Hurricane Joaquin

Hurricane Joaquin

Today has been heavy rain and flash floods every where. I am glad I didn’t venture out as I would have gotten soaked. It’s windy but not too much. During one of the breaks in the rain, my mother decided to open the back porch door. Then the heavy rain fell. Luckily, I got to the kitchen in time before it flooded. It is really humid and the house is very muggy as most of the windows are closed. I am ok in my room, but then I have the AC. I hope the rain clears up by tomorrow as I really don’t want to be traveling in the rain. I don’t mind getting wet if I am just walking in the rain (I love it!) but if I have to go somewhere, I hate being in wet clothes. I don’t usually carry an umbrella in stormy weather because all you are doing is fighting with the damn thing and going to get soaked either way. I will carry it if there is no wind, which is what I hope the case will be tomorrow.

I’m glad I didn’t have to go into town today. There was a fire inside one of the stations and flooding at another one. Good going MBTA! The line was down for a good couple of hours. It is now just getting close to being on time. If the stations can’t handle heavy rain, I don’t know how they are going to handle the winter. This past winter there were major delays all over the place. Commuter rail going to the suburbs were affected as well. It was a disaster. I hope this winter won’t be as horrid, but you never know until January.

I had therapy though we didn’t talk about therapy things. Our connection wasn’t great today, probably because of the weather but I think my therapist needs a new phone and she is in great denial about it. So we talked about tech stuff. She was amazed that she went on the internet when I send her links to my blog. She had no idea. Talk about being clueless. She also doesn’t want to lose my text messages, which I can understand. She did that before and doesn’t know how she did it and boy, was she in a panic. I tried explaining to her that getting a new phone will suck for a little while but she wouldn’t listen at all. This is what I am getting from therapy. Counseling my therapist on cell phones and how the internet works. LOL. I found it funny and made a comment about it. She just laughed. She did read the yesterday’s blog that I sent her. She said that it was good that I sent it to her because she doesn’t know when her anxiety about my pain is interfering with things.

We then talked about my writing, or rather the lack of it. Today has been a long day because I woke up so damn early. She said to print out the things that I have written and read it over. Maybe that will spark something. I haven’t done that yet. I was describing the difficulty of writing when she asked if I had any journals about psychosis or something to that effect. I told her I just have suicide or self harm journal articles. I suppose I could Google something but that sounds like a lot of work for something that is supposed to be fiction. I don’t really want my short story to become a clinical paper. She really wanted me to write about my early experiences with my fantasy world but it would be too triggering for me and then with the weekend coming, her not being available, it would be tough to sit through all that stuff. So it stays in my head where it belongs. I’m already having enough anxiety over the anniversary coming up next week. What keeps going through my mind is when I got the phone call from my PCP while I was driving to my therapist’s appointment (I had a car then). I remember having to pull over because I wanted to listen carefully to what he was telling me and not crash into something. After the phone call, I was numb. I had CES again and I was to report to the hospital the following day for surgery. I am glad I had therapy that night because I was close to losing my shit, but it was a weird calm. I knew what to expect this go round because I had been through it before and I had the support of my group. I didn’t know when I would be able to see my therapist again. I was walking when I went to the hospital but wasn’t when I left, not unassisted anyway. I was walking with a walker or a cane. I can’t remember. I just know my left leg was weaker than it was before the surgery. It is what lead to my disability. I know that if I didn’t hurt my back the second go round with this horrid condition, I probably would still be working now. I lost so much after this but I was determined to make as full a recovery as possible. I had to fight to keep my PT appointments, even though they were just telling me to join a gym. A gym wouldn’t help me. I would have to figure things out on my own and fuck that. I wanted someone to show me what I should be doing and how to do it. That is how I learn. I think during my recovery time my therapist started with the phone sessions and it just continued even after I recovered. If I couldn’t make it to where she was, I would have a phone session. It didn’t become a regular thing until I no longer had access to a car to get to her office thirty miles away from me. Both my cars died on me. They were used when I got them and I just didn’t want to put more money into old cars. I do miss the Camaro. That car was sweet. I got my first speeding ticket with that car. I think I still have the violation somewhere in my files. It is paid, of course, but I just wanted to keep it.

There’s a lot of things I wish I knew when I got the second diagnosis of Cauda Equina Syndrome. Like how my bowels and bladder were going to be. They still don’t work the way they did before. I had retention and leakage with my bladder before the second surgery but it got worse after. If I had checked out the AFO before I got CRPS in my ankle, maybe, just maybe I wouldn’t have it today. These are the things that go through my mind. But mostly it was getting that phone call saying that I had CES x 2 that kills me to this day. It’s going to be a rough week.

Death Dates

Death dates

Whenever I am suicidal, I pick a date that I want to kill myself on. Then if I don’t want to die on that day, I don’t have to go through with it. So far, I am still alive. It was a close call my last date because I wanted to die very badly. I had enough of living and figured it was the only way out of the situation I was in. But my therapist and psychiatrist got me through it. I felt cheated and angry they stopped me. The only thing that got me through was picking another date. This time it is almost a month a way from now. It is how I manage being intensely suicidal. Trouble is, I am not feeling terribly suicidal at this time. Suicide is furthest from my mind, yet I have this date in mind and I am thinking about going through with it anyway just so I don’t have to suffer anymore pain like I have tonight.

My therapist knows about this date but my psychiatrist doesn’t, least not yet. I don’t know if I am going to remind either of them of this plan. I don’t even know how I am going to die. Sure, I have a few ideas but I am not going to do them in my room where a family member will find me. No, I want to be found by a stranger some place away from home. I would love for it to be a hotel room but I don’t have the money to do the deed. How sad is that? Here I want to kill myself and I can’t basically afford to do it in a place I would like to do it in. There has been no downward circumstances to cause me to think about this date. I just wanted it to be before my birthday.

For some reason, my 9th anniversary of my cauda equina syndrome diagnosis is coming up in two weeks and it is bothering me. Normally the day passes and I don’t even notice. But I marked it on my calendar and the memories of that time period have been flooding back. I remember not being able to move my left leg at all because it was too weak. I lost a lot of strength with this surgery. I had to have a blood patch because I had a CSF leak and then I had to be operated again because a fragment of the disc was embedded in my nerve root causing me these problems. It was not a fun time. I then got a nice UTI that made me sick. The antibiotics made me sicker and then they discharged me only for me to come back to the ER the next day for fluids as I was shitting my brains out. I was very sick. But that surgery and the rehab afterwards failed to notice my current problem and that is why I am disabled today. That is why I have pain every day of my life for the past three years. That is why I cannot walk more than a few blocks at a time. My walking distance is 0.4 miles which isn’t much considering that I was once able to walk 20 miles without a problem. Sure I was sore the next day but that was to be expected. But now I can barely walk a mile without pain. And I leak urine if I walk too much. That is something that I have no control over. This is one of the reasons why I want to end my life. I am tired of the pain, the leaks, the immobility. But that is just the physical side of things. It has nothing to do with the mental side.

The mental side I am very depressed. I see no future but lately I have been. It’s been tough to see but I think things are not as bleak as they have been in the past. Despite my physical disability, I am able to look ahead. Just yesterday, I decided on the place where my sisters and I will eat out on my birthday, should I leave this date that I have planned. Four weeks I have to decide to go through with it or not. I know my therapist and psych would rather I not talk about this. Perhaps, they might not want to know about it. I just think that if I want to die, the decision should be left up to me and not my treaters. Sure they have the legal right to hospitalize me against my will but that will not stop the thoughts or planning. Am I a danger to myself? Not today. Will I soon? I don’t know. Depends on a few things.

Suicidal vs Suicide

Suicidal vs. Suicide

I got this from a fellow blogger. I somewhat corrected it so it wasn’t a run on sentence. But it’s mostly the author’s words. Original had “committed suicide” instead of “dying by suicide” which is important to recognize. That is the only words I changed.

“When someone ends up dying by suicide, everyone is there, they feel bad, they say they didn’t “see the signs”. They talk about how amazing you were and so forth. But if you tell someone you’re suicidal, everything is different. No one wants to solve the problem, matter of fact, half the time they act like it isn’t a problem, that you won’t ever “do it”, that it will just “go away”/ They treat it like a joke, well let me tell you something, being suicidal isn’t a joke. People do consider it as an only option, and treating the problem like it doesn’t matter will not get you anywhere. The only place it’s going to get you is a funeral. If someone tells you they’re suicidal, don’t push them away. Instead try to be the one to keep them here.”—realadvicebro.tumblr.com

World Suicide Prevention Day 2015

World Suicide Prevention Day 2015

As many of you that read my blog every day know that I struggle with suicidality constantly when I am in the darkness of my depression. I know writing has been a source of comfort and coping in dealing with these strong feelings. I have not shared suicide numbers before because I don’t think they belong on my blog. But for those that are reading this, it may help someone to talk to or text to in a crisis situation. So please, take down these numbers. Put them in a place that is safe to you, a journal, a notebook, your contact list on your phone, anywhere you might think might be helpful in an emergency and call the number.

The first number is for US only residents 1-800-273-8255. Text support to 741741 again US residents only. It MAY take some time to get to through. I know when I texted the first time, there was a 40 minute wait. I know that might seem like an eternity to someone in crisis but please hang in there and someone will get to you. If the numbers don’t work (I am human after all), please leave a comment and I will fix it. It maybe be that it no longer is in service anymore (text number). There are other resources, if you are interested. Just do a google search to find them. Wikipedia might have some too. If I find some on Twitter, I will retweet them to my page. So far they haven’t sent any numbers or website to actually help those in need just to know the warning signs, which to me, is not too helpful for those with chronic suicidality.