I need to learn, learn to lose. By losing, I mean, to let my guard down. People in Hong Kong or other big cities are always stressed out by working in those sky-scrapers. When the whole world discusses Brexit, I am still talking about how do I deal with my familiar clinical depression. In fact, I have always found that in many past occasions living in Hong Kong or other cities, I would put on a ‘mask’ which was a combination of gestures, facial expressions, words spoken out of my mouth, for the purpose to socialise with people just out of manner, rather than out of my truthfulness.
我需要學習，學習去輸。輸，意思是，將警惕的那份戒心放下。人們總是在香港或其他大城市的那些摩天大樓裏工作，壓力太大都要受不住了。當全世界討論英國脫歐，我仍然在談論我該如何處理我熟悉的抑鬱症。其實，我一直覺得，在過去多次住在香港或其他城市，我在許多場合，會戴上 「面具」：這包括手勢，面部表情，由我口中說出來的話，組合起來就變了「面具」，用於與人社交，真正的「我」就可以躲起來了。
Back to me, the trivial and ordinary citizen. To be honest, I love to be stuck at home a lot as I call this privacy, which I could not enjoy during my 6 years living at a boarding school during teenagehood. I did say similar things about privacy and tired of socialising in my former posts, but I am finding myself harder and harder to accept myself, and I returned to living in guilt. In the past, I want to be on my own completely, now, I am afraid to be on my own completely. I hate tears but I can produce many, and I can’t explain how annoying this is for me. I am an annoying person and I admit to this. When I cry, sometimes I want privacy, so no one sees how ugly I have become in a turmoil; sometimes, I want attention from people to come to me right away with hugs.
回到說我自己，微不足度和平凡的市民。說實話，我好喜歡宅在家裡，我稱這為隱私，因為我過去6年的少年生活都在寄宿學校裏面住，我不能享受私生活。我也確實在我以前的帖子講過有關隱私和對社交疲憊之類的，但我發現自己越來越難以接受自己，而我回到愧疚裏生活了。在過去，我想有完全只有自己的生活，現在，我是怕完全只有自己的生活。我討厭但我可以生產很多眼淚，我無法解釋這對我來說是如何討厭。我是一個可能好惹人煩厭的人，我承認這一點。當我哭的時候，有時我想隱私，不想有人看到我在一片混亂裏變到多麼醜陋; 有時候，我想要大家都關心我，來擁抱我。
Any words said to me by anyone, possibly just neutral in their mindset, sound hurtful to me, and these 3 days, I cried over words said by people instead of just accepting people’s comments. I know that logically, accepting doesn’t equal to agreeing. For example, maybe someone can come up to say to me, I am the ugliest girl ever. Then even I am not beautiful, I accept but I don’t agree to say yes, and not to get so upset about it. I think I just failed to apply this logic these days.
任何人對我說的任何話，可能他們的心態是中立的，但我聽起來好受傷害。就這3天，我就為別人說的話在哭，不去接受別人的評論話語。我知道，在邏輯上，接受不等於同意。例如，也許有人走過來對我說，我是人世間最醜的女生。那麼即使我不漂亮，我接受但不需要同意說，是呀，我最醜，並不需要因為這樣而不高興。我想我這幾天只是沒有應用到此邏輯。
I only wanted good, positive words out of people’s mouth said to me, but this would be impossible, especially when it was me myself who talked negatively and behaved in a negative manner. So let’s say, I cry a lot so that is already a negative behaviour, because I could have smiled instead. Actually, if there was really someone who tried to just speak good words to me, actually he was not speaking out of his true heart, but just try to please me, either out of good or bad intentions. This is called ‘the reality’.
我只是想從別人的嘴裡聽到他們對我說出良好的，正面的話，但這是不可能的，尤其是，那個說話負面，行為負面的人，就偏偏是我自己。就舉例說，我常常哭，這樣已經是負面的行為，因為我可以笑代替哭的。其實，無論是出於好或壞的意圖也好，如果真的有誰試圖只說好話給我聽，這是他沒有講出他的真心話，而只是想逗我開心。這就叫「現實」。
My psychiatrist is finally back today, after spending 3 weeks abroad at a medical conference according to his own words (not sure did he go on holiday so he took so long being away from Hong Kong). He simply said to me today, I don’t seem to have any improvements compared to 3 weeks ago, and to be honest, I was already getting a little sad after he said this. Then I bursted out into tears after I left the clinic; when my Dad heard about what was said by my psychiatrist and so he asked, why didn’t I improve then? Why? I don’t know why either, maybe just because I am not good enough, but not good enough at what? At recovering? Well, I did ask my psychiatrist if I could be cured sooner by having those treatments using electricity to stimulate my brain instead of taking medicine, and he said no. He only said that I still live in guilt so he had to change the medicine that I have been taking. Of course I live in guilt; I feel guilty about bothering all the closed ones.
根據我的精神科醫生自己說他要去國外3週參加一個醫學會議（不知道他是不是其實度假了，所以才花了這麼長時間不在香港），他今天終於回來了。今天他只是對我說：我似乎相比3個星期前並沒任何進步，說實話，他說到這個時刻，我已經開始有點傷感。我離開了診所後就接著大哭起來，當我爸爸聽到了醫生說的話，他問，為什麼我沒有進步呢？為什麼？我也不知道為什麼，也許只是因為我不夠好，但是在什麼事上不夠好呢？恢復進度不夠好？我曾問醫生，我可以通過使用電刺激我的大腦的那些治療，讓自己盡早治愈，而不是吃藥，但他說不。他只說，我還生活在內疚裏，所以他會改變一下我一直在服用的藥，去服別的藥。我當然生活在內疚裏; 我對自己打擾到最親密的人們感到內疚。
I had an issue with myself, which is that I would always pretend to be tougher than I seem to be, even in front of my parents; maybe this is a result of being abroad for too long at an all girls’ boarding school, and from time to time sleeping over-night at strangers’ places when the school was shut. I feel weak to have tears run down my face in front of basically, I guess every single human. I would feel too insecure and unsafe if I don’t wear my ‘mask’.
我與自己有一個問題，就是即使在我的父母面前，我都總是假裝比真實的我要強; 也許這是在國外全女子寄宿學校活太久了，又在當學校關閉的時候不定期去陌生人的地方睡覺過夜。我在每個人類面前流眼淚都會覺得軟弱無能。如果我不戴我的 「面具」，我會覺得太沒安全感，人身也不安全。
I took a long time before I stopped asking ‘the destiny question’: God, why did you make me a mentally ill person? Although now I no longer think and ask this kinda questions, I still want to ask why is my recovery process so slow. After crying so hard, my mum suggested that I would be better off grabbing a bubble tea on my way home to cheer myself up, and now, I know I need to learn how to lose: I don’t have to get everyone to agree with my views on everything, and I don’t have to take negative words from anyone so seriously, except my closest loved ones. However, even those who love me did not realise they said words that hurt me to my guts, then the same theory still applies, which is that I shall not have to take negative words from them so seriously. Yet, it will be a very difficult task for me to learn actually.
我花了很長時間我才停止問「命運的問題」：上帝啊，為什麼讓我患有精神病呢？雖然現在我不再想和問這種問題，我還是想問，為什麼我的恢復進程如此緩慢？哭得那麼辛苦之後，我媽媽建議我在回家的路上買一杯珍珠奶茶，為自己打打氣，而現在，我知道我需要學習如何去輸：我不用得到所有人去同意我自己的所有見解，和我不應對任何人的話都如此認真，但我最親愛的人們就例外。可是，有時好疼我的人們也不知道自己說了傷害我好深的話，那麼道理還是一樣，我不應對我愛的人們的話都如此認真。但是，我覺得這好難學習。
So far, I found out my mum is the only one who always has this skill to know how to speak to me without hurting me, as well as my aunt, whilst almost all the others at some point did trigger me to get an emotional breakdown at least once or twice, which made me guilty and felt like a complete loser, a loser who is slow at recovering and unable to bear hard and bad things commented on me. However, they don’t actually want to hurt me, it is me, the listener’s problem.
到目前為止，我發現我媽媽是唯一一個總是有知道如何跟我說話不帶傷口的這個技能的人，還有我的阿姨，但差不多所有的人在某些時候確實觸發我至少一次或兩次情緒失控，讓我內疚，覺得自己就像個徹底的失敗者，一個康復過度緩慢的失敗者，和受不起別人對我掉下狠話和壞評論的失敗者。然而，他們實際上並不想傷害我，這是我，作為聆聽者的問題。
My aunt once taught me, whatever that I do, I can lose (she means not being able to complete a task) a million of times, but as long as I don’t let my heart get defeated by failing to do something, the thing that I want to achieve will come true. She said that she is used to losing, so it is also no big deal that I lose now. I guess this could mean it is no big deal that I am recovering slowly, dose that include troubles I bring to people around me?
我的阿姨曾經教過我，無論我做什麼，我可以輸一百萬次（她指無法完成要做的事），只要我不讓我的心因為未能做到就被戰敗，我要實現的就會成真的。她說，她自己習慣輸，所以我現在輸了，也沒什麼大不了的。我想這可能意味著我就慢慢康復好了，這沒什麼大不了的，不過這包括我給身邊的人帶來的煩惱嗎？
I lose in being as a part of the majority.
1) So when the majority of the girls who went to a boarding school enjoyed their life abroad, let’s say in U.K., in the States, Canada for example, I was the odd one out that although I did have some good memories, negative ones were of the greater proportion.
2) When I’m religious like many others, I find church life tiring to have to socialise with other Christians, unlike the majority who strengthens their religious faith through attending churches.
3) When many of my girl friends at my age already talk about their dream weddings and wanna have kids in the future, I said no to being a mum and no to have a wedding.
4) Last but not least, when the majority of people I knew in life are free of mental sicknesses, or just at a mild level of some stress-related sicknesses, I have a mid-level kind of clinical depression, anxiety, some weird phobia and mild bipolar.
I lost in many ways, but I have to put myself together again, because I still have stuff to do, however trivial those stuff may be ,e.g. I still have to give classes to kids tomorrow, and I still haven’t finished watching my favourite drama, ‘Margaret and David – Green Bean’.
我輸，輸在不能成為大多數人的一部分。
1) 當多數去寄宿學校的女生們都喜歡國外的生活，有去英國，美國，加拿大的等等，我是鶴立雞群了吧！雖然我也有一些美好的回憶，不好的回憶的比例更多。
2) 當我和許多人明明信奉的宗教一樣，我覺得教會生活要我和其他基督徒社交好累，不像大多數的基督徒，通過去教會強化他們的宗教信仰。
3) 當許多在我這個年齡的女生朋友已經談自己的夢想婚禮，要在將來生孩子，我就說我才不要做一個媽媽，我才不要婚禮。
4) 最後但並非最不重要的，就是，當大多數我在生活中認識的人精神良好，或只是有處於輕微程度與壓力有關的疾病，我就有一個中等程度的抑鬱症，焦慮症，一些怪異的恐懼症和輕度燥狂症。
我在多方面都輸了，但我不得不又爬起來再來過，因為我還有事情要做，就算瑣碎的也好吧，例如，我明天還是要給孩子們上課，我還沒有看完我最喜歡的電視劇，「瑪格烈與大衛 – 綠豆」。
Most importantly, there are people that I still have to see, so no coffins to be chosen for me please, at least not now. However, this is all I feel for now: I don’t get myself, I don’t get my loved ones, I don’t get what and why my psychiatrist said certain things, I don’t get what anyone said.
最重要的是，還有人我要去見，所以不要叫我選擇棺材，至少不是現在。但是，我現在的感覺是：我不理解我自己，我不理解我愛的人們，我不理解為什麼我醫生所說的話，我不理解任何人說的話。
P.S. If I hadn’t been spending my time crying, I would have gone swimming already today, like I said on instagram. Perhaps rather than thinking about what is going on in my world, I just think about when shall I go swimming next.
附：如果我沒花我的時間哭，我今天已經游泳了，就像我在Instagram說的。也許，不是思考我的世界到底怎麼了，只是想想我什麼時候才去游泳。