And how was your day?

It's been a long time since I wrote about my every day.  I got quite sick, spiraling into a deep depression and writing about how unhappy I was, got me nowhere.  So I stopped writing daily.  It may never happen again, the whole daily writing thing, but I had a funny day so I wanted to share it with you diehards that seem to like reading about my antics.  

If you don't know anything about me let's start with, I am nuts.  I don't think we should throw that kind of word or label out there unless we have been certified as such, and I have.  I had a confirmation and everything.  Therefore, I can say, "I be coocoo for cocoa puffs".  In all seriousness, I do actually have a disease I battle every day but today, I just wanna talk about being me.  Not the crazy, she needs help kind of me, just the greatness that is Nicolle and her thoughts.  For the record, my thought here is that my name comes up in spellcheck as wrong because it's not Nicole with one L, and that, offends me.   Off to the races folks.  Put on your seatbelts because a day in my head begins now.  

I started my morning off unusually as I had to go to the bank to withdraw a good chunk of cash to pay off my drug dealer....wait no, that's not why.  See the other day in a bit of a hissy fit I backed up my car aggressively without looking and backed straight into someone.  I needed to get the cash to pay for the damage to their truck.  In pulling into the bank I noted they had drive thru banking.  I cannot tell you how exciting that is to me.  First, I think about how excellent it is that I don't have to get out of my car.  Then, I think how sad it is that society has gotten to where they don't even get out of their cars to do banking anymore.  Then, I drifted off to which was safer, the bank machine inside the bank doors at 8am or the drive thru.  "Which one would ensure I didn't get jacked?", I thought to myself.  I just moved back into the big bad city so these things are important to me now.  I chose the drive thru.  Not just for safety but for the novelty of it.  I did however take my side mirror all the way in so that I could get as close as possible to the machine so as not to allow room for the aforementioned "jacking".  I giggled my ass off as I pulled up to the window and said, "Can I have fries with that?", to no one.    

Maybe now you are concerned about the thoughts in my head?  It's okay, I have doctors who are as well.  

From the bank I headed into the Loblaws in my new area, it's beautiful.  Again, the novelty of a full store with organics everywhere....yeah okay that's a lie, you need to see the fucking bakery in this thing.  It's unreal.  With menopause, which I also have, in addition to being nuts, I can barely remember my name let alone a grocery list so I went through the store wandering blindly completely fascinated with everything around me including all the women dressed in work out gear, makeup, perfect hair pushing babies in strollers.  It's very confusing.  I am in track pants, greasy hair in a bun that I made before I went to bed, and my teeth brushed.  That's about it.  I get in line to check out and then remember the things I actually need and begin running around the store hoping that the ladies with the Lulus and babies take their time getting through the line ahead of me.  

Them....

And me......

Please refer to these pictures again when you read where I ended up later in the day.  

I went from the fashion show to my "transaction" as my husband likes to call it. To exchange cash for a signed waiver of release which I drew up to protect me from being sued for the rest of my life by the guy I hit the other day.  With my car!  Not my fist.  In a hissy fit resulting in very poor driving skills. There we were in Tim Horton's, (the "scene of the crime"), counting out fifty dollar bills from an unmarked envelope. Suddenly it dawned on me that it probably looked like a drug deal so I announced that to my new friend laughing my head off saying, "imagine if I had to call the husband and tell him I now was arrested?"  He thought it was kind of funny I think, but because I burst out with it very randomly, maybe not.  I am not sure he appreciated, "Thank you for doing business with us" as I shook his hand goodbye.  Sure, of course "sorry again" might have been more appropriate but I like to add humor to all situations. 

Bitch better.....  

After my deal was done I needed to head into the city, the downtown core, *shudder*.  I live close enough but not right in it.  My area is very treed, no sidewalks, quiet.  Well it was, until I arrived. The core of hell is not for me but I had to go to the doctor's office and run an errand so off I went.  I learned on the way into the city that cab drivers are all assholes.  I am sorry if you are one, a cab driver that is, to tell you that you are also an asshole.  I know name calling in this day and age is wrong.  My passing judgement and labeling, bad.  And stereotyping this way?  Jesus, people are being arrested for less.   But it's a fact.  To be a cab driver I think you need to get the big A class driver's license.

After my family doctor detached me from the ceiling and gave me a lecture on the breathing and meditation skills required to live in the city, I punched her in the face and ..... no no, I didn't.  I thanked her, gave her a hug and asked her to, "pray for me" and left.  She looks at me funny, just like the guy earlier in Tim Horton's did, when I do stuff like that.  I am not sure if they just don't realize how funny I am or if they are just that worried about my health.  From there I walked, like on the streets, amongst the masses over to William Ashley.  Now picture it, I am still very much in my track pants, hair in the bun from 14 hours ago, no makeup and now, I could use another tooth brushing I am sure.  And I am in William Ashley.  Surrounded by beautiful delicate things, including but not limited to the china.  The rest were women registering to get married in their, you guess it, Lulus. I walked in, straight to a salesperson and announced, "I have been carrying these two hundred dollar gift coins in my purse since 2009 and while I am confident there is nothing in here for that much, someone must have thought there was because they gave them to me as a wedding gift.  I would like to spend them, now, on anything.  Show me what is less that two hundred dollars please". Within about five minutes I had picked out two crystal Christmas trees that are lovely but stupidly useless trinkets that I will probably break in a week.  (Note: I have already dropped the boxes they came in).  The total?  $163.  The balance, "I can put on a gift card for you".  

Fucking hell, really?  I want a $37 gift card to a store that just sold me two fucking glass trinkets for almost two hundred dollars?  What am I buying with that?  Air time?  I miraculously kept all that inside my head and simply said,  "Thank you but no.  Could I donate it to a charity, do you do that?" Ohhhhhffff course you don't.  Because rich people, who spend thousands on glass ashtrays don't give away their money, it's why they are rich.  Again, I kept that inside my head.  I said simply, "let's please find anything, that will use up the balance".  After showing me 27 candle (sorry, correction,"votive") holders I spotted a snow globe for thirty dollars too much and said, "that, that silly thing will do.  My step daughter will like it.  It will make her smile".  I escorted my now very overworked salesperson to the cash register, which in these stores is actually just a computer that holds no cash.  My mistake, I gave her a twenty dollar bill for the balance owing.  I now needed to wait for her to go into the back room, the dark place, where they kept the actual cash for deadbeats like me that use that garbage called actual money.  I shit you not it took ten minutes for her to find twenty cents and my receipt.  I received both with a thank you and then realized I had no fucking idea how to get out of the store.  We had wandered around so much trying to spend my money that I was all backwards.  And that, made me snap.  "Can you please help get me the hell out of here?"  That line, actually came out of my mouth. She pointed me in the right direction while distinctly giving me that look of, "well I never".  That's right lady and you will never again because I will be dead before I am in that store again.  And dead people don't shop much.

$219.80!  

Now I had to drive home from downtown, at 3pm.  The start of traffic in the city.  I considered buying alcohol but then remembered the whole mother's who don't like that sort of thing.  UGH. (Fuck please don't shoot me for trying to be funny using something very serious). 

The things I learned on the way home were wonderful life lessons. First lesson, if you are stuck blocking a crosswalk in your car and you try to move over a lane to unblock yourself, someone WILL speed up from the other side of the light to take up the spot you are trying to use to stop blocking the flow of humans. Because I have a, "I will go anyways" policy, that didn't end well.  Least this time it didn't cost me anything but a lot of honking and dirty looks.  I also learned that while half the population waits in line for the highway, the other half of the population will race up the outside lane and then throw on their blinker last minute to cut into the waiting line you have been sitting very patiently in.  And further, they will think we don't realize they knew exactly what they were doing.  Not only do I know what you just did, I am also NOT falling for it.  Therefore, I am not letting you in.  Under any circumstances.  I would rather scrape down the sides of both our vehicles than let you in for that behavior.  See my earlier transaction at Tim Horton's if you need help believing that.  I will not reward you.  That's not how you train stupid.  

When I got home to my pretty house on my quiet street I could only stop and think, "maybe this whole city thing wasn't the best idea?"

How was your day?  

Borderline Personality Disorder and Me. I mean I, it and I. I mean me. Damn it.

I was doing some reading today on Borderline Personality Disorder ("BPD") which lead me to a You Tube documentary which took my breath away.  Not because it was artful but because it was me.  These people were me.  They were talking about me, and to me.  And they were talking to you as my friend or family.  As someone who knows me, and tries very hard to stay by my side and love me, they were talking to you. 

It's hard to explain what BPD is.  I try by saying, "I don't know what emotion should be where and when.  And that makes my behaviours hard to accept as a result.  I do things that may not seem logical in the moment because I don't know what to do with the emotion I feel.  It's because I was born over sensitive and things happened, life happened.  I stopped feeling what was normal in situations to protect my sensitive self, to protect me from hurt."  It's also genetics.  A pre-disposition to the disease in general but also under, and over, development of parts of my brain that differ from yours.  I am sure you've found yourself thinking, "she thinks awfully different than I do".  And I do.

As I watched the video I found myself writing down the thoughts I have that might differ from yours in the manner they actually presented themselves.  Examples of my thinking or what I think yours might be during one of my BPD episodes.  Maybe I was just thinking about you and something that happened between us.  Perhaps this will help you better understand me.  Maybe you can see how overwhelming the brain can be for a patient with BPD.  Some of the things below were said in the video and I could relate to, many were my own interpretations or thoughts.  

Trigger warning here.  Some of the things I wrote may upset you or even trigger you.

Borderline Personality patients are often compared to burn victims. Their emotions are like raw skin. If you poke them their reaction is so severe because they are already in so much pain. It's incomprehensible pain.

If there is no logic, I cannot process it. I have little emotional intelligence.


I laugh so big when you are happy because I feel your happiness.


I cry when you are sad because I am sad for you.


If you hurt, I hurt. I actually feel what you feel, perhaps even more so because I can't regulate my feelings. This makes me a narcissist in the minds of many. "It's not about you" they've said. 

Now imagine feeling the pain of someone else and not knowing how to process that, and then being told your a selfish ass for feeling it at all?


Don't hug her, she's feeling something and doesn't know what to do with it.


She's like a rabid animal when's she's angry.


Manipulative? It may appear so. Desperation. Is what it actually is.


I do not know how to exist without you. Even though we only just met.


I exist because you make me want to. When you leave me, I no longer see a reason to exist.


I hate you. Don't ever leave me please.


How can you be happy and angry at the exact same time?


You had everything. You were so together. Top of your game. What happened to you?  If only you saw me in the fetal position when I was left alone.


You're dramatic. I am.

I feel more than you can ever imagine. I don't express one eighth of what I feel.


That's drama.


I am worthless. Don't you dare make me feel more worthless.


Today is the greatest day I've ever had. Imagine the drop from that height. I feel that daily.


I drink to numb. I do drugs to numb. Then I have sex to be loved, while I am numb. Why doesn't this work?


I harm myself to feel anything.


I try to end my life to feel nothing.


I eat to feel pleasure but it causes me pain, so I eat to feel pleasure again, which causes me pain.


That stuffed toy I gave you seemed like nothing to you, it meant the entire world to me. I let you see the softer me. 


That stuffed toy you gave me is sacred. Until I get mad and throw it away. Then I have to rescue in desperation to save it because I abandoned it.


You liked her picture. You've never liked mine. You hate me. I hate you for hating me. Please love me. I shouldn't be here because you don't love me.


Please don't go.  Please love me. I can't believe I told you that.  I hate you for making me love. Come back, please. I beg of you. Thank god you're back. I hate this feeling of uncertainty. I can't trust you. Go away. No come back. I exist for you.


You see?  Desperation. Not manipulation.


I am not trying to get you to prove your love to me. I am trying to make myself believe you could actually love me.


Losing you is the hardest thing I have ever had to endure. I wish I hadn't pushed you away.


If you loved me, you would never have left me.


If I loved you or myself, I would never have forced you to go.


What is wrong with me?  Don't you feel this way?  Isn't this how you think?


I want to do wonderful things for everyone today. Why is this not making me wonderful?


I give to you so you will love me.


Everything I see is distorted.


Friend request sent. I Unfriend you.  Friend request sent. I Unfriend you.  Friend request sent. Unfriended. I understand why you no longer accept the request. I would no longer accept me either. 


It's a game you think. It's actually my mind. It's no game.


And when it's done to me. It's a potential hospitalization. It's not fair. There's no equality.  Trust me I know.


I am smart.  Don't argue with me. You think I am stupid. I am stupid.


When something doesn't work for you, you fix it.


When something doesn't work for me, I destroy it.


I will end you. Only because I will love you to death.


Get on with it. Smarten up. Shape up. They are just emotions.


Are you sure you aren't mad? Are you sure? How about now? Are you mad now? Do you love me still? Are you sure? Are you mad yet? You must be mad now? What do you mean you need space? Goodbye. I hate you. I hate me.


Come on. You can control this. I am worthless. Because I can't.


Telling you what I actually feel will make you leave me because I am crazy.


Your face changes and you become cold, visibly cold. It's frightening.  Do you love me in that moment?
 
No.  I actually don't.  It's like I am a different person inside in that moment.  I am not me.  I feel nothing for you.  Then I come back and I am scared to death you might leave.


Please don't worry.  I am safe.  I am working on my DBT skills today.  I will get through another day of this. There are things I am valuing more and more every day.  I am hoping to be the next thing I value most.  I just wanted to express this to you.  I wanted to share this for anyone else suffering from this disease.  I am changing.  It is getting better.  It's getting less dramatic in the ups and downs, the impact is lessening.  But I still have my moments.  Just ask the friend I've been begging to forgive me over nothing and the people I unfriended on Facebook the other night for nothing more than seemingly existing happily without me. 

We all have our good days and bad days don't we?




The documentary is "Back from the Edge" - Borderline Personality Disorder.

Thank you for being a friend.  xo

Scared of dogs you say?

As many of you already know I have Borderline Personality Disorder, "BPD".  To keep it very simple for you not in the know, it's an emotion regulation mental disease where my emotions have not always been on point with the matter at hand.  As an example, I often get angry instead of feeling shame or fear .  That is a very simplified description of a very complicated illness.  What BPD is not, is 17 different personalities.  When people hear BPD they often think that.  BPD is not multiple personality disorder.  For the record, there are only 5 of me living on up in this here noodle.  Shut up, no you shut up, no you.... 

The treatment for this disorder is called DBT, Dialectual Behaviour Therapy.  This psychological treatment was derived originally from CBT, Cognitive Behaviour Therapy.  The basis for CBT was that anyone could change how they feel about something. If you change the patterns of thinking and behaviour then the result would be that you change they way they feel.  DBT was created because a doctor realized that perhaps it's not that easy.  Perhaps there must be an acceptance of one's feelings before anything could be changed.  And even if not changed, there could be this acceptance and set of skills to function and thrive with mental illness. 

I have done DBT since my stay in a mental health and recovery hospital in the summer of 2014.  I have been so occupied with the study of my own thoughts, the acceptance thereof, and the simple feeling of my emotions that I haven't been writing much.  Today, in DBT, I realized I had something I wanted to say.

I have struggled with the concepts behind both CBT and DBT in that I perceived the treatment to be of  the "fake it until you make it" ideologies and I detest that.  I do not believe that you can be a true, honest, real self while faking what you may not actually believe, think or feel.  I especially struggled with the idea that one can simply change the way they think or feel.  People often say, "be happy" and if you pretend it enough, it will happen.  I find that harmful to say because there are people out there with real mental disorders, chemical imbalances, perhaps addictions and they struggle to find any happiness.  How dare we make light of their struggle by saying the words, "be happy" like it was that simple.  I wasn't entirely wrong, nor was I entirely right about that. 

DBT often speaks of things like distraction, to take yourself away from the subject that's making you unhappy.  Or opposite action, the watching of something funny for example when sad.  I struggled with these.  How am I being honest with myself or anyone if I live life by distraction or pretending I wasn't feeling sad?  My doctor would say, "no, you use those tools when feeling the honest emotion isn't the effective option".  What now?  Pardon?  Do I change the subject and pretend I am happy or do I feel the sadness? Define "effective"? "It depends on the circumstances", I was told.  FUCK, what, when? 

Today, the bells and whistles sounded.  The heavens opened up and my doctor and I communicated on a level where I considered something called a hug I've heard people do when they find themselves connecting with someone. 

It goes something like this for example, and bear with me. 

If you are someone who is scared of dogs, what do you do?  You avoid dogs at all costs likely. 

By avoiding dogs, you prolong your fear of dogs. 

In fact, the avoidance of simply feeling that fear of dogs, will typically make the fear of dogs that much greater. 

It makes sense of the saying, "fear of the unknown".  

You avoid dogs because you are scared of them and the longer you avoid dogs the more scared you become until you can't even hear the word "dog" without wetting yourself. 

The idea of DBT is to face that fear while using skills to help you through it.  DBT says that until you actually sit in the pocket of that fear, until you feel it, it will always have a hold of you.  You must actually experience that fear, full on.  Your avoidance of your feelings, will perpetuate them.  Using practised DBT skills you face your feelings. 

Think safety precautions when I say "DBT skills".  Think professional dog trainer with a very well trained dog.  With those two things in place, your skills, you go and meet the dog.  When facing one's feelings one must be safe.  Frankly if you face an unknown dog with urine running down your leg shaking like a leaf the dog might act up.  You need to be in a very regulated environment where you can sit nose to nose with a dog and face your fear.  That safe environment would be a skill you learn in DBT. 

You might need to meet this dog for months, week after week.  Over and over again you sit facing that dog and feel the fear.  You might find yourself crying, breathing rapidly, heart racing, perhaps filled with irrational fear.  Those are simply moments in time that you must experience only to realize that.  They are just moments in time.

The dog and/or (vice versa) your feelings, will not harm you.  The fear will ebb and flow.  Climb and fall.  Come and go.  It will never last forever.  At some point the dog is going to leave right?  Or you will.

Once you find yourself accepting that you are indeed scared of dogs but that those feelings of being scared will not hurt you, then you might find yourself changing.  Your auto pilot thinking that dogs are scary might change.  Maybe not.  Maybe you will see a dog for the rest of your life and think, "they scare me".  That's your auto pilot thinking but that thought will no longer own you for longer than a nano second in time.  And by not owning you, it will no longer guide your every step.  It's just something you think.  It's not a fact.  Our thoughts are not facts.  Dogs are not all scary.  

Maybe you will no longer be scared simply hearing the word "dog".  Maybe you can walk past a dog on the street without peeing yourself.  Maybe not.  Some of our deepest thoughts and feelings aren't necessarily (see above right or wrong comment) changeable but our behaviours as a result can be. So you invest in Depends and go about your life no longer avoiding dog parks. 

What you can do now, is know that your fear of dogs is not going to actually hurt you...it's just a thought, and maybe even a feeling, but that doesn't hurt you or cause you pain. 

Not changing that diaper, that will cause you pain.  *chaffe*

I can't find my words...

If you don’t already know much about me I suffer from Borderline Personality Disorder.  When I feel sadness, grief, loss, threatened, vulnerable, or any other feeling where most would cry and move on with it, I get angry and defend against feeling the hurt.  If I allow even the smallest amount of pain out expressing it to someone I love and trust, almost immediately I will lash out in anger because I feel exposed.  Rage takes over to prevent me from feeling more pain or being hurt by my expression of it.  I was once a very happy little girl then life happened, as it often does.  But I changed.  I developed these personality trait(s) as a cover up to hurt.  They weren’t helpful traits. 

I am in the middle of figuring all this out in intensive Dialectual Behaviour Therapy.  I am very raw.  All this hurt and pain I never let come out in 45 years is right there at the surface, wanting to come out, so I can be done with it.  And it’s there, all the time.  I am either about to explode into tears or into a rage to stop the tears.  I never stop thinking about whether what I am feeling is legit, or a cover up.  Am I being reasonable, or not? Is this genuine and authentic or bullshit?  Often I cannot even identify that until I sit down and do a chain analysis to see what happened and where that might have triggered something I couldn’t handle feeling or expressing. 

I can’t find my words. 

Every time I go to say anything I struggle, especially in a public forum like social media, I freeze and the following happens in my head:

Is this right?

Is this going to hurt anyone?

Will anyone think I am stupid?

Is this stupid?

Does this make sense?

Do I really need to say this?

What is the purpose of this?

Who does it serve?

Could I word this differently?

Is this offensive?

Is this funny or not funny?

What if they think I am stupid?

What if this hurts someone?

What if I am wrong?

What if I am not liked for these words?

9 times out of 10 I end up feeling very anxious and I don’t say anything. 

Sometimes I say things and then I sit and wait, praying it is okay, and that I won’t be judged negatively.  I can sit and obsess over a single sentence for hours.  You are probably thinking, “Then, keep busier”.  Just don’t go on social media.  Well this happens in public too.  With any interpersonal exchange.  I am often silent because I am worried about what I am going to say and what people will think.  I can spend hours after talking to someone wondering if I offended them, hurt them, or if they like me.  It’s agonizingly painful.  I can have a beautifully full and busy day and once I am alone for five minutes I start second guessing everything I did, said, or thought. 

I used to just say shit.  I didn’t care what you thought.  Then this stupid mental illness crept up on me. 

I used to have a pretty high end career.  People knew me.  I was productive.  I think I always struggled with interpersonal relationships.  I was often referred to as a “bitch”.  I was strong willed, opinionated, and aggressive.  Bitch is often what we are called when we are strong women.  People came to me to get shit done back in the day.  Then gradually I started struggling more and more with interpersonal relationships.  Work was becoming an emotional, not intellectual, battle.  I was stressing over things at work I couldn’t understand.  I was constantly wondering in meetings:

Is this right?

Is this going to hurt anyone’s feelings?

Will anyone think I am stupid?

Is this stupid?

Does this make sense?

Do I really need to say this?

What is the purpose of this?

Who does it serve?

Could I word this differently?

Is this offensive?

Is this funny or not funny?

What if they think I am stupid?

What if this hurts someone?

What if I am wrong?

What if I am not liked for these words?

It was the end of my career.  When I started arguing with people irrationally I knew it was time to go.  I knew when I started basing my decisions on how I felt and not what I knew intellectually, it was time to go.  I didn’t fit in there anymore.  I was full of emotion.  To go from that high functioning to where I am at today, over 8 years, is hard to explain.  I spent the first two years after leaving work trying to figure out how to be Nicolle and not Nicolle from Bay Street.  Then I spent the next three years trying to identify what was wrong with me.  I fell entirely into the abyss of depression.  I was misdiagnosed and had to go through endless medication changes until last year I ended up in the hospital for 60 days.  I was finally diagnosed properly and given a plan of action to get my life back.  Since then I have been working my ass off to accept who I am, what this means, and how to go about being the best new me I can. 

I know this is going to get better as I get more emotionally regulated and find more confidence in myself and my reactions.  And that takes work.  Every day I need to evaluate my reactions, my feelings, my emotions.  I have to rate them, and keep track of them.  I have homework each week from a skills class in DBT that teaches people like me how to feel what we feel and let it go.  Not to ride the train of emotions until it takes over every fibre of our being for great lengths of time.  And to be honest in our emotional exchanges.  If it hurts, it hurts.  Hurt is no reason to be angry.  Just feel the hurt.  To say this is an exhausting process is an understatement.  My mind rarely settled before all this started.  And now it’s busier. 

I am so volatile right now it takes every fibre of my being just to keep a lid on my reactions.  When I drive to the city for example and get around other people, some of whom are not very intelligent I become a different person.  I am all hyped up like I snorted cocaine for hours, I appear confident, funny, and aggressive.  But I feel anxiety building so fast and furious it’s like I am going to explode.  When someone pisses me off the rage that comes across me can be overwhelming.  But I keep it in check.  I have to.  You don’t let that loose.  So I lose my words.  My mind is too over stimulated and I can’t find my words.  Or conversely there are so many words that I can’t see straight.

By the time I get back home to my isolation, I could sleep for days I am so emotionally exhausted.   And then I can’t find my words. 

Lately I have been having these attacks, almost like seizures.  Where I feel like I am losing control of the electrical wiring in my brain.  Like I have no control of what’s happening up there.  This can be very common with this type of therapy if you go at it like I often do with things, FULL THROTTLE.  I am being monitored quite closely but you can see how this all might be a little, well, a lot. 

This is why I don’t talk much or write much anymore.  For right now, handling my thoughts and emotions is all the energy I have.  The balance goes to my dog, my step kids (teenagers, they'd suck the blood dry of a vampire I tell ya'), and my husband (an man sized child).  They get what’s left of me, in that order of importance.  Dogs first, humans second.  My motto in life as well. 

I have tons of things I want to say trust me, I usually do.  I just can’t find my words easily right now.  I will be back.  I have a few posts almost ready to go.  I just have to find that right moment in time where I have my words at hand.  

 

Thanks for the patience, support, and reading.  

 

 

 

 

I Think I Might be Ignorant *sigh*

malaysian-mountain-stripping-2-canadians-2-others-get-prison-time-served-to-be-deported-1.3110576

 

I posted the other day how silly I thought this story was that these people were apparently being arrested for pissing off a mountain.  I should have made that point clear.  That was my only point, one cannot piss off a mountain.  The people who worship the mountain, yes.  A mountain, no.  I said it when I posted that there are people all over the world trekking up mountains.  In some cases, climbers have been criticized for leaving their feces behind.  Apparently base camp at Mount Everest is a dumping ground.  But none of those mountains have retaliated was my punch line.  And the local people that worship continue to allow people to climb their places of worship.  I am confident that the shrine I worship at will not be open to the public.  It’s my private place.  Even with a sign reading “Princess” above.  I can say no more or news of it could get out. 

Scientifically it is ludicrous to think a mountain attacked the human race by causing an earthquake because these people got naked.  I will stand by that statement until the cows fly home with the pigs.  And when they flock together I will come on here, in my little public forum, and apologize profusely for doubting the mountain and its followers.  When I posted my thoughts some others jumped on my fool hearty band wagon agreeing with my, “this is ridiculous” statement.  It was all fun and games until that one person got offended on the mountain’s behalf. 

At the time of my post I didn’t make it clear that I actually believe these naked people were wrong.  In trying to make a funny, I forgot to fuck up my punch line with footnotes to that effect.  If these “young people” knew this was sacred ground as one of the guides said they did, they were wrong indeed.  Whether you believe in the spirituality itself doesn’t matter.  You cannot climb up on someone’s alter and shit on it.  The “young people” (as they are referred to in the press) claim they didn't know, and they were just being young people.  Being stupid young people.  So shouldn’t they be charged with being stupid young people?  Or indecent exposure, whichever costs the most.  But jail time?  For offending a mountain?  Keep in mind please, that was the charge some spiritual people wanted to bring against them, “offending the mountain and causing an earthquake”.  Sure you have a right to believe in that, but I have the same rights to not agree.  Don’t I?

One cannot just strip naked wherever you want, even at the ends of the earth with other people getting naked, unless it's legal.  And to know it is or isn’t legal means to know the laws of where you are at the time you are getting naked.  And this is what the defence attorney argued and the judge agreed with, in Malaysia, at the hearing for the two Canadians involved.  Law is law.  Getting naked was the offence.  Pissing off a mountain based on someone else’s spiritual belief, is not.

In defending the mountain someone referred to the naked young people (and by association anyone commenting on this article, including me) as, “typical North Americans”, both "self-righteous and ignorant" ... to the customs and beliefs of anyone outside of North America feeling it’s their right to shit in someone’s living room.  It was something to that affect.  I got really angry and deleted it all.  I do that sometimes.  It’s an impulse control thing when I can’t think straight.  I often find myself being offended and hurt which then rolls lightning fast into being offended and angry as fuck.  I have learned that’s part of who I am and to step away and breathe.  So I deleted it all then sat on this for most of the afternoon thinking about how I really felt and what I wanted to say.   And represented here is how I feel.  I put on my big girl panties and wrote this.  Oh, so you know, when I put on the aforementioned BGPs the outside did see me naked through an opening in my curtains so any rain today, totes my fault.  

Here is my defence.  The leader of the pack in this naked quest was not in fact from North America, but Europe.  I believe there were some Brits and Dutch.  Therefore, it was not “typical self-righteous ignorant North Americans” to blame entirely. 

The defence rests. 

No wait, I have more. 

The truth is the entire world is full of self-righteous ignoramuses.  I might even be one of them for thinking that being arrested for annoying a mountain is a plain old waste of time.  I believe we have a right, as human beings to challenge, question, even joke (oh no you di’ant) about beliefs, religions and spirituality.   But to literally shit on them, no, that might be pushing it.  I did not mean to shit on the Malaysian people as a whole.  I did mean to shit on the idea that you can be arrested for pissing on/off a mountain.  Apparently these kids urinated on the mountain.  When you gotta go…..I joke but really, where does one go up a mountain?  On Everest they use plastic bags and then leave them apparently.  Bleck.   

This is one of Malaysia’s top tourist sites. (Per the old Wikipedia, “Malaysia's top tourist destinations are the Mulu Caves, Perhentian Islands, Langkawi, Petronas Towers and Mount Kinabalu [the offended mountain in question]”).  It also happens to be a place of worship.  These are very conflicting ideals.  Profit versus worship.  Well they should be conflicting but are not according to Pastor Bill Ray on the Huntley channel every Sunday morning.  They are not as conflicting as one might think.  The laws need to be made clear for all the self-righteous ignoramuses travelling to this site with their disposable incomes.  No, that disposable income does not give them a right to shit on the Malaysian people.  But this is a tourist site, a tourist trap, a money maker.  If you are going to profit as a country off your tourist sites, and keep them as sacred places of worship, you need to make the rules clear to protect their integrity.  The law needs to be clear because us ignoramuses be dumb.  Apparently we like to get naked and think nothing of peeing when we have to pee. 

For the record, I do not believe the Malaysian people stupid in general for believing in the spirituality of nature.  I do believe that laws should be based on fact, scientific fact, and much less on religion.  Religious law always segregate against differing beliefs or lack thereof.  I don’t believe anyone has the right to arrest someone for offending a mountain any more than I think a Republican Christian Minister from Texas has the right to arrest a gay person because it offends their belief system.  If that makes me typically self-righteous and ignorant, so be it. 

I am no comedian but I believe that comedians have the right to say whatever the hell they want that’s why they are called rights and freedoms, granted to all.  If I don't like it then I either cringe my way through it, leave, or heckle.  If heckle is my choice then I had better expect a comeback.  This is my heckle comeback.  Yes, I am bracing myself.  I expect to be called something else for being this ignorant.  It’s funny because if I were a professional comedian then my words would likely be considered an "art form" and all bets would be off.  I wouldn’t be criticized or called ignorant I would be called challenging and confrontational, thought provoking.  Label it Art and most tend to climb down off the proverbial high horse.  “Freedom of expression is your god given (if you believe in that sort of thing), right”, they say.

I need a guidebook to get around all these rules in today’s society, I really do.   I have to mention that I do love when comedy is ironic.  I call humans assholes allll the time which oddly enough makes me an asshole by default for that whole, “I am a human thing”. 

*sigh*

It’s all so complicated. 

You judge me for judging and I judge you for judging me.  And none of us went to law school. 

Fuck.

  

My First Anniversary #getloud #bellletstalk #endstigma #areyouokay

It's my first year anniversary.  AAD, After Almost Dying.  PSA, Post Suicide Attempt.  Shocked?  I know.  I just figured that one way to end the stigma of suicide and Mental Illness is to just throw this shit out there.  It is what it is.  I tried to kill myself a year ago today and apparently I wasn't very good at it.  I am still here.  I am beyond lucky.  I am surviving Mental Illness.

I am guessing you are still a little thrown off balance.  How can I seemingly make light of this?  I have to is how.  I am going to keep talking about my suicide attempt matter-of-factually until it stops being a shock.  I want you to feel uncomfortable until; you no longer feel uncomfortable.  I couldn't put it more simply than, suicides take lives.  Suicides are derived from Mental illness.  Mental Illness takes lives.  Every second of every minute of every day, like any other disease, people are dying from Mental Illness.  I tried to kill myself by an overdose a year ago today. 

Are you hiding from me now? 

Did you actually go hide? 

Did you consider unfriending me?

I bet you are unfollowing me?

Have you stopped reading this?

Is this too unhappy for you?

Maybe it's too negative, I mean you might already be struggling with a bad day?

Shall I post a video of baby animals?  Give me a minute. 

Until such time as we stop making Mental Illness taboo, the unspeakable, deaths are going to continue.  People need to be able to talk about how they feel without worrying that they are going to lose the people around them for any of the above reasons.  People with depression, who seem innately negative are suffering with Mental Illness.  They are not "negative nellies".  They are not in control of their thoughts.  They are very much lost and they need your love and support.  They need your understanding and compassion.  They need you to stop saying things like "negative thoughts equal a negative life".  Be that as it may be, they are sick.  They feel miserable.  Unhappy.  Alone.  They want to be anything but all that.  It might just take a little more time and effort than your saying, "just be happy", to get them out of it.  Love them.  Understand that.  You may not understand them but understand they are sick.

"Are you okay?"  Funny you should ask, because that is exactly what you should ask someone you think might be suicidal.  People suffering with Mental Illness are often so lost that this question, may be about the only safe question you can get away with.  The one question that might just push it's way through the darkness.  I remember prior to my suicide attempt being angry with someone as depressive people often are.  I was lashing out at them.  In the middle of that they said, out of nowhere, "Are you okay?" My thoughts raced, "How dare you ask that of me, that's not the point, you were mean to me".  Then I stopped and thought, "NO I am NOT okay.  I am really quite angry right now, unreasonably so, I think.  I am lost in this anger.  Why can't I get out of here?  I am dying inside right now.  I need help.  Someone fucking help me".  Even in that fit of rage, that question would hit home for me, "Are you okay?"  It's so simple really.  Was I okay?

Please don't ever stop asking, "Are you okay?" 

I am alive today because I talked about being suicidal.  I knew I was.  I knew I was feeling so dark that to end my life seemed like a better option than simply living it.  People around me, those that loved me, and had stuck with me, knew I was considering this.  They didn't leave me much room to hurt myself.  But room I found.  If someone is in so much pain they want to die, they are going to find a way to try.  The pain of Mental Illness can be unbearable.  Had I been left alone even an hour longer than I was, I wouldn't be here today.  I talked about being sick and it saved my life.  I got lucky because I talked.  Many are not this lucky.  

Please understand that I am not saying that knowing someone is suicidal will save their life.  But it might.  Certainly knowing someone is suicidal gives them a better chance at survival than silence does.  Often times, there is nothing we can do.  We cannot assume responsibility for another person's life or death.  Mental Illness is a disease.  Until they find a cure for all the various forms of this disease people are agonizingly going to suffer.  People are going to die.  If they do maybe, just maybe, some small part of your heart can find a shred of comfort in knowing that you gave that someone a shoulder, a sympathetic ear, love and compassion.  It's all anyone dying of disease could ask for. 

I know people who have died from suicide and those loved ones left behind will not admit that is how they died.  There is shame surrounding suicidal death.  The fact is, disease took a life.  I think people feel if they admit their loved one took their own life they are somehow admitting they failed them.  They feel responsible.  How did they not stop this?  Perhaps if we all talked more openly about Mental Illness and suicides (suicide attempts like mine) then people could live life with less suffering?  Both those stricken with the disease and those left behind.

Too many mentally ill people are suffering in silence, alone.  As are the families left behind in the wake of this disease. 

Admit to your suffering.  Awareness is key.

I got lucky because I talked.  Someone was listening.

I tried to kill myself and I am grateful I didn't succeed.