Drowning Iris

Drowning Iris

Thursday - April 20th 2001

The face warns of a morning and grief, the knife sharp the tears
sweet.

Where came the rooster call that stopped the cogs of life dead.

And he cried but I smiled as all turned ebony black.

Velvet silence soothed the joy of pain, and I at last found peace
again.

Monday - April 23rd 2001

I did something I've not done in a long time today. I went out, and in
to the centre of Cardiff. There I sat on a bench and just let people
pass me by. The town centre was full of all sorts of people: business
men and women, children still on school holidays, teenagers who
couldn't bare to be in college on such a warm day, students who had
just realised they had money in their pockets because their termly loan
cheques had just gone in.

I love watching people; I wish I could step in to their worlds for a
minute and experience their inner thoughts and feelings. I find it so
difficult to handle being me 24 hours a day, 7 days a week for the
whole of my life. It seems so wasteful that there is so much we miss
out on being restricted to one life. I wanted to be half of the loving
couple idly wandering around in the sunshine holding hands and thinking
the same happy thoughts. I wanted to be the successful woman rushing
back to work with a head full of new innovations. I also envied the Big
Issue sellers, they get to watch people all the time... The thought
that brought me back to the centre of myself was that these people
mightn't be the people I wanted them to be they might be just like me,
trapped and ever looking for something else out of life. A way to
escape from the reality of their lives.

Then the moment was past...dead. I picked up my bags and melted in to
the crowd and in to anonymity, I realised the possibility that people
may be looking at me and wondering what I did and where I was heading
in life. I didn't want to disappoint them so I decided to smile and
think about how nice it was to see the sun for a change... when I left
the high street I chose the route round the back of the union where
there were less people and where it was shady. I was cheating myself by
smiling, but I didn't feel depressed just calm.

Well back to the Uni. Work I have to do... I have to go to the doctors
tomorrow as I'm out of effexor, I don't think we calculated correctly
the amount of weeks between my sessions at the link centre so I'm a
week short. I can't even do simple arithmetic at the moment but whets
new hehehe.
Wednesday - April 25th 2001

16.00pm - I am the girl whose smile casts shadows. I am the girl who's
not got a clue how she got to be where she is. Where is she? Can you
see her?

Last night was good, last night I danced and screamed and loved and
hated and hurt and soothed and planned and ignored the future for then
it was now and now it was then. I felt alive and that worried me for I
am a stone, a pebble weathered by my surroundings but nothing can get
through to me and nothing can get out. The world must have been turning
fast last night for I felt like I was moving. As I walked towards home
satisfied and yet empty. I wanted to take some pills, I wanted to take
50 and I wanted to throw up and pass out in the thrill of nausea. I
searched the house, I turned out boxes and draws for a hidden stash
that I didn't have...it was a calm frenzy fuelled by a desire that
seemed to surface from nowhere. My head was as clear as its been in a
long time like a bracing wind had swept through and cleaned it of the
tangled cobwebs spun from the threads of my consciousness by the
malignant and stagnating depression which has taken up permanent
residence there in. Another gin and tonic put pay to my useless search.
There are no needles in my haystack, nothing sharp, and nothing
poisonous, nothing that could cause me pain... that is created
internally, and my brand of pain is worse than any pill or knife could
cause. I slept... I dreamed... I woke again. Damn the concentric
circles.

20.10pm - She blinks and they notice. Her eyes affect their soul but
not mine. Her voice small, like her frame, says love me, love me, love
me, and they do. Her appearance of vulnerability a sham, behind her
eyes a cold stare. I see it; I've known it. Her face in my eyes
distorted, yet her spell holds many captives... Violence in disguise. I
hate the deceit and pray they will open their eyes.

Thursday - April 26th 2001

Watching watching watching am I crazy or am I a lazy insolent little
girl who's lost. Lost you, lost herself in herself somewhere did I make
a decision to kill her, kill my chances. At school I thought I thought
about a lot and I think I knew it would happen one day. I've known it
since birth, I had potential to go on and on and move on but instead
i'm stood still, left standing. I had more than most people but I'm
going to leave Uni. With very little, maybe a scrapped pass at this
rate I'm not moving only my hand and my mind move and only then to say
the things my "demons" dictate. Better watch they don't send me away
for saying things like that but I think they do exist because I don't
think any one in control of their own mind would want to be like this.
I just want to be me, a child forever, inperfect but loved and living.
I can't work when I leave here, I can't do anything. I hate money, I
hate the idea of people listening to me as I lie, lie to everyone I
don't think I know what the truth is. What is it about and why does it
hurt so badly. I don't know, why don't I have a way with words. Why did
me and her fall out of love, of the love of friendship. Was I too much
of a burden, did she go crazy?? I bet she is still loved though,
everyone always did, she could write and sing and play and draw and
speak and create, I thought I could till I met her, and I loved her for
it, I wasn't jealous and I'm not now believe it or not I just feel bad
now because I cant see her thriving and I'm just dying. I was the
sensible one, the stable one the one who wanted to make all the pain go
away but now I'm the crazy one with the forks, the cutting and the
wrist banging. I'm bruised andsoreWhat would the world say if I gave up
and admitted that I couldn't cope anymore, but I cant lose my freedom
as I wouldn't have friends anymore I wouldn't be able to feed off them
anymore and I would never find love, the love I have been denied. I
want love but I destroy it why can't someone love this crazy girl. Guys
always loved her. I can't keep up with all that is moving anymore. I
have to see my tutor on Tuesday to tell him I'm dead inside and that
university is the last thing on my diseased mind. Kill me or wrap me up
and put me in a draw and take me out once in a while to tell stories of
how I could have been a famous singer or musician but that at the cross
road I chose to be put on a shelf, put my life on hold through
weakness.

Saturday - April 28th 2001

Everything has been reversed today, I slept all day after a good night
outs at metros the night before and now it's midnight and I'm wide
awake... I've got sleeping pills in my draw and I can see them as I'm
typing this, I've got an urge to just get rid of them by taking them
all and then I cant take them again, they are taking up too much of my
time thinking about them. Such a little thing I know but it's annoying
me.

I live in a padded world that I have created for myself. I don't like
the real world and all the sharp corners and hard floors for I am
constantly tripping over or collapsing in a heap, not literally of
course I'm actually not too bad at the walking and balancing thing
honestly hehehe. But hypothetically. My madness is the volume turned
up, it's me turned up amplified and broadcast back to myself. Does that
make sense? People tell me that I'm not crazy and that I just have
major depressive disorder or that I'm bipolar or whatever but to me
that is crazy and I've lived like this for so long that it is me now.
They are giving me pills for being me. Don't get me wrong I dot mind
taking the pills but nor do I mind being the way I am, in fact if they
stopped me feeling like this then what would be left? A shell, a child
looking to find herself all over again, the girl with no opinions and
no scars. If limbo it has to be then limbo it is and I'll just have to
take the highs and the lows as they come, and I will but please don't
turn me in to someone else.

I feel insomnia in my veins... everything is starting to look like I'm
dreaming it, my whole life seems to look like that at the moment, and I
feel uncomfortable when things are clear my dreams are my reality and
in fact I often mix the two. I'll have an argument with a friend in a
dream and then avoid them for days after because of the thinks I know I
said but could remember if it really happened... hehehe I sometimes
never work out which was which. Anyway I'm going to read a novel and
then take some of those damn sleeping pills.

Monday - April 30th 2001

5am - i've just got back from A &; E I woke up today with no bones
in my right arm...as weird as it seems I just couldn't find them. and
this bothered me so much, I was tired, deliriously tired all day and in
the evening a found the remaining packet of zopiclone, and took them
all, and then I cut in to my arms to try and find my bones but they
weren't there...or I wasn't digging deep enough. I sat and cried in the
hospital, everyone saw someone to be pitied. I NEED A GOD DAMN REST
CAN'T YOU ALL SEE I'M DRIVING MYSELF CRAZY!!!!

- Was this a suicide attempt? Said the doctor

ER.... probably I said...

- Right then...hmmm are you on any other medications....for you
depression

er yeah effexor!

- And do you see anyone about it?

A shrink yeah and a therapist but does it look like I'm happy! Does it.
Cant you see that i'm a desperate girl crying in front of you because
she hasn't had a decent nights sleep in over 3 weeks and that even
slight overdoses and self mutilation won't get you to help me I'll have
to do something that will!!!!!

I'm going to demand I get a rest when I see Dr Tye. Until then I'll
have to try sleep with these huge bandaged arms although all I want to
do is cut some more and see them go red! I don't want people who sit
and cry with me I've never expected that, that is what my mum liked to
happen when she felt depressed but me, I want to cry on my own I want
to be locked in a room and left to cry... I cried last night but I
can't do it now though I really need to. I can feel the water flowing
around inside me and yet it wont come out that's where the pain of
cutting helps it brings water to my eyes and then the tears can start
... oh for a ceaseless flood of tears. I want to cry till I choke and
can cry no more. Help me, although I smile and joke about things I'm
really tearing at myself from the inside as well as from the outside,
and there's nothing I can do anymore to stop it, a gate has been opened
and its too much for me to do to close it.

Sunday - 6th May 2001

So many people hiding behind masks, today and I don't think I'm one of
them. I'm an open person, maybe it's a fault. I tell people how I feel.
I don't know how helpful that is to them but it thinking it must help
me at times. Fish hook and knitting needles stick in to us all and just
lately I've been more aware of the feelings of those around me,
physically or mentally. Probably because I've been more of a conscious
human being instead of my usual self buried so deep in my own head.
I've found myself being the person I always knew myself to be. A caring
person who really want s to make a difference to peoples lives. I want
to make sure everyone is fulfilling their potential and that they don't
sell themselves short.

There is so much insecurity in today's society it has taken on a life
of its own. Who is without some personal demon to battle with? Some
times of course you can't help and just have to be there, on the other
end of the phone line. It's the loneliness and isolation that I
experience that makes me realise that although it's almost what I have
chosen in life but it is that very feeling that drives so many people
insane. We are social animals but today's people are moving away from
pack mentality towards self-sufficiency, this can be good in moderation
but ultimately we aren't meant to be alone. Knowing this I still seem
to choose the route of least resistance, which for me is to be in my
own space, where there are no people to hurt me, to contradict me, and
yet nobody to fill the void that is solitary living.

I starve myself of the things I need, not food as such anymore. When
the blades have long been put away and the blood has been shed and the
scars have faded and made their homes on my frail white skin I look to
my failings for comfort and shut out the light.

I don't feel depressed today, I feel like IM watching myself from a
distance. I'm watching another movie about a silly little girl who
flirts with life but doesn't want life to expect anything of her and so
she turns away, leaves the phone ringing and puts a pillow over her
head. Tomorrow things will be the same and that brings comfort and
despair.

Saturday - 12th May 2001

1.24pm - Why? Why do I wake up feeling paranoid feeling the world is
against me? The dreams I have distort reality and I wake up not knowing
what to believe. It then takes me an hour or two to distinguish what is
and what isn't real. I can't answer the phone; I can't talk to anyone.
Am I really the person I think I am? If I am I don't like her...

Have you ever though about putting you head in an oven? You know with
the gas on... would it be easy... I'm not going to do it but I like to
know my options for future reference. Sorry but I have a suicidal
brain; I'm actually fairly stable at the moment... though you might not
believe me. I am the best authority on me though as my therapist said!
I've been too immersed in Plath, but she was such a strong person I
think, I know people saw her as weak for killing herself but I don't
regard depressives as weak. It takes more energy and strength and pain
resistance than you could ever imagine. It would be easy for me to kill
myself but I'm fighting but for how long I can fight is debatable. I
can't see myself lasting to old age... maybe it is better to die young
and leave an impression on the world... in what way I'm not sure yet
but I will.

Tuesday - 22nd May 2001

Velvet darkness wash my skin
That light has stained,
Bleached and sore.
Persephony bought my soul.

The allure of introversion.
Drinks me whole,
Elixir suffocates
That which stops the tears flow.

Hades warm and safe,
Strip me of this flesh that climbs the walls
And swamps me.
Till then I'll clothe myself in black
And turn my face inwards.