The Mass Defective

Surge of sadness

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 14:42:00 +0000

It's a rare occasion when I'm out of bed before noon, so I'm extremely irritated that it's not even 9 am and I'm wide awake even though I brought this upon myself. I decided I'm getting off Seroquel even if it kills me, so I've been taking half doses for the last couple of days. Hopefully at some point my brain will realize it isn't ever going to get any more than that and will readjust to allow me to sleep 8 hours on the half dose. When it does, I'll halve it again and continue.

Spurned on by the lack of sleep, my depression has progressed from a numb nuisance to a surge of sadness. I'm no longer annoyed that I can't feel anything, because suddenly I'm feeling everything. Every pent up emotion I haven't been able to access since March/April is bubbling to the surface. It's both a relief and a worry. I know all this needs to come out, but there also needs to be balance so I don't get swept away into the sea of misery.

Spent the better part of the weekend reading my old paper journals trying to find some shred of evidence that there is more to my insanity than just depression. Searching for signs that any of the other labels thrown at me - Bipolar II, Borderline Personality Disorder, PTSD, etc. - might actually apply. Didn't find anything to corroborate any of those diagnoses. No signs, no symptoms prior to being told I suffer from this or that. All I found was me trying to pigeon-hole myself into each diagnosis AFTER it was tossed my way, especially the BPD, which was rather disturbing.

The experience has left me with even more mixed and suspicious feelings about the whole mental health establishment than ever. My journals clearly show the greatest deterioration in my mental health happened AFTER I'd started receiving treatment, not before. I was moderately depressed going in, but after screwing around with medications and therapy, I'm completely nonfunctional. How does that happen? What the fuck did these people do to my mind? And is it reversible?

Grave injustice

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sat, 07 Nov 2009 03:29:00 +0000

A grave injustice was inflicted upon my daughter by her school and it has me beyond fucking pissed off. For the second year in a row, she was shafted and not inducted into her school's chapter of the National Honor Society. Supposedly the reason is because she got too many negative reviews from teachers. Unfortunately they won't reveal the names of the teachers, nor will they verify that these teachers have ever even had any contact with my daughter in order to be able to offer a "sound, professional judgment" as is required per the NHS rules.

In the past, particularly last year, we had a lot, and I mean A LOT, of problems with just the attendance office alone confusing my daughter with another student who shares the same name, despite the fact that this other kid is MALE! Even though I would always provide her student ID#, which was clearly different from this other kid's, they were still screwing up her attendance records, marking her truant for days I called her out sick or marking her truant for classes she had attended. It got to the point where her counselor told us to stop calling the attendance office and call him instead any time my daughter would be absent.

Given that experience, and the fact that I've heard nothing but praise from all of her teachers about what a wonderful student she is and how they wish they had more like her, we strongly believe that the teachers giving her bad reviews are mistaking her for this other student and are teachers that haven't a clue who my daughter is since she's never been a student in any of their classes.

Yet we have no recourse. There is no appeals process available and she is just screwed out of an opportunity she richly deserves. Academically she outranks at least 50% of the students that were accepted into NHS. When it comes to volunteer and activity hours, she knows for a fact that she has more than twice as many as most of her friends that are in NHS and she volunteers on her own time, not because it's required for certain classes like many of the other students.

The response we've been getting from her teachers that are now learning she wasn't inducted is one of shock and disbelief. Even students that she is less than friendly with that are in NHS are expressing their own shock. The principal of the school even believes my daughter should be in NHS because he knows her from when she was on the student advisory council, but yet he won't intervene on her behalf because he says his hands are tied.

Another kicker in this story is that the teacher that oversees NHS at her school, and is the one that sent her the rejection letters both this year and last, is the very teacher that adores her so much and thinks so highly of her that she wrote a glowing letter of recommendation, a letter my daughter needed for her application to Northwestern University!

There are serious red flags going off that these supposedly bad reviews are not legit, and surely someone has the power to say "wait a minute, we need to do something", even if there is no official appeals process in the bylaws.

Oh, and to add insult to injury, she actually had to sit through the entire induction ceremony and watch as all these other students received an honor she should have gotten. She's in chamber choir and they sing the National Anthem at the beginning of the ceremony and the school's fight song at the end. Sure she could have refused to go, but that would have meant letting down the rest of the choir and she was not willing to do that.

I cry every time I think about this situation. My daughter has had to overcome so many major obstacles in life to get to where she is today and instead of being rewarded for it, she's being fucked over. This could potentially hurt her chances at winning merit scholarships because she'll be up against students of the same caliber as herself academically, and being in NHS (or not) could be THE deciding factor on who gets the money.

My daughter just wants me to let it go. She says since the induction ceremony has passed there's nothing we can do to get her inducted now, even if we submit a formal complaint to the national level (all they'll do at national is investigate the chapter and make sure they are adhering to the rules in the future, they won't actually do anything to help an individual student that's been wrongly rejected). She tells me that if I continue to ruminate about it and continually get upset by it, then she will as well and then guess what? They win. She will have allowed them to beat her down and make her feel inferior, something she refuses to let that happen.

Even in the face of adversity and a glaring injustice, my daughter wants to take the high road and be the better person. That right there is a HUGE testament to her character and honor. Too bad she can't list that on college and scholarship applications.

Chugging along

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 23:47:00 +0000

Despite feeling as if the world is moving in slow motion, I still keep chugging along. Every task seems impossible, especially dragging myself out of bed, but when I'm finally successful (usually by 2 pm), I make sure the first thing I do is clean up in some way...be it wash my hair and brush my teeth or get in the shower, and then I get dressed. It doesn't seem worth the amount of energy I expend, but I somehow feel that if I can delude myself into thinking I'm doing something worthwhile for myself, maybe I'll eventually be deluded into thinking I'm going to survive the current storm.

The anxiety continues to fester and any little stressor sends me over the edge. I spend 50% of my waking hours crying over one thing or another. Luckily I can hide in my room without anyone asking "what's wrong", as if they really care to hear that I'm failing at life yet again.

Lack of money has been a huge problem as the days tick away, getting ever closer to my daughter's 18th birthday and graduation. Yesterday I learned that we will continue to receive the extra amount from Social Security we've been receiving for her until she graduates, however beginning in February, instead of depositing the money into my account, they will now give it directly to her. I don't understand their logic with that since the whole reason they even pay us that money is so that I can take care of her. The only thing paying her will do is complicate getting the bills paid since she doesn't have a checking account.

One of my biggest concerns beyond that is come June 1st, we lose a third of our income when Social Security stops paying the extra amount for her, but I certainly don't lose a third of my bills, so I haven't a clue how we're going to get by. My daughter will still be living with me full time until she heads off to college and even if she's lucky enough to find a summer job, it will only be part time and won't pay much. Guess it'll be back to food stamps, a thought I don't relish only because that means having to go to the local DHS office which always triggers a massive panic attack...even when I do take Valium.

Anyway, tomorrow is Halloween and I'm going to spend it with my daughter, her boyfriend, my sister and my nieces. I'm not particularly up for socializing, but some of the feedback I got from this post made me realize that spending time with my nieces is something that's very important to me and I know it's important to them as well. So I'm going to sleep in as I usually do, get up and get showered, then head over to my sister's for some quality time with her little ones. Even if it only temporarily improves my mood, I suppose that's better than not at all. Plus I know it'll have a big impact on them that their Auntie Sid was there to go trick or treating with them.

Out of ideas

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Wed, 28 Oct 2009 23:11:00 +0000

I'm not sure exactly what I said in order to walk out of my T's office on Monday, but it obviously had to sound believable because despite really wanting me to go inpatient, she let me leave. For awhile she was getting downright pushy, hounding me on the issue, however when I gave her no ammunition to use against me, she was forced to back down.

I readily admit that I am starting to struggle, but I'm not in need of hospitalization. I just need sleep, lots of sleep...and I need something other than alcohol to kill the anxiety, which is worsening by the day. I've tried relaxation tapes, deep breathing, tons of different distractions, but the anxiety continues to grow and strengthen. It's been a long time since I've had to deal with this level of distress and I've run out of ideas on how to cope.

It pisses me off that my pdoc will no longer prescribe any benzos. I was taking the Valium as prescribed 99% of the time for quite a few years, yet I'm being penalized for that 1% when I made some bad choices. I acknowledge I made a huge mistake earlier this year, but should I really be forced to suffer through agonizing levels of anxiety for the rest of my life as a result? How helpful is that for recovery?

Next week when I see my therapist, I guess I'll ask her to put the wheels in motion so I can have a consult with one of their psychiatrists. I really don't feel comfortable switching pdocs and I have no idea how long it'll take before I can get an appointment, but if that's what it takes in order to get treatment for my anxiety, then I guess I have to take that necessary step. Switching pdocs beats drowning myself in liquor or taking up other bad habits in order to cope.

Panicky

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 01:47:00 +0000

Intense anxiety keeps washing over me in waves. One minute I'm fine and the next I'm drowning in panic, unable to breathe. I'd like to take some Valium, but my supply is limited and I feel as if though I should save it for when I really need it.

Tomorrow, if I don't end up backing out, I have an appointment with my therapist, which might explain why I'm so panicky. I don't want her to overreact to the things I may or may not tell her. From the outside looking in, my situation is far more scarier and dire than it is from my perspective.

If I do go, I'm going to be on guard because I already feel as if I'll be walking into a trap. I'll leave early and make sure everything appears safe before I go in the building. I'll also watch the receptionists and see if they're acting suspiciously. The first sign of anything out of the ordinary and I'm leaving.

People try to be so sneaky and I've fallen victim to their deceit before, but I refuse to let it happen again. As the saying goes...fool me once, shame on you; fool me twice, shame on me.

Shaky grasp

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sat, 24 Oct 2009 21:58:00 +0000

I can't seem to extricate my mind from its fixation on doing some serious self-harm. From the moment I wake, I'm continuously bombarded with thoughts and images of what my head would love to do to my body, if only the remnants of sanity would step aside and allow it to happen. In hopes of appeasing the beast within to gain even a momentary reprieve from the barrage, I broke down and cut last night.

Since I have not engaged in that behaviour in quite awhile and I wasn't driven to do it by the rage that usually fuels the need, I wasn't sure what to expect. Unfortunately it did not produce the result I'd hoped for. Instead of feeling a sense of relief, I began to feel more and more inhuman because the liquid flowing from the cuts did not look like blood. It wasn't the deep crimson color one normally associates with blood. Christmas red is what comes to mind, that bright, bright red. It also didn't have the usual consistency, it was too watery and would not clot.

Now I'm not only struggling to ward off the visions playing over and over in my head, but I have to listen to the voice inside saying it was right, I don't really exist. I'm trying my best to hold onto what I believe reality might be, but it's a very shaky grasp.

At times I lose control of myself to the voices in my head. I'll be in the midst of a conversation with someone when I suddenly hear an inappropriate comment spoken and realize it came from me, yet I don't remember even having the thought, let alone forming the words. One example was my sister making a comment about how cute my new haircut was and I replied that it is cute, I'll make a very pretty corpse. I think I was more startled and disturbed at hearing that than she was.

I don't quite understand what's going on, and I certainly can't explain it to anyone else. I feel as if I should just keep my mouth shut and say nothing until this entire episode has passed.

Pull was too strong

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 03:22:00 +0000

As if driven by some unseen force, I made my way through Walmart today, a store I rarely venture into because sheer panic usually sets in before I can even get out of my car. I'd gone to get wiper blades but walk out with a knife instead. The pull was too strong, the voice too loud.

Logic tells me I should get rid of it, but the mere thought of doing so creates a tremendous surge of anxiety, unlike any I've felt in a long time, and I become paralyzed. How can the idea of disposing of an object I know is solely meant to inflict self harm be so traumatic that it sends me into an intense panic attack? You'd think the opposite would be true. You'd think I'd panic knowing it's in my possession and what I will eventually use it for.

Guess that's a sign of a truly sick mind, though I would say I'm feeling fine. I'm not suicidal at all. I did down the bottle of wine as I said I would on Monday and I did manage to sleep until about 5 pm on Tuesday. How it got to be Wednesday already, I don't know. I just hope I remember tomorrow is Thursday when I wake up because I made an appointment to go get my hair done.

I also hope I can make it through Friday, which is always the absolute worst day of the year for me. The kiddie and I made plans to go out, but she has a pretty severe case of the flu (thankfully not the swine version) and I'm not sure she'll be up for running around downtown. Hopefully she'll be better by then. I really want to be out & about where I can turn off my cellphone and be completely inaccessible.

I hate life

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Mon, 19 Oct 2009 22:35:00 +0000

Why is it that when I'm emotionally unstable, everything around me goes to shit too? It's a never ending cycle. This isn't even stuff that would normally happen that maybe I'm just unable to deal with because I am in a precarious state. The most random, bizarre things keep happening. It seriously feels like the gods are conspiring to make sure my life sucks more ass than it did the day before. For instance, the sewer suddenly backed up into the house at the end of last week for no apparent reason. Even the plumber that came out could offer no explanation because the pipe wasn't blocked.

My favorite happened today. I had to drive from Chicago to the Iowa border at 4 am to pick my daughter up because she got slammed hard with the flu while on a trip out there with her choir for a music festival.

I was so beyond livid and so incredibly tired of dealing with all this crap that I called my therapist at 5:30 am to cancel my appointment. Even though I would be back in time, I wasn't up for driving out to her office after driving 6 hours to and from Iowa on no sleep and I'd need to get my daughter to the doctor sometime after we got back. I forget what I said in my message other than I'm so ready to give up on life and that I didn't know if I'd ever bother to reschedule.

She called me back when she got into the office and asked if I wanted to go to the hospital. When I said no, she tried to get me to contract for safety. I said I wasn't making any promises to anyone. I told her I managed to get home without slamming my car into an overpass at 90 miles per hour, which was the only thing on my mind the entire way there and back, so kudos to me.

My T managed to convince me to at least schedule an appointment for next Monday, though I told her I wasn't sure if I'd bother to show. She really wants me to come in and see her on Wednesday, but I'm not sure that's a good idea.

Tonight I plan to cuddle up with a nice bottle of Merlot and a whole lot of Seroquel. I plan on sleeping the entire day tomorrow since the kiddie will be staying home from school. If I stay asleep, I won't be able to act on the overwhelming desire to grab a kitchen knife and stab the fucking shit out of myself. I hate life. I truly do.

Better huh?

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sat, 10 Oct 2009 21:37:00 +0000

Yesterday I called and cancelled my therapy appointment for Monday. I tried to convince myself it was okay to cancel because I had something more important to do, visit a college campus with my daughter since she will be off school for Columbus Day. The excuse was a feeble attempt on my part to try and assuage the guilt that comes whenever I back out of a commitment, but I knew when I made the call my daughter was already making other plans for Monday and a college visit wasn't on the list.

The reality is, I can't handle therapy. I find it nonproductive and traumatizing, but I can't figure out how to give myself permission to quit when everyone keeps telling me that therapy is what I need in order to get better. That it's what I must do for my daughter. It's just getting harder and harder to even care anymore.

The voices are back, shouting their derogatory remarks all day and night. A pall has fallen over my world, making everything appear dark, dull and lifeless. I'm beyond exhausted. My body feels like it's turning to stone. Each movement more difficult than the last. Lifting my head off the pillow becomes a chore that doesn't seem worth the exertion.

Better huh? What if there is no better? What if this is all my life will ever be...a constant struggle to get from one breath to the next?

Feedback needed

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 23:23:00 +0000

I don't normally do this, but I'd like to ask all my readers for some feedback on the following questions...

- How do you think your life would be different if you did not have a mental illness?

- What would you want to be doing with your life that you aren't currently doing because your mental health has interfered with those dreams or goals?

- What constitutes "a life worth living" to you?

These questions can apply to a variety of areas of life - family, friends, hobbies, career - so think about those different areas when answering. If you don't have a mental illness, you can use any physical limitation that may have altered the plans you had for your life.

I'm not looking for off the wall, "if money were no object", type answers. I can imagine the things I'd be doing with my time if I were independently wealthy. It's easy to dream big. The problem is, I can't dream small. I can't dream realistically. And that's why I'm asking these questions.

My therapist, just like others in the past, has asked me to think about what kind of life I'd like to be living if I weren't sick. I've never had an answer to that question. Even when I wasn't disabled by my illnesses, I was just trudging through the cesspool of life. I'd make decisions without ever thinking them through because I had no direction, no goals, and then deal with the consequences after.

I can't grasp the concept of what a life worth living even looks like because I have never wanted life. I've been trying to grab hold of death for as long as I can remember that life is unimaginable to me. Right now I live for my daughter, to take care of her needs. I don't live for myself and I know that's a huge obstacle I have to overcome if I ever hope to get better.

So I'd appreciate any and all replies to the questions I've asked. I'd like to try to catch a glimpse of what life could possibly be, even if it's through the eyes of others. Maybe that will help me begin to formulate a plan, some tiny goals, for my own life.

Either leave your response in the comments or email me at the_mass_defective@yahoo.com

Thanks in advance to all who reply!

Soul-sucking depression

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Mon, 28 Sep 2009 21:32:00 +0000

How do you describe what it feels like so others even vaguely comprehend the recurring, soul-sucking depression? The bleakness that smothers every inch of your being until you're suffocating on a stagnant darkness, visible only to yourself, that leaves you feeling beyond desperate for a quick ending, any ending, that finally obliterates all the years of pain and torment. It all seems so vivid in my world, but no one around me can seem to fathom the level of misery I'm drowning in.

Once again they've started in with the "fake it until you make it" spiel. "Do something different." I guess I'm the only one who remembers that I finally took that route last year. I also seem to be the only one that recalls exactly how detrimental it turned out to be....three hospital stays in two months, a whole lot of binge drinking and a suicide attempt.

Why does this hit every single year? Why does it even hit at all? What happened six years ago that completely destroyed my ability to maintain some semblance of sanity on a regular basis? After all these years, why haven't I found an effective coping mechanism, one that doesn't involve self harm? Why does it become so impossible to do even the simplest of tasks, like brushing my teeth? Why am I so cut off from my emotions that instead of being able to feel them, they are manifesting themselves as physical symptoms...headaches, fatigue, nausea, etc?

I'm so tired of this roller coaster, yet I don't know what else to do, what else to try, in order to get it to stop.

I want to cry

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sun, 27 Sep 2009 00:04:00 +0000

...but the tears won't come.

Something needs to break through the void before the rage does and for once I wish for it to be the sadness. I desperately want to feel it, need to feel it. Every inch of my being tells me this is what must happen, but how do you feel anything when there simply is nothing?

Don't believe I'm real

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 04:29:00 +0000

Another week slipped by without a word written. I hope this isn't a sign of things to come. I really don't want to end up deserting my blog altogether, but if feels as if that's the direction I'm heading in, at least at this point.

It also seems as if time has been frozen and September will never end. I keep looking at the calendar waiting to change it to October, but that day never comes. Instead of a mere 25 days, it feels as if this month has lasted 25 years. Probably a side effect of the disconnect I've been struggling with. My daughter seems to think September is speeding by, as do a few other people I've mentioned the lag to.

I've discussed what's going on with my therapist and she's just happy I haven't cut or had anything to drink, as if those are the first things I turn to when the pervasive feeling of emptiness returns. Obviously the woman still knows nothing about me. During these moments, self injury rarely ever enters the picture. I'm too afraid to cut because I don't believe I'm real, that I actually exist. I don't want to risk having that fear validated by cutting and finding there is no blood inside of me.

As for drinking, there's absolutely no desire for that. The bottle of jack remains on my desk untouched. The wine is still sitting in the wine rack unchilled. The case of beer is on the floor and still full. Another example of why I can't possibly be an alcoholic...I'm not "powerless" over the stuff. I have bottles of alcohol sitting around the house all the time and never touch them. Never have to fight off any urges because there are none. A true alcoholic would be hard pressed to resist the temptation, especially the bottle of jack that's always right there in front of me as I sit at my desk.

A friend mentioned talking to my pdoc about a change of meds, but I don't see that as a viable option considering I don't want to even be on any meds at all. There isn't anything that's going to make me feel whole again, make me feel human. I'm just going to ride this out and see where it takes me. I don't have the life inside right now to do much else.

Unreal

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Thu, 17 Sep 2009 22:02:00 +0000

Normally when I go MIA for over a week, it usually means I'm in the hospital. That wasn't the case this time around though. I've just been at a complete loss for words. On the rare occasion when I could think of something to write about, the desire to sit down and generate a post wasn't there.

I've sunk into my own little hole of isolation where I'm not very cognizant of the world around me. Ask me what day it is and chances are I'll give you the wrong answer. Ask me if it's morning, afternoon or night and I'd get that wrong too. I've missed appointments and shown up days early for others. I'm a week ahead of everyone else, yet also a week behind.

I feel unreal, almost inhuman. I often wonder if I'm the only one living in my reality. Wonder if everyone and everything else is just a figment of my imagination. That's how powerful my disconnect from the world feels. It's as if I stopped ceasing to exist sometime over the past two weeks, but somehow I'm still in the midst of it all. I don't know, it's hard to explain. Maybe I was never here to begin with...

Feel the pull

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sat, 05 Sep 2009 22:23:00 +0000

I'm at a loss for words. I've started at least half a dozen posts in the last couple of days but ended up deleting them all. The thoughts seemed too coerced, too contrived, lacking emotion...

And that's the problem. My entire life feels that way, not just my thoughts. Since my daughter returned to school, it feels like I've fallen into an emotional void. Lightning bolts of rage flash out from time to time, but other than that, there's nothing.

Despite the best of intentions, I end up spending more time in bed than doing the things I feel I should be. I've wanted to clean the house all week, but it took until today to muster the willpower to clean part of the bathroom and do a little dusting. There's no reason for me to have put that and other stuff off all week. There's no reason I couldn't have finished the cleaning today. I feel as if I'm just being lazy, but not really.

I can feel the pull of the undertow, the depression nipping at my heels trying to drag me down, and I'm not sure what direction to go in. I've seen where faking it has gotten me year after year. What other options are there?

Still feeling the stress

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Wed, 02 Sep 2009 01:35:00 +0000

Is it a bad sign when you become physically ill after seeing your therapist? I'm still feeling the stress of yesterday's appointment and my body is reacting by having all my systems go haywire. I kept having the chills this morning, my heart was racing so hard I thought it would pound its way out of my chest this afternoon and don't even get me started on the digestive problems.

The worst was the lack of sleep because I kept having flashbacks to an incident from a few years back while I was inpatient. One where the reality of my entire life literally played out live in front of everyone in an art therapy group, leaving the therapist completely stunned because she realized exactly what was happening as it unfolded. She would later admit that nothing like that had ever happened in her 20+ years as a therapist and she was in utter shock. I know without a doubt that she will never witness such an event again, unless it happens to me a second time.

Once again, I know the reason why my brain chose to focus in on this memory. During my therapy session yesterday we touched on the subject of how I feel no one truly cares about me (the only exception is my daughter). One of the life lessons I learned at a very early age was that as long as I kept my mouth shut, behaved properly and stayed out of everybody's way, people would tolerate me, maybe even like me. I was never allowed to have feelings, let alone express them. The lives of everyone else around me were (and still are) more important than my own, I'm just a background accessory. A full on demonstration of that is what played out in art therapy that day.

I tried to take a chance and speak up. Took the chance at putting my emotions out on the table, only to be traumatized in the process. No one cared enough to stop what was happening with the guy that had interrupted me and the entire group. A guy that had been a problem the whole time he was there and one that many of us were afraid of, including some of the staff members. I wanted to stop him myself, by stabbing him with my pen and beating the shit out of him, but instead I ran from the room in tears. No one cared enough to follow me and help me process what had just happened. No one gave a shit that I was tremendously hurt. I was completely dismissed...just like I have been my entire life.

I find it incredibly disturbing that most of the PTSD-type flashbacks I have are of traumatizing events like that one that have occurred when I'm in the supposedly "safe" environment of a hospital or therapist's office. And my therapist somehow wants me to trust her enough to start digging into my past?

Leave it dead and buried

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Tue, 01 Sep 2009 03:07:00 +0000

Therapy was difficult today and I'm left with one of the most challenging decisions of my life - give up permanently or begin to work through the one topic I've always avoided like the plague...my past. Luckily I have two weeks to decide how to proceed because next Monday is a holiday, so I won't see my therapist again until the 14th.

Last week, the woman I talked to at the DBSA meeting told me what I should do when I reach the fork in the road. In an odd and unsettling coincidence she wasn't referring to just any fork, it was this exact one. She had specifically asked me if I'd ever talked to anyone about my past abuse and when I said no, she said that's where I needed to go. When I reached the fork in the road, she told me, I had to chose the harder of the two, the one that delved into my past.

I gave her the same response I gave my therapist today, the same reply I've given to anyone that even broached the subject with me...I don't see what can possibly be gained from it. I know the impact the abuse had on me. I know how it shaped the person I am today. Ripping open old wounds and reliving the past isn't going to change what happened. It won't right all the wrongs. It's over, it's done with, leave it dead and buried.

Why is there this push to talk about it all the time? We didn't even get into anything specific today, yet I already feel desperately exhausted. When I left her office I was in such a daze that I was unsure I'd be able to keep myself safe. How is making someone feel worse supposed to make them feel better? Why retraumatize the victim?

Another Seroquel rant

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sun, 30 Aug 2009 23:41:00 +0000

My battle with Seroquel continues to rage on and I'm sure it's starting to aggravate people with how much I spout off about my hatred of this drug lately, but it's my blog...feel free to stop reading any time. In fact you might want to stop reading right now because this post will be another rant about how toxic I believe this drug from hell really is.

I'm not in a good mood today, which is probably an understatement, but I'm not exactly sure how to describe how I'm feeling. It's that place, somewhere between blah and suicidal, that's void of description. Unless you've been there, there's no way to express what it feels like. There's some irritation, some depression, some anxiety, some paranoia and an overall general feeling of blah. If I could have stayed in bed all day I probably would have. But that's where a lot of my bad mood stems from...lack of sleep.

Sleep has been hit or miss since I stopped taking Seroquel over three weeks ago. I'm lucky if I average three hours of sleep a night. That's right, 3 hours, A NIGHT. No one can live on that little sleep, no one. The problem isn't just the lack of sleep, it's also a lack of quality. There are five stages of sleep and I'm lucky if I ever make it to level three. Most nights I feel trapped in level 1.

My frustration with not sleeping has developed into a near nightly struggle of do I breakdown and take the poisonous Seroquel that got me in this position in the first place or do I keep trying to figure out how to sleep without it and hopefully someday break my brain's addiction to this evil drug. How much suffering can I endure, will I have to endure, before I am able to sleep like a normal person again instead of being dependent upon the drug induced coma of Seroquel?

When I found myself still wide awake at 4 am almost every night this past week, it was painfully obvious that I had no choice about whether I take Seroquel or not. The drug and the damage it has done to my brain have made that choice for me. As a result, I gave in and choked down 100 mgs of Seroquel the last two nights in a row.

How can doctors so carelessly prescribe such a potent drug to treat insomnia? That's the only reason I was ever put on it, because I wasn't sleeping. That's the primary reason most people I know started on it. The last few times I've been in the hospital, nearly every single patient on the unit was either on Seroquel or had been on it sometime in the past couple of years. Surely there are better alternatives, medications that were specifically manufactured for sleep disturbances, rather than putting everyone on an anti-psychotic.

Unfortunately, like most people, I was first given the drug while inpatient. At the time I was borderline catatonic, barely able to even remember what year it was let alone read the patient information I'd been given on any of the medications they began pushing on me in order to give informed consent. It'd be another seven months before I was at least mildly stable enough to start asking questions, but by then I was already hooked like a crack addict. I gladly went along with each dosage increase because I was too depressed to care.

Now I'm paying for it...dearly.

Wasn't helping

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sat, 29 Aug 2009 18:02:00 +0000

It's only been three days, and already my daughter is slowly crumbling under the stress of school, work and preparations for college...most of it self-induced. The fact that she's been PMS'ing for those same three days hasn't helped the situation any either.

My efforts to help calm her and assure her that this is just a temporary bump in the road failed miserably. I know she has more on her plate than she's used to, but my attempts at helping her take a step back and look at the whole picture more realistically just made her more upset. After about 20 minutes, she said she understood what I was trying to do but it wasn't helping and she asked me to leave the room. I wasn't hurt by her request. In fact I was glad she spoke up and asked for what she felt she needed at that moment.

The whole situation is more frustrating than anything, especially since her last attempt at working while in school only lasted two days before she became hysterical and quit. Her excuse that time was that they were making her stay past 9 pm on a school night and she couldn't keep doing that cuz she had homework, AP exams and finals to get through. I knew the homework line was bullshit since she has rarely ever brought homework home, she usually finds the time to get it done during school. As for studying for AP exams or finals, the only studying she did for either of those was for her Chemistry final and she didn't spend much time on that at all.

With a little time management and communication she can easily adapt to her current schedule, which for the most part is temporary. Her job only runs through November because it's a seasonal business and once she applies to the colleges, she just has to wait to hear back.

I know they are scheduling her for more hours than she told them she could work when she started there a couple of weeks ago, so I told her she should contact the person doing the schedule and remind them she has a limit on the hours she can work per week because of school. They agreed to those terms when they hired her, there's no reason she can't reiterate that to them again since they aren't following them.

Another thing she needs to do is accept that she is just a student and can't control how her teachers run their classes. She was complaining about them wasting her time this week and she wants to start learning. It's only been 3 days! What does she expect to learn?!? The first day is spent telling everyone what will be taught and what the teacher expects of their students. The next couple of days and possibly the next week are spent reviewing past material they've learned that they'll need for this year, an educational limbering up of the brain since they've been on summer break for three months. None of this is new to her, she didn't just start going to school as a senior in high school, yet each year she has this strange expectation it'll be different and she only frustrates herself (and me) by assuming otherwise.

As for the whole college process, she was stressing over how she didn't know all the colleges she was applying to yet and what their deadlines were. She's got it in her head that she must apply to all of them and meet their early application deadlines, which are all in the next two months. I so wanted to tell her she had plenty of time to start looking up the deadline information and putting it into a spreadsheet while she was "busy" doing nothing but laying on the couch watching TV with her boyfriend all afternoon, but she was already too upset by that point and I didn't want to make things worse. Instead I told her that she doesn't need to apply early to every college. Just pick the top 3 she wants to go to and apply to the rest later. Heck, after some time has passed, she may not even want to bother applying to the rest at all.

Today we're talking again and now that she's not so emotional, we've worked together to outline some ideas for how to manage some of her stressors. She's going to research the college deadlines and I'll put them into a spreadsheet for her. She also did send an inter-office email to the woman that does scheduling to remind her of the schedule limits she gave when she applied for the job.

I guess for my part, when she is so emotional in the future, instead of kicking into that "my daughter's hurting, I need to fix things now" mode, I need to remember to ask her what it is she needs from me in that moment. Does she just want to vent, does she want to problem solve, etc. Live and learn.

YAY!!!!

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 16:31:00 +0000

Probably the most upbeat title I've used in the five years I've been blogging, but that's because it's official...

I'm DIVORCED!

YAY!!!! The judge gave the ex a brief tongue lashing on the importance of getting a job in order to pay child support, but didn't order the ex to submit a weekly job search journal to prove he's out looking for an income instead of just being a bum. Given the circumstances...the ex is an ex-con, the economy sucks and there are only 9 months remaining before child support is a non-issue because the kiddie will be 18 and will have graduated high school... there isn't much hope to pin the possibility of him getting a job to. It was very apparent from the look on the judge's face that he knew as well as I do that I will probably never see a penny. But that's okay. The divorce decree was signed and that's all that really matters. I was so excited I wanted to go up and kiss the judge.

After we left the courtroom, I shook the ex's hand, told him to have a nice life and we went our separate ways. I will hopefully never see or speak to him again. Now I get to plan my divorce party!

Trying to understand

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Thu, 27 Aug 2009 02:02:00 +0000

Last night I went to a DBSA meeting. It was only the second one I've attended in more than two years. I often forget this organization even exists, despite having a link to their website in my sidebar, which is why I've only managed to get to two of their meetings. Both have been educational ones where they had speakers on topics that interested me, the latest being about anger.

While anger is certainly something I struggle with, it wasn't the only reason I went to the meeting. I also went because I really wanted to get more information about Bipolar. Fortunately, the group is held at a mental health facility where no one knows me or my history because I've never had the misfortune of being locked up at the hospital next door and I've never used their outpatient services either. The anxiety of being in a room full of strangers was overwhelming, but on the upside, the anonymity made me feel as if the feedback I was receiving was genuinely honest and bias-free.

After the speaker was finished, I grabbed a book they had about Bipolar and began reading it. I'm trying to figure out if Bipolar fits. At times I think it does, and other other times...not so much. I realize everyone keeps telling me to quit focusing in on the diagnosis, but for me, knowing what's really wrong is part of working towards a plan to get better. If I had physical symptoms that were incapacitating, I'd sure as hell keep going to the doctor until I got a proper diagnosis. I wouldn't just assume a lump in my breast is malignant, get my boob chopped off and undergo chemotherapy. The proper diagnosis is important and I think that applies to ANY illness.

As I sat reading the book, one of the people that helps run the group came over to talk to me. Turns out she remembered me from the one time I'd been there back in 2007 because, of all things, my red hair. Apparently my paranoia about it making me stand out like a sore thumb isn't a totally irrational fear if someone can remember me more than two years later after a brief encounter merely because of my hair.

Anyway, she asked if there was something in particular I was looking for in the book. I explained that I was trying to get a better understanding of mania and hypomania. I keep hearing about anger and irritability with Bipolar, but haven't yet read anything that helps me understand how that relates to mania.

Time was limited, but we talked for a good half hour and covered a lot. We have similar histories, so it was helpful that she understood where I was coming from. She asked if I'd be willing to come to one of their care & share meetings, where they split up into groups. I told her about my anxiety issues, especially with groups and she understood but said she hoped that I'd come sometime. Said that by attending those meetings and listening to others, I might find the answer I'm looking for.

It's so hard to relate to other people, which is one of the many things that causes me such great anxiety in support groups. I am going to give some serious thought to attending, though at this point I'm not sure it'll fit into the schedule with the kiddie being back at school and working.

The evils of psychiatry

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 19:02:00 +0000

Late at night, when I'm unable to sleep, my mind goes berserk. It selects a subject and then proceeds to go on a mental rampage. It'll play out past dramas but rewrite the script and attach different endings. It'll worry about events that have yet to unfold or make lists of things that need to be done. Its even kept itself busy by plotting out creative ways to die. Last night, it decided to go on a rant about the evils of psychiatry.

As I lay there listening to the voice rambling on, I decided to grab a pen and paper to transcribe what it was spouting off about. Normally I don't and by morning I barely even remember what the subject was let alone any of the details because I'm so exhausted from not having slept at all. I found this adventure to be quite interesting. Here's the part of the rant I managed to catch on paper:

Psychiatrists nonchalantly wave these diagnoses around as if they were plastic swords, incapable of causing any harm. As the mentally ill are paraded in front of them like peasants before a king, we are then dubbed a Bipolar or a Depressive or a Borderline Personality Disorder or an Alcoholic or whatever is chosen based on a 10 minute chat. What they fail to realize is that their words have all the deadliness of a very real, finely tuned weapon.

Each label they bestow upon us is not accompanied by a delicate tap on the shoulder, but rather is thrust into our gut, slicing cleanly through our already fragile, bleeding soul. Even as we stand before them pleading for our lives, tears streaming down our face as their words cut deep, they seem oblivious to the damage they are doing.

The medications they then prescribe are woefully inadequate and further exacerbate the damage. They may as well just prescribe arsenic. At least with that, there would be a quicker end to our suffering instead of having the chemicals of these psychotropic drugs slowly eat away at our remaining sanity like sulfuric acid on skin.

I know why my mind decided to focus on this particular topic and yes, I do agree with everything it had to say. Based on that agreement, I keep wondering if I should shift my attentions away from this "trying to get better" mode I've been in since 2003 and instead grasp tightly onto what little sanity I have left and protect it from being completely destroyed.

Playing dirty tricks

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Tue, 25 Aug 2009 01:01:00 +0000

What time was it? 3 am? 4? I'm not sure I ever turned to look at the clock. I can't even remember what order things took place in. Did I wake up before I heard the voices or are they what woke me from an already restless slumber? Suppose it doesn't matter. All that really matters is that there were voices and visions of people in my bedroom last night.

I wish I could have understood what they were saying. Seeing as how they were hovering right over me, I should have been able to. Two women and a man talking in loud whispers, seemingly unaware of my presence. Not talking, arguing. One of the women was angry about something.

I quietly watched them at first, not realizing I was fully awake at the time. There was about a 30 second delay before I finally noticed my closet behind them, realized what was happening and gasped loudly, startling all four of us. They took off for the door, disappearing into a shadow once they reached it. That was the only moment I was truly afraid because the shadow reminded me of the evil that's come for me in the night before.

No, there are not ghosts in my house. I don't believe in ghosts and even if I did, what reason would they have to suddenly start showing up in my bedroom? I haven't a clue how to explain what I saw other than my mind is playing dirty tricks on me.

What gives me the greatest cause for concern is that I blame Seroquel for altering my brain chemistry and causing the hallucinations in the first place. Yet I haven't taken it in two weeks and I'm still hallucinating...

Dredge up the past

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Sun, 23 Aug 2009 04:49:00 +0000

So little out of the ordinary has happened over the last few days, yet it seems like each event is accompanied by a flood of memories from the past. Not the distant past, but instead from the summer of 2001 through early 2004. The "descent into hell" years is what I like to call them. Songs I hear, roads I drive on, particular scents, food from certain restaurants...each brings with it a flashback to a time I'd prefer to just forget.

I try to stifle the tears that come up, try to force the images back into the recesses of my mind from whence they came. I have enough current emotional trauma to deal with, I don't appreciate my mind's desire to dredge up the past and rip open old wounds.

Friday was particularly hard. I'd gone to my sister's to babysit one of my nieces while she took the other to get her school physical and immunizations. My daughter was at work and I'd already planned to stay at my sister's house until she got off work since I needed to pick her up.

Driving from my sister's house to my daughter's work took me on a road I have not driven on since March of 2004. I hadn't even realized the significance of the road until my heart began racing and the memories flooded in. Had I not been headed to pick my daughter up, I probably would have pulled over and bawled like a baby.

I don't know why my mind has decided to so intensely and vividly dwell on the past. It leaves me with such an uneasy feeling that I often become nauseated. I'm starting to become paralyzed with fear, worried that anything I do might trigger yet another memory. I desperately hope this comes to an end soon.

Denial or just wishful thinking?

the_mass_defective@yahoo.com (Sid) — Tue, 18 Aug 2009 19:49:00 +0000

As I was typing this up for a post on a BPD message board I belong to, I couldn't help thinking that it would make a great blog post instead, especially since all the questions I was asking turned out to be rhetorical....

One of the most prominent symptoms of BPD is the unstable and intense interpersonal relationships. But of all the symptoms, this is the one I don't have much of a problem with. I read what others with borderline write in their blogs and on the message boards I belong to with respect to their relationships (be it family, friends, therapist, etc.) and most of the time, I really can't relate to any of it.

It's not that I don't have relationships with people, though I do have very few. The ones I do have, by all accounts, are amazingly healthy. I'm extremely close with my daughter, but it's a healthy closeness, not a smothering one. We don't yell, scream or fight with each other and never have. Sure we get angry at each other from time to time, but it's rare & usually it's when one of us is PMS'ing. We don't dwell on the negative or hold grudges, we address what we're angry about like adults (she is nearly 18) and then move on.

I'm extremely close to my younger sister and we both help each other a great deal, from helping take care of each other's daughters to being the person to call when we're feeling down. I'm not close to my parents, but it's because they were abusive when I was younger and have been emotionally unavailable my entire life. However, I've come to accept the limitations my relationship with them has to have. I am civil, even friendly & engaging sometimes, and normally don't mind having them around. I also get along with my other sister, though she isolates herself, and my brothers. I don't have many friends, but I get along with them just fine too.

The only relationship that was ever a true problem for me was the one with my exhubby. There was a lot of the "I hate you, don't leave me" towards the end of our marriage, but isn't that a normal response to fighting with someone you love? Someone you promised to spend the rest of your life with? Isn't it normal to feel abandoned when they cheat on you? The rest of our marriage was full of love and friendship. We rarely fought and our arguments centered around what most couples usually fight over...money. Even when I found out he was cheating, the highest level of betrayal and abandonment I can think of, I responded in the most logical and normal of ways, I threw the bastard out (albeit I did it calmly, whereas most are so angry they throw the person's belongings in the front yard or something).

Even when it comes to my therapists and pdocs, I don't see the intense idolization/devaluation that's supposedly a common pattern of those with BPD. I have never once idolized any of my therapists or pdocs, though after awhile, I will devalue them based on my interactions and perceptions about how well I feel they are performing their jobs.

I've read that having those intense unstable relationships is so central to BPD that those well educated in the treatment of borderline hesitate to diagnose a patient as BPD without this particular symptom being present. Since that doesn't apply to me, do I really have BPD?

The more I think about this, the more I begin to doubt the BPD diagnosis I was given. Is it denial or just wishful thinking? I don't know. Sure I meet the criteria, but I think most people reading the list of symptoms can relate to several of them. But when does relating cross over into being able to be clinically diagnosed with BPD or any other mental illness? The guidelines say if you have 5 of the 9 traits, you have BPD. Does it matter which 5? Does it matter how deeply they impact your life? I can relate all 9 to my life in some way, but what if they aren't very pervasive? What if some of them come and go with a decade or more in between, like the self injury that disappeared on its own when I was 24, only to return when I was 34?

I hate to even say it, but maybe the therapist from hell was right when she said that maybe I was misdiagnosed. But if it's not BPD, what the hell is wrong with my brain? The next logical answer is Bipolar II, since that is another diagnosis I've been given. But I don't ever get manic (except when it was drug-induced). I don't even get hypomanic, at least not by the definitions I've read. I don't respond well to the meds most often used to treat Bipolar, in fact, they are some of the ones I have the worst reactions to.

I've given this a lot of thought and here are the symptoms I experience most often. If I come up with more, I'll add them, but this is what I've been able to compile from thinking back over my past and through reading my journals.

Rage and/or extreme irritability that lasts for long periods of time, days or even weeks at a time
Severe depression that extends back to early childhood
Severe anxiety and panic attacks that started out of the blue when I was about 19
Psychotic symptoms including visual & auditory hallucinations and paranoia, particularly in times of high stress or extremely severe depression
Self injury, usually in the form of cutting, but I have used binge drinking as a means to self injure (occasionally medication abuse is added to the alcohol to intensify the level of self injury)
Intense self hatred
History of multiple complete mental breakdowns, the first one being at the age of 11, where I lose all grasp of reality
Chronic feelings of emptiness
Obsessive thoughts/rituals that for the most part tend to be on the mild side, but at times can interfere with my ability to function in the world
Chronic hopelessness
Chronic suicidal ideation with multiple suicide attempts
Past history of postpartum psychosis (this may or may not have any relevance so I'm including it just in case)

Guess I'll pass this list on to my therapist and pdoc and see what they have to say.