// as is.
| 08/04/2003 - 10:16 p.m. |

email to C., Fri, 08-01-2003, 4:37pm, Subject: re: Read: if/then
Wellll�have a good weekend.
Still ???,
M.


reply from C., Mon, 08-04-2003, 4:04pm, Subject: Re: re: Read: if/then
M.,

I don't know what it is that you are waiting to hear from me. From my perspective, such as it is, you abandoned treatment with a therapist (whom who said that you liked and trusted) at the point at which she was requiring you to go inpt. As you know, I would have pushed that issue harder and earlier than D. You got angry with me when I said that your mother was rescuing you and failing to support you in the way in which you needed to be supported. I don't see anything positive in your flight to Ph.--it still appears to me that you were fleeing treatment rather than moving productively towards help.

I don't know what to make of your emails. With all due respect, it sounds like you are up in your head doing a lot of mind f---ing. I hope that you know that I will help you any way that I can, but what I get from you is a lot of denial and resistance and ambivalence and a refusal to said what you want.

Set me straight.

C.


email to C., Mon, 08-04-2003, 9:29pm, Subject: as is.
C.,
:-(
I am a 'big' ball of frustration at the moment, with myself, my body, my living situation...you...everyone/thing pretty much. So just an fyi, I guess, of where I'm at, though I am going to *try* and respond here as rationally and specifically as I can, as I feel like I *have* been, but I guess it hasn't been coming across that way so much to you...


>>I don't know what it is that you are waiting to hear from me.<<

Er, I'm waiting on a definitive answer as to whether or not you will be my therapist again?? Your original response was:

>>I am not in a position to provide therapy (my contract prohibits it), but nothing is written in stone and so I can't say that is out of the question. The biggest issue for me has to do with what you want and for what purpose.<<

My reading of that was basically, there is a technical issue standing in the way, but its not necessarily insurmountable; rather your 'willingness' to try and resolve it depends on your 'willingness' to work with me...which depends on ?something? from me.

What that something is I at first thought I understood, but am now feeling pretty clueless about.

And maybe I completely misunderstood your original statement? Maybe I missed the definitive NO elsewhere?? But yeah, I'm still waiting on the original inquiry.


>>From my perspective, such as it is, you abandoned treatment with a therapist (whom who said that you liked and trusted) at the point at which she was requiring you to go inpt. As you know, I would have pushed that issue harder and earlier than D.<<

A--Yes, I do know.
B--Yes, I "liked" D. Yes, I thought I "trusted" her...I'm not sure if this will explain anything at all, if it even matters, etc...but am going to copy down on the end of this email yet another (long) journal entry, titled "(momentary?) truths", one that I also shared with D. on the occasion of our final session...


>>You got angry with me when I said that your mother was rescuing you and failing to support you in the way in which you needed to be supported. I don't see anything positive in your flight to Ph.--it still appears to me that you were fleeing treatment rather than moving productively towards help.<<

Re: my mom--yeah, I still disagree with the apparent majority opinion on her actions. And I expressed to you my own perspective on the matter as clearly as possible. So...*shrug*

But I do agree on this point--I don't think there IS anything positive in my return to Ph. For the record though, 'flight' connotes far too active imagery--I was pretty much just passive cargo in this move. I never *wanted* to leave CA. But the financial issue had been looming since I first went on leave from school; treatment for whatever and many reasons was clearly NOT helping me any; I had only gotten worse, more nonfunctional, etc.; and the day from hell just brought it all to a head. If I was going to tell my treatment team to fuck-off regardless, then it obviously made less sense than ever for my mom to be throwing away a truckload of money on my comatose self 3000 miles away. And I said, yeah, sure, whatever, whatever.

And so I'm here. And it's all the same. And I'm the same. There is just one difference--YOU are within driving distance...


>>I hope that you know that I will help you any way that I can.<<

...but I don't know what that means any more than you "know what to make of" my emails.
With all due respect ;)...

...I submit to you a quote from S.: "You should just at least get together once, talk about it in person, have a donut, cut the email-back-and-forth and other shit."

She's actually sitting here in my room right now, flipping through an Apt. Guide book, arrived about a paragraph or so ago, heh. (It takes me an insanely long time to compose one of these (insanely long??) emails to you.) She arrived in the area over the weekend, staying with family in WC at the moment...Lots going on with her, which I won't get into right now, but bottom-line, she looks to be sticking around here for real, we're talking of getting an apt together?!?!...

Anyways, where was I...


>>what I get from you is a lot of denial and resistance and ambivalence and a refusal to said what you want.

Set me straight. <<

I'm *being* straight with you. Resistance? Yes. Ambivalence? For sure.
Denial? Well, I don't see that so much. I'm very well aware of how thoroughly screwed and screwed-up I am.
If "setting you straight" means communicating something else, I'd be lying.
You more than anyone/thing else taught me how to be honest, taught me to value it.
Would you prefer I tell you something easier to hear?? Is that what will be good enough/worthy enough??
I'm so not trying to be a smart ass here. I just don't understand what YOU want from me...

...And *refusing* to say what *I* want??
*frustration re-peaks*
C. :-(...
I am really really trying here.
And one more (short) journal excerpt...my beginning ramblings to try and get myself going in my last long email to you:

What do I want?
That is the question C., it seems, will not allow to go unanswered.
And I so don't know how to answer it.
There are all the 'unhealthy' things--extreme emaciation and death pretty much cover those.
There is the constant, non-specific, all-encompassing CRAVING for HER.
But I know neither is an answer to what she's actually asking.
~~~~~


I searched really hard to go beyond that though, as FAR AS I AM CURRENTLY CAPABLE OF. You've been the recepient of everything I've got. Which to summarize is this: I want 2 very contradictory things. I want YOU to somehow, if it is in the universe of possibilities, help me NOT want the former. I DON'T KNOW how. I'm sorry that this is not enough. I'm sorry that I am not enough. But if I were, then I probably wouldn't be in the hellish place I am. I wouldn't be needing you so damn much, so too much.

I don't know what else to say. I'm sorry if I'm being unfair, if I'm inappropriately taking things out on you? I'm just trying to NOT bullshit. I'm just trying to make some connection...

...while at the same time I've tried really hard to restrain myself from doing the "miss you, love you, can i please have a hug?" routine, but dammit, I do, I do, and thats one thing I actually know I want.

Please be in touch soon??--
me, as is.


ps--the journal entry mentioned up above there somewhere...
(momentary?) truths"