depression mode

october has always been a difficult month for me, I keep getting older.
it's crazy shifts in weather patterns, daylight slipping away, and just sadness.

my youngest sister called today, she always talks for a good while, and I appreciate it a lot. after that, my son called, and that is always good.
I actually talked to both of my daughters today too, and still I am lonely and depressed. there is just about nothing to eat in the house, and no prospects for getting anything. poverty makes a serios dent in my mental health. hunger sucks. and it isn't productive, like dieting to lose weight, ok, that's rarely productive either. it just makes me drag through the days, I keep busy mentally online, and do a lot of crocheting, but I'm just doggone hungry when it comes down to it.

I left a message for the food pantry at church, but nobody called back. I made sure to say that I have no food for the weekend, but perhaps no volunteers came in to hear the message.

it gets old.

what happened?

I just wrote a long rant, and it disappeared! ok, here's a short one, let's see how this goes.

pains

I have to seriously wonder if emotional pain can cause lupus and fybromialgia....... it is certain that emotional pain excellorates physical pain, and physical pain makes depression worse. it can really be a nasty cycle, one thing growing off the other.

I wait for months to get a visit from my daughter and my grandson, but the visit always is too much physical exertion and I suffer so much pain by the time they go that it takes me days to recover. Anguish is a direct result of that.

Has anyone ever done a study to see how many adult survivors of childhood abuse turn out to have chronic pain conditions? From my experiences with other survivors, I have to say there must be a link. How can men keep getting away with doing so much permanant damage to us and also ruin our medical conditions? The cost is high, so high I don't know why they are even allowed to live. Not just because it effects the one survivor, but it also goes on to future generations and spreads agony through communities and so far there is no end in sight.

If bank robbers were allowed to just go on doing what they do, banks would be out of business and people would go back to the barter system in order to make any purchases. See, if money were taken directly from MEN, police would act imediately. Judges would slam down the gavel and guards would clang shut the barred doors.

Child molestors and rapists roam freely.

poems I wrote in early recognition of my abuse

Day 1
Entered crying
as the hurricane howled
eyes wide open
in the dead of night
leaves all colours
blowing in the streets
torrid forboding
with my first moments on earth
Hurricane Hazel and Midnight
my birth

*****************

Liar in the household
keeper of the keys
Holds us all in prison
keeps us on our knees
Lurks about in shadows
whispers filthy words
Menacing my nightmares
as all my waking fears

In he creeps as all are sleeping
horrid grasping gropes
Muffles my cries
fills my eyes
binds my wrists
strangles my hopes

"Hush, it was just another bad dream
you dirty girl"
Daylight comes
I haven't slept

*******************************

Warped Romance

We're going for a ride tonight
we're going in the car
hush the others mustn't hear
you see we're going far
to a place where it's warm all year
we can live at the beach
No, your mother cannot come,
we'll be happy there alone
Just you and me

Every day will be such fun
no one can stop us
no one will ever know
and one day I'll marry you
one day when you're all grown

*********************************

The boyfriend

are you a virgin?
my boyfriend asked, clear blue eyes
looking out from pale gold locks
I've never been a virgin
never been a child
I'm just 16, but I'm very old
He knew what I was saying
more than I could dare see
he took me to a finer place
I'll always wish to be
He touched my heart
and met my soul
and held me for a time
A time that could never last as long
as this need of mine

*******************************************************

I cannot tell if you like me
or if you wish I'd go away
it's so hard for me to
know these things
Tell me what you think of me
tell me I should stay
hold my hand
embrace me
chase my pain away
call me on the telephone
tell me that you care
invite me to be with you
show me that you care
in ways I
recognize


******************************************

terrible twos

Blonde curls
bright blue eyes
laughing, running in the grass
crisp pink dress
lace topped socks
pattent leather shoes
a happy heart
trusting soul
running on chubby two year old legs
looking to you for guidance
for nurture and for kindness

HOW could you bind and rape me?

*************************************

I have more poems written later on, will post them later.

it's not like the movies and tv

lately it seems the theme of many shows I've been watching is something dealing with a small child plagued by "monsters under the bed" or some other such fear. In these stories, Mom or Dad always comes to make everything better. In my childhood, Dad was the boogeyman. He even told me so. Once my mother heard him telling me that, and she admonished him "Morris, don't tell her that." so I whispered to her "He's not fibbing Mommy, he really is the boogeyman".
She brushed it off.
There was never any comfort. No hero. No Superman, Doctor Who or even Robin Hood to come fix the evil monster, we had to live with him every day and night.

After my son was born when I was 12, my mother became another boogieman, not the kind that sneaks up on you when you're asleep, but the kind that steals your son, your reality and your self. The kind of soul-ripping constant force of control over everything, in a 12 year old's world, where there is no escape.

Except for my books and tv, and there was little time for either once I was foisted into the roll of housekeeper.

I had a lot of migraines, and was never alone with my thoughts, if I went in my room to be alone, I was made to come out and "stop being a hermit".

It seems little wonder of how I started living some altered reality here and there, some of it showed up in my art, and some in my poetry, and there was a persona of "Benonia" who would just zone out and feel painful feelings and speak to nobody. By the time I was 15 or 16 and going to coffee houses I started writing little messages on bathroom walls... "Benonia was here" with the drawing of one sad eye.

There were always terrible dreams at night, a woman clothed in long black dress with a dark black veil covering her head, she would follow me around in my dreams, and I could never get close enough to find out who she was, as she would disappear before I got close enough.
In other dreams, my father was chasing me through woods with sizzors or a sharp knife, and I would trip on tree roots and get up and run some more.
I could levitate a few feet higher than he could reach, so I always got away. That dream was better than my real life.

High school provided me with some new form of relief, I started smoking pot and a few other drugs, and drinking more heavily, I was drinking when I was able as far back as 10 years old, but it was not often or much. High school I let myself do whatever I could imagine, damn the consequences.
I cut class a lot, and visited friends at different schools, and still kept coming home by my deadline of exactly 20 minutes after school let out, because I was not allowed a life, or friends. O.k., I was allowed 3 friends, but only if I got all of the house clean first, and returned home before the street lights came on, or I would be on restriction for months at a time.

My younger sisters and both of my brothers were allowed to do as they pleased, but I was permanantly punished. I ran away from home for 3 days when I was 15, and when I came back, mom was going to put me on restriction again, but I refused to let her. I told her I am coming and going as I please, just like everyone else around here. So I went out that night, and any other night I wanted to. I smoked cigars, not because I liked them, but because mom hated them, and made me take them outside.
Partial freedom was not the same as freedom to be true to myself. I had lost a big chunk of myself already, and did not get my memory back of my son's birth until 2009, 42 years later.

I can not get 42 years of motherhood back.

changes

it's pretty hard to have my favorite [recent] therapist and her intern both leave at the same time. They have been so great to work with, and I am struggling with their departure. There is additional stress in that the new therapist will be 2 weeks away from beginning anew. 2 weeks is always hard for me to go without group.

I'm also healing from a small surgery, had a lump removed from my arm. It is probably just a fatty tumor, but the lab results have not come back yet.
I am squeemish when it comes to changing the bandages, and it is a bit sore, but not too bad.

Another thing worrying me; no food in the house by some time tommorrow.....
and no money for at least a 6 days or so. Stress is not new in this area, but continuous.

I'm not up to much tonight, so this is a short blog entry.

depressed a lot lately

sometimes my memories really get me down, and sometimes it is a lot worse than that. I start thinking I really need something to look forward to, and nothing comes up.


I remember when I was 18 months old [less than 2 anyway, as it was summer] and we lived on Bonifant St in downtown silver spring maryland. Mom took me and my brother out in back of our apartment to the playground and left us there, with my 4 year old brother in charge, as she went back inside for a while. We were running and playing, and I tripped and fell and badly skinned my knee. my brother could not carry me, so we were calling out loudly for Mom. She finally appeared at a window and then came down and carried me back to our apartment. When she was cleaning my knee and putting tincture of merthiolate on it, her brother J.B. started leaving.
She had my younger brother in his crib, so she was basically having alone time with her brother while leaving 2 small children unattended outside!
I remember he was wearing his sailor whites.

I sure have some issues with my mother.