Jun 12

 A better day again. No anxiety. The varying symptoms and bullshit are low key for a change. A certain kind of - numb - calm pervades.

The house is empty. But. I am getting used to it.

But I am hollow.

I am not depressed. My mental state has rebounded back to somewhere above the insanity line - I've stopped the mental meds again. But I am hollow. It is a strange kind of numbness. I am not in the moment terribly sad. Terribly lost. I keep it at bay. I do not indulge it. I stay away from the depths. But at the same time, there is nothing there inside me. And if you dig. There is that sadness and despair there so deep it's gone off the end of the scale and wandered into white noise. Like a set of scales maybe tipped too far one way, fallen off, and now there are no scales.

I don't know.

Part of me really wants the joy of another dog, a boxer, or two, or three, or many.

But another part me does not, knows I cannot look after them, and, really, would not be Athena. Would not be Ares. And when I think on it a little longer. I just wish they were still around. And when I think of it even further, I realise, I just wish the clock was turned back 10 years or more. I am longing for a time that has long since passed.

I am in a brief moment of relative peace and calm. But I know that wont last either. Even at my calmest, I see no future. I see no happy endings. And sooner or later - and probably much sooner - the screw will turn again, and I will be suffering on my own once more. Not a good place. The symptoms will shift, come on stronger again, and I will go through another bout of misery.

Is this what life is ? Just. Another day ? I have no plans or hopes or goals. I have no desires or joys. I am grateful when my day isn't filled with pain or suffering or scary shit.

When I spoke with Hazel a few days ago she said something. That the house was too big for me. I had too much space. I rattled around in it. Hmm. I've never really considered it, for or against. But I understand what she means. I tend to ghost around the house, even when Hazel is there. I will pop my head in a room. And just pause for 5 minutes. 10 minutes. Then retreat. Most of the time I live in a single bedroom. I have done now for years. I think maybe that's what she means. When she sees me briefly appearing around the house. Rattling around. It's a slightly odd concept to me that the space could be too big. That's not possible ? But it is possible. It's more than possible when I have so many memories. And each bit of each room, each thing, has a lingering memory in it. It is like a museum of the past. The rooms lie untouched, each one a record of things at least a decade old, two decades old or more.

Part of it I think is being ill so often. And then immobile too. It means I can't really engage with the house. Not to move stuff. Or redecorate. Or change anything. So it stays the way it is.

I'm also terrible at endings. I have a strong irrational emotional connection to things and their end. I would much rather keep a thing with the memories it has attached to it, than be rid of it.

Probably the worst, most, crazy, version of this, are the blood spatters on my stair walls. The one at the top of the stairs, the last bit of my mom. A single drop of blood where she cut her finger. The drop is still there on the wall. 10 years old at least. And then the splatter at the bottom of the stairs from Ares. Where he slipped down the stairs and hit the bottom. His blood still there. Several years old.

I have an attachment to it. As ridiculous as that is. It is a last piece of them still here.

I have that, with a lot of stuff.

Peak sentimentality.

It is twined tightly with me. Very much part of me. It is I think a symptom of the sucking loneliness and lack of affection. It makes me dwell on connections.

But even then.

I do not like endings. No matter what it is. I always had a pang finishing a book. A sense of loss. I get a feeling of being lost after a film. After an event. After a day out. Loss. I am ejected from the moment to stand in the aftermath, now without that thing. And I want to go back. I don't want to be in the cold. I don't want it to end.

That sense of loss pervades all things with me I now realise. I had a pang of loss way back in the day, when I gave up my grandmas TV. I had had it for, at that point, a couple of decades. And getting rid of it. Was a wrench. It was, my last connection to her. All those memories and places. Where her TV had sat in her flat. Getting rid of it felt like deleting all of that. Gone.

So. Uh huh.

I am very not good at endings. Or death. Or abandonment. I endure them. But I am not good at them. Unbalanced.

I wish to be wrapped in a cocoon and never feel loss or grief, just warm and safe, and doze forever.

I suppose, I am still grieving. Still in loss. This is just different shaped echoes of the same thing.

I am not sure I will ever be the same again though.

It feels like something has broken for good. I did not really expect to make it this far. But here I am. But I have no heart.

I need constant distractions to stop me from seeing or thinking. Like a hopelessly sinking boat that can only stay afloat with the most manic of bailing out.

I feel dis-inclined to see people. I feel like I have nothing to offer. I have two choices. Either be honest and be my miserable hopeless self. Full of nothing but nhilism and ashes and the past. Or put a fake face on it. Play a part.

Neither seems like a good thing.

The day turns. My mood shifts. I ponder again what to do with my future, short or long, or what the point of any of it is. I still do not know. I am not sure I will ever know. Just waiting. Curled up in bed, watching Netflix. Sleep. Eat. Work. Rotate.

At least, for the moment, I am not in any great suffering. A rare thing.