About Me

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Washington, DC, United States
I'm Shandi. I hope you like it here. I don't say much with words...but instead I speak to you with music, images, and by showing you everything i love in art and fashion. if you follow me, i will follow back and we can feed off of eachother. i love comments and feedback. thank you for coming. please stay.

Friday, February 12, 2010

Lost myself again and I feel unsafe...

("borrowed" this and the cute little heart thingy below from young mind...great blog I discovered today...check it out)

Hey all...welcome to Black Friday.  It's going to be extra black today. 

I want to let you in on a little secret. 

I struggled with the decision to talk about this here for like 3 whole minutes last night but I figure that my friends and family don't read this blog (unfortunate, I know) so what would I have to lose.  I need to tell someone.  This may get lengthy but fuck it...I just need to get it out.  You can scroll past it if you wish, I don't mind.

 

First I should tell you that I have suffered from depression for as long as I can remember.  If you were to dissect the trauma of my life you will see that I appear to handle isolated incidents in a healthy way.  I mourn, I find the silver lining and I move on.  It's not fake.  I think at the time that I am feeling the pain of whatever happened, that I am finding a light or a way to move forward and that I am doing/thinking whatever feels necessary to be happy again.  It seems, not only to others, but also to myself that everything is ok, or going to be ok, or at least bearable. I always felt guilty for being sad because even as a very young child, I knew that other people had it worse than me...I shouldn't be dwelling on my problems...it seemed selfish and cruel.  I always moved on and I was even told by some that I was the strongest little girl they knew.  Yea right.

It got to the point where I had become so good at "dealing" with the things that I felt and saw and experienced that I think I became numb.  Nothing was a big deal.  Nothing was too much to handle.  Nothing deserved more than a day or two of attention.  Not to me, and apparently not to anyone else. 

Rape.  Death.  Molestation.  Mind Control.  He beat me.  She forgot me.  She ignored me.  Cancer.  Fat.  Sick.  Sad.

No big deal.  It will pass.


I can't really remember if it was me not showing my pain and pushing it away that caused others to seem to do the same...or the other way around. 

The first time I tried to kill myself, I was 8.  My babysitter got into an argument with her mother and it got loud and nasty...somewhere in the middle of the chaos I locked myself in the bathroom and downed a bottle of bubble bath.  I think my mom found out but i guess it was no big deal.  No therapy.  No visits from the church elders.  Nothing.

Thinking back...that was a huge red flag, a really big sign of things to come.  I should have been sent to get help.  Something should have happened.

Suicide became my best kept secret.  I would try to be happy all of the time and then something would change everything...I would spend a couple days in the dark and end with a suicide attempt.  I would fail...sometimes on purpose...my family would yell/cry/console and then we all moved on.  It happened so many times.  I couldn't count how many times.

Pills.  Razors.  Bubble Bath.  Broken Mirrors.  Gun.  Jump.


I had my son in 2002.  It changed everything.  I felt that now if I died...someone would miss me, someone would need me.  My father died when I was young and it was so hard...I couldn't imagine my son having to deal with that...not to mention that he would probably be angry with me that I killed myself.  I bear the thought.

All of the feelings of being insignificant, invisible, alone, unloved, ugly, fat, worthless...all of that disappeared with the birth of my son.  I felt happy enough to live for a long time until things started to fall apart between his father and me. 

I plunged back into darkness...smiling on the outside, dying on the inside.  New thoughts buried the old...my son would be better off without me, I would be doing him a favor, I couldn't hope to ever be a good mother because I felt so worthless and stupid.  I won't see his pain when I am dead, my son's pain won't affect me when I am dead...fuck it, just die.

I took every pill in my grandmother's drawer.  I remember being the my last bottle...the big pills...and having to take them one at a time because I was already nauseous and drowsy.  I sat on the floor of my balcony and the sun was shining on me and the last thing I remember was trying to take another pill but I didn't have the strength...I was taking what I thought was my last breath.  It was and still is one of the most beautiful experiences I have ever had...I felt freedom from the demons that haunted me for so long. 

My grandmother found me 7 hours later walking around naked from the waste down.  I was rushed to the hospital, my stomach pumped and I was sent to the 5th floor for a 4 day suicide watch.  The last pill, if taken would have killed me.

This time it was a big deal.


Everyone who ignored all of the signs were now crying for me, holding me, telling me that they didn't know it was so bad.  I was sent to therapy.  Friends acted dumb and unknowing.  Mom felt guilty.  Family felt angry.  Everyone felt scared. 

It was like a second child being born.  I felt happy again...loved, cherished, hopeful, worth something.

I went to therapy and learned ways to deal without pushing aside and I did very well for a time.  I felt stupid for being so selfish.  I really felt like those days were over for me.  I would never want to die like that again.  I wanted to live.

Well, it's back.  It's so fucking back.  Everything repeating itself.

Wake up and walk around like a zombie until someone else wakes up/comes home/walks in.  Smile.  Be funny.  Be cheerful.  All day I do that until everyone goes to bed.  Then I cry.  I cry for hours.  I can't figure out what has triggered it. 

I am unemployed so I know there are feelings of failure from not being able to find a new job and also feeling like a loser for having to rely on others for financial support. 

I did recently quit smoking pot which I think may have helped me for all of these years to "ignore" my thoughts and insecurities...and put me to sleep. 

I told a friend today that I wanted to die and I needed help.  He said "Oh you don't want to die, you will be ok.  Did you edit my resume like I asked you to, I really need it now."

I told another friend the other day that I was very depressed and that I was worried about myself.  She said "You always find a way Shandi, you will be ok.  Want to get drunk this weekend, I am so stressed out and I need some alcohol?....actually, can I call you right back?"  She didn't call back.

My "best" friend "joked" around with me after I told him I was in a "bad mood" to either stop complaining or kill myself.  Fuck me!  Fuck him.


I wrote in my "Radical Self Love Bible" that has since last night become a very dark and twisted book, pages stained with tears.  I started to cry uncontrollably.  I turned my TV up but I knew that my roommates (brother, sister, friend) would hear me.  I kind of needed them to hear me because I couldn't stop.  I woke up with broken capillaries all around my eyes.  No one has asked me if I was ok.  I am so broken.

I am looking right now to see if there are programs in my area to help me.  I need help.  I need new friends.  I need to move away.  I need to find a way to lift myself up if I have no one to help me.  It's not their fault.  They don't understand.

For now I will keep smiling.  Keep forcing the happy until I break down at night.  I'm really good at that.

See?  I am good at something.

I think I am good at blogging too so I will keep on doing that.  It keeps me afloat I think.  That and my son. 

Maybe when the snow melts I will feel better.  But it's only a band aid.  Depression is a disease...I know that.  It's dangerous.


PS. I just need anybody reading to know that this is not a cry for help.  I will help myself.  Posting this on Into The Ninth is only a release and it felt good..thanks.

Eg elska thig.

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