way over yonder in the minor key

Struggle aplenty, I continue to fight for air. Yesterday was diabolical from the minute I woke up, with panic constricting head and heart. It took me an hour extra to get ready for work and actually go. Stomach was heaving and roiling, hands shaking. What if something happens to me on the way to work...what if it doesn't...

All the while Neil was kind and supportive and trying so damn hard. I wanted to hit him with the bedside lamp. I wanted to scream at him "This is all your fault, if you didn't have such a tragic history with suicide I could just kill myself already!"

Instead I said to him, semi-rational: "We should break up, you deserve better, you deserve someone normal and balanced who doesn't worry you." He made all the right noises, told me he adores me the way I am and admires me for coping so well most of the time. But who knows if we'll actually get through this dark time. He loves me, of course he loves me, but love...it's a fucking joke. It's not enough ammunition against BPD and depression, and I should know because I already lost one man who loved me against the odds. Mr Ex worshipped me, and tried his damnedest, but in the end the illness maimed and claimed the relationship and then stood laughing in the wreckage.

I am trying to calm my mind with meditative thoughts and to ease the nausea and shaking with breathing exercises. It feels somewhat like shuffling deck chairs on the Titanic. I am trying to be confident that the Cymbalta will kick in...soon...any minute now...

we wear our bruises like watermarks

Thank you so much to be darling friends for your comments previously. I wish I could say things have improved. They are made markedly worse, at the least complicated, by the re-appearance of my lupus in a hideous whole body flare that threatens to render me inert. (FYI - Lupus, or Systemic Lupus Eurythematosus is an autoimmune disorder, whereby the body's immune system attacks itself, eg: organs, joints, skin, rather than attacking external threats like bacteria or viruses. It's usually hereditary and incurable).

I'm not foolish enough to gloss over the connection...mind/body medicine is one of the things that cured my fibromyalgia (kind of similar to chronic fatigue and sometimes connected with lupus) and helped control my lupus, so I know that what I think and feel is reflected in my physical wellbeing. The fact that I've been struggling with some emotional issues has left me fatigued and rundown, and a perfect target for a lupus flare. So far it has shown up as joint pain (particularly my hands and right knee), constant nausea and neck pain. I'm lucky, in that my degree of lupus is very mild (so far). I am medicated for it, which helps, and thus far my autoimmune system hasn't attacked any serious organs. I know people who have kidney and liver or heart disease from lupus, and people who have lost eyesight and mobility. My paternal grandmother died because of it.

Anyway. I am now feeling even sorrier for myself, and struggling even more to maintain a positive outlook. I am even tireder than I was when my problems were "just" mental/emotional. The way I beat fibromyalgia and controlled my lupus in 2005 when I was first diagnosed was through fairly strict mind/body medicine - predominantly meditation and diet, as well as the medication.

I just don't think I have the energy it will take to get well again.

Last time I was ill, my mental state was strong, I was in (what seemed then to be) a supportive marriage, I was barely working in a casual job. Basically, I had a lot in the positives column. Now...it seems like things were just starting to take shape for me in my new work/home, and BANG, life throws me a curve ball. Ain't it always the way.

Neil is even more concerned than before, now I'm even more bedridden and exhausted and complaining. I have to make an appointment to see my specialist and find out if my medication needs changing. There really is only one medication for lupus (Plaquenil) but maybe I need more, or something new might have become available. I was so complacent and cocky... I thought I had the lupus whipped.

My mental state has kind of taken a back seat at the moment. I'm feeling okay, coping mostly with work and getting on well with my adorable man. Big picture is kind of blurry. Finer points are kind of rough round the edges. I haven't felt BPD-ish for quite some time, which is mostly (I think) due to the basic CBT/DBT I have ingrained in me, as well as the medication and a strong relationship based on honesty and boundaries. But the scary part is, I feel like I may be slowly unravelling. If I have lost control of my physical health, is my mind the next thing to go??

Title from Perth band Birds of Tokyo's song "Plans".

black eyed dog he knew my name

Nick Drake was born on June 19 - the same date as me and Heath Ledger was born in Perth, Western Australia - the same city as me. It's weird how things overlap, and the fact that one of the last things Heath Ledger worked on before he died was a tribute film clip to my favourite Nick Drake song definitely gives me a shiver or two.

Things are tenuous here, as my posting of this clip suggests. But I know that I can wait out the blues and things will improve again. So much to say, so little energy to describe it properly. It's mundane and parochial but hey, it's my life. Managing to eat (a little too much), sleep (somewhat less than the necessary amount), go to work (if begrudgingly) and stave off bankruptcy (for the moment). All else resides in the too hard basket, and I apologise for my lack of substance around y'all's blogs lately. I will be back. In Nick Drake's words things will be Bryter Layter.