I'm in therapy these days, which might be why I feel so haunted by it right now. But it just keeps cropping up everywhere. As I've mentioned before we are writing essays in school, and all three of them has very much touched on very personal aspects of my past.
Most of my family are also evidently very stuck in my past. They have never been the best at giving me acknowledgement for the good things I do, or even to focus at the positive at all, or let me know if they were proud of me. They might notice the positive things I do, but they very rarely say it to me directly. But they are good at pointing out and focusing on the negative. If I don't answer the phone I must be dead - because of my past. If I postpone an internship to give myself some time to get through losing my soul brother, I must be depressed and headed for the institution again. It couldn't be a rational and wise decision based on the fact that I was emotionally worn out and grieving, and so I needed not to force myself through an internship that to me is very intense and demanding simply because I wanted to avoid hitting the wall and getting completely burned out. No, no. It had to be a sign of me giving up, of failing. Again.
Lastly, I've applied for some jobs lately. Partly because I know I won't get an internship spot this semester because they don't have one to offer me, so I will have fuck-all to do between October 15th and whenever school starts up again next semester in January. And partly because I want more work experience. A lot of students have a part-time job in addition to school, mainly because they have to to make it financially. Student funding and loan in this country isn't enough to get you through University if you live on your own. I'm lucky, I'm on rehabilitation money from the government and therefore am a lot better of financially than most students, so I haven't needed an extra job. But that hasn't been the main reason for not working - I haven't worked out of consideration for myself. School can periodically (like now) be a very rough thing, at times there's a lot going on with exams, lectures or essays, and at other times we have internships which I will claim are a lot more intense than having a full time job, and I know just about every student at my school will agree with me on this. And I know myself pretty well, after years of therapy and analysing my own personality. I need time on my own, to a greater extent than others. And I know that I spend a lot of my energy just maintaining an everyday routine, having to motivate and argue and coax myself into doing the things other people find easy or do automatically. "Emily, do your laundry. Do your dishes. Make a proper dinner. Get a workout done. Brush your teeth. Keep in touch with your friends. Pay your bills. Say yes and go to that party, you need to be social every now and then." Its just who I am, it's a result of my personality disorders, of years and years of isolating myself and not functioning properly. Basically I'm still working on learning how to do the things other people have known how to do since they were 18. And thats why I haven't gotten a job; between trying to get through school and managing my own everyday life (and mental state), I was worried a job would just be too much. Overload. Too many balls in the air. So I have been reluctant to take that risk. But this week I found a few classifieds about small weekend positions suitable for nurses or nurse students. The positions are at Sanderud, a large psychiatric institution about 30 minutes from me. They deal with all kinds of psychiatry; psychosis, drug-related, geriatric psychiatry, you name it. But here comes the past and kicks me in the teeth again; I was admitted to that hospital. Just for 6 days, in an emergency ward, until I was transferred to the long-term institution where I lived. And they might have policies against hiring former patients. And even if they don't, the people hiring might have some serious issues with hiring someone like me. Of course, having been a psychiatric patient yourself can be seen as an advantage in a job like that, at least I do; I've been in their shoes, in a similar situation, I have some insights and experiences that most people don't and therefore can show some genuine compassion and understanding. But they can also view me as a liability, an unstable person. Or they might just simply be prohibited from hiring me due to policies or guidelines.
The thing is, I value my past. Most of it was absolutely shite and parts of me wish I never had to go through all the crap I have. But I know that it has a huge part in making me who I am, for better or for worse. And I truly believe most of it is for the better. I have learned so much, about communication, about how people work, how life works, and how I work. It's made me wiser, better at giving advice, more compassionate and it's given me a lot of invaluable experiences. If I didn't have that past I probably would have been a much shallower person. So I can see the positive side of it. I just wish other people would too.
