Godammit, I’m Mad!

I’m reading a book about addiction that Max read last year. He told me I might like it. I also remember him writing to his girlfriend that the book caused him to review his childhood, which he always thought was “pretty normal.”

The book, by Gabor Maté, a physician and psychiatrist, is extremely compassionate toward the addict. In fact, he explains at great length why the addict never really had a chance: Improper bonding during infancy harms the infant’s brain and sets him up for addiction.

Maté recounts study after study to underscore his thesis. When rats are removed from their mother for only one hour a day, their brains show damage. In human babies, this faulty bonding fucks everything up. The child is forever doomed to suffering and attempts to extinguish the suffering.

I can’t read too much of this book. Someone needs to do a study on my brain, to show how much harm the book has done.

Maté ends the long chapter about the origins of the addict’s malformed brain by assuring us that he’s not saying it’s hopeless! People can be healed, he says, through the indomitable Spirit that lives within all of us.

Meanwhile, I am compelled to look back in time and question everything. I remember loving my baby at first sight. I remember adoring his every expression, every gesture, every hair on his head. I remember nursing him for 14 months. I remember friends coming over  just to  admire him. I remember dressing him in his little outfits, reading to him, cuddling him, singing to him.

But I was a depressed mother. Depressed mothers ruin the brain as well. I forgot to say that. The baby picks up on the mother’s depression and is irreparably fucked.

I wish I could talk to Max about this. I want to know if he blames me. Or rather, if he forgives me.

His addiction must have been a nightmare for him. So much worse then the nightmare it was for us. It was such a long struggle. I never really felt it was my fault, until now.

My own mother hated me and told me so, but I didn’t want to become a drug addict. There was no comfort anywhere, from anyone, when I was a child. I have my problems but I never wanted to stick a needle in my arm. If everyone with an imperfect or depressed mother needs to escape their pain through opiates, who’s left?

I’m caught in this argument.  Depressed people don’t all become addicts. But my son did, and it’s my fault.

I wish it was nobody’s fault. I wish it was a wrong turn that led to more wrong turns. I wish he had been able to overcome his addiction and the pain that caused it. I wish I could comfort him and convince him that he was loved and he was perfect, addicted or not.

Mothers and children, what are your thoughts?

First of all, that Hermes lady is fucking nuts about her photos. She doesn’t want her photos used to mock her. They are there for praise only! They are there for gloating, not for you internet people to copy and ridicule. I found this picture on flickr, Hermes Lady, so relax.

I wasn’t able to force myself to go through 30something pages of her boasting about her Hermes purchases and the attendant ass-kissing. But I think I got the gist of it.

Here is the situation. Hermes is a symbol of wealth and success. Nothing more or less. A woman who spends a fortune at Hermes and then documents it online is a person desperately in need of love and self-esteem. There isn’t enough Hermes in the whole world to assure her of her intrinsic worth.  It’s a mug’s game.

Consumption at this level is very sad. All shopping is a defense against the knowledge of our mortality. It’s a stupid distraction that exists to enrich corporations and to numb the appetites of the soul.

Look in your closet and think about which outfits would make you happy if a family member died in a car crash. Look at your shoes and then look at this picture.

The Hermes Lady is a picture of insecurity, distorted by money and self-delusion. She is a waste of our time. Turn your eyes away from that lady and her ridiculous merchandise.

You already have everything you need to be happy.

Don’t worry about shoes or handbags. Listen to music, look at some art or have sex instead. You’ll thank me later.

“Today marks the official launch of TheFix.com, a new content site aimed at recovering drug and alcohol users.”

I read that and imagined a nice scholarly-looking website filled with information and resources, like the sites about autism or migraines. Instead, it’s a garish tabloid-like bonanza of stupid features like “Worst Celebrity Meltdown” and “Hollywood’s Best Addict Performances.”

Courtney Love is one of the experts on hand to give advice, and there are articles on finding the perfect AA meeting and dating a crackhead.  There is even a BIG photo of a syringe in an arm, to illustrate a story about vaccines. Are they insane? The whole thing looks like a great parody except for its breathtaking witlessness.

Please have a look and get back to me. Tell me your theory on how they got the seed money for this venture and what kind of advertisers will want to get in on this.

Meanwhile, they invite submissions and story ideas! I could never be part of such a shabby enterprise, especially knowing what I do about the horrors of drug addiction. But wouldn’t it be fun to propose some idiotic stories just to see if they bite? How about “Funniest excuse for for a relapse” or “How to flirt with an ER doctor?”

Fuckers.

Because it is my avocation to get mad and start arguments, when I came upon a photo of a woman sticking a needle in her arm, on tumblr, I wrote to the blogger and politely complained. I said the picture could be a trigger for recovering addicts, and that addiction should not be romanticized. She replied politely that she was against censorhip and couldn’t be responsible for triggers. I wrote to the blogger from whom she’d reblogged the photo. She replied politely too,  but maintained that the photo was “social commentary.”

Both bloggers pointed out that heroin addiction is a part of life and that you can’t just show nice things. Both denied that the artful picture of an attractive woman shooting dope was in any way romanticizing addiction.

But wait! The “part of life” argument is kind of fatuous. Vomit, amputation,  and car accidents are part of life. All kinds of distressing things are part of life but you don’t see many arty picture of them. The image of an addict shooting up is a powerful one that has been around for a long time, and it doesn’t show the Part of Life that comes after it: The abscesses, the arrests, the death, the funeral, the sobbing friends.

I resent these images, because they don’t tell the truth.  They are a siren song to young people, just as cigarette ads once were.

I know it’s too much to ask that everyone stop admiring nice black and white photos of addicts shooting dope. But I’d at least like everyone to admit that these images are romantic.  They depict a “transgressive” act, nicely lit and composed, that represents mavericky behavior…even rock and roll behavior, one might say.  OF COURSE it is romanticizing an illness that in real life is tragic, sordid, cruel and lamentable on every level!

It’s not art, any more than the images of bottled fetuses used by anti-choice groups is art. It’s the perpetuation of a stupid and dangerous myth.  Or maybe it is art, but it’s political, even if one insists otherwise.

I am not in favor of censorship. But I post images selectively.

What are your thoughts?

I confided to my psychiatrist that I’m obsessed with the nuclear reactor crisis in Japan and that I’ll be disappointed when they get it under control. I was shocked when he said he felt the same. “Of course.” he agreed, “We all crave this drama, it’s great. It lets us externalize all our feelings of anger and chaos.”  We both agreed that we weren’t actually hoping for something apocalyptic, although I am personally ready for the world to end.

A better way to distract myself has been tumblr, where I can scroll through images for hours.  I’ve learned to avoid the ones with the aggressively teen-aged nihilism: All those morbid photos of skinny kids with septum rings and animated gifs from horror films and topless hippies with guns in their mouths.

There is so much beauty out there. Visual stimulation excites some pleasure center in the brain, like eating chocolate or listening to an aria. Tonight my tumbler stopped working and it was horrifying to be cut off from my new addiction.  I have a lot of avoidance to accomplish. Max’s birthday is coming up at the end of the month.

Can we distract ourselves from everything serious with a focus on beauty products? I’ve always found them comforting, their promise of transforming us from ugly ducklings into flawless supermodels. Okay, so, what is your favorite beauty product that has surprised you by actually doing something good? I really want to know (remember: I’m desperate,)

My favorite product is Kate Sommerville Sunblock 55.  It’s light, greaseless, no fragrance, and leaves a dewy glow.  You don’t have to wear make up and you don’t have to get skin cancer.  I prosthelytize about it to everyone.

Okay, what’s yours?

If you don’t live in Los Angeles, you may not be familiar with Fred Segal, a retail establishment frequented by pop stars and wealthy anorexics. Long ago, I realized that Fred Segal is in league with Satan. But yesterday, I forgot.

Feeling bored and oppressed by existential malaise, I went to Fred Segal to look at earrings. I have been fixated on the idea of gold safety pin earrings and I knew Fred Segal would have some. It’s a knowledge based on the type of people who shop there and a dark intuition fostered by Satan Himself.

So there I was, in the full glory of unemployment, when the salesgirl said, “Yes, we do have gold saftey pin earrings!” She produced five pairs of earrings, one covered in tiny emeralds.  I tried on one earring and thought, Okay, got to have them.

I handed my credit card to the salesgirl, my heart pounding with excitement and guilt. The voices in my head argued about the purchase, with the Addict Voice taking the lead. “So what if you can’t afford them, so what!”

The salesgirl was having trouble with her computer. It wouldn’t recognize my card or anything else. She apologized and decided to reboot the computer.

As I waited, I felt the sense of deranged lust for the earrings start to wane. I could already predict the remorse. Maybe I didn’t even need to buy them. I told the salesgirl while she struggled, “If this goes on much longer, I will take it as a message from god that I don’t need these earrings.” She laughed and said, “No, it’s just a message from this computer, don’t worry, I’ll get it to work.”

She called a supervisor who tried to give her directions over the phone. Now I was sure: I didn’t give a shit about the earrings! Life would go on without them. In fact, life would be much, much better without them!

I reached over and grabbed my credit card and said. “I’m sorry, I’ve got to go now. Too bad it didn’t work out.”

I marched out of there as fast as my wonky hip would allow, dizzy with the joy of missing a bullet. God was stronger than Satan and I owe Him one. If he would hide my fucking credit card, so much the better.

Oooooh, I love these boots, because I love boots and because theyr’e “nude” which is So Essential this season.

But they also come in black suede with gold embossed stuff.

I want these boots. They look like I MIGHT be able to walk in them, too. But I can’t have them because of the no money thing. I can’t buy either pair. Which pair should I not buy more? The nude or the gold?

The sight of this fake fur jacket triggered my shopping addiction, big time. To make things worse, it’s called the Wolf Jacket. It seemed like destiny, if destiny were a voice in my head saying “Buy it, put it on your credit card, do it, do it, do it!”

In a stroke of unwitting genius, I asked my kid webmaster to stick my head on the lookbook model.

VOILA!!! It looks stupid on me! I don’t need to buy it. Free at last!

How many times have you listened to a friend talk about her terrible relationship, only to realize that nothing you can say or do will get her to end it?

I never learn that these people are caught in a cycle of addiction and will crawl back for more abuse until circumstances intervene to break things off.

It should be easy for smart people to figure out that they’re playing a losing game. To everyone else, it’s all so obvious. Now there are 12 step groups for Love Addiction but try getting your friend to go to a meeting. I once got as far as showing someone the online questionnaire about Love Addiction. She answered Yes to nearly every question. But mostly what she really wanted was to talk about the horrible creep who was making her miserable and showed every intention of making her even more miserable.

A long time ago in a galaxy far away, I got caught up like this. A man who didn’t love me and treated me badly was ruining my life. When I broke up with him, he took it well. I felt proud of myself for ending it. Now I would be free! Within 48 hours, I’d call him and whine, “I miss you.” Thus would begin another round of the same pathetic cycle. I needed a fix of whatever it was he was dealing, and he was glad to give it to me. In retrospect, I am amazed at how patient my friends were when I ranted about what a bastard he was.

Feelings of inadequacy, fear of abandonment, fear of rejection, buried rage, lack of self-identity are all characteristics of the Love Addict. Then there’s the dopamine issue once the game gets going.

It’s so painful to watch someone you care about waste their time and batter their own self-esteem through this irrational and obsessive behavior. I have three friends at present who are lost in addictive affairs that are dragging them down. I wish I could help, but I can’t. I’m glad it’s not me, though.

If you’ve broken free of a screwed up addictive relationship, what have you learned about yourself? What helped you to survive the withdrawal? Or how have you been able to lead a friend toward self-preservation?

Still suffering from the irrational and inappropriate longing for leather shorts, I was thrilled to find this hideous pair above, by Derek Lam, for $1,450 at Saks.com. It’s always nice when your unwholesome shopping fixation is chipped away by images or associations that ruin the whole idea of whatever it is you think you need.

Look at this atrocity below by YSL, also at Saks, for $1,950.

Horrible, aren’t they?

Here’s a pair by Juicy called “Moto Leather Shorts” that compounds the “Moto” problem with a ruffle at the hem. Yay!

My craving is starting to wane, but it’s still troubling. To make it even more tragic, the Huffington Post featured an article yesterday that asked: “Can Women Over 5o Look Great in Jeans?”

I resent this stupid question on every level. What the fuck does “great” even mean in this context? Do they actually mean “thin?” Maybe women over 50 should just kill themselves rather than be subjected to more critiques of this nature.

How about this: I have a pair of nothing leather pants that I could cut off to make shorts. Is this a viable plan? Or not?