Aug 8

 I have shifted into sputtering.

Yesterday in the end I managed to stay awake for a few hours before again, crashing out. A handful of hours up time in a sea of 36 hours downtime. Last night after crashing again, I woke up, watched some TV for a short while before sputtering out. Asleep. Then awake a few hours later for 30 minutes. Sputter out again. And then sleeeeeeeep.

It is very frustrating. Watching all your time disappear between your fingers. A day. Two. Three. I know how this goes. This week has been very hard however, no wiggle room at all, fuck you, go down, stay down motherfucker. 

Beyond the immediate frustration the secondary monster starts to loom towering over the horizon. Hopelessness. 

All of this at this point is incredibly familiar territory. It is the same path I have been wearing down for years at this point. It's also, meta level, very human. You can only struggle for so long before it starts to erode you. The sense of not winning starts to sink in. It is part of the grief cycle. The anger and frustration. Then the bargaining. Then the depression.

The problem here, with the whole thing and the depression bit. Is that it goes low. The reality is grim. The cold stark "what is left of your life" afterwards bit is a hard call. And one that very easily teeters on the edge of "this isn't worth it". At what point do you euthanise the horse with the lame leg. And those lines do exist. You can perhaps recoil away from it. Dismiss it out of avoidance. No. Don't be silly. But it is just avoidance. Those lines do very much exist. Even for squeamish humans that have no problem euthanising any number of animals but are a lot more reluctant to apply the same standards when it comes to themselves. It is of course entirely subjective. We don't have clear cut rules or patterns for this in modern society. We have largely avoided the issue. And thus it's not one that people know what to do with. What is acceptable. What isn't. A huge part of that at a societal level is of course trust. It's not just about at an analytical level the nuts and bolts of quality of life vs suffering. It's also about whether you can trust those with that power to make fair, objective, unbiased calls. That it wont instead be used as an instrument of advantage, gain, convenience. Where there are advantages to shuffling people off. Money. Power. A convenient elimination of care provision. Which comes down to time and money. How much easier it starts to become for a society rather than working at the difficult task of caring for everyone, just kill the bottom 10%. Very efficient. Also. Monstrous. Look at Canada. Step by step. It has slipped into an ugly model fuelled by capitalist ideology. Oh. It's too much money to care for homeless people. People with problems. People who have been hit by fate unluckily through no fault of their own. Nothing to be done. Euthanise them. It neatly sidesteps any kind of responsibility. And simply attaches it onto the general capitalist model of society as the ultimate penalty for not fitting into that system. Debt is no longer the lowest failure state. State sanctioned death is. Normalized. Expected. Callous. Casually malicious. Monstrous.

I think it will always be the case in any given society where capitalism - and the value of someone is only rated in terms of a monetary amount - holds sway unless you are incredibly careful implementing it, and then forever more vigiliant for signs of moral corruption of your ideal. Corruption is also another absolute reality in almost any system, but particularly capitalism that has a built in corruption path of money itself. It is the nature of humans to corrupt all systems they encounter. - capitalist or otherwise This is just part of our problem solving ways where a system is treated not as a supportive bit of society but instead as a problem to get round. Eventually. The loopholes are found. Any system is undermined from day one. And eventually collapses under its own weight, even with a good start and vigilance. It is I suspect, the truism of all human systems. They have a discrete lifespan. A best before date, whereupon they have become not only useless, but part of the problem. Unless a system is seen by all as worthy and supportive and not a problem but a help, it will always eventually be corrupted. From taxes to immigration to worker rights to pollution laws to laws of power over people you name it.

Anyway. Tangent.

Back to me.

I am tired and fuzzy. My life isn't worth living. I have been unable to even rouse myself to play a game. Barely able at times to even watch a film or a series, and a lot of that time I can't even do that. 

And whilst at some level you might think, oh, just endless rest and sleep. Sounds peaceful.

That's the perspective of not having to do that. Of living in a different world where you do lots of stuff and then rest. When that's all you can do. The realisation is. You are just soft trialling death. You are, in most functional assessments, already dead. You're just lingering. Like a ghost. Still able to communicate with people inbetween the cracks. Like a voice from beyond through a ouija board.

I will never again have boxers. I will never again go for a walk with a pair of headstrong silly wonderful comedians. I will never again do so. many. things. Many aspects of life for me are already over.

This is a hard revelation. And one again that people are liable to shy away from. No. Don't say that.

But it is true. Wishing it otherwise, pretending it otherwise doesn't make it true. I am not coming to those conclusions because I feel sorry for myself. I do feel sorry for myself. But that's NOT why those conclusions are there. Those conclusions are cold. And analytical. Backed up by a wealth of hard and bitter experience. I too wish it wasn't true. But it is.

Another hard revelation is this end is inevitable for everyone. Not just me. This is the story of people getting older. Losing function. Facility. Eventually these realities land at everyones doorstep. As the final years roll around you lose bits of life forever. The early shutting up of shop.

If you are doing incredibly well. The 1% of people. Then maybe you can keep a lot of your function into your very old age. But even then. It will. Inevitably. Still happen. And the reality is. For the other 99% that slip into lack of capability will be a lot swifter than people imagine.

The wrinkle in my case, as I confront these aging like problems, is that I have encountered this set of problems way way before expected time. I am an "early adopter" of being an incapable oldster. When you step back and look at it from a higher level it's obvious. Clear. Health implications have aged me out quickly. I am a lot older than my chronological age would suggest. And. Unnervingly. Not all of my faculties are all inline with each other age wise. Some bits of me - at times - work as well as they ever did. It is hard for others I think to parse it. It does not track with their expectations of what aging looks like. But. But. They can still hold good conversations ! Surely. They must be ok.

It's definitely a thing that I have run into the frustration, anger and rage for others about my predicament.

One of my friend in particular spent a pronlonged period raging that I was "too young" to be like this. And. In that very common human way, with no other outlet to their rage, they would beat me up. Berate me. Kick me. Shout at me. For being exhausted. For suffering.

It's that phenom of shooting the messenger.

I understand how it works.

Which doesn't excuse it or make it helpful. It is. Unhelpful at best. At worst. It itself is exhausting. Another burden to carry on top of what you already have. You have to absorb their anger, their abuse.

My mom used to do this to me commonly in later years. She would become frustrated for me. Angry for me. But with no other outlet. It would turn to me. Then I would be being berated. Slammed. Crucified. Until I would gently say, mom, please don't beat me up. This isn't helpful. I'm the one being hurt here already. At which point she would check herself. Apologise. And then 10 minutes later repeat the sin.

You can also see echoes of this with my dad and my mom. At her most awful vulnerable moments. He is abusing her. Kicking her. Get up. Get up you fucking bitch. Fear. Worry. Helplessness. Turned into some horrific abusive monster. Lashing out at the very thing that needs help. Insanely twisted.

But so very common.

In a way, with that one friend in particular beating me up in the past about my predicament. It is no real difference to the same frustration I feel with myself. They are frustrated at my situation. They care. They are powerless. So they beat me up. In frustration. As if beating me will cure me. Beat it out of me. And everything will be golden.

This also reminds me of a moment in my childhood. A bit of foreshadowing of the distant future.

There was a point in my childhood where I had become very ill with something. No idea what it was. It was never diagnosed or anything. But I was properly bed ridden for a couple of days. Very ill. Likely some virus or otherwise. And I can distinctly remember at one point my parents telling me to get out of bed as I had been "too long in bed". I got out of bed and my legs immediately folded. This was a huge surprise to me. I had no control over my legs. They had turned to literal jelly.

My parental response was unsurprising.

I was a cunt.

Stop being stupid. Stand up.

I literally could not.

So my dad was angry.

I was left to it in contempt. I didn't deserve any attention because I was a cunt.

Slowly after working on it I started to get some control of my legs back.

I distinctly remember sliding down the stairs on my bum, using my jelly legs as best I could to stop from tumbling down the stairs. And after a bit. I could wobble my way around.

I had no sympathy. No help. Just fucking stop it. And that foreshadowing bit. In the face of a genuine health problem. My dads solution was to become angry and abusive.

65 years later he ended up replaying that in even more severe fashion with my mom who also, could not get up from the floor.

I am loathe to make a connection.

But if you were any kind of rational person.

You could start to piece together my entire lack of self worth. My inability to deal with myself failing. As just that shadow of my old man. I am a cunt. Even when ill. Even when in need of help. Don't you dare expect help. Don't you dare ask for it. You are worthless. Contemptible. For daring to be sick.

I have no worth.

And struggle to accept my illness.

Just like my old man taught me.

Step back a moment. Take a picture from high orbit. Breathe.

It is interesting what the exact details of abuse look like from up there. Sometimes it is not about the caricature easily identified signs. It is instead much more difficult to spot subtleties. The bits inbetween guests visiting. The continual grinding in of not having any worth. Treating another human being like they are worthless. And teaching them to have no worth in themselves. Monstrous. But it's so much harder to spot than witnessing someone bodily throwing someone across a supermarket aisle, and kicking their kids on the floor.

Another friend asked of me not too long ago whether I had forgiven my dad. For what he did to my mom.

There are times. When I am starkly reminded of what he did. The atmosphere in which he did it. When that question. Have you forgiven him. Seems. Itself. Monstrous. Are we... forgiving... of such things ?

When it isn't so starkly remembered. Fuzzed out. The question seems less monstrous.

But for my part. On the whole. It is not about forgiving him or not. I feel sympathy with his current isolated horrible life. It must be awful. But forgiving him ? I don't know. Things happened. Consequences were had. Shit happens.

At least.

That's what a greater part of me thinks. But. I think. When you get back to ground zero with it. When you relive that at its worst moment. There is no forgiveness. There will never be forgiveness. There is anger. So much anger. An intense emotion fuelled rage that he could do that. A primitive drive to annihilate him and his evil. One that has to be leashed. Cool that rage. Do not let your own monster off the leash. I said it many many moons ago. That if there were two of my dad. And my dad had judged himself. I am fairly sure there would only be one of them left afterwards. By his own standards. My dad would have committed murder. Or at the very least, so badly fucked The Other up that it would have been gruesome. Because my dad would not have leashed that anger. 

Ironic. But also. Human. I know many people that apply such hypocritical standards to their lives. "You're too nice. You're taken advantage of." "You do realise that if I applied that to you, we would not be talking anymore" 

Ho hum.

As far as my dad goes. I think. Deep down. I am never going to forgive him for what he did. At a higher level. I understand why he did what he did, I can almost half forgive him for it. The mess and difficulty of trying to be human. Combined with an immature capability in my dad to adapt, learn, not be an asshole. A failure to take responsibility for oneself. But. I think. Really. All of that is a higher art ivory tower consideration of everything. Closer to the metal. The more emotional level. The more animal level. I don't forgive him. He will always be a monster that got away with monstrous behaviour. And everything he has done in his life has echoed down time with him. He has reaped what he has sewn. And a good deal of what he currently suffers with his very small life, is entirely his own self inflicted nightmare.

It is of course something you can entirely sympathise with. Very human. Stuck in your own hell. Unable to escape it on your own. Unable to change. Suffering.

But I have some serious skin in the game on this one. And part of me sees a certain balance of justice going on there. Justifiable purgatory. Even as another part of me would never wish that on anyone. Not even my old man. Suffering is awful. And even monsters shouldn't be made to suffer.

There is, as my shrink would say a little "tension" there. Poised between one thing and another. Sympathy. Versus "Justice". Which often as not is just a fancy word for the much more ugly "Vengeance". 

An ironic thought occurs to me. As much as my dad wanted me to succeed - not particularly for my own benefit, but for what it reflected in him, whether he could brag about it, whether it made him look good or not - there are certain aspects of what he did that set me up to fail. The imbuing of no sense of self worth. You are sewing the seeds of my failure in there.

At a bigger picture level you can see my dad is a tightly wound ball of dysfunction. Rage. Anger. Bitterness. Incapability to deal with emotion. Fear. Anxiety. Turning it all into rage where he can. Zero sense of sympathy. Empathy. Care. Concern. Nothing social. Nothing warm. A relentless task master casually visiting horrors onto his kids. Scarring them. Recalcitrant. Immature. And that overlying hymn to all of it. The depression. Stalking him his entire life. No doubt at least partly powered by all those dysfunctions bouncing off of each other. The lack of control. The internal chaos.

I can see my old man pretty clearly I think. I get a sense of the utterly damaged person he is. And also his masks on top of it. I see the angry overwhelmed scared bitter person inside. 

Sigh.

Enough for today.

There's no more use going down this rabbithole today. 

 More positive.

Perhaps today I can spend a little more time on my feet. Perhaps I can even stretch to playing a game. Shocking. We shall see. I can feel my energy literally bobbing around minute by minute, dipping into exhaustion that makes me want to sleep, peeking above the line for a moment with a glimmer of, lets do something ! Before slumping back into the depths of sleep.

Fuck off. 

Ok. Back down the rabbithole.

Another thing occurs to me. Makes me very sad.

Some of this. I want to talk to my siblings about. I want to share. I want to listen to them. Because I know all the things I talk about also impacted them. Also damaged them. And I want to talk about it. Understand it. Bring it into the light.

But I can't.

Particularly with my sister.

Because it lives in the dark instead.

My sister avoids it. Does not want to "fester" with it. Buries it. Closes the lid. Avoidance.

It is not an entirely unwise decision.

But it makes me sad.

Sad I cannot talk to her about it. Sad I cannot share what is in my heart. Sad I cannot hear her heart.

Instead. It is locked down. Distanced. We are distanced. Everything held at arms length. Because of the pain.

It is the silence of abuse.

That silence that does not get talked about. Is avoided. Run away from. It is how abuse remains hidden. Goes on behind doors. It is not talked about. It is painful. And shameful. And better just to not think about it. And yet. That damage. Has repercussions in behaviour. Aspects of it are passed down to the next generation. In not tackling it, the problems and dysfunctions within it are morphed and passed on down. You don't get a get out of jail free card. You don't just get to ignore it and it magically goes away. All you're actually doing is ignoring the problem and letting it silently "fester". Where it continues to do damage day after day after month after year. And not only to you. But everyone in your circle.

And it makes me sad.

That I cannot talk about any of it.

I fear the burden it would put on my siblings. I do not want to see them suffer. I fear what pain it would bring to the surface for them. The disruptions to their carefully placed and practiced masks.

I fear the backlash that is almost inevitable from it.

So I can't talk to them.

And that makes me sad. That I cannot connect to them properly. That they will never be able to properly connect to those around them. And it feeds my sense of isolation. Awake. In a room full of sleepers. Afraid to wake them from their slumber because I do not want to disturb them from their dreams. 

I think. I need to talk to the shrink about this. Possibly the only person I really can. It will have to do.