I don’t know a good way to begin this post.  This week and maybe last week I began to feel like a normal person.  My emotions seemed to be in check and I’m taking prescribed medications to help achieve this.  Although it has taken away the highs that I experience; the happy, excited feelings associated with feeling good is extremely distracting and I become completely unhinged.  The consequences of this and the time wasted would always lead me to a crash.  It kind of sounds like bipolar disorder but it’s not.  This is usually a daily occurrence.  However as aforementioned, I’ve been feeling much more balanced.  Until now.  

I experience really strong emotions and I want it to stop.  It’s exhausting me to the point of suicidal thinking and ideation.    I know what my issues are and how they drive my moods up and down.  The major issue is social isolation.  That’ll truly fuck you up.  My heart goes out to everyone that has the same experience.  

With that said, I’m pretty isolated and I have been most of my life.  I was born with severe hearing loss and this was in 1991 so at the time, no one knew.  I spent the first couple years obviously not hearing anything (until I got hearing aids).  Which is fine lol.  However I know it fostered an environment for me where I felt isolated and detached from my family.  I couldn’t really communicate all that well and couldn’t pick up on the chatter that goes on throughout the day.   My siblings were adults when I was born and I was by far the youngest in the entire family.  I have a brother that’s 5 years older than me but I kind of dislike him lol.  Tbh, the negativity stems from jealousy and resentment which is sort of pathetic but the guy is gifted and while I’m not going to get into specifics, I cannot overstate how remarkable he is.  Plus, he disrespects me so much. Anyway my hearing is pretty bad lol.  But I’m not deaf so for my parents, it didn’t make sense to use sign language or encourage me to become part of a deaf community.  Hard of hearing is sort of a unique situation.  You’re part of the hearing world but you can’t hear 😂.  I don’t know what people around me are saying, I can’t have conversations with people unless the environment I’m in is silent and they’re speaking loud and clear enough for me to understand.  Of course when does that ever happen? Every environment is noisy and hearing aids aren’t that great yet.  Everything is so amplified and it distorts the sounds so I can’t actually understand what you’re saying.  The point of the story is that it leaves me feeling detached.  Incidentally, I also grew up with just my parents (my brother left for college when I was 12) who are both retired and are insane.  I lived on a farm with them and during my teenage years from 14-17, I didn’t see another person other than my parents bc I was being home schooled due to academic difficulties related to my hearing obviously.  Also I was a loser with no friends bc I couldn’t hear but that’s beside the point.  I’m 28 now man.  I’m trying to be positive.  Work out, eat well, therapy,  setting goals, achieving them etc.  The crazy thing is, whenever I have a good conversation with someone, it brings my mood up to a level of euphoria but it’s reeeally distracting.  I’m incapable of functioning at that point and then I quickly crash.  Another complaint I want to add is my arms and right leg are fucked up.  It’s bad.  No one has seen them but Jesus.  The scars are almost all raised and there’s so many of them.  The reason I even mention it is because all this did was make potential connections with people even more difficult bc there is no way in hell I’m showing anyone.  I’m getting tattoos as soon as I have the money.   On the bright side my homies , I’m almost 5 months sober and I don’t ever plan to relapse again.  I love you.  Thanks for letting me complain.