The closer people are to you, and the more you love them, the more they can hurt your feelings, for they have conquered that special place in your heart, and somehow it's kind of easy for them to crush your heart and destroy the once so precious love you once felt for them.
You know, dear reader, I have a lot of patience. I can take a lot of crap. People have to go to great lengths to destroy me. But there's always a moment when too much is really too much. Last week has been a cruel torture for me and my mom. It's a long and probably tedious story, but it comes down to this: My mom and I in particular have been let down and hurt very badly by the only sister I have and that I seemingly can't stop loving, no matter how much she hurt me in the past. However, as I mentioned earlier, too much is just too much and even I have my limits. When people make clear that they don't want my company anymore, that hits me real hard, especially because I never ever had bad intentions towards them - rather the opposite actually - but with the support of other people I can focus on the people that do appreciate my company. However, I can't support the feeling that I'm being used as an excuse to destroy somebody else. Ok, this may sound very cryptic, I do realise that, but I don't want to go into great detail here.
I also realise that these accusations may seem a little bit vague, but I can guarantee you, never before in my life have I felt so rejected by anybody. Never before have I felt so let down and alone. Never before have I been accused of blaming somebody else for all the crap that has happened in my or other people's lives. I take responsibility for my actions. When I make a mistake, I try to make up for it. And especially, when something's bothering me, I at least try to talk about it or to write about it with the people in question. What's happening now is the following: I've been blamed, I've been rejected, I've been accused of a whole lot of crap, and now, from one moment to the other, I just have to forget what has been said and written to me, and start with a clean slate. Just like that. I don't know how it works for you, dear reader, but I can guarantee you that it doesn't work like that for me. I at least need to talk about it, face to face, or if even that's not possible, at least by mail or chat. But no, I don't have that choice or opportunity right now. I'll just have to accept that I shall be broken-hearted forever, without anything or anybody to mend it. Oh, I can give somebody a second chance, I'll happily do that, but not without amendments. I mean, a surgeon won't operate you and make a huge wound without stitching you up afterwards, right?!
As a Christian, I can forgive people, quite easily in fact. But I'm mostly not able to forget what people did to me, good things as well as bad things. I forgave my sister when she talked badly about me last summer. Now, however, she did the same thing once again, and in fact even a little bit worse, accusing me and using fallacies to put me and my entire being in a bad light. But this isn't what bothers me the most, no. What bothers me the most is that suddenly, I receive this text message telling me she wants to start with a clean slate and that she hopes I can do the same. However, I have to get some things off my chest too. She's had her opportunity, she's done it, but I have to shut up just like that and don't make a fuss about it? Really? What's more, first she didn't want me to come with her family and my parents on holidays, as she'd been irritated by my presence last year, and now, she's completely changed her mind and I have to go with them on that holiday, without ever asking me if I still want to. Because, let's be honest, if you're not welcome and you have only the tiniest bit of female intuition, you can predict that this won't be a happy holiday. That's a shift of 180 degrees, for crying out loud!
My heart is broken, especially since this whole situation destroyed my mother and her mother's heart entirely. I won't go into detail - once again, I apologise for that - but she's been on the verge of killing herself a few times this week. And who has to sit and watch from a distance of a rough 250 kilometres, without being able to do anything but listen? Who has to endure the desire to go home and to comfort her mom? Who has this apt feeling of not belonging in this place? Who wishes she'd never been born? You guessed it, right?
Luckily, I have my therapists. I can talk to several nurses and my psychiatrist about this whole situation. My mom, however, is on her own, as I've noticed that my dad didn't really support her nor did he show some understanding towards her. Quite the contrary, in fact. Anyway, that doesn't really matter. Don't get me wrong, I'm happy that my mom and sister talked about this situation this afternoon, for it became unbearable for my mom. But he or she who hurts my mom directly, also indirectly hurts me and awakens a rage inside of me that I can barely control. I'll probably have no other choice than accepting this statement: "broken-hearted shall I be, for the rest of my life". And what happens next, only God knows... I only wished I could have my say too, for now I just have to say yes and amen, while my heart is heavy and I feel sad, very sad indeed...
Dear reader, it's high time I owned up to being addicted. Not to alcohol, not to hard drugs, not even to soft drugs, but to one of my precious pills: Tranxene, a tranquilizer.
I feel quite bad about it, but at the same time, I keep on taking this drug, day after day after day. And even though it's prescribed, my psychiatrist wanted me to cut down my personal use, because it's actually meant to use in moments of crisis. Instead of cutting down my use, however, I'm only building it up. I have these nights in which I can't sleep, and then I immediately point a finger at the meds, at the Tranxene, to be more precise. So the next night, I take a double dose, which is still less than the prescribed maximum. So why am I making this fuss about my personal use then? Because, dear reader, all day long I'm longing to take my precious 10 mg of Tranxene, so that I can feel groggy, very groggy indeed, with the consequence that I'll have a good night's sleep, which isn't bad, right? However, the feeling of being groggy comforts me somehow. The only bad consequence is that the morning after, I still feel THIS groggy that I can't function in a normal way. It gets even worse: I wake up at about 11 AM, only to have breakfast and return to the safety of my bed for another hour, which means that I can only start studying and working on my thesis after 1 PM.
I'm worried, indeed, because this isn't the first time I got addicted to Tranxene. In Belgium they had me on an even higher dose, and a couple of years ago it also started like this, very innocently. I used to take it in times of crisis, and after the storm was over, I didn't take it anymore. I didn't notice any side-effects of this. Somehow, I got into and out of a crisis constantly for a large amount of time, so I decided I could have more of it on a daily basis. So I allowed myself to take up to 15 mg twice a day. It cost me a lot of effort to kick the habit, but thanks to my former psychiatrist, who handled this in a rude but understandable way, I could cut down the use until I didn't need it anymore. Now, for the past couple of months I've been constantly in and out of a crisis, so I allowed myself to use 5 mg on a daily basis, just to calm down a little bit in the evenings - at least, that's what I told myself. However, when those 5 mg didn't do their proper job anymore, I used to take a double dose, and I've been doing this for the past week - with the exception of yesterday - and actually on a regular basis for the past 3 months. However, Thursday evening I felt really weird. I wanted to take another extra 10 mg, whereas I was already very groggy. I just no longer wanted to go through whatever it is that I have to go through at the moment. I'd rather feel groggy and even fuzzy if I could trade this use for a good night's sleep without worries, without nightmares, just... without fear. But there's more: I'd like to use it during the day too. That's when you know something's wrong.
Now, I acknowledge I should do something about it. I talked shortly about it to my psychiatric nurses, but they didn't really respond to it. Maybe they think it's still innocent, and that I'm just worried for nothing, but I can guarantee you, this is Addiction with a capital A. Especially when the first thing you think about when you're "back on planet earth" - read: not longer under the influence - is the moment you can have another one of those precious pink pills...
I have this craving deep inside of me to take more and more Tranxene, at night as well as during the day. Still, I know I can't do that. It's just that my psychiatrist prescribes it easily, without any question, and my psychiatric nurses don't comment my cry for help when I mention I might be addicted to this drug. I know it's bad to crave more and more pills, and when people reprimand me, I know they're right, but there's a huge difference between the awareness and the moment when you finally undertake some action. I know it's no use denying my addiction, but how do I have to tackle this problem? Especially because I sleep a lot during the day, not only because of the Tranxene, but also, and notably, because of the other meds I really have to take because I need them if I don't want to get into trouble again, in the sense of psychoses and similar situations.
So it's time I said NO to my addiction, but I can't find the motivation to stop this circle of use - and abuse - of tranquilizers. Right now, for example, I'm on a dose of 10 mg. I took it at 9.30 PM and I'm finally experiencing some drowsiness. It feels good, you know, to be under the influence. The only thing is that I can't think clearly and even writing this is a complicated task because I have to read and reread what I've written, so as not to lose the essence of my story. There'll probably be a couple of mistakes in this text I normally wouldn't make, but I'm less aware of what I'm writing. I just write to write, because I have to get this off my chest. Anyway, I'm off now. I've had enough of it. I hope to find comfort in my Tranxene, and tomorrow is another day. Time and time again, I keep telling myself that tomorrow will be different, that tomorrow I'll get up earlier, that I won't go back to bed after breakfast, that I'll start studying earlier... but somehow, it doesn't work out. What I do realise is that I am the only one who can stop and change this behaviour. If only I knew how... Thank you, dear reader, for reading this confession. Maybe this'll help...
Hatred. Anger. Sounds familiar? At least it does for me. Tonight I went to Rotterdam with the people from the church because pastor Bohorquez was invited to preach there. He might be small in stature, but I can guarantee you that his sermon has left a big impression upon me. His sermon was all about hatred and anger that people might feel deep inside of them, and while we were driving all the way back, I couldn't stop thinking about it, especially because I felt addressed explicitly by God Himself. But that's not the only reason I want to share this with you. I think this sermon was not only meant for christians, but also for anyone of you who might be reading this, because - you'll have to face it - everyone of us gets confronted with hatred and anger at least once in his/her life.
If you, dear reader, are human, you must have experienced anger and hatred at least once in your life, probably even more than once. But hey, there's nothing wrong with that! At least, it shows that you're human, just like me. What you do with the feelings of hatred is something completely different, though. You can cherish your feelings of hatred, or you can go to the cross, and put them at the feet of Jesus. See what happens then!
Pastor Bohorquez started off with the example of the Dutch guy that shot several people at a shopping mall and who ended up killing himself here in the Netherlands a few years ago. I didn't know that he was in fact a newborn christian, and that he'd left a letter in his room just before going out on a killing spree in which he acknowledged that he was in fact mad at God. And this said, he killed a dozen people and injured even more. Pastor Bohorquez mentioned that this person was in fact driven by his emotions, and even though he was a christian who praised God on a regular base, he did this kind of crazy thing. Each and every one of us can have these feelings of anger and even hatred. But luckily not everyone goes to a shopping mall in order to kill people. However, every person walking on this planet has this kind of feelings, and only a tiny spark is needed in order to make it all explode, to lose control. And this is what happens way too often. People are provoked and hell breaks loose. Literally.
Now you might think that there's nothing you can do about this type of feelings. You might cherish this kind of feelings because someone has really hurt you or because terrible things have happened in your life. It might seem that life or some specific persons have hurt you and let you down. When I think about myself, I have to acknowledge that some things have happened in my life that were very unfair, like when they locked me up and strapped me to the bed in the Belgian psychiatric hospitals. I still feel very sad about what happened to me over there, and I can still not cope with all that crap. For a very long time I felt the deepest kind of hatred towards one psychiatrist, I even sent her an e-mail in which I told her - anonymously, with another e-mail address - that I hated her from the bottom of my heart. However, when I talk about hatred, I don't have to look back that far. I've also felt anger, frustration and even hatred with a few people close to me, because of their behaviour, because of their way of acting towards me. Now, is there something that can be done about it? In fact, there is!
You could hurt or maybe even kill the people that have caused you pain and let you suffer, or you could talk about it to God. You could say a prayer for the people that have hurt you. That's what pastor Bohorquez told us today during his sermon. Because, if you allow that a tiny spark provokes the feelings of hatred, the devil sees this huge opportunity and exploits it. It's as if you were, at birth, wired with God's computer via an USB cable. Via this cable, God sends you his never-ending love, so you know that He cares about you. However, somewhere in life you can choose to plug your cable in the computer of the devil, and break the link with God's computer. That will only cause you harm, as the devil uses this opportunity to send you his lies and to provoke you, because let's face it, all he wants is that you do things that cause pain and suffering to our Creator. So there is only one way to cope with feelings of hatred: let it go, and allow God to help you with this task.
Pastor Bohorquez compared it also in the following way: when you enter a building, say a bank, during winter, then there are usually two automatic doors. When you want to enter the building, the first door opens, and there is a message on the second door that says that you'll have to wait until the first door closes before you can enter the second door. Once the first door is closed, the second one automatically opens. In life it's exactly like that. First, you have to let go your feelings of hatred before the door to heaven opens. What's more, sometimes the first door won't close, for example because other people also enter, and consequently the second door won't open. And then people get frustrated, because all you want to do is enter the building, or, in our case, heaven or at least a life with God. As a christian, not only other people will want to enter together with you, but also the devil. Then it's your duty to chase him away and tell God that you won't accept this type of feelings and thoughts. So, when feelings of hatred somehow arise in your life, just ask the devil this: Would you mind shutting the door? Only then can you avoid the devil from entering in your life. Close the door, so you can let go those awful feelings of hatred. Remember, only one sentence: Would you mind shutting the door? Very politely of course, because you're well educated, aren't you? ;)
