one step forward, two steps back

My wrist got infected, got cured again. I wear a scrunchie around it and nobody asks. Nobody but Shauna and Erin. So I told them. The rest of the world will never know, will never care, what happened to me on Wednesday.

Today in my therapist's office was a nightmare. She stuck a wedge in me and pried me apart. All the DID came back. I felt so crazy. There were so many voices screaming inside of me... I kept seeing everything in odd angles. I imagined myself small enough to crawl around in the sphere of the lightbulb, safe, away from all of the nightmares... it all crawled in my skin and I sounded crazy, so many people, too many conflicting emotions... she pried and I split, shamefully, crying all the way, but I split and she knew... I'm not healed yet.

I wanted to scream and break the ceiling bulb even as I ran inside it.

And my parents came and told her about Josh, what he's done to me. All of these months he's put so much pressure on me. I'm the reason he lives. I'm the reason he dies. He told his therapist I'm the reason he OD'd. I'm the reason he wants to get better. I'm the reason he can't. I've been so scared that if I left him he'd kill himself. My parents and counselor says he's abused me unconsciously, and manipulated me, made me bear more than any human can bear. I'm finally broken. He finally crashed and I broke with him, broke into all of these personalities that are still inside of me.

AM I CRAZY? Because I feel crazy... I thought the other personalities were gone, but then on monday and tuesday they were materializing due to sexual abuse stuff, and on Wednesday they all came back. When I'm with people it's usually okay, I can focus myself into one person. But it was apparent today that they are all still there inside of me, fractured bits of me, pieces of a broken past, waiting for something. It felt horrible... like alcohol in a raw wound.

I can't talk to Josh anymore, not for a long time, not until he gets better and can be with me without worshipping me, without making me all of his reasons, without expecting me to be more than I can be. I'm so mad at him. Not only has he turned his life upside down, but he has turned mine upside down.

I can't explain how it feels to lose him for now. I can't really tell you how much it hurts, because when I think about it my mind starts to shut down and drift apart again, and I don't want that. But I can tell you I'll surive. I'll survive because that's what I do. People hurt me. Love hurts me. All of the people I love leave me. Every time it hurts just as badly as the last. But I get up again, and I keep living. I keep surviving. And I will survive this. Although some part of me will always been inside Josh, and I won't ever get it back.

I had my birthday party tonight. It was girls only. We are all so used to parties with guys where everyone plays football and wanders around feeling awkward. I wanted to be young again, and I wanted them to be young again. It was a survivor party. Everyone came and drew tribe names and painted their faces. There was about thirteen people there. We played team games, and then we played individual games to see who won the gift certificate. I had to eat a cup of pig intestines. The final challenge was holding a live cricket in my mouth for three minutes. That cricket was jumping around in my mouth, scrabbling its legs and tail against my tongue and the walls of my cheeks, but I did it. I spit that thing out and it was still alive. It hopped off, drenched in saliva. I won the survivor game.

We played party games, told stories about our most embarrassing moments and our first kisses. There was pizza and ice cream and presents. I had a hard time believing that there could be that many people that really cared about me in the world, but there were, and I knew that everyone there loved me a lot. The panic from everything- going crazy again, losing the boy I love more than anyone- subsided just a little, and I did feel young again, and alive.

But I am hurting, very, very badly right now. I love Josh. I love Josh in ways I could not begin to explain. I know, now, that I have to lose him. And I know that I have to move on, because it wouldnt' be good for me to remain trapped in the past with him. But it feels... it feels like living without a heartbeat... like somehow the blood is washing through me, filtering through my kidneys, feeding all my cells with oxygen and glucose so they can respire happily, but I'm not really alive, and my heart isn't really moving.

Things aren't really okay. I'm not sure if they ever will be truly okay again. But I believe in life still. And I believe in myself. And I believe in surviving and moving on, even if for a while I am not whole. I can be happy. I can be healthy. I can do this, with or without a beating heart.

I'm so used to losing the things I love most.