i have been inpatient for six months at new york state psychiatric institute and i have attempted suicide here twice and have been placed on c.o. (constant observation) for the last four months because of this. here are some highlights from my treatment:

 week, or something like that. what has happened? what hasn’t.

last weekend (the first weekend in february) i decided to stop eating. i refused iv’s and got deemed incompetent to make that decision and got one stuck in me anyway. because of this, i had all my priviledges taken away – including the computer.

i just got it back yesterday but not without a fight. there is a girl here that has totally made me feel like shit. she says that i need to improve my personal hygiene and that i hog the remote control. talk about a way to depress me further. she even brought it up at community meeting where the entire patient and staff community attends. god. i swear i am not that bad, either that or i can’t smell worth shit.

because of this i have decided to just hide in my corner and not say a word. i have completed two books and now i am on the unquiet mind, which so far, is excellent.

my mother is coming out to visit the first weekend in march and i am very eager and scared to see her. she judges me a lot on my weight and i am not exactly ready for that because i am not underweight anymore. far from it. (hangs head in dissapointment).

all i want is to get off c.o., and i don’t know how to go about it.

the past few days have been complete insanity. i decided to go on another ‘hunger strike’ as the people here like to call it and not eat or drink. that landed me decleared incompetent and they stuck an iv in me anyway to prevent dehydration. i also landed on bedrest and confined to the lovely walls of the quiet room. they did a 24 hour iv and then it got infiltrated and removed.

i almost got tubed but they said they’d have to take me to court for that and i won’t go there. even though it would be nice to go outside for the first time since october. *sigh* so that was my weekend, sleeping and bedrest and the damn iv. my doctor is on vacation and the rest of the team is saying that my behavior is linked to that. bullshit. i am half ass glad he’s gone for a week.

on monday i got into trouble for returning a pair of scissors and it was deeemed “provocative” by staff. i could fucking erase that word from the dictionary and not miss it. i got into trouble but that isn’t much of a suprise. i’m still in trouble. they’re also checking my blood sugar now. i wish life were more simple.

even the most simple of things drives me need to die now more than ever before.

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if i cannot drink my ensure for me, i will do it for all of you, for joy, for my mother, for everyone. because right now, i have no motivation to do it for myself. and if that seems off, i am sorry. but it is what it is.if i cannot drink my ensure for me, i will do it for all of you, for joy, for my mother, for everyone. because right now, i have no motivation to do it for myself. and if that seems off, i am sorry. but it is what it is.

gossip. gossip. gossip.

there are two patients here. sharyn, who is in the depression protocal; and michelle who is in the drug protocal. they were roomies and shit went down apparently in their room. i got to hear all about it when i was attempting to talk on the phone with will. it helped me realize that gossip is shit and gets us no where and makes US look like asses, rather than vice versa.

i had a session with dr. roman today. he’s going on a week long vacation effective today. he keeps asking if i am angry at him for leaving and i say ‘no’ because i am not. i am not because what can i do about it? he asks for more clarification about my frustrations with him in our last session and why i didn’t just approach him about it. well, i can’t – i am a weak shit – okay? i wrote it out and my social worker and i talked about it. i couldn’t get myself to bring it up. i suck and it’s hard for me to verbalize some things as they are happening. i told him how my rapist would kill me if i got fat and how i believe it because he had the gun.

i have decided to not eat/drink again. be mad at me all you want, this is my decision. i’ll probably kick myself in the ass and type journal entries that bitch and whine and moane but fuck, it’s what i feel i have to do right now for me.

things aren’t well – at all. i got “in to trouble” for swearing at another patient today but it isn’t like that. he called ME a bitch because i changed “his” newstation to another news station (who likes fox news?!?) and i changed it back and told him to “calm the fuck down” and I GET INTO TROUBLE figures. i was told to sign another behaviorial contract and i refused. he (my doctor) said i swore at the patient like i directed it at him, which while i did – it wasn’t like i was calling him a bitch or anything of that nature. grrrr. i have a wild mouth and i am not afraid to use it.

and i told my doctor what upset me about yesterday and he seemed totally clueless. another invalidation. sometimes i just can’t wait to get transferred. i am ready to break my ensure contract as well. the stuff makes me absolutely sick to my stomach and i am repulsed by it.
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the only highlight of my day was getting a present from my friend joy. it had an oscar the grouch visor, cookie monster t-shirt and strawberry shortcake watch. all of which i adored. i wore the visor around all day making people look at me funny and i could care less.

i talked to will today. he always makes me smile so much. i wish i never moved away making us break up. it was a stupid, but neccessary decision at the time.

i’m reading me talk pretty one day by david sedaris and i just can’t quite get into it. or maybe i don’t get the plot, or maybe i need to read his first book naked before i read this one. maybe.

i am not sure if deciding to not care what people think about me is a good or bad thing.

i swear some people are going to end up dead around here shortly because of my short temper. don’t kill me, let me kill them first.

it’s been awhile since i have written in here. a long while. but i am going to start from today, not all the previous days.

i have a behavioral contract but i have decided to not comply with it because i just can’t. ensure and water and my stomach feels like it is going to explode. sure, stupid reasons i am sure but the only thing i don’t get from not complying is bedrest and with bedrest comes no groups and no sessions with my doctor. big deal. not like he understood me in todays session. he made me feel like the biggest idiot on the planet and that is not while i am in inpatient treatment. i need some validation as stupid as my thoughts are sometimes.

fuck the ensure. i say that loudly and proud. fuck it. i can go without water for a damn long time and if i have no support with this, oh well. i can do this alone – even though i don’t want to. i know what everyone is going to say and i expect it so try a response outside of the box.

i wish i had the words to express how i am feeling but the best i can come up with is “fuck the world” that is how angry i am.

i am not going to be writing here anymore. someone phoned in an “anonymous tip” to my treatment team here at PI and needless to say, shit went down. those close to me knows what happened, those don’t close to me can wait till i am ready to talk.

it’s been real all.

Things hurt so badly today. So, so badly and I don’t know why. I wish that there were concrete solutions to the pain that echoes throughout my soul like a fire that burns with desire.

People often comment that I can easily control how I react and what I say and do to situations. That it is my fault that certain things happen, my fault that I am suicidal and my fault that I get put into the quiet room – basically that it is my fault. I have heard this from more than one person. When I hear this, I am inclined to say that such a sentiment is like saying that an alcoholic has control, that a smoker has control, that an anorexic or bulimic has that control. The control only goes as far as one is able to throw the coin.

There are certain learned behaviors that are easier to quit when the responsibility doesn’t fall onto deaf ears. That perhaps instead of saying how much I have failed, that I need to hear how far I have come. Sure, such statements are loaded and may set me up for failure – but I already feel like I have failed in so many ways on a daily and constant basis.

Perhaps there is a balance between honesty and truth that exists like a buttery with it’s cacoon. Embracing yet nurturing. Because I don’t want to be given up on and I surely don’t feel like I am worth anything at all.

The day that came and went had its highs and its lows. The staff wouldn’t give me my cd’s because they think I am going to break them and cut with them. This sent me into an emotional roller coaster. The day was massively boring and all I could do was sit idly in my depression which is perhaps one of the most dangerous things I could ever do.

I cut pretty badly. I am much more scared and damaged than when my doctor left me on Friday. I am crying tears for things that I can’t verbalize. I am angry at a world that I didn’t even know existed two days ago. Just be consistent with me I beg.

What a miserable fucking day. I know I say this a lot but it is so fucking true today that it hurts.

The morning went well. We got strong ass coffee early and I was coloring despite how much I was fucking up what I was coloring – so much in fact that I had to throw it away. And we were all just chilling in the art room making the best of a day that is miserable. And since I am ‘restricted to unit’ I couldn’t even go off the unit for a dance party that was on the first floor.

But around change of shift, Lydia – who has been here all day and had seen me working on the collage I was attempting to work on. Something that required scissors and tape (gasp – a cutter safely using scissors, imagine that). Micheal had originally given me the scissors and I was in plain view of the nurses station as the art room is surrounded by windows. But no – Lydia wouldn’t let that be. She made me turn in the scissors and stop my project… well I slid the scissors across the table and she interpreted that as throwing them to her! I was ordered into the quiet room until the ‘doctor on call’ came to the unit to access the situation. Well the doctor was one that was here at the last rotation – Dr Ghalib (who is also pretty damn hot) and he told me that I had to stay in the quiet room for another hour until dinner. I was screaming in that room, I was bloody pissed. I was snapping a rubber band against my wrist creating welts and scratching myself in front of my “staff guard” and pulling my hair out in massive clumps as well as banging my head against the window and wall. He didn’t do a thing – nor did I expect him to.

When dinner arrived I went into the dining hall and didn’t feel like eating what was given to us, so I gave it away. I was off ‘constant observation’ at that point and had my vitals taken – my heart rate was 149 and I was asked to take in liquids but I don’t think I can because I feel like I would just throw them up because I am not too well off emotionally. When I am an emotional wreck my purging just gets worse. I have been known to throw up water at times.

So no collage. No talking. A lot of steps back in my treatment as I learned only to internalize things instead of talking them out. I learned to take it out on myself. I learned to not express what I am feeling. So now I am left with a whole lot more scars and a whole lot more pain. At least I gave the staff something to do here and another reason for them to hate me.

I can’t wait till Monday when my doctor gets here and hears of this. I swear I don’t want to talk to anyone again. I can’t even verbalize how badly this has set me back.

I hate being punished for shit I didn’t even do.

Enough.

When do we ever get to the point where we have enough. Enough of this, enough of that. Enough yelling, enough not being accountable, enough with quotas, enough with stigmas, enough with labeling. I’m sick of it, I am sick of being stuck in a jar and told that my behaviors equate into some scientific equation.

Will the size of my thighs or dress really matter when I am dead? Will I be remembered for the size of my underwear and bra or the deeds I have done? Maybe that is what concerns me the most. Where priorities are placed and what, at the core of everything, really matters. When I am buried it isn’t going to say “MEG: SIZE X”. So I have yet to figure out why I sit in day in and out so consumed by the fear of the dress size larger than what I wear currently. The fear in eating just the simplest of foods like cold cereal or an orange – at times I have even convinced myself that my children’s toothpaste has calories. What for exactly? Why do I allow myself these rages of emotional vomiting over things that, in the long run, don’t even matter.

I have been overwhelmingly tired lately. So much so that I am sleeping through groups, but I enjoy it. I like sleeping. Sleeping is not feeling, and the less I feel the better off. My legs hurt like a bitch from how badly I hurt them a few days ago. I don’t even know why I damage myself like this anymore. My body just feels like it becomes this huge balloon and the only way to release the tension is to cut, to hurt myself. But it isn’t a talent I can put on my resume so why do I invest so much time into it?

I am sick of reaching out, connecting to people. I fear the relationship with Manav – I fear getting connected to him and it not panning out because he is returning to India in just a few weeks. I am scared over how the relationship with my mother is going to evolve. I guess, all I can do, is walk blind folded into it.

Is there ever Enough?