Insanity

I suppose this post partially has to do with the fact that I finally finished House of Leaves after a year of just putting it off to the side. (Man. Winter break really makes you want to finish all the things you started but never got around to). I would've finished it sooner if it weren't for me being so paranoid after reading those letters at the back of the book.

..too be honest, I'm still filled with lots of mixed feelings; satisfaction, love, fulfillment but mostly fear and paranoia, especially reading all those forum posts.

Which brings me to a point of question. What really drives a person to its point of insanity? Someone once told me (I forgot who) that the difference between a normal and an insane person is that the latter truly acts upon all of their thoughts. For example, out of nowhere you think about laying on the floor at an intersection of a street during rush hour, 'just because you felt like it'. A normal person would immediately think of the idea as simply ridiculous, where as an 'insane' person does so, without thinking of the consequences or simply rejecting the conventional 'rules' of society. (does that even make sense? whatever. you get what i mean.) There are different degrees to classifying whether a person is insane. One, which i'm sure most of you all are familar with is when a person is so overwhelmed with the amount of work that they are simply going 'insane' from it. Another consists of acting upon your impulses, possibily driven by some kind of force, without considering the thoughts or feelings of others. Just you.

Um. I'm still very hesitant to tell completely about my past. (I feel old saying that harhar.) There are still bits and pieces that i just can't seem but feel held back because I get scared of what the outcome may be. Sometimes, I feel like I potentially leave myself out in the open, being vulunerable for anything that may happen in the future.

.. But I guess it'll be for the better. After all. It's in the past. I hope.


Seventh grade. My parents, my sister and I were out on those usual Sunday road trips that we used to go on (Kind of miss them when I think about it). It was a little before my dad was informed of him being diagnosed with Cancer but I knew that something was bothering him, something about his kidney. I forgot. Anyways...until then, my dad is the strong yet silent type. He hardly ever speaks until he feels the need to. Whenever I get in trouble, it's as if my mom is the first line of offense and when it doesn't get through to me or I choose to talk back, once my dad steps in, I immediately start crying within the first five minutes of him scolding me.

Yeah. Even today, there are times I get tears in my eyes when my dad is having a meaningful conversation/lecture with me. Shush.

That day, I knew something was off. Sometimes you can really tell when a person is not in their right mind. He was talking a LOT more than usual and his conversations had no meaning to it. He acted upon just talking and talking without thinking about it. My mom also suspected something was going on but I mean, we couldn't do anything because we were about 2-3 hours away from home and it was in the day time. In addition, we took out the manuel car so my mom couldn't take over the wheel and drive for the rest of the time. By night time, we were on 9th and clement ( i think). and it came to a point when my mom was REALLY concerned and pleaded with him to go back home. Thinking back at it, I'm really glad nothing happened when we came back home because ther ewere so many instances when we were driving around the block, going extremely fast and extremely slow. We got home safely and the night passed by.
At this point, I don't really remember what happened. I think a day or two after that incident, my dad continued to act the way he did and so uh. he went to a psychiatric ward.

..once again it pains me to mention this.

It was scary being in the psychiatric ward in the SF general hospital. It was like. a scene you would see in 'One flew over the cuckoo cukoos nest'. Sort of. I still remember how I was so torn because here you imagine tons of looney people in this place and then i had to see my father in the same situation with them. There were actually multiple times that we had to go there. I remember during one visit that when our eyes met, i feltlike he was so dissappointed in himself, in making me scared.

Those times sure weren't fun.

Afterwards, my dad came home. But these moments would come every now and then. All the way through sophomore year. In fact. the most recent one was a couple of months ago, according to my grandma and joanna but I wasn't there to witness it. I wish i could go into more details about these things but I will never forget that time in May during 8th grade when my dad started to have hallucinations due to a bad mix with his chemo and anti-depressants and started to shout random things. My mom tried to calm him down as the ambulance came and took them away. Hah. I still remember how everyone was gone, leaving me to take care of Joanna and people were constantly calling the house to see what was going on. In my efforts of trying to calm myself down, I made hot and sour soup, which is practically the first thing my dad taught me to make since he knew how much I liked it. I still remember making a blogger post about this whole event when it happened.
(it's funny how i've come back to blogger to talk about this again)
I still don't know the exact details of what realy happened. Asian parents tend to choose not to discuss such matters to their children, feeling that if they disclose that information, it would be too intrusive. The fact that I can't completely communicate with my parents in chinese doesn't help either.
But what i do know is that I will ever forget that day.
SO many things happened that year and things definitely changed.
Looking back, I admit that i'm quite impressed and surprised with what things have turned out. The 12 year old me back then would have NEVER imagined that 7 years later, would have a full ride scholarship to a school her mom once told her that she'll never get into, become involved with so many organizations through out high school and college,turn out MUCH stronger and resilent and continue to have a smile on her face.

There are always days when you come to a point where you just want to REALLY break off all limitations and act whatever the hell you want. For all you and I know, it would be a nice release or the start of something worse. I can tell you straight off that my dad is doing fine now. No worries.

Wow. I sure went off on something totally different. But what made me think about all of this again was when I heard of an elderly Chinese man entering the emergency room because he had hallucinations/delusions and was screaming out for his wife and children. His family wasn't there because he came from a nursing home...

I will never send my parents to a nursing home. No matter what happens.

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Watching Manhunt and reading House of LEaves isn't helping me.