a k r a s i a

Katie
It’s been an amazing year and I’m so glad that I was able to share it with you.  And hopefully we will share many more years together.  How many years are in forevers? :) You always make me smile on the inside, so you needn’t worry how much I smile on the outside. :P
Smiling on the inside,
Your Dumdum

I want you to know that you mean everything to me and without you I don’t mean anything at all.  I can’t believe it’s been an entire year, but I’m better for it and I’d like to think you are too.  Maybe.  I love you.  Happy Anniversary, Dmitry.

Much and many love,

Katie

        Today was my one year anniversary with my wonderful boyfriend and, in deciding what gift he would give me, we somehow got into a huge-ish argument about my teapot collection and Harry Potter. This is the story of how it all began.

        I sent him weblinks to trinkets that I really liked and wanted him to take a look.  Among the three was a picture of a silver necklace that had a bunch of silver turnips as the pendant.  One day last year I exclaimed “You are such a gem!” to my boyfriend, and he responded with “I don’t want to be a gem, I would like to be a turnip”.  Ever since, we have called him my turnip.  I thought the necklace was pretty and sentimental, and a fitting gift for our one year.  He called it ugly and metal and cheap looking.  “Fine”, I said, and I have since dismissed the issue. 

        The second was the most pretty pretty pretty golden snitch bracelet.  It was from my favorite site, etsy.com, and featured an artfully forged faded golden snitch and a little faded gold chain.  It almost looked antique-esque and I liked it quite a lot. I don’t think it is much of an anniversary gift, nor is anything Harry Potter related, but I liked it. 

        Now, about the Harry Potter “thing”: Harry Potter was my life at one point and is now, still, a fixture in it.  I genuinely love Harry Potter.  My mother is a flightattendant and was never home to do anything with me and the rest of my family always seemed too busy.  I started reading the books when I was only 5 years old, the year they came out.  Nearly all of my best memories were spent with a Harry Potter book in hand.  The first time I went to England, I made sure to pick up #5 at the airport, the day it was released to the public.  I don’t think my love is childish.  Harry Potter has a great message, intricate plot detail, and is relevant to almost all people, regardless of age.

        When I was around 9 years old I fell in love with the character Ronald Weasley and, since then, have had an incurable love for redheads. So, technically, I wouldn’t even be with my boyfriend now if Harry Potter hadn’t influenced my affections.  It was magical. I love magic because magic can get you out of any situation.  With magic, you can make a wish, and it will actually come true.  It is a great fantasy, but, I know I it will never be.

        Finally, I brought up the idea that maybe a teapot might be in order.  I like teapots, and any tea memorabilia.  I think teacups and tea and teapots are just darling.  I like to picture myself someday, when I am old, having a little glassy case displaying my collected things for my great grandchildren, like my great grandma.  Her house was my favorite place for a very long time; it was everyone’s favorite place.  It had this spirit, like it was a real-life magic place.  From when I was little to when I was a teenager, I loved going there because it made me feel welcome and happy.  Even my mother, who was 43 at the time of her death, absolutely loved that house.  Sure, she was most the reason why it was so special, but even after she passed, finding all the treasures in her basement was a treat.  I don’t want that many things, no.  I want a few things, that represent who I am and what I love, and when I die someday, people might know and care.  Maybe people might cherish my few things, like people cherish hers. 

        But this was not going to happen, not if Dmitry had a say.  No teapots! No Harry Potter! NO SENTIMENTS! No whimsy, no weird, no child-like follies.  No Katie, I suppose.

        I have despair, because those things are the only things that keep me rooted in who I am.  I was that really super geeky ugly awkward kid, with horrible teeth and flyaway hair, who sat in the corner and read every day.  I was the kid who prayed that someday I might be able to fly so that people would be jealous of me and they’d want to be my friends.  I was that kid, who didn’t have anyone but the characters in my books to keep me company.  I idolized the kings and queens of old, as they were idolized by so many.  They had everyone at their disposal.  They were powerful, and beautiful, and had nice things, and wealth.  I had none of those.  I paraded around the house in horribly made tulle skirt and pretend I was a princess because I knew I would never be one.

        Now, I don’t know what I am.  I suppose, without the sentiments and the Harry Potter and the whatever else, I’m still “that kid”.  Never quite put together, not a lot of friends, and a little off kilter I guess.  I still feel really ugly, and terribly awkward, and like no one will ever like me for who I am.  And you know what, they don’t. I thought one might, but he doesn’t either.  So I will change, because that is what is demanded of me.  I’ve never been one not to please.  I’ve always been a perfectionist. I’ll change if that is what makes you happy.

OH, and it also hurts like a motherfucker.  I have to scream and cry into the towel I am biting down on every time I take a wee.

1

It is all false.  It is all false.  I don’t think I was given a real identity.  I think I am just a mass of environmental traits and learned behaviors.  I don’t think anything means anything.  Nothing means anything.  I “love” I think.  I think I care.  But I’m no different from anyone else here. 

I don’t think anyone else cares.  I think if people cared they’d act.  I think the woman who created me might be less dense and take a clue.  I think she’d be nice when I needed it.  I’m on the edge of my own sanity and I can’t help but wonder why no one knows.  I can’t help but wonder if they all know but don’t care.  This is more than just a behavior.  I think this is my self, whatever that might be.

 This might be why I hate myself so very, very much.  I need to get out, and I can’t.  It’s a tight fit in here.  I’m claustrophobic and it is all closing in very, very firmly.  It’s a ridiculous feeling.  I can’t breathe sometimes. It is almost as if I am being smothered by my own presence.  I hate what I see and feel and hear.  I can barely look in the mirror anymore without crying; I can only do it if I’m with other people.  I hate my own voice and my own thoughts.  I hate my own actions, too.  I actually despise everything I do.  Every turn I take, and every choice I choose is a disgust.  I can’t let my mind run amuck like this but right now all I want is to lie on the floor and become a part of it.  I don’t want to be seen or heard or imagined.  I’m a really bad thing.  I’m a really bad “person”. 

2

I hate myself and I don’t expect anyone to hate me any less.  I am a very hate-able person.  So hate-able, in fact, that the people who once claimed to “love” me, hate me.  They may not say it, because as perverse as humans in nature are, there is a code of conduct that each and every member of each and every society has been grown to follow.  They hate me.  I can hear it in the words they say and the inflection in their voices.  I can see it in the glares and empty stares I get every single day of my life. 

There is not a day that goes by without sadness and pain in some form, creeping up on me and attacking with a sick vengeance.  I will be perfectly functioning one moment, and the next I’ll be weakly bawling my eyes out in the cluttered office of a convenience store.  That is when I cut.  I cut when I need to control my temper.  I can’t just sit around all day crying and contemplating, blaming and resenting.  I have to keep it together.  So I cut so that I have control of the pain.  I can harness the pain into a physical form and make it my pain.   That way, it is no one else’s.  No one else governs how I feel the pain.  No one can make me sad or angry.  When I am depressed I use a box cutter.  When I am angry, I scrape away at my skin with a dull piece of metal.  When I am crying so hard I can’t see or speak, I use broken glass or a razor.  These are just what I have at home.  When I am out, and something happens, almost anything can be construed as a weapon of self-abuse.  The metal bit of a toilet paper roll, a metal hair pick I happened to have in my purse, my bracelet.  As long as I bleed, it doesn’t matter what it is that does the job.  It feels good to be able to feel the pain in a manageable manner.  It feels good to be in control sometimes.

3

I can’t quite see or feel right now.  I don’t know if any of what is going on is really even happening.  I am only writing this so I can busy my mind.  If it isn’t busied, I feel as if it might just turn off all together, and I might just die.  I feel like I’ve been transported into the semi-horrific dream-like existential relationship with myself but I can’t get out.  I slept on a couch and woke up to several strange happenings.  People were talking to me, I was talking to people but I am not able to remember or even comprehend what they were saying.  The birds were outside chirping and in my head I knew they were birds but they sounded like a fleet of horses.  I don’t even know why. 

I feel like I am going to cry.  I feel like I am floating at the top of my head.  I’m not controlling anything, I don’t know anything and everything keeps changing.  I want normal back.  Even whatever horrible thing it is I call normal.   Mostly, I would just love to lie in my bed all day; my heater humming away, keeping me warm and comfortable, my pile of blankets that I cuddle myself into when I am feeling insecure.  Not eating, not really sleeping; not really feeling. 

I used to huddle under a dark green blanket and take 5 Ambien pills and start dreaming in life.  I couldn’t handle what was going on in my real life but I didn’t want to relinquish my control on it, as dreams always force me to do.  I would open my eyes and see a whole, vast world before me.  There were cliffs and waterfalls and icebergs and plains of grass.  It smelled like new books.   It was my own little heaven.  I did this for days.  I just sat under the blanket and dreamed my life.  One day it all went wrong.  I zoomed into an iceberg, and started seeing these discombobulated pixels.  With my hands, I shaped them and molded them into the visage of my love.  Seeing his face right in front of me but I could do nothing.  I was hopeless and powerless in my created paradise.  It was wrong.  I burst into tears and started ruining everything.  I threw the blanket off and started writing words with my hands.  I couldn’t read them, but they made music in my eyes.  I called it a “symphony of words”.  Every letter stepped and flowed and fashioned itself into an entire piece.  He never knew what he meant to me.  He never will.  Not anymore.  Sometimes I try to hold on to a piece of what I once thought was pure, but it’s too difficult.  It hurts too much. 

After the Ambien and the Valium and the Donormyl were all gone, I turned to Diphenhydramine.  It made me sick, dry, and emotionless, which I needed.  I need the period where I felt nothing, and was unable to cry, even though I felt so incredibly sad.  Then, after, I need to be sick.  I needed to get rid of all the pent up tears and self-disgust.  I needed to be forced to cleanse myself of all the impurities of the day.  And, the day after, I’d hardly remember what happened the day before.  It made me cold and dark and frail of heart but I didn’t care.  I still don’t.  I don’t regret any of what I did.  I think it damaged me, though. 

I haven’t taken any aids, and I still feel like none of this is real.  Like I could get up and float away at any time of my choosing. Like a stampede of multicolored billygoats may really sprint past me, like I might be eaten by a gang of white camels and white tigers.  I don’t know what this is.  It hurts.  It feels like giving up.  I don’t want to feel anymore.  I want to be gone.  I just want to be under the green blanket creating worlds that I can never touch or really be in.  I want to wither away until there is nothing left anymore, but I don’t want to do it in public.  I want to hide and never come out.  I cannot deal with this world; I’m much too fragile for it.  I try to hold myself up, and make myself a person but I can’t.  I’m not a person.  I’m a thing, flitting around from world to world, not knowing or seeking which is concrete or normal.  I wonder if there is a way I can compress my whole self, like my leg under a weight.  Maybe I’ll just fall asleep but not really be asleep.  Just unable to move or maneuver or feel responsible for anything that has gone wrong or will go wrong.  I wouldn’t be able to cry or frown or smile or laugh.  I’d just kind of be but not really be.  I’d just float.

4

The voice in my head tells me there is still time.  There is an industrial razor blade in the drawer right in front of you, you should just do it, get it over with.  You know this is what your life has amounted to.  You know you’ve wanted to for years, perhaps even your entire existence.  When you were young, did you not think of this moment? Didn’t you think of it over, and over, and over again?  Overdose, slice, asphyxiate, inhale, fall, collide, shoot, hit…any and all are viable options.  Do you not, every single day you walk to school, fantasize about running into the traffic and becoming a part of the scenery?

You do. You think of jumping off the stairwell, into the cement.  Of pushing just a bit harder when you put knife to skin.  You have tried, and every time you have failed, just like everything else you’ve ever tried to do.  I don’t think I’ve tried hard enough.  As much as life ails me, there are moments that I have.  I have those moments that I want to be happy.  I’d like to laugh more, I’d like to be loved and shown love.  I’d like people to keep their promises, and be nice to me for more than three days at a time.  I’d like forgiveness.  I’d like support, and belief.  I’d like to be cared for and helped and wanted.  Yes.  I’d like all of that. But I will never get it.  

Why am I even foolish enough to try to imagine it?  I’m not worth the pain involved in caring, or trying.  I have done absolutely nothing to deserve anything I have ever received or wanted.  I don’t need to be helped because there is nothing wrong with me.  I’m a waste, and I’d be servicing those who should take my place here.  I’m selfish for even thinking any of this, given my whereabouts and circumstances.  I’m foolish for not doing anything to the full degree.  I was foolish for ending up in the hospital instead of ending up in hell.  It was my fault.  I didn’t try hard enough.  I’m sure if I had the guts I could die by exsanguination.  But I’m a pill popper, because I always take the easy way out.  I am a failure.  I am disgusting. I am an unneeded force of time. I am a spiritual manifestation of nothing.  I should make spiritual literal.  I should be decaying in cold earth.  I should be forgotten. 

I’ve taken to running.  Also, I was going to fast today but I had to go to IHOP with my family this morning, so I went ahead and had some unsweetened mint tea and a house salad (lettuce, tomatoes, red onions, balsamic vinaigrette).  I’m not 100% on the balsamic, but everything else is very low calorie.  Other than that, I’ve had nothing.  I’ve been to the gym twice today, but on the second round I had to cut my workout short because my stupid knee started aching.  I want to be able to work out tomorrow so I’m taking it easy.  I feel like I’m going to pass out though.  So, I might run (literally) to the store and buy an apple.  I hope by tomorrow I will have lost a little of this weight. 

I’ve just taken a shitload of pills.  Knowing my tolerance, I probably will be up and running in about 4 hours, but for now I’m just waiting for the numbing to set in.  I don’t want to feel anymore.  Anything I can feel right now is just pure pain.  I’m tired of being hurt.  I hurt myself enough, why must others hurt me? I’m disgusting.  I’m grotesque.  I know all these things.  I don’t deserve anyone’s love but for a year of my life I thought I had it.  I was wrong.  Love does not exist.  No one has the capacity to love.  People are just shallow and disgusting, horrible beings.  They just hurt you.  Never trust.  Never love.  Never emote or make yourself vulnerable.  Eventually, all of that will just come back to kill you.  For now, I say goodbye.  I wish I could be gone forever.

Sometimes I look at the world and think we’re all jokes.  Like some higher society of people or whatever they might be created us, and we’re all just puppets doing silly things.  It makes me feel like nothing is real; my problems aren’t anything major, they aren’t anything at all.

Ice Cubes (0)- We all know I like a good ice cube.  I have been sprinkling the zero calorie drink mix on them, but it’s a bit of a mess sometimes. Instead, just make a tray of ice cubes with your favorite flavor drink mix, and eat up.  Zero calories and absolutely delicious!

Seltzer Water (0)- Fizzy! And you’ll feel wealthy drinking it.  But only if you don’t get the Wal-Mart off brand, as I do.  If you buy Perrier, feel empowered.  Personally, I hate mineral water, because it tastes like ass, but I mix it with zero calorie drink mix (Crystal Light, Arizona, etc.) and it makes me happy.

Tea (0-2)- Everybody knows drinking tea is a great way to make your fasts a bit more interesting.  There are so many different flavors and types, it just makes me want to die thinking about it.  My favorite tea is simple: Herbal Mint.  It’s delicious, consistent, and I sweeten it with an artificial sweetener (bad, I know, but I’ll deal).

Frozen Grapes (24)- I put them on toothpicks and call them Whimsicles. Like whimsical popsicles.  I think anything frozen is just better.  Except apples, but I loooove my apples chilled and crispy.  Thank Jesus for apples.

No Sugar Added Fruit Popsicles (25)- 25 calories a pop, and full of flavor. I am always stocked with about 4 boxes…judge me.

Unsweetened Pineapple Chunks (40)- You must buy them frozen, because it’s like candy.  You can suck on them, so they take a long while to eat, and they are, again, packed full with sweetness and delight.

Popcorn (50)- I discovered a couple years ago that you could put plain popcorn kernels in a paper bag, pop them in the microwave for 2 minutes, and yield a very delicious, crunchy, low calorie snack.  About 3-4 Tbsp of kernels are needed.  This produced 2-3 cups of delicious popcorn.  I like mine plain, but some people add salt, pepper, or even soy sauce.  Weird as hell, but whatever, you do what you do. 

Strawberry Sorbet (50)- I use a cup of strawberries (that I have frozen and cut myself, the storebought versions often add sugar and other terrible things, also they use the reject strawberries), water, and a teense of Truvia to mix together into a wonderful, sweet sorbet.  It’s a great desert.

Tom Yum Soup (50)- Oookay, this soup is glorious.  It’s traditionally made with chicken and potatoes, but seeing as I am vegan, chicken is a null.  Buy some Tom Yum Instant Sour Paste from your local Asian/Thai/World Foods store, and have some fun.  In my soup, I put carrots, onion, celery, cucumber, and the occasional jalapeno or banana pepper.  If you don’t like it too spicy you can omit the pepper.  The Tom Yum paste is flavorful and only 40 calories for an entire spoonful, which is good for about 3 servings.  If you would like, you can add a half or a whole potato, but that will add more calories.

Grapefruit (80)- LOVE. I eat them for lunch and I look forward to one all day long.  If you only eat half, you’ll get half the calories. 

Baby Food (90)- Yes.  I do eat baby food. On a regular basis.  I love it, but only the fruit flavors.  Don’t be dipping into “Mac & Cheese” or “Pureed Turkey Chicken Whatever”, because I am pretty sure they are ew.  My favorite is banana flavor, pear puree, and strawberry banana.  They are sweet, made with all natural ingredients, and there is no sugar added. Each jar goes a very long way, and I don’t eat more than one a day. I also feel like the jars are pretty portable.  If I ever am forced to go have a juice party with my illegal immigrant friends, I keep one in my purse. 

Banana Ice Cream Stuff (90-140)- Pretty steep as far as calories go, but I love.  I eat one frozen banana on my way to the gym or to school, and make sure I burn it all off, and obviously more, at the gym.  Going to the gym hungry does not suit me, I have hypoglycemia and passing out is a sure thing.  I’d rather just eat the 90 calories and actually be able to work it off, rather than passing out and not being able to work out at all. It has happened.  I can eat the banana frozen on a stick like at the carnival, or, I can cut it up and freeze it the night before, leave it to thaw for 10ish minutes and blend it up into this soft-serve ice cream-y deliciousness.  The extra 50 calories are only added if I add protein powder to the treat, which makes it butch and I have to shove it down my throat to stomach it. 

        Every day is today and every day after today is tomorrow.  It’s ridiculous.  Time is ridiculous.  I can’t count how many times I’ve sat and thought “This year is mine, this year I will lose the weight and finally be happy with myself.”  It’s been nearly 3 months since the start of this year and I’ve lost and gained a lot.  I’m only 8 lbs down from where I started on January 1st. 

        It’s silly how many stupid things affect my weight loss.  Schoolwork, boyfriend, family, tumblr.  If I have a load of homework to do, I eat more.  If my boyfriend says even the slightest meanish thing, I’ll starve for days.  When my family just doesn’t get it, I binge and purge.  And, if I’ve eaten too much, or I haven’t exercised, I won’t get on tumblr because I feel ashamed.  Looking at fat people makes me want to eat, but watching fat people eat makes me want to vomit.  Seeing skinny girls doesn’t encourage me, but rather discourages me. 

        I don’t know what to do or how to do it.  I think weight loss is this simple “calories in, calories out” formula, but then there’s protein, and calcium and iron, and muscle gain vs. fat loss.  Some days, I just cannot eat.  I cannot eat for weeks sometimes, the whole idea of chewing makes me sick. Some days I think I could eat 6 pizzas and 4 cakes, 3 bowls of cereal, and a whole loaf of bread.  It’s so…dysfunctional.  Food and weight and bones are never just that.  Everything has this deeper meaning.   Some days, I wake up to a lower number, and I binge.  It’s like I’m nearly frightened of getting to my goal weight.  If I finally get there, what if it’s not all what it is supposed to be. 

        Everyone pulls me different directions.  My boyfriend will say he likes my tummy one day, and the next he’s telling me I look thin.  My mom calls me tiny but my sister calls me fat.  I look in the mirror and see this disgusting, obese, blob of a woman, but when I try and describe it to the ones who care, they just dismiss me.  I feel like the fattest heifer on planet Earth every time I go to the gym.  Everything jiggles and pokes out.  I work out every day for hours, I go to the gym in the morning, the noon, and sometimes in the night.  Why doesn’t anything change?  I’m fasting, but I know I can’t fast and work out too.  I’ll either pass out or get the munchies and my skin will literally crawl until I assuage it with a binge.  If I don’t work out, I feel gooey.  I feel lazy and repulsive.  Why can’t things just be simple?

Complete fail.
It started out relatively well.
I woke up, got my ass to the gym, and ran for 30 minutes. But, knowing my addictive personality, after school I had to go back. So, I went back to the gym and ran for another 30 minutes and did my weight training. After my vocal lesson, I went back to the gym and did 15 more minutes of high-impact cardio before going to an hour and a half yoga class. All great, yes?

All I had to eat was an all fruit smoothie and a sandwich made with lettuce and avocado. On a normal day that would be high for me, but today I definitely burned upward of 1000 calories. I got home, I was stressed and sad and worried about school and other things, so I binged. I made 2 more sandwiches, some brown rice and lettuce wraps, oatmeal, incessant amounts of pineapple, and Wassa multigrain crackers with Parmesan rice cheese.

I don’t even know what is wrong with me. My whole damn day is down the drain. I’m just going to have to fast, maybe eat a protein banana before my workout and fast the rest of the day, even if I go to the gym twice. I fucking live there. Yet, I’m still fat. I am chubby and flabby and disgusting and I bet by tomorrow I will have gained 2 lbs.

Katie works quietly and quickly.  She had much success with her reading.  She often worries about perfection.

god, even back then.