On Being Possessed

Back in the day, when people began hearing or feeling funny things or acting strangely, they would be brandished possessed by an evil demon and subjected to an exorcism. Which I guess makes sense, if you are inclined to believe in demons. I'm not, but, hey. It's your body.

Yesterday I was officially diagnosed as having temporal lobe epilepsy. Which is a relief because for a time there I did wonder if perhaps my body was being inhabited by a small, grumpy demon spat up from hell. The diagnosis did, however, come as somewhat of a surprise, especially because I am prone to believing that any and all problems I may have will be met with a 'chin up, kiddo' and a lollipop. By these standards I made out like a bandit; a diagnosis and a prescription to some drugs that will hopefully stop my head from spinning 360 degrees and projectile vomiting lumo green puke. I'm sure you're all pretty relieved, too.

The aftermath of the appointment was less than pleasing. I don't think either Paul or myself were expecting quite that many tears. In public. But then again, if crying in public was a sport I would be an Olympic medalist. And it's not as if I don't have a very bloody good reason to be pissed. God only knows how much money I will be throwing down a hole to prevent my broken brain from misfiring.

I've had a day now to sit and reflect on these new developments, and to be honest my feelings are mixed. On the one hand I am so happy that this is being dealt with and I will be able to move on with my life and hopefully gain some semblance of control over how I am feeling. On the other hand... I'm a little pissed, to be honest. Not about having the epilepsy, but rather with all the idiotic people in my life who would go out of their way to punish me for being sad, or frightened, or angry, or whatever. So many people would tell me that all I needed to do to be happy was to think happy thoughts and everything would be okay. If I just tried hard enough, things would be fine. And if they weren't then obviously the blame lay with me.

I'm sad that I wasted so much of my life hating myself for having feelings that I had no control over. And for feeling like I was a fundamentally crap person because I couldn't cope with certain aspects of my life. I wish someone could have told me that it wasn't my fault that sometimes I floated out of my body or got scared or anxious or sad for no reason. I wish that I could have stood up for myself when people said to me, 'can't you just, like, you know? Be happy?'.

I think it was Bill Hicks who said 'I'll start smiling as soon as you start walking away'.