Category: mood disorders

Depression and its lies

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders

Last night I couldn’t sleep. Someone had mentioned how “useful” a screening questionnaire was for suicide assessment and all I could think was, seriously?? Where were you when Jobes mentioned it 20 years ago? It got me steamed. Then I thought of another more direct questionnaire that dealt with suicide and wonder why that wasn’t being utilized. My brain was going and going. I had to write down my notes on the subject because it was 0200 and if I started writing and reading, I had no hope of catching any sleep.

I had therapy. I cried at certain points. Emotions were hitting me like a wet rag. I tried to contain myself but couldn’t. We were talking about feeling like a burden, that she should leave me, and that she was better off without me. I really need to read the Interpersonal Theory a little better. Maybe when I start feeling these things, I can climb my way out of it. Depression lies. I still don’t have a full appetite but I am eating. The physical symptoms of depression are still present. And no amount of therapy can help with that.

I was feeling dizzy after therapy but I had to do an errand for my mother. I did it and my back went out. I had to sit for a long time before I could get up and walk again. I really had no interest in leaving the house but I really wanted a soy latte. I got dressed and waited at the bus stop. While at the bus stop, I was still feeling like crap and must of have thought a million times to go back home. The bus came and I got on it. I got my latte and then I wanted to leave. I forced myself to write for at least a half hour in my journal before catching the next bus home. I don’t remember what I wrote about. I emailed my psychiatrist again. I really didn’t want to. But my therapist was telling me that she wanted to see me because it’s been so long since we have talked. She is a good support for me so I should see her. The depression is telling me otherwise. It’s so hard fighting it. I haven’t heard back from her yet. I have a feeling I am not going to. I don’t know why I keep trying. I just feel like it’s hopeless.

I wrote down my thoughts of my therapy session after we ended. I wrote longer than I intended to but that is ok. No one is going to see it except me. I feel bad that this month I am not going to see my therapist. I will try and make up for it next month. I am ahead in my cell phone bill so I plan on saving that money. I need to start saving money if I can. I hate not having a dime to my name some months.

I haven’t emailed my psychiatrist about going back to sertraline. I feel that warrants an in person conversation. But if I can’t get an appointment with her, I don’t know what I am going to do. It’s not like I am not trying or am avoiding her. It’s just exhausting waiting for a response. I know she is busy. For all I know, she might not be in the clinic full time.

The temps are really messing with my lower back. Sciatica flared up earlier today and now my lower back is aching. I think the weight loss has something to do with it as well, but I could be wrong. I just know I am not eating anything else today. I am just not hungry. The latte killed whatever appetite that I had. All I had today was a handful of pretzel nuggets and a pop tart with some apple juice. This is the longest my appetite has been affected, going on a month and half now. I have lost 12 lbs. so far. I am being careful not to gain the weight back on, but with no appetite, it’s been easy to do. My therapist thinks my stomach has shrunk and that is why I am eating something small and getting full. Whatever works! If I can lose another eight pounds, I will be happy, weight wise, anyway. My jeans can fit me better.

Rearview Mirror and other things

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, depression, mood disorders

Rearview Mirror and other thoughts

I have been trying to write all evening. I wanted to write the “ending” to the trauma of this week that happened 25 years ago but there is no ending. I live with it every day. I am haunted by the memories, though they aren’t intrusive as they once were. The song rearview mirror by Pearl Jam really sings to me. It’s about abuse and how you survived it.

I have a narcissistic parent, there is no doubt about it. He might not be diagnosed by anyone but he fits all the characteristics of the disorder. “supposed to endure, what I could not forgive” that was a common theme in my house. “it wasn’t my surface most defiled”. My father, though violent at times, didn’t hit us after the third grade when someone told the teachers he had been doing so. But that didn’t stop the verbal abuse. Still to this day, he abuses my sisters and I. He thinks he is the king and should be respected above all else. “I guess the beatings made me wise”.

I never call him a dad to other people. He is my father or sperm donor when I refer to him. I call him dad when talking to him but it doesn’t mean anything. See, when I was learning Italian, the word for father was “papa”. I guess I used the word a little too much because I got a few backhands to stop me from using it. So it was dad from now on though I loathe the word.

I wish I could put him in my rearview mirror. Just forget he ever existed. But I have to deal with him to get him to his medical appointments and such. There is no emancipation from him until he is six feet under. And the bastard wants to live until eternity.

Meanwhile, my patience for the guy has hit rock bottom. I don’t care about his demands. I just want to die. The depression has peaked and I can’t tolerate myself anymore. My psych got back to me but we are unable to meet at an agreeable time because of the bastard. I am sure we will find another time.

Random 333

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, depression, mood disorders

Despite it being a good day out, I stayed inside. My mother wasn’t feeling well so I stayed in to make sure she didn’t fall because she was feeling dizzy. She is doing better now.

I didn’t sleep most of the night last night. After chat, I had a renewed energy that left me up till after 0300. I finally took some Ativan and it knocked me out. I had wanted to learn a new technology called Prezi but it was too complicated for my tired brain. So I wrote another blog about my traumatic teen years as this is anniversary week.

The only thing that I have done today was read an article on the repercussions of suicide and how it affects people. It wasn’t an interesting article that I thought it would be. There wasn’t technical language but it just left you wondering what the fall out was. The author kept on using the hashtag #not6 which is all well and good but this paper really didn’t point it out. Maybe I was just tried and was trying to read something that is there but isn’t.

I need to take a shower some time today. My ankle is feeling better than it was yesterday and I am hoping it will wake me up some. I feel so lifeless. I am still really tired. This is the third or fourth day straight that I have not left my house for anything or if I did, I came right back to bed to sleep. I had a cup of tea today hoping it would ward off the tireds but it didn’t. Even if my mother felt ok today, I doubt I would have gone out. I just had no plans to take a shower and get dressed, wait for the bus, get my coffee, etc. Though a nice soy vanilla latte sounds really good right about now. Wish Starbucks delivered sometimes but then, I don’t think I would ever leave the house.

I’ll have to go out tomorrow to pick up my prescription from Walgreens. Maybe I will go to the Square and write. I will do it after my therapy appointment, if I feel up to it. Last night, I got the hungry horrors. I am glad I still had a protein bar from a previous shopping order. I have been wanting to have a bowl of cereal but we are almost out of milk. When my mother buys a new gallon, I will have my cereal.

I can’t believe how tired I am and I haven’t done anything all day. I ate some left over Chinese for lunch and had a bran muffin for breakfast. Dinner will be a lazy man’s lasagna. I don’t like it so I probably will just have the meatballs and sausages in the sauce.

There is still no word on when the new fridge will be arriving. I hope they can take the old fridge out and put in the new one. It will be very sad if we don’t get this new fridge. I had ice cream in my freezer and it was more like soup. It was at one point soft serve but downgraded to soup. Course, I have no idea what we are going to do with the freezer stuff. The weather is going to be warm the next few days so putting them outside on the porch isn’t ideal. I sure as hell am not going to be taking shit to the basement and back up to the second floor. That is a NO.

SPSM and Prezi and being a suicide attempt survivor

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, blogging, chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders, psychache, suicide, suicide attempt, suicide attempt survivor

SPSM and Prezi and being a suicide attempt survivor

For the first time in a long time, I felt I was useful to the #SPSMChat that goes on every Sunday at 10 pm EST on Twitter. I learned about Prezi, which I am not sure what it is yet. I thought it was a video thingy but I couldn’t figure it out and I am much to tired to try. I did make a couple of layouts but it crashed my Chrome and internet so I think I will stick with IE.

What I was talking about with Prezi was being a suicide attempt survivor. Twenty-five years ago today marks the actual day I got help, or tried to. It was a very confusing time and my mother had a hard time accepting me as being suicidal. She was worried about me, as is understandable. But I had my own world to contend to that she didn’t know about. I will write that in another blog, but for now, just know that I was living between two worlds, one that I created internally to cope with the external world.

It wasn’t easy the first few days after my attempt, if you want to call it that. My wrist hurt from cutting and then I found out that cutting really released emotion better than talking did. So I started having my cutting kit. I had to be very secretive but then, I sort of was as I was living in two worlds. I had two facades, the one that school saw and the one my home life saw. It wasn’t much different except at home I didn’t talk to anyone. I didn’t talk to my sisters and my father was not there after his violent outburst the day before. A week after all this suicide talk and me not getting any better, my sisters felt that he had to know. I had a large decorative knife outside my bedroom door. I swore he was going to tell me to kill myself by stabbing myself with it. I couldn’t have been more wrong. Instead, he told me to jump off the Tobin bridge. He was giving me permission to kill myself essentially. Nice guy, huh?

I was a straight A student at school. I also had perfect attendance until that night. I think I had to skip school one day to meet with a counselor so that ended my perfect attendance record for the year. It didn’t matter, I lost interest in school. Nothing mattered to me except for dying. I was 15 years old. The school nurse helped me a lot for the rest of my years in high school. I don’t think I would have graduated if it wasn’t for her. She gave me hope every time I saw her and I knew that I couldn’t let her down by being depressed. She wanted me better so I saw the school counselor instead of going to a private therapist. Unfortunately, when the school year ended, so did therapy. I was deeply depressed, more so than I already was. The nurse got me in touch with a social worker at the community school. I saw her for about ten months before she got married and left. I had a breakdown. I skipped school for a week and then in April of 1992, I tried to kill myself again. I threw up the pills and thus saved my life. I lost all hope that I ever was going to die. I felt like more of a failure than I ever was. That summer, I had my first hospitalization and thus started the cycle. I was hospitalized every three months because my suicidality reached its peak and I couldn’t cope with life anymore. The third time I went into the hospital, I came out as being gay. I had dissociated while cutting because I felt an attraction toward a woman on the T (public transportation). I thought I was going nuts until I met someone in the hospital who was also gay. I came out with my treatment team and felt a huge burden off my shoulders. It wasn’t until two decades later I would come out as being transgender.

My teenage years were filled with hospitalizations and cutting. It was a vicious cycle that continued into my twenties. After graduation from high school, I had my longest hospitalization because I overdosed again on the antidepressant I was taking at the time. I was determined to die and no one was going to stop me. Except, a Jewish doctor that felt I had some hope. She told me the only way out of the hospital was if I were to see her. The outside therapist I saw didn’t want to see me anymore. She couldn’t handle my suicidality. So I started seeing her but my suicidality increased. I was in and out of the hospital from August of 1994 to Jan 1995. I felt like no one could love me. Until I met a boy from Nebraska. He was gay and he loved me unconditionally. He didn’t care about my past. He wanted to help me. And he did. I felt that if I had him, I could heal. It took a while to trust him and I did. We had long conversations about school and life and being gay. We joined BAGLY and met others like ourselves. I still felt like an outsider because I really felt like I was a man. I was too scared to tell anyone this. So I was called a lesbian or gay woman instead. My self hatred rose to new levels. But I always held it in check.

Amazingly, I graduated a two year school for medical assisting. I was still cutting. I changed therapists, again. This time I was seeing a male therapist. It wasn’t too long before I fired him. I had obtained the medication to overdose again and when I told him, he asked if I was suicidal. It was the most stupidest question I was ever asked. Do people obtain large quantities of medication just for the hell of it? Granted I didn’t tell him I was suicidal, but getting asked point blank was kind of silly.

After this therapist, I really didn’t want to see anyone else again. It was really tough because either they left me or I fired them. Most of them couldn’t deal with my suicidality as an outpatient. They just thought the hospital was the way to go. By the time I was 25, I had about as many hospitalizations in ten years time. I just figured that was the way life was going to be. I was going to be in and out of hospitals for the rest of my life and I didn’t like that option.

It took years for suffering till I was an undergraduate at a university where I was taking psychology classes. My cutting had stopped, least for now. I had met my current therapist and she wanted to help me. I was taking a class for psychometrics testing. I researched stuff about suicide and couldn’t find a damn one that dealt with pain. There was an overview of assessments, twenty-five in all, and not a single one dealt with psychological pain. Then I came across the works of Dr. Edwin Shneidman. He lead me to David Jobes and the world of suicidology was open before me. I still felt like a hypocrite when I became a member in 2007 but I learned so much. My hospitalization started to decrease. I was using Jobes’ work in my therapy. I was also using Holden’s work as well. My pain finally had a name, psychache. And with it I could finally stop the bleeding. I couldn’t control the bleeding because I still bleed to this day, but it’s much less now that it’s acknowledge and talked about.

I still don’t have supportive parents. My sisters try to be supportive around my transgender issues but I can tell they would just like me to be my birth name and gender. They don’t know how much my suicidality surrounds me not being in the correct body. I hope in time they will.