An In-Depth Look at a Sad Binch’s Life

Do people blog anymore? Either way, I know I’m late to the game. I have a tendency to do that—I made a Myspace in 2009. I used to own Blogging for Dummies, but I never read it, and I just recently donated it to Goodwill.

I’m great with helping my friends write the first message to someone they matched with on Tinder, but unfortunately for me, I’m shitty at my own personal introductions. I don’t have an elevator pitch, and no, I don’t know my favorite movie. I suppose two truths and a lie is an appropriate icebreaker? I’ll start. My mom’s addicted to gambling, I’m a sexual assault survivor, and I’m really good at yoga.

I think the most salient thing about me is that I’m a PhD candidate in Sociology. I’m currently writing my dissertation on non-heterosexual women’s experiences with vulvar pain. I know—what a sexy topic! But in all seriousness, grad school is the kind of fresh hell that makes you wish you were never born. I think about dropping out every single day. I didn’t gain the freshman 15, but I definitely gained the grad school 50. Yeah I got my Master’s degree, but grad school really only ever gave me excess body fat and a deep, bottomless depression. My psychiatrist and I are still trying to find the right cocktail of anti-depressants and anti-psychotics. But she’s the kind of psychiatrist who keeps a jar in her office with a label that reads “ashes of whiney teenagers.” So if anyone has any recommendations for a new psychiatrist, let me know.

I identify as a feminist killjoy, genderqueer, radical lesbian. My partner and all my friends are queer—except our token straight friend. We talk about polyamory, Karl Marx, my parking tickets, and how everything is a social construct.  I assume this means I already lost some of you. But if you’re anything like me, you haven’t yet unfriended your old manager who loves using the word “libtard.” Maybe you’ll also stick around because you love to hate me.

I love lists so here’s more essential information about me.

• I strive to only listen to woman artists on Spotify. It’s 2019—I’m tired of men’s voices (#MeFuckingToo). Spotify can create playlists like boozy brunch and chillin’ on a dirt road, but they don’t have a feature to skip songs by male artists? Yeah okay.
• When I was in middle school I would blast Maroon 5’s She Will Be Loved and pretend to star in a music video. I broke up with my girlfriend over earth-shattering events out of our control, but I knew I had to fight like hell to get her back. I stood outside her house, banging on her door in the pouring rain. She opened the door, and upon seeing me completely drenched, shirt soaked through and clinging to my stomach, she immediately became overcome with emotion, and without thinking, pressed her lips into mine. We stood there making out in the rain to the sultry sound of Adam Levine’s voice. Except my ex-girlfriend’s front porch was really my walk-in closet. And my ex-girlfriend was really a blow up punching bag I stored in my closet. I often closed the curtain to my closet and made out with my plastic punching bag, pretending it was Chelsea from That’s So Raven. I spent a lot of time in that closet. The symbolism is painfully cliché.

• I saw twin psychics –“the Angel Ladies”—at 17 and they predicted I would “walk the halls of Harvard one day,” but it’s over a decade later and all I have are 20 VHS copies of The Nutty Professor.
• Right after I graduated college, I applied to a Craigslist job post titled, “toys, toys, toys.” Oddly, it wasn’t the most legitimate company and it was easily the worst job I ever had. All I had to do in the interview was enthusiastically love toys and estimate how much the remote-control helicopter cost that was sitting behind the owner’s desk. I guessed $100 and he proudly corrected me—it was only $17 or a similarly absurd price. Something about buying and selling toys at wholesale prices. I don’t know, I zoned out and didn’t quite fully realize until my first day that the job description was just straight up hustling. I had to carry around a box full of product and whatever I didn’t sell got deducted from my “paycheck.” The company didn’t have a license to solicit at people’s homes so we had to stick to businesses. I walked into Pizza Huts and insurance companies and dentist offices, asking if the employees wanted to buy any tasers. (Apparently pepper spray and tasers are toys?) One day I was out on the job with my boss and he told me not to go into the dingy looking bar across the street. I ignored him. I don’t regret my decision because I sold almost all my shit for the day, but I also almost got tased by a very intoxicated man throwing back beers at 1 PM. The last straw was the day I got mugged. Not only would I not get compensated for the day, but I would have to pay for the portable speaker someone swiped. I took my lunch break in my car. I could only afford applesauce and I ate it with a fork while sobbing, my head pressed into the steering wheel.  
• I have a witch’s altar in my dining room along with 3 Tarot decks despite not having a damn clue how to read Tarot.
• I’m excruciatingly indecisive. I’m learning that it’s likely a byproduct of my Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. I try to explain this to my friends, but they still don’t particularly love when I’m not sure if it’s best for me to drive to the bar on my own so I have an easy escape plan or if I should just let them pick me up so I can have a safe ride home later. Indecisiveness might be my worst flaw, but I don’t know. I haven’t decided.
• My friends definitely think that my puns are the worst thing about me. But if I don’t make a dozen puns a day, you should probably call my therapist. Something’s wrong.
• I have a medical marijuana card. I guess PTSD is good for something.
• I often wonder why I’m hungry even though it’s 5 PM and all I’ve had that day are old airplane peanuts and 3 cups of coffee. I usually can’t distinguish hunger from anxiety.
• My partner often commends me for staying strong despite all the trauma, but like, the other day I cried for 3 hours because we ran out of peanut butter.
• My therapist randomly emailed me an article about the differences between a borderline personality disorder and a highly sensitive person. I’m still not totally sure what she was trying to say. I locked myself in my bedroom, hid under the covers, and overanalyzed the email for at least 6 hours.
• I’m 100% positive I have misophonia. It’s the hatred of sound. Personally, I can’t fucking handle any sounds related to the mouth—chewing, biting, swallowing. I learned quickly that misophonia is vastly misunderstood. When I explain the condition to someone it can go one of two ways. First, they might say that they have misophonia too. They think because the sound of people chewing gum with their mouths open is “ew so annoying,” they totally also have a medical condition.  But there’s a difference between misophonia and pet peeves. As soon as you’re triggered by a particular sound, your body goes into fight or flight mode. For me, if I can’t escape the situation, I’ll start to sweat, my body will shake, and I’ll get violent. A lot of people think I exaggerate. Scoffing at the legitimacy of misophonia is the other common reaction I get. But honestly, if you eat a banana anywhere near me, I’m already thinking of at least a dozen ways to murder you. I turn either homicidal or suicidal. It’s lovely never knowing what you’re going to get. I can’t eat meals next to my partner unless we turn up the TV to near-maximum volume. My friends know now to put music on if we’re having a potluck dinner. Sometimes they forget, but it’s nice to mostly have their support. My misophonia was worse a couple years ago. My ex-girlfriend once got so annoyed with my passive aggressive dirty looks, she took her tacos to the bedroom to finish eating. She may have been on the other side of the apartment with the door shut, but I could still hear her crunching. It was essentially grounds for a break-up. I also vividly remember the time someone in my philosophy class was eating trail mix. I couldn’t leave the room because I would miss the lecture. Instead, I sat at my desk visibly yet silently sobbing for the next hour and a half.

• I don’t have OCD, but I do have compulsive tendencies. If I set the microwave for one minute and run to the bathroom, I need to race back and plant both feet on the kitchen tile before the microwave sounds. If I don’t, then the next time I’m in the car with all my friends, we’ll get crushed by a tractor trailer and everyone but me will die. If I’m walking on the sidewalk and a car is coming up behind me, I pick something on my path, like a tree. If I don’t reach the tree before the car passes me (and I’m not allowed to quicken my pace), someone will shoot me in the back and I’ll bleed out on the sidewalk.
• Another fun game I’ve been playing since childhood is pretending that authority figures have access to my optic nerve. They can see what I see, as if they’re looking through my eyes. Currently, I’ve been imagining my supervisor in my head. I act as though I’m not in on it, but secretly I walk around my apartment as if I’m giving her a tour. Here’s a basket of folded laundry. See! I’m clean! Here’s a bookshelf—I’m very well read! Here I am washing the dishes. I am a very responsible grown-up! Now I am petting my cat under her chin. I am very affectionate! Here I am working at my desk. I am productive and care very much about my work! But this uncontrollable compulsion means I carefully police my behaviors. I’m cautious not to look down at my chest when I’m putting on my bra because I don’t want my supervisor to see my boobs. I close my eyes for as long as I can while scooping cat poop because I don’t want my supervisor to see how long it’s been since I last cleaned the litter box. I don’t look down at the toilet after I pee because I don’t want my supervisor to see that I’m not hydrated enough.
• I’ve been told I can be exhausting.
• I try a little too hard to remember the last thing someone says to me before we part just in case they die and I want to tattoo their last words on my body.
• I guess I think about death a lot.
• I’ve recently been cataloging all my fears in hopes that getting them out on the page will diminish their impact on me. The latest fears added to the list are pistachios, school bus lights, and videos of surfers riding 80-foot tsunami-like waves.

It’s 2019 and I’m a millennial. This blog is supposed to be my safe space, damn it. So I’ll likely write about mental health and trauma, family dysfunctions, what I learned in therapy, my experiences with men, and that one time I applied to be on The Real World. Maybe I’ll post rants or personal essays or stand up material or maybe I’ll get high and write in inscrutable messages. For an absurd amount of time I thought I had borderline personality disorder, so really, you never know what you’re going to get from me.  

As a forewarning, I plan out a lot of projects, but I never see them through. So far I started but couldn’t finish two podcasts, 17 essays, and a commitment to drink more water. I recycle New Year’s resolutions yet truly believe every year will be different. But, like, I’ll ~totally~ post here regularly.

Also, you can follow me on Twitter at @sad_binches if you feel so inclined. My Twitter is currently wildly successful and critically acclaimed. I once had 9 followers. Then I dropped to 8, which if you think about it, is pretty impressive because that was 11% of my total followers. I wondered how long a Twitter with a bio that reads ~positive vibes only~ would stay with me. The answer is 3 days.

Please stay with me longer. I have abandonment issues.