...insert witty title here...

I suppose I'm so obsessed with watching Frida because it in many ways feels like I'm watching my own life played out. Except that she's a lot older, the pain is more physical than mental, her anger is more outwardly directed than inward, and she had about five million times the talent I have. If I could have that much potential for the creation of beauty... I mean, damn. I'm more or less all right with words but my fingers lack any skill with a brush or pen. Sigh.

Force-feeding myself is getting a little easier. I can't say the depression is easing or the appetite increasing but I'm adapting to it a bit more readily, I suppose, and making sure to feed myself is gradually becoming a habit. It's so ridiculous, after all these years fighting my hunger, denying it's there, refusing to acknowledge it, I can barely recognize it at all. I can finally see the face of Hunger but can't recognize it.

Something I've noticed here is that Colorado seems to have an enormously disproportionate number of underweight women. Perhaps it's that Maryland is one of the 'fattest states' in the nation (which is true) and I'm accustomed to being The Skinny Freak, but it is truly heartbreaking to see so many women around me starving. What once would be a serious trigger is now something of a reverse; I get so upset witnessing their suffering that I want to prove I can overcome it. Even from a purely visual standpoint, the constant bombardment with fashionable emaciation repulses me as I can see how unappealing it is. The lanugo, the bones and bruises, the skin sagging and prematurely aged. I want to be sexy. I want my hands to stop shaking, freezing all the time, looking like they belong to someone twice my age.

I can't count how many times a day I'll witness girls bone-checking while staring at the dessert case, chewing gum like their lives depend on it, clearly terrified of so many calories surrounding them. How many times I'm asked for the nutrition facts in a certain dessert. (I know most of them but, thank god, we are honestly not supposed to tell.) More than once, women with bloodshot eyes and sores around their mouths have ordered cheesecake to go and I've wanted more than anything to refuse it to them. Or at the least, beg them not to do with it what I'm sure will be done. I'm usually trying to hide that I'm crying as I toss forks and napkins into the bags.

If I could afford enough medication to numb myself out, I'd go for it. Beyond depression these days, it's like I just can't handle the heartbreak of the world. Numbing me out might be more like ballancing me at this point. Everything sets me off. I have to stop myself, constantly, from saying something to all these girls. (As if I have any idea what to say, anyway. Please eat? I know you're hurting but it's not worth it? Are there ANY right words for a situation like that?)

At the same time, it's so impossible to fight against the non-hunger. Why force myself to eat when I'm not hungry? Shouldn't I be grateful? Shouldn't I feel lucky? It's to the point that I'll go all day and realize sometime around bedtime that I had nothing, or a banana, or a piece of bread. The old bruises are showing up along my spine and back hipbones. I'd gotten used to having warm hands and feet but so much for that. My body is again covered in lanugo, or at least, more covered than it typically is... Gah.

I wish I could afford to go inpatient. I need a break, some hard-core internal work to sort things through once and for all.

Search query: cars, apartments, contentment

GOD I HATE CAR SHOPPING SO MUCH HOLY CRAP SERIOUSLY YOU HAVE NO IDEA!!!!!

It kinda makes me want to cry a little. And stick big, hot, super-sharp objects in my eye. Because it would be way less painful and obnoxious.

In case you haven't quite guessed, the thing with the pickup fell through. Commence all-around distress and anguish. Perhaps I got my hopes up too high (after all, I know better than to trust...ANYONE...), but they were certainly thouroughly dashed. Kaboom and shatter and all that jazz. I was way past the point of being desperate to end this cockamamie dragon-hunt for a still-working, cheaply priced mechanized beast. Hey, after all, it's only been like two months. Right? BAH.

To point it bluntly, I'm still living in the land of the carless. I still magpie quarters for bus fare and leave the house at 9:20 each morning to make sure I make it to work by 10:45, despite the fact that a straight A-to-B trip is about twenty minutes. I stumble home, weary and sore, from my long, long days to sift through the gravel on Craigslist in a pointless search for fragments of gold. (Or even fool's gold; I may just take what I can get at this point. Anything shiny.) SIIIIIIIGGGHHHH.

The search for an apartment hasn't even begun yet, by the way and for the record. I'm leaving the start of that up to our future roommate, Daniel. I can only take so much.

One of the most frustrating things about not having a car is that it makes sending t'shirt orders out incredibly difficult. Basically, the only days I can make it to the post office are Wednesday, Thursday, and Saturday, and even then it's dependent on me being able to get to the bus in time to catch it before the PO closes.

...I'm having one of those days where my train of thought poops out halfway through. Yes, I know, these days come with alarming frequency lately... Blah... I'd planned on writing about food and other random shite relevant to the supposed subject of this blog but at this point a conclusion seems beyond me. Maybe later today I'll write more, provided my brain gets back into gear. Sorries kids.

Moving onward and upward

Well, I certainly am exhausted now. Jeez louise!

Most obviously, you may notice the blog format has been revamped. Yay! We have a new main picture (since I'm feeling a little more stuck than happy and in my niche) and at the veeeery bottom of the blog, a hit counter! I've tried to get one of those things since day one but Blogger is kinda a pain in the ass when it comes to HTML inserts - it's taken me quite a while to find a good hit tracker. (Oh, do I miss Xanga's log.)

Best of all... Look to your right. By which I mean to the right of your screen.

See that little thumbnail?

The t'shirt?

HOORAAAAY!!!!

Hey, it's only taken...months... Finally, at long last, the blog is intact, the shop is established, and the t'shirts are listed. The Novare Project finally has feet again. It stands. It propels itself forward. IT ACTUALLY HAS A PURPOSE AND KNOWS WHAT IT IS.

At present I only have half a dozen shirts, but I just put in an order today for a bunch more. Mom, thank you so so so so so much for sending the t'shirt stuff to me! I'm super exciteded. When I've got the energy, I'll e-mail the various sites that linked to me in ages past to let them know all the new developments. It's crazy where this project has led - a new e-mail address, website, even my own damn shop! I deal with a wholesale distributor and am on their 'frequent buyer' list. God, it's crazy.

In addition to melting my eyes at the computer screen, today has been all about cars. I hate cars at this point. I want them all to go melt in vats of acid.

We set the alarms for quarter of seven so as to get to an 'early bird special' at Rocky's Autos, about forty-five minutes away. If the site doesn't give you some clue as to how obnoxious the place is...well...gah. It was POURING rain, cold, and by the time we got to the auto dealer ALL the cheap cars had sold.

It was like being stuck in the midst of a bunch of hypoglycemics scrabbling at pinata droppings. Only you had to pay for the candy. And it was second-hand candy. Slightly used, sort of abused. Sold as is, uncertified, no warranty. To be honest, I'm a bit relieved all the cars were gone, even if they would have been purchased for the price of gravel... I'm completely paranoid when it comes to car purchase.

We were home before noon and promptly crashed to the couch, from which Crystal and I have barely moved all day. (Hey, it's my one day off until Wednesday, I can be lazy. Besides, I've been computer-ly productive.) Jody went out to lunch with a friend then came in and told us to get our shoes on since apparently her friend had a friend who was selling a car and blah blah blah.

That? Was a complete waste of time. Holy crap, batman. It was a 90-something Nissan Sentra which, the mechanic assured us, had about 117.000 miles on it, one owner, all those things mechanics like to assure you. This thing was in worse shape than Amber's car after being totaled, I swear. It had dents (and rust in those dents) on every panel, the rear passenger's side door had a nearly one inch gap between door and vehicle at the top, it drove like a riding lawn mower, and I don't know WHAT had happened to the interior. That thing was scary. And he was asking eighteen five for it, too.

According to Jody, I'm being 'too snooty' in my car shopping endeavours. Beggars can't be choosers, etc. Well... Okay. I know I'm not going to get a fantastic car for $1500 bucks. But that doesn't mean I can't get something that will not look hideous and will last me long enough to earn enough for a better car. Really truly is possible!

For instance. Monday, after I get off work, we will be going to take a look at this little buggy. Jody favors the name 'Tweety', Crystal thinks 'Canary'; Megan opts for 'The Rubber Ducky Mobile'. ^.^

Vrrrrooom!!!!

Zip. Nada. Zilch.

I have felt completely worthless the last few days, when it comes to writing, advocacy, awareness, and any other productive sort of thing I ought to be doing. It's hard to explain what's wrong, what's bothering me, why I can't seem to manage to do...anything... F-k depression, yo.

I need to get back into therapy and have been thinking about it quite constantly. Problem is, I do not want to be in therapy. Screw therapy. I hate therapy. It's one of those things that makes you feel worse before you get better and it seems that no matter how much time I spend working through issues it isn't enough. Bi-weekly, once a week, twice a week, twice a week with two different therapists, psychiatrists, medications, group, inpatient, intensive outpatient, I'm so sick of all of it.

Which thing is finally going to help me, let alone cure me? I'm in a new place now, do I have to start all over trying to find a new treatment team, setting up all those support systems and networks of trust all over again? (And please, for the love of god, DO NOT start in on me with any crap about finding a church. I did that. Long time. It caused most of this, don't tell me that now will be different, now they'll make it all better.)

The most twisted thing is that I am beter in many ways than I have been in years. Even if I still regularly self-injure, sometimes can't get out of bed, am dropping weight again like...something you drop quickly... Well, point is, despite it all I'm still holding a steady job. I'm still in a relationship and we're still in love. I'm at least surviving. I haven't tried to kill myself (or done anything seriously dangerous) in over a year.

It's a record! Yay!

Gah.

And as Crystal points out, I've basically already written this entry. Probably five dozen times.

Depression is so damn boring.

Rant.

Dear whoreish housemate:

STOP STEALING MY F-ING THINGS. This memorandum includes, among ALL OTHER POSSESSIONS, my: cash, collectibles, movies, BRAND F-ING NEW CLOTHING, personal treasures, and WHATEVER THE F ELSE YOU MAY HAVE TAKEN!!!!!!!

I'm a tolerant person. I put up with a whole hell of a lot without getting too loud about it. But I AM NOT a total doormat. I CANNOT TAKE ANY MORE OF THIS. I give it maybe a week at best before I snap and stop giving you the minimal amount of respect that you don't deserve anyway.

No love,
me.

P.S. I want my f-king tank top back. And not the one you stole - a new one. I had it a total of two days before you stole it and having other people wear my clothes skeeves me beyond belief. You owe me a new one. Thanks.

Musings, sundry and disconnected

SIIIIIIIiiiiiigggghhhhh. If I never have to shop for a car again I think I'll be happy. (Except, that's totally a lie. Whichever car we end up finding will no doubt be so gnarly that I'll want a new(er) one as soon as can possibly be afforded.) I hate car shopping. Really, really hate it.

This rapid-cycling depression and hypomania is making life completely impossible and incomprehensibly exhausting. I'm either too hyper and unab le to focus to get anything done or too lethargic and unable to lift my head off the pillow to do anything. The past week or more I've been doing well to make it to work and last my shift without a breakdown, let alone contemplate updates.

Speaking of, I was thinking about this yesterday: DC Cheesecake Factory was remarkably patient with me. I never got fired, never even got a write up, yet I was probably right up there for the Most Unstable Employee award. I suppose consistent competence was my greatest selling point or something, whothehell knows.

Sunday morning I nearly didn't make my bus because dragging myself out of bed and into my work clothes was such a completely overwhelming task. Eventually I'd pulled on my uniform and just sat on the edge of the bed crying, staring at my untied shoes, thinking simultaneously how impossibly difficult and pointless it would be to tie them. But, somehow, I still managed. (And literally all day long almost every friend I have there found some way to tell me I "look[ed] like sh*t", which made me feel a whole lot better.) I still got to work on time and made it through the shift intact without screwing anything up severely.

This anecdote actually brings up two points: first, I'm actually quite a bit more stable than I used to be, despite the fact that it feels quite the contrary. Secondarily, it's evidence to the whole DC-was-more-tolerant point... There were several times at that restaurant where I had to call out because of severe depression/anxiety/whatever, faking the physical only to a small extent since I was so depressed I truly felt sick. Beyond that, however, they had to deal with me disappearing mid-shift now and then, emerging from the coat closet or walk-in freezer after a while, all tear-stained, for no discernible reason. A couple times I came in for my shift begging everyone in sight to pick up for me so that I could go home because either I couldn't stop crying or just couldn't stand the thought of six, seven, eight hours with a plastered fake smile, ingratiating myself to people for their money.

And, of course, there were the couple of shifts that I simply could not go onto the floor because I could not stop sobbing. Including one memorable night that they were already short people and refused to send me home, instead telling me to go to the bathroom and try to pull myself together. I called Crystal, panicking and completely distraught for (as is my bent) no discernible reason, who dropped what she was doing and came running to work as quickly as she could. I'm sure I was completely pissing the managers off since I was...wow, how to describe it? totally unhinged? and they couldn't understand why. All they wanted was a reason but no one had died, I hadn't broken up with my girlfriend, wasn't getting kicked out of school, nothing. I think the explanation I gave was a nothing-everything-I DON'T KNOOOW!!! sort of thing, which didn't seem to cut it.

In the end they really had no choice but to send me home. (I think they gave me like two hours to try to pull it together, though, but it was no use.)

And yet, they didn't fire me. If anything, they undeniably handled me with kid gloves for a few weeks after that; they immediately cut back my hours, no further questions asked, and did all they could to help me through it.

I really don't think this location would be so understanding.

Although, an interesting thought connects to all this: had they fired me for an emotional breakdown, could I have sued? :-P I wonder where psychiatric illness falls on the legal end of things...

...arright, I'm all written out, I think. Don't you just love how my entries sort of fizzle instead of conclude these days? Le sigh.

...Okay, actually, I have NO CLUE how to end this. So I'm just going to let it drop... Crystal suggests saying

THE END

No. No, it really makes no sense. Don't try to understand.

Oh sigh. I've had two full days completley at my disposal, no requirements, all the time in the world to update, and I've had absolutely no energy or mental willpower. Hell, I haven't even done much cleaning to speak of, and that's normally my first objective for every free day on the schedule. I don't know what's to fault for this lethargy and, unfortunately, attempts to force myself out of it have thus far failed.

I wanted to put a clip from last night's South Park in here but unfortunately the Internet Police have really cracked down on pirated copyright material, quite significantly spoiling all my fun. For the run down, last night Cartman was his usual little bastardly self and through a complicated run of events got Butters' parents convinced he was gay. And he got sent to de-gayification camp. And it was awesome. Tag line for the camp? 'You can pray the gay away!'

Every couple minutes at gay camp you'd hear a gunshot as another camper killed himself.

I love it when South Park gets bitchy and preachy.

...I've been a real snark today, I'm sorry. I don't know what it is or where it's come from anymore than I can put a tag on this laziness. Probably the two are related as whenever I feel unproductive it leads to feelings of worthlessness which in turn make me rude and cat scratchy toward all near me.

There are many things happening around the homestead which are relevant toward my blog theme and which I'd like to discuss but wouldn't be fair to the members of the household to do so. The old personal space line must be respected inasmuch as I'd go apeshit for someone to write such things about me.

Have I mentioned lately that I can't maintain a train of thought long enough to finish a sentence today...

GOD.

This is the best I can squeeze out. My brain hurts. I need to make dinner because I'm losing weight again even though I don't mean to. But perhaps I do on some level. That's the gnarly thing about recovery; I feel ugly and skinny but ugly and fat at the same time. I'm hungry and food porn a lot these days but the thought of eating makes me nauseous. I'm indecisive about any and all food-related decisions. Food, food, food, godamn food.

I'm constantly stressing about cars, medication, psychiatric treatment, taxes, cars, finances, cars, food, work, writing, everything. Maybe the external lethargy is a Girl, Interrupted type example of velocity vs. viscosity... I need to be back on the mood stabilizers I hate so much and can't afford, anyway. Maybe I need to try a different prescription.

MANIA CAN ANYONE SAY MANIC EPISODE I'M LOSING IIITTTTT.

In other news, Siri! I got your package and I loved it. Listened to the CD first thing and it was awesome. I'll make you a mix and write you a letter the moment my thoughts can slow to match the speed of my handwriting.

Jumpier than a cricket on crack

All right. Lame as I am and lame as this may be I must confess: I'm really disappointed in American Idol so far this season. I mean honestly. They're all so boring! It's like watching a karaoke competition wherein they're all somewhat stoned and kinda just don't give a damn. I can sing acceptably well and it is really not that hard to perform on the stage. Singing is a matter of performance; sell the song, sell yourself, sell the story it tells. We really care more about how you tell it than how well you sing it.



Oh, wait, but also? A slow song doesn't have to be boring. A slow song can give more opportunity for exciting performance than a fast one. That's all. ^.^

By the way, Siri? I'm starting to really consider moving to Sweden. Care to teach me the language so it won't be quite such an awkward move? =-D

...God, I'm completely ADD right now. I can't maintain any thought longer than it takes to think it, far less time than it takes to type it. I'll try to formulate an update later tonight and if not then tomorrow. Day off! Yay!

Wha?

I'm sorry for all these mad update lapses! It's all the fault of my damned job, to be honest. I get home at the end of a seven, eight, ten hour day so exhausted that updating is the last thing on my mind. (Plus Crystal has been needing it a lot to write an evil, fifty mile long paper.)

As far as now goes... I'm not totally asleep but I'm completely braindead nonetheless. Just kinda staring open-mouthed at the computer, eye twitching absently and intermittently, kinda like the stock market has been lately. (Hell, I'm not even sure if that was clever or just made absolutely no sense.)

It's particularly frustrating since I spend most of my morning commutes contemplating topics that need discussion and ideas that I want to develop. For instance: Family Guy and EDs, the character Maris on Frasier, the ever shrinking department store mannequins, the desirable body type variance among different clothing styles (urban, hippie, sorority, Wal-Mart...). On and on.

Right now though it's all I can do but stare at the words miraculously appearing in this formerly blank text box. Dude... I mean, wow... Watch what happens when I wiggle my fingers.... afgjoaeifjg! Hehe.

I'm going to bed now. I mean seriously. Yeah.

In other news, still no freakin car.

Good Old Evolution

I've put the Dove 'Evolution' video in here before but, hey, it's cool, I'll do it again.



Also, when looking at that I came across another interesting little link. It won't let me embed but I'll definitely direct you back to it... In response to the Dove ad, some girl decided to make her own evolution video. It's homemade, she looks about fifteen or sixteen, so obviously the quality isn't fantastic, but it's worth watching. I enjoyed it. :) Plus, I think it's awesome that she'd have the idea and act on it in the first place. Maybe it'd be healthy if we all made our own evolution documentaries.

No Rest For The Weary and Other Cliches

I'm constantly being told that I'm way too bitter. Honestly, I don't mean to be... But I don't know how to help it! Please correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to have cornered an unfair share on the tragedy market. Or, at the least, the bad luck market which to a crazy depressive may as well be the same thing.

Does anyone reading this know a thing about Colorado Medicaid, how to get on it, and/or have some idea if I may be eligible for it? I'm getting desperate.

My Welbutrin ran out on Sunday. I was able to get to the pharmacy Monday night to fill the prescription only to learn that insurance has decided to stop covering my generic meds as well as the others. It covered a small part of it this last time but said that after what they were willing to pay I've reached my limit for the rest of the year. Considering the fact that the last time I'd been off Welbutrin for more than a day I crashed so hard I wasn't able to get out of bed or stop begging Crystal to let me die, I decided that my only option was to cough up the money so I could get at least one more month covered.

As such, I'm out $76.77 more than I should have been and once this prescription runs out am pretty much screwed. I already had to take myself off Effexor and Lamictal as they both cost around $300 each per month and the lack of them is undeniable.

I miss being able to function. I miss being able to laugh and smile. I miss not crying every day, pretty much hourly, at anything from smudged makeup to the latest calamity on the news. I miss being able to feel like a relatively normal human being.

Aside from the whole medication aspect, I NEED to be back in therapy. Recently I've been seriously aching to be back at an inpatient facility somewhere. I try not to talk about things which would be unnecessary and/or seriously triggering, but...yeah. I would feel so much safer in a psych ward right now.

Beyond those needs, all my medical bills from surgery are starting to come in. Those debts run into the couple thousand mark right now.

Beyond that, though this may sound stupid there's a mole I've been needing to get off for years and in the past few months it's been changing colors and growing and getting scary looking.

Beyond that, I need a car. And an apartment. And the normal costs of living. And cell phone bill.

Jody and Crystal constantly harp on me for never doing, or wanting to do, anything 'fun'. It bothers them that I'm either working, cleaning the house, working on writing and art projects, handling bills and taxes and crap, etc, etc... Crystal wants to go see movies or go to a coffee shop downtown or do something, anything, and all I can see next to those activities in my little mental chart are dollar signs and amounts of time lost. 'Fun' is torturous to me when there is so much else that needs to be done.

They frequently say that taking time to relax and take care of myself is as important as getting those other obligations filled but I just can't see it. I can't take a break from things because even when I try to mind is still tied up worrying about them. I guess that's all part of why I wish I could be inpatient again - it's like the only way I can take a break is to be put in a position where I have no other option.

I'm going to return to my car hunt now.

On Suicides and Faking It

Although this has been several days in the brewing it’s hard to determine how to begin an entry with this particular subject… The reason it’s been so on my mind is that, aside from the fact that depression makes you think of it, one of the girls whose blogs I follow seems to be preparing her own internet death.

I know that to accuse someone of getting ready to fake their death is an enormous, outrageous, melodramatically serious thing. However, I do know what I’m talking about: I’ve dealt with it multiple times in the past. I’ve thought that I’d lost close friends four times in the past only to find out later that they faked it. I don’t have a clue how many other cases I’ve heard of in which the heartbreaking loss of someone loved and admired turned out only days later to have been completely fabricated.

A suicide attempt is not something to shrug off lightly as a grab for attention. In fact, that misconception is among the top three falsely held beliefs about mental illness that drive me absolutely batshit, right up there with eating disorders are vanity and depression is ungratefulness, etc. Similarly, I think that to say faking one’s suicide is purely for attention is also a grave misstatement. At the same time, though, in all the cases I’ve observed I do feel that attention is a large part of it.

Even for suicide attempts the attention thing usually has at least some role, although I don’t feel it’s in the intentional, manipulative way people typically believe. Any attempt, serious or not, is desperation to get relief and find some sort of comfort. In many cases the comfort sought may well be the element one gets when hospitalized – being completely taken care of, getting a break from school and bills and all the crap contributing most heavily to the depression that led to it in the first place.

For many people caught in a suicidal depression the thought of committing oneself is a lot scarier than the idea of dying. As such, if a mild attempt can serve the same purpose without the humiliation of checking into a mental ward, it seems quite a bit more desirable. Additionally, it lends a twisted feeling of legitimacy since you have concrete evidence proving the depression and need for care.

…This is unlikely to make any sense to anyone who hasn’t felt what I’m trying to explain. That’s the totally sucky thing about mental illness: it isn’t logical and it’s impossible to explain logically to someone who isn’t already crazy.

In any case, what I’m trying to explain is that depression makes you feel completely horrible, hopeless, and helpless. If it hasn’t quite gotten to the point that one seriously, one-hundred-percent, for sure wants to die, a half-hearted attempt shows the world how bad it really is inside and hands over that helplessness to someone else to deal with so that you can have a few minutes to breathe and heal. That, in my opinion, is the attention-grabbing aspect of suicide attempts. It seems selfish to all looking on from the outside but to the depressive it’s the only last-ditch effort that makes any sense. Again, don’t forget that depression is anything but logical.

Returning to the concept of faked deaths.

This… I don’t fully understand. I have theories but I’ve never faked my own suicide, only gone with the real attempts... (Which is more f-ed up? God knows.) In all the years I’ve spent online making friends, having feuds, falling in love, suffering explosive fights, I’ve known dozens of people and grown close to many of them. Because most of the circles I’ve frequented in the past have been eating disorder and mental illness related, close friends have gone in and out of hospitals, inpatient facilities, outpatient treatment centers, disappeared without warning, called me on the phone, sent letters, etc, etc.

Two of those friends killed themselves. One died when she was fourteen and I was sixteen. She just disappeared from the internet and I didn’t even know for sure that she had died until recently, when her mom e-mailed me after reading the article about my t’shirt project and asked if I’d ever known her daughter Jade. The other was not a close friend, but a close friend of a close friend… Her parents found her in her car in a coma a few days after she’d gone missing to us in the online world. She died later of liver failure.

::sighs:: I’m sorry for all the cheer here.

The reason I’m bringing those memories up is that in order to talk about faked suicide with the gravity it warrants, you’ve got to understand the reason it causes so much terror and pain. Because it isn’t always fake. It tears us apart because maybe we’ve lost people in the past and maybe we’re afraid of losing you, too.

The thing that angers me so much about faked suicide is that, while I’m almost sure it isn’t malicious and I am sure there’s just as much hurt going on as in a real attempt, the very nature of it is such that the faker gets to sit back and watch everything going on while they’re supposedly in the ICU, judging all of our reactions, trying to see who’s going to miss them most and who “really cares”. It’s just completely… I don’t even know what word I’m trying to find. Low. Dirty. Under-handed. To lead all your closest friends on, convince them you’re dying or dead, just because you want to see who your ‘true’ friends are…? It seems totally sickening to me.

The hardest part about it is that when you’re in the position of watching the drama unfold it’s almost impossible to call the person out. You’re emotionally shredded, scared half to death yourself, and the thought of falsely accusing your friend of doing this to you is beyond reason.

Right now, the blogger I initially mentioned has supposedly just come out of a coma, her kidneys failing from years of anorexia, now in an intensive inpatient unit. Her neighbor is supposedly the one updating her journal to keep all her friends informed of the situation is her neighbor who, without explanation or apparent reason, suddenly has the keys to her house and all her credit cards and everything. The whole situation is completely impossible to make sense of…

I don’t want to go into all the details there. If she really is as sick and close to death as the writer claims, I don’t want to talk badly of my friend. If she isn’t, it’d be almost as bad to write a vitriolic expose and thereby risk pushing all the buttons needed to make the theoretical situation a real one.

That’s why fake suicide sucks so horribly. There’s no easy way to handle it one way or the other. It’s a full and complete double bind, catch 22, rock-and-a-hard-place suckfest.

Melissa, I hope you’re okay.

Slightly more cheerful

For the first time in several days I have something on my mind which is not dismally, morbidly depressing and repetitive, so I'm going to write about it. It may still be ED Awareness Week but I am way too miserable thinking constantly about the subject and constantly having my heart break for every person I pass on the street who looks sick... Let me indulge my happy, off-topic thoughts for a bit.

Stranger Than Fiction. Oh em gee. I wanted to see it in theatres but I kind of have a major movie theater phobia soooo... I'm watching it now for the first time and it is spectacular. I mean hell, for one thing it's got Queen Latifah, Dustin Hoffman, one of my favorite movie crushes and still all-time favorite actresses Emma Thompson, Maggie Gyllenhal... And yes Will Ferrell but he doesn't detract too much. ^.^ Actually he's pretty funny without being totally idiotic.

It's cracking me up, in fact.

I think anyone who has ever written a novel, read a novel, imagined writing things, thought about what it would be like to be a character in the novel would enjoy this movie. Seriously. It's like... pieces of myself all chopped up and strewn about and described in a way that's more funny than dismal. Which, if ever I manage to write my memoirs, is I hope to be the way I describe my life. (Anyone read/seen Running With Scissors? I mean, that guy had about the most insane, f-ed up childhood ever and yet managed to come out of it relatively stable and become a good writer to boot.)

Anyway, that other movie... It's just so adorable and funny and yet still revolves around pretty sucky material. Namely insanity and such... Also, Maggie Gyllenhal is really cute in it. She's a crazy awesome hippie college dropout! (Like me! Minus the 'awesome'!)

Okay, so I'm still watching the movie and am rather distracted now... Hard to write and be engrossed in the awesomeness at the same time.

Conclusion: Go rent it, watch it, and distract yourself from any depressing thoughts spiralling around in your mind. Take a break from car searching and working on your freakin income taxes. Have fun.

Post script: Crystal took a picture of me at Starbucks, sooo here it is.