Dissertation Coda

On the day that I was going to finish my dissertation, I got a phonecall; it was David. David is the guy I mentioned a few posts ago. David was a guy that I did my undergraduate degree with, we were together in the first year after he emailed me and said he wanted to live with me after I put up an ad in the university accomodation website.

David and I got on. We kind of were like Milhouse and Bart in the simpsons. Both of us didn't have many friends, one of us (David) didn't care, but I did. I was the one who always had the schemes and he was the one who silently wathced me as I failed (Barney and Fred). Both of us were like the classic duo of teen comedies, who both shared ineptitude with women and a little bit of downtroddenness.

Eventually I found that both David and Greg seemed to feed on my depression and feed it. They seemed to enjoy criticising me and I didn't want any part of that. So I avoided them.

I want to move on with my life , I thought to myself, over hte past year. And I successfully cut them out.

The end of my dissertation on the friday that I got it written up marked a Coda to our friendship.

I got a call from David on the friday, he made a fake story about wanting to meet me, siad there was a big conference coming on, he was also submitting his dissertation. I was kind of busy and not realyl a good host, I was meant to meet him by a unviersity building but I was busy finishing my dissertation. David then came over to my new place and he stood as he watched me finish off and print my Dissertation.

After that we went off to eat at a chippy, his favourite chippy in town. We ate cheap as usual and it was nice to talk to him again. We were civil, however, I kept my distance, he seemed to respect that.

What then happened at the end of the conversation was that he broke the awkwardness that I was trying to save face by hiding with.

"Why did you block me on facebook?"

I just lied. The most hurtful lie in the world. I just want to lay low for the time being. I dont want people knowing what I do all the time and things are pretty difficult these days. I didn't lie about that, but I wasn't honest that I blocked him. I should have told him:

I'm sorry David, but our friendship is over. We had some good times together but unfortunately I want to move on in my life in different directions to you, I feel like I am stuck in a rut if I stay around with you. I must leave you and your insults, but I will have some good memories. I'm leaving you for me.

After I left him and we separated, he was distinctly quiet after my 'lying'. I went off the sainsburys to buy some things for my visit to see Antonia. Guess who I was in front of in the queue; none other than my old housemate in the second year, and former best friend, Greg.

Greg told me that he is leaving for london (for good) and is starting a new job. Good for him, I said and I genuinely think its good. Greg, David and I lived together for a year. IT was a difficult year for my anxiety. I was not very well and, even though I'm not very well now, it was all very new to me at the time.

Depression. It takes time to learn how to cope. Even though the lessons don't end and don't get easier, you developp a bit of a thicker skin about coping with life. Some nights I feel as if my very sanity had ended, and the next day I wake, in the mist of despair, a new day, and hope. The experience was unforgettably painful, but my life goes on, another day passes, and perhaps things won't be so bad, for a week or may be a month, until the next bout.

I have to accept what I have become. My old friends have left me, or perhaps I left them. Improvement comes by cutting off the corrupted good things that could turn into the bad. I lost two good friends. As I said my goodbyes to Greg, although it wasn't a permanent adieu. I took the bus and went to see Antonia, my girlfriend.

Life isnt' a happy ending, but sometimes, just standing to the last bow is the only victory.

I went 15 rounds with that Masters. But I don't feel proud. I'm dirt poor, I've lost my friends, I have been tortured endlessly and I have diminishing doctoral prospects.

This is the future, and I struggle. I struggle not only to live, but to accept and embrace the now.
I want to do a PhD.

I need to do a PhD.

Conformism

There is a large group of people who are standardly of university age (18-21) have a very odd inconsistency about them. Not everyone is like this, but most people.

It looks as if people these days are brought up, have a distinct allocated period of being rebellious and having fun, and then, knuckle down and become part of the adult world. I kind of understand what Marie felt now. Marie felt like she was suffocated by a world where magic was lost; if everything is knowable, and everything eventually becomes known; the old magic is somehow lost.

I saw this as an abhorrent view when I first met her nearly a year ago. I thought what she meant was that we should enforce purposeful ignorance to save space for magic in the world and the unknown. Perhaps she would not admit it, but what I really think she meant was that she wanted a world where there was still wonder and awe at the littleness of our humanity, and the grand mystery of the natural world.

My parents think that I am rebellious because of my long hair. I am not really rebellious in the James Dean kind of way. I just want to be an academic and sometimes I like to intimidate professional non-academics who think they know more than an academic. (That's fair, right?)

My parents think eventually I will become like everyone else, get a job, cut my hair, and clock on like everyone else.

I don't want ot live that way.

On the other hand, I don't want to live in poverty. I want to be supported financially. I want to be an academic. I want to have a PhD.

That's always been my priority.

Or is it?

Maybe I deserve if I don't get a PhD. Maybe I deserve it cos I was focusing on running my support group, getting angry and hoping and holding out that something would happen with Marie.

In a lot of ways I think realising that I have feelings for Antonia happened by letting go of Marie. Marie is so unique and delicate, strong and fierce yet tortured. I saw a bit of myself in her. I would be attracted to her because I feel so much like her.

Sometimes people get together because of the circumstances. People at uni or school become sweethearts cos they are in proximity all the time. Sometimes just being in the right place with a person with no one around for a long time leads to that one thing lead to another syndrome. God, life sounds like a bad porno movie.

Whatever happened to true love? I dunno. I don't think I care anymore. A big part of me has just stopped caring about things. Morality, justice, pleasure, happiness.

Slowly I just feel more and more numb. Slowly, I feel more of myself dying. I'm not sure I really care that much. I used to, but I just let go....

let go....

The past week

Hello Everyone,

I've been away for the past week or so and not posting. This has been for a few reasons.

1. The most important and explanatory worthy consideration is that my internet connection has died at my flat. Apparently it should be installed in about... three days ago.
2. I may have mentioned that I failed an essay for my MA; I was almost about to finish my degree and then I got the bad news. I failed my essay that I did about a month or so previously.
3. More bad news. My potential doctoral supervisor has refused to give a reference. He said to finish off my masters first, and take things one step at a time. The irony is that when people say that to me, I believe it less: i used to believe in it and say that as a mantra repeatedly.

One step at a time.

4. It looks like my finances are not looking too good. I want to do a doctorate. I want to be in the university. I want to be at uni. I don't want to be anywhere else. I don't want ot take time out. I don't want to have a job and never thing about intellectual things again. I want to write essays and read books and be around academics and learn from them.

I don't want to leave university.

5. My student period ends in a few days. I call my family and they expect me to do everyhting independently. They feel such disappointment in me and don't want me to---

as I type I just experienced a trigger...

I think I'm going to end the post now. Suddenly I want to purge.

angry again

I have finished writing a letter to the NHS about arranging an appointment.

I feel angry.

want to take it out on someone.

spoke too soon about the whole trigger thing...

oh well.

"!!!"

My folders, i have now decided, will possess the following prefix if they warn me of a trigger

"!!!!!"

Improvement

The triggers are lessening, I've not had a trigger in a few days. That's really good...

All I need now is a PhD place.

I need a PhD.
I want to get better.

Happy Anniversary

Today, well yesterday, is the official 1-year anniversary of this blog.

In a way, I guess I am pleased at how much has changed, although I am not in a good way currently, I can be glad of my personal development. I can regret whatever I like if I ever thought hard about it, but today, I shall be glad. I'll try to anyway...I lost my virginity this year, I got a girlfriend who I care for very much. I got my heart broke, and did a conference paper...

Better than nothing.

I hope the next year brings me even more adventure...because...I'm always focused on the now. Never on the wider picture.

That's why I'm bad at planning. That's my big flaw.

heaviness

the heaviness has set in again.

I find it all too difficult to fight on. Why, what's the point of going on?

What do I do?

I guess one thing I can do is buy some food...

then start work

Everything is so hard.

I don't want to do anything. Hope is that tiny glimmer of light, it gets smaller as I stay more sedate.

Done?

Spent the weekend with Antonia. That was amazing. Today my goal is to get another pair of dissertations bound (for me). I've given in my dissertation. Is this cause to celebrate? No...

I need to resubmit an essay, finish my MA. Hopefully get a bloody MA.

And hope....

hope for a PhD place.

What makes a good 'account'

A biography is an account of one's life that does not tell everything, and yet, is warts and all. A biography is a characterisation, but not a full depiction.To write well is not to say everything you know. It is never the sign of eminence to go full on in one's knowledge and skill. That is a fault from which I must learn

horror

is my current feeling.

repeating the feelings of earlier depressions...

broken

Today i asked my tutor to be a reference. I think he refused. He said lets take things one at a time.

I have a feeling the PhD dream isn't going to happen...

I don't want to lose my dream...please please please make it happen...

please give me my dream. I'll do anything...

please God give me mercy....

I will die if I can't do a phd...I am falling apart.

I have been thinking about antonia all day....dreaming of her support...is all i can hold on to

the morning after the night before

Typing perhaps cannot communicate the heaviness I feel. But sometimes, conveyance is not the reason I write; I seek expression, clarification, and most of all, acknowledgement.

I have a lot of flaws. Antonia, I realise, how much i care for her. In some ways, I feel like I am getting over Marie by realising the immanence of what Antonia is; Marie was always at an arm's length. I guess she didn't really want me. But enough about that. let's talk about me, and my faults.

my fault is that I have had a bad time writing essays. This goes back to my undergraduate days. I got most of my MA marks; most of them are just bare passes; in undergraduate degree terms, they are all 2:ii. In school I was always the C-student. What is the C-student? The C-studnet is the one people say could always do better, or the person who did their best and their natural ability was average at best. The person who is average, normal, regular, standard. In British society excellence comes as standard in good universities. Good jobs go to those with good degrees and good marks.

My fault is that I lack clarity and I fail to convey myself. My fault is that I am not humble enough. Today I have been broken as a man. Broken as a boy; made to be inhuman again. In a way, I come to expect this. To expect the struggles of life; just as Sisyphus pushes the boulder up the hill, must it come down again.

Antonia taught me about this kooky new-age thing, called affirmations. I like it. Sometimes, when you are so distraught; so depressed, so broken. The hardest thing to do, is to think positive. To say I can do it. To say I will survive. We are going to make it. Say it confidently, say it clearly, not weakly. Say it strong, say it loud. Say it tall, say it proud.

10.09.08

...the biggest crash in my life

just got an email now.

saying that I failed a unit in my MA

I have calmed down a little, but am still distressed right now.

I am struggling to keep calm.God help me. I am in a bad position to do a PhD.

Observation

Do I talk too much?

I mean like, do I talk so much that I interrupt people and don't allow them to talk?

That's what my friend did in that certain university society...I remember him being very inaccessible as a PhD student. Am I turning into him? I certainly hope not.

Need to be more aware. More sensitive.

stepped out of the fire, tripped into the acid bath

Trigger: marie update on facebook mini feed.

says she is now single.

I just don't want to know anymore. I just want not to be emotionally affected by her all the time. I don't want her to affect my feelings.

Okay, so, today I flopped the job interview. I ate, then, I felt distressed but I was fighting over it.

Now. Marie trigger.

Marie-triggers are so fucking hard to deal with.

stepped out of the fire, tripped into the acid bath

Trigger: marie update on facebook mini feed.

says she is now single.

I just don't want to know anymore. I just want not to be emotionally affected by her all the time. I don't want her to affect my feelings.

Okay, so, today I flopped the job interview. I ate, then, I felt distressed but I was fighting over it.

Now. Marie trigger.

Marie-triggers are so fucking hard to deal with.

The past couple of days

1. Nearly finished dissertation
2. Got a letter from the Benefits people saying they are processing my request (good news)
3. Got rejected from a job interview...i feel a bit down about that.

Gonna have a wank to compensate.

misdirected

I don't like when people are angry, but project it on people who weren't responsible.

makes me feel distinctly uncomfortable. I cant' ask them about it cos they will get angry back. Times like that, or if people respond to me with disapproved anger or annoyance, I just....want to not be there. Purging can help my feelings of coping then

lonely

Antonia is angry at me for my own anger. I feel it is unhelpful to me.

I am lonely. I miss Marie, I had a bad marie trigger yesterday. Alas, I must move on, I must move forward.

erhaps the bigger problems are manifested by the smaller, immediate ones.

restraint

I feel angry about what they did to me.

I must restrict my feeling of anger.

another fault

I need to improve my ability to emphasise, instead of have my own prejudices and assumptions about how I behave and project them on others

stay positive

because I didn't get published.

I might just wank myself off mindlessly...orgasm and arousal is anathema to inadequacy..or at least, its a way to cope.

When I feel distressed; one thing I try to do is set a time to purge, put it off forward in the future...

Okay calm down me...its not the end of the world. Get up and keep fighting.

limitation

a bit part of trying to work out my conditions is to accept my limitations. I am not able to do all the things I can or want to. I'd love to just rest for an hour and get up fresh. I feel like I know where the traps are on the floor, even if I'm walking blind. Learning to avoid springing the trigger. Triggers are agony.

You know...I think I actually used to have trigger experiences even before I started uni...

23 minutes of suffering

I had a pretty bad trigger. The kind that makes you want to purge. It was about marie. I still have strong feelings for her. I guess I have a lot of doubts and uncertainties and inadequacies about the whole ordeal. Why couldn't I help her? Was I not good enough?

So I tried something. Distraction, fighting.

I visualised myself (this is going to sound weird as literally it doesn't seem to make sense) just standing steadfastly, concentrating on an image of myself, holding on, struggling, fighting. I visualised it, I was wearing my most fierce outfit and I would just concentrate on that image, the unblinking, unbreakable me.

Then a little doubt slipped in; that fierce outfit is pathetic, you are pathetic, keep fighting. It didn't work. I then started to think of marie, I felt distressed, I constantly am coming to the thought , the same thought over and over again I could never have her.

Antonia taught me about affirmations. Just say how you want the world to be. State your intention of how you want the world to be, how you want your beliefs to make the world fit it. I want to move on. I uttered the phrase. I want to move on...I want to move on, from a croaky, slow and reluctant voice, the more I said it I had more confidence. I want to move on. I will move on. I'm going to move on.

Eventually the distress was lessened. Is that a success? I don't think breakdowns ever have successes, but, I did record the time in which I got over the trigger. 23 minutes. Not bad, in this world of statistics and data, cold hard facts, that's going to come useful in actually calculuating days and distrubaces

Hmm, I need bubble bath

As I got up today, I got some aromaterapy oils ffrom my collection and I had a long luxurious bath. I feel nice now. I always felt anxious about 'letting go' and relaxing in a bath...for many years.

I am willing to change. I feel improvement is coming. I feel scared of getting better in some ways, the fear of the new, I suppose.

Suicide pack

So as I was unpacking, I come across the random things of the past few years that I acquire and such. One thing that I have acquired is a suicide pill cocktail; it consists of various antidepressants and very very strong things that were prescribed to me during my darkest days. Around the time of my hospitalisation I decided to stop taking my medication, as an empirical point to say that things stopped getting worse when I stopped taking them; the aetiology (which should be fairly strong) was that stopping the meds meant things were getting better relative to them not getting worse, and the initial symptoms remained.

The suicide pack is a relic of the past...will I ever use it?

New flat

There are lots of nice things about my new flat;

1. It is near the catholic cathederal
2. It has a piano
3. It is cheap
4. It is near uni
5. Has a nice table to arrange my computer
6. It's small and manageable (it's more of a -not-bad than a -good thing)
7. Initial impressions: nice guys who live here...all mathematicians

Optimism/hopes

1. I need funding sorted out
2. I need to be accepted for PhD
3. I need to write up my Dissertation Draft