I'm Back, Again

Queenie asked me how I felt about my diagnosis.  When I first heard the diagnosis, I was shocked.  The doctor mentioned it in passing.  I don't think he knew that I didn't know.  Although I wouldn't choose to have a personality disorder, it explains a lot, and there is a level of relief that comes with it.  I always have felt different from other people.  I've been trying to fit into this world all my life.  It has been a struggle, like trying to swim upstream against the current.  Over the past several years, I've been struggling not to move ahead, but trying to just stay in place.  It's a fight that I've been losing.  So now I have the opportunity to build a life that doesn't require so much continuous effort.  I'm not looking for a care-free life, only one that is manageable. 

Imagine a foreign country.  The people in this country speak English, and they have similar customs as we do, but certain words and customs have different meanings.  If you were plucked out of your world, and placed into this world, you would never know when you were operating under a different understanding than the rest of the population.  Well, that's me, except that you eventually would learn how to function in this new world, but me, not so much.  I continually find myself clueless, feeling foolish, disappointed, and stunned.  That's the struggle, trying to fit in. 

Funny that I write well, because, generally speaking, I don't communicate very well.  Ironic, isn't it? 

I remember once, back in the 70's, when I had a flat tire.  (My car was at home.)  I set about changing the tire, when a neighbor drove by, thought that a woman shouldn't be changing a tire, so he insisted on changing the tire for me.  I didn't keep an eye on him, didn't think I had to.  I figured he knew how to change a tire, so  I kept the dog occupied while he worked.  The next morning I left for work and heard a strange noise.  I went straight to a tire place, where I found out that he had not tightened the lug nuts.  At all.  Another time I had driven David's truck into the ditch.  (I wasn't the only one; he did it, too.  Except that I think I did it after he had widened the driveway.)  Anyway, another neighbor came by on a tractor and offered to pull me out.  He wanted to attach a chain to the front bumper of the truck.  I had to show him where to attach the bumper to the frame of the truck.  He would have pulled the bumper right off of the truck.  You would think that I guy who owns a tractor would have more sense than that, right?  I mean, don't you need some kind of mechanical mind to operate a tractor?

And then there was the snake in the bathtub incident.  I was taking a shower one night when a snake crawled up the drainpipe and got into the bathtub with me.  It was that night that I discovered that you really don't need a towel; you can air dry by running around your house naked in a panic.  Anyway, my idea was to pour boiling water on the snake (sorry, animal lovers, but I have a deathly fear of snakes, and I was in a panic).  The question of what to do with the snake after that was the tricky part, because I wasn't touching it, dead or alive.  I called a neighbor to come over and get it out of the tub, but macho guy that he was, he thought the boiling water idea was silly, and came over with a log to smash it.  The snake was still happily splashing around in the shower, by the way.  I didn't want to see the conflict, and left the bathroom.  A couple of thuds later, the snake had disappeared back down the drain, causing my threat level to remain elevated for quite some time.  It was weeks before I could take a shower without putting the stopper in.

I bring these up to illustrate how things just seem to go with me and the outside world.  Especially those times when I've tried to ask for help with anything.  I just don't have the ability to communicate what it is that I need.  I think there are several reasons for that, but the biggest one is that I didn't know what it was that I needed.  I just didn't get it.