Being Single But Not A Lesbian

I met with my therapist and dumped everything that has been emotionally heavy for the past couple of weeks.  The main one being the death of my first counselor when I was fifteen years old.  I never thought about how I would feel or react to her death.  I must admit it's been quite a shock.

She was a "Christian" counselor who, according to my Mom, did a lot of damage.  My tendency is to not talk about it because it's painful and in the past.  The problem is that I'm being triggered by someone else's behavior so I have to get about the business of cleaning up the mess this counselor left behind otherwise I'll crawl into isolation and end up drinking alcohol to numb the pain.

She labeled me as gay at age 15.  At age 17 she told me this.  At age 22 I met a woman.  No wonder I ended up in the Lesbian community for 4 1/2 years.  I never once believed her.  In fact I verbally fought with her before and after I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior.  She had her reasons for believing I was; I had my reasons for believing I wasn't. I walked out of a session and never went back.  In fact, during that relationship, a man I was engaged to previously called to ask if I was seeing anyone.  I said yes and we both moved on.  I was as lost as lost could be.

But God had another plan.

By age 26, I was with my second partner who was a Christian.  She somehow got past Roman 1 and she intrigued me.  But then I was in a different community of women, still didn't feel it was right so this time I asked God to make it clear to me who I was in His eyes.  I needed a clear cut answer so that I would never waiver again or be tempted to fall back into that world.  You see, I felt safe, understood and loved.  Who would ever leave a place like that?  No one in their sane mind.

From June 17-June 24, 1994 God answered all of my prayers and pleadings.  Through Moody Radio and my church, He gave me the answer, "No, I did not create you to be a Lesbian."  I was sitting in my church's midweek service which happened to be Vision Night 1994, when I distinctly heard myself say in my head, "I can't serve God with my gifts if I stay in the gay community.  I have to get out of there!."

I decided not to tell my new found freedom from my partner until I talked with my new therapist.  I wanted to make sure I was on target.  The next day I walked into my new therapist's office, sat down and when she asked what was new I about jumped out of my skin and declared with juebuelence, "I'M NOT GAY!!"  She reeled me in and asked what had happened.  Sure enough, I was free.

From what?

• Hiding from God out of shame and guilt
• My family's disappointment and distancing from me
• No freedom of affection in public
• My insides never felt so good!

I know the Lesbian lifestyle isn't for me but it is for others.  I do not judge people who like motorcycles and I do not judge people who like guns.  To each his/her own.  I'm responsible for myself when I stand before my Maker and give an account for my choices in life.  More than anything else in the world, when Jesus comes up to me and tells God the Father, "Yes, I know Amy." I want him to say, "She let me help her during a very difficult time in her life to make the right choice even though it was not a popular choice."   

That's what my childlike ears long to hear.

Also, I'm committed to a life of abstinence and singleness until God brings the right man into my life.  And if no one comes along, I'll be happy and content on my own.  "It is not good for man to be alone."  He didn't say it wasn't good for woman to be alone.

The Voice of Lonely

Songs have been written about "Owners of a Lonely Heart" and "Who's Cryin' Now" but I doubt people who haven't been in a mental illness hospital as a nurse, mental health counselor, patient or visitor, people not working with trauma survivors and veterans or people helping the mentally ill everywhere they many be, have ever heard what I heard my first night at the Behavioral Health Hospital this last time, when I needed to go for a medication adjustment.

I was alone, waiting for my meds at the nurses station.  When the cry started, it caught me completely off guard.  We share a double door with the Acute Care Unit which is where I was going to stay that night, my first night, but a bed opened up on my unit.  I wondered how one could be so sad.  This beautifully sad cry echoed down the hall I was in.  I was captivated by it.  I sat in a chair, lowered my head and prayed.

So sad....so beautiful...so lonely...so in need of her Heavenly Father's blanket of peace, security, safety and His arms holding her tight, rocking her gently, collecting each tear in a bottle and whispering, "There, there my daughter, let it all out and don't be afraid.  Daddy's here and I'm never going to leave you."

Have you ever heard someone cry from a place in their soul that's so lonely it makes you sad?  I hadn't until the next day.  It was intensely emotional.  I shed tears every time I heard her pain-filled yet beautiful cry.  I closed my eyes and prayed again.

When you know the story of your Savior, Jesus Christ, you remember the anguish he carried on His shoulders and the cries of His heart as He wanted to complete the mission His Father asked Him to take on

It was early in my life as a new believer that my tears for His pain pierced my heart and stained my shirt.  There's a song titled, "I Will Never Be the Same Again."  That's right.  For those of us who have personalized Jesus taking the wreckage of our lives and blowing it away with the gentlest of air from his lungs, we (I) take his gift to heart and try to live the life I'm meant to live according to his plan and purpose.

Lonely?  I don't know if I'll ever hear her cry again in person.

God is good.

He shows up in acute 

mental illness hospitals and 

on the streets 

where most human beings 

do not want to stay alive.

Lonely's cry will forever echo in my body.

The sound of her lonely soul.

In my heart I hold her,

Praying over her,

Rocking her,

On God's behalf, 

Be at peace, Lonely.
Your Father in Heaven is watching over you.

Hearing Stuff That Isn't Real and Hospitalization

I find it interesting when people ask me what it's like hearing voices.  Do they talk to me, tell me to do things, etc.?  I find myself wanting to take back what I said and run to a safe place but it's already out there - exposed and vulnerable. Now, it's time to answer the question so some people aren't afraid (mainly, me).

No, the voices I hear are not commanding.  They never tell me to do any harm to anything or anybody.  The first time I hear something is the warning bell that I have to see my psychiatrist right away.

What I hear and the order it arrives is very important.  The more I have to contend with, the more difficult it is to manage.  Consequently, it leads to an episode which lands me in the hospital.  Therefore, emergency to get in to see my psychiatrist.  I forgot to tell him at our last visit the previous week.
WRITE IT DOWN!!

This is the order of what I heard in the last month prior to hospitalization:

1. A low radio interview with only words I cannot make out outside my body.
2. Loud megaphone voices inside my head.
3. Bad music.  Bad 60's and 70's no words.
4. Some eerie music but the notes are strung out long.
5. One gospel note.  I know it's gospel because of the image in my head.
6. Rap music
7. A loud shout:  "YOU WERE ABUSED!!"  (tell me something I don't know)

Most of the music continued when I was hospitalized.  Almost beat up a patient because I thought she said something to me.  Turns out it was my voices.  The next morning I initiated an apology, she apologized, too.  I asked if she said the sentence I heard then explained why I was there.  She was sympathetic and said she has a bad habit of overreacting.  

8th day of new medication 

5th day dosage increase

1st day with no voices (when hearing them for a month)

Isn't God good?  You bet He is!!

Grateful for a second chance at documenting my stuff better. Enjoy!

For My Psychiatrist

On Sunday
Scrambled eggs for a brain.
Voices faint and out of my head.
Flat affect.
Hiding in the house.
Laying on the couch, under a blanket, clutching a pillow to my chest.
Finished watching "The Return of the King."

Decide to get up to see if that helps.
Complete some household chores.
Start a pot of chili for a friend.
Bring out a piece of a tree to personalize.
Cook thin pork chops for protein.

Lay back down, under a blanket, clutching a pillow to my chest.
Start watching Law & Order Season 7.
Look at cat tree with strings hanging.
Get scissors and waste basket and start trimming.
Episode is a young guy with schizophrenia.

As episode is playing and I am trimming, I start talking.
I am talking back to the episode.
I am interjecting my thoughts, my warnings, my experience.
I am sharing this with a tv character.
I am fervent in what I am saying.

I become more vocal.
My voice becomes loud.
My front door is shut and I am glad because no one can hear me.
My voices are participating.
They have joined in to help educate this young man just like they helped me.

That's why they mustn't leave.
My voices are safe.
They've helped me survive horrific abuse just like my
Split off personality, Erik, when I was 8.
How do I keep them and live with them?

I hid in my house.
Then I went into my shed.
It needed to be organized side to side so that's what I did.
It took a long time to think through what to do first then next and so on.
My scrambled eggs brain couldn't concentrate.
But eventually, I accomplished what I set out to do.

Schizophrenia and Split Personality.
Just two of the many forms of mental illness I deal with.
When the medications can't manage the neurotransmitters right,
CRASH!
And that's what's been slowly happening until yesterday when my head hit the pavement (a metaphor) and my serotonin and other neurotransmitters scattered onto the little dirt road that people seldom travel.

That little dirt road is located inside my brain.
Few people are invited in and even then, fewer stay.
I am prayerfully selective on who is extended an invitation.
It's my home, my safe place, a familiar place, God's provision.
It has everything I need to sustain the life God wants me to have.
But every now and then, it needs a tune-up.

And that's when I see my psychiatrist.
Especially when I've crashed.
It would be ideal if it was before and I did see him before.
It's just that the new medication didn't work and perhaps made it worse.
He doesn't like the voices because they distract me.

At least I wasn't suicidal.

For My Therapist

My brain is crashing.
It started yesterday, into my sleep time and all day today.
My mind is starting and stopping then pausing for minutes.
I canceled going to church, canceled time with Catherine and only sent one message for a possible book meeting on Tuesday evening.

My fear is someone is listening to me as I talk back to an episode of Law & Order.  I feel the paranoia rising up into my brain chemicals.  I'm not laying down on the couch.  I am busying myself by giving the cat tree a trim.  I'm taking all of my medications.

I started hearing voices again maybe a week ago.  I found out last night that Valerie Caudhill passed away.  I was sad because I didn't get to say good-bye.  I found out on Facebook when I was checking my friends' list and deciding whether or not to clean house.  That's when I noticed there was no picture next to her name.  I know you couldn't tell me.

Then I have a friend who stopped talking to me.  Just stopped.  No explanation, no nothing.  After thinking about it for awhile I might have figured it out.  I don't know.  I got this weird message from a number without a name.  Three words.  If that was her, what does that mean?  I mean I know what it means but it doesn't explain anything.  I dunno.  Another grief not understood.

So I'm keeping myself busy but it hasn't helped.  All I think about is this brain disease and how much I hate it.  I can't be around people right now, I don't want to talk to anyone, my eyes get fixed on objects, I'm not going to respond to messages and all I want to do is be with myself and the voices and everything will be okay.

(Inner Child:  I don't want to go to small group and I want to return the money recent people have given to me.  I'm not a charity case even if I can't function like everybody else all the time.  These voices are my friends.  Don't take them away.)

I'll call Dr. Didenko tomorrow for an appointment this week.