Suicidal Again
It was when I returned to Perth that I was suicidal for a second time. Unlike the first, which had been as a result of overwhelming shame and guilt (which later proved to be groundless), this was more like an admission of defeat.
But because I hit rock bottom, I started looking at that part of myself that I hadn't dared to look at before -- the void I felt within. I felt empty and I hurt, but it was my emptiness, it was my hurt. I started feeling again. It was like being Data with his emotion chip being installed.
I'd returned from Sydney after undertaking a vision quest to decide my future. I'd succeeded too, in that I knew I had to move to Newcastle, leave my job, and start studying visual arts at university. But I had to return to Perth to organize things. My public service job was based there, and unless I figured out what to do, my money would start to run out. Also, I'd booked for a Science Fiction convention there and wanted to go. The trip back was the worst bus trip I've ever had. I ran out of money on the second day of a three day trip, and the bus ran out of water over the Nullabor Plains. I was tired and exhausted by the time I returned. I wasn't up for a convention, but I went anyway.
I'd underestimated the effect that returning to Perth would have on me. After experiencing Sydney, Perth seemed like a prison of mediocrity and parochialism. I felt that I'd accomplished nothing. Then things started going wrong at the convention. The person I'd booked the room with (another transsexual, but one who was still in "stealth mode" within fandom, something I couldn't be) had actually booked another. Fortunately, another friend stepped in and shared the room with me. I should have connected with these people, but I didn't -- everything just felt like an empty hollow past time, and I felt the biggest void of all. One night of the con, I looked at a kitchen knife in the room and started thinking how nice it would be if I just slit my wrists and sat there bleeding to death.
Then I realized what I was thinking, and realized that I was dangerously close to attempting suicide. I went down to the nearest public hospital and admitted myself for observation. I didn't trust myself that night. After a 4 hour wait, I was admitted. They gave me a bed and some tranquilizers. After a good nights sleep, I was OK in the morning. I collected my things from the hotel, decided to say goodbye to fandom, and got on with life.
Intuition
My intuition had told me to come to the Hunter valley, that this was where I'd heal and grow, where I'd finally become human. Moving to Newcastle was the start of that. I now live on the outskirts of the city in a place called Barnsley. It's a little out of the way, but it's still the Hunter Valley. I think my intuition was right. It's hard for me to "prove" this (especially since I've been suicidal at least once while here) but I feel it. I feel stronger in myself. I don't mean that I don't have doubts and fears, or ups and downs, I do. But the downs are easier to shake, and the ups are more sustained.
The Shadow
Now recently I'd started to let go of the idea that I was a monster. The voice of self-hate however goes on in subtle sneaky ways. If you do something that doesn't go to plan, it criticizes you for failure; it finds reasons why you are less than perfect, what's "wrong" with you. Back in 1996 when I was in Sydney, and very low emotionally, it shouted KILL YOURSELF at me. I didn't of course, but was that close to doing so. Afterwards, things started to slowly get better. There was another, softer voice in me saying PERSISTENCE PAYS OFF. It was the voice of self-love.
Still, the voice of self-hate waits and continues with it's destructive criticism. It's hard to avoid. Then I read a book entitled There is Nothing Wrong with You, written by a Zen-Buddhist teacher. Imagine my relief when I read the following passage in the book (pages 129-130):
egocentricity is invested in convincing
you that you are an awful person --
that deep down inside you there is
some Horrible Thing. Why? Because
it stays in charge that way.
It can just say
BOO!...and you'll jump back into line and do whatever it says.
But you can call it's bluff
simply by saying,"BRING OUT THE HORRIBLE
THING, SHOW IT TO ME!"And you can say,
"Don't worry. I'll keep it to
myself. I'll keep it hidden.
I won't tell anyone. Okay?"But egocentricity can't do that.
And the more it cannot
show you the
Horrible Thing
the more it will dawn on you that
MAYBE IT DOESN'T EXIST.MAYBE THERE ISN'T A
"HORRIBLE THING"
INSIDE OF YOU
Now this came as a revelation to me. I knew intellectually that I wasn't a monster, but not emotionally. The book had summed up in terms I knew where I'd been at. And it was not a good place.
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