Apple Juice > Wine

That's all.
#soberlife
#nothanks
#bye

...the origin of love

Last time I saw you

We just split in two
You was looking at me
I was looking at you
You had a way so familiar
But I could not recognize'cause you had blood in your face
And I had blood in my eyes
But I could swear by your expression
That the pain down in your soul
Was the same as the one down in mine
That's the pain
That cuts a straight line down through the heart
We call it love

Hedwig Heart... come back Hedwig

sexuality shmexuality. treatment, shmeatment

when I first came out as gay, well, bi at the time, no one believed me. "oh it's just a phase rachel.", or "you feel safer with women right now after your divorce and such", "you're nooooot", "you're straight you just like girls as friends" and whatever else they dared say at the time. "ok, we'll see" was my stark response on cue back then to all these retorts at one of my most personal traits, my sexuality. i had the tenacity, the courage and strength to come out and say who i really was...and others dared challenge me. it just simply made no sense to me. there i was, pronouncing my unconventional sexual identity to other people, and there they were, telling me i was not what i said i was. just a couple days ago, this same thing happened to me again, many many years after first starting to identify as bi/gay/whatever i feel that day. i am a girl who is attracted to girls, bottom line. it never changed since the day i came to terms with the fact and really embraced that it was real. i was attracted to her, then another girl, and five years later, i am still a girl attracted to girls. am i gay? likely. bi? unlikely. the thought of being with a man at this point seems foreign. it seems inauthentic to the self i have learned exists in me, and inauthentic to the identity i long to possess and own. i like women. i like their softness. i like women with tattoos and uneven short haircuts. i like everything about them. my heart races when i see a girl i want to impress, my stomach drops at her attention and my gut swirls. these feelings don't exist anymore in me for men. 

in a similar vein to my unbelieved sexuality, lies my eating disorder. yes, i have one. i have a pretty strong eating disorder. why exactly, i cannot say. when it started, i mostly know, and when it will fully leave me, i cannot yet say. but i compare my sexuality to my eating disorder for a reason. i don't have a conventional eating disorder...sure, parts of it are conventional, and parts aren't. i recently, and by recent, i mean as recent as two days ago, was in treatment for it. i started off as inpatient and residential back in my awful skeletor days, graduated to partial treatment (PHP as we in the community refer to it), which rung me tight and left me out to dry. i switched treatment teams from residential to partial, a move which i believe was detrimental and a huge system flaw in the treatment center in which i found myself. but like many other things, i had no choice. i switched teams, was forced to leave the most helpful and best therapist i had ever known (thanks Alanna for everything), went to partial, and fell down a hole. the partial program sucked, i did not jive with my new team, didn't get what i needed from them. i quivered in fear and disgust at the sight of my dietician, one of the most quintessential roles in ED treatment, and frankly did not find my psychiatrist to be helpful at all. his jerry seinfeld-esque hilarious nature that everyone loved somehow did not seem to serve me. it actually rubbed me the wrong way. i wasn't in a shrink's office for stand-up, just give it to me straight. but no alcohol of course. anyway, i digress. the partial program was wrong for me, i quickly went from somewhat ok to not ok in any way shape or form. my body was changing and i was still being force fed inhumane amounts and getting nothing else out of it. well, except gay group, that is. 

to come back to the point, i compare my ED to my sexuality for good reason. as the patient, i told my team every day, every session and probably frankly to the point of annoyance, how not-ok i was, how unhelped, fatigued, my overused phrase "at the end of my rope" i was...and my incessant honesty fell on deaf ears. "i'm nauseous", "anxious", "impatient", "frankly feel worse off now than before" fell into silence and instead of help, all i got was more food. "more nutrition!!" "no b's, c's all day", and all of that and more. 

just as my gay(ish) profession to others seemed to fall with no sound, so did my honest confessions of my state and apparent un-ok state at partial. keep eating, more nutrition and go home, rachel, was all i got. why this is and why this was, i cannot say. but here i sit now, with my own chosen pb&j (favorite) sandwich, still doing ok and feeling better than i did at partial. 

confused, yes. overwhelmed at the past days' events, absolutely. worse off, no. 

i have been through much, my heart still longs and wants a normal and recovered and decidedly un-straight life. that all remains, and that is that.

with authenticity,

rachel 

When TIme's Up...Denver Dabblings, Part III

How to know know when you're past your "prime", shall it be now or when it's really time?

Who's to say if you're good for sure, good for now, or really cured.

All the questions, all the unknowns, all the queries life bestows...

Upon us they fall, lightly at times, harder still yet still in rhymes.

Uncertainty can be the reddest dragon, the hottest flame, the squeakiest wagon.

Oil it up, let it run its course, or leave it alone, and feel its remorse.

How to know when you're ready to "go", when you're back to "you", how can we know?

I'm not to say now, perhaps nor are you, live moment to moment, is all we can do.

Mindfulness, shmindfulness, presence galore, smirk at it you may but risk the closed door...

that can slam in your face if you smirk too hard, broken windows and glass, their pointy shards.

None of this is pretty, honey, "that ain't cute", remind me please, forget it not, the point ain't moot.

All the questions, cease they likely won't, brush them away, honestly, just don't.

Life is a coaster, an up and down ride, not a straight arrow, not a straight down slide.

Eyeliner smudges and mascara runs dry, we fuck up, we suck up, we scream kick and cry.

But in my gut and at the end, what matters the most are the messages we send...

to our parents, our friends, the universe, our selves, all of the rest, sit on dusty shelves.

I'll use my line again, for I love it so, gotta end some time, so here we go...

What I know now and what I know for sure, the most important stuff is sometimes a blur.

But blurs become clearer the longer they live, so tread forward we must, both take and give.

Life is a swing set, a merry go round, when it's "time", joy shall abound.

But until then and until we know, the water waves, so fuck it, babes, and go with the flow.

With light and gratitude,
Rachel Ber.