thing. "I could do this, but I choose not to." "I have this power." "If things get too bad, there's always this." It's like... no matter how bad things get, there's always an option there. By having the power to refuse that option, to be able to say "Well no, things aren't that bad", I feel stronger. To have an option that you're able to refuse means that you aren't powerless and completely out of control. And by realizing that things aren't that bad... things seem to get better. I don't know if that makes sense to anyone but me. The trouble comes when I get in a cycle of perpetuating that hysteria, where instead of getting better, things seem to get worse and worse and worse until I feel like there's no other solution. I haven't felt that way in many many years.

So I'm calm for now. It's not completely a good sort of calm, I know. It's more a tired calm that waves a white flag in surrender. All of the things that had me stressing out this morning (money problems, existential 'what am I doing with my life' questions, etc.) are still around, still causing problems. The voices that were shouting at me this morning are still whispering in the back of my mind. They could get loud again at any moment. Cease fire, not detente.

I'm going to be okay. I know this. And I know I'm going to scare the shit out of some people with this journal entry, but I'm going to be okay.

This is a war I've fought and won before. I can do it again. Posted by Lisa at May 8, 2000 04:15 PM