To realize I am mad...means I am come back to reality for a moment. I reach for help, a hand to grasp, anything to keep from being drawn down further into the maelstrom. Nightmares beget dark imaginings. They don't go away when I wake up. I call a friend. I hope for an answer and receive reassurance. Meanwhile, I chat on Facebook to another friend. I am insane in my chats. I scrabble at the sides of a well, with no bucket or chain to grab hold of.
I call others to help me. Someone must offer reality. Someone tells me that my thoughts are delusional. It's not real. That is reality, but not for me. Surely my dark thoughts are more real than the truth. Coffee, breakfast, pills, shower: they whirl around me, demanding attention. I do not have it to give them...toss something overboard: breakfast, shower. I drink coffee and take my pills. Did I eat something, too? I can't remember. My body is not shaking. Maybe I ate something. Too much planning to take a shower, although there is a new shampoo I would like to try. Something I bought several days ago. It is a long time ago, now. And I am far away from it.
My madness, on chat with the same friend, reaches a fever that will not break. She has to get off of chat. She has things to do. I call someone else and cry over the phone. The world is mad, my street in particular, and nothing exists outside of my street. There are tasks to perform. If I drank, I wouldn't be able to make it. My success is problematic as it is.
I have spent many years in reality. It's like riding a bike. It requires a small trip down the road, with a bad tire on my car. Then I am back. My favorite thing to do in the morning: making my bed. It is tidy, but luxurious in it's own spartan way. A Queen retires to a nunnery. The bed and floor are plain, dark wood, and gray carpet, with the simplest of cream blankets. But there is a pink, silk pillow, and a silk embroidered footstool, and a lamp made of marble. Other dark woods gleam in the corners, concrete. Wood is as concrete as stone to me.
I still cannot take a shower. There is no reason to be so vulnerable. I layer up against the cool of my rooms. The kitchen is disorganized some. But everything is in it's place, where it needs to be. This week, there are lemons to put in my water, and the slice floats there, like a small whale sunning.
I put in "The Sorcerer's Stone". I call the friend I am having delusions about, that day. The soul I have picked to obsess on. It so happens it is someone thoroughly grounded in reality. I can hear my unreality babbling the details to her. I have to confess to hallucinations to keep from sounding insane. I tell her casually that I have contacted the authorities about them. I was treated courteously by them. A Queen in a nunnery, indeed.
No pill or therapist, or shower or pillow can help me now. I am alone on the phone. Is everything tidy? In case the authorities show up? Are my animals safe? Not too much on the carpet...I couldn't vacuum if I wanted to. I have been diligent. Not too much dust on the cherry wood, or the gray carpet. The heirlooms in the glass cabinet gleam as they have since the days when my mother gave them to me. I think I am surrounded by my mother, and settle in to watch Harry Potter's adventures.
It is too fraught with danger to light a candle. Did I eat something? I am not hungry. My stomach is full enough with the pills and the water. I interact with another household resident. He would understand how I feel if I let him know, but I hang onto what reality there is by chatting cheerily. It's not the world that is slanted, it's me. That has sunk in, after a week of denying it. Why stop taking my pills?
My therapist is upset I have contacted the authorities. Me, too. We have to stay off the radar, really. How could I explain to them that I am not a danger to myself or others? Prisons are full of people gone mad. Is my apartment clean, in case my friend turns me in? Do I look like a Queen in a nunnery? I don't dare ask. Tidy some more, in case they show up. This is sanity, watching a movie and playing with the dog and the cats.
The storm subsides. Last night I dream of my weight problem. My pills turn everything to fat. That's why I stop taking them in the middle of the week. Med-compliant today. I eat nothing but peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and am sick of them. My stomach wants a banana and a boiled egg today. No bananas. There is a need for a shower today. After the boiled egg. On chat again. Others wake, and I am not alone.
Thank god today is Sunday...Harry Potter movies all day. I will tidy some more, and wash some dishes, so the apartment will be warm and steamy with it. It will smell cleaner.
Trying to assess damage today. I am able to write my blog, after two failed attempts yesterday. I will write two blogs today. I am more than normal.
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