Tag: chronic illness

exhausting Friday

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

Exhausting Friday

I slept about 8 hours, though I woke up around 0430. I wasn’t happy. It has been more than 12 hours since my last dose of pain meds and I was starting to feel weird. I also had to pee like a racehorse. I quickly took my pain meds then rushed to the bathroom. When I came back to my room, my ankle was hurting. I stayed up for a couple hours before going back to sleep. I was hungry but I figure I would eat when I woke up next.

My mother was yelling on the phone when I woke up around 0940. I had no idea what she was talking about. I went to the bathroom and overheard her conversation. She was talking pleasantly to someone so she must have hung up on the person she was yelling at. I can only guess it was her sister. I checked the time when I came back to my room. I just missed the 945 bus so had to wait an hour for the next one. I needed to go to town for my prescriptions as well as to Walgreens to pick up my scripts. I wanted to listen to the ball game as well.

I got dressed around 1030 and my mother wanted me to check on my niece as my brother in law was home sick. She had just got up and was okay. I left for the bus stop. It was sunny out but cold. I had a window before it started raining and I hoped to beat it. I ordered my Starbucks drink with the mobile app as I had a free reward. I got a snickers latte. I had it iced. I had to go through each thing to customize the drink. I then saved it to my favorites so I could order it next time I had a reward. By the time I was finished and put the order through, I was close to the Square. I had some pain in my ankle but it was bearable.

I had to sit at one of the bar seats when I got to Starbucks as the table seats were all taken. This kind of puts pressure on my ankle so I just wrote in my journal for a bit before leaving. I didn’t want to aggravate my ankle and cause a flare. I left for town and knew I would miss the first inning of the ball game. There was no way I would be home by 1.

The trains were on time and I got to my doc’s office for my prescriptions. Neither secretary was seeing anyone so the one I was talking to didn’t do anything as the other had already went to get my envelope. I told her she wasn’t fast enough. They laughed. It had started drizzling when I left despite it still being blue skies. That changed by the time I got back to the Square. It was getting really cloudy. I timed it right so I didn’t have to wait long for the bus. I went to Walgreens and there was a wait. The regular girl wasn’t at the register. I stood waiting for like 20 minutes, all the while my ankle talking to me. I paid for my scripts and then went home. It started to rain by the time I got to my street. Great. I had to get my mother’s stuff out of the basement freezer and I wasn’t looking forward to it.

I got a bag to put the stuff in and then went to the basement. The freezer wasn’t making any noises and some items were not frozen. I thought this was odd. I got the stuff with enough that I could carry and then told my brother in law. He thought someone must not have shut the door tightly last time they opened it. I wasn’t convinced. I put the stuff I brought upstairs away and then rested for a few. I then went back downstairs to make sure I got everything and grabbed a few more things. I then went back to my brother in law and told him something is not right. He said the breaker might have been tripped and it was. He said he had the flu and I stayed clear of him. I don’t want to get sick. I went back upstairs with what I grabbed and then went up to my room. I was hungry but didn’t know what to have. I listened to the game for a bit. They scored three runs in the bottom of the 4th inning. I knew they would win so I went back downstairs to make something to eat. I was getting exhausted going up and down stairs. My legs felt like jelly. I made some sausages that had thawed out. I asked my mother how to make them as I never made them before. She told me to split them and then put them in the oven. I did. After 20 minutes, they looked like pancakes, they had flatten out. When I told my mother this, she laughed at me. UGH. I told her that was my lunch and dinner as I didn’t eat and then she said what am I on a diet? I said if I was I wouldn’t starve myself! Fucking ignorant bitch. She really pissed me off.

It’s really cold in my room. I don’t know if my mother touched the heat again. Going to be cold until Tues or Wed when the temps will be in the 50s. Crazy weather. Supposed to have periods of rain though. Just hope my spine doesn’t act up. I hate it when it aches. I can’t wait to see my therapist on Monday. We have a lot to talk about. I haven’t seen him in two weeks. I also see my psychiatrist Wed. I will need a refill on one of my psych meds then. I think now, I have all my psych meds on the same refill schedule. Only took me 4 months to get them together. I hope I don’t wake up before 6 am tomorrow. I hate waking up that early and then getting sleepy a few hours later. Then I feel like shit the rest of the day. Doesn’t matter what time I go to bed. Sucks! I know it wouldn’t happen if I was on a longer acting pain med. I think my sleep would be better as I wouldn’t wake up in pain.

shaky arms are back

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

Shaky arms are back

Appliances that I ordered for my mother came this morning. I didn’t get much sleep. The delivery guys were fast and installed the washer. Thankfully there were no problems, other than the washer need “high efficiency” detergent. I just told my mother to use less detergent. I don’t know why she would use more than a quarter of a cup anyways as the damn thing is so sudsy. She wanted another washer but they didn’t have one that were the size or price range she wanted. She said she would use less. I told her after 10-20 loads, she could just use white vinegar to prevent mold and mildew. She agreed.

I made a sandwich and then went up to my room. I had made coffee but it didn’t help my poor sleep. I took a nap for a couple of hours. I woke up feeling weird. I used the bathroom before my bladder burst. Came back upstairs and then my arms felt like spaghetti. Not what I wanted to feel. It was side effects to the Invega. I quickly took an Ativan before they became worse. I don’t get this way often like I did when I was on the abilify. I hate this feeling. It is the worse.

I called my mother and told her to hold dinner for me. I would be sleeping for a few hours as I didn’t feel good. She didn’t ask what was wrong, thank god. I am feeling restless so I don’t know if I will be able to get back to sleep. I got to wait for the Ativan to kick in. My ankle pain is rearing its ugly head. I just feel like giving up. Last night I was swimming in despair. I wrote some stuff in my journal and then vented to a friend via email. I don’t remember what I wrote. She wrote back in the morning with the words in all caps “Don’t kill yourself”, so I must have written something to that effect. I have been feeling a little suicidal at night. I think it is this time of year. Being in severe pain doesn’t help. I put on an ace bandage thingy and slept with it. For the first time in a month or so, I was able to stand without too much pain so it obviously helped.

Now my ankle/foot feels like it is made of strings. Fuck! I hate this type of side effect the most but it is the least concerning. It doesn’t happen often, so I am grateful for that. I just emailed my psych about this to keep her in the loop.

I closed my window because it was bloody cold in my room when I woke up. Holy crap! It wasn’t snowing or raining yet. That wouldn’t start until the afternoon. When I checked the mail, there were flurries. They didn’t appear to be sticking. My mother had turned down the heat because of yesterday’s high temps. I turned it up as it was cold in the house. I must have been cold during the night because my comforter was on me. It’s still chilly in my room but it’s bearable. I like the cold anyways. My ankle and foot, however, doesn’t. They are warm under the blankets right now. I have made sure to keep them warm. Last thing I need is that icy coldness that CRPS brings. Takes forever to warm up and then when it does, it burns.

I have to go out tomorrow to get my prescriptions at my PCP’s office. I don’t get paid till Monday so I won’t be able to get them until then. I just calculated all the meds I need to get next week and it’s going to be roughly $60. I was hoping to fix my laptop this month but I don’t think I can afford it. I’m still waiting to see what my premium is for my medical insurance. I haven’t received the letter yet, which is odd because I usually get it the beginning of the month. I somehow messed up my finances as I don’t have that much money left over after all my bills are paid. I think I might have to shrink my grocery bill somehow. I wanted to make a chili cornbread casserole. The ingredients are not too expensive, except for the beef. I will have to go to the butcher shop. I like their meat better than the grocery store. You can definitely taste the difference. I might buy a 3 lb bag of beef. Then I can make my dirty gravy. My mother is not a chili fan so I will most likely eat this thing, if my brother in law doesn’t have some. My sister might as she likes hot stuff.

Ativan is kicking in so I am going to rest now. The spaghetti feeling is fading. I am glad.

another warm February day

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

Another warm February day

It is 72 degrees F right now. I went on my back porch and there were bugs flying. I need to fix my screen for my window. I had broken it in November when I took out my AC. It was either break it or have the AC fall. I just hope the screen place can fix it and I don’t have to go to Home Depot for the frame. It is mostly intact except for the corners. The screen itself is okay.

I woke up at 5 again in pain. I was sweating because it was hot in my room. I wanted to shower but it was too early. I would probably wake up my sister and brother in law as their bedroom is below my bathroom. I stayed up for a bit and then got hungry so made a bowl of cereal. I went back to sleep even though my foot was angry.

I woke up around noon. My friend in Canada had messaged me so we were talking for a bit. I wanted to make pancakes but my foot and ankle were being assholes. I didn’t want to flare it up more. I was getting hungry but I didn’t want to move, much less leave my room. I tried to go back to sleep but it wasn’t happening. I decided to shower and then make some buffalo wings. I think my mother is making a chicken stir fry as I saw some chicken chunks in the fridge. She is probably going to make rice for an army. I don’t understand why she makes so much when no one eats it. It ends up getting moldy and then tossed. Drives me crazy.

I haven’t read Harry today, not yet anyway. Voldemort just got the Elder Wand. I decided to stop there, for now. After I read Harry, I plan on reading 1984. There has been a lot of talk about the book since the Orange Buffoon has been in office. I think I read it when I was in high school or soon after I graduated, though I really don’t remember what it was about. I keep thinking of Brave New World and I know that isn’t the same thing.

Fear of suicide (revision to blog of 6 Feb 2013)

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

Fear of suicide.

This statement can be taken one of two ways. The first is that some people are afraid to talk about suicide for fear of sparking ideation or thinking about suicide. The second is that when
someone knows you are feeling low and have attempted before, they are afraid of losing that person and react in ways that may or may not help that person. Suicide attempters are at higher risk than non-attempters.

I’ll talk about the second interpretation first. I have a friend who is having me motivate her into
writing by having me contact her every day for six weeks. What sparked this was, she read my blog about my recent near-suicide attempt. Now her ulterior motive is to keep me alive the only way she can think of, by having me write to her every day. In return, she has to write at least two pages a day for her own well-being. She needs my help to pursue her writing, which is important to her more than anything. We are also guarding a human connection that is valuable to us. My writing keeps me alive, and because she doesn’t want to let me down, that helps her to write. She has this idea that people need human connection in order to stay connected to what they truly need to do, even if that connection is between polar opposites. She is bubbly and athletic, a motivational speaker, while I’m someone who is in chronic pain and disabled because of it.

I have to say that since I have been writing, I have been in better space. I would not say that I feel more connected, but I don’t want to let her down, so I try and write a little each day. Our rules are to email each other when we are done, and we are allowed our birthdays and Christmas off. For days where it is not possible for me to write because of whatever reason, we have given each other three passes on writing. Sometimes, because my pain or sleep deprivation is intolerable I find that it can help me be creative and write about things. I don’t have a censor when I write. Whatever I think at that moment, I write it out. Sometimes I find that writing it on paper helps more than writing in a word document.

I sometimes feel exposed because I am bearing my soul to this person I met through a friend on Facebook. We both belong to the same organization for suicide prevention. I am guessing that because she thinks of me as a sibling, and she did lose her sister to suicide many years ago, she does not want me to end up that way.

I write often because it is an outlet for me and my emotions. I am anonymous when it comes to my blog but not too much, as I pass these blogs on to my personal Facebook site, where my family members can have access to it if they were inclined to read it. Most often they do not because they are not online as much as my other friends are. I do not tell my family what I am doing. It would be heartbreaking and awkward for them to read what I write and then get asked at the dinner table what I meant by something I wrote. To be honest, half the stuff I write about, I forget. It’s an outlet like no other.

I am not going to lie and pretend that I don’t think about killing myself every day. It is a constant struggle, and I think that I worry a lot of my close friends who actually get to know me or who read my blogs about my struggles. But I think the reason why my blog has been so successful is because people can relate to what I write.

As far as the fear that talking about suicide can bring about a suicidal crisis, that is a common myth. Talking about suicide can actually prevent one, but some people are just not comfortable with the subject, and so they will say stuff that they think the person who is miserable wants to hear, like. “You have your life ahead of you,” “Don’t be so down, things could be worse,” or my favorite “You have so much to live for.”

People don’t understand the pain that is involved in depression or in thinking about suicide. I have problems. Quite a few. I have mental illness and chronic physical and mental pain. Both make me want to take my life. I have been thinking about taking my life since I was 8 years old. I was in a lot of pain for some reason or another, and it never got taken care of. Today, I think that pain stems from the fact that I am really a male and not a female. I knew at a young age that I was different, and back then, there was no expressing how I truly felt. I really think that if I had gotten help sooner, this would have come to light sooner, and I wouldn’t be in this pickle today about what to do with my transition.

I’ve started a new journal. And like every other journal before it, the first thing that goes into it is my crisis response plan which is the following (taken from the Air Force Guide to Managing Suicidal Behavior-Appendices)

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 me feel better for at least 30 minutes (examples can include trying to sleep, playing internet games, listening to music, etc.)
Step 4: Repeat all of the above
Step 5: If thoughts continue or get specific, and I find myself preparing to do something, I will call a suicide hotline or someone that I trust sometimes hotlines aren’t so helpful but calling a friend is
Step 6: If I cannot reach the 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 will go to the ER or call 911

I have found having this useful when I have been hospitalized because it provides a plan of something that they need for discharge, and I always carry my journal.