Tag: psychological pain

Saturday blog 18

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

Saturday Blog 18

I slept for most of the morning, which was good because I didn’t sleep good for most of the night. Pain kept waking me up. My brother in law was going to Stop and Shop so I went with him to get a few things. He told me my mother needed milk so I picked it up as well. I didn’t get my fish and chips like I wanted to because I was low on cash. I could just get the essentials, like cream, my powerade, and milk for my mother. That was all that I needed. When I get paid in two weeks, I will do real grocery shopping. I won’t be paying my cell phone bill again because it is already paid for the month. For the first time in months, I will have a little extra money so I might just get another online grocery order. It will save me time and energy from walking around the store. I can just click on what I want.

After the grocery store, I made coffee and watched the baseball game. We won 8-4. In the Bronx. Against the Skankees. HEHEHE. They made a costly error and then loaded the bases and we capitalized on it. Instead of the inning to be over, Aroid took his foot off the bag after review of the play. It was sweet that my favorite player, Brock Holt, then hit a double that cleared the bases. This guy is amazing. He was awesome last year and his awesomeness is continuing this year.

After the ball game, I watched some of my shows. I had to watch the Criminal Minds episode with Gary Sinise. I miss CSI NY so much that to see Gary again was a thrill. He still looks the same.

Other than going to the grocery store, I really haven’t done anything yet I feel really tired. I haven’t played any games all day. It was just sleep, store, baseball game, tv. I guess that is a lot of doing nothing but my ankle would beg to differ. It is hurting like I have been standing on it all day. I don’t know why, as I mostly have been sitting or reclining. But that is the pain syndrome for you. It does what it wants, with no rhyme or reason.

I wonder why is it that if you have terminal cancer and was given only a few months to live, people accept that reality more often than if someone says they are going to kill themselves. I keep thinking about things like this because cancer is held higher than suicide when it is just the same. You are going to die either way. Either through your own terms or cancer’s. And if you survive cancer, you are considered a hero. Yet you attempt suicide, you are shamed and blasted upon. I have accepted that I will probably take my life sometime this year. It is something I have thought about for sometime and though I am not thinking about suicide every day like I used to, I have a specific date that I want to end my life. Not because of shits and giggles, but because I am tired of being in pain all the time, mentally and physically. I know nothing can happen with my life. I fucked it up and there is no unfucking it, not unless I win the lottery. I will never be a therapist because I can’t go back to school. I am in the minority. I am transgendered and never will be accepted by anyone. And I just can’t live with this knowledge. My dreams went up in smoke when I became disabled, when I got diagnosed with mental illness when I was 16. I tried having a life but it just isn’t working out. I am depressed nearly every day for no good reason. I am tired of living this way. It must come to an end. I am just going to die anyway and I rather it be on my terms.

Twenty-Three Years

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, depression, mental illness, suicidality

Twenty-three years

Today marks twenty-three years that I have sought help for my depression and self-destructiveness. I actually didn’t seek help straight out. My English teacher noticed I was upset and pulled me aside and saw the marks on my wrist that I had made the night before. She then told me to stay after class, something no teacher has ever told me to do before. She took me to the nurse’s office. We chatted. I told her about what happened at my house the last two nights and how much I just wanted to die. She called my mother, who then took me to the local counseling center. By then, I told them “nothing was wrong” and that I was “okay”. I declined treatment and went on with my day. Daily visits to the nurse’s office became more frequent. I just stopped in to check in and told her what was going on. She wanted me to see someone so the following week I agreed to see the school counselor. Thus started my official journey into psychotherapy.

It hasn’t been an easy road. For the first ten years, I had a different therapist nearly every year. I think the only time I had two years was with the psych resident that wanted to see me or I would still be in the hospital. I went through a lot with this psychiatrist in training. While in her care, I attempt suicide and ended up being in the hospital for two and half months. When she ended her residency, I went to another psych in training. He wasn’t as good as she was. In fact, he was terrible. I felt like he was more my brother than a therapist but when I told him I was procuring more medication to end my life, he asked me if I was suicidal. That is when I knew he was an idiot. I pretty much ended our relationship within a few weeks and saw someone else. She was good, had years experience. But after I had an argument with my sister and she wanted to know more about my sister’s social life than my anger, I ended things with her. I went about a month without seeing someone. I then decided to go back to my town’s local mental health center. I saw someone there for a year and again, she decided to move on after that year mark. We were finally connected and I felt so betrayed. I didn’t think I was going to see another person again. I don’t know what changed my mind. I knew I didn’t want to see someone else at the local mental health center. I wanted to see someone private. I figured they were less likely to leave their practice. And I luckily found my current therapist and we have been together for fourteen years. It is the longest relationship I have had, outside of my psychiatrist. I am lucky that I have had just one psychiatrist for my medication all these years. She does more than just prescribe my medication. She also does some therapy and is my sounding board for the various medical issues that I have. And I can’t wait to see her again in a week after not seeing her for four long months. It is going to be weird seeing her again.

I don’t know why I have stuck it out in therapy all these years, especially when things were at their worst. I have been beyond hopeless and yet my psych team (therapist and psychiatrist) always made me see another day, sometimes against my wishes.

Response paper for Building a therapeutic alliance with suicidal patients

by Midnight Demon, posted in mood disorders, suicidality, suicide, suicide attempt

Response paper for Building a therapeutic alliance with suicidal patients.

This book is a work of genius among the top suicidologists in the U.S. and Europe. These people actually want to help suicidal people get better and try to make their life worth living. Like most of Drs. David Jobes and Konrad Michal work, they have done an excellent review of the literature and made the book easy to read without a lot of psychological jargon. This book should be used as a handbook for anyone dealing with suicidal individuals. As someone who has been through many suicidal episodes with many different therapists, this book is groundbreaking. It lists his classic work of CAMS (collaborating and managing suicidality) which is a tried and true way of dealing with lethal suicidality in an outpatient setting. The other evidence based therapists will enhance therapy around this work.
The Chapters are broken down easy enough and progress from good to bad in my opinion, of the treatments that work. The conclusion was brilliant by Dr. Jobes. He has stated with clarity the hardships that are faced with suicidality such as the IRB approvals for research, clinicians wanting to work with this population, and the need to try and keep these people in therapy.

A quote

by Midnight Demon, posted in Bipolar Disorder, chronic physical pain, depression, mental illness

“Never kill yourself while you are suicidal. You can, if you must, think about suicide as much as your wishes and let the thoughts of suicide –the possibility that you could do it- carry you through the dark night. Night after night. Day after day, until the thoughts of self-destruction runs its course and a fresh view of your own frustrated needs comes into clearer form in your mind and you can, at last, pursue the realistic aspects, however dire, of your natural life”. –Edwin Shneidman, Suicidal Mind, p166

I came across this passage on the last page of the book. I found it meaningful because I have spent night after night, day after day, thinking about ending my life. I have even thought about ending my life when I wasn’t so depressed and hopeless, but I never felt the urgency to end it when I wasn’t in horrendous emotional pain, or physical pain as it has been the last few years. I posted this, during a chat last night. I guess you can say that I interrupted the chat. It wasn’t my intention. I forgot the chat was taking place during that time. I tried to participate in the rest of the chat but as usual, I didn’t. Yet a few of us had a discussion on the side about how we let our providers know if we are suicidal or not. My experience with my PCP is not to let on that I am suicidal, unless he asks me directly. I cannot bullshit my way out of a paper bag so I will answer honestly when asked a question. Most times, I get the third degree about my suicidal tendencies and my narcotic medication. He wants to make sure I am “safe” with it. What he doesn’t know, even though I have told him a million times, is I am more afraid of the Tylenol content than I am of the narcotic content. But I still get the drill of asking if I am safe with the medication. I really want to say that I have other plans that are more lethal but I don’t for fear of getting tossed in the psych ER.

I am feeling like a caged rat these days. I haven’t been able to get my coffee/latte at Starbucks in weeks because of the severe snow we have been getting. I thought I would be able to go out today but the buses are on a reduced schedule because of the holiday and still trying to get dug out of the snow. Plus, it’s a measly 1 degree out. So I am just staying in my room, again. I am listening to the radio today. Unfortunately, my favorite DJ is off today. We sometimes chat on Twitter.

I found out that my book is being sold on Ebay in the UK. I think it’s funny, but whatever gets my book sold, I am for. I am supposed to send out my book to reviewers, but because of my depleted funds and mail being disrupted due to the snow, I think I will wait until the end of the month. Hope by then, the storms will have gone away. Tomorrow and Wednesday we are expected to get more snow. It’s terrible. I don’t remember a winter this harsh. I just fear flooding when it all melts.

I guess today would be a good day to work on my short story. I will try and work on it after I write this blog. The nice thing about this story is that it’s new. I haven’t posted it on my blog and I don’t think I am going to. Unlike my “Darkness will Win” post, that is going to be published. I am working on collecting a few blogs and short stories together to make my second book. I just hope that formatting goes easier the second go round. The first time it was a nightmare. I literally had to go through all 150 pages to make sure they were formatted correctly on each page. And for the life of me, I could not get the acknowledgements page to be on its own. Drove me crazy! The first copy of the Kindle was all messed up. Luckily, only a few people bought it. I fixed it best I could but I still think there is a blank page in there somewhere.

I haven’t had much appetite the last few days. I don’t know why this is. I am depressed but I am not “that” depressed. At least the day time sleepiness is gone. My therapist is on vacation this week. It sucks having her away. My psychiatrist is still out with her broken hip. I just communicate with her via email. I sent her a couple of emails and got no response as usual. I wish she would acknowledge the damn thing so 1) I know she got it and 2) I get a little feedback. I just feel like I am roughing it on my own these days. I stopped taking my antidepressant because it stopped working. I wasn’t going to increase it without her being in the office. Plus it was causing me to keep the weight on as it increased my appetite. I haven’t noticed a big change in my mood since stopping it. I really don’t miss taking it. One less pill to take at night.