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Goddamn pills. As my medication failed, I was put on "extras", which resulted in the wakefullness of Erin to quite an extent... eight @##$%^& days to be precise. By the fourth day I had quit the new-fangled medications by myself, but sleeplessness lingered. The interesting thing about being awake for over four days happens to be the prevalence of hallucinations; quite pretty ones appear, and they are often interactive. The withdrawal symptoms coincided with my final four days of sleeplessness, and poor Matt had to deal with it all. Thank god he understands.

      So it's back to good ol' Lexapro at above-FDA approval dosages. Wheee!

      But on to something completely different...

      I often ponder my life's direction. I know I'd make a good doctor and that it would be enjoyable for me while at the same time never allowing me to feel as though i'm in an intellectual rut. However, when I'm working in the theater lab, doing carpentry and hanging like a monkey from rafters and playing with lights, I feel happier than I feel anywhere else. I know that life as a theater producer and design tech would be fantastic... but I need the damn financial security. I don't want to rely on anyone for that. Either profession would make me happy... it's just that with the latter I feel freer and so very comfortable. Perhaps I'll work my butt off as a doctor, make some decent money, and then go do theater work for fun...

      Arg!

      I am once again recessing into my antisocial tendencies, and the worst part is that I'm very happy with it. I am keeping my connections open with the four people whom I truly know, trust, and enjoy the company of. However, anyone else I desire to keep at quite a sizable distance. I wonder why this is?

Well, I think the medication is finally starting to fail. I confided in a new person as to how I feel... and he has been wonderfully helpful. However, I am still afraid that someone will find it in "my best interest" to get me hauled away in a straitjacket and I'll end up losing my job and missing classes. That would indeed suck. Alas.

The leaves in the fall of the south are ugly. They do not turn bright and beautiful, and I long for the beauty that comes with the north. I miss the snow and the cold and the feeling in the air that comes with them. However, here I am in the heat and snowless. This is the first time that I have missed anything related to home.

Well.. here it is. I'm actually ready to finally admit that I have anorexia. I am constantly paranoid about my weight, and if around a scale will measure myself five to ten times per day. I feel guilty if I eat more than a bowl of cereal and I find myself constantly covering up my stomach area because of the way that I think I look. My love has the same problem, but it stems from a different root. I have always been very thin, but over the last half year I have gained a small amount of weight.. five pounds. However, I can see it and am very paranoid about it. My love used to be very overweight, and hence knows the pain of weight problems. We help each other out significantly, by constantly telling one another that we're paranoid and rediculous.. and it helps us to keep eating.. but perhaps we should look to outside help? Matt is getting us a scale.. and it could potentially do one of two drastic things.. it could reassure us that our weight gain is all in our mind and set us to ease... or it could become a new way to find paranoia. I hope that it won't be the latter. We'll see...

Well so much with that "sleeping too well" B.S. I haven't slept in days, and I'm exhausted. Luckily enough, the weekend is here.

I've been extremely stressed for some reason lately. The only way I can truly tell that I'm stressed out is that I get those damn canker sores, and they are appearing. Also, I've been feeling fairly sick to my stomach... just need sleepy sleep.

My dad is going on his first date in years! Apparently, she's 40 and cute. I am so damn happy for him... this will help him out so much.

Everything seems to be coming together. My new friendship is becoming wonderfully trusting, my relationship with Matt as not only a lover but also as a best friend is strenthening, and I am sleeping well. Unfortunately, I might be sleeping TOO well... I am constantly falling off into la-la land the moment I can find free time. The second I hit the bed, couch, or floor, be it nighttime or day, I conk out. This has resulted in not only me sleeping prodigious hours, but also I am not able to concentrate on studying like I used to be able to. Instead of being able to read, now I just daydream about sleep with the book open in front of me. Oddly enough, I rarely ever feel tired until my eyes close and I drift off. Unhealthy? Probably.

I am constantly amazed at how understanding Matt is. He handled the presence of the one man he fears, my old boyfriend Randy, extremely patiently and well. He now, hopefully, is more confident that I will stay with him and love him faithfully as long as he's willing to be with me. He has been holding me lately when I have anxiety problems, and he has been spending huge amounts of attention on making sure that I am okay. I adore him, and feel extremely safe with him. I hope that one day he will propose to me, because I will definately accept.

Well, my birthday has come and gone. It was absolutely wonderful... Matthew worked so hard to make the day absolutely perfect. We went out to dinner, and he looked so happy to be dressed up and going out that it didn't feel one bit like he was martyring himself! The evening was fantastic, as only an evening with Matthew possibly can be, and that evening we had a disagreement which seemed to be bad at the time but in retrospect has really helped us to clear some things up and it has made our relationship only ten times stronger. I am glad that it all happened the way that it did.

Randy came to visit. Randy is the man whom I dated for a couple of years before I met Matthew, my love. There has been quite a bit of tension this week, since Randy is taking some liberties and is being a bit pretentious when he really shouldn't. However, I'm lucky enough to have a boyfriend who realizes that I love him and will always be faithful to him, and so he is taking it extremely well. I know that I would not act as patiently as Matthew does if our situations were reversed. I adore him.

I don't know quite what is happening to my relationship with my guide. He and I are not growing distant, but I seem to be looking less to him as a guide and more to him as a friend lately. Odd.

I finally had the dream where I killed myself. I have always been the one being killed against my will, but the image from the dream of me intending and then plunging down from the high balcony towards the cement ground, rotating so that I land on my shoulders and neck to break it, and then not remembering what happened next. I remember falling through the air and feeling no regret, but merely intention. Alas. What could this signify? I am sure it is something significant.

Tonight I doubted my new friend. I realize that to many, having someone confide in them gives them a sense of importance that compels them to continue to listen, and thusly they appear martyristically selfless, while at the same time basking in the care that they feel radiating from the source of the pain: the confidant. I do know that he feels special due to my confiding in him about a bit of my past... however, my doubt has passed and I have realized that he is actually genuinely interested, and not just happy for the confidant's act of showing appreciation. I need a hug.

      Today I reinforced my rather stubborn opinion that girls are insane. One really got on my nerves today, and it took all of the self-control that I have in order not to yell. I have very little patience for those with little amounts of common sense or intelligence. In her case, she has potential to be very intelligent, but needs some common sense and a bit of selflessness before it can show itself. I wish I could help her, and I've tried... however, I can never continue to appear as friendly as my intentions are due to my inability to hide frustration when it emerges. I don't know how to help her any more, since she creates all of her problems for herself. Alas, I have decided to give up trying to help her. I feel slightly like a failure and a bit like a pansy for giving up, but at the same time I realize that it is most likely better for not only my temperament but also my emotions at this moment to worry less about her than she would prefer. How to keep from seeming cold, even when I'm very frustrated? I shall work on appearing happy when I'm truly frustrated. That quality seems to be the keystone of relationships. Thank god my wonderful Matthew does not frustrate me. However, I can not count on it never ever happening, so it's probably a good idea to work on this quality nowadays, before the challenge approaches, so that I will be prepared to deal with it.

      The guilt that comes along with eating has eased off quite a bit lately. Matt has been so wonderful to me that at times he actually convinces me that I am a pretty being. This slight sense of happiness does so much... I have been eating sandwiches and chocolate and such instead of relying solely upon cereal for my food. It is quite a relief... I adore the taste of most foods... and I would do anything to be able to healthfully shake this sense of excessive guilt over eating. Perhaps I should get eating disorder counseling. The sensation of nagging constantly at the back of my mind to stop eating and excersize is becoming a bit overpowering.

Today, in frustration, apparently I yelled at Matt. I honestly didn't think I had at the time, but his reaction to it was so large that I have to believe that I did. I worry about it because although it was due to me missing my medication today and yesterday... it's still scary to see the one you love sad because of how you reacted. I know I'd do anything to make him happy... and it's sad to know that the only thing that I really can do is keep up with my damn pills. That'll fix it... but it's so disconcerting to know that your personality relies on them. Arg.

I hope that he stays as he is... I still have fears quite often. By the time I have gotten this close to anyone in a relationship, or anywhere NEAR this close, the other has become abusive and such. Matt seems far too nice to be real. Yet, I feel completely comfortable around him... how can I trust anyone nowadays?

    The one who has recently discovered me... well... I also have fears related to him. I worry that his intentions were all related to a desire for intimacy, and that he will go away in light of Matt. I enjoy so much the fact that there is someone who, for some reason, I feel okay with letting know the intimacies of my mind. There are many people whom I know, and have known for years, and whom I like and trust. Yet, there are very few whom I feel secure confiding in and allowing knowledge to. He is one of those, who are very rare indeed. I don't want to lose him... and I don't want conflict of trust between him and Matt either... I ask of so much!

Another one became interested. He took in some of what I am, and understood it. I feel quite happy about it, as it is quite rare that someone is not only interested but also pursues conversation. I felt special. Awwww....

    Matthew's constant presence has not proven to be at all stressful or negative... it is a positively wonderful affirmation of the fact that I am quite sure that he loves me. It is so damn comforting. When I wake from the omnipresent nightmares, he is always there to hold and comfort me.

    The nightmares are becoming much more normal once again... I die. I constantly die in my dreams, and experience the fading of death, along with all of the emotions that go along with it. I honestly dream so vividly that I believe it is happening. Many revelations have come through my beliefs that I am dying each night. I generally wake after I die, and fall back asleep to die again. Tis no mistery to it. Sadly, I generally die at another's hand. I wonder if this influences my perspective on others. Oddly enough, dying is much easier to deal with than the other dreams were.

Lately I've been having the longest run of bad dreams that I can remember. I have not gone a night without waking in tears in over a month now. Yet, when I wake, I find immediate consolance in the arms of Matthew. I fear sleep, but still it comes fairly easily. The dreams aren't mere nightmares.. they are disturbing. They explore all of my fears and desires in a horrificly panicked way. I wonder what provoked all of this to begin? I have dreamed that I shot my mother and was in panic trying not to get caught, that I was screwing up my paperwork for financial aid, and that I was making Matt upset. Panic attacks from personal issues with my lack of ability to help my sister as much as I'd like to help her and depressive episodes have been running fairly rampant, and Matt and Jonathan were both needed last night to calm me into my nightmares. Yet during the day, I put on my happy face and act light a slightly ditzy girl. Alas. It's either assume that persona or act as myself, which is apparently too morbidly eccentric for social behavior. I calm myself, take my pills, and try not to stab anyone for my Matthew, so that he is happy. I know that what I am now is better.. but at the same time I really hate being reliant on goddamn pills to make me normal. Nobody knows me but Matt and three others, and it bothers me greatly. I have so much going on in my mind... so many eccentric yet amazing thoughts and ideas... all hiddden.

I never honestly thought that this could happen to me. He took me out shopping for dresses, and is taking me to dance lessons, chocolate factories, and into his arms at night. He is being so perfect, and I honestly can't wait to spend more of my life with him.

    I have been off of my medication now for nearly two weeks. The withdrawal has been a nagging angst, and nothing more, due to the unconditional support of Matt. Thank god for his presence...

    Matt's house is very very interesting. It is 180 years old and has a spiral staircase from his room, the old servant's quarters, that leads down into the kitchen. The cats keep us all amused constantly. The house used to be a boarding-house style inn, and so it is very windingly fun. I hope we can live here some day.

Katie, my little sister, will be coming to visit Matt and I this year at Tulane. It'll be good for her... getting out and having a little airplane trip on her own... at the ripe age of thirteen, it shall be liberating for her instead of a source of travel angst.

    Today I found out that researchers in Japan are developing a method of drawing power from blood glucose, mimicking the way the body generates energy from food. Theoretically, it could allow a person to pump out 100 watts - enough to illuminate a light bulb. I wonder how they will apply that???