I can't sleep. I can't sleep, I can't sleep, I can't sleep. Why do I sleep late every day? Because without the aid of sleeping pills, I CAN'T SLEEP.
I try to sleep. I go to bed at 12, at 2, early times for me. But then I lay there for the next few hours, listening to the cat snore, listening to the rain, listening to the call to prayer, listening to every damn thing that confirms to me that I'm not sleeping.
Not that sleeping helps. Oh no, hahaha. That would be too kind for my brain. No, no, when I sleep it's the most restless, active-dreaming sleep that when I wake up, I realize I've been asleep. There's virtually no difference! Not even the pills help with that. By pills I mean the PM versions of common headache medicines. Lest you think I've gone the rock star way. Not quite nightmares but by no means pleasant dreams, just weird stories that disturb and sadden and confuse me, every night. And thus, I never wake up rested no matter how late I get up. But Leyla, you say, when the body sleeps more, it feels more tired. Of course you don't feel rested, you're sleeping too much. I beg to differ kind, disembodied voice. When one falls asleep around 5 and gets up at 1, that's not too much sleep. That's the normal amount of sleep the body requires. So technically I should wake up refreshed! Ready! Happy to take on the day! But that would be too kind, no, I should just keep on waking up feeling like something really heavy ran me over. Not a car, not a tractor. A monster truck maybe. One that has a personal vendetta against me.
I have too many thoughts in my head. They swirl around and repeat themselves and spawn many other tiny thoughts like those asexual organisms you learn about in biology. They don't need a mate to reproduce, they just build up and up and then through mitosis or osmosis or some other reaction, they make another. But my thoughts don't let that stay put, oh oh! No, they'll then analyze the meanings of osmosis and mitosis and add meiosis and all the useless information I have stored in there will unravel and join the thoughts until my head is so full, my brain begs to be let out.
You could make a science fiction movie out of my mind. The Girl Who Thought Too Much. You know what the finale would be? Complete, psychotic breakdown. The brain devours the girl, then everything else until the world is a black hole created by a monstrous brain. Hmm. Is this what happens when I stop the Paxil? I thought I was doing fine but then, I could sleep with Paxil. The thoughts wouldn't mutliply like bunnies in heat with Paxil. I didn't grit my teeth, to fight the weird about-to-cry-ness that always seems present, with Paxil. The weird, about-to-cry-ness that comes with any excess of emotion, was never present with Paxil. Supposedly, the reason people cry is because our bodies over-react and produce chemicals and hormones. Well, bottle me up, because apparently I have enough chemicals and hormones to appease both junkies and the sexually confused alike (respectively, the junkies get the chemicals the boy-girls or girl-boys get the hormones.)
Once upon a time, people were scared of anti-depressants including a girl named me. What if they made you a zombie? And not the cool kind of zombie that ate brains (oh-ho, want mine? It's chock full of yummy thoughts), but the kind that had no personality and was numb to the world. But then the girl named me was prescribed Paxil. And it was all right. It made the choking feeling and the heart racing stop and the personality stay the same. And then she went off it and thought, hey! No side effects! She was smart and didn't do it like the last time where she forgot the pills when she went to visit her boyfriend's family and ended up vomiting the entire night from withdrawal and the worst fucking headache a head has had to suffer. In the world. Ever. Your boyfriend's mom's chocolate cranberry brownies ain't so tasty passing through your throat the opposite way. This time, she slowed it down and cut it off. And she was fine and wondering what good were they really? Was it all psychosomatic? Maybe it did really help because right now she's feeling more of the psycho without the somatic. Or is it because she knows, and the brain knows, and the thoughts know, she's off it?
My brain hurts. The thoughts hurt it. And my jaw hurts. The teeth gritting hurts it. Especially since teeth really have no control over eyes and tear ducts as much as we'd like them to.
Sometimes little girls have to ask, Universe? I hope you have a fucking plan because days like today happen and I just can't understand why. Tossing and turning in bed doesn't help especially when your fickle cat growls every time you come near her rear (which sets off even more thoughts, seriously the slightest thing; did the cat suffer some horrible rear-end situation in a past life? In this life? Do cats get reincarnated? What was the cat's life before she found the little girl? Was she happy? Is she happy now? What if something happens to the cat? Will the little girl be okay (NO))? And so on. Oh and don't even get the girl started on life without the cat because right now, the unsuspecting creature is pretty much all that's holding her together.
Little girls aren't as little as they would like to me. They get tired of bullshit and thoughts and mouth aches and lack of sleeping. It's not fair to count on Paxil and pills, because it's just asking too much of them. It's too much pressure for the poor little pills. And the brain. And the jaw. And the eyes. And the head. And the heart.
So Universe, help out a not-so-little little girl. OR AT LEAST LET ME GET SOME SLEEP.
Showing posts with label days of Paxil. Show all posts
Showing posts with label days of Paxil. Show all posts
Friday, June 25, 2010
Thursday, February 11, 2010
What It Feels Like For A Girl...
...with OCD. I don't know if I believe in all these acronym conditions like OCD or ADD, I tend to think there's a part of every person that the individual can't control. Whether it exhibits itself as closing the door seventeen times a day or being unable to sit still for five minutes, it's out of your hands and it's just a part of you. It's a quirk to show that no one is perfect and ever really totally in control. I mean, I do think one can start to control or even completely get rid of these involuntarily placed systems within the body but it takes training, time, and sometimes even medication. And sometimes you're just stuck with them, they are a part of what makes you inherently you. I myself like things in even numbers, sorted out and paired. I also have a habit of obsessing about one thing until someone shakes the thought out of my head, either by comforting me or by yelling at me to get a grip. To better explain it, say I get a thought. Like my mom isn't completely happy with the tattoo she got a few years ago. In my head this will grow and grow and become a problem and make me think, but she has it forever I need to make sure this thing she's wanted for so long is perfect, I need to make her happy. And then the burden of it will start dragging me down and I'll go with how? How can I do this? Maybe she's okay with it. Maybe it doesn't matter. I'll keep asking her if she's sure or try to get a plan made until she snaps at me or I just go crazy and chew my nails until they bleed. Hypothetically speaking of course.
I'm not a doctor, heh, but I'd say that's a little OCD. To go along with that I also have this thing. It's kind of still a hush hush subject in some places but I've grown to accept it a little bit, and now I don't care who knows. I have depression. No, I don't sit in my room cutting myself and writing poetry about dead flowers and hating myself because Sartre stated that life has no meaning and that's the truth. For the record, yes it does. Every life is precious and Sartre can kiss my ass. Hell is other people Jean-Paul? No, hell is studying you for two years. In French. And reading and acting out Huis Clos. In French. And spending hours figuring out how to write about you in the correct tense. IN FRENCH. Okay, sometimes it was just spending hours inputting English sentences that Babel Fish would translate into French which we'd then type up without bothering to fix it, but still. Where was I? Oh yes, life is wonderful. It's a gift. If it didn't mean anything then we simply wouldn't exist. Which is one of the many reasons why death scares the living shit (bahaha living get it?) out of me, but that's another topic. Yes, I have depression. It apparently runs in the family. I got smacked with it for the first time, for real, the summer between my junior and senior years of college. I couldn't sleep. I couldn't eat. I was listless and bawling and it felt like this huge spiky rope was coiled in my stomach and was slowly killing me. I couldn't breathe because of it (it stretched all the way to my throat) and it always felt like my heart was beating too fast. I actually tried taking my pulse and counting the beats because I thought my heart had turned into a hummingbird and was about to flutter out of my chest.
I didn't know why I felt like this and I was so scared that it wouldn't ever go away and that I was not normal. My dad was also going through something similar (needless to say that summer was not a good one for our family, especially my mom and sister who had to deal with us and all our other family members and their crazies). No matter how much my mom said it would pass, I couldn't believe her. It scared me to go to the doctor because it made it seem so serious and it scared me even more to take pills, Paxil and Xanax, because I thought they would make me addicted and I'd have this problem for the rest of my life. Well, I've come to realize I will. But I won't always feel like that. The pills did make me feel better, they balanced my brain chemistry so that I could breathe and eat again. The Xanax was awful and made me fall asleep immediately and wake up half an hour later gasping and choking in the midst of a panic attack. But the Paxil helped and so did the Diazem when I had the really bad attacks. I remember the night I felt slowly like me again. I picked up, "Lamb," by Christopher Moore and managed to sit and calmly read and eat miniature Snickers bars, the first thing I ate after ten days. God bless chocolate. The whole thing seemed to last forever but it was only a couple weeks.
I stopped the Paxil a few months later but until now I had two more bouts of the scary Leyla mood as I think of it. My leg tattoos set one episode off. Ugh. Luckily, I'm over it and I have 3 pretty peacock feathers on my right leg which I jokingly say represent my mom, my sister, and my dad. I currently take Paxil and I do have a doctor (who I have not seen since September though, whoops) but other than the occasional and normal "sad" day I'm fine, I'm me. That's what made me feel such relief when the "episode" passed. The drugs didn't make me a zombie and I didn't turn into a facsimilie of a happy version of me. I'm Leyla. The reason I still take them is because the doctor recommended it because I'm in a, "transition stage of my life." And since the episodes still happen, I'd rather keep them at bay with some help rather than succumbing to them. I will stop taking Paxil eventually though and maybe I'll have to start again in the future. I sure as hell hope I don't but I know what to expect and what I can do to combat it now. I also know that there are others like me, a close friend for one, and that talking with them and being there for them is just as helpful when you feel like you're the only crazy in the world.
Ah transitions. Better known as change. Even better known as my greatest enemy. I don't like change. I like things the way they are and to stay the way they are. My biggest worries during the episodes were along the lines of, oh God what is going to happen to me after college, where will I work, where will my friends be, why are they not staying with me, why do I have to be so far away from my family, why is it ending so soon, why can't I just be a kid again? I fervently wished to be a kid and happy and safe in my home with my healthy grandparents and parents. My grandparents have been going through a lot of health scares in recent years and all that just makes me think about our mortality and then I get panic attacks because honestly, I'm lost without my family. I truly am. We are all so tight-knit and loving, I don't think I could've turned out the way I did if not for them. I still get those worries but I'm learning to calm them.
Change makes me anxious-making and I don't like it. It always makes the fluttery stomach spiky rope thing come back and consumes me with worry. You can always tell when I'm worried because my nails become non-existent.
Lately though, I've become better at it. About looking change in the eye and taking a deep breath. But sometimes it still beats me. It makes me cry and even when I'm not crying it still makes me leak out of my face orifices uncontrollably. It makes my stomach flip flop in a bad way and convinces me I'm about to throw up. I don't know what sets it off. Sometimes it's just the fear of the unknown and I hate not knowing. I had to leave L.A. because this happened and it's just an all-consuming, get me out of here this instant, snakes choking my insides, call my mom constantly for reassurance, sob for no reason feeling that takes over me and destroys all rationality. I get smaller episodes too that aren't that big a deal but make me ashamed. Like I left LA previously on a visit to my friend because I had this feeling. And now I get it when I'm away from home, like spending the night somewhere. I make excuses, valid ones actually, and try to get myself out of the situation and then I feel horrible because I'm usually changing plans with somebody to do it. I feel so guilty and then try to convince myself it's ok and I'll make it up and it's just lousy but then I'm home and my stomach calms down. I know my cousins reads this and I was supposed to spend the night at her house which I'm totally fine with, I love hanging out with her. But I was worrying about a book I have to cover for my internship (by tomorrow. And they still haven't sent the book), and this meeting I have tomorrow and I thought it might make me bad company for the night. But what I don't understand is, they are all easy fixes. The internship said if I couldn't do it by tomorrow it would be fine but I want them to think I'm Superwoman and then be open for future job possibiliies but I know I'm not Superwoman so why force it? And the meeting? It's closer to my cousin's house than my own and I could just go from there in the morning but I just get this need to be home and handle it from there and nothing can quiet my insides until I'm "safe."
This is why I have unhealthy relationships with my phone and computer when I'm not home, they are the lifelines connecting me to where I feel safe. But safe? I'm safe where I am that's not home too. I need to get rid of this second-guessing and self-sabotage because it's slowly eating at me. My calm-down music is now the live versions of Madonna's, "Like a Prayer," followed by, "Jump," followed by the album version of, "Ray of Light." They helped during the ride home but I don't know if that was because I knew was going home or because they are good soothing songs. So I hope people, especially my dear cousin who I love with all my heart, understand when I do these spastic things that make sense in my brain and that I force to make sense in real life. Then punish myself for wanting it that way.
I don't quite know how to explain how change, depression, weird panic get-me-out-of-here moments, are all related but to me they are. I want them to go away. I want the Like A Muse project to help me get going with my life both in the physical sense (getting in shape, writing) and the emotional/metaphysicial (my mind-set and my habits that I don't like). But if they are a part of me, a permanent part that contributes to making me who I am, I want to be okay with them because I feel guilty and I hate that feeling. I spend way too much time feeling guilty and trying to rationalize it and it's really tiring. It hurts my brain. So I'm going to stop. And go work out and read the stupid book if my internship boss lady ever sends it.
Oh, on the way home the dolmus (mini-bus) driver got in a fight with one of the passengers We were all on his side though and finally had to yell at the idiot man to get out of the car. Ah Istanbul.
I'm not a doctor, heh, but I'd say that's a little OCD. To go along with that I also have this thing. It's kind of still a hush hush subject in some places but I've grown to accept it a little bit, and now I don't care who knows. I have depression. No, I don't sit in my room cutting myself and writing poetry about dead flowers and hating myself because Sartre stated that life has no meaning and that's the truth. For the record, yes it does. Every life is precious and Sartre can kiss my ass. Hell is other people Jean-Paul? No, hell is studying you for two years. In French. And reading and acting out Huis Clos. In French. And spending hours figuring out how to write about you in the correct tense. IN FRENCH. Okay, sometimes it was just spending hours inputting English sentences that Babel Fish would translate into French which we'd then type up without bothering to fix it, but still. Where was I? Oh yes, life is wonderful. It's a gift. If it didn't mean anything then we simply wouldn't exist. Which is one of the many reasons why death scares the living shit (bahaha living get it?) out of me, but that's another topic. Yes, I have depression. It apparently runs in the family. I got smacked with it for the first time, for real, the summer between my junior and senior years of college. I couldn't sleep. I couldn't eat. I was listless and bawling and it felt like this huge spiky rope was coiled in my stomach and was slowly killing me. I couldn't breathe because of it (it stretched all the way to my throat) and it always felt like my heart was beating too fast. I actually tried taking my pulse and counting the beats because I thought my heart had turned into a hummingbird and was about to flutter out of my chest.
I didn't know why I felt like this and I was so scared that it wouldn't ever go away and that I was not normal. My dad was also going through something similar (needless to say that summer was not a good one for our family, especially my mom and sister who had to deal with us and all our other family members and their crazies). No matter how much my mom said it would pass, I couldn't believe her. It scared me to go to the doctor because it made it seem so serious and it scared me even more to take pills, Paxil and Xanax, because I thought they would make me addicted and I'd have this problem for the rest of my life. Well, I've come to realize I will. But I won't always feel like that. The pills did make me feel better, they balanced my brain chemistry so that I could breathe and eat again. The Xanax was awful and made me fall asleep immediately and wake up half an hour later gasping and choking in the midst of a panic attack. But the Paxil helped and so did the Diazem when I had the really bad attacks. I remember the night I felt slowly like me again. I picked up, "Lamb," by Christopher Moore and managed to sit and calmly read and eat miniature Snickers bars, the first thing I ate after ten days. God bless chocolate. The whole thing seemed to last forever but it was only a couple weeks.
I stopped the Paxil a few months later but until now I had two more bouts of the scary Leyla mood as I think of it. My leg tattoos set one episode off. Ugh. Luckily, I'm over it and I have 3 pretty peacock feathers on my right leg which I jokingly say represent my mom, my sister, and my dad. I currently take Paxil and I do have a doctor (who I have not seen since September though, whoops) but other than the occasional and normal "sad" day I'm fine, I'm me. That's what made me feel such relief when the "episode" passed. The drugs didn't make me a zombie and I didn't turn into a facsimilie of a happy version of me. I'm Leyla. The reason I still take them is because the doctor recommended it because I'm in a, "transition stage of my life." And since the episodes still happen, I'd rather keep them at bay with some help rather than succumbing to them. I will stop taking Paxil eventually though and maybe I'll have to start again in the future. I sure as hell hope I don't but I know what to expect and what I can do to combat it now. I also know that there are others like me, a close friend for one, and that talking with them and being there for them is just as helpful when you feel like you're the only crazy in the world.
Ah transitions. Better known as change. Even better known as my greatest enemy. I don't like change. I like things the way they are and to stay the way they are. My biggest worries during the episodes were along the lines of, oh God what is going to happen to me after college, where will I work, where will my friends be, why are they not staying with me, why do I have to be so far away from my family, why is it ending so soon, why can't I just be a kid again? I fervently wished to be a kid and happy and safe in my home with my healthy grandparents and parents. My grandparents have been going through a lot of health scares in recent years and all that just makes me think about our mortality and then I get panic attacks because honestly, I'm lost without my family. I truly am. We are all so tight-knit and loving, I don't think I could've turned out the way I did if not for them. I still get those worries but I'm learning to calm them.
Change makes me anxious-making and I don't like it. It always makes the fluttery stomach spiky rope thing come back and consumes me with worry. You can always tell when I'm worried because my nails become non-existent.
Lately though, I've become better at it. About looking change in the eye and taking a deep breath. But sometimes it still beats me. It makes me cry and even when I'm not crying it still makes me leak out of my face orifices uncontrollably. It makes my stomach flip flop in a bad way and convinces me I'm about to throw up. I don't know what sets it off. Sometimes it's just the fear of the unknown and I hate not knowing. I had to leave L.A. because this happened and it's just an all-consuming, get me out of here this instant, snakes choking my insides, call my mom constantly for reassurance, sob for no reason feeling that takes over me and destroys all rationality. I get smaller episodes too that aren't that big a deal but make me ashamed. Like I left LA previously on a visit to my friend because I had this feeling. And now I get it when I'm away from home, like spending the night somewhere. I make excuses, valid ones actually, and try to get myself out of the situation and then I feel horrible because I'm usually changing plans with somebody to do it. I feel so guilty and then try to convince myself it's ok and I'll make it up and it's just lousy but then I'm home and my stomach calms down. I know my cousins reads this and I was supposed to spend the night at her house which I'm totally fine with, I love hanging out with her. But I was worrying about a book I have to cover for my internship (by tomorrow. And they still haven't sent the book), and this meeting I have tomorrow and I thought it might make me bad company for the night. But what I don't understand is, they are all easy fixes. The internship said if I couldn't do it by tomorrow it would be fine but I want them to think I'm Superwoman and then be open for future job possibiliies but I know I'm not Superwoman so why force it? And the meeting? It's closer to my cousin's house than my own and I could just go from there in the morning but I just get this need to be home and handle it from there and nothing can quiet my insides until I'm "safe."
This is why I have unhealthy relationships with my phone and computer when I'm not home, they are the lifelines connecting me to where I feel safe. But safe? I'm safe where I am that's not home too. I need to get rid of this second-guessing and self-sabotage because it's slowly eating at me. My calm-down music is now the live versions of Madonna's, "Like a Prayer," followed by, "Jump," followed by the album version of, "Ray of Light." They helped during the ride home but I don't know if that was because I knew was going home or because they are good soothing songs. So I hope people, especially my dear cousin who I love with all my heart, understand when I do these spastic things that make sense in my brain and that I force to make sense in real life. Then punish myself for wanting it that way.
I don't quite know how to explain how change, depression, weird panic get-me-out-of-here moments, are all related but to me they are. I want them to go away. I want the Like A Muse project to help me get going with my life both in the physical sense (getting in shape, writing) and the emotional/metaphysicial (my mind-set and my habits that I don't like). But if they are a part of me, a permanent part that contributes to making me who I am, I want to be okay with them because I feel guilty and I hate that feeling. I spend way too much time feeling guilty and trying to rationalize it and it's really tiring. It hurts my brain. So I'm going to stop. And go work out and read the stupid book if my internship boss lady ever sends it.
Oh, on the way home the dolmus (mini-bus) driver got in a fight with one of the passengers We were all on his side though and finally had to yell at the idiot man to get out of the car. Ah Istanbul.
Friday, January 15, 2010
Like A Dream...
"Why was I your last choice?"
Stupid question. Yes I knew it was a stupid question but I asked it anyway. Why was I the last person my boyfriend landed on, on his quest to find a girlfriend? I liked him from the start why didn't he return the favor? You'd think I was past all this bullshit. Four years and some change into a relationship should mean I am happy, self-satisfied, and even a little smug, deservedly so, as what other 24-year-old girl has the boyfriend I have? And truly, he's wonderful. He was my best friend before my boyfriend and that's the dream right? Well I got it. And still these idiotic niggling thoughts pop into my head and show me once again what a pathetic excuse I am for a human being.
Why is always at night? Why is it when the world is sleeping that us seemingly content and happy girls toss and turn and analyze and come to the conclusion that we're crazy and stupid and hate our lives when in fact, we should be thanking God or whatever higher being we believe in that we have it so lucky. For the record, I do believe there is a higher being; someone who knows what they're doing. Because if I didn't believe everything happened for a reason, well I'd just have kill myself. Except I wouldn't because I don't believe in suicide. Anyway, I am one of those content, happy, and overall lucky girls that's convinced she's barking mad as she spends night after night, awake and sad. I come from a pretty well-off family that's half Turkish and half Iranian. The bonds that tie us puts the fairy tale that was, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," to shame. We breathe, eat, sleep, and live each other. Which sounds gross but really, we're the most tight-knit, protective, loving group of people that could ever share common blood. On top of this, I'm highly educated, fairly intelligent, have awesome hair when it cooperates, and an excellent taste in music. Yes I am a self-proclaimed heavy metal chick but guess what. I am. So fuck you. Iron Maiden forever. And then there's my boyfriend who any sensible female would take an appreciative glance at and who I find very attractive and who sincerely calls me a hot ass babe. Screw your feminism, in my head where I reign as the smart but weird friend to the hot girl (RIP John Hughes but nothing Molly Ringwald as ever been in compares to my life), I crave to be judged by my looks sometimes.
And yet here I am, pulling an Elizabeth Gilbert as I sit up in my apartment, my amazing, gorgeous apartment located in the heart of Boston on Newbury Street I might add, lamenting how deeply, deeply unhappy I am. Maybe it's something all of us privileged white girls go through but depression is a bitch. Especially when there is no goddamn reason for it. I had my oh-so-delightful first nervous breakdown (yes first, as in, more to come) a few years ago during the summer between junior and senior year of college. Then again after I graduated and started my MFA. Then again the next summer. And now. What the fuck, man. Why me? I went to art school where I had a blast for four years as well as getting degree in Media Arts, I got a masters in screenwriting, and now I have every opportunity to make something of myself in the creative world. Except this is the very reason why I bawled my eyes out, quit an internship program that may have lead me to what I've wanted in Los Angeles, and came crawling back home.
Why am I the last choice? Why was I never asked out in high school? How come all my friends are hotter than me? How come I'm such a failure in my eyes? Can I write? Why do people tell me I can when I don't even know anymore? Why am I so far away from my cat, the only thing that has brought me joy in the past year?
I need to get the fuck over myself. So here we are. I want to be a writer. I want to be heard. Hell, maybe I even want to be a screenwriter but I sure as hell ain't gonna succeed if I don't write so here we go. Time to analyze and take a few steps forward.
Madonna is amazing. I've loved her since I was a kid. Yes I am pulling a non-sequitur much? but it will make sense. See, the stories that I love to read are the stories about people, people like me, women, who have come to a block in their lives, in their, to all outward appearances, perfect lives. They crave more. Eat, Pray, Love and Julie & Julia were the two books from last year that sucked me in and made me cry out (inwardly of course, as I'm a robot who can't express emotion unless I'm having one of the aforementioned breakdowns and leaking tears from every face hole), "This is ME! This is what I feel." This past week in L.A. it all came to a head. I didn't want to be there even though I had worked so hard to get there. I got my driver's license, I applied to my school's post-grad program that helps place students in internships within the industry, I left my kitty with my parents in Turkey, and hauled my ass to California. But that awful feeling happened. Depression affects everyone differently but the way my dark passenger, to quote Dexter, rears her bitch head is by forming a giant lump in my chest and throat, killing my appetite, and thoroughly convincing me that I'm dying and I'm going crazy and I'm the only freak that feels this and the world is ending all at the same time. After teary phone calls with my parents and long, long, often heart-breaking conversations with my boyfriend that I won't rehash here, I up and left L.A. and came back to Boston. After three days. And it all boils down to being afraid and not knowing how I was going to get by alone in a strange city that required driving. Yeah, I'm that hysterical woman from 1930s mystery novels that needs a proper slap to come to her senses.
Enough is enough. Time to fix me. I wasn't happy in grad school because I thought I was wasting my life and now it's 8 months past graduation and I still haven't done anything and I'm 24 and time is running out and I've gained weight, and I'm ugly, and I'm just a worthless person. Well, no happy person I've ever met thinks so harshly of themselves so here is my first step. Learn to love myself. Oh barf, I can't believe I just wrote that. Before I go hug a tree and make a dress out of hemp let me get to my point. I was lying in bed tonight, not sleeping, and got to thinking about Madonna. I've listened to her my entire life and I spent today walking around playing my favorite song, "Like A Prayer," over and over. There's comfort in familiarity and Madonna is my childhood and the bond that connects me to every important female in my life from my mom to my cousins to my sister to my best friends. Lo and behold, "in the midnight hour, [I felt her] power." There was a book I once read by India Knight called My Life On A Plate. In it is a description of the main character, "playing Madonna." Basically, whenever a situation arose that she couldn't handle, that she balked at, that made her uncertain and fearful, she pretended she was Madonna and rode it out with confidence and style. I get that. You see, to us Madonna is the ultimate queen. She's been around forever, she always looks fantastic, she's her own muse, she's got talent and creativity and she has that attitude that you just can't mess with.
I want to do that too.
I mean, I don't literally wanna become Madonna, I have no patience for children and certainly won't adopt any, neither will I dye my hair blonde because being a brunette is the one thing I know I take a glowing pride in. Though my hair right now is very blonde streaked. I was having a Kat Von D, trashy dark with blonde highlights moment. Hey, I pull it off. But I digress. No, I don't want to be Madonna but I would like to play her. I want to face problems head on instead of cowering and taking the easy way out. I want to be successful. I want to look fabulous and know it. So here is my Julie & Julia-esque journey of self-discovery; I will make a concise list of every momentous look and fad Madonna went through and pay homage to it in my daily life. Maybe looking ridiculous will help me get over my self-esteem issues. Maybe it will make them worse. But it's something. I can tackle things that I normally don't like writing daily or on a semi-regular basis, do stuff I never would do otherwise, say off the top of my head, riding horses with self-assured aplomb. Watch out Lulu (my dad's horse), English-version Madonna Leyla is coming. Of course I will document it all here which is the next step in getting me writing. I want to do 100 days of Madonna. Maybe they won't be back to back, but I will have 100 days where I tackle the day as Madonna would do and never look back. I've always wanted to be a muse to someone but that is just a girlish fantasy that will never come true. So Madonna will be my guide to make me the muse I want to be for myself. Sounds egotistical right? Good, I think I need that now.
I warn you though, I tend to ramble when I get going. So I will write a lot. Hopefully. I hope so. Writers should write. I can't say now if it'll be good but by the end I hope I can sincerely say it and mean it, have faith in myself. Now I go crawl back into bed with my gorgeous, wonderful boyfriend who will read this in the morning and either pat me on the back or agree, finally, that I am crazy.
"Like a dream, no end and no beginning."
Stupid question. Yes I knew it was a stupid question but I asked it anyway. Why was I the last person my boyfriend landed on, on his quest to find a girlfriend? I liked him from the start why didn't he return the favor? You'd think I was past all this bullshit. Four years and some change into a relationship should mean I am happy, self-satisfied, and even a little smug, deservedly so, as what other 24-year-old girl has the boyfriend I have? And truly, he's wonderful. He was my best friend before my boyfriend and that's the dream right? Well I got it. And still these idiotic niggling thoughts pop into my head and show me once again what a pathetic excuse I am for a human being.
Why is always at night? Why is it when the world is sleeping that us seemingly content and happy girls toss and turn and analyze and come to the conclusion that we're crazy and stupid and hate our lives when in fact, we should be thanking God or whatever higher being we believe in that we have it so lucky. For the record, I do believe there is a higher being; someone who knows what they're doing. Because if I didn't believe everything happened for a reason, well I'd just have kill myself. Except I wouldn't because I don't believe in suicide. Anyway, I am one of those content, happy, and overall lucky girls that's convinced she's barking mad as she spends night after night, awake and sad. I come from a pretty well-off family that's half Turkish and half Iranian. The bonds that tie us puts the fairy tale that was, "My Big Fat Greek Wedding," to shame. We breathe, eat, sleep, and live each other. Which sounds gross but really, we're the most tight-knit, protective, loving group of people that could ever share common blood. On top of this, I'm highly educated, fairly intelligent, have awesome hair when it cooperates, and an excellent taste in music. Yes I am a self-proclaimed heavy metal chick but guess what. I am. So fuck you. Iron Maiden forever. And then there's my boyfriend who any sensible female would take an appreciative glance at and who I find very attractive and who sincerely calls me a hot ass babe. Screw your feminism, in my head where I reign as the smart but weird friend to the hot girl (RIP John Hughes but nothing Molly Ringwald as ever been in compares to my life), I crave to be judged by my looks sometimes.
And yet here I am, pulling an Elizabeth Gilbert as I sit up in my apartment, my amazing, gorgeous apartment located in the heart of Boston on Newbury Street I might add, lamenting how deeply, deeply unhappy I am. Maybe it's something all of us privileged white girls go through but depression is a bitch. Especially when there is no goddamn reason for it. I had my oh-so-delightful first nervous breakdown (yes first, as in, more to come) a few years ago during the summer between junior and senior year of college. Then again after I graduated and started my MFA. Then again the next summer. And now. What the fuck, man. Why me? I went to art school where I had a blast for four years as well as getting degree in Media Arts, I got a masters in screenwriting, and now I have every opportunity to make something of myself in the creative world. Except this is the very reason why I bawled my eyes out, quit an internship program that may have lead me to what I've wanted in Los Angeles, and came crawling back home.
Why am I the last choice? Why was I never asked out in high school? How come all my friends are hotter than me? How come I'm such a failure in my eyes? Can I write? Why do people tell me I can when I don't even know anymore? Why am I so far away from my cat, the only thing that has brought me joy in the past year?
I need to get the fuck over myself. So here we are. I want to be a writer. I want to be heard. Hell, maybe I even want to be a screenwriter but I sure as hell ain't gonna succeed if I don't write so here we go. Time to analyze and take a few steps forward.
Madonna is amazing. I've loved her since I was a kid. Yes I am pulling a non-sequitur much? but it will make sense. See, the stories that I love to read are the stories about people, people like me, women, who have come to a block in their lives, in their, to all outward appearances, perfect lives. They crave more. Eat, Pray, Love and Julie & Julia were the two books from last year that sucked me in and made me cry out (inwardly of course, as I'm a robot who can't express emotion unless I'm having one of the aforementioned breakdowns and leaking tears from every face hole), "This is ME! This is what I feel." This past week in L.A. it all came to a head. I didn't want to be there even though I had worked so hard to get there. I got my driver's license, I applied to my school's post-grad program that helps place students in internships within the industry, I left my kitty with my parents in Turkey, and hauled my ass to California. But that awful feeling happened. Depression affects everyone differently but the way my dark passenger, to quote Dexter, rears her bitch head is by forming a giant lump in my chest and throat, killing my appetite, and thoroughly convincing me that I'm dying and I'm going crazy and I'm the only freak that feels this and the world is ending all at the same time. After teary phone calls with my parents and long, long, often heart-breaking conversations with my boyfriend that I won't rehash here, I up and left L.A. and came back to Boston. After three days. And it all boils down to being afraid and not knowing how I was going to get by alone in a strange city that required driving. Yeah, I'm that hysterical woman from 1930s mystery novels that needs a proper slap to come to her senses.
Enough is enough. Time to fix me. I wasn't happy in grad school because I thought I was wasting my life and now it's 8 months past graduation and I still haven't done anything and I'm 24 and time is running out and I've gained weight, and I'm ugly, and I'm just a worthless person. Well, no happy person I've ever met thinks so harshly of themselves so here is my first step. Learn to love myself. Oh barf, I can't believe I just wrote that. Before I go hug a tree and make a dress out of hemp let me get to my point. I was lying in bed tonight, not sleeping, and got to thinking about Madonna. I've listened to her my entire life and I spent today walking around playing my favorite song, "Like A Prayer," over and over. There's comfort in familiarity and Madonna is my childhood and the bond that connects me to every important female in my life from my mom to my cousins to my sister to my best friends. Lo and behold, "in the midnight hour, [I felt her] power." There was a book I once read by India Knight called My Life On A Plate. In it is a description of the main character, "playing Madonna." Basically, whenever a situation arose that she couldn't handle, that she balked at, that made her uncertain and fearful, she pretended she was Madonna and rode it out with confidence and style. I get that. You see, to us Madonna is the ultimate queen. She's been around forever, she always looks fantastic, she's her own muse, she's got talent and creativity and she has that attitude that you just can't mess with.
I want to do that too.
I mean, I don't literally wanna become Madonna, I have no patience for children and certainly won't adopt any, neither will I dye my hair blonde because being a brunette is the one thing I know I take a glowing pride in. Though my hair right now is very blonde streaked. I was having a Kat Von D, trashy dark with blonde highlights moment. Hey, I pull it off. But I digress. No, I don't want to be Madonna but I would like to play her. I want to face problems head on instead of cowering and taking the easy way out. I want to be successful. I want to look fabulous and know it. So here is my Julie & Julia-esque journey of self-discovery; I will make a concise list of every momentous look and fad Madonna went through and pay homage to it in my daily life. Maybe looking ridiculous will help me get over my self-esteem issues. Maybe it will make them worse. But it's something. I can tackle things that I normally don't like writing daily or on a semi-regular basis, do stuff I never would do otherwise, say off the top of my head, riding horses with self-assured aplomb. Watch out Lulu (my dad's horse), English-version Madonna Leyla is coming. Of course I will document it all here which is the next step in getting me writing. I want to do 100 days of Madonna. Maybe they won't be back to back, but I will have 100 days where I tackle the day as Madonna would do and never look back. I've always wanted to be a muse to someone but that is just a girlish fantasy that will never come true. So Madonna will be my guide to make me the muse I want to be for myself. Sounds egotistical right? Good, I think I need that now.
I warn you though, I tend to ramble when I get going. So I will write a lot. Hopefully. I hope so. Writers should write. I can't say now if it'll be good but by the end I hope I can sincerely say it and mean it, have faith in myself. Now I go crawl back into bed with my gorgeous, wonderful boyfriend who will read this in the morning and either pat me on the back or agree, finally, that I am crazy.
"Like a dream, no end and no beginning."
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