Elle

 Dear Elle,

    I genuinely struggle with my mind going in too many directions at the same time. People will be talking, and multiple times in a sentence I'll lose track of what they are saying. That's what I liked about you. I liked not needing so many words. God, it can be beautiful to only need a very few words. 

    Pretending to care becomes such an albatross. You always seemed to genuinely care. I still like to listen sometimes. I don't like listening to the same things anymore. I'm tired of trying to understand certain things. I'm tired of caring about some things. I wonder what to say or do much more then I actually do anything or say anything. 

    It's not even a choosing your battles thing, it's feeling simultaneously torn and apathetic. Wanting to say or do multiple things at once but also not any of them. When I was medicated on the clozapine it was like playing a musical instrument. I wasn't sure what was going to happen, but it flowed so smoothly. Now it's fits and starts, and I seem to have more deliberate effect. 

    Maybe you didn't understand as well as I thought you did. I may never know. You had the intuition, though. I know you were able to read me. I can't just turn my mind off and on. I can't reprogram it. I need more sleep. I feel so disconnected, but there's things I don't want to remember. 

    I'm walking around in a daze. In the back of my mind, I keep thinking about the same things. There's no reset switch. Trust is all mixed up in that I don't know what people want, if I can give it, or if I even want to. The edges are a little smoother, but I feel brittle. I don't expect to always feel in control, but now I wonder when it is that I am in control. But supposedly that's the whole point. A lack of agency. Separation of thoughts and memories and skills. 

    The brain is a muscle, and it needs training like any muscle. But there seems to be something tangible between myself and others. A barrier. I come out of conversations thinking of everything that wasn't said. but it seems as though sensation returns more and more. Just not sure what to do about it. Where to take it. I feel compelled to do many things but unable to do much at all. Then I find myself asking myself what normal looks like. How much of each action the average person does. As if I can follow a formula for each moment. Living life like a computer with punch card instructions. 

    Sometimes when I talk to people it's like talking in an echo chamber. Like I'm simply agreeing with myself. Other times, it's like no connection at all. Just white noise. Life can be strange. 

   The wierd thing is how people cant seem to make up thier minds, but the way i see it, if my dx is bipolar then they want me to advocate but if its did they don't want me to advocate. Funny how that works. As if a dx code changes my life so dramatically. 

Ashes