D-Day, June 17 2004; My Timeline

The events that happened the week it all started make me sick every time I recall them, but I keep replaying them. In about 4 days these things happened. So here they are:

• Day 1:

  I return to camp. Heartsick that I have no where to go once camp is over. I am trying to understand that my family is not there for me. I don't know how I will pay for anything. I don't know what work I will do. I am letting go of the idea of college, but passing up on education for emotional distress is confusing. I keep weighing the choices.

  At camp, I get back into running. I've never been a hard runner and I was doing 6 miles a day. I was eating less, because the guy I liked had introduced me to the diet he used to train soccer players. I was in the best shape of my life. I felt beautiful and broken. I'd stood up to my mom. There was some freedom, even if the consequences were unbearable.

• Day 2:

  In the morning we do swim tests and I receive my lifeguard certification. Later, we have a break and go to the mall. I am still so torn inside. I go to a salon and have my hair cut boy short. It feels good. I feel stronger. I buy pink running shoes. These will get me somewhere. I eat less. I help manage the children at camp. There is a lot to do. I get lost in the woods. I feel okay about it because life feels like being lost. I make it back.

• Day 3:

  I do something strange. I am very fearful about what do about college. I want comfort. My friend, James. that helped me out was there. He was so cute. I wonder if maybe I love him. I desperately need comfort. I sneak into his cabin with my sleeping bag and sleep on the ground. I never wake anyone. I'm up before dawn and out. I don't know if anyone saw. That day we go mountain biking. It's amazing. I love the beautiful hills. They are so pretty. I return to camp and feel faint. I miss campfire time.

• Day 4, Part 1:

  The next day I was scheduled for lifeguard duty, so I got ready to go to lunch and the pool. Then the camp owners tell me I am fired. They tell me I need to seek counseling and am not fit to work in the state I am in. They are correct, but they don't know that I have nowhere to go. The decide that before sending me home they will take me out to dinner. It's a husband and wife. They seem like such good people. They have kids. They seems to take care of kids and protect them. This felt like a good place, but they are firing me.

  I've never been fired before. I've always been an exceeds expectations person. And I have nowhere to go. At dinner, I breakdown. I cannot fathom what is happening. I start to believe it's all a game being played on me. I cannot face what is happening so I get up from dinner and start looking for James. I thought, this must be like a romantic comedy where there is a great trick! He's planned this dinner with this parent like couple and it's really a safe and romantic night - not sending me back to the haunted house my parent's call home.

  So I start running. I start looking for James, but he isn't there. The couple I was with ask a cop to help find me. The cops asks me what I'm doing. I say I'm looking for James. They say they will help me. They put handcuffs on me. The handcuffs are so tight. They ask me to get in the car. I think what a wild trick this is! So elaborate! To have the cops in it! Nothing else made sense. There was no other explanation for what was happening. I wasn't being arrested. They didn't read me my rights. I was so so scared. I probably started singing then. I sing when I am terrified. The cops drove me to a hospital.

I will tell you about the hospital tomorrow