Category: writing

just a bad day

by Midnight Demon, posted in Chronic pain, depression, physical pain, suicide, writing

Today I had a bad day. I can’t describe more than that because I just am so overwhelmed I might start crying again.

I had my therapy session which didn’t go so well. We ended up talking about basically me getting out of therapy which she wasn’t keen on because she knew my result. I have another appointment with her tomorrow to go over weekend planning. I feel like I am in the hospital but on an outpatient basis. I also forgot I got visual therapy tomorrow. I really don’t want to go but its too late to cancel now. I have no idea what is involved and it kind of is scaring me a little. My eye doc says it just some exercises for my muscles as they don’t like to converge when I am reading, or something like that.

I would say today was kind of productive. I got my groceries delivered, vacuumed, and got my hair cut. I ordered some healthy stuff like steamed broccoli and apples to help cut down on my carbs. Least they will be the healthy carbs.

The weather has been awful today. It has been freezing rain to hail and my back has paid the price. I still can move but I don’t know how long that will last. I have tried all the exercises I know to move my hip extensors but they still feel locked. I know once it stops raining, the pain will go away but right now it sucks! My spine aches like no tomorrow and my scar hurts like a bitch. I used to love the rain. Now the rain hates me. Probably because I can no longer walk in it. I used to love walking around my neighborhood getting soaked to the bone. It was so refreshing. Course my mother thought I was going to die of pneumonia each time I went but I didn’t care. I learned the hard way of not staying in wet clothes though. I did one time and got very sick. I never did that again.

school and coffee

by Midnight Demon, posted in mood disorders, writing

I’m at starbucks and I wish I brought my laptop. I thought I would see my coffee buddy but he isn’t here today.

I have stuff to read in my bad but I just don’t feel like reading it. But I do have my journal which occupies my time for now. I am listening to Linkin Park because I am just in that kind of mood.

It’s good that I got out of the house after being cooped up for two days because of my bowel situation. I think things have finally settled down some. Plus I really wanted to get a McDonald’s cheeseburger and Chicken Nuggets. But I had a delicious turkey sandwich instead with some BBQ chips. My coffee of the day is Blue Java and I am sad to learn that it is being phased out. I am going to miss this delight. My next trip will be the West Java (also from Indonesia) but iced. I tried it hot but it had an aftertaste I didn’t like. I wish they made these reserve coffees for the Keurig. But then I really would not leave the house.

I’m really disappointed that I can’t go to school because my LTD states that I can’t collect when I am collected SSD. No where was that stated to me. And SSD didn’t care that I was collecting. Now because I was collecting at the same time, I have to repay what I owe, which basically means nothing for me while I am in this loophole. I am so pissed and depressed. Now I have no extra money for school or for anything really. I just have to live on my SSD check. I hate being screwed. It’s like when I got the check from UMB. $3k and I spend it on bills and the following the semester they say oops sorry you weren’t supposed to get that money, just $800. UGH!!!! Next time I get big money I am not spending a dime from it. I’ll just keep it in my checking account until someone says that oops I over paid you and I will have it to hand back to them. I feel so fucked over its not funny. I still plan on taking that one class over the summer. NOTHING is going to stop me from taking this class. Even if it’s the last class I ever take at UMB, I want to take it. I just hope they let me register even though I am not a student there at this time. I might get readmitted but what would be the point. I can’t come up with a grand every semester. Unless I stop eating or stop taking my meds or something. I might have to look at another school that doesn’t cost so much. Right now I don’t want to think about losing my baccalaureate at UMB because I will just cry. I might just have to stand at a corner with a sign that says change for college. But then the state might have something to say about that and then I will be screwed for not declaring this “income”.

Plateaus

by Midnight Demon, posted in Chronic pain, mood disorders, psychache, suicide, suicide attempt, writing

Plateaus:

People often hit plateaus in varies areas of life. Whether it be losing the last 5 pounds in weight loss, running, or just writing.

Besides these things, there are those that are more personal. You might hit a plateau in a relationship, in therapy, or medication wise. That is where I am at now. I have a plateau with my meds.

At first I started feeling better. Always a good sign when you are feeling crappy. But lately I feel that even though I can go up on my medication, I feel that it would probably do no good. I have reached the point in a short period of time and I feel frustrated about it. I feel like here we go again with yet another med. But unlike other meds, this med is keeping me stable despite making me feel 100% better. It is maybe making me feel 85% better and that is a lot considering all that I go through mentally. Oh, just to let you know I am talking about psychiatric medication and not something else.

I have hit these plateaus with many drugs. Usually when I do, I start slipping within a month. But with this drug I am not feeling that way. I feel ok but not ok in the sense of euphoria. Just and overall feeling of contentment. But given the circumstances of the moment, I am convinced I am suicidal but it is not because of the meds. It is because of other factors that cannot be explained. It is because I have a nerve condition I cannot tolerate. I have mental illness and it drives me batty. But not as bad as my nerve condition get me. I just want to die and no one can see that. No one can see how much I hurt. But I go along with the charade of feeling fine and happy because I don’t want to worry friends and family. I can’t tell them I have a broken heart and that I am dying of humility and loss of dignity. That is what I go through on a daily basis. And right now this is at its peak despite the meds making me feel better and be on a plateau. This is what the face of being suicidal is like. Everything seems normal to the other person but inside you are dying. Wanting to make them see that you are not ok. But you are the winning actor in the play and cannot show emotion. And so that is what the play is about. Feeling high on the mountain but feeling also like you are dirt.

new journal and Crisis Response Plan

by Midnight Demon, posted in depression, mood disorders, suicide, suicide attempt, writing

I started a new journal tonight. And like every other journal before it, the first two things that go into it is my crisis response plan and the Holden psychache scale, though lately it just is my response plan.

I tried finding the response plan online but all I found was emergency planning and a very LONG one that the Navy cooked up, most likely from the article I read about military suicide crisis training. I tried to find the article but I am unable to locate it in my files. I haven’t searched my thumb drive because I can’t locate that either. GGGRRRR so I hope I am not plagiarizing when I post this plan here on my blog:

Crisis response plan:
When thinking about suicide, I agree to do the following:

Step 1: Try to identify my thoughts and specifically what’s upsetting me
Step 2: Write out and review more reasonable responses to my suicidal thoughts
Step 3: Do things that help you feel better for at least 30 mins (examples can include, trying to sleep, play internet games, brush hair 100 times, write in a journal, listen to music, etc)
Step 4: Repeat all of the above
Step 5: if thoughts continue, get specific and I find myself preparing to do something, I will call XXX @ 555-555-5555 or suicide hotline
Step 6: if I cannot reach above I will call my therapist or psychiatrist
Step 7: if I am still feeling suicidal and I don’t feel like I can control my behavior, I go to the ER or call 911 (or whatever the local emergency line is for your country)
I have found having this in my journal useful when I have been hospitalized because it provides a plan of something that they need for discharge and I don’t always carry the card or the paper with me but I do carry my journal.

The second thing is Holden’s(Holden, Mehta, Cunningham, & McLeod, 2001) psychache scale and I don’t feel comfortable posting that here but you can look it up in the reference I have posted if you have access to the library.

I tend to hold off on it because I haven’t been using it lately. I know what the scale looks like and after a while you can manipulate it to whatever you want it to be from high to low. Plus when I feel numb or “fine” it’s hard to tell what kind of psychological pain I am in. My therapist and I used to use it to gauge how suicidal I was but then it just got to be like a joke. Or that the tables have turned on me because I was the one that brought in the scales and the response plan. My therapist didn’t have a clue about suicidality, which is typical of most therapists. That is why they like to pawn you off or come up with lame “safety contract” that is really a legal form for THEM not YOU. Least with the Response plan it give you something to take home with and is more detailed than anything I have come across.

Holden, R. R., Mehta, K., Cunningham, E., & McLeod, L. D. (2001). Development and preliminary validation of a scale of psychache. Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science, 33(4), 224-232.