Category: psychosis

ankle chronicles 4

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders, psychosis, suicide

Woke up this morning and I am still in fricken pain. It’s so bad that I really can’t move my ankle/foot. It’s the same type of pain I felt yesterday morning that lasted all day and into the night. I slept for about six hours before it woke me up again. I just had breakfast so I am hoping I can get back to sleep. Looks like I won’t be going out today, and if I do it will be comfort food like donuts. I had a good donut at Starbucks yesterday, a raspberry/blueberry one. It was very good. I like their new line of pastries, though it is kind of expensive.

All of this psychosis that I have been having is making me think that life is not worth living. I keep thinking of the studies that show that people that are psychotic are more likely to die by suicide than non-psychotic individuals. Great. Why can’t I go through with what the voices are telling me to do? I am scared though, scared that I might start cutting again because that is what the voices want. I haven’t told anyone outside this blog how things are. My sister wants me to babysit my niece tonight. The only good thing about that is I will have a huge screen TV to watch the game. The little one will be asleep so I don’t have to worry about entertaining her. I have been meaning to tell one of my sisters I am doing poorly but I just can’t seem to bring myself to. It’s not easy telling others that you are psychotic. I told my psychiatrist I was crazy and of course she tells me I am not. OK, like normal people hear voices all the time. And without the stupid “normal” voices, I can’t read like I used to. I need the narrator voice to concentrate while I read. It’s the only way that I can retain the information.

But I am in the middle of a pain flare up. There is no way I am seeking out psychiatric care other than my therapist and psychiatrist. I know that I will be in put in the hospital and I probably won’t have access to my pain meds. That will NOT be good at all. I am so tired of being in pain all the time. I didn’t do anything to my fricken ankle so I am not sure why it’s so angry with me. It hurts all around the bone on the outside of my ankle. It’s like something is crushing the bone, or trying to. It is maddening and despite not trying to think about it, it doesn’t work. The pain is just too intense. I am really hurting and wondering why this is happening to me now. I know that is one of the things that I will be asked when I am in the damn hospital. “What set things off”? I don’t fricken know. Maybe I put too much pressure on myself to complete the book. Maybe it is because I had a dissociative episode and now I am paying the price by hearing voices. I just want it to end, to have the voices stop. I am not hearing them now because I am too tired to listen to them. And somehow when I am in great physical pain, it’s like my psychiatric symptoms are on hold except for the depression. The depression is always there no matter what. And I still feel like I am carrying around black clouds. The thing is, that while you are in the hospital, your medical care goes out the window. They really don’t care about your physical complaints, unless you are having a heart attack or something, then they care.

I am just worried sick about where I will end up and if it will be close to public transportation or not so I can get home without bothering my sister. But if I end up in a faraway hospital, I will need a ride home. I know I shouldn’t be stressing about where I will be placed but it just helps me to know. But none of that matters right now because I am in a pain flare up and until my pain levels are under control, I am not going anywhere.

I had planned on watching college football today and the Sox game but I just don’t feel like it. The Nebraska game will be on at noon today, Sox game is I think at 6, and OSU is at 8. But I just took my pain meds and soon will be seeing Morpheus. You would think that I would be used to taking two pain pills that it wouldn’t affect me now but it still does. Funny how it only seems to affect me during the day and at night, not so much, unless I take an Ativan.

I am mostly packed for my stay. I just need to put in my hormone pills. I hope this works and I don’t get my menses this month. I will really be upset if I get it. Being in a locked psych unit is one thing, but having your menses on the unit is quite another. I am bringing my stuff with me just in case I do have bleeding. I just hope I don’t have to use it.

Damn this ankle pain is so fricken bad. I should probably ice it but I am starting to feel the effects of the pain meds so I know I will be knocked out soon. I don’t want to keep the ice on my foot longer than twenty minutes because that isn’t good. I once fell asleep with the ice wrap on. My foot didn’t like it and was grateful when I woke up and took it off.

For those that are reading my blog for the first time, I have cauda equina syndrome and complex regional pain syndrome that is causing my pain in my ankle. I also have chronic tendonitis in this ankle that no one knows why and has not been helped with standard treatment (rest, elevation, ice, compression). I have nerve damage in this ankle/foot and it becomes fatigued very quickly as I have weakness also.

feeling uneasy

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression, psychosis

Been having a rough few days. Psychosis has not let up but I have so far avoided going in the hospital. I just can’t go in for material reasons. My baby (laptop) is on its way back to me and today because my mother is deaf, missed the doorbell. Now I have to wait till Monday to get it back. If I got my laptop today, I would have made a plan to go in the hospital on Monday. Now, no such luck. I really need the break. I am having command auditory hallucinations (AH) and those are really difficult to deal with in an outpatient setting. But my psychiatrist didn’t seem too concerned, though I really downplayed the severity of the AH. I still am wicked paranoid and can’t shake the feeling that I am being watched.

The day did not bode well for me because I woke up in severe ankle pain. I was close to cancelling my appointment with my psych today but I knew that if I did, I would have a hard time getting another appointment. And if I did go in the hospital, I would have a hard time getting discharged if I don’t have an appointment. Sometimes you need to have the follow up appointment with your therapist and psychiatrist before they can consider discharge. I am not hoping to stay too long in the hospital but I can be there up to fourteen days. I also stressed to my psychiatrist that I wanted to watch the Sox game today so I couldn’t go in. She joked but she knew I was serious. She knows that if I was really feeling bad, a baseball game wouldn’t matter to me.

Other than trying to write and keep up with this blog, I am having a wicked hard time with my other writing. I have been journaling because I am watched less and don’t feel that the voices can read my thoughts as much. I feel like I am getting behind though there is no official deadline or something to do my writing. I haven’t tried editing since last Saturday when I got overwhelmed. I can’t really think straight with the additional meds and have been getting agitated easily so I have been staying away from my book. I really thought editing would be easy but it is not. I gave myself a goal of publishing it by Oct 15th but now it is looking more like the end of Oct/early November. I really need to decide the order of my chapters but I need to wait till this psychotic episode passes. I got an email from my friend in Scotland who says he will be purchasing many copies so he and his family can read it. I know that I will be successful the first month or so and that is all that I am hoping for. I figure at least fifty or so copies will be sold. But I could be wrong. It could be more. But I don’t want to really count my chickens before they hatch. And I really don’t want to think about the implications of losing my disability if I am really successful. But I will worry about that when and if things come to that.

I still am depressed. I tried to be cheerful when I saw my psychiatrist but I just didn’t have it in me. I just felt flat. It hurt to really think what I wanted to say. I really wanted to give her the low down but feared I wouldn’t leave the office without an escort to the ER. Now I am kind of scared of what the weekend might hold for me if I can’t get on top of this. I know that if I go to the local psych ER I will get admitted, even if I just want to talk with someone. I have packed a bag just in case I go in. I just feel so uneasy. I am really shocked that my pdoc didn’t really encourage me going in the hospital, but then she usually leaves it up to me to make those kind of decisions.

overwhelmed 2

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression, psychosis

Having a really rough day. Talked to my therapist this afternoon and she really thinks I should be inpatient with the psychosis being active. I am torn now because I think I do need some stabilization but I am so afraid that things might not go as I think it might. I was having little dreams last night where I went in and because they wouldn’t give me my pain meds, I flipped out, which is never a good thing on a psych unit. I demanded to be discharged AMA (against medical advise) but there is always a three day waiting period for you to be evaluated and such before they grant you discharge or not. Plus I am hoping I will have access to my tablet so I can listen to music or I will go nuts while I am there. I have a blue tooth headset that I can use so I don’t have to worry about them taking away my wired headphones.

Today I am still overwhelmed. I didn’t have a good night last night because of pain. It kept jolting me into panic mode so I had to take another Ativan to calm down. Eventually I fell asleep. But now I just feel on edge and like I am being watched. I guess you can say I am paranoid. I don’t like being paranoid. But I am in the safety of my room so I know that nothing will really hurt me while I am here.

I had to copy the music that is on my phone to my laptop so I can then copy it onto my tablet. I don’t remember the last time I updated the music folder on my tablet so it will be good to have my current playlist and stuff.

I got a call from Dell saying they received my laptop and are working on it. I am glad. I was getting worried about it as it has been almost a week since I sent it out FedEx. I hope my baby is still in one piece. I also had a worry that I might not be able to get my laptop back as my mother is deaf and can’t hear the stupid doorbell. If I am in the hospital, it might not get back to me right away. There is no one else that can sign for it as everyone else has work or school. Great. Just when I think I can go in, I think of something to prevent it from happening. I know that I shouldn’t care and take care of myself and all that but you don’t know what is going to happen when you are inpatient. You might be there a few days or a few weeks. You might have cell phone privileges or you might not. Either way, I can risk my baby sitting in storage while I am in the hospital. If I don’t pick it up by the time they specify, they might return it back to Dell and that would soooo suck!! I wish I knew why it took so friggen long to get it to Dell. Last time it only took 3 days! I am just wicked anxious right now. I probably am just rambling over nothing.

I just feel so overwhelmed and I don’t know why. I really am thinking of going to the psych ER. Sometimes just sitting in the waiting room calms me down enough that I tell them I don’t need to be admitted, that I am having a hard time and stuff but I don’t need to be in the hospital. I had that happen to me when one time when I was psychotic. I ended up going in the hospital a few days later but still it saved me a weekend trip in the hospital. I still haven’t packed a bag yet. I have no idea what to bring or wear. I mostly just pack a pair of jammies, underwear, socks, t-shirts, and sweatpants. I usually wear a pair of jeans when I go in. I figure I don’t need much because I can always wash my clothes if I have a long stay. But deciding what book to bring and stuff always gets me. I usually try and bring a good book that is light, even if I don’t read it. My last admission I brought a Cognitive therapy suicide book. It helped me to do the exercises and stuff, got me thinking on how to get better. I was half way through it when I got discharged and have not touched the book since then.

It’s so hard going into the hospital. I have been inpatient more times than I like to admit. Before the age of 25, I had almost 20 admissions. Since then I have had almost ten admissions. I think this time will be my 31st or 32nd, so I know what to expect, how long the wait will be, what to bring, what not to bring. I do know I have to make a medication list and bring my hormone pills just in case they don’t have the brand I am using. And I have to stress to the admitting doc that I take all my meds at night, which is not an easy task as things get lost in the shuffle. It’s easier when it’s a day admission and you actually meet the psychiatrist you are going to be seeing. But it’s rare that this happens. My only fear is a body search, where you have to undress in front of a staff member. Those things are so humiliating. But I understand them as patients try to sneak in contraband or worse drugs to shoot up or snort while in the hospital. The worst part are the smokers. They no longer let people who smoke out for a break as most hospitals have a strict no smoking policy. The worst is being around them jones-ing for a butt. They are provided nicotine patches but I don’t think they work for some them. Also what I find silly is that you are allowed to charge your cell phone but you can’t use it on some units. I hope I get admitted to the hospital I was at before. It will be a pain in the ass to get home from if I don’t get a ride but at least I know I can use my cell phone and tablet without a problem.

psychosis and songs

by Midnight Demon, posted in depression, psychache, psychosis

I was chatting with a fellow blogger tonight about various things and one of the topics that came up was measures to fix the mental health system. 1) there needs to be more funding to keep existing programs open. 2) needs to be a better crisis response across all state hospitals or city hospitals so that people do not resort to suicide because they got left behind. People have the notion that inpatient hospitalizations are a cure all for all types of psychiatric ailments but what they don’t realize is that treatment hardly exists behind closed doors. Sure medication is dispensed but what is needed is therapy on the floors more than what the nursing staff can provide.

I have been struggling the past few days with psychosis and am wondering if I should be in the hospital. I was able to get a hold of my psychiatrist and she allowed me to take my old go to antipsychotic med that I like when nothing else seems to work. I just took it and I hope that it stops this song that is playing like a broken record in my head. The song is sirens by Pearl Jam. It is striking a chord with me a little too well and is “talking” to me, telling me that I should die. I don’t understand why this is happening, though it seems to be the course after every dissociative episode I face. I become purely psychotic after losing time.

I still am under black clouds. Listening to music is helping. I just wish the feeling like nothing would stop. And I still have the heaviness in my chest. The psychache is in full gear. I guess that is why the song is telling me to kill myself.