motions of living

It’s after midnight. With all the meds that I have taken because of my back pain, I should be out like a light. But as usual, the darkness has taken over me and I feel the need to write. I am thinking about my suicide plan, again. I can’t seem to not think about it. I know people need me to be here. And I want to be there for them, but I am suffering to the tenth degree of hell and I don’t know how much more I can take. I am not in serious pain, though my foot is throbbing like my heart beats. I can never get away from the throbbing.

I was reading a self-help book tonight about shame and perfectionism. It got me thinking about how much I am hurting because I was abused but I never talked about the abuse. My therapist calls it “loyalty” to my parents. I won’t say that about my cousin because I have little to no contact with him. It makes me sick and triggers me every time I see him or hear his name. What is worse is that he has a brother that looks just like him. Freaks me out every time I see him. But I have to remind myself that he is not the one that hurt me. I don’t know why this stuff is coming up now. I guess it’s because it hasn’t been dealt with and keeps surfacing at inopportune times. Like do I really need to talk about this stuff? It’s not the reason why I want to kill myself. Though maybe the shame is. Shame is a big thing. But most of it has to do with the fact, I am ashamed of who I am. I am not a male like my brain thinks I am. And it hurts. Being in chronic shame hurts. I feel disgusted with myself about this. I am appalled that I have breasts and get a menstrual cycle. In a few weeks, I will have to have a pap smear. I am not sure how it will go as it is a new person. I don’t know if she will be good or bad. But I am a trusting type. I will tell her to use a small speculum and pray that I don’t feel anything because of my nerve injury. I think the stress of this has spilled over to shame. I hate my privates being looked at, even by a medical professional. It just makes me feel dirty though I know logically, there is nothing wrong with this. It is a medical examination to make sure things are “normal”. It has been ten long years since I last had an exam of this nature so I am long overdue. This person doesn’t know my history of abuse, my history of nerve damage, nothing of the nature. I just hope I don’t shock her when I tell her I can’t feel her touching me. It’s just another thing that I am embarrassed about.

Then I think, why bother with this exam when I am going to kill myself in a few weeks from the time of the exam. It makes no sense, but yet I go through the motions of living because it is expected of me. I hate this responsibility to others that is preventing me from killing myself. And why do I have it!?? My therapist says it’s because I am not an impulsive person. I used to be an impulsive person, but that was more than 20 years ago. I used to cut back then because it was my only way of coping with the pain. Now, I just think of these elaborate ways to kill myself that doesn’t involve drugs or cutting. I have moved past that and that scares me because the methods that I have chosen are more lethal. More lethal and less window of survival. I have thought it out very carefully. But again, my heart is conflicted. As much as it wants to die, it doesn’t want to cause others pain. I know that I will be dead and that it shouldn’t matter, but I am a sensitive person that thinks of these things. I wish I could be selfish, just a little bit of the time so I could try and take my life. But I am not. It was drilled into me at a young age to always put others first. And I am putting others first before taking my life. My therapist says that she will never recover from my death and I know that is true. UGH. I hate her for doing this to me! Why did she have to shed a tear when I told her years ago that I was going to take my life? It was that tear that is killing me today and part of the reason I am still here. Without her passion and love, I wouldn’t be here. I don’t mean love in a sexual sense. We are not “lovers”, just have a huge feelings toward one another. With my psychiatrist, there is a pride and joy I get from her. Her smile and comfort keeps me going. I know she will always be there for me, no matter the hour. And I do love her for that.

I really don’t think that if I didn’t have their belief in me when I feel so worthless and hopeless, I would still be here. Yet I still struggle to take my life. The constriction has its hold on me during these dark hours of the night. Yet they don’t show their face in the morning light. It’s terrible going through this night after night with no relief. If I could, I would end things now. But I don’t want my mother to find me. I feel that will kill her. I have to find a place to do the deed. And I have been lazy trying to find a spot. It’s not like I can google it. Why must suicide be so hard? Yet people do it every day. I envy them, I really do. No one sees this side of me. No one is there. Sure, there might be a hotline or crisis center I can call, but why bother. I am not in distress. I am not in imminent danger. I just feel like killing myself because my heart hurts. The heaviness is back and it’s hard to breathe. My left breast feels like it weighs 6,000 pounds upon my chest. Yet I often think of cutting it off with piano wire. I just am afraid of the ensuing blood coming out of me that I won’t be able to stop. I will bleed to death and that is not a good way to go. I hate myself for feeling this way. I feel evil. I feel like I have to do something to ease my ache in my chest but what? Tylenol won’t work or any other analgesic. Even my opioid pain meds won’t touch this ache. How am I to relieve this suffering? I can’t sleep. My brain won’t shut down. I am dying a slow death. I am tired of hurting this degree night after night. And it’s a lonely struggle. I smile it away so no one can see the hurt beneath the surface. It is for me to bear and me only. It’s called the motions of living and it sucks.

Writing Bug and Suicidal Risk

Writing bug and Suicide Risk

I have the insatiable need to write. I thought about journaling but I don’t feel like entering my thoughts in a private journal. What I have to say is too important. It is about my suicidal feelings. I am torn, really torn, about what to do with them. I am in no danger tonight. But I picked a date and that date is slowly approaching. I have been trying not to think about it but it’s in the back of my head. I keep thinking/telling myself I don’t have to go through with this. That I can make it through. A friend of mine would be crushed without my help. And would be devastated with my loss. I can’t help but feel trapped. Like I can’t take my life because people need me to be here and I don’t want to be here any more. It’s a struggle I have been dealing with for years. I am tired of fighting this. I just want to give in to my thoughts, to not exist anymore. It’s painful to breathe. I am tired of the heaviness on my chest and the accompanying chest pains that magically appear and disappear on their own. Sometimes an Ativan is needed to get rid of these pains. I know it’s my anxiety when the pain goes away and the heaviness lessens.

Right now I feel like I am a burden to myself. I almost told my therapist today that I don’t want to meet twice a week anymore. I know she wouldn’t approve. She knows I have a date but I have not given it to her. I just can’t because I know she will try and stop me. It’s not like she is going to be okay with me dying by suicide. No therapist will. Then I have the agony of sending a copy of my book to a former therapist. If I send it now and she tries to get in touch with me after I die, I know the book was written in vain. Some writer I am. I write how much this process has helped me, how CAMS has helped me and then I kill myself? Good going. It just doesn’t make sense. I am afraid. I am afraid of getting older and I don’t want to live because I never wanted to be an adult. But my support system kept on telling me I was worth it and I believed them. So I am still here today.

I know one day I will end my life by my own hand. It is written in the statistics of suicide research. I fit every model. I am high risk because I have attempted multiple times, I have an abuse history, I am transgender, and I am hopelessly depressed. All these factors are not good in assessing suicide risk. The only thing I have not done is give away my most prized possessions. Though I really don’t have any. I have my suicide library that I value dearly but it hasn’t helped me deal with my suicide thoughts. I have not been cured of them and as one person in my life has said, I never will. I will always have these thoughts of ending my life. But do I have to act on them? Should I just let them fester until they boil over? I don’t know. Right now I am calm. I am just going through the motions of life as if I were living without thinking of taking my life. No one knows except my therapist and psychiatrist. (And now the blogosphere.) I really want to end my life yet I still want something from it. What I want, I don’t know what that is. I would love to complete my degree but I don’t have the money for it. I don’t even know if the stress of school will activate my paranoia and psychosis again. I do want to write another book. But I have no ideas. They are few and far between. Then I think I should go back to the hospital where I will be safe and possibly be able to think of something to write. But why bother with that if I just want to end my life in a month and a half or so. I am so torn. Ambivalence is such a bitch. And it’s not like you can do a pro/con thing when contemplating ending your life. Every time I do it, I seem to have more pros than cons. There are reasons why I want to end my life. I don’t want to be in chronic physical pain anymore. I don’t want to have psychache. I don’t want to live because I just can’t tolerate my self hate. I can’t tolerate being a woman when my brain keeps telling me I am a man. And the only reason I have not gone through with transition is because my mother won’t accept me as a man. So I rather die as her daughter than her son. I have nothing else to live for. I am only alive to keep my therapist and family happy. They know my suffering. I guess they rather see me suffer than to be dead. I have been fighting this depression for a really long time. I have been suicidal since I was eight. I first attempted when I was ten. That was thirty years ago. I think that is a long time to suffer from a depression that defies treatment. No pill alleviates my suffering and I have been on many. I am just a hopeless case.

I thought about sending this to my therapist but I am not going to. It is written by me and not my alter, Hyde. I am very tired but I am not in pain, least not physically. My brain just wouldn’t shut off until I wrote this stuff out. Now I am feeling sleepy and I think I can call it a night. These suicidal thoughts that come out are my midnight demons. They come out after midnight and I am truly in their grip. My heart is heavy and there is nothing I can take to make it light. My world is dark and gray. It has been like this for a very long time.

Third Blog of the Day: Suicidal Ramblings

Okay, so this is my third blog of the day. I just feel the need to write as my brain is overloaded with this heatwave.

I love my new haircut but my mother doesn’t. My father didn’t see it today. I didn’t remove my baseball cap so he could comment on it. He was wondering why I didn’t shave my goatie I have going on. I usually trim it when I see him but I am tired of trimming it.

My brother in law put in my AC so my room is more tolerable now than it was earlier this afternoon. I am wicked tired. I should be sleeping but I feel like I should write. I got too much stuff on my mind. Like why am I not a boy. Why do I have to have female breasts. I feel like such a loser.

My therapist doesn’t know the week I plan on killing myself. I won’t be telling her. I have everything planned out, sort of. Only question is timing of it. I still need to give my psychiatrist her goodbye letter that I wrote a month ago. That is important to me. She needs to know what I have written. I think I will mail it the day I will die. Course, I am still ambivalent and might not go ahead with my plans. I still have not found a cyber person to take care of my social media accounts when I die. But then, I don’t think too many people pay attention to what I write so it might not be a big deal, especially on Twitter. I really don’t see too many people responding, but I could be wrong. I won’t know because I will be gone.

I wish I could say what my reasons are for killing myself. Pain is one. Being transgender is another. Living in a female’s body sucks. In June, I have to go for a pap smear because it’s been ten years since my last one. But I am wondering if it will be worth it at all seeing as I will be dead a few weeks after I am gone. It’s almost like, why bother? I go through the motions as if I want to live so no one has a clue I want to die. It’s not like it is written on my forehead.

Another reason I don’t want to live anymore is because I am tired of living a life I just don’t want to live. I am tired of breathing. I am tired of just being. I am tired of my life being such a struggle every day and no one noticing. I am tired of hurting every single day. I am never going to be a stellar writer. Hell, I can’t even sell 100 copies of my book. I can’t even give them away for free. That is how bad my book title is, perhaps. I am not looking for awards but a simple appreciation can go a long way. I am going to give the book away to the two people that have influenced the book the most. Then I am going to kill myself. I am such a loser. I keep thinking that this is wrong, that I can’t kill myself. I don’t have the guts to go through with it. But I can’t help thinking that suicide is the answer for me. It will solve the pain piece. I won’t be in pain anymore. I can go to my death bed as a female like how every one sees me. My psychiatrist still sees me a female, not as a male. But then I have known her since I was a kid. I don’t blame her. How do you make that kind of transition? Even my eye doctor is the same way. It’s all confusing and rather than sort out the confusion, I rather die. I should maybe write a goodbye letter to my eye doctor. I have known him for more than twenty years. But how do I even begin to write something like that? He is a good guy. We have hung out together for a little bit, coffee and movies. I have even made him dinner a few times.

Then I think about my family and how devastated they will be when I am gone. It kills me. Some days I care and others I try not to. Knowing that I will be a source of their pain is not a fun thing to know. I try not to think about it because it always puts a stop gap measure in my planning. I love my sisters and my nieces and nephew. I know that this will hurt them beyond all measure. But I know they will get over my death with time. It is the one thing that I think keeps the suicidal demons going is knowing this. I don’t care how my aunts will react to my death. I worry that my mother will die of a broken heart. But then it will be her “daughter” and not her “son”. She wouldn’t have to deal with me becoming a man. And I think that is better for her.

Hospitalizations: Fifteen Minutes of Fame

Hospitalizations: Fifteen Minutes of Fame

I had therapy. My therapist read my “Brick Wall” blog. She asked if we could talk about the bricks and we spent most of the session going over them. I also told her about my book problems, that I think it is disorganized. She said that it is her most prized possession, so I think she is biased in my writing abilities. She said my short story was heartbreaking to read. I haven’t gotten too many likes on it. I may have to play with the tags a bit. Anyway, talking about the bricks was difficult because it lead to where I was in my last hospitalization, where I wrote the story. I told her how no one was looking at the bricks, that they were just looking for the cement to dry before sending me home, so to speak. That is all they cared about. Stabilization and discharge were the key focus of what they wanted to do. What brought you in the hospital, they didn’t care about. Or if they did, it was always, “we’ll talk about it tomorrow” but never did. I hated that my needs were ignored and patronized. I flatly told them I was going to kill myself when I left the hospital during my initial few days when they wanted to discharge me. And it was true. I needed help and was going to stay inpatient to get that help. Except the help came back to me looking for help from outside services. The social worker that was working with me didn’t care about my needs. I ended up having to call places to look for outside support. I tried to get it but never had a call back or even an email back, though one place the email came back as undelieverable. It was a trying time. I wanted to kill myself so badly and yet I was supposed to make all these phone calls to show that I wanted to live? To do the work my team was supposed to be doing? I just don’t understand their mentality. Yet it has been nine months since I left the hospital. I am still here because the anti depressant they put me on really help stabilize my depression. Too bad it no longer works. I stopped taking it in December.

My therapist thinks I should write a blog about past hospitalizations and current ones. Thing is, I don’t remember much. I know things are different today than they were back then. For example, there are no longer any outside passes given. If you want outside passes, you are basically discharged. When I was in the hospital in August, they wanted to give me grounds privileges. This meant that I could go out for staff walks. I told them adamantly no because I was scared I was going to run. They gave it to me anyway. Granted that at the time, I was in an AFO so I know I wouldn’t get far, but they still took that chance of letting me go. Stupid, I tell ya. I should have gone away from the group and tried to escape. I don’t know what that would look like but I know it wouldn’t be good on either side. I would most likely get reprimanded like a child, even though I am an adult. But that would be on them. I told them I would run and if I did, it was on them, not me.

I remember a time when I was in the hospital 21 years ago. I was severely depressed and suicidal. I had attempted suicide and was hospitalized against my will, in fact the admitting staff forged my signature on the consent form. I went through my records after discharged. Anyway, back then they had ground privileges, which meant you could leave the unit unaccompanied by a staff person. Just as long as you stayed on hospital grounds. Well, I decided to walk around the block after working hours and got “caught” by off duty staff. My privileges were revoked the next day as I broke the “rules”. I never kept my privileges too long. I always did something to revoke them. One weekend I had to beg for an outside pass just to pay a bill (I was there for more than a month and if I didn’t pay the bill, my phone was going to be turned off). I told them I would be back within an hour and I did. It was the first time they trusted me to do this. It was tough because I was so suicidal and they weren’t going to let me try again, hence why my stay was 2 ½ months. That was my longest time in the hospital. It did help me but the demons were still there. I had major issues that I still don’t talk to anyone about, not even my current therapist. It’s just too scary.

Last night I was looking for former therapists. I came across one, Dr. B. She helped me probably more than all the rest. She was the longest therapist that I have seen till that point, three years. All the rest of the therapists that I have seen were year or less. I am going to send her my book and email address. I wrote about her in my book. It was hard not to include her because the opening introduction has her in it as that was my first serious suicide attempt. I had made other attempts before that one, but this one landed me in the hospital and then I was there for a long time. That is when you had good care and one on one contact with someone. Now they have these “teams” where there are all the staff from the unit meet with you for fifteen minutes or so and then decide what to do with you. Fifteen minutes to decide if you need further stay or discharge. It is nothing like the care I had 21 years ago. You met with your inpatient therapist, then a social worker, and then your contact person who was a staff member for that shift. This no longer happens and it’s sad. No longer do you feel safe in the hospital or cared for. It is the end of the era for hospitals. I will never go back, no matter how suicidal I get. They can just kiss my ass goodbye.