Depression has returned, not in full force, but as a dull shroud over my entire day. It covers me with guilt and confuses my willpower whenever I think of something I should do....D. was very patient. He knew the things to say and ask. By the end he had taken me deeper than I had ever gone with any loved one, into my self-doubt and dysfunctional thinking. I felt very vulnerable, scared in fact. At that point I had to stop....
But neither of us have been sleeping very well. This is another frustrating aspect of my depression. For the past two years I have slept deeply and soundly. Now suddenly my old pattern has returned, waking early and often, not getting back to sleep. Feeling tired during the day.
I dreamt I lived in a townhouse complex
on the side of a steep slope alongside a mountain lake. Mary, our real life landlady, managed the place. My unit faced the lake, but I could no longer afford it and had to move to another one higher up the mountain.
A road ran past the front of the first row of units along the top of a cliff above the lake. At the end of the row it turned sharply and doubled back on itself, running behind the town houses and in front of the second row.
While walking along this road I saw my friend M., who I haven't seen in two years now. I wanted to seduce him so I followed him. Why have I been having these intensely sexual dreams lately? I can only half remember them, but they contrast with my feelings when I am awake~~my libido has been depressed like everything else.
Anyway, I followed Michael up the winding road high onto the mountain, where I lost sight of him. The rocks were bare except for a few patches of snow and glacial ice. The mountain top was rounded and smooth, easy to walk on, and bleak but beautiful.
Later I found a new apartment, higher up the mountain and shoddier than the town houses along the lakeshore. When I moved in I tried to connect the telephone, but found that something inside the phone itself had to be set to match a code in the line. Without this I couldn't use the phone.
I could store some of my things in a garage across the road. Several of the neighbours shared this space.
A single man, tall and slender with black hair and a well-kept beard, lived in a house nearby. We greeted one another and chatted briefly.
Later, from my window, I saw someone go riding by on a spirited black horse.
Then I heard a car accident and went outside to see what had happened. Two cars had crashed at the corner outside the house where I had my apartment. This collision seemed ridiculous because I lived on such quiet side streets.
Someone had tied the horse nearby, and it was bucking wildly. Suddenly it struck an elderly man with one of its hooves.
Then everything was gone and I was alone in the intersection. But I knew I had to get help for the old man because the horse had hit him in the head. I couldn't use my phone, so I went and asked my neighbour with the beard. For some reason he couldn't call out, either, but he got in his car and drove to look for help.
I found the old man's wife, who lived on a floor of another house nearby. Her porch overlooked a small yard behind one of the town houses below, and Mary was sitting there at a picnic table. The old woman was nosy, and liked to watch Mary from the doorway. She was busy doing this now, but let me use her phone to call an ambulance for her husband.
The four children are here for the weekend. Yesterday we settled into a better bedtime routine, but it has its hitches. The problem has been that E., S. and Brenna are all supposed to go to bed around 8 pm but Marian is a night owl and doesn't go to sleep until about 11. Of course E. wants to stay up with Marian, and Sh. doesn't understand why he gets to stay up and she doesn't. Brenna, agreeable as usual, has always liked bedtime...
I discovered what wonderful company Marian is at this time of the evening. She seems at her best in the company of adults only. She says she likes to watch me working at the computer~~and watch me she does. Sometimes we talk about writing, about school. She has progressed a lot in math, got 100 on her math test last week....To think that for 20 months I have been deprived of these beautiful, poetic evening times with my clever girl!
I've been exchanging e-mail with another on-line journalist, Al Schroeder for several months. Our shared interest in fantasy writing and in novelists like C.S. Lewis and J.R.R. Tolkien have inspired me to put some of my own creations on-line.
I was worried about how this would interfere with my hopes of someday making a living as an author. Al said he never puts anything on-line that he would consider publishable. It is all snippets, legends, rough maps...the sort of things Tolkien would never have been able to get published during his lifetime, but eventually took form in The Silmarillion and Lost Tales.
Ah, delusions of grandeur fill my mind's eye!
Once I decided to put some of my own stuff on-line, an incredible energy came over me. One day last week I put together all the material making up the newest page on this site, The Kingdom of Sirindór. Please check it out and let me know what you think. I will be adding more in future, so if it interests you, drop back often.
I created Sirindór almost 20 years ago, along with early versions of many of the major characters that populate the story I one day hope to publish. The world comes complete with an original language I created, history, legends, drawings of some of the characters....
....Marian told Karen that she read Daddy's Roommate on the weekend. And yesterday Marian told me the school was having a parents' night that Karen hadn't told me about. I managed to arrange to go.....
I need to arrange to discuss with the principal the fact that I am gay, but I find it intimidating. Somehow I've been feeling more "activist" the past few days, even thinking of dropping in at my old church some day and seeing how people react. But to actually sit down and discuss my sexual orientation with a right-winger like the principal is a supreme test of my mettle.
This morning I will have my second meeting with Karen and our assessor. I'm sure Daddy's Roommate will come up, so I'm taking it to show how positive it is. And I have concerns of my own, about Karen teaching a five-year-old about the devil, and that people who don't accept Jesus will go to hell....
I want to take Marian and Brenna to the Unitarian Church in Guelph. They need to know that some people think differently. They need to learn about acceptance of others as a value. And they need an environment where some other children's parents don't live together. In the girl's school and church they are the only ones. They also need to see me in a community where I am accepted for who I am.
Writing here has felt like pulling hens' teeth lately. My heart feels too raw and ugly to expose....Part of my depression arises from the course of the recent meetings with the assessor. I should just be relieved about getting overnight access to Marian and Brenna, but I am distraught over K.'s intentions and motives for seeking sole custody.
Even on the weekends when they stay here she wants to be able to pick them up Sunday morning and drop them off again after church. She wants them to attend church with her every week, besides going to their Christian school. She doesn't see why they should have any religious experience apart from the community that repressed and rejected my sexuality, vilified me and shunned me over the breakdown of my marriage. And I have learned that if she obtains sole custody, she could insist on the children being raised exclusively in the religion which she chooses. In the past couple of weeks she has not shown much willingness to compromise on this issue. And it scares me.
Yesterday's meeting left me feeling hopeless and lonely. When D. got home he tried to be playful but I lashed out at him. So he watched TV while I went for a walk in the mild darkness.
On my way back from the bridge I noticed a movement near the river bank. Without that movement I would never have noticed the great blue heron, settling for the night in the dim glow of street lights. Apparently it had just caught something out of the dark water, and swallowed it. Then it yawned and turned still as a stone again. The heron and I stood and watched for a few minutes, alone except for each other, the world silent except for the opaque poetry of the river.
When I got home D. held me, loved me and made gentle fun of me. He tried to talk me out of my depression, but none of his sensible words could penetrate my despair. Until he told me I had to believe in myself and I shook my head.
"Then let me believe for you," he said.
After thinking for a moment, I nodded. I have the courage to draw strength from his faith, just barely.
Yesterday I drove to Toronto for my therapy session, and on the way home dropped by Daniel's place. We had only a few minutes~~he was waiting for a call~~but he was glad to see me.
"This is fun!" he said as he hugged me at the door. Daniel always manages to surround himself with a sense of joy and adventure. His bright expressions cheer me. He is a big man with straight brown hair, a pronounced nose and chin, and unusual black-rimmed glasses. We packed our half hour with updates on friends, plans and of course my D. and his Martin. The visit bestowed moderate relief on my psyche.
Therapy gave me some difficult questions to contemplate. M. [my shrink] asked more than usual. Often I just talk and he listen, then drops in some token advice. But now he is delving, probing. Some of the questions surprise me.
When we were talking about my trouble accepting the mediation process with Karen, he asked: "Does it give you any comfort to know that she might also be dissatisfied with the outcome?" It seemed a bizarre question at that moment.
"No," I answered without hesitation. "It doesn't comfort me at all. I want her to be able to get on with her life and not be upset with me."
"But realistically that isn't going to happen soon," he said. "She could stay angry for many years."
M. tried to help me focus on accepting the circumstances and deciding what to do next. But everywhere I turn I see a risk of undesirable outcomes.
This morning I visited a beautiful, poetic journal called weightless, waiting by Cynthia, a resident of GeoCities Wellesley. Her voice reminds me of my own~~nature touches her like a lover, and fills her words with imagery. I have only read a few entries, but plan to return. Her pages suggest expectation. Many of us writers await something powerful, and our waiting is subconscious. It echoes like a hollowness in our throats, a space of readiness, yet to be filled.
I used to desire the love of a man this way. I remember 10 years ago lying on my bed on a Saturday morning, with sunlight tracing shadows of tree branches across my quilt, wanting to share the peace and warmth of that moment with someone. That longing felt vast, hopeless and unspeakable.
Last night I lay on the couch, facing my lover across the living room. Our eyes found and searched one another, smiled. D. has flowed in and filled that empty place. Even when I feel horrid, he holds me and his comfort breaks through to me in small, important ways. I have never felt so much connection and trust in someone so close.
But no person can fill the writer's space~~no one except myself. Only I can fill it with what will happen to me, and what I will become.
After my session with M. I realized I am rarely happier than when Marian and Brenna are with me. I always anticipate their visits with anxiety and weariness, expecting them to drain my resources, and indeed I usually feel exhausted when I take them to their mother's house. But I rarely feel depressed afterward. They give me purpose. They bring out my most energetic and creative self.
Yesterday I met my friend Peter for the first time in over a year. He is one of the few friends who stood by me when I came out....I met Pete and Nancy during the summer of 1984 after my second year of university. They helped me that fall when my roommate and his girlfriend were killed by a drunk driver. After that Pete and I were roommates for a couple years. Pete and Nancy got married and worked as missionaries in Zaire for several years. We kept in touch and when they came home they started spending time with K. and I. During the breakup, Peter was there for me. We did't necessarily agree on everything, but he didn't need to understand me in order to accept me. Now he's started his master's in family studies. Next semester he'll begin doing therapy. I can't think of anyone better suited.
People make God to be whatever they need God to be. The Israelites worshipped a war god who would approve and affirm their need to conquer and establish a homeland of their own. Whether or not we accept those values now, they reflected the Israelites' needs in a primitive world.
In Roman times the Jews needed a god who would bring meaning in the midst of their oppression. Jesus and his disciples preached inward salvation and hope for a better afterlife.
When I was seriously depressed and losing the respect of my community and loved ones, I related deeply to Jesus in Gethsemane, his grief and isolation, and his grappling with impending death.
We look for a God who matches our own internal values, needs and wants. If we lack the security to accept this in ourselves, we seek affirmation and and justification outside ourselves. This is the motivation behind a fundamentalist view of the Bible or any writing. But what we do not need~~in our multicultural society, faced with important questions about the future or planet~~is a prevailing view of a cosmos governed by a god of war, or a god whose people's fortunes are not clearly rooted in this cosmos.
On Wednesday our assessor held what I expect to be the last interview with K. and I. We have resolved several important issues. The three of us will have one more meeting including the two lawyers as well. He will write up a co-parenting agreement and we have only to sign it. He will recommend to the lawyers that the document not address the issue of custody, since it is legally obsolete in most regards. All the decisions K. and I will have to make have guidelines in the agreement. If we cannot agree on something, we are required to go into mediation before going to court. That is what I have wanted all along.
K. still wants sole custody, but she has no reason to seek it except for her own "peace of mind." She has agreed that the girls can stay with me on Sunday mornings; for now I will not take them to church anywhere, though legally I have the right to do so.
As I walked out of P.'s office building on Wednesday afternoon, I felt a heavy shroud lift from my mind. I can't say that peace started to return, but I felt a relief. Finally, something...something...has been resolved. I am tired.
The question of child support, and what will happen to the money from the sale of our house, must still be discussed. It is not a trivial matter, but is far less emotionally packed. The road ahead now is for me to find a job. I have received the application forms for vocational rehab services. I need to focus my energy on getting them filled out.
Apart from the stress of assessment process, I've had more energy and better moods over the past couple weeks. It seems bizarre that all the other depressive people in the world feel gloomy as winter approaches, and right now I am feeling more stable. The extended warm weather ended abruptly this week. Yesterday morning the world had evolved overnight into a candy-coated fairy realm. Maroon and gold maple leaves still clung to the trees, but everything was tufted with white. I have always thrived on transitions, despite the threat of impending chaos. Though my mind and body prefer sun, warmth, green living things and growth, my soul seems to rouse itself at the first hint of change, whether the budding of new life or the shedding of leaves.
I've had a slothful, apprehensive summer. It reminds me of my high school days, when I always secluded myself like a monk for the three months of vacation. I spent no time with friends, I never got a job. I just closed myself in my bedroom, wishing the afternoon would drag out longer and longer, hating the grinding sound of my dad's car pulling into the gravel driveway. Though we lived on Lake Erie beach front, one summer I didn't swim a single time. Going to the beach meant enduring my parents' company. I still don't understand why I hated it so much. My father was aloof, caught up in his political gripes and petty crusades. He showed no interest in the things I read or created.
In my room I read, wrote, drew maps and created fantasy kingdoms on paper. Sometimes I ventured outside and enjoyed the beauty around our property, the lush lawn, the rampant overgrowth of soft maples in the wood lot, butterflies in the vacant lot, the banks of warm, wet clay on the bluff above the beach. I wish I had appreciated these things more, immersed myself in them totally.
It's the same way I wish now that I could immerse myself in so many things: writing, crafts, walking, meditating and exploring my inner world. I have time now for these pursuits, but have so much difficulty focusing my energy. Will I look back on these days in regret?
...This week I walked out of the grocery store to find I had left the car door open. This has been happening repeatedly. A lady in my building asked me if I had a reason for leaving the car open, or if it was okay for her to close the doors if she found them that way. My mind is a cyclone. I remember the important things, like picking my daughters up from school on time, or paying the rent. But at least once a week I make some strange omission, a number of which could add up to calamity.
My therapist has filled out a medical report to accompany my application for vocational rehabilitation. It asks: "In your opinion do any of these conditions limit this patient's activities pertaining to normal living, such as: self care, communication or motor activities?" He has checked yes and explained: "Some difficulties with memory, concentration and attention."
So this is me.
The good news from my appointment with him yesterday is that he has encouraged me to write during the several months while I am waiting to get into the rehab program. I actually felt excited when I left his office. In a way I have needed someone's permission. This means I must devote time each day to making headway with my fiction writing, getting some poetry published, and returning to a regular schedule with this journal.
All written material and images are ©1997-2002 Van Waffle. This page updated Apr. 16, 2002.
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