Love, Justine

WOMEN’S CENTER

April 24th, 2018

Day 295

Tuesday

6pm

My rheumatology appointment was okay. My doctor said that I had protein in my urine last time, so he repeated the urinalysis. 

I hope my kidneys are okay.

I talked to my sister, and she “yes”’d me to death–yes I’ll call my therapist, yes, I’ll call my psychiatrist, etc.

She’s never like that. 

Usually when I tell her she needs help, she says that I’m nobody to be giving her advice, and disregards it immediately. I think she needs to be hospitalized. She seems to think she can will herself to be better–she kept saying, “I’m going to try really hard to get better!” insistently. I told her that she needed to ask for help in order to get better. 

Duh.

She should know that by now. 

I’m worried about her.

She seems desperately lonely.

April 25th, 2018

Day 296

Wednesday

1pm

I talked to Elizabeth, my sister…she was somewhere where it was really loud and there were a lot of people talking…it sounded like a bar. She had to go outside so that she could hear me. When I asked her where she was, she said, “Franklin…a lot of stuff has happened since you went away…” I said, “Yeah, I know you’re in Franklin, but WHERE/” And then she told me that she had to go eat lunch and hung up on me. She didn’t seem to remember talking to me yesterday at all…it makes me sad.

In any case, right now we’re in some stupid drug and alcohol group with a new lady they shipped in…she didn’t bring anything for us to do. We’re talking about conspiracy theories surrounding 9/11. 

Gawd.

How incredibly stupid. This has nothing to do with drugs or alcohol. This lady is just letting Jolene, one of the new women, talk and talk and talk…I know her whole life story six times over now. 

I’m so tired today. The weather is cold and rainy, and all of my joints hurt.

Uh oh.

Now Jolene has worked herself up to the point of crying. 

Ugh.

When is this going to be over?

The other new woman’s name is Jo. Now Jolene is talking about babies dying and child molesters getting their kids back before drug dealers. She’s got a $2 million lawsuit against an Acorn gas station where her boyfriend beat the shit out of her on camera and they didn’t call 911.

Hm.

Hope she wins.

She says her whole face was reconstructed.

Yuh oh.

Now she’s talking about seeing God.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmm…….now she’s talking about abortions. She’s using this as a personal therapy session. Now onto abusive boyfriends and how they manipulate and brainwash you. Now onto sex with random guys. 

Huh.

This is at least a little interesting. Now how jail is easier than real life. Now onto being addicted to cigarettes. Now how we don’t speak to our families.

I’m worried about Elizabeth.

April 26th, 2018

Day 297

Thursday

9:30am

Mr. Big is making me read the NA book:

“Just For Today–Living the Program”

“Worrying is a lack of faith.”

“We try to avoid the self-deception of arrogance and self-righteousness.”

“When we accept that our addiction caused our own hell and that there is a power available to help us, we begin to make progress in solving our problems.”

“Each day most of us ask our Higher Power to help us stay clean, and each night we give thanks for the gift of recovery.”

“One way that we can continue a conscious contact [with a Higher Power] especially in hard times, is to list the things for which we are grateful.”

“Gradually, as we become more God-centered than self-centered, our despair turns to hope.”

“Any clean addict is a miracle. We keep this miracle alive in ongoing recovery with positive attitudes.”

“Three basic spiritual principles are honesty, open-mindedness, and willingness.”

“One way to practice the principles of how [the program works] is by taking a daily inventory.”

“We put spiritual living first and learn to use patience, tolerance, and humility in our daily affairs.”

“We begin to feel loveable which is a feeling totally alien to our old egocentric selves.”

“By asking for help, we can change.”

“We need to recognize two of our seemingly inherent enemies, apathy and procrastination.’

“A relapse and sometimes subsequent death of someone close to us can do the job of awakening us to the necessity for vigorous personal action.”

“We may become angry and resentful toward anyone or anything.”

7pm

For some reason the Sleep Nazi is on 2nd shift today–ha! She joked to Loreen that it would smell better if she left the room, and Loreen snarked back, “Oh yeah? You don’t like the smell of failure and bad decisions?”

Funny.

I guess I’d better go get ready for the meeting.

Now Mr. Big tells me that until I write my essays, I cannot file my early release paperwork with the Courthouse!

WHAT?!!!

GRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR……………………

11pm

Loreen just told me she saw a ghost. 

Hm.

It’s rumored around here that there was a boy named Jacob that hung himself in one of the bathrooms some time ago and now his spirit haunts the place. 

I believe it.

Loreen was really spooked, so spooked that she spooked the staff. She says he’s about 5’10” and has brown hair. The boy who hung himself was 15 years old, so the story goes. I tried to look it up online but the only death I found was a six-year old girl in the early 1900s that died in a fire. This place is very old.

In other news, Nikolai came to the meeting and was very shaken up. She finally shared at the end of the meeting, while crying, that she wasn’t doing well and wanted to be back in the Women’s Center. I feel so bad for her. She’s been institutionalized her entire adult life, and she doesn’t even know how to live “on the outside,” much less do it with a newborn baby. 

Poor girl.

I hope to God she doesn’t relapse.

The Stupid Asshole she’s living with, I’ll call him SA for short, is a controlling demon with so many issues that Nikolai is having a really hard time dealing with him and the baby.

April 29th, 2018

Saturday

299

6:30pm

It’s cold and rainy today, and my joints hurt, and I REALLY don’t want to go to this meeting in Galeton tonight. Georgia, one of the new residential workers, texted Mr. Big to see if I could stay back and write these three stupid essays he wants me to write, but he hasn’t answered.

I guess I’m staying then.

I hope he doesn’t pitch a fit when he looks at his phone. I’m writing one now on “How My Actions Affect Other People.”

It is, of course, all bullshit.

Better get back to it.