On the plus side, Ryter bought me candy!

So today I got a call from my therapist telling me that apparently last week she was on vacation, so I was supposed to come in this week, and oh yeah, if I tried to cancel because I had already made plans, she was going to bill me for $70. Despite the fact that if she had called me with sufficient time for me to actually make the cancellation, I would have done so on the grounds that I haven't been to the gym since last week and at this point I honestly think working out and getting some endorphins flowing would do me more good than going to see her.

So I went in, and I explained that I was going to look for someone else, and we decided to have me continue to see her until I line up a new therapist, because right now I shouldn't really go without someone to talk to.

I got back to campus and went to make an appointment with the school's psychiatrist, but I was informed that in order to see him, I would have to see the school's therapists for a few weeks. Now, I know that they do this in part to prevent people from visiting multiple doctors and abusing meds, but considering that they won't let me get long-term therapy on campus, and I immediately burst into tears, which should have indicated that maybe there was an actual problem, you'd think they'd have some sort of emergency contingency plan or something.

So I asked my mom to help me get a list of psychiatrists and therapists in the area from my insurance company (I can NOT deal with that right now) but she said it would probably be a month or so before any of the psychiatrists could see me.

Now, to vent.

Psychiatric medicine has the WORST system. I mean, basically this means that someone in my situation has two choices-- be miserable and have their life slowly fall apart over the month or so before a psychiatrist meets with them, or get emergency care, which isn't really a choice, because it would entail self-harm of some sort. This is setting people up for a fall. I am logical and composed enough to know that hurting myself, even if I only did it to try to get some much-needed care, would ruin my life-- I'm still dealing with the aftermath of last time (and I feel no real desire to hurt myself). But five years ago, before I knew what I know now? And what about people who are a lot less rational than I am? These doctors seem to think that unless someone is causing themselves harm, it's not an emergency situation and they can wait as long as need be. Well, sure, I don't need help as much as someone who has attempted suicide. But it's like in ER medicine. A person who attempted suicide is about like that guy who gets hit by a car and has a collapsed lung. A person who just cuts themselves, that's more like someone who's really sick and puking everywhere. They still need emergency care, but they can wait until after the hit-by-a-car guy. I'm sort of in the "broken arm" category. I'm certainly in a more serious position than the person who's coming in to tell the doctor that their medication is working fine, thanks, no, everything's okay.

I don't know how they could do it, exactly, but there really needs to be a system so that people in my situation, who are incapable of functioning but aren't actually hurting themselves, can get in to see a psychiatrist within a week at least. If I want to talk to my doctor about a birth control checkup I can get in within two days, but when my mental state is so fragile I burst into tears at the thought of listening to automated voice messages from my insurance company, I have to wait a month. It's completely unreasonable.

Ah. Complaining about things makes me feel a lot better...

I should really be doing Genetics right now.

The trouble with being depressed is I have an instinctual need to hide it. When I was younger, I used to practically brag about it, using it to get attention, which helped me feel less alone and uncared for. However, sometime when I was in high school I began to understand good attention vs. bad attention, and that, combined with stern cautioning from my parents and my guidance counselor that colleges and employers will avoid depressed people like the plague, made me force myself to learn how to hide it from people I didn't really, really trust.

Of course, this was impossible sometimes. I remember one of my high school history teachers (sucky teacher, nice woman) confronting me because I seemed "sad all the time, and unusually quiet." My 9th grade science teacher picked up on the fact that at the time I was scratching my arms with keys (my mother had removed all sharper objects than that from my room) and burning the hair on them with matches or candles. I had a bunch of teachers talk to me about low performance or falling asleep in class. They didn't send me to the guidance office or anything, they just talked to me and tried to figure out what was going on, and then once they figured out I was already in therapy, suggested that I talk to my therapist about it (to which I replied that I was already doing so) and did their best to keep me on top of my schoolwork despite my total apathy on the subject.

Then last year, I was forced to reveal that I was very depressed to my roommates, because I was bursting into tears in front of them. See, the way I handle stress and depression has been evolving since I was a kid; when I was little, I took it out on my family members, usually my brother and sister. This, while very effective at making me feel better, was obviously not a good thing to be doing, so it slowly morphed into abusing my siblings less and myself more. This was better than pummeling my siblings, but still not a good system, so it seems to have evolved again, this time into crying. A lot. At everything. And sometimes at nothing. While I'd like to deal with it a bit more productively, at least crying doesn't really hurt anybody, so I'm okay with crying.

Anyway, my problem now is that I really don't want to face the fact that I'm depressed, and yeah, I think I need medication again (I will make a doctor's appointment sometime this week). More significantly, I don't want to deal with explaining it to Cellamica. Two results: first of all, Ryter's been getting 95% of my crazy lately, specifically the bursting into tears at the slightest provocation, which sucks because he's not in the best emotional state right now either. Second of all, I am suppressing and faking my emotions around everyone else, trying to seem at least calm and collected, even if I can't pull off cheerful.

I really, really hate it. Plus I have trouble because someone will say something to me, and I have to scramble for a response and often pause for too long before answering, because I'm not actually capable of thinking about things lately. I don't talk much unless prompted and then my replies are slow and sometimes don't really make sense in the context of the question. Meanwhile there's a fight in my head as I'm struggling to bring my consciousness to the here and now long enough to answer a simple question.

There are few things I hate worse than being stuck in my own head, and I am. I'm forcing myself to seem normal, but inside I feel like I'm trapped in a fog. I feel absolutely miserable.

And you KNOW this isn't helping my mood.

I failed a Calculus test today. I know I did. I studied all last night and afternoon, and I got in, and it was like I had never seen anything before. The questions were ten times harder than any sample problem we had done in class. I felt like I'd wandered into the wrong math test.

The biggest problem with my lack of understanding is I don't actually understand what it is I'm not understanding. So I can't ask for help, since professors won't accept "I have no idea what I'm doing wrong," they want you to have actual questions when you go to them. I don't have questions because I don't understand anything, I basically need someone to sit with me and walk me through everything we have learned until I can actually figure out what the hell I'm doing wrong, then explain to me how I can do it right, and give me practice problems and make sure I am doing them right as I go.

I also need someone to explain to me how it is that I am walking into a test feeling completely prepared, like I really know the material, and then realizing that I actually haven't a clue.

I only ever had one math teacher who was willing to actually give me what I needed to stay on track in her class, and she was my high school algebra and algebra II teacher. Only good math teacher I ever had. That's what I need for Calculus, but unfortunately, my high school math teacher devoted several hours a day before and after school when I was in trouble, and also was just really good at explaining things so I could understand them. I really really doubt my Calc professor's going to want to do that, and besides, he's got a really heavy Chinese accent and I can't always understand him.

Meanwhile I managed to get a C- on a Genetics test, one I actually thought I was going to do WELL on, because I studied on my own and with Libentra and I understood all the concepts we went over. And Organic, naturally, is still a disaster; my highest quiz grade was a 60% and the other two have been in the 30% range.

I am completely incompetent and idiotic. I'm gonna wind up kicked out of the Honors program, and I'll have to take these classes again, and I'll probably fail them again. I can't ask for help because I don't actually know what to ask, and they aren't going to accept "I just don't get it." And no matter how much I study, how confident I am, I still walk into exams and don't understand anything. It's not that I brainfreeze, it's not that I don't study, it's not even that I don't attend classes. I just don't GET... something. I don't even know what I don't get.

I think there's a Math Center that may be able to help with the Calculus, but I don't know what to do about the Organic. I really need a tutor, but the school doesn't really offer them for that level. Maybe my professor can tell me where to go.

Grr

So I, still feeling very depressed and all, went to go see my therapist today, hoping I would get a chance to talk about this and maybe find out what I should do. I rode the bus in, I waited 40 minutes like usual, then I waited an additional 15 minutes, wondering where the heck she was. Finally I asked one of the other people who works in her office where she was, and he said he hadn't seen her all day.

No note, no call, nothing. And it's not like I can just drive back to campus, I was left with the choices of waiting around like an idiot for another hour and a half for the bus to arrive, or calling Ryter AGAIN to come pick me up (last time I had a therapy appointment I missed the bus afterwards, since they changed the schedule slightly over break). She just canceled with no warning, which is a) incredible unprofessional and b) really not fair to me, since I can't easily get to and from the office.

Plus I'm still depressed, and knowing that my therapist doesn't even care enough to give me a two-second phone call to say "hey, sorry, I can't come in today" isn't really helpful.

I'm stopping therapy with her. Like, as soon as is practical. Most people seem to be of the opinion that at this point I don't really need therapy anyway. Ryter put it, "You don't need a therapist, you need a friend." Unfortunately, "friend" is harder to look up in a directory.

On the plus side, I finally did my laundry after two and a half weeks....

I think I'm depressed.

I'm retreating into myself, constantly berating myself over my appearance, my actions, or my intelligence. I am struggling in Orgo, which isn't helping. I need to memorize chemical equations but I got behind and now I need to catch up. I got a 28% on the last quiz.

Of course it didn't help that I was a real idiot last weekend. See, Thursday was Valentine's Day, and I agreed to spend Thursday night with Ryter so we could have a really good Valentine's Day. I decided I really didn't want to lie to my professor and take a make up quiz, so instead, I studied for an hour before, went in for the quiz, and then went back to Ryter's. So I didn't get enough studying in and as a result, spectacular fail. It was dumb and I knew it was dumb and I did it anyway because I wanted to spend time with Ryter, and while I enjoyed that time, it was still a bad decision.

And I wound up staying there the whole weekend, because I had originally intended to go back Saturday night and study Sunday like usual, but Ryter's dad invited us out to sushi, and turning that down would be sacrilege. In retrospect I should have gone back Saturday and had him pick me up to go for sushi but my judgment seems to be impaired. Luckily I don't think that was too bad a problem.

The trouble is that I want to seek out my friends, who I feel like I haven't seen much of, and hang out with them; I want to go do things and hopefully have that help pull me out of my funk. But I'm so withdrawn right now that I don't do anything unless someone asks me; I can't seek people out or plan things on my own. Ryter invites me to come see him all the time; sometimes Cellamica invites me to dinner or Libentra asks me to grab lunch with her. But I really want to spend time with Vivacia, and with Mack, who's at UNH now (he finally transferred, and even got on-campus housing), and Closer, too. I want to be out there and doing things with them, because I feel like I'm losing or have lost them and I really don't want that, especially not with Vivacia. I bought her a little potted rose bush for Valentine's Day and left it at her door (she was out), but I think it might have upset her, because I forgot to leave a name (dumb) and she was concerned it was a creepy stalker or something, and then had to explain to her residents that no, she did not have a secret admirer who was going to make Closer jealous.

And I can't even reach out to her, or to anyone really, so I'm just kind of hoping she'll call me or IM me or something. I hate this state I get into. I'm perfectly amicable and normal when I'm with people (except Ryter, he's been getting dumped on a bit more than is fair lately), it's not like I'm being emo all the time, but at the same time, I can't seek it out, it has to come to me, and as a result I spend most of my time daydreaming and staring off into space or quietly sitting here and thinking about how stupid and useless I am.

Meanwhile my joints are hurting constantly, especially my bad knee, and I joined a gym which is showing me just how terribly out of shape I am plus isn't helping with the joint pain (it's not serious pain and I know when to stop, so it's not like I'm going to hurt myself).

I'm not at the level, yet, of needing medication again because I can still pay attention in class (even if I don't study enough) and I'm not doing anything that will really hurt me; I'm trying extra hard to take care of myself, in fact, because I'm hoping that if I get healthier I'll have a little more energy and get out of this. But still, it's kind of sucky. I need to push past it, but I feel like I'm Sisyphus right now.

Wish me well...

Yet another one...

Last night I had another story dream.

A young woman in a wealthy society had two lovers, one who looked like George Clooney and one who looked like Adrien Grenier, and she was secretly dating/sleeping with them both. She was invited to a weekend event held at an old mansion converted into a summer resort, and all her friends and some of her family was there-- and unfortunately, the two lovers were both invited.

She was remarkably sneaky in managing to keep her two secrets separate from both each other and the rest of the group, which pleased her no end. One afternoon she told the older lover that she would meet him in his room, and she went outside to get a breath of fresh air and so that her sister would think she was gone to walk in the garden. However, as she turned to reenter the house, there was a massive explosion-- someone had planted a bomb in the house, and she watched it explode right in the area of the house where she knew her younger lover to be. As people fled the area, headed for the lake or their cars, a second explosion went off-- this time closer to where she knew the older man she had planned to meet was.

Flash forward several months, and she's visiting a hospital. She goes to see her older lover, who is recovering well but severely disfigured; she then goes to see the younger one-- who is severely brain damaged and missing his legs, and sits on the floor of a padded room drawing in crayon. She has realized that of the two lovers, she was truly in love with the younger-- but because she had tried to have both at once, neither would ever be whole.

She left the hospital and met with an old man who told her he had a solution-- that he could send her back in time to occupy her body for the day of the explosion. She immediately agreed, and soon she was back that day; however, this time she changed her path. She paid a soothsayer and sent him to her older lover's room, claiming it was to be a fun little gift and she would join him soon; she then told the younger one she would meet him in his room instead. However, the soothsayer drugged the older lover's tea, and, per his instructions, dragged the man into the closet and pulled down clothes to pack around him. She had noticed that the items in the closet had been mostly out of reach of the second blast.

Meanwhile she met the younger lover, not dallying in the garden, and she told him she loved him, and they made love in his bed right before the blast went off. However, as they were farther from the center of the blast and they were in the bed, they were merely jostled and hit by splinters of wood.

A few days later, she is sitting with the younger lover in the hospital garden. They're recovering from the injuries, which aren't very severe, although he has trouble walking due to a shard of wood that hit his leg. Suddenly she sees the older lover walk by, glance at them, and walk faster. Giving her younger lover a reassuring kiss, she runs after the older one.

"I'm sorry," she said to him, once she caught him.

"You should be," he replied. "You played me like a fool. And then you chose him over me." It seems that in the rescue, the truth of her relationship with the younger beau became very apparent. "You hurt me."

"I saved you," she replied. "Why do you think that soothsayer drugged you? Why were you in that closet, protected from the blast?"

"You couldn't have known that ahead of time," the older man scoffed.

"I saw what happened to you-- saw you hit by the blast, your face practically blown off..."

"What are you talking about?"

"I knew. I did it to save you."

"You couldn't have... You didn't have anything to do with the blast, did you?"

"No!"

That's when I woke up. You know, for me, dreaming is a bit like watching 3/4ths of a movie and then having to turn off the TV. Annoying.

If you have saints make appearances in your dream, isn't that supposed to mean you're like blessed or something? What does the Terminator mean?

Last night I dreamed that I was working at a store or a gas station or something, and three guys came in-- two short guys and a really tall one-- that I recognized from the news as being wanted for some crime. So I had my co-worker stall them and I went to the back room, got some stuff for makeshift handcuffs (fuzzy handcuffs, wire, and a flower press- don't ask me why a gas station had fuzzy handcuffs, or a flower press) and we managed to get them restrained until the cops showed up. However, as soon as the door opened for a customer, they made a break for it, and the cops didn't wind up catching them.

They headed to the five-lane main drag through the town and I followed them at a safe distance. All of a sudden the tall one stumbled out onto the street, right in the path of a Greyhound Bus, and one of his friends cried out "Oh shit!" and lunged at him, trying to push him out of the way. End result, they were both hit, as the bus swerved and sideswiped them. The other guy ran off, and the short guy, who seemed to only have a few bruises and scrapes, attempted to move the taller one, who had a very broken leg (it was twisted all weird) and was slouched forward and bleeding everywhere. He was also unconscious. Concerned, I ran pout into the street, narrowly missing a truck myself, and cried "Wait, don't move him!"

"You!" the short guy cried.

"We have to call an ambulance, his spine might be injured. Anyone have a phone?" I looked around at the few people, like the bus driver, who had gathered. They dug in their pockets. Suddenly remembering, I pulled out my own phone.

"No, wait! They'll come to arrest us!"

"I promise I won't mention who you are. He needs an ambulance. I don't care about the police right now."

"Okay..."

I called 911 and said to the person in a shaky voice, "Hi, I'm at the corner of..." I looked at the nearest sign "18Q street and 102, a guy just got hit by a bus, he's bleeding and his leg is broken."

"Okay, we'll send someone."

I looked up from the call to see the injured guy raise his head groggily. "What happened?" he asked. His friend explained it to him.

"We have to get out of the street," the injured guy said, pushing himself along to drag his leg. His friend grabbed him as well and before I could stop them, they were on the far curb. I followed them, and we waited for the ambulance.

All of a sudden this giant Megatron-like robot came down the street, zapping things with it's arm laser. "We have to move!" the tall guy said.

"You can't walk!" I cried. "Your leg's broken!"

"How bad is it?" He looked down at it and winced. "Oh. Hang on." He grabbed it and twisted it back into position, and it made several cracking noises. The other guy and I kind of stared. He cracked his neck, and his right eyeball withdrew into his head, and in it's place out came a Terminator style red eye. I realized that where the red "blood" had cleared in his wounds, underneath there were glints of metal.

"What ARE you?" I cried, not realizing the Megatron bot was getting closer.

"Go, hide," he ordered me, standing on his now-stable legs. "She doesn't want us."

"Not even me?" the short guy asked, as I ran off, headed for the nearest building. A giant metal hand swiped at my head before I ducked into a storm drain and was able to sneak over to a building. Outside that building was Mother Teresa (don't even ask) and as I ducked in, I grabbed her wrist and pulled her along. We headed for the basement, which was semi-developed and had workman's tables, which we hid inside. I heard the giant robot outside, and was absolutely silent and unmoving. Soon she passed, and I came out from under the table, cautioning Mother Teresa that she might want to stay there for a bit longer.

Suddenly Terminator-guy came down the stairs (he appeared to have found himself some machine guns), saying, "Disguise yourself or something." I grabbed the conveniently-located makeup kit and some spare clothes and dressed in a sort of disguise, even changing the way I walked. The two of us then returned to the surface and I cautiously went over to the Megatron-style robot, who didn't seem to recognize me. She continued to search for me, though, yet I was able to actually go with her, and she didn't realize who I was.

I wish I could remember how it had ended... I think there was a firefight.

I'm... sort of back.

Lately I've become obsessed with the news.

Normally a healthy interest in the news is a good thing. There is a definite value to staying on top of current events, especially in an election year. But my problem is that I'm unable to detach myself from the news. Hearing about a famine makes me depressed. Hearing about an injustice by a government makes me angry. When Huckabee won Iowa I was afraid (this fear has since passed, I can deal with McCain winning).

I mean, I don't freak out when they talk about the Bird Flu and shit like that, because I actually understand things. I respond to real problems, not problems imagined by Fox News to scare the populace into submission. But I can't detach myself from the real problems in the world.

I don't want to become apathetic like the rest of the world, but I also don't want to be depressed or furious every time I read about something terrible that's happened, and I don't want to feel like I can't go a few days without reading the news. And I also want to be able to debate politics without feeling terrible afterwards.

Ryter's attempting to help me with the problem, with minimal success. Basically I've been avoiding reading news sites, and avoiding any sites that might involve me getting into a debate. So if I comment on a blog, I make sure it's one where I generally agree with the writer, lest I start a debate. I'm also trying not to talk about politics much, though that's difficult with the election going on (Ryter's also not really helpful in that regard, but oh well). And I'm trying to spend less time online. Failing miserably in that regard.

But I'm hoping I'll be able to get to the point where I can read the news without obsessing about it and debate with others without upsetting myself soon. We'll see.