Joanna Jeanine’s Diary Entry #7
Trying to distract my mind, I’ve thrown myself into books. Lately, it’s been Philipp Mainländer. What a fascinating and tragic figure—so brilliant, but so tormented. His writing, his ideas, are like a storm: intense, churning, restless. Reading him is like being inside the mind of someone who sees every flaw in existence and can’t look away. It’s such a shame—no, it’s infuriating, really—that he ended his own life so young.
I woke up today feeling weighed down by a kind of sadness I can’t get rid of. It isn’t just being sad—more like this deep, listless dissatisfaction that keeps running under everything. I find myself so tired and so worn through by this stupid disease. Multiple sclerosis is gnawing at me—not just my body, though losing so much of my mobility hurts every single day—but at my sense of self. It’s like MS is killing me inch by inch, not always physically, but with this persistent, gnawing frustration. I’m not who I was. I miss walking, not just to get somewhere, but for the sake of moving, feeling free, feeling capable. I loathe sitting here, becoming someone who depends on others. It chips away at my independence, and with every bit that falls off, I feel myself fading. Trying to distract my mind, I’ve thrown myself into books. Lately, it’s been Philipp Mainländer. What a fascinating and tragic figure—so brilliant, but so tormented. His writing, his ideas, are like a storm: intense, churning, restless. Reading him is like being inside the mind of someone who sees every flaw in existence and can’t look away. It’s such a shame—no, it’s infuriating, really—that he ended his own life so young. I can’t help but feel we’ve lost someone who could have been one of the greats, someone who might have changed the landscape of philosophy if he’d endured a little longer. People love to say that his philosophy led him to his tragic end, that his ideas were his undoing. Maybe that’s true, I don’t know. But to me, it feels like such a waste of intellect, of diligence, of a mind that wouldn’t stop probing and searching. It’s hard not to draw some parallels to how I feel on days like this, the sense of frustration, the fatigue, the endless wrestling with things I didn’t choose. It reminds me how fragile even the strongest minds can be. I wish I had a sense of hope today, or something wiser to write, but I just don’t. Maybe tomorrow I’ll wake up in a better place. For now, it’s one more page turned in a heavy book, one more day lived in a body I hardly recognize.
Joanna Jeanine’s Diary Entry #6
The strangest sensation comes over me: I feel blank, almost as if my face has disappeared—erased, featureless. Nothing to distinguish me, nothing to mark me as me. I imagine myself as one of those unfinished marionettes in a cluttered workshop—no identity, no lines drawn, just raw wood and string, not ready for anything, not even display.
It’s an overcast day today. The sky is a heavy, blank gray—the kind of endless, low ceiling that presses softly against the world, muting every color. There’s a gloom to it, and just enough chill in the air that for a moment, I’m fooled into thinking it’s Autumn. Almost. But I know soon enough it will shift—humidity creeping in, the air growing thick and hot. I can sense it waiting in the wings, ready to replace this melancholic chill with a different kind of discomfort. I woke up feeling ill, a fog wrapping around both my body and my thoughts. There’s heaviness in my limbs that I can’t fully explain away, and my mind feels just as sluggish as the sky. The strangest sensation comes over me: I feel blank, almost as if my face has disappeared—erased, featureless. Nothing to distinguish me, nothing to mark me as me. I imagine myself as one of those unfinished marionettes in a cluttered workshop—no identity, no lines drawn, just raw wood and string, not ready for anything, not even display. Even when people surround me, it’s as though I’m alone, locked somewhere far back within myself, behind rattling thoughts bouncing around a vacant space. I watch the conversations and interactions as if through frosted glass, both near and infinitely far away. I can’t seem to trust my own opinions, let alone voice them—sometimes I wonder if they even matter, or if anyone would care if I did speak up. But why should they notice me? There isn’t anything worth seeing. That’s what it feels like—hollow, indistinct, a silhouette instead of a person. These moments of emptiness come often. Still, it’s not that I’m unhappy with my life in general. If anything, I’m genuinely grateful for how things are. I like the way I live, the patterns and routines I’ve built. But inside myself, I’m restless, dissatisfied. Content with the world that I move through, yet at odds with the person moving through it.
Joanna Jeanine’s Diary Entry #3
My dreams of the angels of Ezekiel’s vision have been haunting me. It is bad enough that I am hounded by regret and anger, even though those events of disgust are long past and gone, but it is another thing to be tortured by these voices and demons that constantly torment me.
Another night and another day without rest. I haven’t slept in a while, but I feel frenetic and filled with anxiety. My dreams of the angels of Ezekiel’s vision have been haunting me. It is bad enough that I am hounded by regret and anger, even though those events of disgust are long past and gone, but it is another thing to be tortured by these voices and demons that constantly torment me. On several occasions, I have awakened from dreams of terrifying angels into a reality of demons and devils taunting me. I cannot remember what it was like before the demonic entities that have become my constant and malign companions. Sometimes, the voices are so loud, it is unbearable, and I resort to the liquid antipsychotic when the regular four antipsychotics are not working. As of now, I am fatigued, but alert and agitated. Another night with the specters of the past, another night with Hell as the destination, and the entire world’s weight on my back.
Joanna Jeanine’s Diary Entry #2
It’s been hot here, and the weather is affecting my condition, my disease. The lesions in my brain and spinal cord swell when it’s hot, and I am unable to walk or get around as easily. I guess I should be used to it by now, but I’m not.
I’m planning on a couple of book releases this year. The majority of the writing is finished, thankfully. One book will be philosophical musings, and the other a book of poems and prose poems. I want to work on my novel, but I am stunned by anxiety every time I think about it. It seems like a monumental task, so I tell myself I only need to write a few pages at a time, each day, if I can. I’ve been so depressed lately, though. Less downtrodden and more sad. Somehow, it seems less sharp a downward trend than depression, more soft a descent, but still a spiral out of control. It’s been hot here, and the weather is affecting my condition, my disease. The lesions in my brain and spinal cord swell when it’s hot, and I am unable to walk or get around as easily. I guess I should be used to it by now, but I’m not. I’m pretty fearful. I have to get an MRI soon. I am afraid of what they will find.
Joanna Jeanine’s Diary Entry #1
I’m absent from reality. I’m invisible, even to myself, at times. I look around and all I see are faceless people walking around and living life, not so much depersonalized as out of reach and unrecognizable to me, because I simply don’t know what to look for.
I feel terrible today. How can I be enough for others when I don’t think that I am worthwhile to even myself? Sometimes, it all seems futile. I want to be more; I want to be better. I would love nothing more than to be a source of support and camaraderie for others, but I find it increasingly challenging to do so. I feel so detached, so dissociated. Maybe that’s the problem. No one wants a psychotically depressed, borderline personality disorder case on their hands. Why would they? So, I do my best at writing, at art, and so on, to reach people indirectly, from within the relative safety and distance of art. I want to create catharsis for others through my work, but more directly, I want to prove to myself that I am good enough, to no avail. I’m absent from reality. I’m invisible, even to myself, at times. I look around and all I see are faceless people walking around and living life, not so much depersonalized as out of reach and unrecognizable to me, because I simply don’t know what to look for. They don’t care about identity, I think, because they know who they are. I feel lacking in identity, lacking in definition, and a reason to exist. Civilization goes on and acts on its wishes, according to its devising, giving itself agency, all while I am merely a spectator to their lives, their endeavors. I suppose I always have been.