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It's · all · in · my · head
This is only a test
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hello! this is the obligatory public message to inform anyone who stumbles upon my journal that it's pretty much friends-only. so if you're not on my list, drop me a note and a decent bribe, preferably in the form of baked goods, and i'll let you in. |
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well man. i feel like i have no idea how many days have passed. when dad woke up, he was not the same man. irrational, hallucinating, aggressive, violent, paranoid, mean, rude, ugly. he told everyone to fuck off, pulled me close and explained to me that the entire hospital was a scam run by the christian church to hurt people, to paralyze and kill him, to make money. the drugs were bad, the food was poisoned, he was divorcing mom, none of the doctors had any education, there was a fire and kidnappings and huge coverups, he swore we were still in miami and that he could see the pool out the window, that they had decided to keep him for three years, that his respiratory therapy was making him sick, that i hadtohadtohadto bust him out, that i was his only chance at escaping certain death.
boy, to say i'm tired would be an understatement.
mom's part of the vast conspiracy, so she couldn't help if she wanted to--not that she does, not that i blame her, considering the verbal assaults that have beeen hurled at her and the wild swings she and i have been closely evading.
today we had blessed few hours when he was no longer paranoid, just hallucinating. i will take that any day. he was having a blast. but---sigh-- he fell back into it.
one should never have to plead with her father not to make her use the restraints again. that will fuck with someone.
the next surgery is tomorrow morning. mom is sleeping on my couch now so she can go tomorrow at six. i'm kind of looking forward to the free time his being in the ICU allows me, so i can go grocery shopping. i really, really need to. and do laundry.
the only thing-- i swear, it's fucking amazing-- that has kept me floating above all this has been this amazing wonderful boy-- oh my god. i skipped his conference, of which he was so, so proud, to be with dad. he came over, exhausted, and just loved on me and was an allaround fucking prince. sometimes i look at him and smile and it would seem so natural to just say "i love you" but it makes me too scared, too vulnerable. and he asks me what i'm thinking of, and it almost seems like he wants me to say it, but. but i can't, because it's Too Soon and Not Appropriate and i probably just Don't Know What The Hell I'm Talking About. i keep setting these ridiculous deadlines for myself, like... i'll wait until after a, b, and c, and if i still feel the same, i can tell him. or... wait until my situation is totally neutral, so he won't think i'm being dramatic because my dad is all fucked up.
to tell the truth, part of me wants to just freeze this whole moment in the relationship, when things are still just like goddamn-i-like-you-in-such-a-big-way-let's-make-out. i'm so happy and having such a good time, i can't deny that it's terrifying. of course i will ride it out and see what happens, but i'm holding my breath. it's like when things are frozen with liquid nitrogen. looking at it, you're so bewitched by the simultaneous softness and sharpness, the perfection and symmetry of the crystalline surface, and then you reach out to touch it and your warmth immediately shatters it into tiny shards. |
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well yes. today dad got moved to a different bed, farther from the central chaos of the ICU. it's still in the ICU, just a different little corridor. I went straight from the gym to the 1:00 visiting session, and he was tired and very cranky and kinda drunkenly telling us to go home, but whatever. then we went back at three and he was with his new (HOT) physical therapist, sitting up! he sat up for like ten minutes. then pat and liz came to visit for a bit, and it was all lovely. he even got to eat! he had a little cup of vanilla pudding, a foritified milkshake thing, and some iced tea. he's very scared about the next operation and claims that he's not going to go through with it, but i've decided to just kind of ignore him. he has to do it, and that is that. the charge nurse, sandy, has taken a liking to me and is constantly asking me what i've eaten today. and of course i had to make something up beacause i hadn't eaten anything yet! ah well, i have now. she and i talk about politics-- she loves the texas freedom network, the organization that william works for. she's on their mailing list and was very impressed when i told her that william is probably responsible for at least some of the info. she's going to the conference that william got mom and me tickets for, to see helen thomas speak! so sandy has decided i'm going to be the first female president of the united states, and she doesn't want to see any of this not-eating bullshit from me anymore. she looks straight into my eyes and i know she will kick my ass if i don't eat my wheaties. ha.
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 calm | |
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breathing tube came out before we went back for the 3:00 visiting half-hour! so now i've seen him twice breathing on his own, once with my mother and once without. it's so good just to sit there and listen to him snore. he's talked a little bit... mostly he's still very sleepy, kind of saying a word or two, drifting off, saying another word, drifting off. but little by little i can tell he's retaining more... today at five when i came in alone, he gave me a big smile and told the nurse "this is my daughter." he asked for water, but we couldn't give it to him yet because the breathing tube had been removed too recently. when i left, he woke up long enough to tell me that he loved me and he seemed to understand that i would see him tomorrow. mom's going to try to come in for the 10 am shift tomorrow, which is good because i would really like to sleep. then she can do 10, 1, and 3:00 and i can do 1, 3, and 5:00. i think he may be moved tomorrow too, but i'm not sure.
all the nurses call me miss lindsay and ask if i'm feeling better. then i turn bright red, and they say it's nicer to see that color in my face that white-as-a-sheet cheeks and blue lips. the charge nurse, sandy, made it very clear that if i came in without eating breakfast again she was going to whoop my ass. good to know. |
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well. heh. my mother called at 9:20 to tell me that visiting hours were from 10:00 to 10:30, so i got up and rushed over to the hospital. i remember standing over my dad's bed, chatting at him, and feeling lightheaded. then suddenly i was slumped over the bed and there were like five nurses around me. yeah, i fainted. whoops. so they wheeled my ass on a stretcher down to the ER where i got an EKG and paid a hundred dollars for them to tell me that yes, i had sure fainted. and they made me drink powerade, and william came and got me and i went home and took a wonderful power nap on his chest. now he's back at work, i'm at home, and mom's here and we're going back to the hospital at three. then probably also at five, and i have therapy at 8:30, and then i'll probably go to william's for a bit before i come home. sigh. so silly. i was so embarrassed to pass out. oh well, i'm much better now.
dad's doing real well. from what i saw and what my mother told me, he's much more awake today, feisty. the breathing tube is still in, but will probably come out tomorrow. he keeps trying to pull it out, which is not a good idea.
that's all the news for now, stay tuned. |
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the ICU is a scary place. seeing x-rays of my dad's back full of rods and screws is a scary thing. watching his twitch and writhe, his arms strapped to the hospital bed so he won't pull out the tube inflating and deflating his lungs with constant, clicking regularity, is almost too much too bear. watching tubes run in and out of him... watching the nurse empty the blood from the receptacle, clear the saliva from his mouth, his face and body so puffy with edema...holding his hand, and him not holding back... the blood caked onto the tube in his neck... i don't even know the function of that one.
"things were going well, but he was just bleeding too much, and we had to close him up."
"we'll just wait and let him recover before we go in again."
"oh, he won't remember any of this."
"mr. wolin? can you wiggle your toes? ... well, you can try again later."
me, jauntily, "i love you very much daddy, we're so proud, you're a rock star, things will be easier now, you've done so well..."
i haven't cried. i feel like there's air inside me that can't decide whether it should be cough or a laugh or what. it feels like a big "HA" that won't come out. i feel like i'm going to throw up.
my mom left, and now william's on his way here. i hope traffic isn't bad.
i don't know what else to say. god, the twitching was the worst. his arms, straining against the restraints... the doctors wouldn't quite say whether it was just from all the medicine, or pain, or instinct to pull out the tubes, or what. i wasn't sure he could hear us until the nurse asked him to open his mouth and he did. i just kept crooning, just try to relax, daddy, we're here. when he would stop twitching for just a moment i would say that's a guy, that's right, just try to rest, everything's ok, you did great, you're doign great.
now all there is to worry about is opening him from the front, shoving his organs around, deflating a lung, putting bone grafts into the empty places in his spine. peice of cake.
the doctor remarked that i needed a belt. "my father isn't even wearing pants," i said.
oh, daddy. you never looked so small. we put hospital socks on your feet in case you could feel how cold they were. i told the nurse you tend to be chilly. |
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daddy's in surgery. mom is here, we're watching morning shows and drinking coffee. the nurse called to tell us he had gone to sleep peacefully and that they had started in on him. tonight he won't be conscious and there will be a machine breathing for him, but i might go see him anyway. just because it feels right. nothing feels real. when the nurse calls to check in, the phone won't ring any differently if he's dead. it'll be the same cheery cell-phone song, regardless. it's weird, i kind of expected it to be clinical and ominous. i smoked a cigarette in front of my mother. i don't even know what to say. when you read this, say a prayer for him, in whatever way you do that. just think nice things. here's a link about the kind of surgery he's doing: http://www.txscoli.com/pedicle_fusion.htmand http://www.txscoli.com/lumbar_laminectomy.htmand next week, http://www.txscoli.com/intervertebral_cages.htmit's actually lumbar and thoracic, but that doesn't really matter. you get the idea.
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 awake | |
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the thing i miss most about living in the country is looking up at the stars. being able to see the milky way, almost solid with dusty light. being able to pick out constellations and make up new ones. so many stars, so luminous it's like a whole different kind of day. dark, yes, but emanating that particular bluish light that somehow makes everything clearer than it is when the sun doesn't give it a choice. when it's dark, the earth seems to make itself known, seducing us with dreamy sillhouettes, guiding, indicating, letting us discover what it chooses to reveal.
here, even the brightest stars are dim, and probably satellites anyway. but it's worth it for the overwhelming sensation of closeness with humanity... the knowledge that all around me, there are people laughing, crying, making love, getting older, dying. the fact that it's unfathomable is comforting. sometimes i wish we hadn't gone and ruined the mystery of the stars. i try to push it out of my head that i know what they're made of. it was far more romantic when i believed that the stars were made of crisp, cool, solid light like the kind of air that circulates around ghosts and angels.
i like to remember that the stars are always there, just like the sun is always there. the sun never sets, the world turns. |
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don't you hate it when you get all dressed to go to the gym, get there, and your fucking elliptical nemesis is on the machine AGAIN?!? i swear this girl must be looking in my window, ready to jump on the machine as soon as i prepare to go. don't you also hate it when you go in anyway, do 200 bicep curls and 200 tricep curls, stand around like an ass, and this chick is STILL doing intervals on the fucking thing? gah! don't you also hate it when you wait around reading magazines until she finally gets her impossibly-in-shape ass off the machine, and hop on only to discover that the gym gods have decided that you will only SUCK today and you end up squeezing out a measly 30 minute bounce before deciding that no, you don't want to be That Girl Who Passed Out On The Elliptical And Went Thump? in sum, i suck today and i forgot i was wearing makeup and it all migrated on a river of sweat down my cheeks and i had like a 10-minute conversation with haaron (heron? i have no idea) looking like a fucking raccoon. good thing he's such a kind-hearted guy he didn't even mention it and i'm sure he doesn't think any less of me. he even cheered me up and assured me it was just really hot in there, and that he felt lazy too. on the upside, i can now hold in my hand the keys to my new apartment. and i got my ID card, and the picture is actually kind of flattering. tomorrow i must purchase a mattress and open a bank account. and watch the convention with william and his friends, and go to therapy. part of me wants to skip therapy, but i won't, i probably need it.
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 aggravated |
Current Music: |
nellie mackay- sari | |
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once again, i have the same old revelation that people are not all that different and that i've been an asshole for shutting so many people out of my life because of some kind of preconceived notion. like today, i had the most lovely workout with the company and encouragement of a baby-faced little man who i would bet a million dollars used to be in the military. we watched espn and talked about baseball, and it occurred to me as i was sweating and grinning, grinning and sweating, that i would not have given this person the time of day five years ago. and it would have been because i didn't think his shoes or something equally inane fit into my little idea of who was a good person, an interesting person, an intelligent person. i don't know why working out fills me with such love for humanity, but it really seems to. i was just walking back up to my apartment, all limp and sweaty, and thinking about how utterly random the actual phenomenon of getting along with someone is... you can have nothing at all in common, but the easiest conversation ever, or all the same interests and find the conversation about as smooth and stimulating as a head-on collision. funnily (yeah that's a word, fucker) enough, i've had this revelation about a dozen times since i started recovery. i guess because there's a string of similarity between people with EDs that makes that kind of deep connection more likely, but on the surface i have to deal with the idea that some of my closest friends are members of :gasp: sororities, and that they listen to really bad pop music and think that beer pong is a viable form of social interaction. on a radically different note, where the shit did the day go? it's nearly seven. i guess that's what happens when you delve into your stash and take your last alprazolam xr (high-powered xanax extended release stuff) and crash for fourteen hours. heh. |
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yay, sex! three cheers for fornication! |
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today i saw a homeless man holding up a cardboard sign with nothing written on it. so i gave him a pen. ... shit has rather hit the fan with devin and jennifer, and i feel pretty terrible about it. william says it's just because i'm looking for a reason to hate myself, but. i don't know. see dev and jen had been making out, which i was not aware of. then when i was taking jen home last night, i told her about the night devin was rolling and he got a little inappropriate with me. nothing happened, of course, but i guess it hurt her feelings enough because today she broke it off with him, and i feel awful. i mean, perhaps he should not have tried to get in my pants. perhaps he should have told me they were dating. but perhaps i should not have been a gossipy bitch. i apologized to him, and he didn't seem mad at all, but man. i was happy with our little unit. i should have intuited that there was something between them, i just didn't. i really like jennifer. agh, what a mess.
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 blah | |
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i have had a social life lately. shall i give you a moment to gasp, faint, revive yourself, and continue reading? alright then. ... i've been chilling with devin, in fact he and jennifer are coming over tonight. the three of us are getting to be a lovely little unit, and it's sweet. i think being friends with me is the most intellectually stimulating thing either of them has done in a long time, and they like it. both of them have expressed a desire to maybe take some classes at the community college, and have bashfully asked me if i could maybe point them in the right direction. i'm honored. it would be great to see devin try and get himself educated, despite his learning difficulties. it's really hard for me, sometimes, not to be terribly angry with his parents... his father for being so lazy and irresponsible, his mother for taking drugs while pregnant with her babies and not giving them the opportunities they should have had. he and chance are beuatiful, special people and they've had it so, so hard. devin's come a really long way, but he still shows signs of his old problems... the other night he got a pill of x from this dealer we went to visit, and he took it that night, randomly... i sat with him in the parking lot of his complex till like one because i didn't want him rolling alone, but it was weird and i know he was all druggily attracted to me but we share a great-grandfather so put the brakes on that shit! ew. i dunno. there's a bit of awkwardness. in other news, i met this kid william off of friendster yesterday for coffee. we chilled at halcyon... that's like his and his friends' headquarters. he knew everyone who walked in! he's 23, works as a legislative research fellow for a group that is trying to get the abstinence-olny sex ed program in texas changed. he's really smart and sarcastic and quite short, only a tiny bit taller than me, with super curly brown shaggy hair and freckled shoulders. after coffee he and i went to his apartment and i watched him clean for a bit... then i had therapy, but i came back afterward. we started to watch a movie but it was a little boring aaaaand we made out and it was lovely. then he called me today and asked me to come over and chill with him and his painter friend brian to watch this audrey tatou movie "god is great and you're not" (or is it i'm not? i've forgotten now), which was good. brian and william both fell asleep through the whole thing, and the kitty elliott fell asleep too, on my lap. then when it was over william walked me to my car and gave me a lovely goodbye kiss. he even said he would call me tomorrow during the day... he's got a party he has to go to (some ex-coworker) at night, but he wants to hang out in the day. OH! the weirdest thing about him? he's divorced . when he was 18, he got married right as he joined the military. apparently they never even lived together, and he was in training for pretty much the entire duration, but still it made me feel old and very young at the same time. i am making out with a person who has been married. good god. freaky. ok i'm done now.
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well. today i got up at like 2:15 and i am not going to the gym because my knee hurts and i have a migraine. BUT i was social last night, oh yes. i hung out with my cousin devin and his friend jennifer, and it was fab. we smoked a joint. we talked nonsense. we giggled and were people. i mean, it's kind of sad that all their cigarette smoking gave me a migraine and knocked me out forever, and that i came home at midnight because i was tired (i am an old lady! holy jesus!), but on the whole it was really lovely and we are starting a new era of me-and-devin-chilling-a-lot and being a cousin-crime-fighting-duo-extraordinaire. huzzah. thank god i have so many relations. it makes it a lot easier to make friends.
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content | |
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the most wonderous thing happened today! someone had abandoned dozens of high-quality fashion magazines, and a few fitness ones, on the corner where the trash goes! so of course i took them all and they are sitting on my dining room table waiting to be attacked with scissors and paste. yay! there nothing from 2004, mostly 2001-2003, but i don't really care, i'm not using them to become fashionable anyway. fabulous!
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 creative | |
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i had an awesome view of the fireworks from my balcony. and then the reality of war got too near, and i came inside. it's really grotesque when you think too hard about fireworks. i wouldn't recommend it. |
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i just did an hour on the elliptical. an hour! plus 100 crunches (i can do 200, but my tummy muscles have been sore) and 150 bicep curls (can also do more, but same issue). but ANYHOW, i am a rockstar. you know you wanna see me naked.
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badass |
Current Music: |
thunder | |
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testing... i think i made an avatar!
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 bouncy |
Current Music: |
talib kweli and hi-tek | |
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om_manipadmehum's journal