may 29 2015

[from the writing workshop. I handwrote this and read it aloud.]

Well.

I find it bring up a lot of things in my mind

someone in my emotions,

when given the task

of writing – or saying –

“whatever I want.”

Well. Since I am here

because I want to

participate in a mixed abilities arts and cultural

performance, I will

talk about some things

I think of related to

any of that. Well.

Any of that and also

whatever I think of

next and not limited

to anything that

emerges, or fades,

in the process.

Well yes. For me there

is so very much always

already here and gone.

Do you want to talk

about class? Growing

up just outside Pittsburgh

PA, near the Chartiers

Creek, always flooding

or threatening to, which

is really more like a

river anyway. About

living on unceded

indigenous territory. At

the point of 3 rivers –

Chartiers goes to the Ohio –

where Anglo settlers

gave indigenous people

smallpox blankets. Where

Penn Avenue was the

redline. And my Austrian

Hungarian ancestors had

a butcher and deli. Turned

into a candy store,

Diabetes, thyroid, sweet

tooth, and dementia.

Where my mother’s haunted

house – split in two by

a shared stairway –

lives by the river. The

flood side of the street.

Up the Allegheny we went

as kids. Slower pace.

I’m all slowed down

now that I got beat

up. Beat down. The

knock – knock – knock –

knock – knocks –

the crack – crack – crack –

crack – cracks –

on my what? My

cranium – my head – my

skull. The assault,

the trauma. That

both knocked my

brain around, knocked

the wind out of me,

pulled the rug out

from under me and

by the time you

receive these words –

knock some sense into

me. Literally. Actually.

Abruptly. Gradually.

Directly. And violently.

Randomized. Selected

to be traumatized.

Don’t say victimized. I

can. But I prefer you

don’t. Opened my

American eyes. White

woman tears and white

Pittsburgh fears. Now

I claim Disability.

As mine, as the pace,

place, space, where I

belong. And rise.

Invisibly, always and

already constantly

disclosing. Black lives

matter. Disabled is

beautiful. Shut off

notices are sexy.

Victims Compensation

reimbursement is strong.

Eating like I don’t know

where or when my next

chance will come.

The name of the game

is microaggressions. If

you can survive

brain injury rehab –

have you really won?

What’s your prize? Are

you normal like the

staff now? Do you

pay income tax now?

How? How should I

live when I’m too tired,

nervous, tense, and scatter

brained to power the

Revolution. When I learned

oppression I for how

much poetry comes from

repression, depression,

dispossession. This is not

the Oppression Olympics.

Or ParaOlympics. I don’t

live there. I live.

Always already behind and

beyond. At once

disconnected, derailed,

disembodied, and perpetuating

stereotypes. Trauma

gives rise to trauma.

Pain pervades.

Personality disorders

parade. PTSD sets

you free. Welcome to the

future. Chronic complex trauma.

Chaotic and disorganized.

Before you can choose

your family you have to

survive. Accommodate me

respect me appreciate me.

I was always already

doing the best I could

with the understanding

I had at that time.

I believe. A Spectrum

of beliefs. A fluid

spectrum of multiple

complex and creative

even – dare me to say –

spiritual – experience.

Before I experienced a

single day of peace,

you were there. Always

and already waiting for

me to undetach.

Was that the first time

I really broke the ice

and felt compassion.

The glacial pace is

too much for many.

They don’t know.

I taught letters and literacy. Language

linguistically with

clarity and a constructed

careful sense of competence.

Rebuilding the identity

smashed like a

brick wall wrecking ball

you see the Shadows in

East Liberty but not

the Lounge that’s history.

Ancient history as birth

right and two or

more lives are what I’ve

inherited.

What is it that sounds

so terrifying about

diffuse axonal injury –

about neuronal connections

shifted. About coup- contre

coup and IMpact.

Better now NO never say

it like that. Just is.

As it is.

microhistoire day 6

I connected more because of the interview and that disclosure and process itself was super important.  so it’s tough to not have given people my foundation and my context. I am slightly frustrated, or maybe concerned, or maybe disappointed, that it doesn’t seem like many folks doing staff roles, nondisabled, or even disabled participants, are coming from a place of understanding intersectionality, that we are agents and victims of oppression at different moments, that ableism is a legit thing that is underrecognized, and that the whole premise of theater and director is perpetuating a patriarchal authority and hierarchical setup. This feels uncomfortable to me for the same reasons I struggle with having a boss. I like lateral. And there is also a large focus on attending to sensory and mobility impairments esp those requiring equipment. And no validation of mental health struggle and other invisible disability. I’m thirsty for getting some validation from others who have a disability justice framework. In that sense I feel alone problematic disruptive and disappointed. This work on access is important for sure but I’m wanting more than just nondisabled or caretakers or staff or professional artists to learn a bit about interpersonal skills with disabled individuals. I am wanting a systemic radical rethink and transformation. The element I am really vibeing with is the cross disability crowd.

it’s hard for me in real time under a tent in a noisy environment to have the self awareness to articulate any of this. (…building trust…) Like I didn’t know how to point out the harmful ableist antihuman historical use of terms like “stupid” and “dumb” in the U.S. When referring to disabled people, especially deaf people and autistics, and how that layered with racial supremacy belief and eugenic pseudo science to mean segregation, incarceration, abuse and torture, forced sterilization of black folks esp black women with an array of divergent needs and disability. That leadership is using some heavily loaded words and I am not talking about intention. Of course it’s not intentionally malicious. But the real issue is learning from missteps and holding space for the history of the intersections of racism ableism misogyny homophobia and deadly combination of those oppressions with the tangible violence of capitalism. State medical and police violence. All these are underground contexts informing our lives not being allowed to surface as reality in the show. Oi vey! *drops the mic*

micro history day 3

Well to be honest I felt like the leadership was not that respectful to the people who talked about child abuse and sexual assault. Also the one day I tried to lay it out up front because one of the participants said the people (meaning those with disabilities) were too broken to hear her stories but she cried hearing ours. That was b.s.    She was referencing what I read out loud the day before. So there is some typical nondisabled people being shitty not on purpose but just by like, not getting it. And me, then I was feeling like I fucked up by not responding to thank and acknowledge those people for sharing until the next day, and worried that my response or lack of was actually harmful by “normalizing” abuse of women with disabilities.  There’s a lot to think about! There’s a lot I feel like I could express that doesn’t seem to fit into the “artists vision” for the show  ..and I feel like I’m holding back to try and give everyone a chance to read and share ….

giles corey had “first world” problems?

11-1

Write about how I feel

How do I feel about mom

I am angry at her

I feel neglected by her

Hurt by her

I feel like I deserve better

The way she treats me and others in my family and others in general is unfair

She is selfish

She is disturbed

She is unable to control herself

She is not an adult

She is taking the easy way out

I feel frustrated

Sometimes I feel guilty

Like I should be helping to fix her

I had the idea though, realization, that I cannot control her

When she got cancer I tried to be there

To help her see things more clearly

To support her when we were scared and not sure how things would turn out

She seemed to get worse and that angered me

I’m angry because there is nothing I can do

I just have to let her be how she is

Even though I disapprove

And do what is best for me

To protect myself from her

To keep a distance between us

Set and respect boundaries with her

And to be able to judge when it is worth it to interact with her and when it’s better not to

To deal with her tirades, her ranting, her cruelty through words

To remember how she raised us in the house on parke street

I wish she would move out of that house

So many painful experiences in that house

When j pushed k into the wall and broke through I thought ghosts and crying children and memories were escaping from the drywall

She is exhausting

It is so ridiculous and extreme that it seems unreal

I feel intimidated by her at times

Not quick enough to escape her clever cruelty

Not distant enough to stay out of range of hurt

Not mature enough, humble enough, to not take it personally and not react

She makes me mad

She triggers reactions in me that make my emotions fly

She doesn’t listen to me

She is always talking and doing and reacting at the next level

Not even there with you

Acting like a ghost

Like a haunting spirit who is following around and burdening the people in her life

Reminding them of her sorrows

Reminding them once she’s convinced them, that they are not real

The only thing that is real is the suffering in her life

Not yours!

Not mine

She has apologized to me in the past

But it doesn’t really matter

Because she did it by phone

And couldn’t say what it was she was apologizing for

She said she thought she was doing what was best for me

What about how she hurt j

I used to be afraid of how she would attack him

And I used to cringe and shrink and shrivel at the names she would call him

Meanness she would spew

Guilt and shame and belittling she would lay on him

Pressing on him like the weight of boulders

Flattening like the condemned of the witch trials

Hysterical

She never heard or showed that she did, anyone else’s fears, pain, tears, tenderness, vulnerability, love

She never really showed love, did she?

I don’t think she could love us,

Love anyone, love me…

She might have wanted to love me, thought she was being loving to me, tried to be loving as a mother

Tried to nurture

She did some beneficial things

Involved me in reading books and visiting the museum, learning

Involved me in music and instruments

Took me to the zoo and the library and the park

She encouraged me to read and travel and go for education

But I felt the sting of her manipulation

Because she wanted these things for her

And since she couldn’t she was determined to use me to get what she wanted for her own

She thought she could suck it out, vacuum it right through my body, like I was just a conductor, a vessel to be used to placate her

To salvage her life

She dumped a lot onto me

Smothered me with a lot

And also squeezed a lot from me

Today I was at a thrift store looking through the book section

And I saw the book Reviving Ophelia, a book from the nineties about troubled girls, wayward souls who were beyond help, who were problematic, disturbed, ruined, sad cases

And I realized for the first time, that when I saw that book of mom’s, found it laying around the house or wherever it was

That that book was about me

She considered me a problem, trouble, fucked up, mistaken, misguided, lost, needy, astray, ruined, twisted, shamed, blamed, guilty, basically unworthy, disobedient, ingrateful

She thought I was a bad kid

That I was becoming a problem child, a girl to be worried about

A destructive and misled teen

Who was damaging her life and her family life by my behavior and being

I never before put it together that she must have seen that book and bought it with me in mind

The subtitle is Saving the Selves of Our Adolescent Girls

It includes stories about maladjusted young girls who get into low self esteem, sex, and drugs and alcohol, and who are powerless against peer pressure but can’t fit in

I think that might have been one of the first times, when I

encountered the copy of that book lying around, that I thought I even “should” be afflicted by any of those problems, any of those societal issues plaguing young girls my age

I hadn’t thought of any of that as applying to me

But she did

Thought of me as being or being susceptible to rebelliousness, self consciousness, angst, causing familial relationship problems, being unsuccessful in school, getting into trouble through pregnancy, std, or trouble with the law, causing embarrassment, developing an eating disorder

The feeling that I disappointed my mom

And also irritation and anger that she was so hard on me

Feeling mixed about wanting to appreciate that she refrained from putting me in extremely dangerous situations and was not consistently physically abusive

But feeling wronged and hurt and confused about her being consistently psychologically abusive and continuing to be manipulative, difficult, embarrassing, and unable to provide any kind of support for me emotionally

Being upset that I will not be able to share with her the changes I have experienced and resenting that I have to hide the brain injured self and disabled self from her out of fear of retaliation

Feel like she will never accept me

And wanting to reject her for what feels like her rejection of me

Feeling like I was a disappointment to her even though I was always trying my best

Even though she wanted the impossible from me

Even though I am still doing my best and I’m not perfect

She wanted me to be perfect

disabling denial

10-29

what would be all the worst case scenarios. the fears i had after the attack. how did i survive. i just coped. i started school as a project to throw myself into and problem solve instead of feeling my feelings and accepting the new normal. i was trying to get back to the old normal. ego and pride and identity. sense of competence and accomplishment and satisfaction. reading and information and learning and writing and academics. had all lost its luster. the worst thing which ended up coming true. worst would be if this terrible thing happened to me. if this tragedy was real and not a dream. that it would ruin my life. that i would never be able to have a good life if something like this assault and injury actually happened. that it would mean i would have medical problems. health problems. thinking problems. that i had no choice and was permanently changed. that i was damaged. that the damages were real and made me worse, less, not as good. that i was marked, scarred, damaged, ruined. that i would never be able to have a good life with such a trauma blemishing my story, my record, my timeline. that i would never recover. that it had ruined me. that it had power over me. that it was the worst possible thing. that i had lost all the good things about myself and what was left now? i sat around, or laid around, lamenting and persuading myself that i had suffered and was a victim and that this was a terrible tragedy that could never be accepted, never gotten over, never recovered from, never remediated. that there was no justice. and there was not. there was no person to blame. no accountability. only victimhood.

i talked to a at remed and said i was interested in a women’s group about tbi support.

i talked at therapy about how after the assault i knew and felt that all the overwhelming difficult flooding feelings and thoughts were going to come back and i was afraid i couldn’t handle them, couldn’t survive them, couldn’t manage myself through them. there’s this feeling of not being able to do that alone. of needing help. of needing another person.

the therapist was talking about separation. i had never thought of it in terms of that. separation anxiety. fear. early childhood fear. fear of separation. now i’m currently feeling fear of flooding from the traumas and difficult truths coming back, coming up to the surface, to my consciousness, and being given voice, spoken aloud. but keeping them silent does not make them less true. this is about being afraid of acceptance. what does it mean to accept the truths of what has happened to me, to my mind, to my body, to my being and my spirit. what really has happened to me? what do you do how do you go on when the worst has happened, and how do you cope, manage, survive, how do you thrive and heal and share and participate???

emerging from someplace cold

i’m afriad of what i might find. i’m afraid of what i’ve been hiding/from. will it be too deep. will it hurt. how will i handle the feelings and the burden and the heavy especially while i recover. is it the right time. is it time. is it coming clean. if i tell my therapist what does that mean. do i feel more vulnerable then. does that make it more real. am i less able to own it or more if i’ve shared it. what happens when they ask me and i tell them. what about when someone asks how i feel and i am not sure. and i stop pause and close my eyes trying to feel like i’m not faking when i answer their question. and i still don’t feel much of anything. how do i know how i feel, what i need or what. how can i inhabit my moment and experience with my body so that i have sensations and feelings.

bridgeville nightmare

my dreams are integrated and woven. small pieces and segments are echoing and fading fast. the shells of them are calling me to pay attention to what is happening when i sleep. bishop’s pizza in my dream. they asked me the name. i said bishop’s. i passed a place called bishop’s pizza while driving to ohiopyle sunday. i didn’t stop at bishop’s, but i remembered when i saw it that i knew it from a dream. the name. the path. the way i chose to drive. to direct. to travel. shopping centers. like those plazas stretched out on route 51 on the journey home from ohiopyle. like the one in bridgeville where i sat outside at had tea on a sunny october day, after a three hour long cognitively wearying neuropsych exam. where i walked and listened to albert camus’ the stranger on audiobook through headphones. walked the parking lot. where there was chuck e cheese where i went as a kid. where i practiced parallel parking near the driver’s center. where i used to get my hair cut at fantastic sam’s. where i went to see movies at the theater with r when we were in a relationship together. and also with m. that was a theater i went to with my boyfriends. on dates. i think with friends too. maybe in highschool. and college. the movie theater. family things. the kmart. this time i walked around looking for a mailbox and an atm. i found only the former. and i had a lot of thoughts. flashback memories. less dramatic sometimes, other times wholly dramatic as much as you want. a train went by as i sat outside alone. i sat there as an adult. breathing and soaking sun. eating and sipping. reading reviewing and making lists. listening to an existentialist novella. with my car in the parking lot. i had left it unlocked. the shopping plaza. shopping center. it made me think. i have had another recent dream and it included the shopping center of crafton ingram. the one i grew up near. where my brother k works. where i used to go and spend money on toiletries and cosmetics. one of the first places i could walk to. the first place i tried shoplifting from just to see if i could. and what did it feel like to do. i was with my mom at the time. payless shoes. i think i took a gel insert for a shoe. for some reason i think it was just one though. confusing. i thought about the abandoned house near the farm in garfield that s took me into. and i saw all the cans and jars containing food sealed in the kitchen or what would’ve been a kitchen, the pantry, shelves. and realizing that people have shoplifted a lot of food. that sometimes that’s the way to get things. it can be out of need, out of resistance, out of aggression, out of boredom, and etc. there are motivations. there are many ways to skin a cat. and i suppose reasons to do it. so what does happen when i’m asleep. am i finally ready to connect the sides of my life. dream and wake worlds. the memories. i’m ready to admit the psychoanalysis with lm is stirring me up and bringing another layer into my days my time my life and awareness. i don’t know quite how she’s doing what she’s doing. we talk about how frightening my mom was. and how i survived trauma by her as a child. physical and psychological. and how it was scary and i blocked feelings to survive. and what i did was ok. i was ok, i am ok. i was doing my best. the situation i had at the time was filled with pain and sharp barbs and wires and traps and syringes and caves and ghosts and masks and machines that could kill you.

haunted library dream from about 6 months ago

I had dreams. They included getting a job at the library or something like it. I was hired with three other people and had to work for a husband and wife team. Two of the other employees were k and her sister g. I couldn’t find the employee handbook or figure out what was expected of me in terms of where I was to work and what my schedule was. At one point the wife and the husband both were calling me on the phone to say I was taking too long a lunchbreak and had to come back. When I walked outside I met r’s sister s in squirrel hill. We were going to hang out but I couldn’t avoid their phone calls any longer. I had to call back and say I was coming. They asked me how many hours I wanted to work. But it was in a way that was implying if I really wanted the job or not. And I thought to myself well maybe I could tell them I want part time. But instead I gave a number close to full time, 38. Because I was afraid of saying the wrong number. I thought to myself I would figure out what I could ask for later when I checked the manual on the computer. I couldn’t get back to the right place on the intranet. D was there for parts of things, seeming like he knew everything he needed to do and how to be comfortable and handle the situations. There was some tension with the woman authority, somehow she decided she didn’t like me. The way I dressed or what I did at all. Thought I wasn’t deferring to her enough. Didn’t like me talking to her husband or his friend, the other person who work in an authority position. There were stairwells to the rest of the library and the bathrooms, I couldn’t find the bathroom. When I opened one door it started turning on music to another part of the library. I noticed a camera on the wall up above. I was scared to go to the bathroom then. It was cluttered and had drawings and pictures and things on the wall that reminded me of something like kiva han coffee shop style. I was in the depths of the library building. There was nyc, crafton, squirrel hill, places I’ve been. At one point I said something about how I used to think or suspect the library might be haunted. I didn’t get a response from anyone about that. I think also b from duquesne was there and possibly j from grade school. People who knew what they were doing and seemed to be getting along fine. I felt poor and confused and lost and bad in comparison to them. I wished I could get one of them to sympathize with me and explain some things. To be my friend or ally.

 

While using the neti pot I was looking in the mirror at my neck and chin. Some blackheads. Some hairs poking out. Some moles. Some red spots, raised bumps. These are pretty normal if you’re the type of person to get them on your skin. I then had the memory about having my school picture taken in kindergarten, but I had the chicken pox at that time. I remember mom freaking out about how unfortunate it was and how the pictures were completely ruined because of the marks on my face that you could see. She was upset with me for coming down with the chicken pox at the time of school pictures. I was five. She was upset that my face and skin did not look perfect in the picture.

created 10/30/14, last modified 11/2/14. reread for first time 5/4/15

why. i think about and think about and sometimes try to write and sometimes don’t try. i sometimes but not often type rather than drag my hand across pages. somehow that seems more in step quicker with my thoughts even just because they’re so scattered. somehow it feels too slow to write by hand with a pen and i’m tired of being slow. so i haven’t captured or recorded or narrated much of rehab then. it’s been four weeks going to remed. they said i’d need six months. til april 2015. can it be true? they also said it might not be that long. well which is it. can’t they tell. what am i working on. how far along am i. one of the things that keeps coming is the flooding feelings of how at first after the assault and injury i was worst off. like tripping and falling a lot. dizziness lightheaded and changing colors and contrasts before my eyes. headaches in the front and back of my head. feeling out of sorts and very distant from life and a system designed and lived by people. being too tired to do anything and not quite wanting to sleep. being perpetually confused. in denial. not being able to read. the words not being understood. trying to do a word search when i was bored and not being able. feeling like a completely different and unfamiliar person. some of these things come up. they don’t leave me alone. not being able to concentrate when i can hear other people talking. especially if it’s loud. feeling lost. disoriented. getting angry at other people and judging them hard for not having any idea how to relate to my and how to hear my experience. being angry at them for not knowing how to listen, how to talk to me, how to help. angry that i didn’t know what help to ask for. angry that i didn’t understand my experience and angry at how different and challenging the experience was. such a hard time even having conversations. talking to people i already knew. it was like the most tedious and intimidating task i could imagine. feeling completely unable to leave the house once it was dark. incapable of walking to the bank four blocks away by myself. incapable of buying tampons from the drugstore alone. the interactions. the walk. the lights. the music inside. other people. strange people. strangers. strange things on shelves. aisles of garbage and things i hated. i feel angry frustrated irritated and aggressive when i go to remed and have trouble with activities. i’m upset with myself when things are difficult. i’m upset with myself when i make mistakes or go slowly or do things other than how they should precisely be done. upset when the therapist makes a comment or noise or gesture indicating they are amused or confused or were caught unaware by my approach or response to the instructions for the task. the task at hand. feels like i am at the mercy of worksheets nd charts and computer screens. feels like i am running as a hampster would in a repetitive strain dream. feels like i am crying like a baby and raging like a bitch and reexperiencing my hurt and rejection and righteousness all over the staff and the facility and anyone related to the whole operation. so tired of systems. wondering about how it would be like if i had a strong network of support. a family on my side. close friends who had stuck with me and learned with me and walked along with me, coming through the turbulence. these feelings are tiring. exhausting. they feel old cause i’ve already done them and yet fresh because their strong and grooved in paths and ruts to make them strong and seasoned and layered and so difficult to climb out of upon noticing that i am in one.