I f****ing hate/love the show Intervention... and I hate my life

The simplest summary of this entry is that I should be watching something else.. but anyway.

I really hate how the people on this show get to go to places I could never dream of affording. These are not places my insurance would pay for. These are nice rehab/treatment places. Places mainly for people with rich parents.

I mean... I am not some of these people... I'm not on meth (really common on the show), I don't have any kids (one I was watching), but honestly... I could be some of them.

One.. a woman who alternates between anorexia and alcoholism. At first a bottle of blueberry (yuck) vodka a day seems extreme.. but I've done a bottle a day of vodka

A woman who alternates anorexia and self harm.. I've cut worse than that.

The ones who drink wine or beer all day... the ones hiding vodka everywhere. I don't have a rich husband or family to hide my drinking from. My kitchen is filled with empty vodka bottles. I plan my schedule around getting vodka.

The thing is... My family is not the dramatic type to do a show like this. My family sure is not rich enough to send me to that sort of rehab. I have not lost kids and jobs and prostituted myself. I am in graduate school and work and put myself in debt to drink this way. I don't have kids because I have intentionally not put myself in situations with that risk because I knew emotionally I couldn't handle a family or a child

So yes, I fucking hate this show. Either people have families willing to do this drama and money and whatever to put people who don't want help through wonderful treatment places. Or people who have lost jobs and lives get treatment that I can't get because I have a fucking job and can't even afford what my insurance offers.

Yes, I'm crying hard writing this. The show has ended, so it's not even like I could try. Most people don't even know I'm this bad. My parents never have shown any interest in fighting for treatment mainly because since I got my own insurance, it was my job. I called and I obsessed and I cried over getting help.

And I am starting yet another semester of grad school with a great GPA (grade point average 3.84 out of 4) and only maybe a handful of people understand a little of this. Even they know how much I drink, but they don't realize at all how hopeless I am.

It fucking SUCKS to be such a "high functioning" alcoholic, bulimic, depressed, whatever. Nobody notices enough to fight for me. I'm healthy enough I can be expected to hold a job. I'm not on disability. I know people who are... and I honestly don't see them as sicker. I see them in a situation where family expects them to keep up the treatment-illness cycle. Or they have family that can afford whatever treatment is suggested.

Most people in my life ask when I expect to graduate with my masters degree. A few mention treatment... and the assumption then is even that it will be over the winter holiday or after graduation. There's probably some that just expect AA to fix it... and I'm not going to claim that isn't true.

Except, AA is the "softer way"... there's a part in the big book "How it works" that talks about trying to find "an easier, softer way but we could not"... and I'm sorry rehab is an easier softer way. Fuck even family that aware and that fight for it is easier and softer than this.

The 12 steps may be the answer, but there's a difference between working them in a safe, therapeutic treatment environment or in an environment where I can continue to depend on my family financially forever... and then going to grad school, teaching 3 classes a week, and pretending through all that that I am a functioning human being.

It is the 2nd week of school.... this is probably a bad sign. It's the 2nd week though of 4 years of grad school. Before that I had a couple more where I was working full time and responsible for my own insurance. In that time, I did go residential for bulimia... but that bordered on begging and pleading for help because I knew insurance would not pay for anything helpful since I was so fat. I was in psych hospitals and I don't remember how those bills worked out. I did end up on short term disability, but that ended pretty quickly when I went back to work after 2 months.

Since grad school, it is just me. I am the only one who advocates for help. I am the only one who knows the severity of my drinking. I am the one who hides everything from my job because if I lose it, I will have nothing. I am not convinced in this job that I will keep my job if I consider disability since everything is determined a semester at a time. And with all this, any treatment depends on the income and the insurance that comes from me being a functional teacher. And this fucking sucks.

I am an expert at pretending. I don't know my students reviews, but I have heard I have never had a complaint. I have covered for other graduate students and have them asked to attend my classes instead. So I am such a fucking WONDERFUL insane person that everyone loves me. And I am wondering how much longer I can live like this.

So the major life lesson is probably to stop watching "reality tv" about mental illness