| name | value |
| location | Melbourne |
| date | 2025-09-30 |
| dateFormat | dd-mmm-yyyy |
| slug | 2025September |
九月三日
Tonight I went out of my way to buy a physical copy of Steppenwolf. Almost bought three other books just because there was a 3 for 2 sale. Talked myself out of it thinking, I probably won’t live long enough to finish reading them.
九月七日
No, it’s not worth the trouble.
九月八日
The moon is a celestial body. I am an organic body.
世界各地的月食，第一口吃掉的地方不一樣。 天涯不共此時，也不共一輪月。 宇宙自然運行，人抬頭望月，感到悲傷寂寞也可以，感到滿足幸福也可以。 宇宙只是在自然運行而已。
月亮只是月亮 身體只是身體 今夜我愛這月亮 也喜歡我這具身體
Tonight, I cease fire with myself.
Sent L the message I kept not having the energy for, as today I hit a point where I just felt nothing but indifference. In my drafts I had different postscripts, some gentle and open for reconnection, other condemning as I couldn’t stand letting this person get away with what he has done. In the end I had none of those. I just don’t think it would matter anymore.
九月十日
At this precise moment, a crushing wave hit me that I feel nothing but a violent wish for death. I am so lost, not knowing what to do, that the only thing I have right now is this notebook. Does writing it down ease the pain, I do not know, but I have to try. The only truth I know of this world is that nothing is permanent, and so this shall, too, pass.
Uncannily enough, a student in my class has the same name as L‘s flatmate, who speaks also in the same voice and same flat-tonality and same quietness. It’s been seven weeks and I finally couldn’t hold it and told my student so.
I added, but the other Con is not someone I like. The student played along and accepted that he is the better Con. I was in a good mood and told him he’s the best Con.
A good mood, as I thought I was in, is probably skewed from the reality. My hands were shaking, and I couldn’t focus afterwards and forgot a couple of things. Triggered and agitated, would be a more accurate description.
Later, having accepted that I would not be able to reach L, hence there’s little hope of getting my belongings back, I blocked him.
I felt much relief. Even though my body and part of my brain still uncontrollably grieve, I feel lighter, for the first time in many months now.
九月十一日
Emotions caught up today, I couldn’t focus. I feel extremely tired. Last night’s sleep was very bad and during the day I felt I was falling asleep. I knew it too well these are the symptoms of my organic body trying to fight depression. I decided to do some house inspections, before that I would nap. Out of habit—as this had been what I had to do for June and July, I opened the therapy app, and then started reading those unsent drafts I wrote to L. I felt this profound sadness. My 15min short nap was infused with but that. Then I woke up, completely unaware of reality but only this sadness, for a good few seconds.
On my way back from house viewings, I felt this immense urge to smash things, to tear myself up. Then I caught it and took a moment to acknowledge it. Why do I always turn violence inwards? I always, always want to hurt myself, punish myself. Yes, occasionally I would wish I could punish the people who have caused all these, but in action the only person I end up punishing is no one but myself. I wish the act of killing oneself is easier.
九月十四日
The past few days were hectic. 2am, finally had a moment for unproductive scrolling. Saw a short clip on unrequited love, cried unexpectedly out. A moment of emotion outburst. Since Wednesday midnight there hasn’t been a moment for this until now.
Now I’m exhausted again.
My Apple Book app shows that I’m on 84-day reading streak. Of course that‘s less than the actual number—I’ve read at least a page everyday, since the start of the year, doing my StoryGraph challenge—it’s just I don’t always read on my phone.
This streak started roughly when I started to process my grief. 84 days ago, it was June 20, 2025. It sounds about right, because there had been days I was completely immobilised and couldn’t read at all, so the reading started a bit later than our separation.
My heart still aches for this loss, thankfully a lot less now. Though I still occasionally fantasise about the possibility of us speaking again, making amends, reconnecting. Sometimes I’m swept by the flashbacks of all those good moments, full of love. Other times I’m utterly disappointed by his behaviours and lies, and the foolishness in myself that chose to believe and love him unreservedly.
One thing grief and reading have in common is that, they are mine and mine alone, unless I ever choose to share them through writing or spoken words.
Doing the training module on children protection, I was triggered over and over again, constantly on the verge of tearing and I had to take multiple breaks. It’s proven to me that I am not capable to be a high school teacher. Then what am I good for? I am never convinced to live for myself—I truly do not want to live this life—now the only thing I can think of and qualified to do to contribute to the world that I care about, is actually difficult for me to do.
九月十五日
85 days now. Every other aspect of life right now is already stressful and overwhelming enough, but he is still on my mind. I still wake up to the thought of him. I hate that this is the case, but it really seems there is nothing I can do about it.
很多時刻都在恨自己，為什麼還在痛，為了一個這樣的人，已經花費了很多不值得花的時間和情感，分開之後的時間已經快超過在一起的時間，卻還在如此劇烈地疼痛著，哀悼，回憶，幻想。
大腦一直在想辦法保護自己，每一刻的感知都如此劇烈，但很快就會忘記。
我不斷地翻閱從二月以來的日記，散落在各個app和筆記本裡，公開的私密的，所有愛意瘋漲和不安的證明。
那時將我對他的愛比做了在最優環境下生長的植物，我帶著懷疑卻沒有修剪，甚至任由他去給它施肥，輕聲說「長大吧，快長大吧」。
現在看來它其實是可惡的野草。燒不盡，拔不完。在那個冬季短暫死亡時，我想要把它除掉空出位置來，結果發現是徒勞。現在它還在想扎根，刺進我的血脈，汲取我的精神和力量，殘忍地長在我所有大的小的撕裂的傷口上。
我為我愛錯人，無法控制當下自己的疼痛而感到羞恥。羞恥又再帶來一輪痛。
可是沒有什麼好羞恥的吧。諮商師對我說：
No one can see what you're seeing, or feel what you're feeling, unless you share it with them - whether it's through writing, or spoken language, or some other form of art. And I wonder if this is a strength of yours, Eileen, that has felt like a weakness in the wake of this breakup. You have a rich and layered inner world, and from an outsider's perspective, it's a gift that you can access it so completely. But to the wrong person, it may feel like too much. Have you ever felt that way - like your thoughts and feelings are too big, or too intense?
是啊，我要把自己完全調成機器人模式才能躲避高敏感帶來的一切震動，可這沒什麼好羞的吧？
確實，我愛錯了人。明明感到危險和不安的時候還是決心要給生命和愛再一次機會，依然決心去愛，真心去愛，毫無保留地愛了。好像也不是那麼不堪的事情吧？
My therapist said also this to me:
So we're circling around this idea that Lawrence has been the first domino. And I wonder if there's a way we can understand him as a catalyst - a person who, in his own way, has accelerated the process of healing from a longer-standing hurt. Because you've been hurt before, Eileen, and you learned to cope with that by being pretty self-reliant. But Lawrence's betrayal has placed you in a position where you can't be self-reliant anymore. You need to let people in, and lean on them for support. And in the process, you might discover that they're capable of offering you a kind of love that your family couldn't - a kind that says, I see all of you, and I accept you, even if your needs are not exactly the same as mine.
九月十六日
Today my thoughts and feelings are all over the place. The morning was a struggle, like any usual depressive morning. Thoughts and flashbacks rushed in and I felt drown. Took some time to do things to distract myself. The laundry pod was a bad decision—that was the laundry pod I mainly used during the last few days we were together, and the scents fuelled my nostalgia and inflicted pain.
Replied to some messages, trying to make an analysis of the development of my feelings, tracing the timeline.
Eventually as I walked out of the shuttle bus, I gathered some strength and could think and see clearly and through: I was and still am just lonely, and I have an abundance of love to give. L wanted it, so I gave him. That was all. In giving him the love he sought, I naturally also formed a habit of truly loving him. This is just who I am. I don’t lie. I give genuine love and I give genuinely. As a person who feels and loves too much, I am now suffering from the much anticipated consequences of that.
It is also true that since N, nobody has shown me this much of love, which I never thought would happen to me again after N. I was swept away by the love bombing. I got carried away. It is not surprising because this is how love bombing works, and I do have issues. It all makes sense.
I printed off my writing, Absurd growth. Yes, I think that text has come to an end, even though I haven’t finished this round of reading The Myth. I closed it with a last breath of my love for Lawrence. Printing it out would be the closure. It’s long overdue, but this chapter is officially closed now. I do have better things to worry about.
Ending of the piece.
The love I had for that person mutated into a vile, carnivorous weed. I thought it had rotted away. When it shriveled in winter, I imagined torching it with a controlled blaze—cleansing the soil, making space for something tender to grow. It played dead. But like all monstrous weeds, it thrives on ruin. Not even a wildfire could scorch it out of existence.
It slithered back in, driving its roots deep into the raw meat of my wounds—whether shallow scratches or gaping lacerations. It drinks my agony like nectar, siphoning my blood, my breath, my will, to fatten itself. It coils around my bones, burrows into my organs, spreads like a plague. Its growth is a grotesque infestation, a medieval torment device lodged in my flesh. It is obscene. Inhuman.
These are the moments I long for my old magic—the numbness that once shielded me. I wish I could blind myself to the sight of this weed sprawling across my existence, strangling every inch of me. I beg for the growth to cease.
But what I crave more violently, more viscerally, is my own annihilation.
九月十七日
想到我的unproductiveness，想到我的一事無成，又想到不只是身邊的朋友，哪怕L的前女友，都擁有比我更多的支持系統。而我什麼也沒有。
這個念頭出現，快下公交的時候忽然就崩潰了。
從bus loop走到數學樓哭了一路，感覺真都快站不穩。到了數學樓下還沒哭完，坐在樓下的木凳上接著哭。
聽見有人走過，調整了一下抬頭看，一個藍頭髮的亞洲女生走過來，跟我說沒事的，都會好的，let me give you a hug.
她可能以為我也是大學生吧，跟我說大學就是這樣，然後她上學的掙扎之類的。
我們互相祝福之後她就走了。
陌生人的善意，總是會在很崩潰的時候零零散散地出現。我都記在心上並且每個時刻都希望能回報給世界同樣的，微小的，一點點善意。
不是「我三十歲了怎麼還會走在路上忽然哭起來」，而是活得越久傷口越多，在任何時刻都有可能什麼地方撕裂開來了，痛得我眩暈。
九月十八日
It hurts it hurts it hurts. It still hurts.
I knew I shouldn’t have trusted L, yet I still did. Slowly but I did. I knew everything changes, more than anything people do, yet I believed in his words and grew some faith. It all now backfired. And it hurts. It burns my heart but the weed of love regrows and crawls back into every corner, its vines so resilient, not giving a fuck about how it strangles its host, it just wants to grow.
I was whole before I met you. Not flawless, but healing—stitched together over time, scarred but strong. You wanted a space in me. You searched for the tender seam of an old wound, and when you found it, you tore it open with merciless force. Not gently, but violently, that was how you wedged yourself into me. You split me wide, ripped through flesh and memory, and forced yourself into the raw cavity. You grew there, tangled in my blood and pain, feeding off the rupture like a vine in fresh ruin. And then you left. You removed yourself from the bloody, sticky ruin, left me gutted, hollowed out, a gaping wound where you once thrived. I bleed still. I ache endlessly. I am ravaged.
九月十九日
You once asked me whether I’m as honest with myself as I am with others. I said yes.
Then you asked about feelings. I still said yes, but added that sometimes I act against them—just to punish myself. To outsiders, that might look like I’m not being honest about my feelings.
But there’s more to it. I think I’m just forgetful.
I carry a certain perception of my self-image, and I selectively forget things—feelings included—to protect that image.
One thing that’s come with age and growth is the ability to discern the fine line between shame and guilt.
I no longer fixate on an ideal version of myself. I’m faded now. My ego, close to nonexistent.
That was why I decided to write down how I missed kissing you. Why I wrote down how my love grew for you.
Simply because I no longer feel ashamed for having loved someone, even though this someone does not deserve my love. Even though I let myself be gullible and made myself look like a fool. I no longer feel that shame. And to keep myself from forgetting, I write.
I stopped denying what cannot be denied.
I loved you. I still do. I know if you ever showed any remorse or accountability, I wouldn’t even blink and would embrace you back to my life. I know this is foolish, to be manipulated by you this way, but I know this is how I feel right now. In that sense I am glad that you don’t love me at all. Glad you’ll never reach out again.
Because I won’t have to fight myself to protect me from you.
I miss your body. And this is the first time when I miss someone I also miss their body.
These are not the only things I want to write down.
As I was walking home, in the warm spring night, I felt just a little lighter, a little less tethered, a little more relieved, a little more comfortable with your absence, with the absence of what we had.
I savoured the lightness and fulfilment I felt from spending time with this new group of friends. We didn’t do much, we just climbed, barely even talked about anything other than climbing. But it was soothing. I didn’t feel drained, despite it being a social situation.
And I looked at the gaping wound that you torn in me, and I thought, it is okay, I can stitch it up again. I do not need to find a substitute to fill the void. I will slowly, slowly, close it up and everything will be fine.
It is a promise I want to keep, even though you wouldn’t care less. I will not replace you or our memories by anything or anyone else. But I will outgrow the pain.
This notebook, is all I have. Writing is my only tool.
Reading is my shelter.
九月二十日
忽然很想給外婆打電話。其實也不算突然，週三那天想到自己無依無靠而在學校崩潰的時候，直覺好像只有外婆可以打個電話過去。
電話接通之後發現，幻想中的安慰和傾訴，全都沒有發生。找不到一個線頭可以拉出我最近的苦楚。她離我的生活太遠了，我即使詳細描述我的處境，她也不能明白究竟在哪裡我被煎熬著。
她用玩笑的語氣說，「每天只是在混日子」，我聽了內心只覺得恐怖至極。活得那麼辛苦，卻只是為了活著？如果人生只剩下，一日三餐，我不明白為什麼還要活著。
I recently noticed that when I read Camus and Hesse, sometimes the sentences resonate with me too greatly or the thoughts they provoke are too tremendous, I let out a satisfied sigh, or even a moan, just because how content my brain feels. That momentary sensation feels a lot similar to, reaching a sexual climax.
九月二十一日
Love is a choice. Knowing that you didn’t love me the way you claimed to do, didn’t stop me from loving you. Although I had to choose to try to stop loving you, because the malice in your treatment is harmful to me.
I want to hug, I want to write, I want to scream, I want to drown myself, I want to jump off a cliff.
好像，我只是好像，想要佔有你。
The connection you felt, was at the cost of draining me.
九月二十二日
I’m trying to walk out of this marsh, but my feet are mired. What is holding me back—the quicksand, the ooze, the tangled reeds, or the churning undercurrent—or the entanglement of all of them? Whatever they are, I realise they come less from our past, and more from my present mind: my fixation on the past and my confusion.
If I could accept the classification of finite simple groups without understanding the proofs, why can’t I accept our outcome, clear and undeniable right in front of me, without understanding why?
My ankles are strained, trapped in the snarled water weeds. They look messy, but oddly beautiful. I see red marks—streaks of blood—on my body, dissolving in the water, staining the murky depths with colour.
九月二十三日
The unresolved betrayal is ripping my heart apart.
I should never forget the joy and excitement I feel before seeing my supervisor. This is how it feels to see someone you like and love and/or respect. The joy is so big I would start running.
九月二十四日
The way I talk about my dad, even now, makes me realise one of my deepest struggles: I find it hard to see a person both for who he is and how he treats me. I never separate how he treats others from my image of him—but somehow, I always separate his personality from my own existence. To this day, I recognise and even admire certain qualities in my dad, vividly remembering how I romanticised them as a child and grew up under their influence. But alongside those influences were his abuse, his violence, his constant invalidation and humiliation. I suppose that’s the root of my issue. Growing up denied of my worth, I came to see myself as worthless—and the way people treat me as irrelevant to who they are.
That’s why I could still love Lawrence, despite everything he did to me. But I shouldn’t. And I won’t—not again, not anymore.
Like any wound, the best way to attend to a wound is to not touch it and just let it heal. When it itches, it means new tissues are growing and no matter how unbearable that is, scratching, or worse, tearing off the scab is a horrible idea. Even though it provides temporary relieve, form the itch. The newly opened wound is going to bleed again. Longer time is then needed to heal that, yet again.
I should keep this in mind, and stop messing with my wounds.
I seem to have lost my ability to eat and sleep. Only, it is not because of L anymore but because of maths. My actual, long-term, life partner. Although a divorce seems to be lurking just outside the door.
I used to romanticise maths a lot, but like most of those who have stayed in a relationship, or marriage, for too long, I no longer feel the need to bring it up every three sentences I speak.
Now at the brink of potential separation, like any divorcing person might also do, I started to reflect on my relation with maths and this long journey with its company.
It is hard to remember when it started, except that it was before even school. The series of poetic maths books teaching old puzzles dating from the Ancient Greek, were my first encounter with maths. It was certainly love at first sight, even though at the time I would have no idea what love was. It wasn’t in my vocabulary yet.
九月二十六日
I stated dreaming again. Every night in the past week I had vivid dreams. It feels as if my brain finally tries to heal.
First night it was still Lawrence—even in the dream he wasn’t present and I had to ask someone else about him.
The next night it was my high school best friend. We were doing something together again.
Then it was my parents.
Just then, I was just climbing with a couple of acquaintances in my nap.
I gave chances that weren’t deserved, and waited longer than I should have.
Your silence is not my burden to carry. Your avoidance is not my responsibility to decode. Your lack of integrity is not a problem of mine.
I release the expectation of accountability from someone who refuses to offer it. I no longer hold on to the hope that you’ll do better—because your proved yourself incapable.
This chapter is closed and I shut the door.
There’s nothing left to say to someone who chooses silence over accountability. I’ve done my part—more than enough. If you won’t return what you borrowed, then keep it. Let it rot in your possession. Along with your immaturity, your unkindness, your lies and your vices.
I am tired of being tethered to someone who refuses to show up. Your absence is loud. Your avoidance shows who you really are.
I see you clearly. You know that, and that is why you are afraid, that is why you refuse to take responsibility.
This ache—this weed that grew from love—has overstayed its welcome. It probably will remain for a little longer. It probably still grows for a bit more. I’ve tried to torch it, uproot it, starve it.
Perhaps the point isn’t to kill it.
I am no longer tending to it. I should just turn away.
Let it starve. Let it wither. Let it claw at nothing.
I have other wounds to tend to. Other truths to write. Other lives to live.
九月二十七日
論文衝刺好像治好了我的失戀痛。 ——還有這週以來每天晚上不同的夢，感覺腦子終於決定自我治療了，在夢裡給自己開刀。—— 現在想到L只會覺得淡淡的厭倦。 謝謝數學。雖然不知道它還會陪我多久但至少最後這幾天，它又救了我一次。
人的腦子真的是很神奇的東西。
週二還因為前一晚關於L的夢差一點崩潰，甚至在導師面前說出了很不自控的抑鬱發言。 當晚夢見了高中最好的朋友，但現在也不往來了。夢裡夢外也平靜接受。 週四早上從有爸媽的夢裡醒來。 之後夢就開始變成，在外面攀岩。
感覺腦子在一個接一個地處理創傷。夢裡的現實好局限，就像是腦子在分區隔離，一個一個壞組織地切割。
今早醒來時已經不記得昨夜是否有夢了。
九月二十八日
做數學的我擁有我欣賞的所有美德。
It’s not that I don’t have other aspects of self, but only when doing maths I’m the person I aspire to be. That’s why I sometimes wish I could base my identity on maths. Without it, I’m truly not someone I am proud of.
九月三十日
我因為感知不到性吸引所以從來沒有辦法靠告訴自己「我只是喜歡這個人的身體」來走出一段依戀關係。反而因為，不感受到性吸引但還是喜歡這個人的身體而，反覆被回憶傷害。
L真的有很美的身體。時至今日我還在想念，我們赤裸相擁時他皮膚的觸感，在海水裡在淋浴下，他打濕的眉毛和頭髮。
sexually charged的時候，他潮熱的身體聞上去跟歐洲白蠟樹味道如出一轍。以至於一整個六月我在德國街頭隨時隨刻都會被迫想起，我們最後在一起的那一天。
Last day of September. It is warm and humid.
Finally submitted my thesis. The nap-mare was a big shock but I can convince myself that it’s just my brain trying to do its job. Being me, and protecting me.
On my way to Up, feeling the excitement of seeing J again. Reading Steppewolf on the way. At Windsor station—in hindsight I don’t think I’ve never paid attention on the surroundings because this is one of the two trainlines I frequent—I looked up.
Saw this view and quickly took out my phone and took two shots. Only after the first one did I notice the crack in the window. What was it from?
Then I arrived at balaclava.
And then it started to rain.
And then it started to thunder.
Submitted my thesis before I went on this journey to catch up with J.
We climbed and dinned. Between those two things we aimlessly walked up and down the street. Him aimlessly, me with an intent to look for a place to eat. Eventually, we had fish and chips, again. Weirdly, always fish and chips. Last time after the fallout with S, it was over a plate of fish and chips I couldn’t help but cried.
At the gym I bumped into Memo again. Last time I saw him he asked me about Lawrence and I told him we were having some unresolved issues. Today he saw J with me, I could tell he was having thoughts. Quiet judgments even. I almost wanted to tell him how badly Lawrence treated me but I refrained.