I Got a New Drug... It's the darndest one ever!

` There's a rainbow to my right and a sunset to my left. In between the two, Phil's cousin Matt is playing Halo. He got here (from Columbus, Ohio) just today, though I've been too drowsy from my new prescription to really go anywhere with the guys.

` And what is this new drug? I bet you'll find this amusing:

` I've been prescribed many things in my life for my emotional problems, including: Celexa, which wasn't effective; Zyprexa, which caused 'halos' to form around lights in my field of vision; Zoloft, which somehow caused me to gain thirty pounds; Geodon, which ironically made me constantly vomit and convulse for two weeks and lose the thirty pounds; Abilify, which made me constantly twitch, rock back and forth, and act and talk just like a crazy person; Wellbutrin, which caused a painful seizure and an even more painful hospital stay; more Zyprexa, which caused me to weave across four lanes of traffic about five times because the street lights obscured my vision; Depakote, to prevent me from having more seizures, and; Nortriptilyne, which makes me sleep twenty hours a day and suppresses all my emotions entirely.

` And what did my psychiatrist prescribe just yesterday?

` Benadryl.

` *Ahem* - I actually wrote this earlier about my experiences with over-the-counter allergy medicine:

` I would have these internal struggles with myself, trying to rationalize my actions. I'd think: "But I'll be able to calm down enough to do something important! My mind seems so much sharper... and I actually stop feeling bad!"
` And I'd counter: "You only think it clears your mind because it makes you feel that way! It actually is just making you all drugged up. No wonder you feel much better, too - your muscle tension is so low! That's no way for someone to live their lives!"

` Well, I need a clear mind and low muscle tension, and Benadryl's actually worked on those counts... so... that's what she told me to take!
` Ha!!!
` It actually amused me so much that I told Joey 'Swill Man' Migeed about it when I saw him on AIM. You know,

` Stop LICKING ME!!!

` Oh, sorry. Butters has gotten back into her old habit. I hope this means her eye is feeling better. Well, time to put more salve on it! C'mere, kitty!

` I'd go, but as I've got quite a reputation for making my blog entries monstrously long, why stop now?

` Well, I still have part of our last IM session, though not the part about traveling to various countries. You see, Joey's been in Cairo for quite a while now, though he comes back to America tomorrow.
` Cairo sounds like an interesting place to go, but what do you think we actually talked about?

Me: what's STRING spaghetti, anyway?
Joey: you don't know? the long noodles!!
Me: I just call that 'regular' spaghetti.
Joey: yeah...but to some people "regular" is elbow macaroni, so I give it a name
(Very long lull.)
Joey: yum...spaghetti
Me: Ah... good idea...Weird. 'regular' spaghtetti = elbow macaroni. I hear that in Italian their word for 'pasta' is 'macaroni'. And vermicelli means 'worms' or something. Why don't we all call pasta by its description? like; 'I like the green, corkscrew kind'
Spaghetti's my favorite, though. I think the word means 'hair' or something. I forget.
Joey: heh
Me: Yum... hair. "More worms, please!"
Joey: spaghetti is good stuff....and I love the frozen pizza that comes in those yellow boxes...don't know if you have it over there...on the hip 'n' swingin' "west coast"
Me: in the yellow boxes? What kind?
Joey: i forgot the name....there's also an identical kind in red boxes called Tostinos or something
Me: Oh, Totino's. Yeah. You know what's funny? I've seen Canadian commercials for DiGiorno frozen pizzas and they're called DeLicio for some weird reason. Hee hee.
It's not delivery, it's DeLicio! (It's the "cheesiest!")
Joey: them crazy Canadians
Me: I didn't think it possible, but their humor also tends to be even dumber than ours, from what I've seen on their shows. Kids in the Hall at least was weird, but.... I don't know. Then again, is there anything worth watching on TV in America that much? So many shows are too stupid or whatever to be funny.
Me: (Their commercials are the same way, somehow... they're even stupider than ours!)
Joey: gotta love Family Guy
Me: Oh, yeah... that's why he's a comin' back from the dead! I couldn't believe they cancelled that show! Of course, we can't get Fox with our puny antenna.
Joey: hah....well, I'm going off for a few minutes, because I need the phone to order some KFC...I haven't eaten anything all day
Joey: bye
Me: Happy finger-licking goodness! I gotta get to bed, though.

` Now don't you feel so priveleged to have read that string of total mundanity instead of something remotely interesting?

` I call it 'reality blogramming.'

` Also, if you noticed, I tend to type a whole bunch, and not just on my blog. But starting from now on, I shall work on a new technique I've decided to call 'subtraction' - saying more with less words. Working on this technique, I can write my novel, 'CM', more effectively!

` And as soon as my internet service comes back online I'm going to post this.

` It's nearly twenty four hours later, and our ISP is back up!

` But first, I must tell you what happened last night:

` The headache I've had for just about two years suddenly started hurting so much that tears started pouring from my eyes. It's a very interesting experience for me, personally, because all I could think of was how my dad would say; "Stop it! You have no right to cry! Who do you think I am, some idiot?"
` I was trying to stay quiet about it, but then all I could think about was my dad saying with great disgust; "Oh, crying quietly like that. People think that's so grown-up, but it's not."

` The only thing worse than having a migraine is to think that I'm doing something wrong when I'm reacting to it. No wonder I kept apologizing because I woke Phil up, who then made things worse by getting all agitated and cranky and wanting to take me to the Emergency Room. I decided to lay back down, but then I started gagging. Strange, I didn't feel that queasy...
` Meanwhile, he was saying; "You're starting to panic. Calm down!" and I was shaking my head.
` Then somehow, vomit erupted a couple times onto the sheet below my head and got in my eye, but I didn't feel anything. I think it might have something to do with the fact that both of my eyes are completely numb right now.
` Well, I got into the bathroom and washed up, Phil steam-cleaned the bed and then threw the sheets into the washer, while apologizing to Matt, who was sleeping on the couch about four feet away.

` And you know what was really weird? I got out of bed and Matt was in the last level of Halo - which I've never been able to get past - and I apologized for making noise last night and Phil stomping around and bickering only feet from his head. ("How do I get these in?" "Just throw the sheet in!" "How do I get this other thing in?" "You have to wait." "What cycle do I put this in on?" "I don't know." "Then I guess this doesn't get washed." "Philll! I can't see!")
` Matt said; "Oh, that's okay. The only time I woke up last night was when the cat sat on my chest this morning."

` What a sound sleeper!

` Also, a little later, he actually beat Halo. Something I've never been able to figure out how to do because of the copious amounts of tentacle-creatures.

Do you know what Defragging is? (I should HOPE so!)

` Here's a cute little humorous question for people who own computers - especially ones with a Windows Operating System of some sort. I think it is immensely funny when they don't know the answer. You get 2 pieces of delicious candy for answering this correctly:

What is defragmenting, or, 'defragging?'

Bonus Question, (worth another delicious piece of candy):

Why is defragging important?


Answer:

` When you put files into a hard drive, they are all inserted in a row, something like consecutive pages in a book. When a file that is between two others gets bigger, for instance, it will need to extend despite having no physical space at the end of it. So it puts a little 'go to' message at the end and skips ahead to a blank space to continue depositing the file. This is called 'fragmenting', for obvious reasons.
` Similar complications happen when you delete things and create blank spaces, which may be in the middle of a dense block of data, providing more space for files to get fragmented to. After a while, in order to read any fragmented files, the hard drive then has to skip backwards and forwards from piece to piece as it goes along, a lot like a super-fast version of a 'Choose Your Own Adventure Book'.

` Needless to say, your hard drive head really gets a workout from all this collecting pieces of files, and that slows down your computer like mad!
` Logically, what defragmenting does is takes all your smashed and broken pieces of memory and puts them back together, so your hard drive is not in constant pursuit of them.
` Windows is especially bad with this in that it doesn't attempt to avoid these problems by doing things like fragmenting files in as closely-spaced areas as it can.


` Bonus Answer:

` It is important to defragment because your hard drive will become less and less coherant until it simply grinds to a screeching halt! It also makes your computer more likely to cause an error, which could cause your hard drive to crash! I remembered the hard drive in my first computer crashed - everything I'd created was lost! It was as if I'd formatted the hard drive!

` Of course, long ago I didn't know what 'defragging' was, because when I was trying to learn about our first computer, my dad kept touching me and distracting me, which eventually drove me out of the room. As I was the only one to really use the computer, I doubt he defragged it at all! This may have something to do with it - also, Dave, the computer guy, apparently enjoyed it when our computer crashed! He might have set it up to crash! Not sure...

` Oh no, here it comes!

` And now for a bit of DadRanting, as he was detrimental to my computer knowledge: That computer had the then-brand-new Windows 95 on it, but Dad didn't let me use it much until we took both DOS and Windows 3.1 classes. Which we did.
` So, we sat in a classroom for hours, which was stiflingly boring. I learned everything I already had figured out and little else. (But not defragging!) My dad evidently didn't learn much (not even how to operate my laptop after he stole it), and my mom is still computer-illiterate!
` On the same vein, we weren't allowed to get the internet until we took internet classes (what brainfart can't use the internet when they can use Windows? Someone without abstract thought, evidently...), but his manic phase, in which he paid for the computer classes, was over, and (as usual) he didn't take any more interest in it. So he never did allow me to get the internet.
` Whenever I went over to other people's houses, I was like; "Ooh! Can I get on the internet?" The first time I used the internet myself, I picked up the basic things you need pretty fast: The URL (address) bar, the back and forward buttons. EASY! I COULD USE IT! I'm pretty sure chimps could if you gave them a chimp-oriented web site!
` After Dad moved out (stealing everything he could while we were out of the house), we got ourselves a new, 80 gig computer (which I learned to defrag!), with high-speed internet, and I quickly learned 'Reload' and 'Stop', and 'Favorites' ('Bookmarks'). Learning 'Find' was next; I figured it out because I've been using the same feature since 1997 when I had Corel Wordperfect! (Just didn't notice it at first.)

` Enough DadRanting! Seriously, though, if you own a computer and are capable of using the Internet and reading this (not requiring any braindead classes), 'Defrag' should be something you already know to do.
` If this is so, here are three pieces of delicious candy!

` If not, how to get to it is easy: For Windows users, anyway, go to your Program Files, where all your programs are generally installed, then your Accessories folder. It's in the folder marked System Tools. You just tell it to defragment any of your drives and it does it. Mine even gives me a preview of what it looks like - it shows how all the data is distributed via variously-spaced chunks and bars; most of it's blue, but the red bars are where it's really mixed up! The bar in the middle is green, because you can't defragment what is needed to run the computer! Then, it gives me a preview of what it predicts it will look like afterwards, but it's not very accurate until the process is almost finished.
` If your computer only defrags so much at a time and then stops, you may need to do it several times in a row. Sometimes my computer says: 'This volume does not need to be defragmented' - even when it does! So I continue until it defragments all 80 gigs before I can count to ten!
` And you call yourself a technoholic... well, you'd be surprised how many people don't know this! They're all like: 'My computer used to run so fast... what? What's defragging? Never heard of it."

` Anyhow, if you don't defrag, your hard drive is in trouble!

` ...And since I can't make little shooting-stars, I'll just write:
` This has been a Public Service Announcement from SQN!

` For me though, I'm finally getting around to making my own HTML files... it's so fricking easy to grasp! A chimp could... well, maybe not HTML because chimps don't always have the best spelling skills, but I'm sure a chimp-oriented programming system using single-lexicon commands can be invented! The successfulness of such an endeavor would show how organized and abstract a chimp's mind really is! Or isn't...

` Even more off the subject is my Personal Note: Just earlier, Phil, EdgeWalker and I saw about twenty fireworks displays from the terrace! Everett's show was late and evidently most of the people had left - we saw droves of cars driving away!
` Instead of the barge shooting off the fireworks near shore, they apparently began to get the attention of whoever was left by beginning the show while the barge was still way, way, off in the distance. By the time it got to the dock, where a few people were probably still waiting, the show was over!

I'm not the only one with DadStories

` I also have a half-brother, whom I've always called 'Brother' for some really strange reason. Though he moved out when he was eighteen (and I was nine), he's still somewhat affected by my dad's insane criticisms. Earlier this year, Brother did say to me, while ranting about Dad, that he's had this inferiority complex instilled by my self-righteous father all this time, but was really starting to realize that what my dad thinks of him doesn't matter. Dad's just an asshole. And I wouldn't use that word unless I really meant it. So who cares what he thinks?

` But wanna read something funny? Brother (oh, that looks so weird in writing!) apparently did something really amazing to rebel against my dad that he never found out about - and it's really friggin funny! Mua ha ha ha ha haaa!

` Yes, from the beginning, my brother (half-brother, anyway) has really feared my dad, and later on, hated him. When Bro was really little (way before he was even a sibling at all), my dad would ask; "Hey, you wanna play Coleco?" Brother would whimper; "Do I have to?"
` Why? Because Dad would get really angry when he lost. There was this one game where they piloted little, goofy tanks, and my dad would say; "Hey, move your tank out of there so I can shoot you." And when Bro didn't, Dad was not usually able to win. And when Dad was not able to win, you'd have this;
` "GOD DAMMIT! YOU DON'T LET ME WIN, YOU LITTLE BASTARD!"
` Storming around the house and ranting, screaming at my mom because he's the sorest loser of anyone I've ever known.

` From what I gather, my dad was a baby about everything since my mom married him. Now, around when I was born, Bro went to boy scouts, where he learned that the other kids and their dads absolutely hated my dad's guts! They'd say; "Is that that Jerry guy's car? God I hate that guy!" and stuff. Hearing that comment was the first time my brother learned that he wasn't the only one who loathed his stepfather.
` Another thing that greatly annoyed the people in Troop 507, was that, after scout meetings, Dad would hang around with the last person to leave and not let them go home until hours later - my mom actually thought the meetings were supposed to end after nine! Not only did they hate that, but my brother did too, because Dad didn't let him ride home with anyone else.

` Nifty Fact: Medina Boy Scout Troop 507 has unique patches and brands for their picnic tables. My dad was behind that - I think Mom actually drew it, and he colored it in - it's supposed to be a cartoon bee, though it's kinda creepy. I know this for a fact because I saw the paper prototypes when I was a kid and asked what they were for.

` Another thing he tells me about was when Dad would make him go clothes shopping and buy pants, he'd do the 'belt loop tug' in front of a cute sales girl and say "Does it fit in the crotch?" Not only for pants that he hadn't tried on before, but all the pairs of the exact same kind of jeans of the same size that he was going to buy.
` Apparently, Dad was under the impression that they'd somehow be a lot different from one another.
` Well, that's DadLogic for you.

` In junior high and high school, Bro's life was especially bad for an entire year because for all that time, he was grounded! He wasn't allowed to go anywhere besides school or work and wasn't allowed any privacy for the half hour he was allowed to talk on the phone. Why? I think it was because of the incident where Dad thought Bro had been 'hot-roddin'' around in his car, even though he very well knew that the gas gauge frequently read lower than the actual level for some reason. Dad, of course, being Dad, didn't care why he appeared to be missing some gasoline. He just wanted Brother to suffer his wrath.
` He said; "If it wasn't you, then I'm going to stay up all night and wait for the son of a bitch who drove off with my car."
` Bro said; "And I'll stay up all night with you, because I sure as hell know it wasn't me."
` Naturally, though Bro wasn't really the rebellious type, Dad was doing a lot more than cramping his style - a bit of retaliation was in order.

` Sure, he couldn't do anything directly - that would involve another year of grounding - so one of the things he did was to buy an entire slew of cars - a Dodge Charger, a Buick Skylark, a Pontiac (Sunfire, I think), and a Volkswagon Beetle - all without my dad's knowing! (My mom didn't know either, until recently.)
` Way to go, Bro! So, how the hell did he pull that off?
` He parked them in either his friend's driveway, or in the somewhat nearby parking lot of GOW Printing, where he worked. He also got a Toyota truck, which my dad did know about because he began parking it in the driveway. Dad protested it, but at least Bro's little truck lasted ten years - longer than any of Dad's vehicles! (One of them being a dorky, green Mercury Bobcat with stripe-decals and an orange interior. Three weeks after Dad gave it up to Bro (on the edge of mechanical failure), it suddenly burst into flames, and guess who got the blame?)

` Just knowing that Bro was able to dupe Dad, I'd say, is quite satisfying. I wasn't nearly competent enough to rebel against him - mostly because I didn't realize that he was even the slightest bit mean or unfair, so I didn't think I was justified. Really - I thought all that was just my perception and wouldn't allow myself to think of him in a bad light because of the way he demanded that I idolize him.
` Honestly, I think my biggest rebellion was to put pickle brine in an icky spice cake he'd made when I was about twelve. Why? Because it was supposed to be for me, my friend, and her friends at an outing. Just for us. Except... he knew I didn't like spice cake. So he deliberately made it just for them and excluded me entirely.
` You know, that kind of thing.
` I was so mad, I was like; "That's not fair! They get to have cake but I don't!" I had learned to be a sore loser from him (though he did this kind of thing often enough), so I decided that I'd rather not see them eat cake in front of me: That's why I made it all pickly. Apparently, the cake was also for him, even though he wasn't invited to our meeting, so he cut a piece and tried it. And... he started giggling (a bad sign) about how weird it tasted. He asked what I put in it, still grinning, and I told him.
` There was much yelling about how much of a rebellious bitch I supposedly was and so I was grounded from going to see my friend at all.
` Honestly, though, that was about the best I could do in that area. Other things I did, when he screamed at me for rebelling against something, were either his own delusions, or else I was probably acting out of my deep fear for him. So those things don't count.

` Ooh, to buy cars with my own money for about three or four hundred bucks a pop and then hide them from him. Now that's something that would piss him off... if only he knew.... But that wasn't the last thing my brother's done that would irritate him greatly, which he told me about several weeks ago.
` Now, clueless as ever, Timmy Pierson the Amazing Neandertal Man, apparently never found out where my dad had gone to, so when Brother ran into him at the Drug Mart parking lot, he asked where my dad was. Bro told him Las Vegas, somewhere.
` To Bro's surprise, Timmy said; "Really? I was just planning a trip there! I'll have to look him up in the phone book."
` Bro grinned and said; "No kidding! Well, you do that."
` (No, we don't really hate Timmy - he's actually a nice guy - we just like to make fun of him and most of his family for being both stone-age and modern - like the Flintstones, but the other way around.)
` Just the vision of my dad opening the door and thinking to himself; 'What is that goober cave man doing here?' is also a very nice thought, and I'm laughing about it right now.

` Boy, I can't remember the last time I laughed like this...
` Oh, yeah I can - the other day when Edgewalker was surfing through streaming internet TV and we saw a really alienating part of Santa Claus Conquers The Martians on Mystery Science Theater 3000. Yeah, this is like that, except less sounds of revulsion.

Does Insomnia Ruin Your Life?

` I can't stay awake.
` I can't stay asleep.
` Don't you hate it when that happens?
` It's true for me all the time - therefore, I'm always somewhat asleep, and I really don't know what's going on half the time. I spent my teenage years at home, alone, sleeping a lot while my parents were at work, barely seeing anyone else but them when they got home.

` In sixth grade, when I had a 'real desk' with two of the other students, I slept on a bean-bag chair in the back of the room (after trying to sleep two hours in the short bus). In elementary school, I slept in my cubicle all morning, and usually nobody cared.
` I find that very strange, as another student was kept up all night by seizures and he was always being woken up! I didn't even have an 'excuse' to be sleepy that anyone knew.

` Of course, I did have a very good excuse - my dad did not always allow me to go to bed at night. He'd have 'talks' with me, sometimes until the sun came up! He'd say; "I'm glad I can have these talks with you." and I would say "Yeah, me too, really!" because I believed them to be quality time in which I learned many exciting, useful things about myself.

` As you can expect from people like my dad: 'Talking' = Logorrhea. And Logorrhea + me alone = brainwashing sessions. This, coupled with severe, chronic depression, is why I became an insomniac.

` Of course, it was not every night - most nights, he'd scream at me to "Git tibet!" (as he pronounced it) and "Don't wake up Mahm!" Wake her up? Okay... like... he was yelling?
` But whenever he felt like it, he'd make me stay up half the night or more 'having a talk' which consisted of me dozing off at the table, punctuated by my crying or otherwise responding to the crap spewing out of his mouth, though I wasn't really allowed to talk.
` What was more, I wasn't allowed to leave the room! He'd make me stand on the steps for a half hour - easy! - before I could take a bathroom break, unless I gave up and sat back down, because the way he engages you and looks at you as if you're really listening makes you want to try to tell him you're leaving for a minute, but he doesn't acknowledge it!
` Sometimes, I'd go into the bathroom and I could hear him, still talking like I was sitting in front of him!

` Anyhow, I thought that him paying so much attention to me and letting me stay up was some kind of privilege, because I didn't have many - I wasn't even allowed to draw at any time after dinner!
` It turns out he was just using me, abusing me, confusing me, depriving me of sleep, and not actually paying any attention to me or my feelings at all. Still, it was enough to make me feel special: I was getting attention!

` According to my mom and brother, he's been an insomniac since before I was born. He's had his own problems, not the least of which is his mental illness.
` To me, though, the child he blamed for everything, what do you think he said?
` "It's yer fault! Yer always up awl night an' yew keep me up! I heard yew up las' night! Yer lucky I didn't kill yew! Yew always shlam yer door!"
` "I-accidentally-shut-my-door-too-fast-because-I-was-standing-there-for about thirty seconds,
wondering-when-it-was-going-to-close,-and-then-I-realized-it-was-open too far,-and..."
` "That's no excuse!"

` Daily, I had to take this crap. Gee, sorry for causing you your lifelong insomnia, Dad!

` Now I'm stuck with it... There's problems galore. For example, I have the tendency to say things in my sleep over the phone.
` There was an entire year like this - I'd always answer the phone in my sleep, and usually people weren't able to tell, so that got me into a lot of trouble.
` That doesn't happen as often now, but it is annoying when I'm talking to someone and I start saying things I don't mean to.

` I've fallen asleep hundreds of times while driving, but only for a second at a time. Not only that, but I can't pay attention to anything properly, and therefore, I can't do anything I really would like to.
` At least not often... and when I do, I just don't enjoy it.

` Anyway, now I can't get to sleep when I need to. Thanks, Dad! I lay in bed all night, and I can only sleep during the day unless something wakes me up in the morning and I stay up, but usually not the whole day.
` Then I always cycle back to getting up in the afternoon. Sometimes I won't be able to sleep all night or day either and yet not be able to fall asleep until the next morning.
` I have to schedule all my appointments for the afternoon, like I did today. Luckily my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder group also meets in the afternoon. It's so ridiculous! In fact, every time I sleep a good eight hours and wake up in the morning, I still fall asleep before evening!
` Basically, sleep and lack thereof seem to cause all my awareness problems.

` Now I'm getting even more concerned! Yesterday at the kite field, Phil was chewed out by his former kite mentor, Larkin. Instead of telling him how to do things, he laughed at him and also told him that maybe his kite was not made for doing something or other, finishing, with his face two inches from Phil's; "What do you think about that?"
` And why? Aside from the fact that Phil noticed he smelled like he was high, it might have something to do with something else he said: Something about how I supposedly told him that I had 'whorish feelings' and stuff that he really didn't want to hear, and asked him; "Seriously, is she your sister? No really, man, is she? Because why would you go out with someone like her? She's not eccentric, she's insane!"

` Needless to say, Phil was in too much shock to say anything. If he hadn't walked away at that point, I think Larkin may have wound up black and blue.

` Whorish feelings? Now, did I say that to him the day before, when I was in the kite field? I don't remember even talking to him at all!
` As far as I was concerned, I spent the entire time crashing my kite into the ground, puddles, trees, etc, because I was busy watching everyone else or dozing on my feet. Was I talking to him in my sleep? Or at all?

` A few days before that, I also went to the kite field with Phil. Now, the last time I had seen Larkin, he was in our apartment and I was practicing this song on my piano about my insane dad that I wanted him to hear as an outsider audience - barely anybody I know actually knows that I even have musical inclinations, and it's hard to find people to at least listen to my music.
` It turns out that he also has an insane dad, although his dad just seems to hate people and try to live alone. I told him my song was about how my dad accused me of everything under the sun. I told him that my dad wanted me to grow up to be a whore so that he could yell at me, but in no way did I have any inclination to be one.

` So what really happened? What did I say? Was I asleep? Was it me? Was it him? Was it both of us? I can't say. If I really did say I had "whorish feelings" then I must have been dozing off, because what else could cause me to say that? (And not remember!)
` And my insomnia causes me to doze off. Is that it? What's more, the teacher of my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder class thinks that I probably do really belong there. My next class is at three this afternoon. Now, I don't recall having 'missing time,' but such a thing is a common enough symptom of PTSD. Could it be that? Will I ever know what's going on?

` No matter - I have singlehandedly caused Phil to be alienated from the kite field, and he's having trouble finding another one from within twenty-five miles. Though this is the first time it's happened, will my lack of attention keep causing these problems? Will I always be too bored to stay awake, no matter what I do?

` Stay tuned for more 'Misery!' on SQN, with a special thanks to my dad!

Update! Go here to read about the fact that Larkin is a psychotic pot-addicted, conspiracy theorizing Nazi who is both delusional and blows up at people unpredictably. I think it means there's hope for me yet...

The Importance of Recognizing Abuse... An Unbelievable Tale of Insane People In My Life

Ah, my first DadStory. I hope I can encourage you to make fun of my dad's psychotic antics, as well as the Special Education dopes who never found out what was going on. As my childhood was nothing but being confused, used and abused, it's all one really can do....
` And laugh from time to time, will ya?

When I was three or four, I was playing on a wooden swing-set made many years ago by my dad, who was at the time having a bout of logorrhea (lit. 'verbal diarrhea'). He was talking about utter craziness that most people would be trying to escape from, although I, having an Impressionable Young Mind, took everything he said religiously.
` It was all quite disturbing - he was telling me I didn't have rights in this country even though he did; that's why I wasn't allowed to do such-and-such, and I remember quite distinctly this exchange:
` I was saying; "But why don't I have rights?"
` He said; "Because I own you."
` I said; "And so does Mom, right?"
` And he said; "No, see, because I own you and Mom, just like I own the house!"
` So I said; "But I thought Mom owned the house, too!"
` And he said; "She does, in a way, just not the same way as I do."

I never asked what he meant by that exactly, but I know that he did mean that he owned me in some way. The way he talked to me in the third person, calling me 'she' and 'her' instead of 'you', really did seem to mark me as less than human.
` He wouldn't let me do the things I was supposed to do, instead getting in front of me and doing them, or even moving my arms and hands like a marionette so that he could still do what I was doing even if I was technically touching whatever-it-was.

...Yeah. Ha. Well, I guess that is more sad than funny. And this, most of all:
` I remember hating life so much as a small child that it wasn't long before I found myself at the top of the stairs, wondering if I should throw myself down them.
` I kept thinking; "This will hurt. But what if I don't die? But I have to die! I've lived long enough. I know enough. That's good enough for me!"
` Then my dad came up the stairs and I said to him; "Dad, I feel like I want to kill myself."
` And he said; "Well, everyone does, from time to time."
` I said; "No, I mean, all the time."
` He said; "No you don't, quit makin' stuff up!" and continued on.

I... was... four! From that day, I vowed not to kill myself - but not because I wanted to live! It was because I wanted him to make sure he knew that I was capable of feeling. I hated it when he didn't believe me - which was several times a day...

And my mom? I never talked to her unless I had to, so she didn't know much about my life, despite living in the same house. My dad didn't trust either of us, so neither did I: He told me practically every day that my mom was schizophrenic and could not be trusted.
` Constantly, he'd bring up examples of how insane she was because; "She doesn't remember that happening, but I do!" or, "She doesn't remember me telling her that! I tol' her and tol' her and tol' her that! And she says; [mocking in an unflattering way] 'Oh, I don't remember!'"
` His conclusion? "She has multiple personalities: She's a schizophrenic!" Not that dissociative identity disorder (a personality disorder) and schizophrenia (a psychotic disorder) have that much in common. But being a kid, I didn't know that.
` In fact, I thought Dear Old Dad was some kind of genius because I never really knew what he was talking about on any subject. (Guess what? Neither did anyone else!!) And as time went on, he got worse.
` He would always be telling me that he remembered things happening that I didn't. What was his explanation? I must be crazy, too! So must everybody else who he had the same problem with, which consisted of about... everybody else!

Ha... Hilarious!

And then, of course, he'd also blame people for things they didn't do, which would necessarily involve being Loud and Anti-Logical. Off the top of my head, I recall an incident from when I was nine: It was an hour after I'd eaten dinner, and I had just remembered that there was still some rainbow sherbet in the freezer. Naturally, I opened up the freezer door -- but... it wasn't in there!
` So, I went upstairs where my parents were, to ask Dad where the sherbet was, only to find him in the hallway/laundry/junk room, talking to my mom. However, he didn't notice me because he was directing Large Quantities of Logorrhea at my mom.
` A little later, I heard this huge roar of anger: "Where's the sherber'?"
` Well, that's what I had wondered!
` He marched me downstairs and showed me the freezer. "Where is it?" he demanded.
I said; "Actually, I wanted some sherbet today and it wasn't there, and I went up to ask you if you ate it or something, but you didn't hear me because you were talking to Mom, so I didn't think it was important enough."
` So here's a really typical example of his logic: "Well, since you didn't tell me before, you must be lying!"
` And I was like; "No! I did, but you weren't listening, because..."
` And he said; "Well, I don't remember, so I must be right!" (I'm not kidding!) Then he had this huge, terrifying grin as I sputtered in disbelief.
` He kept insisting that I confess to eating the sherbert, and I was panicking and crying, squealing like a Really Unhappy Pig; "I really didn't!"
` This dragged on into the night - though apparently oblivious, Dad didn't even turn on the light. He just made me sit at the table, the only light coming from the parking lot of the junior high school (at the time), pacing back and forth between the kitchen and dining room (which were by his crappy design, and which he never thought was important enough to finish).
` "What did you do with the sherber'?" he kept barking.
` "I don't know what happened to it!" I cried. "I thought I saw you eating some last night! I was going to ask you..."
` "Well, Mahm [Mom] sure as hell didn't eat it! But if you didn't, who did? Huh? How could you not remember eating an entire half-gallon [typical exaggeration] of sherber'? Huh? I know why! It's because you're a damn schizophrenic!
` "Maybe it was one of your other personalities! Was it [E]? Or was it [other E]? [Last name]?"
` "NO!" I shrieked, seriously not remembering having eaten any sherbert for at least a week (considering that I didn't like it very much).
` It was late before the repetitive grilling cycles were too much for Dad, and he finally allowed me to go to bed. Even so, the accusations didn't stop. For over a week, every time he'd walk through a room where I'd be minding my own business, he would stand in the doorway and give me the ugliest look, as if to say; 'You know you did it!'
` And then I would start crying, desperately pleading; "I didn't do it! Why won't you believe me? I'm telling the truth!" (Of course, even if he could see see that someone was telling the truth, that did not generally affect his opinion!)
` It stopped, however, just after I looked up from a TV show to see that he was loudly staring at me. I tearfully tried to protest even louder than this, and he walked off, disgusted, into the hallway/laundry/junk room. My mom also happened to be there, and she asked; "What's that all about?" Immediately, he began complaining about my behavior to her, and then, just as suddenly, he stopped talking.
` Wow!
` Then, he shuffled back into the room extra-slowly, staring at the floor. Most amazingly of all, he said in a barely-audible whisper; "I'm sorry."
` Wow! To think that Jerry ever apologized to me occasionally! That didn't keep him from getting angry over these things, though: For many years after the Sherbet Incident, he would gripe to me about how my mom had held this most vital secret in our sherbet status - he even made fun of the way she'd finally 'confessed'; "Well, I guess I'm your culprit."

That was my life, basically. I was blamed for many things, most of which I didn't do, which was especially evident in the accusations requiring me to break the laws of physics (stuff like me giving him physical and mental difficulties), yet I must have done these things, obviously, because I was a bad kid who was plotting against him.
` But again, I didn't know that. I was a kid. And he did a really good job convincing me that he was God.

Needless to say, he always told me to be a 'good person' like him. Well, I succeeded in imitating him exactly, and it wound up getting me into Special Ed.
` But he wasn't the only reason. I also have a severe reaction to hormones in non-organic milk. [Edit: Actually a psychosomatic disorder with symptoms as described below. Oh, and hormones - in general - don't actually leak out into milk anyway, though they are present in meat.]
` This 'milk-drunkenness' is very well-known to anyone who knew me as a kid; my eyelids would swell up and develop almost black circles under them, my judgement would be extremely impaired, my skin would get very itchy and irritated at light (but not heavy) touches, and my anxiety/irritability levels got to the point where I would laugh nervously, plot my next suicide attempt, and scream profanity at my very Special Educators.
` It was an awful feeling, it felt like my head was filled with wool; my thought processes would barely slog along, and I was so irritated and pissed off that I couldn't stand it! (Unfortunately, I was actually addicted to it!) It was about the most intense feeling I've ever had, besides the feeling I got when my dad would blame stuff on me, or when some horrible disaster (i.e. torture) has befallen me and someone thinks I'm making up some kind of excuse to get attention!

Anyway... some of my classmates had the same problem with milk and wheat and stuff, so... guess why they were there? [Allergies? Though I will note that two children who were treated for allergies showed remarkable transformations in only days.]
` Even though my teachers knew the problems they would have with us after lunch, we were still ordered to do schoolwork. I don't know about anyone else, but all I could think about was running around, crying and nervously laughing (everyone thought it meant I was 'happy' - even me!).
` When I got so shaky I couldn't stay put, I'd get this huge 'fear grimace-thing' and hide. In third grade, when I went to Garfield Elementary in Medina, there was this pine-green laundry bag filled with sheets for the kids to punch when they were angry, and I'd take the sheets out and hide in it.
` Mr. Peterson, a schoolroom volunteer from the Baptist church next door, would then just pull the drawstring and drag me into the hall, or sometimes down the stairs, as that's where the school time-out room was.

Ouchie.

` What did the principal think of this? He would sometimes assist Mr. Peterson in dragging me down the steps when I wasn't in a bag! Once locked in the allergen-filled time-out room (which had been stripped bare, with plaster falling all around my ears), I would sneeze and cough, visibly discolored from all the bruises, hives and rugburns, and Mr. Peterson would tell me that they had called my mom and told her 'eeeeverything' that happened.
` Of course, by 'eeeeverything,' I assumed he'd meant 'eeeeverything', so I didn't think I needed to bother telling her. Which I didn't, since these episodes were way too embarrassing for me to willingly talk about.
` Eventually, this led to me being sent to my room after school every day. Since I wasn't allowed back out of my room, my dad could go in there as long as he wanted and there wasn't anything I could do to escape.
` Did he lecture me for hours? Yes. Did he offer any discipline? No. I suppose he pretended to, but in reality, this was mostly an important chance in his day to vent about how bad his co-workers at the phone company had teased and mocked him.
` Yes, that's right. He'd complain for hours about his personal problems to his kid!
` It went like this: "Bill Grimsley told me I didn't know how to handle this Trouble Ticket, but that's because he doesn't know anything!" or "All day today, they kept saying these nonsense words and then laugh when I asked what they were saying!"
` That sort of thing. He did the same thing to my brother, too, actually.
` By the time it was dark outside, I would be really tired and off my guard. That's when he'd grab me and spank me as hard as he possibly could. I'd say; "Not as hard as last time!" and he'd say; "I won't!" though I didn't think my begging for mercy had any effect (he'd argue otherwise).

By the time I was seventeen, I hadn't significantly matured or developed beyond this sorry state. I was in my fifth year of staying at home all day while my parents were at work; my main way of learning about the outside world was through television.
` It was in the fall of this year (1999?) when I found out that my mom had no idea I'd been regularly abused in school. She was just beginning to say that she thought my dad was 'ill', and I would tell her things that she said confirmed it.
` For once, we had a reason to talk, and one of these times, I'd made a joke about bags and me being in them, but to my surprise, she didn't understand what I was referencing. When I told her, she said; "If I had known that, I'd have pulled you out of that school right away!"
` I was surprised because I could have sworn my dad used to tell me how stupid and wrong people were for doing stuff like that to me - yet apparently, he didn't think it was worth discussing with my mom.
` It was because of his 'Yer teachers are wrong!' logorrheic spiel that I had no respect for teachers or their assistants. They were 'stupid', after all, so apparently being dragged down stairs and such was not grounds for getting them in trouble for any reason.
` Criminal? Stupid? Same thing!

Meanwhile, my dad upped three of his logorrhea topics. The first concerned how 'stupid' I was because I 'sassed back' - read; was frequently in a panic because I was unable to correct some misinformation he had created, whether intellectual or 'myfaultal'.
` The second was how 'smart' I was, because I had an IQ of 160 in first grade, not that he cared unless there was someone else around to brag to.
` The third was about how 'crazy' I was supposed to be, seeing that I wasn't telepathically tapped into his delusions and so could not anticipate what to avoid saying around him. (He probably came up with new ones all the time, too, for the sake of starting an argument.)
` I never understood these lectures of his. The only message I could derive was that I was 'bad' and there wasn't a thing I could do in order to change, unless I had his help. Except, his help turned out to be a series of traps designed to destroy my sense of self-worth. They were very effective.
` Basically, they went like this: "Come try this, it's easy! Hey, what are you doing, you stupid bitch? You're not capable of doing that!" or, "What do you think you're doing? No, of course I don't remember ever letting you do that - why don't you ask one of your other personalities?"
` Worst of all, he'd constantly be groaning that he was unable to break my spirit. Literally. I specifically remember this happening a lot over the years:
` "You're fight'n and fight'n wit' me, all the time!" he'd say. "You're just so stubborn and belligerant. Horses..."
` Here would be one of those maddening pauses of his, before finally continuing: "People break their spirits so that the horse just gives up and will do anything they tell it to. Nau, I've been try'na break your spirit for such a long time, so you'll behave, so I can control you, but all you do is rebel! You just think I'm being mean, but I'm try'na help you!"
` I really had believed that was true, because whenever I told a Special Ed teacher or counselor about how he yelled at me all the time, they repeatedly assured me that he only did it because he loved me.
` Yeah... he must have loved me more than anyone in the world! Which of course, is why I believed him when he said; "I love you more than anyone else, even Mahm! More than anyone ever, ever will, because no one will ever be able to stand you. You actually think you're gonna get married? If by some miracle you do, your husband will wind up being a wife-beater, because no one can stand you! No one!"
` Holy frell!

This was bad news for me, because in fifth grade, Ms. Kauffman (who later married Mr. Porter from the next room and had a baby girl), taught me, as 50% of the classroom's female student body, that I shouldn't learn with the boys because the only thing girls were good for is being uneducated housewives. (I wonder if she's the same way with her daughter?)
` I was kind of glad the first time I walked through the door of my sixth-grade class in Garfield, and found her sitting at the teacher's desk... and she told me in no uncertain terms to get out! What did I think I was doing? Going to school?
` Apparently, I wasn't enrolled in Garfield anymore, little did I know. Neither did my mom. So she found this little crappy 'retard school' on Remsen Road called C-FIT to send me to. Mr. Galbraith and his assistant, Mike Swanson, were two characters which greatly aggravated us kids to the point where people would have to sit on us!

My mom didn't know any of this for years either, until I told her that I ran into Dave Fowler from Mr G's class, and that he told me that they shut the school down for abusing the students. She was very shocked. She said; "No wonder you said you hated the teachers!"
` Yeah... all I'd told her about was how we weren't allowed outside for recess or anything all day, and that they'd make us sing along with a tape about stuff like 'And that's why there are no unicorns!' and... 'Kickin' down the cobblestones. (Da-da-da-dum!) Lookin' for fun, feelin' groovy! Hey there lamp-post, not so fast! (Da-da-da-dum!) Try to make the morning last!'
` Not to mention... my LEAST FAVORITE OF ALL:

You are my special friend, (Special friend!)
And when I think about what knowing you has meant,
I thank my lucky star (Wa-oo!)
That you are who you are! (Wa-oo!)
You are my...RRRRRGGGGHHH!!!

That kind of crap. Which is pretty aggravating in its own right.
` Anyway, even though my mom didn't know about the abuse at C-FIT, I was "home-schooled" after that.
` Good things: No more abusive teachers, just nice people - and some really annoying ones as well.
` Bad things: Dad, and Dad-related bull$&!# such as him saying there was a show on TV about me... myself... and how I thought there were cameras set up all around the house so he could watch me.
` (Well, I had been on a hidden camera before and lied to about it, which Mr. G and Mike had laughed in my face about; plus, it is the kind of thing Jerry would have done if he didn't have to 'gettarountuit.')
` So for six years, I sat around all day while my parents were at work, thinking that they were somehow able to watch me from work or somewhere. I'd just sit there at my desk, screaming at the room, thinking I was getting through to them and then being disappointed when they'd 'ignore my pleas'.
` I'd be like; 'Well, that's just because they don't want me to know that I'm right about the cameras. Jerks!' The only time I ever left the house was when my mom would drive me to go 'socialize' in meetings like H.E.A.R.T.S. group, a homeschooler's book club, some other stupid thing that I guess was a book club at some time, and later, 4-H.
` Luckily, this boy named Phil went to all of those meetings, so I got to know him pretty well.
` I started going out with him when I was seventeen, when the roof was coming off my world and I needed a sane person to talk to about the level of insanity exhibited by PsychoDad.
` Phil had several stories of his own to share, mostly incidences where my dad would be spouting off utter insanity with a straight face. For example:

"So, Phil, you have sinus congestion? Maybe you have allergies... I have something you might try... See, before, I couldn't go outside and get things done because I was too stuffed up. But now, I take this; [places product on the table in front of him] Nasal-Crom: It changed my life!"

...Uh, yeah. Now do a Raisin Bran commercial!

Anyway, I have to go to a therapist in about six hours, no thanks to Jerry the Rat.

Hey,Girlfriend:
Just read everything above.
May I suggest that you have hardcopy of what you wrote. It needs a 'tad' organization, (re: which happened at which school)
Great reading. And, I can relate really well. I do know what it's like to be accused over and over and not be guilty. It's one of the reasons I am a recluse.
Hugs, ( and you know how many miles it is from here to there?) Geez. four days travel at break-neck speed-o.
Mucho' hugs

Dory | 04/04/2005, 02:03