follows me

I wake up I look at the clock, nothing has dawned on me yet and I stumble to the bathroom and I brush my teeth and I look at my bed and I think

is it my bed

or is it a country divided

and I put on my eyeliner and I get dressed and go to work and say hey patients what the fuck is up what do you want what do you need

and i schedule patients for therapy and i answer the phone and i file for auth and in the back of my head there's a rusty clock ticking down the days and minutes and hours until I have to make a choice

and i think about my benefits and my life insurance policy and my friends and all my shit in my office meticulously arranged and hung and there just seems to be so much of it how could I have this much shit

do i really need all this shit

i have to stop accumulating all of this shit

and sometimes it all gets to be too much and my eyes get itchy and i have to leave i have to go in the bathroom go in the breakroom go in the supply room

i cannot have a red face or wet eyes because i am literally the first person people see when they walk in and i have to keep it stuffed in some internal drawer that it doesn't fit into so that these fucking patients have the correct patient perception

i go to lunch at 10:30 and it follows me follows me

i try to read or write my story and i don't see the characters anymore and i have no interest in them and i can't write them because their story is now my own and i can't think about it more than i already am which is every second every hour every day it follows me, follows me

i try to read pdfs of books i've saved in between patients and i always see things that remind me of things i don't want to be reminded of so i stop reading it follows me, follows me

and then i feel that free fall in my gut and i panic because i have nothing to grab onto and i need something steady and i need something something something

so i go to my private blog and i read conversations i've saved and sometimes they do the trick and other times they're just a placebo

i try not to watch my IM

i try not to repeat old and unhealthy behaviors, but it follows me

i close my drawer and i lock up the safe and i get in the car

and after 8-10 hours of being buttoned up it always just spills out

and i hate myself for it i hate to cry i hate the fear i hate the terror

i hate that i have no where to run, nowhere to hide, nowhere to lay this down

i get home and i take my bath and i sit in the hot water and i think

what have you done

what have you done

who the fuck are you anymore

and what have you done?

you're no better than he is

you're no better than what he did

you're no better, rae

one day i'm #1

and the next day, nothing

how's a girl supposed to make a decision

When she's an option?

get dressed

wash my face

eat dinner

watch grey's

and it follows me, follows me

love and anger and frustration and erratic desire and choices and pain

it all tugs at me with its sharp needle teeth until i need another bath until i need to wash it all off

nothing gets done and nothing gets solved

so i go to bed

and i wake up

i do it all over again

and it follows me, follows me

and i think if you knew what it's costing me

to love you

you wouldn't ask me to

and if you think i'm asking for too much

you should be prepared to get nothing at all.

i cannot ask for more than what you're willing to give

i cannot ask for more than what you're willing to give.

-rae