Honestly, when things feel good, I feel fake.

I just got done reading a blog post that Lizenka put up on her blog. Here is the blog post she put up (http://lizenkalizenka.blogspot.com/2011/04/just-feeling.html)

The stuff she said on there really resonated with me.

I think that I have been trying to act happy for so long that when I do feel happy it just feels so fake...

I dunno, maybe this feeling of fakeness will go away someday, and maybe I will be able to actually feel genuinely happy and accept that someday...I sure hope so, because this is getting a little old...

This past weekend was Easter weekend, so I went to my aunt and uncle's house for the weekend and hung out with them and my cousin. It was nice to be at their house, but I am also happy to be back to my dorm room. I have about 3.5 weeks left of classes and exams, so life is a bit crazy right now getting ready for the end of the year and doing all of the last minute papers and tests that professors seem to cram into the last few weeks of the semester...

Anywho, I am not in a particular mood to write a long blog post, so this is pretty much all you are gonna get...

*Warning: this post could trigger* Counseling session

I had counseling today again. I am sort of still trying to process some things and I decided to make a blog post to see if I can manage to sort through it all...

First off my counselor, Cindy, asked me, as she always does, what had gone well during the time since our last appointment. It is sort of strange because sometimes in our meetings I can barely speak, like pushing the air from my lungs and past my vocal cords in order to make sound just takes too much out of me and is too hard, that and also I freak out about what I should say, I am always worrying about how what I have to say sounds, or if it is right and whatnot.

Anyways, she asked me what had gone well since our last session, and I squeezed a few words out, saying things like "I spent time with friends" and "I tried to exercise several times" (both of which are things that we have discussed in our meetings as ways to combat depression). She asked me if there was anything else and I sort of shrugged, and then she reminded me of the idea to work on visualization that we had talked about previously and wondered if I had worked on it. I told her I had, though not every day like she had suggested.

So just now I am realizing that I am making a totally boring post outlining every little detail of our appointment today, which was not the point of this post. I think I was sort of procrastinating on getting to that point by just saying everything that happened. Enough of that, I am going to go on to the parts that are really rolling around in my head.

First off I want to say something she said to me that really is messing with my head, I don't even remember the context for this part, but like I said it is really screwing with me. She told me that I don't have to stop self-harm. I was like wait a second, hold up, isn't the whole point of the appointments to help me find "tools" to use to keep me from self-harming. I didn't actually say this though, I don't know if I even ever responded, but it is still screwing with my head now.

A little farther into the appointment she said she wanted to ask me something. She asked me what my emotions are about stopping self-harm. I told her I didn't really know if there was a specific emotion that I could pinpoint. She then said "ok well we are going to go simple then, sad, mad, glad, and bad: those are the four emotions that I want you to use to tell me how you feel about stopping self-harming." I told her that it was sort of a mix of sad and glad. Part of me knows 'I should not be self-harming' and 'normal people don't do this', and that part of me is happy to be working on stopping self-harming, finding more tools to use to keep from cutting. The other part of me is sad, that part of me is missing self-harm. It is something that has always been there for me and I don't particularly want to have it completely gone and no longer an option. She then asked me what the ratio of the two are, which one is stronger? I told her it was about 50/50, but tonight, mere hours after the appointment, for some reason I feel like the sad part is getting stronger.

I just don't know anymore. I know what I should feel, and in my head I know that self-harm is not a good way to be, I know that it is something that I should want to recover from, but in my heart I just am not there right now.

So that is basically where I am feeling right now. I have never felt this negatively toward recovery in a long time. It used to be that I really wanted it, but now I just don't know. I feel like I am slipping deeper and deeper into depression right now, just not doing well in general, and I don't know that the exercising and being around friends is really helping right now. I don't particularly want to spend the rest of my life medicated, but I am beginning to wonder if I will be able to pull myself out of the hole I feel I am in right now.

Sorry to anyone who reads this about such a depressing post, but I am just not in the best of places right now, I mean it has been quite a while since I last self-harmed, but I am just not feeling happy at all.

I need to head to bed now. I suppose I will post again sometime in the near future.

just the ramblings of my mind on a tuesday night...

I am not worth the effort of stopping self-harming

It isn’t hurting anyone

I try to stop self-harming because I know in my head that I shouldn’t do it. I know in my head that I should find better ways to cope. I wonder how I am supposed to translate those feelings to my heart. How can I actually let myself believe them deep inside of me? I have been repeating the ideas that I shouldn’t self-harm over and over, I say it so often, I tell myself I shouldn’t do it and so I don’t, not always. But am I doing it for myself? Or am I doing it for others? Is it ok if I am doing it for other people? Can I really have healing if I do it for others? I tell myself that if I just repeat it enough it will finally sink in, and I will accept it as truth, but will I? I have been telling this to myself for nearly 6 years now, almost as long as I have been struggling with self-harm, will I ever be able to believe it really?

back to the counselor I went...

I had an appointment with a counselor at school today. I am not sure quite how I feel about it. I am sort of extra stressed out about it all right now. I feel very vulnerable and out of control right now. I mean I know I don't have to talk about anything I don't want to, and that I am the one who signed up for the appointment in the first place, but I just am feeling in a really bad place right now. I made an appointment with her because I have been in a really bad place lately, and I am worried that I might be depressed. I come from the idea that I would like to keep from being medicated if at all possible, so I want to try out some other options before resorting to medication.

The last time I had been to see her was near the middle of spring/second semester of last year. I had gone because I had had a really close time when I was feeling extremely triggered and wanting to self-harm, I had kept from self-harming but wanted to talk to the counselor. When I came in earlier today, she basically asked me why I had come in and I told her how I was feeling depressed, and just not good lately. After discussing that in general (symptoms, how long had I been feeling that way, any life changes that could be causing it, any medication changes, was I suicidal etc.) and some ways to help combat depression (without medication, things like more regular exercise, trying to be more involved in events, spending less time alone and more with people, etc.).

She then told me that she had looked over the notes from our previous sessions and wanted to talk about self-harm. How long had it been since I last self-harmed? I told her it had been about a month give or take...then she asked me how many times during the school year I had self-harmed thus far, I took a rough guesstimate and told her that I had probably self-harmed 6-7 times in the last school year. She looked down at the sheet she was writing on and jotted something down (as she had been doing the whole time) then looked up at me and said with a sort of disappointed tone, "that is a lot more than last year". The way she talked about the self-harm in general is sort of bothering me. She almost seemed sort of dismissive of it, and sort of said things to the effect of well don't do it again before our next meeting. It is just causing me to sort of freak out about it. Because, not saying that I will, but what if I were to self-harm, how am I supposed to come back and be honest about it afterward and face all the disappointment in her voice? I guess going to counseling in general sort of stresses me out, I find it so hard to talk about these sorts of things, and it is really taxing for me to be talking to a stranger about them.

The whole confidentiality thing sort of freaks me out too. The form we have to fill out at the counseling center has the confidentiality rules on the back and you have to sign the paper to agree with the terms, usually there are three things on there, first is that if you tell the counselor you are planning to harm someone then they have the right to break confidentiality and tell the person you say you want to hurt, and also to tell the police to protect that person, if they suspect abuse of a child or of a dependent elderly person, and if they suspect that you are going to harm yourself. The first two are pretty straight forward to me, but the last one really freaks me out. What do they mean by harm myself, what happens if the counselor suspects that I will self-harm, will she have to tell someone? Or is it only if she thinks I will kill myself? I just don’t know and that is what worries me.

So basically, all in all, I am just feeling a lot more vulnerable and out of control since the talk today, I feel closer to self-harming than I have in a while. I am in general a people pleaser, and the pressure I am feeling to try and please her by not self-harming is sort of causing pressure that I would normally relieve by self-harming…it is sort of crazy really.

Anywho, I really need to head to bed now, it is getting late. Hopefully I will be back soon enough. My next appointment is next Friday, so I will probably want to blog again then. One last thing, I mentioned to the counselor that I used to journal a lot, but it doesn't seem to do as much good anymore, and she said maybe we could talk about journaling next time and more ways to journal that might help.

Emmy R.

Counseling Appointment

So I just wanted to make a quick post before I head to bed.

Last night I cried myself to sleep. It was horrible and made for the worst nights sleep I have had in a while, not to mention just a general lack of sleep because I couldn't fall asleep while sobbing.

Anywho, the whole crying-myself-to-sleep thing at least had one positive outcome, I finally made an appointment with one of the school counselors. I have met with her before, but not at all this school year if I remember correctly. I though my appointment would be made for like next week or something, but it is already this Wednesday.

I have been feeling so extremely down lately that I just don't know what to do anymore, and I feel like this is my only option. I have no motivation to do anything whatsoever, I hardly scrape by and do the bare minimum for classes. I don't want to screw up this semester.

Anyways, I am sort of glad that this appointment is coming up so soon, but I suppose it gives me less time to psych myself out about it.

Hello again.

I started writing in this blog a few years back because I wanted a place to be anonymous and to share my innermost feelings. I wanted to be faceless, sort of a cover to show how I felt. My real emotions came through this blog. Poems I wrote, the emotion spewing forth through my fingers as I was typing. Somehow though, the relief that I felt as I typed stopped coming as easily. Little by little the relief that this blog brought lessened. It brought me to this point, where I rarely come on here anymore, each time promising to write more regularly, apologizing for my absence to the empty ears of my nonexistent audience.

I miss the days where I could pour my emotions out on here and it was so easy, so simple. I could talk about my struggle with self-harm and know that only strangers will read it. I could be a nameless, faceless stranger.

I changed my mind the other day. I uploaded a photo of myself, it scares me to think that someone I know could come across this blog and see my photo and read my words. How would they react? What would they think? Would they realize that the truth is that I am a stranger, a stranger to everyone around me? Would they think this blog was fake? Would it be dismissed, a mere trifle that I exaggerated my emotions into?

I started recording videos for a YouTube account a while back. I really enjoy making the videos, another outlet for me to express myself, but somehow not quite as pure as the written word. . I have met some amazing people on YouTube. I feel like I am doing far more good there than I ever did on here. I have more subscribers than I ever thought possible when I first started out. I thought maybe one or two people would find my videos, but there have been so many more who find me, some subscribe, others just comment on my videos. Strangers who I get to know through their posted videos, countries or even continents separate us, but I feel closer to them than I do to almost anyone in my real life currently. I was even asked to join a collaboration channel, where hundreds upon hundreds of people subscribe and could possibly watch my videos. I feel like I am in a position to help people and that is what I want to be doing. The pain in my life that I have experienced, I don’t want it to be all for nothing. If I can help other people maybe that will be enough, maybe it will make the pain ok. I don’t really know.

Right now I am struggling; I feel depression looming over me, most of the time I hardly make it through the school day. After I am done with school and work I come back to my room and fiddle around on the internet for the rest of the afternoon, hardly caring enough to glance at my homework and doing the bare minimum to get a passing grade.

I feel like a failure. I sit in my room all day by myself doing mostly nothing. I close the door so I don’t have to face the laughter and good times that might ring down the hall towards me from the other rooms. I hate myself for where I am. I walk around campus, rarely smiling, feeling alone. I hardly care enough to try to find some people to hang out with. Most weekends I spend cooped up in my room, by myself, watching reruns of Law and Order. I wish I felt some purpose to my life, I mean I know what I want to do in the future, but what should I do now? How can I have purpose in my life now? I feel alone and sad.

This might seem stupid, but it frustrates me that everyone around me has a “significant other” all my friendships change because people start dating and then care more about spending time with their new beau than about any old friends. Of course I sit here on the other side of things completely alone, with no dating prospects. I haven’t ever had any dating prospects. Then my mind follows some sort of deranged logic that leads me to what seems to be the fact of my lack of value. People have no interest in spending time with me, what does that say about me as a person? Guys have never given me a second glance, how should I understand my value from that? Long ago, I accepted the fact that I would likely never marry. I might say to my friends that I just have too much personality for most guys, but the truth is that guys just flat out are not interested. But like I said, I have accepted that. I will grow old, either alone or with my adopted or foster children, or even still living with my parents (my goodness I hope that last one doesn’t happen, I mean I love my parents, but I don’t want to live with them forever). I am resigned to this fact, and for the most part I am ok with it. I wish I had a friend though, someone I could trust to fill in that gap, the loneliness that is all consuming, someone who needs me as much as I need them. All of my friends have someone else, another friend group, or just SOMEONE, who they can go to besides me. No one needs me.

This blog is getting far, far too long, so I am going to end it soon. I suppose I will end with this, I don’t know where I am going right now. I wish I had something in particular to look forward to, but I cannot seem to find it right this second. I hate this feeling of being at rock bottom. I want to go back to counseling I think, make a new appointment with the counseling center on campus, but I worry myself too much about it. I have been before, and it doesn’t seem to help, but I just don’t know what else to do. I think I am depressed. I hate to use that word, it seems so cliché, but I just don’t know what else to call it.

Anyways, I am out of here. Hopefully I will be back soon with another post, sorry for leaving you guys hanging (that is if anyone really reads these) so long between posts.

Emmy R.

Once Again

Every time I post, pretty much, I say something along the lines of "It has been a while since I posted, but I just wanted to give you an update..." And once again this is basically about that.

I just recently headed back to college and am done with the first two days of classes. It is weird this year because I have moved to a different dorm with different rules and a change in the basic setup of it all. There have been a lot of changes lately, and I am not sure if they are for the better or not. I was supposed to room with a friend, which would have been nice because I would have gotten a chance to have a higher level of comfortability, but that changed last minute. I do not fare well with change, and although my new roommate is great, it has been hard to get used to all this change within a few weeks of school starting. Also now that classes have started I have added stress with that.

Like I said, my roommate is nice, but she is almost nice to an extreme. It is kind of weird. I never really had a relationship with my previous roommate, we just basically lived in the same space, but this roommate like wants to talk about our day, and I am just really not used to it, so it is a bit weird.

Also another thing that has changed recently, is my relationship with my friend that I was going to live with. I do not think that the strangeness is because of the moving out thing though. I feel it is more because of the fact that she started dating one of my other friends during this summer. They seem great together, but it is definitely awkward to hang out together when it is just Brandy and Jordan, and even more so because Jordan acts like a little gentleman and like helps Brandy out of her seat and stuff, and opens doors for her, I mean I guess it is all stuff that guys are supposed to do for their girlfriend, but it just seems awkward and weird.

I just feel myself growing apart from Brandy and Jordan, like however much closer they get, the further I get from Brandy in particular. I hate it, but it just feels like that. And then they do all this stuff together and hang out and do other couple-y stuff, and then I get left behind by myself in my dorm room.

Other than that I have been feeling really down lately, near the end of the summer it got pretty bad, and then it got a bit better for like a week, and then lately it has gotten worse again. I am never really interested in doing anything more than I have to, half the time I do not even care about working on my relationship with my friends. I just sit by my computer when I am not in class or at work, and mess around watching youtube videos and on tumblr. I have also been really tired all the time, which lately I have blamed on jet-lag from my flight to school, but really is not based on that I do not think. I realize that what I just said is like basically the definition of what depression is, but I do not know if I can see myself getting any help for it. Also lately my cutting has gotten worse again, I constantly feel like cutting, but half the time I am too down to do anything about it, and most of the time I just really cannot even bring myself to care anymore, like I just do not care if I get better or not. I have been cutting on my legs now because it is easier to hide, but once winter comes I might go back to my arms, because it feels better for some reason. I feel so lame and just out of it. Part of me wants to get out of this funk and get some help for it, and maybe some medication, but the other part just tells me I deserve to feel this way and why go to the counseling center at school because it is not like they will help anyways.




Sorry this is such a downer post, I hope that all is well for anyone who actually reads this blog...