TheBanyanTree: The Schizophrenia Diaries

[Monique]

Stew's entry for February 23, 2004


I'm sometimes not there.

I'm disappearing. Which, in the end, is kind of what I'm looking for anyway,
but the process isn't exactly an enjoyable one. Lately I've had a number of
fantasies where I become somebody else and live a life of complete solitude
- where my life has absolutely no impact on anybody else, and where nobody
else has an impact on me. That to me sounds ideal. I'm tired of being
influenced by others, and having my existence be the cause of trouble for
the people around me.

But the process of getting there isn't pleasant.

I remember Kim, at the hospital, saying to me that she had to constantly
focus on me because I would "disappear." And that always threw me for a loop
- how does a 6 foot 3 inch 350 pound man just disappear in a room the size
of a large living room? But I guess I had this ability to be quiet and
remain motionless and just disappear out of the view of others.

And it's happened to me in other places and at other times that I didn't
want it to. Like last week I was visiting Computer Concepts and Sven and
Robin were chatting with each other. I came in, and they both kind of nodded
a "hi" to me and I quietly waited until they were done talking and Robin
asked me if I was there to pick something up. I said, sure, if there was
something to be picked up, and she handed me a file of stuff. And then I
guess I disappeared because she and Sven resumed their conversation like I
wasn't there. These are a couple of the only people I currently feel close
enough to to call friends, but I was instantly outside of their periphery.
Not even so much as a "How are ya doing?" from either one of them.

Even the Post Office thinks I'm not here. I forgot to pick up my mail for a
few weeks, and suddenly, when I do check, I see that all my mail has been
removed and there's a note in there saying "Vacant." Granted, trying to get
the Post Office to leave me alone is indeed one of the things I am trying to
do (I'm sick and tired of the Tuesday afternoon coupons for merchandise
nobody could ever possibly want being shoved into every single mail box in
the entire west coast. I'm tired of the little blue and white slips of paper
showing me a picture of some poor kid who has been missing for 15 years. I'm
sick and tired of being reminded every week that there is another person
suffering.)

So, that feeds into my wanting to disappear. I already am disappearing. why
not make it complete? It's not like there are too many people who would even
really notice. And really, me disappearing would benefit most of the people
who would notice. But there's only one problem.

I'd know I'm still here.

No matter what I do, I'd still be saddled with the same problem: me. And
even as I disappear to the people around me, I don't disappear to myself. In
fact, I become even more aware of myself. I become more aware of my
thoughts, my feelings, my disappointments, my inactions. I become
increasingly aware of how I'm not accomplishing anything, how I'm getting
older, how bad my arm pits smell. 

I want to disappear, but I want to do it on my terms.

Stew