Once I was diagnosed with bipolar disorder, all of this seemed to make sense. Of course, I was strange, I had severe mental illness! My bizarre persuasions were pathological now. But now that this diagnosis has been termed a misdiagnosis, the reality has set in that there are no excuses left. I really am just a bit strange.
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When I was a kid I always felt like I was constantly out of my depth. The complex post-traumatic stress disorder that I lived with robbed me of an identity. For me to compare myself to someone else was silly. It didn’t matter what the comparison was going to be, I would always imagine myself losing horribly. There was no point in trying!
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My mom did send two postcards that weren’t signed. One told me I didn’t know what she meant when she said what she meant about what she said. Or something along those lines. I literally couldn’t understand the message. The other one just said “Happy 40th Birthday.” Like I am a distant relative and she saw my birthday coming up in her calendar.
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I read The Good Body by Eve Ensler in college and I desperately yearned for the kind of self-acceptance it modeled. But I wasn’t there yet. But I got there eventually. As equal parts apology, acknowledgement, and wonder, I want to say a few things about my body. All of them are way overdue.
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I haven’t been writing poetry lately. Or really, much of anything. For the last four-ish years I have been writing on occasion, but nothing I am supremely happy with and everything I produced seemed to feel… different somehow. Not as powerful. Not as passionate. Some kind of watered down, mealy mouthed collection of niceties where the subject matter was literally no longer life or death.
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But then I went to visit my mom’s side of the family, the last time I ever did, and was kicked out of Thanksgiving. I came into that therapy session charged up and ready to unpack my what had happened. The psychologist brushed it off and kept returning to the topic of vegetables and how I needed to eat more of them.
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I was never a little girl who dreamt of my perfect wedding day. My childhood was spent surviving emotional abuse and neglect. I could never picture myself as an adult at all, let alone imagine myself walking down an aisle. The future was an encompassing gray haze to me. The only way to avoid getting lost in it was not to engage at all.
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In the midst of feeling like I am barely human, barely functioning, barely able to pretend anymore, an amazing opportunity comes along. Not sure if it will pan out. Not sure if I will be back on here complaining about missed chances in a few days. But having some hope for breakfast is the most filling meal.
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While sometimes I feel a twinge of regret when I hear someone talking about their best friend from 4th grade or how their college roommate is now their bridesmaid, whenever I look back on how I was treated and suffocated in these past relationships, it becomes very clear: a 20+ year friendship with someone who saw me as someone unworthy of respect is absolutely not what I want.
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I actually feel really good about this. Not entirely sure why. Maybe I don’t have anything left to feel right now. Who knows? I am excited to see where this goes and quite frankly, if it all goes terribly wrong, how will I even know?
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Although I’m still not 100%, the fog of cognitive confusion is truly lifting. I find myself able to follow complex tasks and I’m even forgetting less. It’s a relief to know the haze I have been living in for so long is not permanent.
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I knew I did not miss my own mother. Cutting off contact removed my vain hope she would one day become someone she was not and actually be a good mother.
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