I have the word “fight” tattooed on my left forearm.
I got this tattoo in early 2009, not knowing how much I would still need it 16 years later. It’s a reminder, on the wrist I used to cut, to keep getting up and trying again.
On that same wrist, still visible, is the scar from the first time I hurt myself on purpose, 30 years ago. That is not the only scar. There are many scars. But there is also a reminder to not let the darkness win.
I’ve had almost daily migraines since my brain injury four years ago, but they’re getting worse now. Most days, by the end of the evening, it hurts to even have my eyes open, or to be in anything but very dim light. Sound bothers me. Movement bothers me. My brain doesn’t work right, and I get severe nausea some days.
I am always exhausted. I take hot baths in the dark.
I will be 44 in April. I don’t want to live the next 40 years of my life this way.
I have tried new, just-approved medications. I have taken the tried-and-true migraine meds. I’ve swallowed thousands of pills and given myself injections. I’ve gotten Botox. Nothing works. Opiates help but I’m only given a limited number of those, and some days they don’t even seem to make a dent.
When I tell you that my pain gets up to a 5 or 6 out of 10 almost every, you might think I’m telling you that it isn’t that bad. But I’ve had multiple kidney stones, one of which had to be removed surgically. I’ve broken my clavicle on three occasions. I’ve had multiple toothaches at the same time. All of those hurt a lot, but none are a 10 on my pain scale. 10 was when I had an abscess in my face. 10 was screaming “what kind of fucking hospital is this?” when I had been given the maximum dose of intravenous Dilaudid and I was still in agony.
Pain that hits a 5 or 6 almost every day is enough to seriously impact my life. It’s enough to make me flirt with the idea of razor blades and high bridges.
I have good days, when the painkillers work and I manage to laugh and enjoy myself. But I have bad days when I feel truly hopeless. I keep picking myself up and continuing to fight, but it is getting harder and harder to do. Four years now of accepting my diminished potential, of letting go of dreams, of trying to dig my way forward and transcend, somehow, the absolute shitshow this brain injury has brought into my life.
I am stuck in a place of making do and settling for less than I hoped for. All because someone else decided he knew better than I did about how I tolerate a certain kind of anesthesia, and I reacted the exact way I’d told him I would– which is to say, Versed makes me try to fight off whoever is trying to operate on me. Rather than stopping the procedure, he or someone in his office slammed my head into something with such force that I am still affected every single day by the injuries they caused. And I will never know exactly how it happened. I just woke up with a bump on my head and a moderate amount of brain damage.
There’s nothing anyone can do, it seems. They can’t make the headaches stop. My therapist can’t help me process this so that it’s somehow okay. It’s just awful. It continues to be awful. It has been awful for almost four years now.
I have lost so much, held on to what I could, and only managed to gain a little through sheer force of will. I don’t want this to be my new normal. I don’t want this at all.
We are raised to believe that if we’re good people, if we follow the important rules and try to be kind, if we persevere and strive, we can arrive at a place of contentment and happiness. I know now that it simply isn’t true. You can get utterly fucked by the fates in an instant, and nothing will feel safe, stable, or whole ever again.
I don’t trust contentment or happiness. I don’t trust stability or safety. And I wish beyond my ability to communicate that I had never gotten this wise. I’d rather be ignorant of all of this. I’d rather be stupid, safe, and happy.
I used to think that an unexamined life isn’t worth living. Now there are things I desperately wish I had never had to see.
All of that being said, I had a very good day on Sunday. I had a very good session with my therapist on Monday. I am continuing to fight. I am looking forward to my next Bacon Blue burger at our favorite bar. I might visit San Francisco in March, and I’m tracking the prices of airfare to Boston, Vermont, and San Diego.
On my right forearm, I have a tattoo of a human heart, and banners over the heart bear two statements in Latin: cogito ergo doleo and dum spiro spero.
It’s becoming almost a yearly thing now, that in June, I take a last-minute, spontaneous, emergency leave from work so I can get some fucking rest. A bit early this year, as it’s starting May 31st. And I expect this to be a short one, just a week or so.
When you find yourself sobbing uncontrollably to a bewildered, but verykind Nurse Practitioner at your neurologist’s office, repeatedly saying “I don’t know what to do,” and “I can’t do this again. I can’t go through all of this again,” it’s time to take a fucking break. So that’s what I’m doing.
I have been searching my mind for the past two weeks trying to figure out what the hell happened. I was doing so much better. My job is great! My coworkers are cool! My veggie garden is coming along! My marriage is going well! My health sucks, but other than that, things are good! So why am I so exhausted all the time? Why can’t I focus? Why can’t I sleep through the night? Why do I never feel like the sleep I get restores me at all? Why am I stuttering? Why am I hallucinating? Why am I crying?
I woke up at 2:20 Tuesday morning and saw a baby dinosaur on my nightstand. I was not frightened because
I knew that it was not real
It was clearly not a threat to me. It was an adorable baby dinosaur.
I googled to see if I could figure out what kind of dinosaur it was. It was a Parasaurolophus. They look like this:
And that’s very much what the baby dinosaur on my nightstand looked like, but thinner and smaller.
I joked about it. On the internet, and to friends, I joked about the baby dinosaur on my nightstand. And then, around midday Tuesday, I realized I was doing The Bravado Thing where I pretend I’m fine, that it’s all a joke, that I’m not fucking terrified that I had a full-on hallucination.
I didn’t see a shadow and think it was a cat. I didn’t see papers ruffling in a nonexistent breeze. I didn’t see an image and wonder if it was moving, which often happens to me since my injury. I had seen something, fully formed, in living color, that was not there. I had blinked, I had looked away and looked back, and there it still was.
I thought about it, really thought about it, and then I burst into tears.
I contacted my neurologist’s office and he said yes I should definitely come in. And that’s what I did– yesterday, now, I guess, since it’s almost five in the morning on Friday. But I haven’t yet slept.
There are two main suspects as to what might be the direct cause of my hallucinations, and they might have worked together. The first is exhaustion. The second is a muscle relaxant I take to help me sleep. Both can cause hallucinations. Both have, in fact, caused me to have hallucinations… but never before at “baby dinosaur” levels.
But the bigger factor, the actual mastermind behind the crime… this metaphor is stupid… is that two weeks ago I put on a beautiful navy blue dress with a lemon print and emceed an event for my workplace. For four hours I worked the crowd, called out raffle numbers, dispensed prizes, mingled with vendors and guests, and collected booty from the various booths. I was charismatic and I looked adorable in my dress and I was told by multiple people that I did a wonderful job and they’d love to have me emcee again next year.
I told my boss the next day that I was exhausted but had had a lot of fun. Actually, what I said was that I felt like I’d survived an exorcism and a cocaine binge both in the same night and still had to work the next day.
I didn’t know that I would still be exhausted two weeks later. I didn’t know. I did not count on that at all.
A year ago I was working a job that I had once loved, a job that I had once seen a bright shiny future in, but by that point in May 2023 had gotten so effed-up and twisted that I was on the verge of killing myself. I have written about it, but I cannot put into words the despair I was feeling.
In October, I moved on to where I am now, and it took me months to relax and realize that it’s pretty unlikely that my current coworkers are going to turn on me with knives out (although with my current Health Bullshit, it’s more possible than I’d like.) I’m in a good place, and I FINALLY started getting better. The headaches decreased in severity if not in frequency. I wasn’t under such an enormous amount of stress. I no longer wanted to die. My marriage got better. I unclenched. I started listening to music again. I started noticing nature more. I started trusting people, just a bit, but it felt nice. My brain was healing.
And I felt like I was finally, finally, out of the woods.
So when I started losing my words again, when I started stuttering worse than I ever have, when I saw an adorable baby dinosaur… well, this isn’t even past tense. I’m scared.
The upside is that I have a plan now. I have 10 days to try to get some rest, to tend to the garden, to pet the cats, use the rowing machine I insisted we buy, to clean up my office, to try to learn how to make oatmeal interesting, to maybe learn to crochet. I have 10 days to breathe and try to let my brain heal a little bit.
The downside is that I now know I will have to be exceedingly careful going forward about what responsibilities I take on, because four hours of calling out raffle numbers and working a crowd is apparently enough to make me very, very ill.
So ill that my neurologist made me promise to contact my psychiatrist to loop her in, and the nurse practitioner practically begged me to take leave from work and let my brain rest. So ill that they both assured me that they care about me and want me to do well and asked me to keep them updated. And I know that they meant it.
And now it’s 5:11 in the morning and I didn’t take the pill that knocks me out, so I’m awake. I will be awake until exhaustion makes me fall asleep. I am going to have to reset my body to fall asleep naturally without the tranq darts I’ve been pumping into myself. I’ve been too terrified to give this an honest try, because I remember when I first got hurt and I was averaging about 4.5 hours of sleep a night and sincerely believed that my brain was melting. I spent my days just trying to stay awake and feverishly playing Sudoku and doing other kinds of puzzles so that my brain would not, in fact, melt. I memorized the presidents in order. I did logic puzzles. Trivia. Anything to keep my brain active and not-melted.
When my doctor prescribed a muscle relaxant to treat my whiplash injuries (the head injury, which is the sexy part that gets talked about, came along with some pretty severe whiplash) ANYWAY I took a half a pill on a Friday night just to see how it affected me and I basically tipped over sideways on the couch a half hour later and realized that this little pill was the answer to my prayers. Finally! Sleep! Except that little pill is dangerous. And I cannot sleep without it. And I’ve now been taking it for three years. And it took me, oh, about two and a half years of knowing it’s bad for me to finally commit to getting off of it because I am so damn scared of the terrible insomnia I had when I first got hurt, and how lost I felt when I was so addled and all I needed was rest but I couldn’t fucking sleep.
But if it’s getting off the pills or dying… I’m going to white-knuckle my way through this. I have Mtn Dew, Adderall, several pot shops in the vicinity, a good hot water tank, lots of tea, a rowing machine, a garden, and ten days to figure this shit out.
And, in case you didn’t know, I am Kate the Great and I am a fucking badass.
Two years, eight months, and four days ago, I went to the oral surgeon. They put me under. I woke up. I was terrified. I was crying. I asked, did something go wrong? They said nothing happened. One of the assistants seemed angry with me. I didn’t know why. I couldn’t stop crying. My friend Jordan was my ride. He was waiting in the parking lot. They wanted to go get him. I wouldn’t let them. I wanted to calm down first. I didn’t want him to see me like that. I couldn’t stop crying. I didn’t know why I couldn’t stop crying. I didn’t know why I was terrified. No one would tell me anything. Eventually I calmed down a bit. I was still pretty out of it. I don’t know how long it took, but if I had to guess, I’d say maybe twenty minutes. Jordan came in. They walked me to the car. Jordan drove me home. Jordan got my husband and they put me to bed. I slept and slept and slept. I was a mess. I had gauze in my mouth, and stitches, and I just wanted to rest.
That was on March 15th, 2021, which was a Monday. I think I worked that Tuesday. I can’t imagine how I worked Tuesday. Force of habit, I guess. I know I can’t have been feeling 100%. I haven’t felt 100% since before March 15th, 2021.
Tuesday night was when we found the bruises
These were obviously fingerprints pressed into my arm.
We were laying in bed. And The Husband-Bot said Oh My God Your Arm. And I was like What Are You Talking About. And he said “Look.” and I Looked. And I was like, T, those are fingerprints. And he said “Yes, they are.” And we marveled.
I had a knot on the back of my head. I had bruising under my jaw. It hurt to swallow. It hurt to put even featherweight pressure under my chin. Someone had obviously restrained me with great force. Multiple someones. Someone had obviously slammed me back in the chair. I had been injured. But I didn’t know yet how injured I was.
March 15th, I went to the oral surgeon.
March 16th, we found the bruises.
March 17th, I emailed the oral surgeon to ask what the hell had happened.
And on March 18th, I figured out that there was something really wrong with me.
That’s when I knew I had a concussion.
Today is November 19th 2023. It has been two years, eight months, and four days since my most recent traumatic brain injury, and I have been well and truly fucked by it.
I saw my amazing doctor on March 23rd. She verified that I had a concussion, which at that point was a mere formality. By this point I had
been bucked from a horse in 1985
attempted (and very much failed) to pop a wheelie in 1987
fainted and smacked my head against a wall in 1995
gotten t-boned by a truck in 2011
I knew what a fucking concussion felt like.
On April 8th I facilitated a staff meeting but then started hallucinating like I’d eaten some excellent shrooms. It was then that I decided to take the rest of the day off and not to facilitate meetings for awhile.
Work was very understanding, if by understanding we mean that they said that they understood while actually making everything much harder and tilting their head like confused dogs when confronted with the fact that, yes, I still had a TBI and, yes, that actually did change some things and no, that wasn’t something I could just kinda, y’know, opt out of on weekdays or anything…
(fuck you kristin)
(I have a new job now)
The first three months after my injury I tried to behave as normal. I tried not to miss work, not to make excuses, not to slow down or change my routine in any way, and it almost killed me. I was getting worse instead of better. I couldn’t really sleep– it’s a sick irony of TBIs and that they can cause insomnia when what you need more than anything else is rest. So I was working eight hour days and sleeping about 4.5 hours a night and experiencing ungodly migraines, dizziness, ataxia, paraphasia, hallucinations, issues with word-finding, short-term memory loss, and a host of other issues that made me feel like I was going senile at 40. I was worried that I was losing myself. In June I broke down and ended up taking three weeks of leave out of desperation and sleeping as much as I could.
Part of the reason it felt imperative to take leave right then was that things had come to a head with my mother about her continuing pressure on me to have a relationship with my brother which I did not (and do not) want to do. I had to really break that down with her and put her on a time out, and this was very difficult for me emotionally. I wrote a rather lengthy blog post about this at the time if you feel like hunting it down. It’s not hard to find.
In September I received a two day unpaid suspension for goofing around on my work computer on the clock. When I pled that a lot of the things they cited were work-related, that in many cases I was trying to stay awake and alert when I ran out of tasks, and that my judgement and awareness of time were affected by my traumatic brain injury it fell on deaf ears. This is when I started to seriously believe that management was trying to get rid of me.
So at that point I was six months into my TBI adventure!
Throughout all of that I was trying very hard to be upbeat! Hopeful! To maintain my belief that healing was just! around! the corner!
Spoiler: no.
I got a new therapist around that time who was awesome! Her name was Jacey! And she was very good at helping me see the bright side of things. She felt like a friend. Our weekly sessions really helped keep me going. So that was great. My work situation still sucked ass, but at least I had someone to talk to about it.
And now I’m sitting here trying to think of other things that were happening in autumn 2021 and I can’t think of a fucking thing… I think I was just in survival mode, you know? Waiting for the good things I was sure were just right around the corner. I know I wrote a Christmas letter that year?
So I guess we can pick back up in Spring 2022.
MARCH: A year after my injury. I threaten to sue oral surgeon. He sends money. It isn’t a ton of money, but it’s all I’m going to get. I had to sign a NDA. We start shopping for a house in earnest. [We did not have “buy a house” money. We have “Oregon has great first time home-buying programs and we had hubris and now have SO MUCH DEBT OH MY GOD WHY DID WE DO THIS” money.] I hired the first realtors I met up with because I got a good feeling. They were a team who I’ll call Carrie and Fiona. I only meet Carrie the once, Fiona was our point of contact from then on.
APRIL: Jacey the therapist decides to leave the practice she’s at but super super pinkie swears she’ll totally for sure going to start up somewhere else to continue the super important work we were doing. I never see her again. This devastates me. I go into a terrible depression. The depression goes way past April. I am still in the depression. I do have a therapist currently, though.
MAY: HOUSE HUNT! We find a great-looking house and are about to bid on it when we discover that it was pretty much the site of a gun battle the year before and decide “nope.” We decide to confine our search to a certain part of town where we really want to live, which limits our options but makes us focus more.
JUNE/JULY: More house hunting. I have become obsessed. Travis keeps telling me to chill. I MUST HAVE A REWARD FOR ALL THE BULLSHIT I AM GOING THROUGH. ALL WORK AND NO PLAY MAKES KATE A DULL PSYCHOTIC MESS. We find a house which is MEH but for some reason Carrie the realtor (who T has never even MET) really wants us to buy it. It is dark and dank and a homeless dude lives in the shed and it isn’t at all what we want and there is no driveway and no back yard (and an awesome back yard is on our MUSTS list) but for some reason Carrie is like THIS IS YOUR HOME BUY IT. We do not buy it. There’s this other house that we wanted to look at but the residents got Covid so we couldn’t. But then a couple weeks pass and we’re like what about that one…….
So it’s July 27th and we go and we look at it and T is like DO NOT GET HOPES UP DO NOT FALL IN LOVE and we drag our friend Dan along like we usually do and I’m just walking through this house like uh-huh…. uh-huh……. hmmmm……. uh-huh….. and then I go in the back yard and I sit in this Adirondack chair and Dan walks out and we make eye contact and we just, like, nod.
So we bid. And they came back a little higher. And we said Mmhmm okay. And then and then and then we have a house. We moved in September 21st, 2022.
Dan does not live here. We just rely on him to be rational and see things we don’t. It’s good to have a friend like that. I fall in love with everything. T is a ball of cynical anxiety. Dan is level-headed.
So I fucking love our house. Original 1958 oak floors. Not pristine, but solid shape. Central heating, no AC but we can dream. It’s in great shape for its age, good foundation, new roof, new huge deck. It’s charming as hell. We love our neighborhood. Quiet. Great Mexican restaurant a few blocks away. Friendly people. It’s just… nice. We’re still learning how to be homeowners. But it’s great.
But there’s nothing, nothing, nothing that can compensate for the TBI. $10k wasn’t enough. $10mil wouldn’t be enough. Nothing would be enough. Nothing.
We’ve been in the house for 14 months. We wouldn’t have the house without the catastrophic head bonk. And I think I was so obsessed with finding a house because I thought it would make up for the head bonk. And it doesn’t. It couldn’t. It was stupid to think that it could. It’s a great house. But nothing could.
I am mostly “back.”
I am doing way better than I was a year ago. I am doing immeasurably better than I was two years ago.
But I will never be like I was before I was injured. Looking at me you might not know that. But I know it. Every day I know it. I feel it. And it bloody kills me.
I spent the first, like, 29 years of my life in the pits of despair, man. Agony. I had good days and bad days. I had good years and bad years. And when I was 29 I had to move out of my rental house in Portland and I had nowhere to go so I went to my mom’s house in California because I was out of fucking options. And I got a job and I got a nice boyfriend and everything was temporary but it was sunny and it was tolerable and I was happy for just a little while, and I knew then that it was possible to be happy.
And everything went to shit again, and everything stayed shit for quite some time, but I knew it was possible to be happy so I fought like hell and I eventually got to a good place, a stable place, what felt like a really sustainable place, and by the time I was 39 I was married and I was on the right pills and I was employed and I was fucking healthy and everything was coming up Milhouse.
I guess I still believed in the American dream, that with enough sweat, luck, and bootstrappin’, you can do anything, you can be happy. You can succeed. I believed that I was away from the yawning chasm I’d camped next to for most of my life and I’d never get that close to it again. Suicidal? Not me! Not anymore, not ever again.
I thought I’d fought hard, and I’d won. I thought I could stop fighting.
We’ve been here for over a month. The floors are oak that someone put carpet over but someone else ripped the carpet out, thank goodness . It’s somewhat drafty and badly insulated. Apparently our gutters aren’t great. The fan in the bathroom needs fixing. The kitchen is too small.
It’s lovely.
We hosted people in the backyard approximately every other day for the first month we were here. Now it’s cold and the backyard is soggy. There are some tomatoes that I should bring inside. I ate a pear right off the tree a few weeks ago and it was delicious. I got a tan but now that it’s cold I look kind of sallow. The cats settled in nicely. Husband and I manage to both be in the too-small kitchen without wanting to murder each other, and we’re both sort of amazed that this is so. The tub is pretty big and I spend a lot of time in there. The furnace is noisy and we don’t run it very much. My office is the warmest room. The bedroom is barely big enough for a bed and a dresser. We’ve managed to keep the place pretty tidy. My office is the only room that is a mess, but it’s getting better.
I’m a mess, but I’m trying to get better.
My job is trying to suck the life out of me, but now that I have a mortgage I’m not allowed to tell anyone to fuck themselves. I still love a lot about what I do, but management isn’t very kind to someone with brain damage. Downright unhelpful, actually. Last week was panic and this week is numb. Next week will likely be panic again.
I sit in my cold house with my warm cats and find peace wherever I can. I nest in my warm office with my cold thoughts and try to remember that things have a way of turning out okay, because I know this to be true. Most of the time, things turn out okay. I keep telling myself that.
It’s weird to be in such a bipolar state. Some things are going so well while other things are going so terribly. And I’m bouncing back and forth between elation and despair.
The house is really very nice and we’re quite happy to be here. I wish everything else was going so well.
I haven’t blogged in awhile. It’s not because there’s nothing going on. There’s a LOT going on, it’s just that none of it is super interesting.
I’m still recovering from my stupid head injury. I got some money for it, which is nice. Started watching a bunch of The People’s Court on YouTube and realized that I could do a small claims suit. To sue someone in small claims court in Oregon you need to notify them first of your intent and give them time to respond. So I did that and the bastard surgeon just sent me money so we wouldn’t have to go through the whole nonsense of court.
T and I, with our newfound riches, started looking into buying a home and have quickly realized that we are not going to be able to do so without a miracle– or the cooling of the market, which will hopefully happen soon. 10 years ago we would have been able to afford something awesome, but Portland is very hot right now when it comes to real estate, so we need patience and probably to save more money. Or a miracle. If anyone would like to lend us a few tens of thousands of dollars, that’d be swell.
I had an evil coworker who left in the middle of last month, and that makes me happy because she’s terrible.
The cats are fine, we’re both basically fine, everything is FINE. I’ve gotten good at doing subtle makeup. So that’s nice.
I’m still in school, still gettin’ A’s, still plugging away at everything in hopes of a brighter future. I turned 41. I’m tired all the time.
We met in the swimming pool at our high school when I was a sophomore and you were a freshman. I had just given myself an appalling haircut, but you said it didn’t look too bad. I appreciated that.
We didn’t get to know each other until I was a senior, in psychology class. We both tested as introverts but were the loudest people in the class. We argued a lot, but it was in good spirits. I broke up with my high school sweetheart and developed a big crush on you. I wrote you a letter to that effect, and you wrote back and used the word “ennui,” which had to look up. I wish I still had that letter.
We went on for years, almost being a “thing” but never made it over the threshold to being in an actual relationship. We dated. We kissed. You asked me one night to help you shed your virginity, and I did because… well, why the hell not? The only other time we slept together was right after your dad died. I didn’t know what else to do to console you.
I fucked around with your feelings an awful lot, and for that I’m sorry. All those times we were “almost, but not quite” were because of me. You were smart and funny and athletic and witty and kind, and wicked hot, and I… for some reason just couldn’t be in a relationship with you. On paper, you were everything I wanted. In practice, it always felt off. I shouldn’t have kept leading you on.
I once dumped you in front of a “no dumping” sign near a canyon. You pointed it out wryly.
You stopped speaking to me nigh on 20 years ago, and you were right to do so. I was a mess, and more importantly, I treated you like shit. I didn’t mean to, but that’s no excuse.
I thought about reaching out to you to apologize. You turned 40 yesterday, and I thought I’d look you up and see what you’re doing these days. I knew you were in a hoity-toity industry and had been for years. I knew you were still in our hoity-toity hometown. I stumbled on your Instagram.
You’re married. You have two sons. Your wife looks nice. You enjoy baseball. You lost much of your glorious hair. You look happy.
I decided not to reach out.
You’ll never read this, but if you ever did– or if I can send a thought out toward you, 700 miles away– I would tell you that I am deeply and truly sorry, that I think you’re wonderful, and that I am so, so happy that you seem so happy. I would tell you that I’m a better person now, that you had a positive impact on my life and taught me the word “ennui” and you were so beautiful and I’m so fucking sorry.
But that would be for me, not for you. You’re fine. You don’t need or want anything from me.
I took an hour-long nap that evening and woke up feeling a little better. My husband and I watched Scrubs and ate McDonald’s and I felt like life might still have some good things in it. But then my husband fell asleep, and I couldn’t get my mind to settle. So I got back up at about 3am, called in sick to work, and spent a few hours composing and perfecting an email, then I sent it. Here’s my favorite paragraph:
I don’t know if I did something to piss you off or if it had been brewing for awhile. What I do know is that yesterday you sent me a text message more suitable for a blind date who tried to get handsy and then wouldn’t stop calling at 3am than for someone you’ve been friendly with for years.
I think that sums it up pretty well.
I finally fell asleep yesterday morning at about 8:30. Woke up at 1:30pm, called into a virtual work meeting, and spent the rest of the afternoon goofing off.
What I realized in the course of writing and revising that email to Amanda –and this isn’t just sour grapes– is that I don’t want to be friends with people who don’t tell me when I’m being an asshole. If something isn’t working, if I’ve pissed you off or upset you, let me know. Even if I can’t fix it, even if what I’ve said or done is unforgivable, at least give me the courtesy of telling me to fuck off. Don’t just disappear like I won’t notice that we’ve gone from hanging out weekly to “what the hell did I do?”
I know a lot of people don’t like confrontation. I get that. But suspecting something’s wrong, but not knowing, is a particularly agonizing sort of hell.
Unless someone is threating to your well-being –like they say vicious things when upset or have been known to bitch-slap people for looking at them funny– you have no excuse to ghost people who you have an established relationship with. It’s cruel, it drags things out, and it’s cowardly and weak. I have no interest in spending time with people who think that’s acceptable behavior.
Does it suck that I lost a friend? Absolutely. But the part that feels the worst is that I obviously misjudged her. Amanda comes off as feisty and opinionated, and I was under the impression that she would never pull shit like this. But she did. And that’s on her, not on me. I’m no longer pulling myself to pieces wondering what I did. After I slept on it, I stopped really caring what her reasons were. Because no reason could be good enough to cut someone off in that way.
I hope that, in the future, you will tell people what’s going on instead of hoping they’ll just fade away and leave you alone. That’s a weak move, and it’s cruel to the person you’re avoiding. Not knowing is so much worse than hearing the truth.
There are absolutely people in my life who I’ve cut off. One was an ex who I’d tried to stay in touch with, but who was unsupportive and casually cruel, so I told him that he was awful and that I never wanted to talk to him again. Another was my brother, who I didn’t tell right away because I thought that what he was saying and doing was so singularly awful that I really had nothing to say to him (and he also gets violently angry when opposed.) I eventually did explain that posting Facebook memes sympathizing with the Neo-Nazis in Charlottesville was a pretty fucking shitty thing to do, and he even seemed to understand. I still don’t talk to him, though, for other more complicated reasons that I’ll probably never blog about because YEESH families are messy.
I’ve for sure stopped talking to people I met online and hadn’t known for very long, back in my dating days– but again, a few IM conversations or a first date at a bar don’t equal a relationship.
There are people in the past who’ve cut me off or distanced themselves from me, and in a lot of those cases, I kind of get it. I stole their crushes. I freeloaded off of them. I said things that were careless and offensive. I wasn’t a great person. My high school best friend lives in town, and being that she knew me through all my shittiest phases, I understand why we’re not superbesties 4 lyfe. I was an asshole to her. We’re friendly but not really friends. And that’s okay because I know the reasons.
But now I’m a fucking awesome person. I have flaws, sure. Definitely. But I am fairly responsible, a good cook, funny as hell, smart, caring, generous, kind, and always trying to improve myself. I am warm, and I take the time to hear people out. I made myself into someone worth knowing. It was hard work!
You don’t have to like me, laugh at my jokes, or enjoy my cooking. You are not required to be my friend. But basic human decency and being a non-awful part of society as a whole means that you at least owe someone an explanation if you’ve decided they’re not worth your time after years of friendship. This seems basic to me.
My husband has a friend (whom I’ll call Roxxi) whom he talks to several nights a week. He told her what was going on, and she sent me this amazing email that made me feel 97% better. In part:
You’re thoughtful, loving and deeply committed to self-improvement. With your job, school, marriage, fitness, hell, even getting your license back, you’ve overcome some major hurdles and really exemplify the kind of “the world can fuck me over, but I’m gonna get back up and show it what I’m made of” attitude that just gives me all the empowerment boners.
I’m glad to call you friend and really sorry you’re going through this.
I told her I want to print out her email and keep it in my wallet for the bad times. And she’s agreed to tell me if I’m ever being a jackass or simply need to shut the fuck up. Because that sort of thing is obvious to Roxxi, too. I didn’t know it before last night, but she’s not just my husband’s friend. She’s my friend, too.
I’ve been tweeting this year, what with all the upheaval and the Covid and all that. It’s a good way to stay abreast of what’s going on, and I’ve been working on not getting into Twitter fights because they’re stupid and don’t change anyone’s mind. Instead, I watch animal rescue videos. Those mellow me out.
I find myself often recommending products that I really like on Twitter. No one cares. I have no sponsors, I’m followed by not-a-lot of people and no one knows who I am. But there are things I want to share with the world! Because I believe in them! And this is my blog! I do what I want! And this is my Christmas-themed post!
So here’s my list of the products and services I’ve enjoyed this year! Check them out if you like.
Glossier makeup has a lot of great stuff. I don’t really care for their skincare or scents, but for day-to-day low-maintenance wear, their makeup is the BOMB. Their prices are pretty reasonable for higher-end stuff, too.
I love their Perfecting Skin Tint, which gives my skin a lovely glow without looking the least bit fake. It’s very light coverage, but it really does make you look radiant without being done-up. I have an uneven complexion and this smooths it out just enough. Lasts pretty well, even better with primer. $26.
Their Generation G Sheer Matte Lipstick is also a real winner. I have it in Cake and Jam, and both of them give a lovely tint to my lips. It’s not super long-lasting, but it doesn’t dry my lips out and can be reapplied throughout the day. $18.
But most of all I want to recommend their amazing mascara. Lash Slick is by far the best mascara I’ve ever used. It creates length and definition without clumping, making my eyes look more awake and bright, but without making it obvious that I’ve done anything to my lashes. $16 and worth every damn cent.
Seriously, look at my lashes. This is one coat. LEGIT AMAZING.
Their Colorslide eyeliners are also totes amazeballs, they glide on your lids like buttah and last all day long. I have Stable Relationship, Brack, and Sparkle Shark, and they all get used on the reg. $15.
On the more expensive side, I just discovered Tom Ford Traceless Matte foundation and it is like airbrushing in liquid form. For when light coverage isn’t good enough, or for a full glam look, this stuff is awesome. It has a subtle lavender scent that fades quickly, it feels very lightweight on the face, it lasted all day without primer (I’ll use primer in the future, though) and it didn’t make me break out (always a concern with scented makeup and heavier foundations.) It’s spendy, but if you want a great medium-to-heavy coverage you can slap on and then not think about all day, it’s worth checking out. Comes in lots of colors, I just happened to get a sample that perfectly matched my skintone. Ordering a soon! $88.
My go-to scent this year has been Kilain Princess. It’s got a lovely, warm smell. It can be a bit overpowering, so use sparingly. They say it smells like marshmallows, green tea and ginger, none of which I detect. To me it smells like sexy comfort hugs. And doesn’t everyone want to smell like that? I’ve linked to the purse size because who the hell wants to spend $75+ on something without knowing how it smells on YOU? $30.
GoPuff is a fantastic service that I can’t recommend enough. It’s like grocery delivery for when you’re baked (or when you aren’t, in my personal case, but I can see the stoner appeal.) Our orders have always been SUPER QUICK and their reusable shopping bags are very well made for something they give out for free. Got the munchies? Want some Cheetos and a bath bomb? They will hook you up.
For the comfiest, non-wedgiest underwear I’ve ever worn, I highly recommend Thunderpants. They come in lots of cute prints, and they’re always adding new ones. They aren’t cheap, but they’re a treat to wear. They have camis, bralettes, and men’s & kid’s underthings as well.
And this is the year I discovered sports bras. This bra from Jockey is a great combination of supportive and comfortable. It’s available in more colors which are more expensive, but I love the dark grey anyway so I just ordered two more. It doesn’t flatten my boobs! But it also is wireless and super supportive! If you wanna forget you’re wearing a bra, this is a great option.
I bought some Reebok socks very similar to these earlier this year and they are super comfy athletic socks, excellent for taking a lot of walks. They’re a good weight for summer and fall, they wick well, and they’re very comfortable all day. Also, they’re well elasticized, and the ankle isn’t so tight that they leave deep marks scored into your flesh. Which is nice. They fit perfectly and seem to be holding up pretty well.
I could name more things, but this is probably enough. I love my Fitbit, except when it misbehaves, which it does sometimes because it likes to keep things interesting. I bought some boots but I’m not sure how they’ll wear yet (going great so far!) As always, Gap jeans fit my butt better than any other brand no matter how much I weigh.
Ten years ago I was a fucking disaster of a human being. Holy Moly.
But I feel such sympathy for that fucking disaster of a human being. I didn’t know yet. I just didn’t know. I hadn’t been diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder and wouldn’t be for three and a half more years. That diagnosis was like a magic lens that make all the fucked up shit pop into focus.
I even wrote about how I’d get hooked on people and not be able to let go. I wondered why I was built that way. I obsessed for yeeeeeeeaaaaaarrrrrrrrsssss about poor, poor K who was, yes, kind of a dick sometimes, but did NOT DESERVE years of fucking birthday emailsfrom me in addition to me joining a Meetup group because he and his wife were in it. Even before I knew what flavor of crazy I was being, I should have known that I was being a creepy fucking stalker.
OOPSIE.
I was so angry at anyone who didn’t love me back the way I thought I deserved to be loved. I thought I was special and everyone else was cold and shut off. Turns out I was, like, super mentally ill. My shrink says all of those things can be true, I’m a special feelings princess, other people are cold and detached, and oh yeah I’m also like super mentally ill.
I see my BPD as being in remission. Like cancer. Like you gotta keep an eye on it and keep seeing your medical professionals on the regular, but you are not actively growing tumors or bleeding into your brain or anything. Woo hoo.
But there are nights like tonight when I feel nostalgia like indigestion in my gut, when certain songs bring back certain people. The only girl I’ve ever loved is a prostitute in Tucson now. The boy who went on vacation and never came back but didn’t ever tell me we’d broken up. My high school sweetheart who got married again and isn’t speaking to me again probably because his wife doesn’t want him to. Fucking Bruce who hasn’t talked to me since I told him that I didn’t really want to hear about his wet dreams through the medium of text message. And so on, and so on. My ghosts.
To paraphrase the late, great Carrie Fisher: Nothing’s ever really over. Just over there.
Self-Indulgent Drivel 