sixteen years

Sixteen Years

Today is my niece’s birthday and I thought it would be a cool thing to review those years. A lot has happened during that time.
1998: I brought my niece into this world as I was part of the delivery team. She came into this world at 21:47. It was the happiest day of my life watching her birth. It made me happy, if only for a little while as I was still battling depression of sorts. I was working for thoracic surgery at the time at a big hospital in town. It was a busy place. Then my supervisor found out I was gay on Valentine’s day and that was the last week I worked for that surgical group. I then went to work, through a friend, at the next big hospital in town. I spent 14 years there, giving it my all only to be tossed aside when I could no longer perform my duties due to my physical disabilities. I learned a lot of things at this job. Mostly how important lab results are in the care of the patient. It might not be the sole key to diagnosis but it does help with patient care.
My favorite uncle died this year, losing to his battle with kidney disease. I was so messed up by his death that I didn’t go to the wake or the funeral but visited his grave when I was able to. Things really were never the same after this. My father’s side of the family were dwindling. And it was very sad.
1999: nothing note worthy
2000: the year of the computer collapse. No major computer issues happened until later that year when the lab went from one computer system to another. It took forever to get things done. It was the busiest time for OT in the history of the lab because the new computer system was so slow. Later this year I started having back pain. Little did I know that I was doing too much as I was working as a temp in medical assisting on my days off and also working as a cashier at a hardware store. It was the only time that I worked three jobs consecutively.

2001: My almost fatal work year. In February I had emergency surgery that would forever change my life. I couldn’t walk and it would take me weeks to learn to walk again. I also started with a new therapist yet again but this one I hope would stick around. Even though it has been almost fifteen years that we have been together, I still hope this to be true. I had to relearn quite a bit. I went back to work earlier than anticipated because I had no more earned time and basically didn’t have a paycheck. It was a hard time but I had to go to work. But I didn’t realize that going to work for forty hours would be so tortuous. I had to cut my hours first to twenty and then slowly increase to thirty-two. It took me a few years to make it back to forty and then some.

2002: I start on a very potent pain medication and it helps with my pain so that I can work pain free. But my moods were shifting up and down, really bad. I again thought that this would be it, that I would kill myself the next month if things weren’t put to a halt. I was put in the hospital, on a detox unit unbeknownst to me. There I was fed lies and had a nitwit for a psychiatrist. We argued the whole time I was there and by the end of my stay I had the staff and patients call her Dr. Dittlewhack, because she was so whacky. She thought one of the antidepressants that I was on was an antibiotic. I knew more about medication that she ever did. She took me off my pain medication and my muscle relaxant and told me lies that my doctors wouldn’t treat me for my pain or for my mental illness if I went back on my pain medication. I was furious. But when I got out, I learned that my doctors had no knowledge of what this idiot had said and they certainly weren’t going to stop treating me because I had pain issues. It was all lies. I so wanted to place a complaint against Dittlewhack for her mistreatment of me but never did. It was my one regret in life. I did, however, file a complaint with the human rights officer as staff and other doctors would interview patients out in common areas rather than private interview rooms. I hated that hospital stay and vowed never to return to that hospital.
2003: only thing noteworthy in this year was the Sox blowing the ALCS to the Evil Empire. It would end up being the last time the Yankees would make post season for a while

2004: my therapist goes on maternity leave. I am going back to college. I have an interim therapist because to be without one for four months would kill me. I was never more afraid of losing my therapist than I was this year. My biggest fear was that something would be wrong with her kid and force her to change her schedule or not come back. This would be the last year that my therapist would be at the same location as the interim therapist. Later this year, a friend would give me a car and I would be a car owner for the very first time. I sunk money into this baby to get her up and running but in the end it would be for waste. I couldn’t keep up with her demands. I also left the lab for a research job at this time. Life in the lab had become intolerable with the new supervisor and I felt like my job was going to be in jeopardy because we clashed so much. When I was called in the chief supervisor’s office because I deleted stupid emails, it was the last straw for me. I had to transfer out. And I did, partially. I still kept my Saturday hours and worked thirty-two in the research job. It was the first time in three years that I worked so much. I was pain free and almost recovered from CES.
The Sox win the world series for the first time in 86 years!
2005: Lots of major things happen. Starts with me working my ass off at two jobs. Research had to cut my hours so I was now working twenty hours in two positions. Things become intolerable. My psychache was getting worse and worse with each passing day. I knew that I was on the verge of another hospitalization and then a group leader told me I wasn’t cut out for another psych hospitalization anymore. I lose my mind. I really planned on ending my life this year. I had everything down to a T. I tried to play it off with my therapist that things were going good. And then she asked me a question that saved my life and forever changed my course of therapy with her, “what was really going on”? I end up going to a partial hospitalization program so I could continue to work my research job as there would be no one to cover me.
2006: the year I wish I was dead. I got CES again in the fall. It is still unclear to me how I got it again or how in five months my back went from bad to worse, needing emergency surgery yet again. I would lose function yet again in my left leg and had to learn to walk again for the third time in my life. I had wicked bad muscle spasms in this leg that made me wish I went through with my plans from a year before. I hate my therapist. I knew what to do this time around and stuck with physical therapy for almost six months. All through it, I still worked two jobs.

2007: my beloved Sox win the World Series Championship for the second time in three years. I am still recovering from post CES. I learn about the American Association of Suicidology and become a member. I start writing a paper on how the medical profession always has a scale for physical pain but not psychological pain. I submit the paper for the AAS as the conference will be held in Boston the following year.

2008: I go to Barcelona on a business trip. All expenses paid through my job. My paper gets accepted for the AAS and I work on the poster for it. I am really excited about this. This year was probably the year I realized that my career is in psychology and not the lab. I try and work harder for my degree. I end up with a psychotic breakdown in the fall. I am heart broken as I have to put college again on hold. The voices become very demanding and medication doesn’t seem to work like it once did. I am hospitalized again as the voices want me to kill myself. I am put on high doses of trilafon and then am evaluated for clozapine as it has been more than two months and the hallucinations just won’t quit. This has been the longest I have ever been psychotic for.

2009: I start the year with an involuntary hospitalization and am placed on abilify to help my mood and psychosis. I do ok on this new medication and have minimal side effects. Soon as a month or so passes I stop the medication. I am without antipsychotics for a good year or so.

2010: I am still working two jobs and now my research job has kicked up a notch as I now have to go to dialysis centers to pick up blood. I am driving all over the city, getting stuck in traffic and basically spending my life on 93N/93S, mostly 93S. We get more help to coordinate pick ups and drop offs and the like. Worse of all I suffer a sprained ankle that has me in a boot for a few months due to severe spasms.

2011: My health starts failing. My depression worsens. My leg/ankle/foot keeps giving me pain and no one can understand why as physical therapy and scans/x-rays are normal. It is discovered that I am not walking correctly when I see a special physical therapist that deals with AFOs. I am evaluated and my life is forever changed again due to the nerve damage in my ankle/foot. My foot turns and pulls on the muscles and tendons it shouldn’t when I walk. I am placed in an AFO and by year’s end I make the decision that I need to work just one job. Little did I know that this one job would be the last job I would ever have.

2012: the world doesn’t come to end. My career as a lab assistant is over. I go to the AAS annual conference in Baltimore and become convinced that I am a hopeless case. When I return from the conference, the occupational health and my department decide that I am too disabled to work. I have to file for long term disability and social security. I am beyond devastated. I am truly hurt that despite my slaving at this job, an exception cannot be made to keep my job. So I leave in tears. The worse thing that happened was that my student loans are garnishing my SSD. I also have two hospitalizations as I cannot deal with the stress. I am back on abilify and need to stay on it if I want to keep the voices at bay. I also start a blog and it is successful.

2013: A new Year. This year I work on my book and by year end, have it all ready for an editor to pick through and red ink the shit out of it. I work closely with a writing partner and by October, my suicidality lifts enough that I am no longer thinking about suicide as much. Though it has been a brutal year for my depression. I write blog posts and dissociate. My therapist and I come to terms with suicidality on her side of things. Hearing her spell out how difficult it is helps me understand better what she goes through when I am suicidal. Just as in 2005 when she helped me through my November attempt, so she did again help me through. It wasn’t easy. There was a lot of arguing and a lot of frustration but we made it through.

2014: I don’t know what will happen this year. I hope that my book gets published. And I hope it sells a million copies so that I don’t have to be on disability anymore but that remains to be seen. The baby that I brought into this world turns 16. Amazing what happened in those years…