Iriega

I have access to over 4000 units of insulin. I’ve heard horror stories of people ODing on it and then being revived and brain damaged. I don’t want to be a vegetable, drooling and incontinent, a burden on my family.

I just want to be gone.

Can anyone tell me whether they’ve known anyone that has successfully killed themselves by ODing on insulin?

I can’t remember happiness. It’s like there’s a filter in my mind. I can see it and hear it. But the memories are scattered like dappled sunlight on autumn leaves.  It’s all so distant, locked behind gates of obligation, towers of expectation, walls of mistakes made and learned and the shame of those unlearned. Sometimes there are glimpses.

Piercing sunlight through cicada husks on the back fence.  Riding a pink bike on the driveway with no training wheels. Falling off…wrinkled hands brushing me off. Sitting on Nonno’s knee and getting a beer moustache.  Roaring laughter when I tell him I don’t like it and that it […]

I’d like to share one of my favorite poems with you guys. It’s by D.H Lawrence-

“Self Pity”

I have never seen a wild thing

sorry for itself.

A small bird will drop frozen dead from a bough

without ever having felt sorry for itself.

Simple yes. For me it holds a simple truth. At night if it’s bad, I like to whisper it slowly to myself. I just wanted to share that.

Some things we can’t comprehend,

There are wounds that will never mend,

Tender to the touch, pus filled and laced with need,

Silver nitrate to cauterize yet still we bleed,

White coats, sharp metal and cold objectivity,

Subjective amputation, no room for sensitivity,

Our entire being defined and mapped by charts,

Digits in flowing valleys with no hearts,

Things we can’t see, so small but all consuming,

Encourage a suffocating fear forever looming,

This relentless decay, driving a hypnotizing fatigue,

A glimpse of the black waltz, a secret intrigue.

They told us what life’s about,

Grow up, do well in school, and don’t act out,

Make friends, find love and get employed,

Marry, get a mortgage, be overjoyed,

Have kids, watch TV, don’t forget to vote,

Go to church, find some hobbies, congratulations you’re afloat,

Donate to charity, go on vacation, but ignore temptation,

Grow old, retire, spoil the children, and thank your democratic nation,

Reminisce, be at peace and look forward to the afterlife of your choosing…

Yawn.

Forgive me for snoozing.

I can’t help but think how fucked we all are,

If the above is the ideal then we’re all screwed,

We’re told from birth “this is the plan”,

Society sets this norm…builds this pedestal,

There’s no […]

My dad once said-

“Elle if you don’t have your health…

…you don’t have anything.”

He was right.

“We can give you 50 years”

I don’t want 50 years, I want forever.

“Check your sugars Elle”

“Take your insulin Elle”

“Have you checked your feet Elle?”

“When’s your next appointment Elle?”

“No relationship can survive contempt”

That’s what they say.

They also say ‘mental illness’

…when the impacts are all physical.

“Cheer up Elle, the world isn’t gonna move for you”

“What doesn’t kill you only makes you stronger”

“Ugh do you have to inject in public?”

“HOW ARE YOU?”

And this is what I say-

“They live in their perfect little boxes…

Shock and horror for anything outside of ‘normal’

And melt away at the […]

Dawn bleeds across the sky,

Heedlessly ripping deep nights hue and cry,

Below the girl stirs,

Simultaneous to the devils purr,

“Damn, another day…”

…with no parley

The lancet stabs,

Done in habit…yet the pain still grabs,

14.3, 12.1, 10.6, 17.8,

These numbers condemn,

An onslaught to her mind, nothing to them,

“I can’t live like this.”

She wonders ‘what if?’- pointless to reminisce

Injecting…play the insulin game,

Let’s lower the high and take away the shame,

The world shifts, hands tremor…oh shit,

A low is calling…drags her down to the pit,

“Hush Jellybean baby”

Momma’s gonna buy you a chronic maybe

…maybe 50 years

No, she thinks. On her terms death will appear,

No…no sweet death for her,

They shake heads- hell you will incur!

She smiles.