FUCKING KNEES

I sit here, in Starbucks, again. My head in my hands, again. Trying not to cry. Trying to remember to breathe. Does it really matter. If I cry? If I forget to breathe? I don’t think it does. Right now it would be a relief. Maybe not to my fellow customers and staff, but to me. Rome is in eleven days. I cannot walk. I cannot walk. I cannot walk. I need to cry. I am forty and I cannot walk. Do you realize how paralyzing that is? Ha – hilarious. I still have it the the humor department. Isn’t that great? Yet tears are welling in my eyes. The dam is about to burst. I don’t care. My knees hurt. Even a couple of months ago I could walk. Now the fuckers are quitting on me. How am I supposed to be a tourist with no legs? How does that work? We’re staying three metro stops from the Vatican. Whoopy-fucking-doo. It doesn’t matter if I can’t walk to the train station, or walk when we get off. Will I just stay in the apartment while my family explore? Will I make up some excuse for the kids? Will my husband think I’m being weak again? Do I give a shit anymore? It’s so tiring giving a shit. I think I gave up giving a shit long ago. But I do. I am sore. Every day. I limp and roll like an eighty year old. Fuck it all to hell. I am already depressed, yet I am supposed to be cool with every piece of shit thrown my way? Fuck you. No thanks. And I’m supposed to lose weight magically without being able to walk. Fuck you.

I met a friend for lunch today (you know who you are). She suggested seeing an orthopedic surgeon. I’m an idiot. I should have thought of that before. I’ve already made an appointment for next week. I saw my friend an hour ago. I am desperate. God I hope they can give me a steroid injection next week. I would love it if I could walk in Rome. Even if I wasn’t going to Rome, the thought of being able to walk in a week is amazing. No it’s tolerable. If I never get better, I want out. Fuck this. I want dead. Now that doesn’t mean I will kill myself. It means I want to, even more than I did before. Before the crippled knees. I had the crippled knees intermittently before. They sucked then, but at least I had good days. Those good days outnumbered the bad ones. Now there are no good days. Every. Single. Motherfucking. Day. Is. Bad. Awful. This morning in the car, in the parking garage, I sat in the car for 40 minutes. I couldn’t face the thought of getting out of the car. It would mean walking. It would mean being. Eventually I got out. I limped the two blocks to where I had to be, stopping several times. Each time I stopped, I nearly cried. I was out of breath. My knees were throbbing. I felt there was a huge rock on my back. No more, my body said. No more, said my mind. Rest Ingrid. It’s been too much. You’re done. Sweetheart. You can quit now. You have permission. Everyone has a breaking point. You’re past yours. Something, somewhere, pushes me on. I wish it wouldn’t. I’m so, so, tired. I wish it would let me stop.

Back here in the present in Starbucks, I’m crying again. I’m sad that I didn’t quit this morning. Why did I push on? I don’t understand. I’ve had enough. Why do I keep going against the grain? Trying to beat an unbeatable enemy – myself? Why do I feel so low today? Why has everything come back again? My depression never disappeared, but why does it feel like the burden has increased tenfold again? The load pushing me down, not letting me up, no matter how hard I try. I have spent the last twenty minutes doing two things. I’ve been looking at the floor, where the sun and trees in the wind is making patterns on the floor. I’ve been trying to care enough to make myself write, but not giving a shit. The other thing I’ve been doing is thinking of two friends. Once diagnosed with cancer two months ago, who died last weeks, the other who found out she needs a mass removed late last week, and is having the surgery tomorrow. Fuck cancer. And here I am complaining about knees and my brain. I keep writing this and deleting this. I can’t write it right. I don’t even know what I’m trying to say. I just know I need to talk about B + M. Their fights were and are much more scary that mine. They wanted\want to live. I don’t. I stay here for my kids. That is all I know. I love my kids. They deserve more than me. I think I’ll probably crack at some point and go. I can’t imagine being able to live on like this for twenty or thirty years. Hopefully it’s only twenty. My shitty heart will probably see to that. Knowing my luck however, I’ll have found some unlikely will to live, and then be pissed I’ll only like to sixty. Fuck shit!

I’ve stopped crying. Not that I was bawling anyway. There are no longer tears in my eyes. I keep a log of depression symptoms to discuss with my psychiatrist each week. I wrote down some of this stuff. I was much more clinical writing in the log that here. I do mention all the important stuff though. No holding back. No way he can help me if I’m not honest. I suppose the most important thing this week, is that I think I’ll end up topping myself eventually. So we’ll talk about that tomorrow, but since there’s no imminent threat to life, we won’t do much about it. I still need an individual counselor. the last two dumped me. They both said I needed residential care. Everyone else agreed, but none of the residential care places would take me because of my heart, so we were back to square one. Anyway. I suppose a goal for the next couple of weeks before I go to Italy, could be to have an appointment set up with an individual counselor, for when I come home.

I don’t think I’ll be going home for a while. I’ve an hour left on my parking. I’ve nowhere else to be. I’m working on another post – a short story. I’m dreading getting up out of my chair. My knees will scream. I’m already kind of needing to go to the loo. When that becomes urgent, I will go, and I will likely cry in the bathroom, head in hands again, and all the same feelings of hating life, self-doubt, wanting to be dead will rush in. And all people who have never been depressed, and have never had many chronic health issues, will wonder what the fuck I am crying about. All I say to you is walk a mile is my knees. Oh. Never mind. My knees can’t walk a mile anymore. Hi, nice to meet you, my name is Bitter Bitch.