Do you ever feel as if you are a foreigner in your own body?  I feel as if I don't fit and it is really uncomfortable.  I really hate myself.

White Picket Fences is a very interesting article.  I need to reread it several times and allow the full impact into my heart.

I edited this out of a letter I was writing to someone.  I decided that I just couldn't send it, but it was something that I wanted to save and think about some more.

The description of "too depressing" has been used for me, along with "too clingy" and "too needy".  Never was it suggested that I seek out psychiatric help, despite evidence of serious depressive episodes which started showing up when I was 3 years old.   Even when I was being treated for bulemia and anoerexia, they were seen as the cause of my depression rather than the other way around.  The descriptions of my personality led me to isolate myself, bury my feelings and deny my rights to happiness and even God's salvation.  I wasn't good enough, I never will be good enough.  If people get to know the real me, they will see the black spot on my sole that will scare them away from me.  Since I can't deal with anymore rejection, I want to be the first to reject.  I liken myself to an armadillo, curling up into a hard ball at the first sign that I might have to open up. 

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day
To the last syllable of recorded time,
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life ’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

The words of Macbeth, written by William Shakespeare.  Of all his plays and sonnets that I read, studied or saw performed, this passage has stayed with me the longest.  Perhaps because even at 15, this was the best description of life as I saw it.  Invariably, I always come back to this as my cornerstone definition of life.

What is NORMAL?  Who defined it?  Who decided who was, and who wasn't normal?  Who tattoed LOSER on my forehead?