a borderline teacher: January 2006

Wednesday, January 25, 2006

Trying to explain

On Saturday night, I decided to take my old entries offline and then, on Sunday, I wrote the previous entry. Shortly afterwards, I checked my email and found that comment under the post with the Ichneumon fly picture.

I was fairly surprised that anyone would be so vindictive and unpleasant but, as the other comments, emails, phone calls and texts arrived over the next couple of days, I knew that one person’s cruelty and anything that I may have to deal with as a result didn’t matter in the greater scheme of things.

I have received emails from some people, asking why I have taken my old entries offline and saying they are disappointed because they found my blog helpful and they think it is unfair of me to hide my past by removing the entries. They asked if I am ashamed of my illness. I am writing this entry to reply to them and the others who have been so supportive.

I am moving my diary back to Live Journal, where I feel safer in the knowledge that it is “friends only”. I have mainly enjoyed being able to be open and honest to the world about my good and bad sides and try to show people my path to recovery via this blog. Now, however, my feelings have changed. I removed the old entries on Saturday night because, as I wrote on Sunday, I can’t afford to look back anymore. I need to look forward and my blog contained too much of the past I am moving on from.

Since receiving the comment on Sunday, I am sure that I have done the right thing. There are too many people out there who, for whatever reasons, want to prevent me from moving on and I certainly don’t feel happy thinking that they can look into my inner thoughts. I struggle to tell how I feel in therapy, but I have always found I am able to do this in writing and my blog has been an amazing therapeutic tool. It is for those reasons that I am returning to LJ, where I am now going to write all about this fantastic, incredible and soul-restoring week.

I will not close this blog because I hope to continue to use it for certain things, but maybe not for a while and never again to tell my innermost feelings.

Sunday, January 22, 2006

borderline teacher

Once upon a time, there was a girl called Cat. Cat found it hard to live life on life's terms and she struggled to achieve inner peace. Cat was a fortunate girl, because she had a wonderful family and a circle of good friends.

Cat discovered that success helped her to hold some of the peace she had been searching for. She tried out lots of different courses and finally realised that she was happiest when she was teaching and embarked on fulfilling this career. Despite her inner dischords, Cat worked hard to make her life worthwhile, trying to pinpoint the parts of her that got in the way. Cat gave up alcohol and tried to overcome the other factors, eventually engaging in some tough therapy and some time out from her beloved career, while she endeavoured to overcome her demons.

The ride was not a smooth one. Cat didn't always make the right decisions and she often hurt other people along the way. Again and again she tried to put things right, often needing to take several steps back down a path in order to get back onto the right one.

One day, Cat realised that she had fought the demons and, although they were still there, they were weakened and Cat was the strongest personality inside her now. She realised that the path ahead was a crucial one and she needed to focus hard on not tripping up while she walked it. If Cat let herself look back at the journey she had travelled she would see that it was so meandering and maze-like that there was no way she could turn back. Cat had to keep on going and the only way to do that was to look ahead.



Once I was just borderline. Then I was a borderline teacher for a while. Over the past 6 months I have worked through the borderline and am now on the brink of being teacher. Just teacher. Borderline in the context of the disorder is between psychosis and neurosis, but in the context of my career it it is between teacher and not.

I am very scared and feel quite alone, but that is the path I have chosen. Try to hold in your minds that, although I did do some awful things and I have been an awful person, I am not in that space anymore. I will always hold what I was inside me, because I do not deny it, but I can't wear it on my sleeve anymore.