But What If I Can't?

I am many things, one of which is a singer. I've sung for as long as I can remember, which for me is 2 or 3 years old.

My first musical memory is of my father standing me next to the piano and teaching me the song "Dites Moi" from South Pacific. Dad played, I sang, and an obsession was born. I can still hear the 4 bar piano intro in my head, V to I, in staccato chords. Dad would play the first note of the melody at the end of the 4th bar, so I knew where to start. But I didn't need the help. I couldn't HELP but know where the song started. It just made sense. It couldn't be anything else.

My love of music grew and grew, from a tiny spot in the center of my little body to the ends of the earth. Momma and I would sing songs from Disney movies and Broadway shows. I knew the words and melodies to every rock song Dad played with his band (I can still feel the foam microphone cover on my cheek as I sat at his keyboard during rehearsal breaks). My Fisher Price record player played everything from John Denver and the Muppets to the soundtrack of "Pollyanna" to Michael Jackson's "Thriller"-- a 4th birthday present from Dad. 

My family likes to joke that I started my "stage life" when I was negative 6 months old. Momma was pregnant with me during a run of "Trial by Jury", a G&S operetta. How could I help but love the theatre? I knew it before almost anything else!

Then when I was 6, I began piano lessons. I had been sitting at the piano "pretending to play" for so long that Momma and Dad knew this was the next logical step. My piano teacher was a little Italian nun with whom I had a love-hate relationship for the next 12 years. She was a part of the Irl Allison Guild; this is an organization for which you must play an "audition" every year in front of a judge, and receive an annual award commensurate with the material you present.  (Translation: If you don't screw up your songs too badly, you get a medal.) I loved these auditions because it was an adrenaline rush like no other.  You sat precariously on the edge of a piano bench, willing your hands to do what you'd worked so hard at all school year, in front of an audience. Then you got to do it AGAIN for a family recital in June..... now my obsession for music included the thrill of live performance.

And so it continued, with piano recitals, stage shows, choral concerts, band concerts, musicals, Pops concerts, Tanglewood concerts, Symphony concerts, more stage shows, TV tapings, movie soundtrack recordings, and on and on and on.

Last year, I came to a violent curve in my musical road.  I was onstage, and suddenly the feeling that I always cherished, that sense of "right" that music and performance gave me, was slipping away.  It turned to panic and rage.  My blood pressure skyrocketed, I broke out in a sweat, and I had to sit down in the middle of a performance.  My wonderful flying feeling from music was crashing and burning in front of my eyes. I tried to brush it off, as a simple flexing of the nerves, or a hypomanic episode.  But it keeps happening, and happening, and happening....

Since then, I have had a few other close calls and cancelled performances.  Two weeks ago, I was singing for a Marvin Hamlisch Tribute at Symphony Hall; we were doing all numbers from "A Chorus Line" with the original Cassie..... holy shit!  This is what young Broadway fans dream of!  How exciting!  But for me, it turned sour again.  I couldn't enjoy it.  I was so bogged down in sadness and anxiety that I had to actually keep myself from sobbing whilst another soloist sang "Sunshine, Lollipops, and Rainbows".  I COULDN'T SING FUCKING SHOWTUNES WITHOUT CRYING. As the 2nd evening of performance progressed, I made a decision.  That night, I would go home, get settled in for the night, and kill myself.  This was it.  Music held no beauty for me anymore.  I sang and felt nothing. What was the point? What will happen to me now?  My sublime comfort in all the chaos had been music, and standing on a stage singing as though the devil were chasing me. It was gone. And soon I would be.

I managed to remember my promise to Paulie and cling to life until the next morning when I got help from my therapist... into another hospital. Now, I can get through the day without wanting to die, most of the time.  I tried hard not to cry for that week in hospital, and the week thereafter when I thought about the fact that I may never be able to perform again. I can't find my fire. I can't find my love of this precious gift that was given to me when I was 2 years old, standing next to Dad at the spinet in the living room, right along the stairs.

I listen to music and sing along softly to the radio. I sing jazz as fiercely as I want while doing the dishes.  I can't practice.  I'm trying hard to keep my chin up, knowing I do have some musical obligations.  My conductor at the Hall is being gracious and wonderful and letting me try a few weekends of Tanglewood this summer. I am determined to find my sublime comfort again, in the memories of a toddler singing in French with her father......

.....but what if I can't?...........

Coming Out of the Dark?

Sorry, gentle reader, but I'm on a mental health kick. I find it fascinating to watch my brain fluctuate. Hope you don't coming along for this ride of random thought.

Sitting in my sister's apartment in Astoria, I am listening to an old Gloria Estefan song. "Coming out of the dark/I finally see the light now/and it's shining on me".

I have been doing pretty well in the last few weeks. I am beginning my life "again". There are voice lessons to teach, books to catalog, a husband to fix the house with and just love!, as well as family and friends to see.

But I am struck at how this time around is different. I am not sitting around waiting to feel better, bemoaning my terrible mental health. I am not asking for another pill to numb things. I am working even harder through my emotional upheavals. Self harm urges and disappointments are being faced head on. I am even stronger than I was before. I am stronger BECAUSE of the dark. The bright moments of my life are made better when looked at next to the dark.

No one says "That one glaring spotlight is beautiful." They say "Look at those stars" or "What a pretty night". The darkness is what makes the starlight stand out.

Sorry, Ms Estefan, but I refuse to come out of the dark. The dark is where I live and die. It is how I will choose to exist, amongst shining stars.

Life on the Inside: or, How to Take a Shower in Fifteen Minutes or Less

When one is on a psych ward, there are at least 2 constants: crazy people, and "checks".  Checks are the constant "checking on" every patient throughout their day.  One staff member per hour walks about with a clipboard, making sure that everyone is safe and accounted for EVERY 15 MINUTES.  They bang on every closed door, including the bathrooms.  A running joke amongst "serial patients" is that if you get REALLY good, you can get into a bathroom, shower, change, and leave before someone comes banging down the bathroom door, insisting that you scream out your first name, last initial over the sound of running water whilst you scrub your hair.  It's like a guillotine that comes out of nowhere, blasting your last dignity; a hot shower where, for a short time, you can forget that you are so crazy you live in a locked space.

Life on an inpatient unit is a real lesson in diversity and similarity.  It's a study in opposites, and how they co-exist.  In this particular case, everyone is here because "coping on the outside" has become impossible.  We are a danger to ourselves and others.  How we handle this ranges from sleeping 20 hour a day to running around the halls in socks at all hours of the day and night, making signs for "those that are not aware of how things work" and refusing all medications.

We squeeze stress balls and wrap ourselves in hospital blankets.  We talk to each other about the "good old days", when we used, drank, cut ourselves.  We compare scars and "The Lists"; lists of the hospitals we've been to, lists of the restraints we've been subjected to, lists of the drugs the docs have "tried out" on us.  We eat far too much, sharing candy and treats visitors have brought us.  We are from the city, country, suburbs.  We live in mansions, ranches, split levels, apartments, group homes, and cars; mental illness is the Almighty Equalizer.

I have watched as a young man cried into the shoulder of an elderly woman, finally accepting his addiction.  I have been the recipient of a piece of candy and a smile from a Hells Angel who loved classical music as much as I did.  We are a beautiful and highly dysfunctional family.  We scream and yell and laugh and cry and try to be "normal".

Today I am reeling; mania has taken over my life in a very real way.  I am inpatient now, trying to mix meds and coping skills into a kind of "cocktail" that might work. 

Mania has made me angry, violent, and frustrated.  My mood is labile (Holy understatement, Batman!) and I find myself getting into arguments with friends and family for no "good" reason. I cannot sit in a group for more than 15 minutes without having to leave.  I have a nasty twitch in my hands if I try to stay any longer.  I find myself pacing the halls, biting my nails so I don't scream at nothing and no one.  I shake violently just trying to keep my brain from leaking out my ears.  Sitting in a group starts to give me a glimpse into the life of Bruce Banner.

Up until yesterday, I would have said that I continue to have great faith in the medical profession to get me through.  Now my feelings are mixed.  While speaking with a doc on Tuesday, we discussed the medications I have taken in the past.  One of them is Depakote; I took it from about 1998-2001.  The doc immediately interjected "Well, I would never put you on that again; it obviously already did its worst." When I asked what she meant she told me that Depakote has been shown to cause PCOS (polycystic ovarian syndrome).  This is the condition that prevents me from ever having children.  Now the truth comes forward; the very medication that was supposed to "help" me ripped away one of my biggest dreams: motherhood.  The Brahms "Lullaby" plays over the loudspeakers here as I write this, indicating a baby has just been born.  Everytime it plays a bit of my heart bleeds faster. 

And now here I sit, at the end of a little twin hospital bed, writing on a tray table, begging God and all the saints and angels to come and bear a little grief and mania with me.  Maybe if they do, I can finish this latest of life's showers in less than 15 minutes.

The Descent...

On Monday, I went to my bi-weekly voice lesson.  I had a great time working on lots of musical theatre repertoire, and my teacher is a gem of a human being.  The lesson began with him taking one look at me as I approached his front door and saying, "Honey, talk to me..."

How do I respond to this invitation?  "Oh, I'm fine, just deep in thought!" "Oh, don't worry about me, I'm just trying to remember the lyrics we have to work on today!"

No. I looked him square in the face and said, "I think I'm losing my mind."

I haven't been using social media very much in the last few days.  I haven't been working, singing, reading, eating, sleeping, or anything really in the past few days.  I have been too busy trying to keep my brain inside my head.

I am manic.

Now, gentle reader, when I say manic, I do not mean the little hypomanic "blips" I've had in the past.  I mean that I am completely off-my-rocker.  I am not quite hallucinating yet, but every bit of my concentration is going toward not hurting myself/anyone else, as well as anyTHING else.  Last night I actually had to physically stop myself from getting out of bed at 11pm to smash every inanimate object in my living and dining rooms.  I had never felt so strongly that I NEEDED to destroy everything there.  Why?  Sure beats the shit out of me.

I have spent entire afternoons this week sitting on a chair and NOT cutting my arms to ribbons.  It takes all of my energy to finish sentences.  I have never been this manic in my life.  I have been anxious, or depressed to the point of self-harm, but this is brand shiny-new.  Paulie sat with me on Monday as I hung onto his sweatshirt in the living room and sobbed over and over again "What's happening to me; WHAT IS HAPPENING?!?!"

Possibly the biggest KICKER to this entire shitty ball of wax is that I had my husband drive me to an Emergency Room on Monday night.... and they sent me home. I'm not crazy enough.  I had no "confirmed plan" of suicide that night, so "Medicare won't pay for any kind of inpatient treatment.  And don't bother telling me now that you're suicidal.  It won't work."  It was then explained to me that there were people waiting 3-5 days in the same emergency room who had not gotten a bed in a substance abuse facility yet.  There were waiting lists for every hospital and program in the area.  I wasn't getting in anywhere.  They told me to go home and talk to my therapist the next day; that she would have MORE luck of getting me into a facility THAN A HOSPITAL WOULD.

So now I sit at home and wait.  There is a facility in my hometown that is able to "talk to me" on Tuesday.  A psych hospital that is quite popular and rhymes with "LeClane" has a 5-week wait to just TALK to me for an intake, never mind get me into a program.

Paulie is being so good; he sits and tries to keep the demons at bay.  I speak in half-sentences and bewildering metaphors, and rail at anyone who will listen to my tale of woe.

Now begins my spiraling descent into uncertainty and insanity.....Hello, old friend.

The Little Dolly

The past weeks have been a little dicey, as my last post indicates.  My husband has not been well, and to make matters more difficult, I have not been well.  The flu came at me twice, and I swatted it like an annoying insect twice.  A few days of rest and fabulous chicken soup (made by said husband) seemed to do the trick in both cases. Paulie needed a trip to the ER on Saturday, and so flu symptoms were quickly forgotten as we headed over to LGH and took the time to get the thing diagnosed (a post-surgical kidney infection... GAH!) and treated.

Now, the past few days have been restful without any effort on my part; a rehearsal here, a few lessons to teach there have been the extent of them.  There are probably a million long-term projects I could be working on, but for now I can't think of a single bloody one.  There is a new novel on my coffee table, a bag of junk food newly procured from the convenience store, and a few scratch tickets (purchased from the winnings of my Christmas stocking tickets).

This is a new experiment.  I will attempt now, with great trepidation, to not do anything simply because I have the time.  I will not do anything on PURPOSE!

Ah.... there it is...The Voice of Reason: "Laura, you have so many things to get done.  You don't work a full-time job.  You don't have a house full of people to take care of.  Get out there and do something!!!" The voice of reason usually sounds like my father, which is inherently unfair, given that my father is NOT the kind of person to push anyone else.  He's simply the hardest-working person I've ever met, and so when I don't think I can work, his voice sounds.

My father is the person who worked 3 jobs while attending college full-time, and then continued to work at least 2 part-time jobs while working full-time once he graduated.  He married, had 4 children, and made us all feel like the most special people in the world, all the while teaching a full school day, gigging at night, and oh, yeah, getting a Masters Degree as well.  In the summers when he wasn't teaching, he added another job to the docket.  He painted houses, worked in offices, taught private lessons... he did whatever it took to make sure that we were provided for, both physically and emotionally. He's a bit of a demi-god in my book, and one whose shoes will not be filled.... EVER.

So, of course, here comes my guilt.  As people in the biz might ask: "How do you follow that?"

I dunno.  I guess I'll stop trying.

The more important thing about my father that I truly wish to be, much more than a hard worker, is a supremely kind and generous person.  My father finds a way to make every person in a room feel special, for whatever their strengths are. He remembers names of spouses, children, family, and friends.  He asks about jobs and accomplishments. He sometimes touches their arm when he talks to them, so they know that they are his sole focus.  When someone cries he hugs them, rubs their back, asks what he can do.  He passes a guy asking for money on the street and always has a one or a five on him to give. Sometimes they want to talk.  He does that too.  He's the guy who makes sure that people have what they need, and always DEMANDS that no one know about it; therefore I'm not going to tell you about any of those things either, just that they happen.

When I have been at some of my very lowest points, my father has been there.  I remember being rushed to the hospital for a suicide attempt, and my father wasn't home at the time.  When I came to in the room I'd been assigned, it was to my father's arms around me.  I immediately started to cry and ask forgiveness.  Dad just sat there on the side of the bed, holding me and telling me it was ok.  That I was his Little Dolly, and I would be fine.  He told me to "take it easy" (his favorite phrase), to take my time feeling better, and not to worry about a thing. While I still have moments where I'm sure that I'm disappointing him to the point of pure frustration, I also know that he loves me more.  It's awe-inspiring and scary and comforting all at the same time.

So now, 13 years later, I'm choosing to take another page from Dad's book.  I'm going to try my very best to be as good as I can to people (a life-long pursuit, especially for one as snarky as I am!!!), and at least for tonight, I'm going to take it easy.

"Pray for the grace..."

In times of great stress, I find myself hearing my grandmother's voice.  She is a woman of unbelievable strength, now 83 years of age, still driving, working and living a full life.  She raised 7 children while taking care of her own elderly parents, and loved her husband more than anything in the world, though he was alcoholic.  Now do NOT misread this; he was wonderful and sweet, but she was the woman of steel who made ends meet and kept the world going when others could not.  She is well-read, and a devout and prayerful Catholic.  When Da died at the age of 59, she was a rock and a symbol to whom we could all look for strength.  I can still see her at Da's wake, tall (to my 8-year-old self) and kind and quiet, speaking in a low, soft voice to all the friends and family who came to pay their respects.

I hear her voice speaking to me, with so many wonderful phrases of hope and strength that she always kept on the tip of her tongue:

"Laura, in the Light of Eternity, what does this matter?"

"Laura, pray to the Blessed Mother; she always hears us!"

"Laura, pray for the grace to understand what this means.  It always means something."

And so hear I sit tonight, weeping over my keyboard, hearing Nana Fitz's voice and praying for grace.  Dear God, I am praying.

God has been good to me.  He has brought me through much, and given me Paulie, who I love more than I could ever actually explain.  Paulie has, thus far, seemed to come through cancer treatment very well, but now we are faced with more health obstacles that have come to light through this surgery.  Every time I feel as though I have a handle on the "medical overview", it changes.  I have just finished taking Paulie's blood pressure--high, and with an irregular heartbeat.  I walked over to the bureau, put the cuff and stethoscope inside a drawer, and burst into tears.  When will the end of the worry come?  Why couldn't God do this to me instead?  I'm strong; I can take this.  Don't make him, God.  He's already taken care of me; let me take this for him instead.  Please, PLEASE!

And then, again, I hear Nana: "Laura, pray for the grace."

When I was young, I thought she meant grace in a lady-like sense.  That I could somehow pray for the delicacy to see things as a young lady, and not muck things up like my rough, blunt younger self. Maybe to be less emotional, more rational.  Now my rough, blunt older self sees that praying for grace is really praying for a steel skeleton.  It's praying for the grace of wisdom.  It's praying for a rock-solid center, so that you can look to yourself when there may not be any others close at hand.  It's praying for the grace to be broken in so many places that they all calcify as they mend, and make you rough, blunt, and hard as iron.

I'm praying, Nana.  I'm praying.

Ending a cycle of silence

This day feels like it was a long time in coming.  It's an impossible thing to write; I almost don't want to look at the words as I type them.  I may even be looking down and typing by feel right now because I can't believe that I'm doing this, but I am ashamed.  I am ashamed that it has taken this long for me to publicly admit something that should not be shaming.

I am a rape survivor.

Good Christ, I actually looked at the screen while I typed that, and now I'm nauseous.

For some of you, this post is over.  You'll click away now, with a comment about how needy that poor Laura is; she had to write about "that kind of thing" on her blog.  What a terrible thing, and what a messed-up girl she must be for admitting something so publicly.  Maybe you're right.

But I'm pissed at myself because it took me so long to talk about this.  I am ashamed of the fact that I could not, until now, say those few words above without feeling like I was going to vomit, and that everyone I knew and loved would hate and abandon me.  So I just never said them.... but the time has come for this cycle of silence to END.

The truth is I WAS raped.  And then I did something completely STUPID.... I blamed myself.  I was the idiot who went to that place.  I was the moron who dressed in a "cute" way that night, in hopes of meeting a nice guy.  I was the absolute cretin who didn't fight.  I was the shamed individual who said "No one will believe me; it's my own cross to bear."  What a Catholic!!!!  I was raped and then I FELT GUILTY ABOUT IT.  I went ahead and did every single thing one is told NOT to do in a situation of violence.  I kept my mouth shut.

It took me almost 4 years to admit to anyone that it had even happened.  At one of my ER visits, a nurse asked if I had a history of sexual violence, and I found myself saying "Yes."  She looked up from her clipboard, her eyes asking for more information.  I then blurted out "I was raped when I was 20."  I couldn't believe my own ears.  I had kept it a secret for so long, it didn't even feel like I was the one speaking.  A tailspin of self-doubt and loathing promptly began.  I must have been wrong.  Maybe I made it up?  I'll just keep it to myself; I'm imagining things.  And then I found myself telling Paulie... and my parents... and a few other family members.  Whoa.... that shit really happened.  But I wasn't going ANY further than that.  Because people don't talk about that stuff.  It's off-putting and makes one look like they just want sympathy, right?

Now, 12 years after the incident (the rape, Laura, call things for what they are!!!), I find myself more sensitive to blatant justifications, jokes, or a generally flippant attitude toward rape and sexual abuse.  The past few months have been particularly painful, with no real reason in sight.... and last Sunday night, I lost it.

Audra MacDonald won a Tony award for her role as Bess in "The Gerschwins' Porgy & Bess".  She took the stage, and began to give a lovely heart-felt speech about how grateful she was to the world of theater.  She thanked her leading man, Norm Lewis....and then said that she enjoyed being raped every night by her "Crown", Philip Boykin.

Did she truly mean that she enjoyed even a pantomimed sexual assault?  Absolutely not.  Did she make a bit of a mistake in putting things quite that way?  Yes.  Was it her fault?  No, it was a whacky way to say "thank you" to a fellow cast member because she won a huge award and was excited. But I was livid, and everyone in the room with me knew it.  I ranted and raved about her behavior, and blathered furiously on Facebook.

I calmed down and asked myself "Why does this particular transgression bother me so much?"  Later that night, I started to get my answer: "This will continue to bother you until you get serious about it.  You need to take a stand, Laura.  Be an adult and do the right thing."

And so I think it's time.  I think it's time that I join the ranks of those who don't "take it" or "hush it up" anymore.  It's time that I do the right thing by every person who has been sexually assaulted, and speak my mind when I don't like something I hear, become publicly involved in sexual injustice and abuse.  In short, I will use my big mouth for something good.

If even one person comes across this odd, disjointed blog post, and decides to report a rape or assault, it's all worth it.

I'm through with silence.