Surface Area

It's the same old thing. Every part of my body hurts everywhere, almost all the time, and I can't make it hurt less, but maybe if I decrease the surface area, it won't hurt in as many places. Maybe that doesn't make any more sense than, "I stubbed my toe, so I might as well cut off my foot."

But it is getting more clear, inside my head. I'm starting to feel a little emptier and the space inside my skull and inside my organs isn't so swollen. I think I've only cried hysterically once in the last week. That's the longest it's been since May. I know that the emptier I feel, the quieter I feel, and the less I can feel in general. This is the only thing that makes the humming stop.  

I have a hard time telling myself in the bad moments that it won't always be like this, when Gideon shuts off and I can't feel him, or I can feel him, sinking into the other side of the bed. I should start tracking it, somehow. I don't know how I manage to keep myself from vibrating out of my own skin. The best way I can think of it to just...lose a little skin, at least. That's the most I can do. I might not be able to crawl outside of myself, but I can at least decrease the surface area.

This could all be fine in five hours. Or it might already be fine. Or it might not be fine for three days. Or never. I have no way of knowing. Times like this, I can't tell where the diseases end and where I begin. I don't feel like a person, just a vibrating, crying, soft, exposed nerve ending. Wires spitting at the break. I worked for eighteen months to develop an identity, and in the last four weeks, I lost it all again.