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its been a rough couple of days, since tuesday night ive got more agitated, im now at the point where i want to get in the car and drive away. it all started tuesday evening, i was finding myself to be more easily distracted, my sleep paterns were disturbed and also by one of the dogs. Wednesday morning i was having mild convulsions and wasnt very mentaly competant as well as unsteady on my feet when i got out of bed. I had a similar night last night but got out of bed earlier than expected today, its early afternoon now and im getting quite fretful and feeling the urge to escape. my work rate has fallen to almost non existant but it will keep plodding on.

notes

After a small amount of thought, i have decided that posting or trying to post every day is just a waste of time, to just add an note saying that today has been just ok helps no one. My efforts would be better put in to my musings and when things get bad. i hope to still post several times a week as i do have many ups and downs. But its better to document all things well than many things badly.

millie pulled a pistol on santa

Today i have been working at home (yes im sad enough to work saturdays, but as i loose so much time during the week through concentration problems i spread my week over the 7 days now. Plus my wife utilises my funny periods as her personal web researcher). While i work i like to have music playing, one of the great things about PC based mp3 players is the great random function.
ok back to the musings, while i was working a great aerosmith track came on, "janey's got a gun" this got me thinking (unfortunately for me i can think about many things at once, i like music as it allows one of my other trains of thought to be taken up with something easy), for those that dont know the track, its about a girl that is abused by her father and the revenge that she exacts on him. the song is much like "millie pulled a pistol on santa" by DeLa Soul.
What these songs got me thinking about wasn't revenge on the man, i have had several friends that offered to do that in the past & have turned them all down as it just isn't me. the songs got me thinking about someone that i used to work with and how we used to talk about things.
I have to get one thing clear, I DONT BELIEVE IN GOD, im not aethiest, agnostic or any of the others. After my rape i came to the decision that there cant be a god if he/she/it allows things like that to happen to innocents. For the nosey ones of you "yes i was a virgin, and remained one for quite a while after my experience".
Back to the point of this blog, this gent that i worked with was a very intelligent man, a devout muslim (which i have to praise him for the strength of his belief). For those that dont know, muslims believe that god gives them their lot and they should be happy and praise him for that, much like all other religions. so when i told him about what had happened to me and his response was a simple "that is gods wish, be happy with that" it got me thinking about how small minded and brainwashed people can be.
My point is that if this man's wife was killed at the hands of a drunk driver, would he be so flippant with his gods wish comments, or would he calmly accept that reasoning from another.
I don't like to talk religion or politics as we all can have quite strong views, all of which can be valid. But for any person to so blindly follow unsound doctrines cannot be good for anyone. Im sure someone from the religious right or left would quite happily imprison janey or millie for killing their abusive fathers and never bat an eyelid if someone said an eye for an eye.

I dont condone violence, i would be happy if the world turned to meat eating bhudists and were just nice to each other. but if your a janey or a millie consider your actions as not everyone that percieves themselves as good would see the correctness in your actions.

what a wonderful life :)

Its Friday morning and i have just had my session with CMF, and after a 2 week layoff the session got quite in a swing. It was very hard work but turned out quite fruit full.
CMF knows that i am quite good at avoiding subjects and so after one or two false starts the session did get quite taxing and made me both very nervous, anxious and also got me emotional enough to bring a tear or two to my eye.
My homework from the previous session was to enter situations that make me anxious and not try to escape or change the situation, the airport last week being quite a big one. Also this morning i changed my routine from when i parked the car to getting to my session with CMF, i added another task other than getting to the session. The normal task usually involves me walking a certain route. I changed this route and even added the goal of finding the office of a particular company in a part of town that i had never been to. My goal of finding the company failed but situation was enough to raise my stress levels, and i also resisted going back and walking my route afterwards.
Back at the session we talked about the day of the incident and discussed more in depth about the situations of victim / instigator. unfortunately as i don't remember too much about the whole time we were hypothesizing and talking about teenage hood and how a person responds to a situation, or how their mannerisms affect what or how others respond to them.
I, as i know many others find it very hard to say "i am the victim" you always carry with you the thoughts based on 'what if' 'did i' ' was it me' or many other variations. Today helped to bring many of mine to light, even though i know that i think them, saying them and exploring them more so are very difficult. My doubts and punishments seem to be based on the fact that even though i am obviously masculine i do allow my feminine side to show through and always have. could this have given the man the wrong signals. did idle chit chat bring out the fact that as a teenager i didn't have a girlfriend, i had a crush on a girl but that is as far as it went. I was very naive as a teenager and have been told many times since that i couldn't see someone making advances to me even if they shouted it into my ears and kissed me.
So thinking about it did i have the wrong combination of signs as a teenager that attracted this person to do what they did. this doesn't change the fact that i was a victim but can help me figure out the "why me" part that is always there. This why me has been quite a big prompt for the actions that i have done since with my life and my body.
As i have said before i am not interested in knowing what happened that day, but to truly settle and be able to move on i need to sort out the whys?????
what if:-
i hadn't gone to is house would things be different - probably, but by this happening it has opened so many other routes in my life that may have never been there.
what if i had denied myself to myself and i was gay - sorry guys you just arent my thing, women just have that thing that attracts me......maybe im a lesbian!!!!!
what if i had killed myself after - that wouldnt answer anything, i may have caused more hurt to others than i have ever been through myself.
what if it was me that actually started it - i believe that maybe my naivety could have opened me up as an easy target.
what if i had said yes out of curiosity - i have never been gay curious. from a designers perspective "men just dont have the beauty of form that a woman has"
was i just in the wrong place at the wrong time - i could well have been. but i think maybe over time i may have been groomed through regular visits to this persons home.
what if i had had a girlfriend - i dont think that would have put him off, would have just made home more cautious.
is being slightly effeminate a problem for a man or just a problem with society - that is for you to answer!!!!
did my inquisitive mind and naivety get me into trouble without knowing - yes.
had i been groomed - i remember him being a gay male with no bisexual leanings, but why did he have hertero sexual porn magazines.

i could go on and on (i think) but that is not the point, i don't need to come to peace with the past and stop punishing myself about it. but what i need the most is to open up my future and learn to relax in the world that i am in now. a world that i know is as safe for me as it is for anyone else, one where i can both give an receive love and affection. It would be nice to be able to hold my wife or parents and not have the voice in the back of my mind saying 'pull away you are too close, you are unsafe'
As CMF and i talked earlier, i developed a tool set for survival as a teenager. these tools helped in the short term. but over the last twenty years i have seen them ruin relationships and sections of my life, i have also seen them open new doors that never may have happened. but in a simplistic sense they are now broken and useless for my life now and for the future that i want to have.
my 'omework' <---(CMF that ones for you) for this week is based around the tool set. the goal is to list my tools for survival and then to propose another set more suited to life now. I will amend this page as i write the lists.
Current tools:-
1. Runaway physically (my favorite - to the sea, or just move home)
2. Block emotions.
3. keep myself mentally active.
4. Never be in one place too long (doesnt really happen anymore as i have responsibilities now...work ugh)
5. Mental colapse (my brain is part of me, and it is its way of telling me enough is enough!!!)
6. Constant monitoring of my surrounding, at home or in public. Visually or Auraly.
New Tools:-
1. Relax
2. Trust
3. Alow the panic to set in, and then let it go away.
4. Believe in my belief that other people are good.

The depression sets in

I know alcohol is a depressant, and after weekend of drinking too much i have become more and more physically depressed over the last two days, my mental state has regressed too, i am finding everyday jobs harder to do. my concentration isn't affected to badly but i find that i am putting jobs off more and more as today has progressed.
This morning i awoke with what i term as the shakes, after returning to sleep , i awoke with mild hallucinations. These went quite fast but i still found that i was very unsteady on my feet and also mentally frail and not totally in control and able to comprehend.
Hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Weekend In Heaven, Panic from .........

What more could i want? A weekend at a wedding in Poland. I have to admit that i have been ok, maybe it have been that my nerves were calmed through copious amounts Polish vodka.
On Thursday night i was very calm, normally i would be stressed about packing and getting things right. The first signs of trouble were in the airport on Friday morning. I have noticed that over the last few years that when i have flown on an outward bound flight i have become very nervous to the point where i either need to thrown up or pass out on the flight.
This Friday morning was no different and to top it off we were delayed by 2+ hours. My nervousness was very apparent that my wife noticed, which is relatively unusual.
Throughout the rest of the 3 days i was in a state of heightened alertness and constantly watching, the nervousness wasn't a problem, but as i said earlier it may have been the alcohol. The alertness didn't get in the way as it looked as though i was just admiring the surroundings, which were a fairytale castle to start with.
The return journey was noticeably calmer than the out going one, and the end to a good weekend.

talk about boring.......

Hi, as with the last post life has been quite steady. no problems or upsets (boring). I am finding now as Thursday progresses that i am getting a little apprehensive about going to Poland tomorrow. I dont know why as i love to travel, but i have found that over the last couple of years I have become more nervous when i fly.

Funny Friday and the uneventful weekend

After waking at about 4am on Friday morning. i found my mind was racing. The chances of me getting back to sleep were very low. I found in this time that my thoughts were solving things and putting problems into solvable patterns. I managed to plan quite a complex letter and solved a problem with a set of drawings. Throughout the day i was quite agitated and unsettled but towards the night I calmed down.
The rest of the weekend just steady, on Saturday I went to a local mall and stayed calm.
Today Sunday was your average day but as the day has gone on I have found myself getting more nervous and for the last few hours I haven't been able to stop rubbing my head.
I have been thinking alot about what is show as my inability to allow people into my personal space, I know my wife is finding it hard as I rarely hold her. Iam trying, this morning I tried but the urge inside me to move away. This urge is with everyone but i am going to try to break this habit, not just for me but also for others.

been a few days

Well im back, ive left it a few days and now its time to talk again. The last 3 days have been a mix of most things, on Sunday i was quite depressed and ready to just walk away from everything, work and family things got a bit much. Later on monday i told my wife that she was the reason that i had a problem. It made me feel better, it is amazing what being honest to yourself and others can do. you do feel liberated.
Tuesday i was more or less back into my stride, the day just floated by except for a cold that has reared its ugly head. Even as a depressive, the one thing that gets me the most are colds. They just knock me for 6, I hate the fact that it is an artificial depressant that i have no control over, not being able to breathe and the lethargy that comes is dreadfull.
Even with a cold there have been certain pieces in the news that do make you think that you are still lucky, Helen (the cancer lady) sorry i cant remeber her full name passed away at the weekend, she had amessage for anyone that has an illness. And to me it was fight, fight, fight against any odds. It was more poinant to me as she was local to the part of the country that i was born in. I even used to indoor climb & swim at the sports centre that she used when i was a child.
The other high profile death was that of luciano pavaroti last night, as with any death it is sadening but with pavaroti's it stands to remind us that death still comes to us all no matter how rich we are. money may help prolong life through expensive treatments, but we all should still live part of our life for the now and make sure that the now is the happiest that we can be.
Yesterday (wednesday) went totally according to someone elses plan of which i seemed to have no bearing on what so ever, not to say it was bad. work ended up down the pan and then i spent the afternoon with a client, a gent that suffers depression, paranoia & mild learning difficulties amongst his ilness's, but even with that he can still make you laugh and see good sides to things. 5 hours of thumbs up's and jokes really helps.
I wish both myself and others could take many leaves from his book on life, and it would help us all out some.

frying pan and fire

time to do a 2 day post.
Day 1 - yesterday was therapy day, due to privacy i cant say to much, i can say that CMF and i arrived at a point that we seem to have being striving for a while. Certain sessions are easy, some hard and some very hard. I would have described yesterday as a hard and its now time to start pushing myself to sort out some neuroses. rest of the day was quite hard, i was nervous but armed and ready to take some steps.
Day 2 - Saturday - Today as been quite normal, on awaking i was a little shaky and nervous but this passed, we visited 2 busy shopping areas, the first one through familiarity wasnt much of a bad experience but i was always on guard to a moderate level. the second centre was busier and my stress levels were much higher but i coped.
one piece of advice for anyone that would wish to do this, for me the writing of this is quite hard, i understand that i will become more open over time.