Patsy's story
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Thread Starter
Join Date: Dec 2006
Location: England
Posts: 2
Patsy's story
I swear, I'm going to try to make this short!. No, change that . . . my days of being perfect are over. I'm going to be myself, especially at this place, and stop trying so hard to do everything right, and perfect, and never let anyone down, and always do the right thing, and always end up **** on anyway because that's the way the world just is sometimes . . .
I'm going to be me.
Today.
All day.
I'm not going to care what anyone else thinks of me. I promise.
And there starts my story, doesn't it? Had one of those mothers who would go on ranting screaming tirades in the middle of the night, would wake us all up from sleep to clean our rooms, and at 3 a.m. Whilst other kids slept and had sweet dreams, I was on the floor with a tiny nail, picking specks of dirt from between the floor boards. This was, of course, AFTER I had picked up all the broken glass (Mom would take a broom and start at the top of the room, bookshelves, bureaus, etc) and 'sweep' everthing to the floor. But this was BEFORE she would tell me to pack my bags because she was going to take me to an orphanage and leave me there and never come back for me, because I was 8 and had a messy bedroom. It was AFTER she had told me she hated me and wished I was never born, but BEFORE the next day when she became contrite and told me she loved me, and asked me to forgive her.
Any wonder I was self-harming at 11, drinking at 12, doing drugs and having sex at 13, anorexic at 14, married the first guy who would take me away from it all at 18, divorced at 20, and did my first 'running-away-from-my-problems' at 22, into the military, to live overseas, work in a mostly-men's career field (aircraft-radar maintenance), which basically translates to lots of drinking and sex? I'd had 4 miscarriages by the time I was 24, and when I became a mother at 25, is it any wonder I was such a lousy mother that my daughter still throws that in my face (she's 25 now)? Any wonder that I still don't know how to treat friends, and still run away from things? This paragraph should never end, but I'm just going to quit here -- you get the message. Pretty screwed up life, and all of those things, from anorexia to self-harm to my first thought each morning being a margarita to beating myself up over my mistakes and knowing I'll never be good enough . . . all of those things are all still with me today.
Several times in the past 30 years, I've been told by doctors that I'm unwell, in vague terms -- all those miscarriages, ridiculously underweight, my bone marrow won't make cells fast enough when it needs them, and sometimes my blood-counts are so low I have to have transfusions. Finally, after a rapid decline a few years ago, the haemotologist ordered a bone marrow biopsy, and it revealed that I only have about 15% of my marrow left. At my age, it should be at least 70%. At a certain age, it begins to decrease, and that's normal, but when it's this low at this point, it's due to other factors. They can't pinpoint exactly what caused mine, or when, but the most common causes are drugs use, alcoholism, radiation, and chemicals -- they can all damage the marrow irreversibly. Well, I've done them all, so it's anyone's guess.
But you guessed it: I cleaned up everything for a while, not 100%, but fairly well, and my blood counts improved, and the cells looked normal. Of course that means I started drinking again (isn't denial a lovely thing?), and now when I go for blood tests, not only are there not enough cells, but they are malformed and not able to do their jobs as well. It's "very serious," they tell me with a serious look on their serious-doctor-faces. But my problem is my addictive personality -- I trade one thing for another, I lie to myself, and the usual. It sems like if I keep letting myself be addicted to anything at all, I keep my addictive personality.
So it isn't just alcohol that I have to quit, it's being a perfectionist, and the whole sordid mountain of stuff that's 'me' that I have to sweep away, and replace with a better person.
And it feels far bigger than the mountains of crap that my mother used to sweep (bulldoze?) into the centre of my bedroom when I was small, and feels just as huge and impossible to tackle. So I'm here, and taking it one day at a time, with anyone who cares to be here, listen, be a friend, and let me listen and be their friend. I cannot do this alone. I cannot face the enormity of it all.
I can only face the next hour, or maybe five minutes. Right now I'm sitting at my computer, and I'm okay. I have a mug of coffee in front of me, and nothing else. I'm not scared right now. And I'm determined to beat this.
I'm going to be me.
Today.
All day.
I'm not going to care what anyone else thinks of me. I promise.
And there starts my story, doesn't it? Had one of those mothers who would go on ranting screaming tirades in the middle of the night, would wake us all up from sleep to clean our rooms, and at 3 a.m. Whilst other kids slept and had sweet dreams, I was on the floor with a tiny nail, picking specks of dirt from between the floor boards. This was, of course, AFTER I had picked up all the broken glass (Mom would take a broom and start at the top of the room, bookshelves, bureaus, etc) and 'sweep' everthing to the floor. But this was BEFORE she would tell me to pack my bags because she was going to take me to an orphanage and leave me there and never come back for me, because I was 8 and had a messy bedroom. It was AFTER she had told me she hated me and wished I was never born, but BEFORE the next day when she became contrite and told me she loved me, and asked me to forgive her.
Any wonder I was self-harming at 11, drinking at 12, doing drugs and having sex at 13, anorexic at 14, married the first guy who would take me away from it all at 18, divorced at 20, and did my first 'running-away-from-my-problems' at 22, into the military, to live overseas, work in a mostly-men's career field (aircraft-radar maintenance), which basically translates to lots of drinking and sex? I'd had 4 miscarriages by the time I was 24, and when I became a mother at 25, is it any wonder I was such a lousy mother that my daughter still throws that in my face (she's 25 now)? Any wonder that I still don't know how to treat friends, and still run away from things? This paragraph should never end, but I'm just going to quit here -- you get the message. Pretty screwed up life, and all of those things, from anorexia to self-harm to my first thought each morning being a margarita to beating myself up over my mistakes and knowing I'll never be good enough . . . all of those things are all still with me today.
Several times in the past 30 years, I've been told by doctors that I'm unwell, in vague terms -- all those miscarriages, ridiculously underweight, my bone marrow won't make cells fast enough when it needs them, and sometimes my blood-counts are so low I have to have transfusions. Finally, after a rapid decline a few years ago, the haemotologist ordered a bone marrow biopsy, and it revealed that I only have about 15% of my marrow left. At my age, it should be at least 70%. At a certain age, it begins to decrease, and that's normal, but when it's this low at this point, it's due to other factors. They can't pinpoint exactly what caused mine, or when, but the most common causes are drugs use, alcoholism, radiation, and chemicals -- they can all damage the marrow irreversibly. Well, I've done them all, so it's anyone's guess.
But you guessed it: I cleaned up everything for a while, not 100%, but fairly well, and my blood counts improved, and the cells looked normal. Of course that means I started drinking again (isn't denial a lovely thing?), and now when I go for blood tests, not only are there not enough cells, but they are malformed and not able to do their jobs as well. It's "very serious," they tell me with a serious look on their serious-doctor-faces. But my problem is my addictive personality -- I trade one thing for another, I lie to myself, and the usual. It sems like if I keep letting myself be addicted to anything at all, I keep my addictive personality.
So it isn't just alcohol that I have to quit, it's being a perfectionist, and the whole sordid mountain of stuff that's 'me' that I have to sweep away, and replace with a better person.
And it feels far bigger than the mountains of crap that my mother used to sweep (bulldoze?) into the centre of my bedroom when I was small, and feels just as huge and impossible to tackle. So I'm here, and taking it one day at a time, with anyone who cares to be here, listen, be a friend, and let me listen and be their friend. I cannot do this alone. I cannot face the enormity of it all.
I can only face the next hour, or maybe five minutes. Right now I'm sitting at my computer, and I'm okay. I have a mug of coffee in front of me, and nothing else. I'm not scared right now. And I'm determined to beat this.
Member
Join Date: Oct 2006
Location: MAINE USA
Posts: 312
Hello Pasty,
Your story hit home when I read it. My father when drung on weekends would screem how he hated me while beating me. The worse was when he spit on my face. Year after year I had to live through that. I am a recovering alcoholic and can do it just one day at a time. I go to AA meetings. I was lucky not to try drugs as they were just not around back then. Alcohol or drugs same addiction. I am trying to quit smoking cigs right now and it is tough. I can not guess how differcult it is for quitting drugs, hard enough for just nicotine. I hope you seek some help from NA/AA.
http://www.aa-uk.org.uk/
http://www.ukna.org/
I wish you the best and maybe I should post in children of alcoholics some day. Keep posting and try meetings, they do help so much.
Your story hit home when I read it. My father when drung on weekends would screem how he hated me while beating me. The worse was when he spit on my face. Year after year I had to live through that. I am a recovering alcoholic and can do it just one day at a time. I go to AA meetings. I was lucky not to try drugs as they were just not around back then. Alcohol or drugs same addiction. I am trying to quit smoking cigs right now and it is tough. I can not guess how differcult it is for quitting drugs, hard enough for just nicotine. I hope you seek some help from NA/AA.
http://www.aa-uk.org.uk/
http://www.ukna.org/
I wish you the best and maybe I should post in children of alcoholics some day. Keep posting and try meetings, they do help so much.
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