40 days. I will be in California in 40 days. I'll be with Cody in 40 days. It's official. 40 days. I can't believe it, is this real?

I am unbelievably excited, happy, and just ...amazed.

However, under all of these content feelings, I feel doubt. Not for my arrival or the idea that I will enjoy myself. But that he won't step up. I have set myself up for disappointment. It won't happen. It's impossible. He will not make the decision then and there. I will have to detach myself. How could I possibly do this to myself?

After making the almost three thousand trip to him and just giving up? I can't help but think it's wrong. Maybe it is. Should I give him more time? Should I give myself more time?

No... no more waiting. I can't. No matter...how much I care from him. Until he says the words to change my mind on or before I leave that airport to return home, I will have to realize he won't make me stop waiting. I won't be hurt again.

Ahah. Who am I kidding? I am not that strong. Am I? How could I possibly detach myself from love towards him? Is it even possible? Will I have to wait and be kicked aside again? Until it's branded in my retnas that I am not wanted in that way? I can't do it again.

Why does this have to be so hard? Why can't he just return my affection in the fashion that he did before? Why does he have to let me doubt this way? I am only true to myself here, in these words, these pixels. While I may be happy and glowing on the outside, turmoil rages inside of me still. I have no faith in a god and I have no faith in myself. There is nothing to lose faith in anymore. I only have hope that the future will be kind to me.

So, I've come to this conclusion.

I'm going to give Cody till our meeting date in January to change this. Should he do nothing, I will completely pry myself away from him romantically but still remain a friend. If he can't make the decision with me being there in person for the first time, then I don't think it will work. The scenario completely terrifies me. I have to do this though. It's not an official thing between us, rather a limit for myself. I won't make him crazy over this, and I will not let him try and make me hang on longer. I cannot play this waiting game. Not again. I've been so alone for so long. He picked me up when I was so far down after Josh. That horrible insanity, depression, anxiety & rejection. He had been there to make me smile every day. I never really saw it that way.

When the stuff with Zachary happened though...he stopped saying he loved me so much. We still kept talking the same way, but all I need is "I love you" to keep going. Really. I'm so independent, I've been so deprived of physical contact that words are all I need.

However, if he keeps up this really horrible attitude with Cass & then puts it on me, it will be the total end.

All I want is to be closer to him. I don't know him well enough. I'd hope that this "decision" thing would. And I'm terrified of losing him. It's something I have to do though.

I love him so much.

Cassie is back at it again with Cody & Meg. I'm angry with Cody for being such a douche to her. He really is being so close minded, ignorant & thick skulled. It makes me so angry. She said she's done with it; because before I started talking to Cody, this had been the cycle between the three of them. Would it happen to me?

She's saying I should dump him, to stop waiting. Move on, stop talking to him. Because I'll only get hurt. And, from what I see, not much will change. How does one who never gives up, give up?

Even if it runs me into the ground, I never give up. I keep going till I can go no more. It's destructive, but it's who I am. I won't make someone else share my fate, but I'm terrified of letting what happened with Josh happen again. The waiting game; I'm tired of it. And even if after it's over, not much will be different. He's not an emotional person. Whenever I need someone to help me, Cody's reaction is "Well...sorry" and then back to whatever. It's not just with me, it's with Meg as well. It makes me wonder how they're such good friends. I don't see any support. I'd like to hope it's behind curtains, and that it's really there but I see no evidence.

I feel so alone.

I remember...a year ago...I was a freshman. The high school program totally blindsided me. I was unprepared. I was ridiculed by my team mates behind the locker room walls. I thought I had someone that loved me a hundred miles away. I was so depressed. I can't believe what a fool I was to keep chasing after Josh. Look what happened.

I remember two years ago. I was in eight grade. I was the happiest I had been in so long. Zach brightened my life. GJY was my escape & where all my friends were. I was wildly successful in school. I was happy...my depression was almost completely suppressed.

I remember three years ago, seventh grade. I was addicted to hurting myself. I tried to kill myself three times. I was isolated. I gave up swimming. Dropped ice hockey after a month. I was failing every class. I had no life outside of my online friends.

I remember in sixth grade, four years ago...I was beginning to realize the full brunt of depression. I needed a way out, I way to focus. I needed to feel. I needed...the pain. I needed the friends I met on AB.n. They gave me a reason, pathetic as it seems now, they still give me one. I remember Colleen. My first...best friend. And I never got to see what she looked like...I suppose I never will. I miss those days...not particularly the depression...the only care of myself. To fall into that depression, that sadness, that...amazing conundrum. I was numb. I didn't care.

I remember almost five years ago. I met the woman who changed my life. My true blue best friend. Cassie. She is in so many words and not enough, one of the most amazing people I have ever met.

So, what is this year? This November? This favorite month of mine in the year 2009? I am no longer depressed. I am still battling the constant urges of self-injury. I love someone who loves me back, Cody. I am going to meet them on my 16th birthday. Despite some of our polar opposites, I can't believe how much I really do care for him. My lomography, my piano...my future. I'm failing math, but not without a fight. Swim team has been delayed, but I will kick ass. But, but, but. I am still me. I am me. I am...Caitlin.

Look at how much has changed in these short five years. I remember that end of the season swim banquet for Blairmont in 2007, reading "My Sister's Keeper" and staring up at the slate gray sky. I remember how estatic I was just to own a Roy Mustang UFO plush in the Christmas of 2006. I remember how I first broke my skin out of desperation in the winter of 2005. I remember that day in the creek, Zach's 14th birthday, how we had a water fight. I remember sending Colleen's birthday present....a drawing of Edward Elric, a picture of me & $10 to buy volume 5 of the Naruto manga. I remember that late night talking to Dooz on AIM, confessing I had cheated on my math work and her telling me about how she did as well when she was a homeschooled student. I remember that night I was on webcam for Josh, and "We Are Broken" came on. I began crying endlessly about what had happened to us with his impatience, and my idiocy. I remember cutting my hair crooked, and hiding in a corner of the basement with a hood on when Penny came to babysit and then hugging me tightly "It's not that bad dear". I remember that time in the phsychiatrist's office, when she had the candle burning on her coffee table. It smelled like apples. I remember those early summer mornings of physical therapy for my shoulders and lifting 10lb weights for each arm in four different exercises. I remember the night when my character in AVATAR - Chosen, Hotaru, died the first time. And all the times after that. I remember the first time I played Yuki & Shuichi's theme on the piano, how frustrated I was and then mastering it for my teacher. I remember that time I was walking down the stairs to the pool deck after I had been to Disney & Zach said he missed me. I remember that time I fought with Cody about Meg, Steph, Cass, Brit & I meeting in the summer of '09; that I stole his idea. I remember that fake bag of coal I gave him for Christmas. I remember going to Setsucon '09 and sending Josh pictures of my ninja necklace. I remember opening my first Celga bill and vomiting. I remember that Penguins game I went to with Cecelia, how she thought I was odd. I remember that time I told Nur about my cutting at that home meet in the summer and how she stared at me, then later betraying my trust. I remember all the times I kicked Navi into the baseboard heater in the computer room. I remember the time I stayed up late to rewatch Serial Experiments Lain, thinking I wouldn't have the desk set up for much longer when in fact I'd stay that way for two more years.

I remember...all of this and so many more memories. So many more people that have touched my life in countless ways. I remember this all as if it was just a second ago.

Oh wow. I'm crying.

I've only known one person to ever commit suicide. One other to attempt it who I live with & then myself.

The person who had been successful, I only knew for a short time in my life. It's been awhile since I thought about him. I miss him just as much though. He was like a second grandfather, my next-door neighbor & a teacher in many ways. Mr. Tim. I remember his fish pond Austin and I would run up to during the spring and summer. I remember his son's old tree house we'd beg to go up into. I remember his blackberry bushes at the edge of the woods. I remember his beautiful garden with the gigantic, or what seemed gigantic to me at the time, stepping stones. I remember one of the times he helped me get across the monkey bars in my back yard. I remember his wonderful generosity of letting my family use his pool for swimming lessons. I remember the wonderful bonfires we would have.

I also remember the day my mom explained to me when his wife, Donna or as I knew her as Miss Donna, had advanced skin cancer. I remember my mom trying to refresh her memory as a radiation oncologist, going through her gigantic medical text books and bouncing ideas off with my dad. I remember the day trips she, my mom, Austin & I would go to. Places like State College. I remember that time I lost my tooth in the car, and I couldn't stop crying, and she tried to calm me down. I remember the times she would read stories to me, no matter how many times she had read them before.

I remember the day that she died. I also remember Mr. Tim's slow decent into an inescapable depression. Seeing him walk around the neighborhood in the winter as my mom would pass by in the car coming him from school. She'd stop to say hello to him. He looked so ragged and just sad. I remember visiting him and how he'd just collapse crying into my dad's arms.

Then, I remember the day he died as well. I was six. Tessa was a baby. I did not know he killed himself. I didn't know till I was eleven. I over heard my parents talk about it. The space of sadness I had gotten over years ago, came back in a new, intense and unforgiving manner. "Why would someone do that?" "Why didn't he ask for help?" "Why did he leave his kids behind?" "Didn't he think about them after they lost their mom?" "Didn't he think about Austin and I?"

In the time span from age six to age eleven, my world changed since his death. The same road leading to his house, we never played on our bikes near again. His lovely garden began to die. We didn't go up to his house on Halloween night, knowing the light above the door wouldn't be on. After he died, everyone in the neighborhood said "It just isn't the same." and it really wasn't. The Dereeses moved. The Pattersons moved.

And then someone moved into his house. They put up a big fence between his and our house. It was because they had two big dogs. Austin and got angry for this. We'd throw sticks and rocks at the fence in frustration. Little did we know later, the people that moved in were a homeschooling family. One of the two boys, Luke, was on my swim teams.

Then we moved to where we are now. I started homeschooling. Pierce was born.

It's amazing how much I've been able to look back on. I think it was in Jodi Picoult's "My Sister's Keeper" how Katie describes losing a loved one as you feel as though nothing changes, but as time goes on, you look back and see how much has really eroded. And how much it has.

I'm a survivor of suicide in more ways than one. I'm a survivor of Mr. Tim's, but also my own three attempts.