jeez, louise

I have not been doing well.

That’s about par for the course for me, the boundless depressive. I had enjoyed about 8 months of a novel strain of hypomania, this sort of joie de vivre that was more akin to jolts of electricity than it was to a sea change. I suppose around December, the circuit went dead and I was left with this aching intuition that, unfortunately, I am the same person I’ve always been.

I chalked this comedown up to rekindling things with my ex, that my awareness of doing something harmful to me, backsliding to a comfortable place, was having an effect on my mood and self. And this did make sense then and does make sense now. I could not respect myself for going back. I could not square the feelings I wanted to have and what I did have, the position we were in versus the position I hopelessly thought we could occupy. And I thought it would be a growth moment, to once in my life act to reduce the friction and dissonance between what I want and what I feel like I deserve. However, in the wake of my decision, one month of life removed from the suspected cause, I feel no better, and in fact, feel worse. I feel much worse.

So, it cannot be her. Not wholly, not entirely. How convenient would it be if it was, though. If only, if only. Alas, it seems that the issue lies with me, as they often tend to.

I don’t know how to fix myself. In therapy today, my best friend and sensei, Lucy, told me I needed to reframe the value propositions I’ve attached to growth, to goodness, to what twisting oneself out of a hole looks like.

I suppose before I talk about that, I should outline how I feel about who I am, or who I am in the first place.

I do not feel like I am a good person. There is a double reason here, as there often is with me. To begin, I do not like my intentions, my impulsivity, my emotionality, my sensibility, my callousness, my childishness, my malaise. I do not like being so aware. On top of this, however, and probably more impactful to the deprecation, is that I do not like that I think these things about myself. I do not like that the way my brain works, the way I can be both infinitely involved with and infinity abstracted from myself. My brain deludes itself into thinking it sees itself objectively, that it is capable of judging its subjectivity from a point of cool rationale. It leads itself, I lead myself, to thinking that my conclusions are correct because they are grounded in more logical processes. A good person would not be so narcissistic about their own self-hatred. A good person would not be afflicted by the defects of venomous self-analysis. And here I am, obsessively cutting open my flesh, peeling it back, looking at the gears and cogs beneath and sneering at their form.

Part of me wants to believe that everyone is as equally unsightly underneath as I am. Part of me really wants to latch onto the idea that I am not separate from everyone, not distinct, not alien, that the levers lurch grotesquely regardless of who you are, and that my main defect is not my mechanics but my awareness of them.

I’ve lost the plot, as I usually do. I’ve been drinking a lot, more than I should. It doesn’t even help, it’s just a desperate petition to something other than myself. Maybe this beer will send me back to greener pastures, maybe this one will deaden the ideation, maybe this one will poison my liver. I don’t particularly like it, but the idea of Me, Unmitigated sounds absolutely miserable.

I am not okay. I have not been okay. I have not yet processed what Jane did to me, what I did to her, what the room looks like now that the lights are blown out.

I will not be okay for a while. I will not stop missing her for a while, I will not feel okay in my skin and on my lonesome for a while. I will not love myself for a while. I think that’s alright.