Covid and mental health dump in the tags//

***If you are triggered by any mentions of self harm and/or mental health problems PLEASE KEEP SCROLLING & DO NOT READ my tags on this post.****

i just need to vent so badly and this is my safe space i don't know where else to put this 😰😰

And sure it’s easy to say you can’t spend your life worrying about it that you shouldn’t be worrying every time you have a prolonged period of happiness. And we’re not talking about just good days we’re talking about happy happy days like really good days that can lead me to worrying and having bpd doesn’t help because I can have elevated days or moments because of it that could mimic the early warning signs of mania albeit it doesnt usually last long hours, a day, maybe days but not often. But the thing is until you’ve experienced mania you can’t really understand why. After years of not being vigilant or being able to recognise the symptoms whilst it might not always be healthy to analyse when I get this happy the alternative is I miss the signals and am unprepared & so are those around me for when I inevitably go into full on mania. It’s no longer a fun happy time for me which undiagnosed me did feel that way. Now it’s scary because I have entire gaps of time just missing where I have no idea what I said or did. I have no control and no boundaries & that’s the scary part the combination of having no control with the lack of boundaries. The increased impulsivity & the lack of lucidity for the duration. You have to understand at my worst I felt so euphoric I felt like I was invincible ( I wasn’t suffering delusions I didn’t think I was literally invincible like Superman but it was more like a I feel so fucking great nothing can stop me) I felt like I was the best thing I was so confident it could have veered into arrogance at times. I felt like nothing could stop me in achieving the things I wanted (invincible). I actually got to a point where I wasn’t eating I slept maybe 2 hours in a 48 hour period but had so much energy I couldn’t sit still. I was talking incoherently jumping from topic to topic incredibly fast. I got down to an unhealthy weight I didn’t feel hunger and I didn’t feel like I needed food. I didn’t recognise or understand the impact that was having on me because I didn’t feel it just like my body survived on no more than a maximum of maybe 5 hours sleep and often a lot less for what may have been weeks on end and yet I felt on top of the world. My body went over the limits of what it could normally do, what anyones body should be able to do. So the last thing I want is to relapse into mania again because it’s warped over time and mania can be worse the longer it’s left untreated and whilst I was on medication none of it was actually working or treating the Bipolar so I might as well have not been on meds because they did nothing for my Bipolar but gave me a whole host of awful side effects. I’m sure I am worrying for nothing and it’s just my anxiety and maybe I should worry a little bit less because it’s been a few days and I have had lows during these days (but arguably bpd based lows which can happen even during manic episodes) and I don’t think I’m going into mania I think I’ve had a very tough few years with disaster after disaster & I’m finally starting to heal and grieve and try to put my life back together again and we are getting sunnier weather it’s leading into summer and weather does affect my moods (some research has suggested living in sunnier climates can help ppl w/ Bipolar and such). It doesnt mean mania just because and I need to learn that but I also don’t want to relax so much I forget to be wary of actual blinding signals of mania but idk if I could tell them apart from just being happy like I said early warning signs aren’t necessarily that noticeable and my usual warning signs aren’t too applicable anymore for a variety of reasons incl changes in my physical health.

I’m also not sure if it’s too much of a leap, because there was a ton of things piling up, but I am thinking a pretty big driving force behind this relapse in my anxiety and depression was related to trying out a new birth control for a few months (and subsequently stopping when I realized that was probably a factor) 🥴

I can’t have the pill with estrogen because it causes me a certain type of migraine that makes it dangerous and doctors will not prescribe it for me, and regardless I remember having mood issues on those too. So probably around June I opted for a progesterone only pill, and for that first month it was fine besides some mood issues right around my cycle specifically. By July the panic attacks were getting noticeable and bad out of nowhere, and by August I’d linked it to being a lot worse around my cycle and realized there was definitely a new hormonal component. So in early September I stopped the pill, bled randomly mid-cycle, and the rest of the month was pretty rough. That was when I had to see my primary doctor because my heart rate was off the charts and became peak agoraphobe and quit my job. I’ve noticed a spike of the anxiety symptoms around ovulation time too (and newfound ovulation pain, so I’m always aware it’s happening, it lines up exactly when my tracker says it should be.) October hasn’t been perfect, but I feel like each cycle I’ve gone through since stopping I’ve felt myself get slightly better. I’m just wondering if this suspicion is correct, how long it will take me to normalize and truly feel like myself again?

At any rate, I’ve had the convo with my boyfriend that I’m pretty burnt out on trying new hormonal contraceptives. I think they’re great for a lot of people, but for whatever reason my body personally reacts insanely when I start fucking around with my hormones. He’s thankfully very supportive and reassured me he doesn’t expect me to risk my health for birth control which is a relief. This, unfortunately leaves me with not many options besides the copper IUD (non-hormonal) which I’ve heard from many friends HURTS so I’m kind of a huge baby and afraid of that. Option 2 is lean all in to the condoms & fertility awareness route where I just track my ovulation and pray each month. 😬.

Hi c: I remember a post, I think it was from you, about long covid and getting it? Was that you? A friend of mine is struggling and I was wondering if you had any advice about what she can do :< Thank you!!

Oh no, I hope your friend feels better soon! That might have been me, I think I posted about it here a few times and there have definitely been twitter threads.

Standard disclaimer stuff: I am not a doctor. What I found helped me might not help someone else. Long covid is kind of fucked up to deal with because it seems to hit everyone in different ways, in different areas, and months later something that wasn't a problem before can suddenly become one. The long haul groups talk about it as something that feels like it moves around the body, like a total shit gremlin.

The thing that helped me the most initially was joining the facebook groups with other people figuring shit out. This was back April/May for me but they're still very active and full of people sharing resources.

Survivor Corps is I think the big one and they've been the ones reaching out to media and doctors to try to gain some recognition with the medical community initially (as far as I know, all kind of a blur tbh). There's also a long covid group here, and if your friend searches for like, long covid + the country they're in there are usually more local/regional ones for resources closer to home too.

Because we don't really know what specific mechanism is triggering a lot of the long covid stuff yet, most of us are just treating symptoms. Some people have been diagnosed with mast cell activation syndrome (MCAS) and I don't know diddly squat about that but it might be something for your friend to look into. My whole thing has been inflammation and my immune system basically attacking itself because immune systems are both very complex and compellingly fucking stupid. Not to victim blame the immune system or anything.

What helped me depended on what was going wrong at the time, obv, but it means it's a long list.

This is just going to be a brain dump, sorry.

- I never had pneumonia. Mine started in my throat, probably damaged my vocal chords, but never turned into pneumonia. I still had shortness of breath, pressure in my chest, and my oxygen levels dropped. I could breathe but with great difficulty and described it to the EMTs as "breathing is like work." It took all of my energy and focus to breathe in enough. If you are that this point, ever, like, literally fucking ever, call an ambulance.

- Tylenol for a fever. 

- Blood thinners if necessary, I never had any but we know now that a lot of problems are blood clot-related. Tbqh my blood is more thin now than anything but I always had anemia and some sort of “your blood is too small actually?” problem and we don’t know why. I just bleed a lot and bruise easier now. 

- If they try to tell you it's anxiety or in your head or you're not that bed, tell them to go fuck themselves and go to the hospital. Get tested if you can. A lot of the problems long haulers ran into was that we got sick before tests were available, or we were talked into staying home by the emergency workers, and we never got tested. This opens the doors for doctors to tell you it's all in your head, psychological, anxiety, allergies, etc. Just. Go when you first feel sick if at all possible. Get tested before it turns into long covid. 

- I was not sure in the beginning what "shortness of breath" or "pressure" actually felt like, and it made me delay calling for an ambulance for a few days as well. For me, it felt like there was an elastic band of pressure around my lungs. I couldn't fully inhale. My diaphragm was fucked in ways I still don't understand. My lungs also felt heavy, like there was a weight on them or like my lungs themselves were too stiff to inhale. That all counts as pressure/tightness/shortness of breath. So does air hunger, or feeling like you want to be swallowing air.

- I know I'm being super obvious but seriously shortly before I got sicker, I hit up twitter to ask what "pressure" was supposed to feel like because I couldn't tell if what I had "counted."

- Breathing: lying on my stomach with my chest propped up by pillow, in bed helped. So did  pursed lip breathing: here.

- I was prescribed salbutamol initially, which did help with the worst of the wheezing and opened up some of my lungs so I could breathe easier. When I went to the ER again a couple months later, they gave me like 5x the usual dose and sent me home.

- I'm also taking Flovent/fluticasone twice a day for asthma maintenance.

- Histamines are a problem for a lot of people. Some develop a histamine intolerance, which can be helped by eating a low histamine diet.

- Antihistamines helped me the most. I was taking Allegra-D daily. Pepcid AC also helps, because it targets a different kind of histamine. There was such a run on Pepcid when this started that it was actually impossible to find in my area and I had to order some online. 

- I was recently prescribed Singulair and it has been life-changing this past week or so. As far as I know it's not really an antihistamine but blocks/inhibits a particular receptor involved in inflammation that comes into play when allergies do.

- Electrolytes. I don't know why, but my electrolytes are permanently fucked and too low now. If I don't go through like a litre of gatorade a day (or whatever, pick your brand of supplements), I am even more tired and brain foggy than usual. Helps a lot.

- Inflammation is a major problem all around. Sometimes I go for the naproxen or advil and it will help any really major acute flare-up now (like, I can feel when my gallbladder is getting inflamed and about to spasm and I can cut it off sort of), but mostly it's also daily maintenance. I take cucurmin and black pepper daily.

- Other supplements: vitamins A & D, a multivitamin, NAC. ��

- CBD oil. This worked wonders for me for a lot of the side-effects of covid, costochondritis and shingles pain especially.

- Diet. I mentioned the low histamine one above. Other people have had some success with a low inflammation diet. Some folks also have so many GI problems that they basically ate chicken and rice and slowly reintroduced foods to see what would trigger something. I appear to get super fucked by nightshades now, e.g. Alcohol is an absolute no. I had to cut caffeine for months because of my heart. (No caffeine/alcohol/red meat was my doctor's first and best advice for heart stuff at the time.)

- Speaking of the heart stuff, if your friend is dealing with that: electrolytes again. I have pedialyte freezies that I would suck on whenever heart palpitations started and it helped calm it down some. My heart was so, so fucked for months that whenever I ate or stood up or sat down it would hit like 140bpm and I had to spend an hour moving as little as possible or I'd just about pass out. There are a LOT of long-haulers now dealing with POTS and I can't really speak to what helps that in particular but if your heart is messing up at all: call a doctor. I still don't know how damaged my heart is from all of this because doctors and wait lists, etc. Get a jump on that.

- Insomnia was absolutely the worst I’ve ever had and I’ve had lifelong, “I’m awake for three days wee” insomnia. The Singulair knocks me right out at night, so that's a bonus, but there has not been a single night since getting sick where I didn't have to take something to help me sleep. I was on Zopiclone before getting sick, at least, but seriously talk to someone about insomnia if necessary. The sleep deprivation alone was making so many things worse.

- Brain fog? Brain fog. I don't have any or many answers for this. My short-term memory is wrecked and usually I'll remember something 2 weeks later, so I live my life on a 2-week lag now.

- Related to brain fog, fatigue. Don't fuck with it. Do not. Chronic Fatigue and Myalgic encephalomyelitis are both brought up often with long covid. I am dealing with it but don't know what to say about it yet because I haven't had a single doctor give a shit thus far. I've spoken to a relative who's an occupational therapist about it and her most helpful advice was about "energy envelopes," which is basically spoon theory. If you feel tired: stop. If you don't, or if you try to push through, we relapse hard and fast and you can pay for one day of walking 10 minutes too long with weeks of being stuck in bed. It's miserable. It will take longer to get back to normal. Some of us can exercise and feel amazing after; others are exercise intolerant and it wrecks them. (I feel best after like, 10 minutes of walking and sunshine right now, which is after months and months of being bedridden.)

- Treat mental exertion the same as physical. Doctors told me to drink Gatorade after mental work because it's still work, and it has helped a lot for whatever reason. It also helps to work on one thing at a time, take a break, switch gears, take a break, etc. I can't multitask anymore anyway.

- Eliminate whatever stressors you can. Stress will make everything worse. 

- It comes and goes. Every relapse was a bit shorter and a bit easier for me, so that now when I fuck up it's like 2-3 days instead of weeks, but it's a rollercoaster.

- It can be random as hell. For about two months my gallbladder just decided to up and die, basically, and we were talking about having it removed. And then it was fine. Hasn't bugged me again lately. I know I said it's symptom management, but it's also like... symptom chasing and trying to figure out what's happening every time the sun rises. This is also exhausting. Everything is exhausting.

- Brain shit. Some of us have serious trouble reading. Sentences swim together. Letters wouldn't turn into words. I took this as a Challenge and started reading children's books and then Animorphs again, like... slowly, as much as I could do without pushing it, and it's still not perfect or great but it was an okay place to start. Honestly the hardest part was the embarrassment and going from a PhD program to reading kids books, but. Do what you have to. Do what you can.

- Sticky notes and labelling things around the house so I could see them when I needed them. I am not fucking around when I say brain fog. I can open the fridge, know I have milk, know it is in the door, and literally not see it to find it. I will put the cream in the dishwasher. I will spin in circles in the kitchen remembering and forgetting and remembering why I’m there again. Sticky notes. Also: journals, index cards, write literally everything down if you need to remember something. Put it somewhere obvious. I like writing on the bathroom mirror for the important shit. (Don’t use lipstick.) 

- Unsurprisingly, a lot of us are struggling with anxiety and depression. Don't let doctors get it backward: it's not anxiety making us sick, it's being sick and ignored and fighting to be helped that's making our mental health worse. So many doctors tell us it's all in our head. I did not move across the country because I was too sick to take care of myself because of ~allergies~ or ~anxiety.~ Fuck off.

- So, so many people report that they relapse whenever they menstruate so if your friend is in that group, they might want to prepare to feel like fucking trash every 4 weeks no matter what they do. I don’t have any advice on this one, I’m sorry. There are a lot of people discussing it in the FB groups, though, and those are searchable for symptoms. 

- So... a tl;dr list of things that might help: anti-inflammatory diets, anti-histamine diets, pepcid AC, allegra or other allergy meds, vitamin A/D/E, multivitamins, electrolytes and gatorade, albuterol, fluticasone, zopiclone (or anything that helps with sleep), CBD oil, singulair, anti-nausea meds (buscopan), muscle relaxants (spasming gallbladder). Rest, so much rest, do not fuck with The Rest if you can help it. I also encourage just getting high and edibles as much as you can because it sure helped me chill out big time and I think was a big factor in my recovery, at least as far as helping me calm down and helping my heart were concerned.

- The actual most helpful part outside of what to take or do was other people. Friends would go out and get me things when I could not, including like, cat food deliveries and all. I had co-workers ready to step in to take over my work on days I could not. I had friends calling doctors because I was too tired to fight them or self-advocate. I don't think it's an exaggeration to say they helped save my idiot life this year. Literally. It's a lot to ask of anyone but it's also that level of support that some of us need, and there shouldn't be any shame in it. (I still feel bad about it anyway but what are you gonna do.)

Depending on where you live, some places are setting up long-haul covid clinics to help people. Reports are mixed: some demand you had a positive test even if you were sick before tests were available. Some people are getting a lot of help regardless. Some are being sent home and told not to come back anyway. It’s kind of a gamble right now but either way, there’s at least some medical recognition making headway now so my fingers are crossed.

Anyway you basically sound like a good bean and your friend is lucky to have you asking around. I have absolutely forgotten something at some point in here because, well, brain fog and no memory, but if you have any questions or want something clarified please just ask. Stay safe!

usually this is something i’d post on a side blog with no tags or followers (just to get out of my head), but i think this time i want the possibility of someone helping. idk how long this will be but i’ll put it under a read more when i’m on my computer.

i’ve been struggling more lately. idk if it’s just the pandemic and quarantine and everything getting to me, but this has all been happening before too, just maybe not as often. i’m more anxious, i’m more depressed, i want to shut myself away from friends and not leave my house much unless it’s a quick trip somewhere by myself. i’m so tired all the time. i’m just so, so exhausted. and since i’m home a lot with nothing to do, i’ll sleep. my schedule is so messed up. i sleep basically 5am-2pm and then sometimes still take a nap. like today i slept 5 or 6 am- 2, woke up and had something small to eat, sat at my computer and then slept again 6:30pm-9pm. i jokingly call this my “unemployed schedule” with my parents, but i think they just think i’m lazy.

and speaking of them, i think a lot of my problems i have with myself would be nonexistent if i just had good parents. my crooked teeth wouldn’t be an issue if my dad didn’t hate doctors and was scared of the dentist, therefore never making appointments for me or my brother, resulting in us both not having good teeth. my weight and unhealthy relationship to food wouldn’t be an issue if my mom would have just made me eat a god damn vegetable when i was a kid instead of just giving me chicken nuggets so i would stop whining. and when i was chubbier then other kids, instead of herself trying to fix my diet by actually cooking healthy food and making me eat it, she made me see a doctor and go to group sessions of other kids in similar situations (that i was very uncomfortable going to, to the point of me crying, but she forced me to go anyway). which none of that helped anyway, it just made me self conscious about eating so i now hate food and when i do eat in public, i feel gross and that people are staring at me. and now my body has tricked itself that if i’m out in public, i can only eat very little or else i get sick and throw up. and my mental illness could be in check if my parents just put in any effort. they’ve been aware of my depression since i was in 3rd grade (which my mom would phrase as “you don’t seem as happy anymore”) and i recall having anxiety since kindergarten. i get that we didn’t have a lot of money when i was growing up, so maybe they just made me see the guidance counselor every friday for two school years. which is fine, that’s what they could do and it was at least something idk. but after that it’s like they stopped caring. i went on to public school after that and i hated it. i constantly would go to the nurses office in 5th grade and pretend being sick so my mom could pick me up or some how get me home. that should have been a red flag. or whenever my dad asked me how my day was and i never said “good”, another red flag. i was so depressed for the rest of my time in public school, and they didn’t do anything. sure i would join clubs or play sports to try to make myself happy and have fun, but it wasn’t ever enough. high school was even worse. i was angry all the time. just that angry emo kid sat in the back of the class. and eventually i lost almost all my friends. i started cutting, but i kept it hidden until i got changed after gym class one day. someone i was kinda friends with spotted the cuts on my upper arm. they gave me a knowing look and asked what happened. i said my dog scratched me. but it was way too many cuts and too dark to be dog scratches. but they didn’t ask again and i was grateful because i didn’t want help at the time. rest of school went on, the cutting stopped (or at least stopped being as frequent. relapses now and again), had panic attacks before and during school (that i always seemed like a burden for having when my mom had to deal with it), then i had a manipulative friend/ex gf i’m not even going to get into rn. long section short, my parents knew i was struggling. they would mention it off handedly. “you didn’t seem as happy” “we saw their was something going on” stuff like that. but they did nothing to help me. never asked questions, never talked to me, never asked if i needed help or someone else to talk to.

after highschool the panic attacks weren’t as frequent, but the depression was there. and they knew it. because even now and then i would bring it up, especially when i was having a breakdown. i would tell them i need help, i need a therapist and i need medication. she said (because it was always my mom i would go to) that she would see what she could do. then nothing happened. another time, full break down, and i fully told her i am suffering and i need help. she made me feel like such a burden and an inconvenience. she said she had no idea how to get me a therapist. no idea where to start. so i told her, mainly yelled, to ask this one lady we know (someone who had actually done more for my mental health than my own mother) for advice because i know her two kids go to therapy and stuff. she said she would try but she never did. few weeks ago, i have the biggest panic attack i’ve had in a while. full hyperventilating, almost going to throw up, all because there was a bug in my room trapped under a bowl. that is not healthy. i’m sobbing and gasping for air as my dad is trying to get the fast bug off the floor but not lose it, and once it’s gone i’m in bed sobbing and heaving and my whole body is twitching uncontrollably. she thinks she’s hot shit because she did that “5 things you can touch” bull shit once i was starting to calm. nothing again after that. what they did, they bought a hand vacuum so i could catch bugs myself. i guess so i won’t have to bother them at 4 in the morning and again freaking the fuck out. all in all, if they got me therapy as a teen and i had meds, i probably would be much much much better off. i won’t even go into the trans stuff rn. i think they think it went away because they ignored it and i don’t talk about it with them. even tho in the rest of the world away from family, i go by my chosen name and my friend calls me “he”. but it’s been almost 4 years, if not already 5 years, since i came out to them. they said they looked up therapy and stuff but again, nothing ever happened. i joke with my parents and say they’re lucky i don’t steal my dogs prozac and they laugh. i know it’s exactly the one used for people because it’s the same exact one my ex took. these days i’m starting to see things out of the corner of my eye, but nothing is there. i tell my mom i think i have adhd or something because i’ve read symptoms and it would make sense. and i also don’t remember a time where my head wouldn’t just be quiet. even now. it never is. but she says i was tested and they didn’t say i had adhd. when i was 7... and it’s misdiagnosed in afab people... and especially since i was anxious as a child.. and nervous around the lady who tested me. when. i. was. 7. shit develops later in life. but she won’t believe me because she says she’s trained to see the signs for her work. but then she’ll bring up how my uncle, grandma, and dad, are like the poster kids for adhd. and she just won’t believe me.

i’m really struggling with just everything. and i feel guilty that i’m even struggling and “feeling bad”. i’m a white kid from the philly suburbs. everything could be much much worse for me. but then again, i know thinking like this isn’t good for me. just because it could be worse, doesn’t mean it still can’t be a hell of a lot better too. i just want to be okay. i want to be healthy and happy. i’ve never really gotten to experience it all. my happiness seems fake and it fades away. my idea of health is “going to the gym and the right amount of anorexia.” i know that’s not healthy but that’s just the only way i know. my mom doesn’t seem to care anyway. i tell her that when i am working or i was in school, i would only have like one meal a day. she didn’t say a thing. i just want to be happy. i don’t want to die. i really don’t. i hate being alive but like, i’m already here. i’m not going to take myself out. but it’s just so hard to exist a lot of the time. idk how i’ve done it this long. and i can tell it’s gonna get bad again because i tried to cut myself a few nights ago. the knife wasn’t sharp enough to really make a mark but i had no energy to keep trying. i really need help but idk what to do anymore.

Well, I'm almost 5 months in. The struggle seems to get worse instead of better, which I halfway expected. I felt so numb in the beginning and distracted with having to take care of a baby at 52 years old.

It is absolutely bizarre the range of emotions that I have felt. I'm sickened by the relief that I feel not having a deal with her addiction anymore. I'm excited, exhausted, and totally feel robbed of the grandmother experience that I've spoken of so many times. I feel embarrassed and like a shitty grandma that I feel relief when my ex takes the baby oftentimes. He never, ever, ever seems exhausted or ready for a break the way that I do. I love that baby with every fiber of my being. But I think I have not yet mourned the loss of the life that I thought I was building for myself. Not to mention my ex barely works at all, so it's easy for him to have energy and excitement for taking the baby as often as possible. He has his own business painting houses. And between losing his daughter, his own depression, and the coronavirus pandemic, he has hardly worked lately. So on top of everything else, I'm paying his bills, because without that, he's unable to help me with the baby.

After Melody died we decided as a family that it would be best that my ex move into the dreaded condo. This is the same condo that my ex-mother-in-law lived in when she had her heart attack. And the same condo that my daughter overdosed in. But that fucking condo is paid off, it was bought with cash. So, because my ex was essentially homeless, he has to live there if he's going to help me. And the only bills are the HOA, and the utilities. Plus there's the added expense of Melody's car that my ex is driving, the car payments that go with it along with the insurance payments. So I'm literally paying all of those plus my own bills so I can have a few days on my own... Until the long awaited inheritance comes from my ex's mother's estate -which will be just enough for my ex to buy a van for his business, get his teeth fixed, and overall get back on his own 2 feet - then my paying his bills stops. Should be in June sometime.

I feel sickened even saying all this. I should be elated to have Melody's flesh and blood offspring in my life, and I am most of the time. Not to mention this kid is amazing. He is so joyful, completely has Melody's spirit, and is about as easy as a baby can be. But that doesn't make my struggle any less.

The level of guilt that I feel because I'm relieved when I have a break from the baby is reprehensible to me. The level of sadness and missing my daughter is incomprehensible to me every time that baby learns something new or does something new. I can literally hear her voice, her laughter, her love for her child every time he pulls up to stand or laughs or crawls or eats his dinner with his own hands or when he babbles "Mamamamama". That's by far when I miss her the most.

I also feel super guilty when I think about if she was still here, knowing the downward spiral that she was on before she overdosed. There's this devil and angel sitting on my shoulders arguing with each other about how I don't miss the addict, but I do miss my daughter. How do you reconcile that? I don't think you can.

I feel like if she was still here, she would be making my life a living hell as an addict, and would have probably died from Corona, because of the major lung and heart damage that she had done to herself, along with the reckless life that goes with being a heroin addict. But near the end of her life, she was literally fighting everyday to find long-term rehab. And what if she had gotten in? I feel like we would have been living the life that we had been for over a year that was clean and sober and fun as hell. There are just so many questions, and scenarios, it boggles my mind.

I found out a lot of stuff after she passed away. I found out that she was far more down the rabbit hole then I thought. She was living the addict life 100% over the last two to three months before she died. I thought that her grandmother getting sick and dying was the catalyst, for the most part. But now, as I said before, she was completely and utterly relapsed. How on God's green earth, after everything I've seen and been through, could I still be so fucking blind? And the pain doesn't stop there. Just the other day I found that my toolbox was missing. She clearly hocked it.

I'm just posting because I don't care what groups are out there for support, I still never feel like I can speak my brutal truth. Not to mention, groups like Nar-Anon and others are all about the God talk. I'm so fucking over the God talk. Can I just find a fucking group where we can just let loose of our feelings no matter how grotesque they are and not have to pray at the beginning in the end of it? I'm always strangely comforted to know when other people have been through what I've been through, while still being sick that this could happen to more than one person, not to mention hundreds of thousands of people. That's the only real reason I want to join any group at all, is just so I don't feel alone in all this mess. So in my mind, I have nowhere else to go accept my Tumblr blog.

I'm so lost, and so alone. I really, genuinely do not know how to deal with my shit. I need to be up and happy and perky for this baby, and for the most part I am. But when it's bedtime, and I'm playing one of mommy's videos for the baby while he drinks his bedtime bottle, he always smiles at a certain part, and I'm shattered every time. There's not a single soul on this Earth that knows how much pain I'm in, but not in the sense that one might think. Yes, I miss my baby girl more than words can express. But I'm so fucking glad the addict is gone. And I feel disgusted even saying that. I also feel a lot of guilt around not promoting his father's memories at all. There's a lot of resentment there, but I feel like the right thing to do is to make sure he remembers his father too. How do I resolve that?

And other logistical thoughts come to mind. Like I am going to be 70 when he turns 18. I'm going to die when he's fairly young (assuming I don't die younger of a car accident or some other stupid shit). It's so not fair to him. And I think about what am I supposed to tell him throughout the years? He's going to know who mama is thru videos on my phone, the pictures on the wall, and the gravesite that we visit all the time. I don't know how I'm going to answer the questions this sweet baby is going to have. I don't know how to tell him how much she loved him and make him understand that she did not choose drugs over him. Drugs chose her over life. I also need to make sure that I put in my will who will take the baby if I die. Let's look at the options... There's my sister who has desperately wanted a child over the last 10 years or so and is 48 years old. She's had mental health issues for as long as she's been alive. To put it bluntly, she's incompetent of having a child full time. She is also narcoleptic I think I mentioned before. Sorry honey, you've got to stay awake for this one. Then there's my ex, who loves the baby equally as I do. But he doesn't have a responsible bone in his body and is an anarchist and conspiracy theorist. He's incapable of taking care of a baby or child from a responsibility standpoint, not to mention the crazy shit he would put in his head as he gets older. Finally there's my son. He's pretty much the only one I would trust to do right by this child. But he's made it quite clear that he's never wanted to be a father. I did ask him about it, and he said that he would accept the task if it came to it. But I want someone who wants the baby, not has to take the baby, not just someone who would accept the responsibility.

I need help, no question about it. But no matter how many Google searches that I do, I can't find a single place or counselor where I can get very specific help for my issues. I don't want to let this baby down. I don't want to fuck him up either. I want to be the very best grandma and mother that I can be for him.

What do I do?

Oh and finally, I've been drinking a lot more - or more frequently. If it was up to me, I'd drink daily. Quantity wise, it's not that much. At most a bottle of wine, mostly when my ex has the baby, but sometimes after he's asleep for the night. I'm not trying to get drunk, per se. Just trying to unclench my muscles and stress. Sometimes it eases my sadness, sometimes it exacerbates it. Plus it helps me fall asleep, which has been a challenge for me since entering menopause. I take a 1/4 bar (.5mg) of Xanax frequently before bed to help sleep, and never up my dose (too scared). But if I skip a couple of days, by the 3rd day I have withdrawals that feel likey old anxiety attacks. I take a quarter & the symptoms fade. Well ain't that just the last thing that I need! I want to phase it out, but as long as I have sleep issues, a job, and a baby, I don't see how I can. I skip days purposely so it remains effective without taking higher doses. Now that I'm working from home, this would be a great time to phase out. But every time I try to skip, I'm tossing and turning all night - which is torture.

I just wish I could get into a yoga routine or any other exercise routine, as well as meditation. I know that that would help all of my issues. But gumption is not exactly my forte right now.

Re: Self Destruct, I just wanted to say that you are a lovely person, and your diagnoses and destructive patterns do not define you. I hope you hold onto hope and keep growing; you are worthy of good things. I don't know if this helps, but I've been happily married to a woman with BPD for over a decade now, and while it hasn't always been a bed of roses (I have my own issues too), there is so much more to us than our fuckups. It's a bumpy road - don't be hard on yourself for falling sometimes.

For a decade? You managed to make it work? Thank you for this. I have been with my fiance for 5 years this October. He also has his own issues Asperger’s & some other stuff.  I just..I keep failing. I have a major MAJOR fear of abandonment like major and something happened in our past to sort of make it more valid but not valid. Like it’s not valid but in my head my bpd says oh because of this it’s valid. I don’t know it’s just I do things that I shouldn’t horrible things...like invading his privacy and It is SO horribly wrong and I know that.  But it’s like I get this thought in my head and it niggles at me day after day after day and then I have real life things that have happened that sort of make it more real in my mind as actually being a thing that could be true.  And because I’ve had things in my past to do with lies and such I am SO so horribly paranoid about being lied too and the thing is it’s not about how big or small the lie is I just need complete honesty and not even the average person is honest about EVERYTHING...but I...I’ve always been this uber honest person to the point teachers used to continually say at parent’s evenings sometimes Erin is too honest for her own good. I think it’s also tied in with my anxiety that causes major guilt around lying for example when I hid my self harm I actually never lied as soon as I was asked if I self harmed I told my parents I broke down and told them. I couldn’t lie. There has been few occasions where I’ve lied. Like obviously I’m not talking about the tiniest white lies saying you’ve done a chore and you haven’t. I mean more important lies than that but yet ones apparently most people find small but to me they aren’t and I have major issues around trust fear of abandonment and it all comes down to having open honest discussions. The issue is because of my partner’s trauma in his past he suffered major abuse and because of his Asperger’s he shuts down he’s not communicative in anyway possible. I imagine being married to a woman with BPD for a decade you’ll understand we can be very emotionally charged and we need that constant validation and when we notice ONE tiny thing off that most people wouldn’t think twice about we instantly jump to paranoia and that’s me. I struggle with his Asperger’s coping mechanisms and such because I am the pure opposite. He can’t talk about his emotions easily and me...I am a ball of emotions that never stops talking. I can’t always get that emotional needs met but at the same time he will go out of his way to put ME first my emotional needs first and I know I cannot ask for more. I just feel like I do these things because I am scared and I feel like I don’t know I don’t know why I do this. Why I invade his social media why I do this stuff. Like why? It’s like I want to find something to upset myself over OR it is like the paranoia takes over in my head and I just...it is all I can think about so I just..spend hours down a rabbit hole and betray his trust for nothing...for what...my stupid thoughts in my head.  I’ve been trying so hard to get past this and I HAVE been making good progress. Like I’ve been doing good but it’s like when I do relapse into old behaviours it’s just so SO bad. There is so much stuff about people with BPD being abusive etc etc and I am so afraid of being what people expect.  I am also fighting to get therapy and treatment. I noticed I was doing better but it seems that when I am under stress the BPD gets worse and idk sometimes it is so hard to do all of this without self harming without i dont know.  I don’t know how to get past my self destructive behaviours. I thought I was doing so much better and then I go and fuck everything up. It’s not fair on him regardless of the past I shouldn’t be doing that you know. I SHOULDNT and I just feel like everything people label borderlines as right now. How do you ever get past your wife’s fears of abandonment? The paranoia? The need for validation which can become too much for some people?  Obviously she might not be the same as me there’s 9 criteria we only need 7 to be diagnosed maybe she doesn’t experience these things the way I do but if she does please reach out to me again and just..how..how did you guys make it work?  Sometimes I feel like I’m doomed to the symptom that says borderlines often have SHORT LIVED relationships.  even though we’ve been together for 5 years nearly I feel like one day it’ll be the straw that breaks the camels back so to speak and he always says thats not how it is hes in this with me for the long haul. But man my mind is SO fucked up right now. I just...idk. Thank you though. I’m gonna keep reading your message over because it is very comforting to see someone whose maintained and has a good loving relationship with someone with borderline for a decade that...just thank you for reaching out to me.

Antipsychotics, Psychosis, and I

This is a tough subject to write about, it’s like I’m looking at an empty screen and filled with ideas but the ideas stay there instead of being typed onto the screen. But I will give it my best shot. Apologies if this seems like word vomit, or if I jump from subject to subject, but know this comes from the heart.

Now, on to my history of psychosis and antipsychotics:

I’ve been on one antispychotic or another (sometimes two at once) since the age of 16 (except for 2017 when I cold turkey’d all my meds, but that’s a story for later) when I had my first psychotic episode. Part of me wonders how well these episodes were handled, whether I would have been far better off and relapse free going to a Soteria type environment. But nonetheless, history is history and it’s not like Mississippi would be having radical schizophrenia treatments anyway. Mississippi throws their schizophrenics into the state hospital and either leaves them there to die or ejects them onto the streets with little to no social support, where they inevitably die as well. [1]

The only reason I have not succumbed to this fate is because I had a therapist with enough foresight to put me on SSI (disability) and I have a family that understands and supports me, and has good insurance that I can take advantage of until the age of 26. Thus I see a doctor who admits not to the state hospital, but to a local private one known for being quite good. I am privileged in that sense, despite my illness, and despite me being on disability.

However, back to the point, I’ve been on every atypical antipsychotic except some of the newer ones (Saphris, Invega, Rexulti, to name a few,)[2] and Seroquel (except for sleep). I’ve been on Haldol (haloperidol) as well. I am currently on Vraylar (Cariprazine) but I am worried that this medicine will follow the pattern that all the others have, and it is this pattern I will explore later.

My journey on the “med carousel” has been a wild one. Filled with moments where I felt miserable, filled with moments where I felt like I was cured and all was good in the world. But all those moments point towards the same conclusion, in the end: relapse. 

Before the medicines came, the psychosis did. I had my first psychotic episode at the age of 16, months after my parents divorced. I was feeling immense pressure at that time, as an AMAB person, I was the only “”man”” in the house, and responsibilities came with that. Instead of “stepping up to the plate” I instead withdrew, and sunk into a deep depression complemented by acute panic attacks. I was put on Celexa (Citalopram) by a local doctor who specialized in adolescent care. This lifted my depression, but did nothing for the crippling anxiety I felt at school.

Then suddenly, one night, I heard a voice speaking to me. It was a whispering voice, I could not discern the words, and then more voices accompanied them, until I sat in bed miserable, crying, unable to function. That was how my mom found me in the morning, crying with my hands over my ears, complaining of a “crowd of voices.” 

I was immediately rushed to a local hospital, where I was put on Risperdal (risperidone) and I stayed there for five days. I was so sedated during these five days that I could scarce stay awake, they went by in a blur. I dimly remember a visitation where I begged my mom to get me out of there, but she refused. It’s something I feel resentful about to this day.

After discharge I was well for a while, until symptoms returned, this time with accompanying delusions. Latuda was the next med of choice, one that worked well for a time, but then failed me and ended with me being back in hospital, but this time, the state hospital.

Whitfield, the mere name seems to scare residents of Mississippi. Whitfield is very much a stereotypical state hospital, poorly run, with no air conditioning in some buildings, poor computers, and an over-worked staff. I will not go into detail of my stay there, I will just say it was not enjoyable

After my stay there where I was tried on several medications (which, to be honest, I can not recall) my psychiatrist accused me of malingering. If his medicines weren’t working, well then the problem must be me! He severed our patient/doctor relationship and I continued on, discharged from the state hospital, fighting down psychosis and trying to be normal despite daily panic attacks, hallucinations, and believing the FBI was reading my thoughts.

Eventually, it all became too much, and I broke down in front of my family. This brought me to my next doctor, who I see to this day. He was much more kindly than the other doctor, with a happy tone in his voice and a genuine desire to listen to my troubles. He prescribed Geodon, and it seemed I had found my miracle drug.

But this drug failed me as well after a few months of blissful silence in my own head, I was hospitalized during an acute episode of hypomanic psychosis, which brought me to the label of schizoaffective bipolar. [3] During this hospitalization I was put on Haldol (haloperidol) and lithium, both did their job and I was out of the hospital after two weeks.

Fast-forward 6 months, I have a falling out with my therapist, I refuse to do the work in therapy (later I learn, I simply was not mature enough to do work in therapy) so she recommends I be kicked out of the house, and my mom obliges. [4]

With that, I stop all my medication. The Lithium? thrown in the trash. Haldol and Geodon? Same

At first it seems like I’m going to be okay, but of course, the psychosis is always there, always lurking, always looking to take an opportunity. The result was 6 months of unending psychosis where I scarce leaved my apartment (and most days, my bed).

This psychosis was only ended by a visit to a Partial Hospitalisation Program (PHP) where I learned skills to manage my psychosis, and was put back on the Geodon.

But of course, the Geodon again failed me,and after a Geodon + Haldol combo ended with crippling Akathisia my doctor was out of choices, and I went back to partial hospitalization to try Clozaril (clozapine).[5] But, the doctor said I had another choice, Vraylar. This Vraylar was new, expensive, but the doctor thought it would work. And so far it has.

Yet, the fear remains, what if it stops working and I have to try Clozaril? 

These thoughts haunt me, but I hope they won’t hold me back, and I hope that in the future I can find the right amount of coping skills and medication to truly one day feel happy. 

I know this is a bit of a word vomit, but this is for me, not for the reader, although I hope you got something out of this. In the future I will probably blog about antipsychotics, prognosis, and whether I want to be on them or not (as I’ve recently read Anatomy of an Epidemic by Robert Whittaker, who argues that antispychotics can be beneficial in the short term but are worse in the long-term). But for now, this is it. 

Endnotes:

[1] This is the subject of a lawsuit between the US Justice Department and the State of Mississippi, which is ongoing as of the writing of this piece.

[2] I am going to be using American brand names for the antipsychotics in this piece, but where I can recall the generic name I will use it alongside the brand name.

[3] I conceive of schizoaffective disorder not as is its own valid scientific entity, but merely an explanation for the co-existence of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder or major depressive disorder, something deemed impossible by the Kraepelinian dichotomy which the DSM-V still follows quite rigorously

[4] Me being transgender also had something to do with this action of kicking me out, but that is not a subject I felt like broaching today.

[5] Clozaril is a dangerous drug with a 1% side effect rate of decreased white blood cells, which can be fatal. As a result, the drug is a pain in the ass to take. You can only have one weeks worth of the drug at a time, and to get the next weeks dose you have to get your blood tested to show your ANC count is normal.

chronic pain

I wonder a lot about it. I'm so sad for so many days and it just feels like an endless battle. Like that of time. No matter what you do, it seems like depression will shrink back into you. It can very sneakily work its way back into you. Or it can just slap you from nowhere in the face again. It's fighting with anxiety. For unlimited soldiers, however. Is it ever going to end? And I wonder you can cure depression? Will I ever get healed? It's a vague concept to be healed and can have a few interpretations. Cure can only mean relieving someone from a disease or condition's symptoms. Sure, I believe we can all find ways to relieve our depression symptoms in this concept. I've heard some people claim to have fully cured their depression. I heard that actually, and I saw it online. I don't know what to say. When they tell the truth, then I'm very pleased with them. I think it also depends on what kind of depression somebody might have, how bad they is, how it affects them, and other factors. Yet for those like me who suffer so badly, who have hit rock bottom severely, and there is literally nothing worse you could fall apart from losing your own life, can we finally get rid of this? What should we do? Many people say they believe that there is a cure for everything, every illness, every condition in which you can feel completely secure with the symptoms forever. There's a relapse, of course. But these people also say that a relapse can be healed just as quickly. I don't think about that. I no longer know what to do. Depression is such a strange thing. I've got good days too. I've had days when I don't feel depressed actually. Just like my soul, it just gives me a break somehow. It seems like a struggle every day. Despite my anxiety, I always have bad days. When I climb a mountain, there is no peak, no matter how far I climb. There's no plateau there. So it's like I've been constantly pushed back two steps and then two steps forward and on and on and on and on. Many people say you have to find your depression's root cause and then fight it effectively from there. What if you know, but can't fight, a root cause? What if you don't know the cause of your root? What if you're part of your root cause? Depression is a burning fire. A huge fire inside you. But it feels like this flame will always remain lit, no matter what you do. It'll never go out full. You can make it smaller. Keep it small for a few days as you can no longer feel it within you. But it can't just disappear for good in some way. It will go up and up and down and down continuously. I don't think you'd have any idea how it actually feels if you don't fight depression. I've heard a ton of people say that I just don't understand this anxiety mental illness. Sometimes we all get sad? Sometimes we're all trapped in a cave. It's fine. All you have to do is find your way out. Yeah, but it's like getting stuck in that pit and not coming out. I couldn't find a way out. You can't see a way out. Not even feeling like you could get out. It is rainy. Much darkness. Truly, very bad. I don't feel like anything sometimes. Like I'm now gone. And depression kills me because in this death I exist. It is so difficult to understand. It's so hard to explain. I can't even get it out. I've been trying to understand for many years how mental illness affects me. Why am I doing this? Why I get a spurt of joy on a certain day, like I feel like I can live my life full of hope and fulfillment and just be very happy. While I'm sinking underwater for other days. And just as I'm about to die, I've been brought back over the surface to take half a breath and then shoved back down straight and the cycle continues. It's killing me slowly and it's so painful. While I'm absolutely emotionless the other days. A prisoner. I'm not afraid. I've sucked every emotion out of me like anxiety. Like I've already let it assert its victory. I'm not even handling my depression although some days and it's not addressing me. We are spinning out each other. But on the hand of the turn, I no longer know who I am. I'm not one of them. I'm not having any problems. But I don't have anything to live for either. It's so weird. So it makes me wonder if this feeling, this illness, this disorder, this thing inside me is always going away well. Will this be the case? What am I started to do to get it going? I'm doing things obviously to control my anxiety. I've done almost everything. Many people say it is only possible to manage depression, not absolutely cure it. So, do I believe this? Such a chronic pain, it feels like it's never going to go away completely. So, at this moment I value happiness friends and of course family. Happiness is something you can take for yourself alone. If you choose to be positive and appropriately channelize for feelings, then you will achieve happiness. It's not as plain as it seems, though. To work on it, you need to make efforts. Second, it's not a one-off event. To reach this condition, you need to do these things every day. Today, while you sometimes need to look inside for warmth, you need to seek your family and friends ' help. Looking within is important to find true happiness, but surrounding yourself with positive people is equally important.

Bleeding Red

Preface: I’ve been bitching around the bush of this long enough. So, I’ve been really silent on a bunch of stuff that’s been eating me alive which has made me both inactive and unproductive. I’m going to get straight to the point, starting off with the TL:DR from my post on my main blog. Context: An anon asked me if I was alright because I hadn’t updated in a while.

TL:DR You probably didn’t ask this to hear about all the bad shit of my life so here’s the short of it. No, I’m not doing fine. I will try get next weeks post out on time and I’ll work on making up on the lost posts. Updates will return regularly, ‘ite.

Time for the thick and thin of it.

Insecurity and being shafted: I’m stoic, even at my worst I won’t say anything. I’ll push through regardless of my current condition and since I’ve gone years like this, it’s not hard for me to do. In my real life situation, I’m currently in a place of social isolation. This has lead to a somewhat near reliance on Tumblr to be my social outlet. This present many issues.

The main one is that I’m quite the isolationist. This has only been reinforced by many interactions throughout the entirely of my life. Because of this, I can’t say I’ve ever had anything really more than two friends at a time. While in a way this has helped me express myself so well through writing, it’s come at the cost of social skill. I don’t talk to anyone.

With this kind of issue you could easily imagine that the THREE PEOPLE (four now, but very limited) to ever directly talk ended up in a way shafting me. The first blocked and disconnected with me without warning or reason. At this point we’ve been talking to each for about a month and we hit it off very well and then one day, silence. Never heard from them again. That fucked me up hard when I finally realized what happened.

The second person left during the Tumblr P**n Purge. We were talking about how to contact each other on other platforms and then they stopped responding. I had already given contact to other platforms of which they pinged me in any way. Another person that I trusted massively on here just abandoned me and I’m still hurting from that. Wasn’t fair at all.

Then the third person was someone that I been following for a while. This person is actually the reason that I’ve been putting this off for so long. I don’t want them to see this post but they will. I got an ask from them that ultimately turned out to be misinformation. I said I wasn’t mad but I was. I was so fucking angry about it and I’m still kinda mad, but I didn’t want problems. I still don’t. I just didn’t want them to worry about it. This will come back later.

I try my best to be as inoffensive as possible. The problem with that is that much of the things I believe or enjoy are highly divisive. Hell, even my own identity can be seen as offence. I’m bisexual, non-binary (I’m currently still questioning this. I might actually be gender fluid but in the overall scheme, that’s worse than being non-binary), and nonreligious. I’m in a very religious area so you I’m still “in the closet” about much of this IRL. I though it would better online but with how much people are saying bisexuality doesn’t exist, or that non-binary isn’t a valid gender (or that being gender fluid make you insane and you should be locked up) and all the hate people who say they are this are getting, the very community that’s supposed to accept me, HATES me. I had a bi pride flag icon last year during Pride Month. I never doing that ever again. It was terrible.

I’m trying my best to come out of my shell like I said I would when I made this blog but it seems I’m just crawling further into it. People I think I can trust keep setting me up to fall, people I know in real life won’t ever accept my existence if they knew who I really was, and my own mental health problem and self loathing are eating me alive. But that isn’t the total of it.

Crumbling Pillar: I’ve always ended up in the position where things were thrown onto me. In which no one wanted to do, I was stuck with. Because of this not only do I have a severe distaste being around my family (beyond everything mentioned before hand) but I grew to have a negative out look on everything. This effect is still quite obvious in my writings, especially my poems. Out of the 14 poems on my poem blog @washed-soul​, only one has a happy meaning.

The one happy poem was called dreams. Under a metaphor it talks about how a demon kept me trapped in a dark space. I start to get better and nearly break free before I have a negative relapse back to my old ways. The poems ends with the demon putting a end to itself leaving the nightmare in which it was keeping me in to slowly fade away, letting one crack of light peeking through to become a window to a door until one day I walk free. When writing this poem, I never thought I would find myself rebuilding the nightmare but that’s where I am.

I’m done with holding things together that other people have placed onto me. Because of this, issues have began showing in my private life. Issues that should’ve been solved decades ago are only now being addressed. This change in the status quo of my life has caused many issues in my productive and mood. Between everything else I’m too tired to do anything.

Is that a reason, is that an excuse. No it isn’t but it’s the best thing I got as a reason. I’m doing my damnedest to do the best I can but of course, when it comes to the thing that matter I just fall short. Big fucking whopha my intelligence and capability does me if I can’t use it for anything that means a damn.

Meaningless Triviality: I’m a very emotional person. I’m very strongly bound to my emotions and if everything above hasn’t given it away, my emotions are very negative prone. But it just doesn’t stop there, it goes back into my memories. I can only honestly place 3 happy memories for certain that aren’t either A) a dream or B) me escaping reality through my mind. Besides that, almost all my memories are negative. 

People like to throw around the word Nihilist to describe themselves because today's culture is very, god while I hate to use this word, edgy. For those who don’t know a Nihilist is someone who views the world as being completely  meaningless and reject all religious and moral principles. I very truly struggle with this outlook of life. It’s a daily for me to berate myself saying “just kill yourself” or “I want to die” or just shutting down and crumpling up while say “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry” over and over again. Hell, I did that while writing this. 

I take things very hard, even the slightest transgression. I’m so used to trying to make things perfect and because people have the image that I’m the smart one, the mature one, the capable one, I’m left with the over hanging expectation of excellence. Almost no room for margin of error or being human. Since I’m the silent type, I put up no challenge and work to meet it. Only time I get any praise for anything too. 

I guess as a little self promotion to my main blog, for those that have read the very first few updates of my main blog @the-truth-behind-redacted, or read Defiance’s character sheet, while The Machine and Defiance are separate character, they both share the name Machine. That in part is a reflect of said above expectation. How ravenous and inhuman it can be all under the guise of something human. Those characters are the two sides to the same coin. 

Remember how I said I try to be un-problematical and how I try to avoid any potential conflict. In the first segment I told on how I lied about my feelings just so another person didn’t have to worry over something that honestly, in hindsight, wasn’t even really a big deal. But I also said how it consumed me in anger. I just don’t want to bother anyone over anything. It’s part of the reason why I am writing this post, as some way of a self enforced rehab program to get better. 

This absolute consumption of negative emotion has pushed me into a non human state before. I hit a point of absolute mental exhaustion and in such a self enforced bubble of actual hatred I became completely apathetic. I felt numb to everything. I watched and heard of terrible things happening to people, and felt nothing. I watched people lives crumble before them leaving them nowhere to go and LAUGHED. “Just another worthless pathetic worm on this rotting carcass of a planet being hit with the hard reality that life doesn’t care for them. What whimsical pathetic bullshit they deluded themselves with to think otherwise.” This isn’t an exaggeration on how I thought, this is what I actually thought. Which brings me too.

The Mandatory Sob Story: Roll your eyes everyone and get the tiny violin. I guess in order for everyone to exactly understand the place I’m coming from when it comes to mental health I’ll have to detail my experiences. I have a long standing history with mental illness. I have professionally diagnosed OCD, Bipolarism, Anxiety, Chronic Depression, and visual and auditory hallucinations. I take 600 mg of Seroquel a day as well as Amitriptyline when needed. I’m also still currently in therapy to deal with said OCD, Bipolarism, Anxiety, Chronic Depression, the visual and auditory hallucinations, as well as Suicidal thoughts, and my Nihilism. There’s a reason to why I’m so god damn familiar with mental illness and treatment plans.  

OCD and Bipolarism run in my family on my fathers side. My Father’s Father had them, my Sister has them, my brother most likely has them (however he refuses to see a doctor because he uses said possible mental illnesses as a get out of jail free card. He doesn’t want to be treated and he has FUCKING ADMITTED IT), my father has them, and I have them. I, however, have the misfortune of having it real bad. I said yes to well over half of all the total symptoms when I was being tested (I don’t remember exact numbers but I remember there being three pages worth of common symptoms) which was very worrying to the doctor. I was currently in an inpatient hospitalization program at the time for both suicidal thoughts and actions, and severe depression. 

On that, my graze in with suicide. Before I went into my first inpatient program I was contemplating suicide. I was sat in front of a mirror with a bottle of over the counter medication. It was an unopened bottle of ibuprofen, 1000 200mg tables. What I planed to do was down the whole bottle with benadryl and die in my sleep. I had the small box of benadryl got from the Kroger pharmacy and a hand full of ibuprofen poured out looking directly into the mirror. My suicide note was sitting on the desk on my room with an online copy on my laptop open.

I sat there for an hour in the dead of midnight complicating my life. I had lost all hope in the world, filled with hatred, anger, pain, and despair. I had no god or after life to look forward too, part way hoping that a Hell existed for me to burn in. I hated myself that much. I was close to taking the first handful before before I caught a glimpse of my own eyes in the mirror. In what was in a weird sudden epiphany I realized that I truly did become what I hated but not for any reason I told myself. I became the very bastion of negativity I sought to fight and rid of in what little friends I did have. That was what set off my path to recovery in spite of the medical system. I guess if people care I’ll make a separate post on that. 

Before I move on, I feel I should explain my history with the visual and auditory hallucinations. It should be no surprise that with everything else above, I also had extreme paranoia that led to me having very bad insomnia. Insomnia is, just like most other medical disorders like Depression, Self-harm, Anxiety, OCD,  Bipolarism, is romanticized to hell. Insomnia isn’t having one nights bad sleep where you got 5 hours of sleep instead of 8.

You know what Insomnia is? insomnia is being physical incapable of sleeping despite not sleeping in 2 to 3 day while your body suffers massive agony brought on by this. Muscle spasms and seizing, difficulty breathing, your eyes feeling like fire ants are eating them, and of course visual and auditory hallucinations. Now I already had issues with visual and auditory hallucinations even when I could get sleep regularly but the combined effects of my OCD and Bipolarism made this perfect condition of Insomnia, Anxiety, Paranoia, with the already added in disposition to hallucinations and I felt like I was actually losing my mind. 

My hallucinations presented themselves in three forms. Disassociation of reality, night terrors, or alterations of reality. Disassociation of reality often were complete black out moments. I would lose any perceived connect to reality and enter an episode of my mind. I can’t remember what they actually were but I do remember what it felt like. Cold sweats, anxiety to point where if I didn’t lock up I would vomit, actual physical pain, mind numbing fear, and intense fatigue. 

The second were night terrors often in the form of horrific “things.” I do remember these and most of them were as best as I could describe, forms of things that were vaguely human and formations of industrial machinery. The most vivid one I remember was of a long lengthy apparition that was for the most part human but many locations of it’s impossible physiology were rebar beams and mechanical sockets. It began when I was about to fall asleep and it was next to my window. The thing was making week groaning and gasping sounds before it violently slammed against my window breaking it then letting out a horrific howl that I can’t describe as it tossed itself out followed shorty after with the sound of bones breaking against the dirt. 

Now that might not seem so bad, exspecally with everything that is in horror movies or games now, but keep in mind that was fucking real to me. It was as real as the clicking of the keys of my keyboard as I’m writing this. As real as the chair I’m sitting in and as real as the wall in front of me. As far as my mind was concerned that thing, what ever it was, actually existed. It took me physical touching my window to make sure it wasn’t actually broken and checking outside to see if there wasn’t a body there. This isn’t the type of thing I talk about lightly. 

Finally there is the alteration of reality. This is very simply but it’s something that fucked with me hard. For very little meaning or warning, I would have trouble interpreting the world around me. My hearing and sight would be warped and there wasn’t any real way to tell what I was hearing or seeing was real or not until the episode was over. The way I got through these was the ultimate fake it till you make it. Obviously, very often I failed and this created issue in my schooling. 

Ending Message: I’ve been in a very bad state for a while now and as it is now, no signs of getting better. I also strongly believe my medications are being to fail me which I’ve been telling my doctor and therapist for over a year now but nothing’s been done. Mainly it’s my Depression but insomnia episodes are beginning and my own paranoia been on the rise. It’s gotten to the point where I can’t even look at a creepy image or thumbnail without having a very bad episode. 

I’ve managed to eat something today which was nice but my body is cramping hard. And to possible stave of a possible comment, I’m biologically male. Like I said I’m not in the best head space, or living for that matter. If this gets better, only time will tell. 

Personal Shit that You Don't Have to Read

What's the point anymore?

Everytime I try to make something go right or even just try to do something, I either fuck it up or just get further behind which just makes me more and more depressed/mentally ill.

I'm so far behind in my classes, feel like I'm a shitty teacher/lifeguard/friend, and have no motivation or energy to fix it as much as I may want to.

I was supposed to submit a project which I've barely started on Friday and just missing assignments for my classes. I'd be surprised if I don't fail a class this semester. Most people know but I'm student teaching right now and I had to teach a 3 day lesson sequence (actually what that project is) and at the end I had to give a quiz which the class average was a 67 which in the district I'm teaching in is just a F (70 is a D) which means I failed my students. I also had a student write on the top of her quiz that she didn't feel prepared/comfortable taking the quiz about 2 out of the 3 main activities were completely unhelpful (not including our class discussions although I doubt those seem to help her too since she missed questions on the quiz that were learned in the discussions).

When it comes to lifeguarding, I feel like why am I even doing it? Just today at work I didn't quite get a bandage wrap right for a girl who needed it and one of my HGs had to redo it. Sidenote: I was working with 2 of HGs because we are so bloddy understaffed that we have like no regular lifeguards that can work A, B, or C shifts so HGs have work LG shifts if possible or we're just short and stuck on stand for hours. I'm also good at some LG skills but are utter shit with others like stride jumps and back boarding out a passive victim. I know it's why we practice at inservice but it doesn't help me feel like embrassassed when I fuck up. [Inservice is a monthly meeting where we go over what's going on in the facility and skill and also practice skills]. I also tend to go to the first inservice meeting of the month and found out that my supervisour is going to start having sign-ups and if less than 5 people sign-up for one, it's not going to happen. Well twice in the last 3 months, it has only been me and 1 kid who went which means those are going to start being cancelled. Well the issue is that the other meeting is on a Sunday night and I can't do Sunday nights, I have other commitments like I play in my church's handbell choir. It's not fair...

I have been in such a terrible mental state that as caused me to be a shitty friend. I want to help so bad but I can't work through my own shit... I feel terrible that I can't help them properly...

Physically, mentally, and emotionally I've been a fucking disaster. Physically I got sick from my students 2 weeks ago and still stick. I've also been in absolute constant agonizing pain everywhere. Based off of some medical ads I've seen (because they're fucking everywhere), there were some for fibromyalgia and as I kinda relate to the symptoms they were discussing so I looked it up and there is a chance I may have it. Obviously not self diagnosing myself, but it's something I'm definitely concerned about and will have to talk with my doctor with (if I can get myself to call the practice to set up a physical exam appointment that I need anyway). Emotionally I've been much less able to hide my feelings which isn't good because as a teacher and lifeguard, you have to shut that shit up and suppress it when you're working. I tend to suppress everything anyway because I don't want people to worry or just deal with people who don't understand at all trying to help (and making it worse) or telling me to suck it up "because others have it worse" but it getting so much harder. Mentally, I have been super depressed with spikes of anxiety and I can't escape it at all. I think part of my issues are stress and not sleeping (like I'm averaging maybe 5 hours). I'm still taking my medications but it's just bad. I have been selfharming more and more recently. I went through a period where I managed to go on average 45 days, but now I'm lucky if I go a week. I relapsed on Saturday and almost again earlier today. I want to stop but much to my old therapist's surprise, it's not that easy. I also have been struggling with the bombardment of suicidal thoughts mainly late at night keeping me up. It's fucking terrifying. I'm not going to act on them. I actually cut myself to make the thoughts go away.

I want everything to stop. I want to end this suffering. I want something to go right for once... 😔

ECT procedure #27 (7/18/2018)

This is my twenty-seventh electro-convulsive therapy procedure & my fifteenth bilateral procedure.

Pre-treatment analysis:

This is my first appointment in 2 weeks which means I had a pretty long break.

To be honest, it really hasn’t been so bad! I had a day or two where I felt a lot of anxiety or depression mostly based on things happening around me but sometimes those kinds of things are unavoidable. I really felt like these last two weeks went pretty well and I was happy to notice some of my memories coming back to me. This is a huge deal for me because losing some of my memories was the hardest part of doing ECT for me. In fact, one of those days I was feeling a lot of anxiety was actually yesterday because I was/still am really nervous and doubtful about going to ECT today mainly because I feel like I’ve made so much progress with regaining memories that I am scared I am going to lose all of that when I go back in today. Part of me thought “maybe I should cancel and just stop doing ECT altogether. I am feeling mostly fine and my depression is manageable now (which is wasn’t before) so whats even the point of going back? I want to remember the things I forgot more than anything right now.” but then another part of me thought “I need to go back and finish what I started. There is a reason they tapper you off so you don’t go into a full depressive relapse. Do you want that? No. You have to go and take the risk.”. It’s never fun to be felt like your own brain is pulling you in two different directions.

So here I am, about to drive up to my appointment. I decided that it was worth the risk and even if it sucks to feel like you are recovering memories just to have them ripped from you again, it’s not worth being SUPER depressed all the time. It’s not worth feeling like you want to die all the time. It’s not worth sitting on your couch or bed wondering what is wrong with you because you have a mental illness or multiple mental illnesses and hoping that somehow you will just fade away from existence.

Remember that if you can when you are also feeling doubt about going back to your ECT appointments. Remember THERE IS A REASON THEY SCHEDULED YOU THE WAY THEY DID. This is the treatment plan they thought was best for you so you can have the best results and recovery.

I understand what it’s like to have that doubt and anxiety in your head that tells you “Is it worth going to if I feel crappy about going and that in its self is making me more depressed and anxious?”. I wonder that too and am going into my appointment feeling that way. “Is it worth it?” is the big question. I don’t have all the answers but I can say if you can manage to get past that doubt, I think it’ll be okay and you will make it through. If you can’t get past it, maybe you should stop because maybe that means it isn’t working out for you OR maybe your shock level needs to be upped or if you are doing unilateral, maybe you need to switch to bilateral. EITHER WAY, make sure you tell your doctor what you are feeling and thinking. Get their opinion on what to do next. Don’t just quit out without saying anything because that could potentially make you so much worse. I will always say this over and over again: communicate with your doctor! I can’t even emphasize how important that is. If you don’t, you will be stuck with that doubt forever and possibly spiral into that pit of fear and depression again and doctors can only help you to the best of their abilities if they know what is going on and you are fully open, honest, and receptive.

I plan on bringing up my doubts today before they shock me and will update on what they say if I can remember. If not, I will schedule an office visit to discuss these fears and doubts.

For all the people out there reading because they are getting ECT, STAY STRONG! You are doing your best and you GOT this! <3

Post-treatment:

I feel like this treatment session went well. I talked with my ECT doctor about my fear of losing the memories I am regaining and before they put me under for my procedure, they reassured me that one ECT treatment will not reset my all my progress with my memory. They also reassured me that my recollection of memories will improve as I go down on the frequency of treatments as well. Hearing that definitely helped me feel less anxious before the anesthetic was injected.

This confirms what I was saying earlier on how it is so important to talk to your doctors about how you are feeling not just physically but mentally. It can also be beneficial for you if you are already getting these treatments done because keeping it all bottled up and not having your questions answered can counteract your progress because it’ll make you feel more anxious and depressed.

That aside, after I woke up I felt fine. Just a hungry and a little spacey as usual. The rest of the day I was able to do things like run a few errands with the help of my partner. I didn’t feel like I lost much memory after this session. Maybe a little harder to recall the previous day but it wasn’t completely wiped from my brain or anything.

Over all, I’d say things went well.

Results:

Long-term Memory Questions: All questions answered correctly with minor hesitation.

Short-term Memory Questions: All but one question answered correctly with minor hesitation.

Slow cognition: Yes (minor)

Memory loss: Yes (minor)

Attention span: Good.

Tiredness: Yes (minor)

Trouble retaining newer memories: Yes (very minor)

Symptoms:

● Headache (moderate)

● Loss of balance (minor)

● Fatigue (minor)

~ End of ECT day #27 ~

consuming drugs, therapy, and keeping sanity.

oh hello there, I don't feel okay to start Monday. I think the best way to dump this horrible feeling that eating you alive is by e-journaling. I'd be grateful if you could listen to my story for a couple of mins, reading these passages below. but it's okay if you want to skip this too. your rights, your call.

ok,

so, the right hand side are drugs for my uncontrollable gastro reflux or our doctor called it gastritis; and asthma. after getting hospitalised due to severe asthma attack, I have been consuming these drugs intensively. before and after meals, along with maintaining healthy and on-time meals, which of course was quite a challenge due to my unbearable loads of work, which piling like a fresh washed laundry.

I wasn't feeling quite okay once I was back home. I didn't know why. I had this perpetual relapse of gastritis and asthma, sometimes I've got this stupid headache and mood swing, fatigue, overslept, or sometimes, unexpected panic attack. I have done everything I could, including mindfulness technique, seeing psychologist, eating and sleeping well (yep, I tried), but the symptoms were there. the past three months was the worse.

that Friday morning marked a little change. I dared myself to see a psychiatrist. my thoughts, feeling, and bodies had been all over places. I had been secretly having constant nauseous, asthma, stiff neck and shoulders, silent night cries, pain in my head and my chest (sometimes). and these couldn't be neglected anymore. I was having a mental breakdown a night before stepping in my feet to the hospital.

I went to mental health hospital at Dharmawangsa. I thought the place would be excessively gloomy and extremely clamorous. I was afraid of being triggered. but, I was wrong, the fact that it was one of the calmest place in Jakarta somehow calmed me down. the doctor was understanding and acted like your wise and knowledgable 'engkong'. he suspected that I have been having anxiety disorder. we talked everything in surface, not deep enough, as he said, I needed time to clear my head first and be patient with the process before proceeding further to consultation and therapy. he prescribed me three kind of drugs for my anxieties. he said it'd be useless if we were having therapy without balancing the neurotransmitter in my brain. to be honest, I was quite miserable with the fact that I had to consume another drugs for quite some times. I tried to negotiate with him, but I couldn't. his answer made sense to me and he had the expertise! so there I was, accepting his advise though my heart was heavy.

I cried to Pida after fetching my med from the pharmacy. I couldn't believe that I had to consume another drugs for keeping my sanity. she was really kind and understandable. she listened to me and saying things that I never expected before. she said that it was like we were having a flu or headache. it was not enough for our body to fight alone, it needed a booster and this drug was a booster for us to be 'cured' effectively and efficiently.

so, if you see the left hand side. those are my sedative pills. as much as I want to heal myself, it is still hard for me to chew the reality . sometimes, I am still feeling miserable, I've got nausea everytime I am about to consume my drug. I don't know why I am feeling this way. since Friday, I tried hard to reconfigure my mind and took affirmative action to myself that I'm okay with the medication. but I don't know, it is mixed feeling, I'm not quite sure how to live today and tomorrow. but, yawes lah, nderek kersaning semesta.

Jakarta, 31 Januari 2022.

My Journey With Deppression

17/8/2021

Introduction

I’m an introvert. I realize I have depression a few years ago because of my horrible mood swings and I cried most of the time without any reason. Most terribly, I had very frequent suicidal thoughts. But I never took any action because I hope it could go away by itself. I tend to hide my emotions and pretend I am okay all the time because I hate to spread out negative vibes to others. Whenever I know I am depressed, I would rather lock myself in the room until I am managed to hang up my “happy” face. At those time, frequent visit of depression is my daily life and I thought maybe this is just me, I get used to deal with all those pains. I never see any future in me, and I always wonder when will my life end. Today? Tomorrow? Or maybe next week? I don’t get interested in anything and I can’t feel any joy most of the time. I hate myself a lot and I am afraid to be left out. But luckily, I am smart enough to react the way people would expect so that I would get a real happy face in return. I know I seems pretty normal to everyone, including my parents. Sometimes, I tend to wonder whether I really suffer from depression. This continues until I went to college and I met my roommate, Ling. She is one of the main reasons that make me wrote this book.

As I continue college, I realize my depression gone worse. I struggle to perform well as I want to meet up to the good student expectations. I always have an urge to meet up other people’s expectation as that’s the only way I know to get a happy face in return. Until, I realize Ling also suffer from depression. As we get close, we realize a lot of similarity in each other and could really understand each other feelings. As time goes, I realize I am not alone and it can be treated. And this inspired me to get help – visit a psychiatrist. As a saying goes, in order to help others, you must know the way first and I wish I could do something.

In the psychiatric clinic, I was given a set of depression questionnaires to answer and interviewed by the psychiatrist as part of through psychological assessment. The psychiatrist confirmed the depression with anxiety, and I was not surprised with the diagnosis, in fact I feel relieve to know an answer.  This is because even though I realize about my symptoms, I still really wonder whether I suffer from depression. I’ve doubts, plenty of it – I keep thinking that it’s just me instead of depression. I feel very confused, lost and of course, depressed. There are times that I break down and cry. I feel like I’m at a crossroads, not knowing what to do and how to get out of this depressive “shell”.

This is certainly a very challenging assignment as it is painful to write down the stormy journey of depression. My tears flow like a river; my heart oozes with “blood” of sadness. After every page of the journey, I got to make effort to sooth myself.

Nevertheless, I’ve got no regret in taking up this challenge. I now know that I’m not alone; there are many others with similar experiences. I hope that my sharing can help others to have a better understanding of depression. May you be at peace with your depression, able to cope with it and move on meaningfully with life. Last but not least, thank you for your interest and time spent reading my journey.

 1.Hopeless

They are like shadow, always sticking around.

When I’ve relapse of depression, I felt completely hopeless and useless. Feeling frustrated, I wonder why my life has to be this way. What is the point living if I’m going to feel terrible like this repeatedly?!

 2.Useless

Why am I even existed?

I feel I am so useless. I’ve disappointed so many people in my life. Why is life so hard? Whenever I thought about my divorced parent, I would blame myself as the cause of the divorced. If I was cleverer, if only I was behaving better, I am just a bad luck. I am completely useless! 100% useless! – no doubt about that. I often tell myself. I hate myself so much.

 3.Guilt I’m not a good people.

Sometimes, my mood swinging terribly and I needed a quiet moment for myself. As usual, I hid myself in the room. That one day, my sister came in and talked to me. Like a mad girl, I lost completely and yell her out of my room. My sister was frightened by my inexplicable behavior. After I calm down, I felt extremely guilty about my own behavior. What is use that I have read lots of books about self-control.

 4.Burden

I always feel like a burden to my family and my close friends. Everyone is busy with their lives. How much patience and tolerance can they have for me? Deep down inside my heart, I know nobody is interested and patient enough to listen to problems over and over again. In fact, I don’t think anyone can really understand my feelings. Sometimes, I can’t even understand and tolerate myself. I feel frustrated and fed-up with myself when I’m not be able to cope with my negative emotions. I really hate to be a negative spreader. Several times, I was thinking of ending my life so that I don’t have to burden those people whom I care about. Maybe they will feel sad but at the same time relieved. I’ll feel relieve too. Right?

 5.Gloomy evening

I love quiet gloomy weather, as I feel like the world could understand me. Gloomy weather makes me feel connected. Unlike the full spirit energy with the sun, I felt pain as its hard for me to be as motivated and energetic like people around me. Gloomy weather allows shadows of hopelessness, helplessness, loneliness, listlessness to haunt me. It’s a time for battling with depressive and anxiety storms. When that happens, I’ll normally lock myself in and cry profusely. Yes, crying does help to release painful emotions. And crying along the sky allow me to feel less useless.

 6.Suicidal thoughts

Life is full of suffering and pain. Will ending my life be the end of pain? I have no future anyway... Whenever I think of ending my life, I feel sharp pains in my heart, like being stabbed with a knife repeatedly. My family will feel very sad when I’m no longer around. Will they?

 7.Selfharm

I know I’m not supposed to kill myself, but I have no idea what is the point to continue living without having the control power of my emotions and behaviors. Finally, I discovered a way to feel better. Instead of letting depression pain creep in, I choose to hurt myself emotionally willingly. This causes more painful mental torture of depression- I can’t stand it, I’m so helpless. “But, that’s better than ending my life”, I console myself.

 8.Struggle with medicine

The struggle with medicine is not from me but from my mom. Before I finally seek help from a psychiatrist, I’ve done thousands of researches about medicines and I clearly understand that the medicines are important and safe for me. No matter how many times I tried to explains to mom about the effectiveness of medicines, mom still feel very reluctant for me to take them. She is worried about potential side effects and she still refuse to accept I have depression. This causes a lot of stress for me and got me doubt that the medicines will work for me. I still sometimes doubt that I have depression, and think it may not work for me as I don’t have any depression. Maybe it’s a big mistake of wrong diagnosis. And other main reason is because of medical fee is quite a burden. My psychiatrist was kind enough to give me some discount. Soon I realize that medicines are not everything; but they are essential together with other treatments for depression. Such as family support, exercise, nutrition, spirituality, etc.

Medicines are not everything but they are very important.

 9. Not my True Self

In the first month of my medication, I don’t see any different in myself other than calmer in anxiety wise. My mind was full of negative thoughts as usual. As I am used to being depress for a few years. “We will add a new medication,” said my psychiatrist as I struggle about hope of healing. The new medication caused me to slept most of the time for a few days; I slept most of the time as my body needed time to adjust to the new medication. However, I also noticed that the new medication made me feel calmer. The mood was better with less negative thoughts. But I felt weird with my new self as I was used to the me with horrible feelings. I just felt numb. Not really become happier, but just less negative. That really prompted me to look into myself – Who am I?  Which is my true self? What is my purpose of life? What makes me happy?

  10.You are not alone

My depression symptoms are persistently for more than two weeks and it was affecting my daily life. Please seek for help from mental health professionals. Always remember that you’re not alone in coping depression. Depression symptoms includes depressed mood or crying spells, loss of interest or pleasure in most activities, sleeping too much or not able to sleep, slow thinking or movement that others can see, fatigue or low energy, feeling of worthlessness or inappropriate guilt, loss of concentration or indecisiveness and recurring thoughts of death or suicide, etc.

I’m blessed to choose to treat my depression. I feel less lonely these days as I’ve a group of supportive friends with me along this journey; some of them also have depression like me. We hold one another’s hand tightly as we overcome challenges and discover meaningful experience in life. In each battle with depression, I’m becoming stronger and stronger.

 11.New discoveries

Pulling weeds, I need to plant good seed too.

Recently, I had a new hobby – gardening. I started to plant various type of plants including snake plants and pumpkins. In the process of taking care of my plants, I think of a sentence- Mind is like a patch of garden. When my mind is full of weeds, I never bothered to pull out the weeds. Worse still, I “fertilized” them. That’s how I end up with depression and anxiety. Besides pulling out those weeds, I need to plant good seeds in my mind garden so that the flowers and fruit of happiness can grow. I did as advise but was impatient; I dug out all the seeds before they had a chance to sprout and grow.

I realize I tend to do a lot of good deeds like helping friends in all sort of problem and things that are conducive to healing of my depression like exercise, meditation, study about depression, etc. People compliment and thank me for what I do for them. But I still feel that I’m not good enough – I blame, criticize and find fault with myself. To avoid a depressive relapse, I got to constantly remind myself, “You are good enough.” Even though I always doubt myself, I remind myself whatever I’m doing is not perfect but good enough – keep it up and you’re on your way to recovery.

Everyone will respond differently when depression hit them. Depression is not by choice but respond is by choice. I know that I can’t depend on my medication. I’m responsible for my healing. Psychiatrist can only guide but not support me all the time.  

 12.Lets be friends

 Dear depression,

You ruined me by intruding my life. You create so many painful emotions and sufferings. Do you know how much I hate you? You have spoiled everything. Worse, you even introduce me your “friends” – hopelessness, helplessness, uselessness, loneliness, guilt and anxiety. They take turns to visit and torture me – it felt terrible! I’m frustrated and don’t know how to deal with you. I can only hug myself and let you torture me. I’m very sick of you, of us. In order to make a change, I have thought of a way – to be a friend to you. If I can’t beat you, at least allow me to make peace with you. I’m sorry I didn’t take care of you since the day we met each other. Sorry for being rude to you as I always chased you out from the door and treat you like a monster. Thank you for coming into my life. You make me stronger and wiser. Because of you, I learn that I need to love myself more. I can also share “our story” and “relationship” with others. I will welcome your visits and learn from you. I believe that everything happens for a good purpose. I might not find out the purpose for now, but I have faith that it’s just a matter of time that the understanding will unfold itself.

I’m sure you are my teacher that will guide me towards a more meaningful life. Who knows – because of you, I will have the chance and knowledge to help people with depression and other mental illness one day? Let’s march forward, transforming Depression into wisdom and compassion.

I’m grateful to have you with me in this life journey. You have given me an opportunity to see things in a different perspective, clearer and better.

“He who has a WHY to live can bear almost any HOW” - Friedrich Nietzsche

I love you, my dear depression.

 With love,

Lavena.

  13.What Depression benefits me?

1.      I’m more empathetic. I understand more about people with depression.

2.      Depression helps me to reprioritize my life

3.      I understand and accept that I can’t control everything in life

4.      I appreciate life more. I’m grateful that I’m alive

5.      I know who are the ones who really care for me

6.      I’m more kind to others.

7.      Depression is like a compass; It reminds me about self-care and focusing on what’s important in life.

8.      I have learned to be less serious and laugh at myself.

9.      I realize I’m not weak, in fact I’m stronger than I could imagine. If a person could survive from mental illness, this person could deal with anything in life.

Content of my book.

i’ve been living with undiagnosed mental illness since i was young i never brought it up because i thought it was normal. the mental illness i’ve been diagnosed with and given medication to help with them are trichotillomania, anxiety, depression, and ocd. i suspect i still have more that i’m still struggling with like an eating disorder and possibly adhd/add. but those are hard for me to bring up to my family because i’m afraid they won’t take me seriously or just say i don’t have it. i currently take two medication ment for adhd i was given them for trichotillomania because after qurentine and a week before my trichotillomania got worse, to the poin were i moved from just pulling my eyelashes or eyebrows to my hair. the medication doesn’t help that much and i still have to restrict my hand from getting to my hair. i’ve cut it because i looked like joe exotic but worse (i love ya joe). i was getting stressed with everything going on. i wanted to die and just disappear. i recently started to pull again after a good month or two of my pulling. i now have another bald spot and maybe another i can’t see. but the medication helps me with symptoms i’ve researched online that are related to adhd/add. i still have problems with some but it helps and so does my anxiety/depression/ocd medication. i still have those rough days we’re i want to disappear more the usual but i get through them. i’m having a really bad day and tryed to kill my self and it might work. i have lived in a household full of fighting drug usage and alcohol usage since i was young my dad would always be passed out on the couch every friday-sunday from drinking too much and from smokeing. my mom had cheated on my dad 3-4 or more times and constantly lies to my face. my sister has done the usual i have a tought past teenage  stuff like sneek out and done multiple drugs and has gone to juvi and put on probation. other then that she was great student she had perfect grades and school was a breeze for her. i must admit i am slowly following in her path or doing drugs, and drinking alcohol just to feel something. i try and try with my school work i’m in advanced classes and i usually do great. i’ve been going through a rough patch in my life right now going through relapses and getty so close to ending my life. i have always felt i have been compared to my sister my whole life. i’ve never done great in school up untill high school when i started to take advanced classes to change my education around. however i still feel like i disappoint my parents. i know they have high expectations for me but i sometimes feel like they are to high for me to reach. even when i’m on my medication i still want to cry and give up because of my academic grades. this six weeks they have been lower than any low grades i’ve had. i disappointed myself and my family. after i told my father who wants to see me succeed and rise higher then he ever did i felt like he was more disappointed in me then he has ever been. the thoughts of suicide and wanting to disappear came back from the deep deepest of my brain came back again and more powerful then ever. i know the lethal doesages for my medication and took just enough to get closer to death i have ever been. this may just be me relapseing again and this may be the worst relapse i’ve ever had. i’ve never wanted to die or dissaper so much before. i feel like i can never succeed i feel like my dad had told me i’m going to be homeless and jobless for the rest of my life and i’m never going to get the job i want. but i know he didn’t say that i make myself think he said that or at least thought it. i just want to be gone already i’m never going to impress my parents or family members. no matter what i do. weather i cook or clean or get a 87 on a math test they are always going to criticize me saying i could’ve done a better job. my mother has never felt she loved me to me. she might love me but i feel like she doesn’t. she has yellled at me for tge littlest things i do wrong and i feel like my family and the world would be better without me