Variables

Life is kind of funny. You think all I have to do is have a positive attitude and take care of myself and everything will be o.k. But you know what? Life is full of uncertainty! I mean we don’t get to choose when we are born or when we die. However, that not the only variable. Take for instant this guy in my group therapy. He is super hot and I like him because he doesn’t smoke, but for the life of me, I can’t get him to talk to me! Maybe it’s some weird cosmic karma. I mean I used to be only a hundred and fifteen pounds in high school and I had long blond hair down my back, but I was so shy. I find guys on Facebook from my high school and they usually say, “Amanda I had a crush on you way back when, but I could never get you to talk to me.” So no matter how much I like this hot guy Jason there is this variable of him choosing to talk to me that I can not control.

Another example is my apartment, I want to be in it sooooo bad. It’s not like living with my parents is horrible or anything, it’s just that I want a place of my own with my own stuff and privacy! However, I can’t control when I get to the top of the waiting list. Maybe that is some kind of weird cosmic karma. I always wanted to stay with my parents. I mean I really wanted to go to college and I thought going in another state would be fun, but I dreaded the day my parents pulled away from my dorm hall parking lot. I tried to spend every minute I could with them. I still have this feeling like if I don’t sit and watch a movie with them at night than thirty years from now when they have Alzheimer’s, I am going to wish that I had watched the movie with them on July, 28th, 2010. However, that too is a variable. I mean my parents could live to be a hundred and have all their faculties or they could both get heart attacks tomorrow. I have no control over that and I shouldn’t worry. You know why? Because if I spend every waking hour with them, then I am going to be seventies years old and my friends will be gone and I will wish I would have went to dinner with them instead of spending time with my parents! Anyway, now that I finally want freedom from my parents, I have to let the universe deal me the luxury of enough people moving out of TSA for me to get into it!

I would like to give just one more example. The success of my poetry, I have no control over that. And of course, that too is some weird cosmic karma! I remember my really good friend in high school. She was the president of the creative writing club and I was the vice president of the creative writing club our senior year. I asked her if she had one wish what would it be and she said, “To live in a world where we wouldn’t have to worry about money. Where I could just spend my time writing.” Now I have my life all figured out where I don’t have to work. I get disability benefits from the government. I do volunteer work and group therapies to keep my life in balance, but I don’t have to wake up a six – thirty in the morning or worry about a presentation for my boss or anything. So I can use my spare time to write. And that’s why I like blogging, it gives me an audience! However, I have no control over the fact that if I send my poetry into a publisher that she will like it! I still talk to my friend from high school, she is getting her Ph.D. in creative writing right now, but she has to work at the college with a classroom full of people who don’t know if they even want to take a class in poetry. I mean they could just be doing it because they heard that it would be an easy credit for an elective! And here I am writing a bunch of shit on a computer to people when I could be writing a master piece that would change the world! Well, maybe this so called “shit” might change someone’s world. That I guess is another variable!

Anyway, all I am saying is don’t get discouraged because life is not all ours to control. We still may have shitty days because dogs will crap in the house, people we love will get sick, or we miss the five fifteen train going home. Just because you eat right and take all your medicine doesn’t mean that you get to live to a hundred and three. And just because you love your parents doesn’t mean that they will always do what you want them to do or be. I guess the same goes for children. I don’t have any yet and that is another variable. My goodness, I didn’t realize all the variables there are!

Moving On

Well, I’ve been really busy which is why I haven’t blogged in almost two weeks! The most exciting thing I did was go to a Bon Jovi concert. I've never been to a live concert of someone famous enough to be on Saturday Night Live. I mean that’s what I thought two weeks before the concert when I saw Bon Jovi on SNL. I’ve been to concert before, but they were Christian local bands that I don’t even think get air time on the radio! Now I have a little crush on Bon Jovi because he is even cuter in person. However, if you told me five years ago that I would be in line for an hour waiting to get a good seat (my best friend and I had lawn seats), then I would crush through a ton of people to the stage, listen to a rock concert, and then crush back through a crowd of people. I would tell you that you’re crazy. Mostly because I had a hard time handling crowds!

You know what else I’ve been up to? I joined a Yoga class. Today was my third class. Five years ago, I had just had a bad experience with Albify and said that I would rather be fat and have diabetes than hear voices. Now that still is true, but in October I decided to give Geodon a try. Now I am not promoting or telling you not to take certain pills. Everyone’s brain chemistry is different so unless you happen to be my long lost twin; you have to find the medicine that is right for you. Anyway, it was a little scary at first. And there were points when I have had delusions and the medicine had to be adjusted, but for the most part everything is o.k. So I decided if my medicine is going to help me lose weight, I am not going to let it do it all on it’s own. I’ve been exercising two to three times a week at the Y. Then, I would say about February, after being encouraged by the scale, I started eating better. So far to date I have lost thirty – one pounds. Anyway, I finally feel comfortable enough to join a class at the Y and I choose Yoga because I still get panic attacks. I thought Yoga would relax me and it does! I am getting better at the stretches each time I go. And it’s a wonderful feeling to be fit.

I am also thinking about the future. For example, I am going to compile a body of work of my poetry and submit it as a book of poetry to a publisher. Also I am thinking beyond the apartment that I am on the waiting list for. I have two possibility for my midlife years. One I don’t get married, save money to buy my own mobile home, and get a little puppy. The other to find a man, get married, and go through an adoption agency for a son between the ages of two and five years old. I really don’t care where I live if I get married (of course I want to stay in the North Country of New York state, I meant if my husband wants a house and he can afford it, then it’s all good with me). I don’t have a boyfriend at the moment so I tend to think of being by myself, but now that I am doing more I do meet more guys! I guess will have to see. I still live one day at a time, but there was a time when I just couldn’t think beyond a year or two. I just didn’t see hope. I thought I would muddle through life the same way for the rest of my life! I thought a good day would always be just because I didn’t have an episode and I got a hamburger at a burger joint that made me feel good.

Now my question is: I am I better? Did I move on? I have moved on to a “life worth living.” However, a schizophrenic is never “better.” Tomorrow, my Mom’s CA125 could come back that she has cancer and I could get so stressed out that I don’t go to that Yoga class and instead I just sit in my room and draw lines on my arm with scissors or talk to voices that no one else can hear. Although, I would like to think I would handle it better than that. I’ve got have a lot of coping skills. All I am saying is there is always unforeseen stress, but there is hope at the end of the tunnel. Right now I am not going to worry about the unforeseen stress and live my “life worth living.” I am going to be happy with more than a burger and I going to see hotties both in concert and working out at the gym. I am going to look forward to my little puppy or my beautiful son. I am going to live each day as “normal” as possible because I have moved on!

Life is crazy

Life is Crazy
By Amanda Robin

You think I am crazy?
Check out life!
It will throw you
For a roll coaster ride.
One minute things
Are up.
The next there down.
You thought you didn’t
Have many friends
Then you lost them
And realized you
Had way more than
A handful.
So you tried to change
That and guess what!
You have way more
Than a handful again.
Boys seem to come
And go.
You think well,
“I always have
My girls.”
Then a really fly
Guy who
Just happens not
To smoke
Shows up right
In front of your face.
Your dreams fall apart
And you decide to
Dust yourself off!
You do things
Little by little.
Then you realize
You have created
A life for yourself
That makes
The old dream
Pale in comparison.
Yep, that’s life
And in a really nice
And exciting way
It’s pretty screwed up!

Irony

I started my stress management group yesterday. That is partly why I haven’t blogged yesterday. As my followers know, I try to blog once a week! Anyway, it was in the evening. It was a very interesting group. It is actually run by a psychiatrist, which is unusual, all the other groups run, at the mental health clinic I go to, are run by therapists. Being a group running psychiatrist is also unusual because the clinic is a government run clinic (I am on Medicare and Medicaid) and there is SOOO much work they put on the docs! I found this doc. to be very insightful and caring. And you know what else there is more men that go to this group. There is one my age and he looks really cute, he doesn’t say much, though. I have decided to first try to become his friend before I jump to day dreaming stuff!

Anyway, I am getting side tracked here. Let me back up a bit. From 2004 to 2006 I went to a day treatment facility for the mentally ill. I think I wrote about it in my last blog. Anyway, about a year into going there I made this friend Catlin. She actually sought me out and I felt special. However, something was always off and I didn’t quite put my finger on it. She did do little things that annoyed me. I have friends that smoke and I used to smoke so I respect their need for a cigarette. I don’t condone smoking, but I can not judge as I can honestly say an over eater’s anonymous group would do me some good. Anyway, a lot of times I will be in a mall or restaurant with one of my smoking friends (in New York State you can not smoke in public places) and they need a cigarette. Most of the time I will let them go outside by themselves, but sometimes I accompany them so we can keep the conversation going. My smoker friends will politely only smoke one cigarette if I am out there with them, but Catlin will smoke three or four. Also she told me before that if someone can handle their weed then they can smoke marijuana. I know these are minor things, but they bothered me. And to me there was something bigger that was bothering me that I couldn’t figure out. So I stopped calling her and returning her phone calls and I had already graduated the day treatment facility so I wasn’t in regular contact with her.

Now here comes the irony. I went to my stress management group and she is a member of it too (which I didn’t know until my first day which was yesterday). And you know what we talked about in Stress Management group? Toxic relationships! Most of the things we were talking about applied to her. I know she is a nice, smart, and interesting person. However, she brings me down, I don’t feel my morals are validated in the relationship, I don’t feel comfortable in the relationship, and something feels wrong in my gut. So what the heck is this gut feeling?

I thought about it today. Yes, it was still bothering me once I got up this morning. Not like bothering me where I couldn’t function because worry is a symptom of my mental illness when it effects my daily activities. And I can tell you that I didn’t lose any sleep over it. I just thought about it because she is this nice, smart, and interesting person. Well, I finally put my finger on it. Some of you may know, and for those of you who don’t I will go into it a little, I had an abusive relationship with a woman just before I was diagnosed with my mental illness. One of my axis of my diagnosis is that I have a sexual identity issue. This means my sexuality and thought of what I am bothers me. And I have learned through therapy that I may never know my sexuality. The best label I can tell you is that I am bisexual preferring men. I can not see myself living the rest of my life with a woman. There really are only three women in my life that I have ever been sexually attracted to and I have fallen in love with one, my abusive ex – girlfriend.

Anyway, I hope that is a good explanation of my sexuality, but back to how this relates to Catlin (who is straight by the way). When I first met my ex (I am not going to tell you her name because she doesn’t deserve to be immortalized on the internet at least not by me) she sort of picked me out of the crowd. I was actually at my first open rush event in my sorority, after pledging my sorority, and this woman came out of no where and paid attention to me like I was the only person in the whole room. And thinking about it, when I meet Catlin she picked me out at the day treatment facility and acted like I was the only person in the whole room. Now some of my followers have spouses and lovers and will tell you when someone swipes you off your feet that’s one of things they do. However, in a healthy relationships someone doesn’t do it manipulate you. They don’t do it so you don’t see their flaws and have you just focus attention they are giving you. Well, at least I hope not. Also when I came to know my ex, she constantly gave me attention like I was the only person in the room. Now those same swiped off your feet people will tell you that healthy relationships have space. You invite people on double dates, you have friends you go do stuff with, and you have hobbies that you do that you later share with your lover, but every waking moment is not spent with that person. I realized that, looking at when after the group therapy was over; Catlin, who hadn’t seen me in three years, jumped across the room to ask me to go to for coffee with her like we were close still, was focusing just on me. It was creepy. I know that she isn’t after a love affair. However, she is trying to manipulate me back into that toxic relationship where she brings me down, my morals aren’t validated, and I am uncomfortable.

You see my irony? The psychiatrist led a group discussion about toxic relationship and here I was in the room with someone who wants a toxic relationship with me! No, I am not going to quit the group. Knowing Catlin, she probably won’t show up half the time and quit in a couple of months. Also I have a right to be somewhere that is going to help me. I also want to venture into a friendship with a hottie! However, for now I will tell her I am too busy to hang out and if she stats callng me again (she hasn’t called me since I broke off the friendship before) I just won't take her phone calls . Like I said, she is smart. If she doesn't get the idea, I will tell her that I have stuff I have to work on with myself and can’t be around her right now. Maybe that’s still giving her hope. I just don’t want to be rude or put her down. I would like some thoughts on this. I appreciate my readers and do read your comments. I always respond, I don’t know if you check back after you write something, but I do. Thank you my on – line support buddies!