Atypical Depression (AD) is a subtype of dysthymia and Major Depression characterized by mood reactivity — being able to experience improved mood in response to positive events. In contrast, sufferers of "melancholic" depression generally cannot experience positive moods, even when good things happen. Additionally, atypical depression is characterized by reversed vegetative symptoms, namely over-eating and over-sleeping.
Despite its name, "atypical" depression is actually the most common subtype of depression[1][2] — up to 40% of the depressed population may be classified as having atypical depression.
I finally told my mother how I feel about her wedding and everything. God, I just wish she would stop telling me what I want to hear and just tell me the fucking truth. I am so sick to death of her avoiding a subject she knows I am angry about. Lying to me will not make it better, ma.
I'm staying with my father this winter. He hasn't replied to my e-mail yet, but I'm sure he'll say yes. I freaked out at my mother in an e-mail just now while discussing plane tickets and my passport.
The truth is I think Michael is a pig. He eats like one, he doesn't LISTEN TO MY MOTHER. Have I mentioned this a million and one times yet? How can I let this man marry my mother?
Also, I refuse to live in a place they share. That's ludicrous, I will not stand it. They can get rid of my bed and all of my belongings from now on because God Damn it he will not be a member of MY household that pompous, white American prick I HATE HIM SO MUCH
tori amos
"fat slut" you said
what luck i said
to be stuck in your happy family
don't you dare, i said
judge me
you go and
stick it in somewhere
i'm sick of hearing it
go stick it in somewhere
i'm sick of hearing it
The Space Heater, by Sharon Olds
On the then-below-zero day, it was on,
near the patients' chair, the old heater
kept by the analyst's couch, at the end,
like the infant's headstone that was added near the foot
of my father's grave. And it was hot, with the almost
laughing satire of a fire's heat,
the little coils like hairs in Hell.
And it was making a group of sick noises-
I wanted the doctor to turn it off
but I couldn't seem to ask, so I just
stared, but it did not budge. The doctor
turned his heavy, soft palm
outward, toward me, inviting me to speak, I
said, "If you're cold-are you cold? But if it's on
for me..." He held his palm out toward me,
I tried to ask, but I only muttered,
but he said, "Of course," as if I had asked,
and he stood up and approached the heater, and then
stood on one foot, and threw himself
toward the wall with one hand, and with the other hand
reached down, behind the couch, to pull
the plug out. I looked away,
I had not known he would have to bend
like that. And I was so moved, that he
would act undignified, to help me,
that I cried, not trying to stop, but as if
the moans made sentences which bore
some human message. If he would cast himself toward the
outlet for me, as if bending with me in my old
shame and horror, then I would rest
on his art-and the heater purred, like a creature
or the familiar of a creature, or the child of a familiar,
the father of a child, the spirit of a father,
the healing of a spirit, the vision of healing,
the heat of vision, the power of heat,
the pleasure of power.
An LJ writing prompt for lack of better subject matter
Some people spend their whole lives preparing the answer to this question: What albums are on your personal all-time Top 10 list?
I took this to mean albums I can listen to the whole way through and never skip a song, albums that will always make me stop and listen for a bit, albums that make me remember. Not really the sort of things I would put onto mixes, just because I think the album in its entirety is so great. Got it? Okay.
"I have wished that each building around us
Was a cedar, a poplar, a pine;
That the men and the women were statues,
An the rain that was falling was wine;
That the lights were ethereal flowers;
That the cars were the nooks in the wood,--"
Ameen Rihani, Lilatu Laili
HOORAY!
i don't think obama will make revolutionary changes or anything, BUT the fact that he won is really exciting to me. michigan approved medicinal marijuana use, massachusetts decriminalized the possession of an ounce or less of marijuana, and colorado and south dakota rejected anti-abortion proposals! this is so encouraging to me. i hope that as older, narrow-minded generations die off and younger, better educated people put their two cents in, the U.S. will become a more just, democratic place to live.
here's to hope.
and obama, you better use your power wisely, bitch!
"The Trans for Obama campaign continues! It's your time to stand up & be counted, trans democrats, independents, and republicans! If you're voting for Obama, why not make your vote count twice?
First, here's a reminder of an event way early in the campaign that has been forgotten by the "they're both against gay marriage" set: Obama made a point of shutting down homophobic sentiments when he could have just let the moment pass. For those who think that them both being against gay marriage means there's no difference between them when it comes to LGBT issues, please remember that McCain chose a running mate who is for "ex gay" therapy.
Then go look at these photos. I love that this photographer just kind of knew - as did Richard Avedon (watch till the end) - that Obama would become President Obama. Look at the one of his shoes. Of him cleaning up the drips from his ice cream. At the faces of the young people listening to and looking at him.
My firm belief is that Obama is an extraordinary president for extraordinary circumstances. [sic] That we are in the latter is in no doubt, considering this week's economic news; there are lay-offs happening in all sectors of the economy. That the former is true - that Obama is the right president for this time - is only something I can be sure of in my head and heart. His decision to run when he did, his unbelievable good planning with making it to the nomination = all of these things, the odds he's beat, tell me that his time is now.
And now it is yours. Go out and vote - early, if you can, to avoid the lines, or on November 4th."
My dad's buying me a Yaris hatchback sometime within the next week or two. It'll be really helpful for me if I get to finally drive myself back and forth between home and university. With my schedule being the ugly mess that it is, is it any wonder I find myself constantly exhausted, constantly waiting or constantly late?
In other news, I feel pretty good about being back in university. My saving graces are four classes in particular that I really enjoy. Four out of six is not bad, so I consider this semester a success so far. One of the four classes I've fallen in love with is a social behavioral science class called "Identity, Difference and Deviation in Society". I absolutely love it, because some of the biggest anthropological studies from about the 1960s and back seem obsessed with blaming social deviancy on repressed homosexual urges. I find it endlessly amusing on the one hand and pretty sick on the other, which means that all in all, I was made for this class, and this class was made for me.
So I guess the short version of this is, I'm tired and overloaded, but I'm relatively happy all things considered, and I'm doing ok. I miss Jay a lot, all the time, constantly, especially in the moments before I fall asleep, when in that haze between dreaming and being awake I reach out to the other side of the bed and am always surprised not to find him there, warm and peaceful and perfect in every way. I'm suffering by being away from him, and it causes a huge massive black hole in my life. In my heart, in my soul, in whatever you want to call it. I'm damaged and incomplete until I can be with him again.
But all things considered, I'm doing ok. How are you?
"Friday, September 26th ended a week in which thousands of copies of Obsession: Radical Islam's War Against the West -- the fear-mongering, anti-Muslim documentary being distributed by the millions in swing states via DVDs inserted in major newspapers and through the U.S. mail -- were distributed by mail in Ohio. The same day, a "chemical irritant" was sprayed through a window of the Islamic Society of Greater Dayton, where 300 people were gathered for a Ramadan prayer service. The room that the chemical was sprayed into was the room where babies and children were being kept while their mothers were engaged in prayers. This, apparently, is what the scare tactic political campaigning of John McCain's supporters has led to -- Americans perpetrating a terrorist attack against innocent children on American soil."
And when I googled this event, the only sources that showed this were blogs. No news sites whatsoever. The most remarkable source on the list was this Huffington Post article.
