Journalling

From the department of odd things to feel bad about, I've been journalling physically--like, in a journal--and can't help but notice that that's been really cutting down on the stuff I enter into my online journal, ie here. Last night, for example, I wrote a big thing about how I'd been talking with a friend about Cal (and Steve, and myself) and his problems with filtering, only to be suddenly struck with a memory about the time I had to interview to get into my alternative high school and had what I thought at the time was some sort of breakdown, but what I now see must have been a classic case of being autistically overwhelmed: I froze, was overtaken by waves of conflicting emotions so strong I felt like they were going to kill me, then decided that I couldn't let them show because that would ruin my chances of getting in. So of course my coping strategy was to cry and bite myself really hard at the same time, so hard I left marks I could stick my thumbnail inside up to the meat of my thumb, so hard it left a huge bruise and a slight scar.

Then I re-interviewed a week later and got in, thank Christ. Probably because they'd figured out that if I ended up "having" to go back into the normal public school system, who the fuck knew why might happen...but whatever, it's over. It's long, long over.

Still, it would have been helpful to know exactly what that was about, at the time. That it wasn't because I was hopelessly broken, but because I was different.

I want to make sure Cal never has to feel like that. If I do nothing else for him besides what I'm already doing, what I've already done, I want that. I want to teach him he doesn't have to show everything he feels, and even if he does, it's not the worst thing ever. It won't kill him. Nothing will, except death.;)