Tag: psychological pain

still in a foul mood

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, cauda equina syndrome, chronic physical pain, depression

Still in a foul mood

Woke up early again today. Seems my bladder likes to be relieved before seven these days. Then I am up for most of the day. I am not happy about this new arrangement but if it means not wetting myself, then I will do it. Lord knows how many times I have had dreams about going to the bathroom and actually peeing. How I have not wet the bed so far is a complete miracle that I am guessing I am blessed with CES for the retention it gives me. I guess that is the only blessing CES has given me.

I went to my “happy place” (aka Starbucks) and it didn’t make me happy. I had a good new latte called Caramel Flan. It is not too sweet but very caramelly. If you love caramel, I highly recommend it. I then started my journaling but kept on getting distracted because my earbud on my right ear kept popping out. Every few minutes I had to push it back in. So annoying. It made it hard to write anything. So I just went on Facebook and Twitter. When I finished that I left. I was going to go to the grocery store to pick up some more powerade but I missed the bus and had to wait for half hour for the next one. I just decided to wait for the bus to take me home instead. I really need to call Sallie Mae to get my loan payment reduced or deferred. So I am going to call them after I blog this. I have been putting it off because of the holidays but now I can no longer do that.

My mood is terrible and I might start an argument with the person. I don’t care. I don’t have any extra money to pay them right now. I can barely get by on my income as it is. I am on a strict budget with paying the editor and not being able to eat out is killing me. It is a necessity right now that I eat at home but I do enjoy not cooking and just placing an order for delivery. I think most people enjoy that but I no longer have that luxury, least for now.

I know yesterday I had thoughts of death in my last blog. I woke up with them again today. Seems no matter how much I try to keep them out, they creep back in. It doesn’t mean that I am suicidal. I am not planning my death, though if the higher power wants to take me now, I wouldn’t mind it. My family might but I wouldn’t. Seems my family is becoming more dependent on me being home than ever. I being asked to babysit more and to take my father to his doctors appointments. I don’t mind doing it but I also like to stay in my room and be shut out from the world. Since not being able to work, I have not gone to Boston.com for news. The only news I get is from Facebook/Twitter. So it no one posts a big story, I am not likely to get it or know about it. I do get YahooNews on my twitter account but I have not read a paper in years. I used to like reading the Sunday paper at work. It was a good way for me to keep up on things and check out the new books that come out. Now unless I see a book on a show or promoted through twitter, I am not going to know about it. Or through my favorite authors. I think that is the best way to promote is by social media.

I cannot wait for March. I can finally get my tablet off my phone bill and will be saving fifty dollars a month. My phone bill will finally be affordable on my new income. I still will be able to use the tablet, least I think I will. As long as I have Wi-Fi connection, I should be ok. As it is, I don’t use it much. And it is considered a dinosaur now so I doubt anyone would want it except for recycling or something. I might still keep it as I have Kindle books on there.

I don’t know why I am in such a sour mood. I know sleep has something to do with it. I can’t stand it. I hate being down because I know there is nothing that can be done about it. But at least it isn’t sucking the energy from me. But I think it is only a matter of time before it sucks my motivation. I still have to write my few pages for the new book today. I still have no idea what I am going to write. If nothing comes to me, I will just edit what I have.

One thing that pisses me off about my mood being low is that there is no reason why I should be depressed, unless I am still grieving for my friend but I don’t really think that is it. Whatever it is, I hope that it goes away soon and I go back to my midlevel depression. Because this foul mood sucks.

Anhedonia and rubbing elbows

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, depression

I had trouble sleeping last night. I woke up from a bad dream at 4 am and took a while to get back to sleep. Then I slept for a few hours before waking up around 8. It’s snowing out so I won’t be going out today or tomorrow as tomorrow is going to freeze. Thing that sucks is that I won’t be seeing my primary as they have closed the office and I won’t be seeing him for another few weeks. This totally sucks. Now I have to wait for my prescription by mail because I couldn’t get it in person. I just hope that I can ration out my remaining pain meds until then.

My ankle is really hurting today and when I lift it up on my toes, my whole leg start jiggling. I know it is a new nerve problem but I want to see what my primary says before I run off to the neurologist. My luck, they will want a demonstration and it won’t happen.

I haven’t made any of the phone calls that I need to today. I am just being lazy. I need to take a shower but my ankle is hurting so I will put that off for today as well. Maybe if the pain meds quiet it down I will take the shower.

I got a good email from my neurologist. I had emailed her one of my blogs and she said that I am an amazing writer. I had to text my therapist that.

Speaking of therapist, I had my session with her today. I am feeling really upbeat today for some reason. But I keep feeling like it is going to end soon so I am trying not to keep my hopes up that this feeling will last. I was very happy to talk to her today. I told her about the author Konrad Michel’s email exchange. She thinks I am rubbing elbows with the suicide people of the world. I told her that is crazy, that I am just emailing him out of courtesy so that in case someone reads my book and they go to him about it, he knows. I don’t want to get sued over it or feel like I am plagiarizing his work. Most of it is in my own words and I did quote what I needed to. I just don’t think one email constitutes knowing a person to rub elbows with them. I also told her about the anhedonia that I have been feeling. Nothing seems to be good as it was with me. Nothing tastes good. I don’t feel pleasure in eating my favorite foods. I have been trying to snap out of it but it is difficult. Even though I felt sort of upbeat today, it kind of wore off and I am back to my normal restrained self. It sucks when you are in this type of depression. I am really surprised I am not thinking about ending my life. I guess I have really turned a corner and don’t go to that place that often anymore.

I just took a picture of the snow outside for a friend that wanted to see how much we got. I think it’s hysterical that some of my friends that live in warmer states like Arizona and California don’t see as much snow as the New England states do.

My eyesight is not getting better. I am hoping to make an appointment with the ophthalmology people soon. My vision keeps going in an out with blurringness. It is really frustrating as I got to really focus my eye to keep them focused on things. It is a pain when I try to read or play on my laptop or even write a blog.

I can’t wait for tomorrow night. The OSU game is playing. I have been looking forward to it. I just hope I can stay up and watch it. I don’t do so well with night games. Maybe I will try and take a nap like I have been trying to the last few hours and I will be rested enough to stay up. But the trick is not to wake up before 9 am. My mother has been waking me up every single morning for the past week and she is always up around 8. And she puts on the tea kettle and doesn’t shut it off right away. Annoys the crap out of me.

Don’t feel anything but blah

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

I don’t feel anything but blah

I had an exciting day. The coeditor of the Building a therapeutic alliance book has totally said it was ok for me to write about the Aeschi model in my book. I am very excited about this. To know more about the Aeschi model, you can read this blog here. It’s in the middle of the blog.

I know I should be feel ecstatic but I don’t for some reason. I liked that the guy gave me some more stuff on the Aeschi model to do some more research into it, but it was just general stuff. He also gave me his chapter in the book. OMG I should be jumping up and down (well not really but you get how I should be feeling). I just don’t understand why I am not feeling joy.

I guess I am just feeling like a nothing and this guy doesn’t think I am nothing if he is letting me acknowledge him in my book. But I just feel so blah. I don’t get it. An author I highly respect emails me back and says I can acknowledge his work in my book and I don’t feel anything but blah? I guess it just hasn’t hit me yet. I know this guy doesn’t know me and I don’t really know him. I know his works as I have read his professional papers and stuff. But I have never met the guy. And I just wrote to him telling him my life story. I am thinking I might have scared him off with that.

But then, if he gets scared easily with my multiple ideas of suicide, then how does he deal with it in his practice? Silly me. I did nothing but praise the guy. I know it isn’t exactly his model. It’s just common sense. I should just write a paper about Aeschi. I thought I wrote about it in my blogs but I can’t find it. I forgot what I called it. I know it’s there because the blog is in my book.

I had a good day, even if I am feeling blah. I realized today that I am neither happy nor depressed. I just don’t feel anything. I guess it is just anhedonia, another symptom of depression. And this time it is very thick. Usually I am ok with it but not being able to feel pleasure with things I used to enjoy bothers me. I find it hard to write when I am in this state. I also find that I am easily distracted to things. Music, for example, is distracting me as I write this. I have to concentrate on the lyrics for some reason when I am like this. Facebook is also distracting me. I just can’t concentrate on what I want to write. It is frustrating as all hell.

I might be depressed, but at least I am not thinking/planning on killing myself. Don’t know if that is a good thing or a bad thing. I keep waiting for the big hurt to come that causes me to think of killing myself. My pain, as much as it has flared recently, has been bearable. I don’t feel psychache. I don’t feel any type of psychological pain in a long time. The heaviness in my chest that was there before is gone. Maybe I have turned a corner. Maybe the suicide demons have gone away.

Reflections on the Year

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, chronic physical pain, depression, psychache, suicide, suicide attempt

Reflections on the year

This time last year I was deeply in physical pain and psychological pain and in the throws of a yet another nasty depression. I was asked to do a writing project for a friend and I didn’t think I would make it. I was sure by this time, on this date, I would be dead. And if I happened to be alive on Dec 17th, I would surely die by my own hand. I promised myself that if things were still the same, that this heaviness that I felt in my chest were not gone, that the pain in my ankle/leg/foot were not decreased, I was going to end things, permanently.

This year, things are still not a hundred percent better but things are less. My depressions are bearable when they hit. I have Wil Wheaton to thank for giving me the tidbit that my brain is not working right and that things will pass and be better tomorrow. My suicidality, though still a deep part of my soul, has decreased to the point where it is just thoughts I ruminate over and then give up. I figured out with the help of some books that this is always going to be a struggle for me, that my depression and pain are always going to be there. But like a former therapist said to me, you don’t always have to act on what you are feeling. These days, I am a little bit more hopeful about the future, though I don’t always see it. I still get hopeless every once in a while but it doesn’t last forever like it once did. I find that writing my blog has been a life saver for me. Mr. Hyde hasn’t come around in almost two months now and for that I am grateful. I have people in my life that have helped me see that I can succeed, even though I am disabled. It took a long time for me to accept my disability. Took longer to grieve it. But eventually, when I realized that part of the depression and suicidality was the grief I was not mourning, I took it apart piece by piece and wrote about it. There was nothing I could do about the pain except wait for the pain meds to work and for that I grateful that I have it. Also emailing my psychiatrist about the depth I was in helped as well. I don’t know if I am still going to have the same doc in 2014 and that scares me. I know that getting pain medication is going to be harder to get with new doctors and even harder as government rules will dictate the rules for prescribing rather than relying on clinical judgments. I don’t know what I will do then. But that is not my worry for today.

I don’t know what brought about the change. Maybe it was having a daily contact with someone miles away from me, urging me to continue my writing and work on a book. Maybe it was a little of owning the depression and taking charge of it, that it doesn’t have to rule my life like it would love to. I just know that I feel differently than I did a year ago. And though the impulses to kill myself are still a threat, I have a therapist that is behind me like a fungus that won’t go away. I really doubt without her countless sessions I would still be here. She really has been the one person that I can always rely on to be there when my mood is dark and gray. We might have our arguments about treatment but I know that she believes in me that things aren’t always going to be so bleak. I guess I have more people in my life now that believe that I can do things where last year I didn’t think I was going to survive my own lethality. I have been tested a few times this year to end my life. I have made several plans before today to end my life this year. My therapist can account for that. Though I have only had one psychotic break this year that required hospitalization. My hospitalizations have been fewer in recent years than they were in the past. I think that is more because I don’t think they help as they once did and that is a shame. You don’t get the care I once relied on.

Lastly, I have to thank country music for without listening to the same songs over and over for hours of despair, I doubt I would be able to make it though the horrible nights when I couldn’t sleep, either because of pain or despair or both. It is the one genre that I can relate to every song and let my brain do the escaping when I was writhing in agony. From songs like “water tower” by Jason Aldean to “Crash my party” by Luke Bryan, to Taylor’s endless songs and lastly to the other artists that I have followed but are not so popular, Casey James and Cassadee Pope. Without music, the heart just doesn’t heal from pain.