no relationships for me, thanks.

 

one of my recent relationships gone down under the weight of my OCD (page 37). i have severe trust issues, but still jump in when i find someone interesting. a new friendship is always refreshing: sharing and disclosing...then it hits. my overwhelming need to know it's permanent and that i can keep trusting. the need to know i'm really wanted. vulnerability pulls me into obsessive cycles of dependence and frustration, and the poor person runs. it's completely my fault, as i see it happening and despite attempts to control it and even stop it, it takes over my brain and ruins everything good in my life. i fucking hate it.

pages 38 and 39

page 40

challenge to stay open-ended. LOL.

how my journaling started

i used to write endlessly in my personal journals. i was born with a LOVE for the physical act of writing, and kept many diaries and keepsake journals. but the matters i wrote about in my young adult years were things that bothered me, so i was actually giving permission to my brain to continue obssessing. yes, i unwaveringly believe that this process is cathartic and useful, and that writing out thoughts can dismiss them from your mind, but i also found that i kept returning to my journals for affirmation that i had reasons to be crazy. by rereading entries, i opened old crap for re-examination, which eventually made the thought processes spin further out of control.

i continued writing for years, sometimes pages filled with small longhand, other times a few disjointed words scrawled, painted or carved into the paper, but really very few drawings of any kind. the written word was seemingly more understandable to my imaginary readers? my only "art" was done separately from my journals, for classes mostly...

at the time i was most prolific with written journals, i was the most ill. i didn't care that my rantings were very unpleasant and disturbing to others. i was still new to my braincrap (as it presented during these years), and i was unsure of what to make of it.  i was scared, suicidal and in moments of lucidity, embarassed. this dark period (that sounds so artistic) overlapped with my bachelor's studies in art therapy and psychology. at one point my art therapy professor (thank you, M) expressed concern over my art therapy class journal and projects. he insisted i find a therapist, and i did.

and the excrutiatingly slow process of mental rehab (through self-imposed art therapy) begins...