Monday, September 17, 2012

I Can Hardly Stand All The Excitement

I've spent the past two weeks catching up on a backlog of shit that should've been done a long time ago. Some of it, I wasn't even aware had NOT been done. So B. from Huntsville and I have written probably 100 blog posts, getting (and keeping) everything up to date. Needless to say, I'm exhausted. The backlog is done, but I'm still having to write 4-6 posts a day to keep on top of everything.

But you know what? I work my ass off, and I deserve every goddamn dime of it...and then some.

In other news, the dreams still haven't stopped. Night before last I dreamed that J. had fallen off a bridge (dream logic, don't ask) in the middle of a storm. The water under the bridge was rushing violently (personal phobia), but no one else was going out to try to save her, so I did it. I pulled her out and thought she was dead. She lived, though, and I woke up shortly after that.

Talk about fucking nerve-wracking. Why won't these stupid dreams stop? All right, subconscious, I get it. I have issues and things I need to take care of. Stop beating me over the head with it, ok?

Tuesday, September 11, 2012

I Wish....

I wish I were thin.

Ok, not thin, but I wish I weighed what I did in high school. 170-ish. Which sounds fat until you consider that I'm between 5'9" and 5'10". Either way, it's a hell of a lot less than I weigh now.

Why? Lots of reasons, really.

But I'd be lying if I said it didn't have a lot to do with the fact that I wish I could be Spider-Woman for Halloween.


Where I'd go dressed like that, I have no idea. I might just stay at home and look at myself in the mirror. Plus, it'd give me an excuse to dye my hair black again. I miss the shit out of my black hair. :(

But for reals? Read about her--Spider-Woman, the original Jessica Drew version. And if you don't wanna wade through all that shit, just suffice it to say that she was brainwashed and started her "career," so to speak, as a villain. When she realized she'd been brainwashed, she turned against her brainwashers (is that even a word?) and went "good." There's way more to it, too, but I'm too lazy to write about it all. Suffice it to say that I find a lot in the character that I can relate to.

There's this, for example (clicky if it's not big enough to read; Blogger does something weird with image sizes):


Story of my life. *Sigh*

Besides, red looks amazing on me. Yellow, not so much. But red? Oh, yeah.

30 Things About My Invisible Illness You May Not Know

It has been brought to my attention that it's National Invisible Chronic Illness Awareness Week. They're running a thing called "30 Things About My Invisible Illness You May Not Know" and asking prolific bloggers to fill out this little questionnaire-type thing.

Clearly, I'm not a prolific blogger. I doubt anyone reads this thing but maybe...me? But, still, I feel compelled to do this shit, anyway. If there is anyone out there reading, humor me. Or skip this post. Whichever is fine. But maybe it'll help someone. And even if it doesn't, I guess it won't hurt.


30 Things About My Invisible Illness You May Not Know

1. The illness I live with is: Bipolar I, with psychotic features. I also have linear scleroderma with some generalized symptoms, asthma, severe allergies, and migraines. Also, a kitchen sink. I'm answering the questions in the context of bipolar, though, as it has had a even bigger impact on my life than being a fat asthmatic.

2. I was diagnosed with it in the year: 2010.

3. But I had symptoms since: As long as I can remember. Since I was 5 or 6, at least. Maybe farther back. My memory is shit.

4. The biggest adjustment I’ve had to make is: Learning to live without people I truly care about because my illness is such a monster--and it turned me into one, too. Also, I have to pay very close attention to things other people don't even think about, like how much sleep I get.

5. Most people assume: That there is nothing wrong with me, unless they've had the dubious honor of dealing with it firsthand.

6. The hardest part about mornings are: Finding a reason to bother with even getting out of bed.

7. My favorite medical TV show is: House, I guess, but I don't watch TV. Haven't even really watched House in a couple of years. I haven't had cable since 2006.

8. A gadget I couldn’t live without is: My sweet, sweet Kindle with its impressive collection of cheap/free books. There are days when it's the only thing that makes life worth living.

9. The hardest part about nights are: Not thinking about all the things I've lost. As you can see, I can hardly ever manage to do it.

10. Each day I take: 150 mg. of Wellbutrin--1 pill--in the morning, 2 B-complex gummy vitamins, 150 mg. (usually) of Lamictal--one 100 mg. pill and two 25 mg. pills--at night, and whatever headache or allergy stuff is necessary to get through the day. In the winter, I often need my albuterol inhaler for the asthma because it's aggravated by cold weather. Also, lots and lots of caffeine.

11. Regarding alternative treatments I: Think you're a goddamned idiot if you think popping some stupid herbal preparation or whatever is going to cure you if you're severely mentally ill. It might work for people who are either not sick but think they are or for people who are only mildly ill, through the placebo effect. But if you're really sick? It's like trying to bail out a sinking ship with a teaspoon.

12. If I had to choose between an invisible illness or visible I would choose: Visible. At least then people wouldn't think I was full of shit when I'm unable to work or sleep 18 hours a day or sleep 2 hours a day or whatever.

13. Regarding working and career: It's hard. I've never really held down much of a job in my life. I can do it for a little while, but ultimately, I unravel. Before I started working at home, which I had to do for lack of any other options, I worked temp jobs. I've done this longer than I've ever done anything else (4 1/2 years).

14. People would be surprised to know: That I wish I could speak Spanish a lot better than I do (which is to say, hardly at all) and give English lessons to immigrant adults who genuinely wanted to learn.

15. The hardest thing to accept about my new reality has been: The isolation.

16. Something I never thought I could do with my illness that I did was: Run my own business.

17. The commercials about my illness: I don't think there are any, at least not that I know of. Again, I don't watch TV. Hell, they advertise antipsychotics like Seroquel and Abilify as antidepressants nowadays. People don't talk about the bipolars and the schizophrenics in polite society.

18. Something I really miss doing since I was diagnosed is: Being able to drink socially. I can still do it to some degree, but it's not worth it most of the time.

19. It was really hard to have to give up: The belief that if I just tried a little harder, I could control these demons on my own. I had, after all, been working with that assumption for nearly 30 years.

20. A new hobby I have taken up since my diagnosis is: I haven't, really, unfortunately. I have to work way more than any person should, and when I'm not working, I'm actively trying to work on myself. So no new hobbies, at least not right now.

21. If I could have one day of feeling normal again I would: Get together all my old friends and have an outrageously stupid party or something. Just anything to help me forget the shit I have to live with for a little while.

22. My illness has taught me: To look at things the way they really are, rather than the way I want them to be.

23. Want to know a secret? One thing people say that gets under my skin is: Anything that has to do with Big Pharma conspiracies and people not needing "all that medicine." Please. Suck. My. Dick.

24. But I love it when people: Think of me and do any little thing to show me that they've thought of me. Doesn't have to be big. Even someone engaging in a conversation with me about something not superficial for no other reason than because they care what I think is enough to make my day.

25. My favorite motto, scripture, quote that gets me through tough times is: I grew up in the Baptist church and attended a Methodist one for a while when I was a little older. Still, this particular story--and I'm going to quote it in its entirety because of the impact it has on me, even though I realize it's long--has only acquired its significance in fairly recent times. There are multiple reasons why. (I'm breaking it up into paragraphs that aren't in the original text to make it easier to read, due to its length.)

Early in the morning, he came again to the temple. All the people came to him, and he sat down and taught them. The scribes and the Pharisees brought a woman who had been caught in adultery, and placing her in the midst, they said to him, "Teacher, this woman has been caught in the act of adultery. Now in the Law, Moses commanded us to stone such women. So what do you say?" This they said to test him, that they might have some charge to bring against him.

Jesus bent down and wrote with his finger on the ground. And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, "Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her." And once more, he bent down and wrote on the ground.

But when they heard it, they went away one by one, beginning with the older ones, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before him. Jesus stood up and said to her, "Woman, where are they? Has no one condemned you?"

She said, "No one, Lord."

And Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you; go, and from now on, sin no more."

~John 8:2-11

26. When someone is diagnosed I’d like to tell them: This will be the hardest thing you have to deal with in your life because no matter what you do or how hard you try to divorce yourself from it, it's always there. But there are people in the world who understand, and those are the ones you want to keep around, for they can help hold you up, even when you can't do it yourself. And for God's sake, take your goddamn medication, don't drink, don't do drugs of any kind, and try your best not to derail your own recovery.

27. Something that has surprised me about living with an illness is: The fact that you can occasionally find understanding from people you never would've expected it from.

28. The nicest thing someone did for me when I wasn’t feeling well was: Help me clean my house and catch up on my work before it got even farther behind and I got more overwhelmed. (I'm looking at you, Kitty Cat.)

29. I’m involved with Invisible Illness Week because: Eh, I don't know if you'd call this "involved," but I'm doing it in hopes that maybe what I have to say will help someone else somewhere down the line, as trite as it sounds.

30. The fact that you read this list makes me feel: Hopeful. Maybe there are people out there who care, even anonymously.


Also, there's this, about living with a chronic, invisible illness, if anyone gives a shit.

Saturday, September 8, 2012

Sexuality: From Hyper- To A- In 3 Easy Steps

Ever wondered how to go from hypersexual to asexual in 3 easy steps? Well, wonder no more, my friends. Teh Bunneh has the answer, from bitter experience.

1.) Lose your mind.
2.) Lose everyone who's ever meant anything to you.
3.) Get medicated and watch your desire to get laid go down the toilet.

See? Now wasn't that easy?


All jokes--even lame ones like that one up there--aside, I have seriously lost pretty much all my inclination toward sex. I'm not sure when or why or how it happened, but it did.

Ok, well, here's the thing. In the abstract, I would totally say that I would like to have sex. In theory, it sounds like an excellent idea. But in practice? Ugh. No, thank you. Please keep your disgusting paws off of me.

Obligatory TMI warning: I don't know that the problem is my "sex drive," whatever that is, because I don't have an issue with masturbation. My vibrator gets its normal amount of use, you know? But the very thought of someone else touching me turns my stomach. I've become very standoffish--almost Asperger's-like. I've always been a little uncomfortable with being touched by most people, but I've gotten worse. I don't even want my friends to hug me. Just...please...no.

This has been going on for awhile, but what brought it to the forefront of my mind was a dream I had a few nights ago. My dreams are extremely vivid nowadays, and they torment me all night, every night. I can remember 5 separate ones from last night, for example. AND I TOOK A SLEEPING PILL! Needless to say, without the pills, my sleep quality is complete and total shit. Which is probably at least partly why I feel like hell lately.

Anyway, the other night, I dreamed that I had sex with this one dude I used to know. Actually, it was the guy my mother tried to marry me off to when I was, like, 16, but that's a whole 'nother can of worms I'm not going to open here. And, no, I never actually had sex with him in real life. Even though I was forced--ok, blackmailed--into dating him for nearly a year, I never even kissed him because...well, because I didn't fucking want to. And I hadn't yet reached the age where I fucked men because I didn't know what else to do. *Eyeroll*

Ok, I'm off track here. I'll leave the explanation of that situation for another day.

The point is, in my dream, I fucked this dude. Not only did dream me cry after it was over--and made him do it doggie style, so I didn't have to look at him--but also real me, when I woke up, literally felt nauseated. I expect that if I could've woken up enough, real me would've cried, too.

Not most normal people's reaction to a sex dream, hmm?

It wasn't just the fact that it was that guy, either. I mean, I'm sure that was part of it. But, like, back in April when my friend L., whom I fucked off and on from the time we graduated high school until about 3-4 years ago, came over, I rebuffed his advances, too. He came and sat next to me on the couch and threw an arm around me, and I kept scooting farther and farther away, until the arm of the couch impeded my progress. Then, I made some lame excuse about being tired and went to bed. Alone.

What. The. Fuck?

Don't get me wrong. It's not that I wish I *had* fucked him. I'm glad I didn't. This is just out-of-character behavior for me. I mean, I've got the numbers of at least 4 men in my phone whom I could call anytime I wanted, and they'd come over and fuck me if I just asked. A few minutes on the Internet would dredge up quite a few more who are willing. New ones, even. I just don't want to. Like I said, the thought of it makes me feel ill. I don't even get on any of the sex/kink/hookup websites anymore. Well, I still get on my message board, but that's not to hook up with people. It's just to chat with my old friends. I pretty much avoid the sex stuff there.

I'm not sure what happened. I haven't had sex in nearly 2 years. Haven't done anything, period, in over a year. Have I trained myself out of the desire? Or is it something else?

A part of me thinks that I've finally accepted how self-destructive that impulse is. I've realized that it's not healthy, and it damn sure doesn't make me happy. I don't like being a slave to an overwhelming, driving NEED that pushes me into doing shit I don't even want to do, things that I know are horrible ideas, things that are bound to cause more problems than they'll ever fix just to shut it up. Maybe I'm tired of that particular demon having that kind of control over me, so I've finally broken its hold on me? I don't know.

And, too, maybe I'm sick of the way that so many people have used that awful demon inside me to get what they wanted. Some of them didn't realize how exploitative it was, so I don't blame them...but some of them did. It wasn't the desire for them to fuck me that drove me to it. I was being driven by something bigger and stronger than me, and I turned to sex in DESPERATION to quiet it. Nothing about that is healthy. I don't fault the ones who didn't know. I do fault the ones who knew and didn't care.

I'm also sure that part of it is the fact that the sex demon inside ruined my relationships with the people I loved the most. My desperation to shut it up made me do horrible, stupid, destructive things that hurt other people even more than they hurt me. So every sexually-tinged thought is tainted with that knowledge, whether consciously or subconsciously, so I'm sure that's not helping matters, either.

It's just as well, I guess. At least I'm staying out of trouble.

Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Letters From A Crazy Person

Dear X,

In the grocery store today, the cashier whose line I got in looked so much like you that I had to check her name tag to make sure it *wasn't* you. I know, what the hell would you be doing working in the Oxford Walmart? I dunno. It just took me by surprise.

What's worse, she didn't just look like you. She talked and acted like you, too. And I had to stand there and smile and say nice things while she rang up my stuff and chatted with me. I think I pulled it off, but Jesus Christ, it was hard.

Before I left the house today, I had all sorts of big plans for all the stuff I was going to get done. But running into a you look-alike fucked my head up so much that I managed to write a grand total of 4 blogs all night long.

You're on my mind all the time. And the stupid radio keeps tormenting me with this song:



The song is 20 years old. Why is it playing on the radio every time I get in the truck nowadays?

I'm so sorry. So, so, so sorry. You'll never know how much. Just as you'll never know how much I love you.

~A Stupid Rabbit





Dear Y,

Florida was marvelous. Even if it did rain all the time, even if every single time we tried to swim was interrupted by something, even if we couldn't stay down there very long. None of that mattered. You know why? Because I was in my favorite place in the whole world...with you.

Oh, how I wish things could be the same again between us. You have no idea how much I wish they could be. I don't ever say anything, mostly because I'm a chicken shit, but I also don't want to make you uncomfortable. But, goddamn, I miss the way things used to be.

I guess it's true that you don't know what you once had until you've lost it. I took what we had for granted for years and years, and I deserved to be tossed aside for it. I don't blame you in the least. But that doesn't stop me from wishing it could be different.

I will keep hoping. I will keep hoping my whole life. But even if it never goes back to the way it was, I'd rather have it this way than not have you in my life at all.



You have always been--and will always be--loved by me.

~Bunny

Sunday, September 2, 2012

You Still Have...All Of Me

I shouldn't care. I know I shouldn't.

I shouldn't even think about it.

But I do. I can't help it. It's beyond my control.

I can keep it to myself. I can hide the pain that gnaws at me. I can stay away. I can avoid wreaking havoc on their lives by keeping away. I can bear the pain. I can do all these things.

But I can't forget. I can't help being haunted by them, by ghosts of people who aren't even dead. I can't help loving them still, even the one whose knife I still haven't managed to pull out of my back yet.

No, I can't help loving them. And I damn sure can't help hating myself for it.



You used to captivate me by your resonating light
But now I'm bound by the life you left behind
Your face, it haunts my once-pleasant dreams
Your voice, it chased away all the sanity in me

These wounds won't seem to heal
This pain is just too real
There's just too much that time cannot erase....