What Happens When Your Mantra of "No Regrets" Collides with All of Your Regrets?

I live with a heavy load of paranoia as part of my daily existence.  I take, and have been taking, medication for paranoid schizophrenia/bipolar disorder for many months, and it works.  Some.  Which equates to the following: the nagging sensation that everyone hates me has diminished.  It doesn't mean it's *poof* disappeared.  And even while it's true that paranoia plays a far smaller role in my current mindset, I'm still constantly encountering places from where my past bumps into my present and the paranoia that imbued itself in those places somehow evinces itself and frightens me once again with its strength and its cruelty.

(Does this make it sound as though I'm not taking responsibility for myself - for where I am, for how I've behaved, because of being routinely terrifically paranoid?  I hope not - I'm trying so hard to own my behavior, past-present-future.  But it worries me.  What if I'm handing off the blame?  And on and on.)

One of the recurring elements of my particular brand of paranoia is preventing people from having the opportunity to turn on me, or that is, preventing what is my perception of people turning on me, by disengaging from them before the opportunity arises for them to do so.  Let's say you're one of my sane friends: that must seem odd, that moment where I suddenly disappear and refuse all contact for a nonspecific length of time, only to once again reappear.  This is, of course, when the paranoia dies down and all I see is that I miss you. 

I'm ashamed of it, but what's worse?  I suppose it's being ignorant still of the behavior itself, of simply going through the routine of shunning people once I've worked out in my paranoia that they have taken a dislike to me, find me unworthy for all the reasons, grand and stupid, that I've determined throughout the years would make me loathsome and unlovable. 

So does that make me crazy?  I guess so.  I suppose?

What am I to do?

And the medication helps.  I've been able to be undeterred by paranoia to the point that I have gone back to college and am finishing my degree.  I'll be done by December of 2011.  I was thinking I might try for finishing at the end of summer, but it's too much, I would have to take five classes per term for the next three terms, and it would be harmful to the homeostasis of the family environment, such as it is.  (It's not perfect, that's for sure.)  I keep trying to predict my future, post-graduation, but I think it's best to simply keep my sights on finishing school.  At least I know I can do that.  Itself a huge marker of success.

I'm taking a creative writing class this term.  Our first session was today.  I locked up when it was time to produce something based on a short piece of writing the instructor had passed around, something she concluded was themed on the lines of regret.  I ran with it, and wrote a thing I was entirely dissatisfied with afterward.  Of course.  How could I be otherwise?  I can't get outside of anything I've written for at least a few weeks.  I can't hear it as anything other than a bunch of rattly-beans-in-a-shaker set of sounds until after a set amount of time has passed.  But I volunteered to read it aloud anyway.  Just to dare myself.  Just to see if I could.  My voice shook and I nearly choked, but I did it.

It was really scary.

When I got home I wanted to write something more, but something concrete, something uncreative.  Blogging isn't supposed to be that, at least not these days, these days of flash and shine and ads and humor and entertainment.  I'm daring myself to write in incredibly monotous tones in a public forum, unedited to reflect how dull I can truly be.  So that I can prove to myself that it's okay.

It's really okay.

And writing with a pen is hard.  Much harder than with a keyboard.  Ow.

Comments

[sam {temptingmama}]

I've been a long time fan, and will continue to be. I think you're amazing, brilliant and vibrant. You will always continue to inspire me.

Thank you for writing this. Truly.

[Deb]

Thank you so much for what you said, Sam. Just for being supportive. You're a really kind person. Thank you.

Deb

[slouchy]

i love you too. and it will ever be thus.

(ps bet the people in your class were bowled over by your writing -- as we all are)

[Nancy]

What they said. Hugs and love to you.

[roo]

Deb, the last thing you could ever be is dull-- and if this post is an example of your trying to be, it only proves my point.

The medication does help, some. When are they going to make that magic pill that will let us be our best selves all the time, eh?

And it sounds to me that you do everything in your power to take responsibility for your life and decisions-- maybe to the point of excess, even.

I'm glad you chose to write this.

[Mary]

I have missed you so much!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Debbie]

Sarah, would that it were true.  I worry far less about bowling people over than I do about keeping them from throwing their squashed school-bag bananas at my big blockhead.  And thanks for loving me.  I don't know that I deserve it, but I'll take it anyway.

[Debbie]

Nancy, my dove, right back where you lobbed it from.  Big loves.

[Debbie]

 I do try, Roo.  Honest.  It just seems like sometimes my urge to communicate the routine attempts I make to do right by my world are drowned by my stupid behaviors.  And I can't tell whether that's true or whether it's the paranoia talking.  At least, not most of the time.

But just knowing you're along with me on this ride makes it slightly less horrifying and a lot mo betta.

Love love love.

[Debbie]

What means the most here, Mary, isn't the words (though that isn't to suggest I'm not adoring them -- for I am); it's ALL THOSE EXCLAMATION POINTS.  Nothing says love like an abundance of exclamation points.  :) :) :)

[magpie]

((!!!!!)) = is that good loving?

i love seeing posts of yours pop up. more, please.

be well, dear.

[nonlineargirl]

Doll, one of the things I have learned from our friendship is that normal is that people are so often their own worst critics. (I think this is true whether or not one is in need of pharmaceutical or other outside assistance.

Know that from my perspective, I am always happy to see you, yet more important is knowing you are well. I hope your meds can help you focus on your many strengths.

[Kyla]

Damn the "new" blogosphere. The old one was better. YOU being here make this current incarnation of the blogosphere better.

I'm taking Storytelling this semester for my speech credit. Wonder how it will affect my writing.

[Neil]

Hi, Debbie. Haven't turned on you. Yet.

[Major Bedhead]

I haven't turned on you, either. I get the paranoia, to a certain extent. I think almost everyone gets a bit paranoid at some point (at least, everyone I know) and while it may not be as severe as what you experience, I can at least understand it.

Don't beat yourself up. I love you in spite of, or maybe because of, your little mental quirks and oddities. You're all good in my book. (It's an odd book.)

[Deb Rox]

Finishing by 12/11/11 sounds lovely, super wonderful, lovely.