LustingforNightmares

tumbleweed
2020-11-10 16:26:00 (UTC)

the bodily

"Patricia" by Florence & the Machine [haven't listened to Florence & the Machine in a long time, I'm glad I'm listening again. A hopeful song]

November 10, 2020 Tuesday 3:26 PM

Stress and urgency have an unpredictable effect on me. Sometimes they make me extremely productive (i.e. last weekend, when I spent hours every day cramming for my Oceanography exam. Paid off!!! I got a 92, which is a huge improvement from the 74 I got on my last exam LOL). Sometimes it just makes me tired. I think I should probably feeling urgency, but I don't. Where a week or two ago, I was full of ideas and creativity and energy, and I felt comfortable in my body, and interested in dating, and I am now sort of emptied out (in the back of my mind, I wonder if I was hypomanic, before reminding myself that it's useless to wonder). I think it started last week, but I definitely made it worse by smoking weed over the weekend LOL. I wasn't going to, but Maria, matt, and Greg were smoking, and I could smell it and I made a split second decision. I had already told Matt I wasn't going to, so I think he was concerned, but I was fully aware of the consequences and I did it anyways. Nadiya also partook.

The last time I smoked weed was in April, I think. I was alone. Matt had left weed at our apartment and I had rolled a clumsy joint and sat at the corner near our apartment in the dark and cold and smoked some of it. I don't think I ever finished that joint. Anyway, I like smoking alone because there is less available to trigger my anxiety. This time was also nice, though, because I trust my friends. There was a moment in which Maria scolded me briefly for holding the joint inside the house, and being slow and clumsy with the weed, it took me a few tries to follow her directions. I thought about that moment for the next ten minutes, feeling bad, but also telling myself I didn't need to feel bad, and of course it continued on repeat—not just because my anxiety is generally obsessive, but because of the way weed affects time. I experience the same moments on repeat for small eternities, my body shaking. We were watching SNL and the 16-minute David Chappelle spiel felt like it went on double time, and the rest of the sketches felt equally absurd. I kept thinking I was dreaming. I felt so nice and bodiless and stupid. My thought process interrupted at every possible junction. When I went to sleep, I was reading and I could barely focus. Eventually I settled down, but then I masturbated and when I came, it sustained itself through like three peaks. Embarrassing to admit that.

I wouldn't say the high was "worth it," but it was nice. "Worth it" in that I've spent the subsequent days sort of empty and weird. Yesterday, I had a hard time interacted with Marie, because I was sensitive to noise and I felt very quiet and serious inside. I still feel quiet and so I am holing up in my room re-watching Avatar. Since a week or so again (pre-weed), I've been experiencing some anxiety, and it's only gotten worse, but only gradually. Each day that passes, I have more moments in which I seem to disappear out of the present for a minute or two, seeing a past moment and then curling over with regret, and murmuring in real life, "Wow, I hate myself!" I think saying stuff out loud helps me come back to the real world and remember that I'm here and I can't do anything about the past; that it likely wasn't as terrible as I seem to think it was, and that either way, I'm moving forward.

--

I had a bit of a fight with Isaac on Friday. He texted me on Thursday to ask if I had time to call, because he missed talking to me. I thought that was sweet so I scheduled a time for after class on Friday night. For the most part, the conversation went fine. I was glad there was a good amount of time between our talks, because when I first returned to school, he wanted to talk way too often and it felt like I had nothing to say, so it made me anxious. But I told him I would like to talk less often and he accepted that.

He said he wasn't doing so great, feeling a lot of anger. Told me about how he drove at about 160 mph the other day and I sort of scolded him. But he seemed to enjoy that, enjoyed my worry, which irritated me. Felt like I was playing right into his hands—I wanted to tell him that the worry really wasn't anything beyond a basic concern for peoples' wellbeing. Anyway, I didn't dwell on it too much because Isaac is going to do what Isaac does, and it's not my responsibility to police him. I did what I could.

But besides that, the conversation really was okay, and it flowed decently. Whenever we talk, I am always sort of carrying it because I talk a lot and because Isaac doesn't really like to express himself much (sometimes when I ask him questions, or probe into his reasons for doing something—which usually requires a lot of specificity on my part, a string of queries, sometimes yes-or-no questions—he'll just say things like "That sounds like me," or phrases of equally vague quality lol).

Towards the end, when I was about to hang up—maybe an hour or so in—Isaac was like, "Can I tell you something that might make you mad?" Hoo boy, that's never a good sign, but I couldn't just say no. So he told me that sometimes, at around two in the morning, he would drive in front of Sandwich's house and screeching his wheels to wake him up. I immediately said, "That's not funny. Don't ever do that again," and he was like, "I only did it twice," and I said, "Don't do it again," and he said, "Maybe I won't if you talk to me a bit more." Which shocked me. I can't remember what I said, but I didn't agree and finally he promised not to do it again and we hung up, but I was still mad.

I discussed it with Nadiya, because she's a very good sounding board. She's generally not very judgmental of the involved parties (unlike Maria or Matt), so I tend to trust her assessments. She said it sounded 1) like he had a crush on me and 2) it was extremely concerning that he would sort of "threaten" me, etc. I don't know, it's been a few days, but all I know is she inspired me to talk to him about it, so I told him that he crossed my boundaries and that I wanted to talk more. Nadiya also assured me that it wasn't my fault, which I needed to hear.

Oddly, I didn't feel *that* mad, though. I was mad on principle, but it wasn't passionate. I mostly just felt disappointed. And also kind of... relieved? It can be hard to talk to Isaac because he still has very few friends and doesn't talk much about himself. I don't like silence, so I mostly talk about myself or whatever. I was really glad to start talking to him again, because he's always been an interesting person, but now it feels like our friendship is at a stalemate as our conflicting social needs are meeting. Mine being a necessary distance and his being frequent contact. It was sort of a relief, to entertain the idea of not having to try so hard anymore for something that should be natural.

I am reluctant to end our friendship for the wrong reasons. I don't want to be wrong again. Wrong about who is and isn't good for me. I don't want to find I've made the same mistake as before. I am sure there are good reasons too, but I am upset with him, so I can't think of them.

We talked on the phone on Sunday and I basically told him that if he ever does that or anything of that nature again, we will not be friends. It isn't healthy and it's a breach of trust (he said, "explain that," and it was weirdly difficult for me to explain how trying to hurt—however mildly—the people that mattered to me because I let him into my life was, indeed, a breach of trust!) He agreed and had a very heartfelt apology for me, saying that he knew he wanted attention and felt neglected but he shouldn't have done any of that. I offered a compromise, which was for us to schedule a time to talk every two weeks. But that felt too long for Isaac and he didn't like the scheduling aspect, so he asked if we could just talk more frequently and text more, but I didn't want to. I feel like, if I were to agree, I would end up resenting Isaac for making me force a closer friendship. It has to be organic. Isaac is still in the lower ranks of friendship—we're not close, I don't trust him, but I like him and would like to continue talking. Anyway, that's how it went. Forgiveness and all. I can't tell if I'm still upset or not. I am wary, for sure. That's fucked up. He knows where I live. What if he did that to my parents? How would I explain that to them? What if I ended our friendship? What would he do with his anger then? How would he channel it?

Anyway, it's over. All I can do now and try to move on having learned to keep an eye on him.

--

I look at myself in the mirror. My body type reminds me of the Ancient Greek ideal, which is nice, I guess, but I still don't love it. I'd rather be twiggy and boyish. I try to bury myself in fabric and I hate the summer for the way I have to show myself. I feel ugly and soft. I want to be a boy, with hard lines in body and face. For a hot second, I wondered if it meant something, to want to be a boy. But it's not that I *am* a boy born with the wrong body—it's that I want to be anyone else. This is, in fact, my body, I just hate it. I hate being reminded it, because I loathe physicality. I hate sweat. I hate fat. I hate pooping and peeing and farting and burping. I hate greasy hair and body hair. When I want to be with a boy, I think it's because I want to feel the hard chest, the vaguely smoky (for lack of a better term) mouth taste, the rumble of their voice and the externality of their genitalia (so as you can see, not exactly a realistic picture of "boy"). Boys are almost always larger than me. They will be skinnier and lighter than me, but rarely as short, and anyway they make me feel small. Diego had broadish shoulders and a heavy body, so when he put his arm around my waist, I could feel the way I fit easily without bursting and bloating out of the hold. Once, he put on my winter jacket and he remarked that he didn't realize I was so small—the jacket couldn't fit along his shoulders. I also remember Trip, and how he could pick me up and hold me against the wall, and in general had very little trouble handling me, lifting me, and I sort of had to stand on my tip toes to kiss him because I'm about 5'4" and he was six feet tall.

I wonder if I like that because of the way they contrast my body into a smaller space. I think it is. Sometimes I think I like it so much because I want to be that, too, with the flat and innocuous chest—being able to run your hand over it mindlessly, putting on shirts and having them hang straight down. I sort of hate boobs for that reason, but if mine were any smaller, I would look stupid given my body type. As it is, my boobs aren't very impressive, but they're certainly there. Earlier in my life, I would wish to be a different type of girl, with a different body and a different face and different talents, but right now I am more interested in being a guy who is good at STEM or something, multi-lingual and cheerful and sporty. Things I don't relate to. As is consistent with my escapist fantasies.

My self-esteem is just low right now. I will get better soon. Anyway, I think I want to actually start doing a little work now. I missed class because I didn't sleep well and I felt like shit when I got up. I should probably email my teacher but I'm sort of embarrassed and I don't know what to say. I should've used my accommodations when it occurred to me last night that I didn't feel good, but I am stupid and I thought I would still be able to go. If I still feel shitty, I'll use them for Thursday, but I will probably be okay by then.

All right. C ya.




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