In my last session with my therapist, he told me he's not going to bother getting IFS credentials, and I said, why?
and he said, well, I don't expect to have more than ten years to use them in,
and I said, what?! well, I mean, how old are you, wait, you don't have to answer that if you don't want to, which is the way I usually ask impertinent questions

so then my therapist, who is a genial older man that I get along with quite well but whose advice I have been assuming is coming from someone my parents' age or so, says, amused: "eighty-five"!


Wow. Okay so yes, I live in the land of long-lived hippies who are 80 and look like they're 60 (my landlords) and or are 55 and look like they're 40 (my swim-'biddy')——but genuinely dude is in way better shape than my parents or Trav's. Wow.

Anyway he's been encouraging me to bring in other media to getting out my memorikes besides typing them out and he thinks my lack of artistic practice is perfect fodder for comics and before I was like "nahhhh"——

BUT NOW I TAKE HIM WAY MORE SERIOUSLY YOU GUYS. Because he is hella old! Like, I realized I was trying harder to follow his advice and of course every observation I make has to be followed by analysis

——BECAUSE I'M FUCKING AUTISTIC (always have been) (hello echolalia)——

and LITERALLY my train of thought went like this: I think I value his opinion more because he's like, that old, and is still doing so well when he's actually seen some shit.

Then my train of thought kept going.

I know too many idiots my parents age who *think* they've seen shit but actually just made it go to shit, but yeah, maybe I just like grandparents better, who knows——omg do i trust him more because he's closer to death

so then I texted panda and long story short my comic will be the adventures of Grim Reaper and Plague Doc and here's the inspo which I already owned, they are squishables, you are welcome:

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therapy Yesterday. We walk there. Teyla and I both leave the house/neighborhood on Wednesdays, and then I don't have to leave again until next Wednesday if I don't want to. Usually I don't.

Quarantine and being sick has reactivated my agoraphobia big time. I sense so deeply that I need to be left alone?? It's probably not healthy I admit. Right now I'm so thin-skinned giving an awkward compliment makes me feel like—my default is to say god, you screw-up—hey, so just stop existing, stage right!

My therapist called me special, said I don't say this to everyone. I really believe you've got so many gifts. I told him I want to believe it, I just—don't. I stay adrift in a sea of "perpetual uncertainty, discontent and torture."

He said of course it's not logical, you were conditioned to insecurity your whole life.


... what the fuck I'd never thought about it like that. I mean yes, learned helplessness, but I'd never thought of it as insecurity on demand.

I know like—zooming out, the reason I got treated like that was all about control, and the inability of my emotionally immature system of care to treat difference with respect and sensitivity instead of criticism, alienation and harassment. I know they had to shut me up and I've known it all along, but that doesn't change the "conditioned uncertainty" of every layer I revealed.

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Doc says the keys to recovery are "Repetition. Determination." Yesterday, listening to me rant, he thoughtfully added "Patience."

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First thoughts upon listening to KID A MNESIA:

It does not surprise me that Radiohead's preferred edits make Thom's singing even less intelligible.

This came out 20 years ago???? Oh yeah, I remember taking my birthday money to the mall to get it. Cool.

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Originally posted at Dreamwidth. Comment there (), or feel free to comment here.

Adulthood is different than I expected—— a lot more conversations revolving around buttholes than anticipated.

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Originally posted at Dreamwidth. Comment there (), or feel free to comment here.

more freewriting
more talking before I've finished my coffee, insert eyeroll here

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so they did this ... wait let me back up and refresh everybody's memory since I've become this incredibly sporadic journaler instead of my somewhat sporadic nature before moving to California——

side note: people who don't live in the western USA often don't realize that California is basically two, possibly three to four separate states. There's one part that would really like to get back to their populist, small town 'republican-esque*' roots

(* Republican politicians are motivated only by greed and sociopathy to increase divisiveness but citizen Republicans do occasionally believe they have different motives
whether or not that ends up being true I will leave as an Exercise for you, Dear Reader)

ANYWAY, in California you have, as soshesays, north to south, Log Fog and Smog.

Travis, Sasha, and I all live (mostly) in Fog, although tbh Log extends down here too——

okay where was I, catching everybody up on Erika's weird health shenanigans——

I THOUGHT OF A NEW METAPHOR btw.

My body is a old house with lots of curb appeal and basic structural soundness while still having a desperate need of a internal refresh of its systems as many of the amenities one would expect are broken—for example, temperature regulation is subpar and systems tend to break——however, as the remodel continues we notice there are lots of fun surprises like gorgeous old tiles!

However, the owners for the last 30/35 years did not take care of the property, mostly due to bad practices that were intergenerationally passed down. New management is now in place but change is slow and incremental as endangered species of Erika's Sanity nest on this property.——

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more writing tomorrow, perhaps actually about my health. Will finish at this totally not a stopping point because today is a beach day.

Here, ( have a picture of Dog and some AmaryllisCollapse )

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