Tag: psychotherapist

thoughts floating around the brain

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

Thoughts floating around the brain

I took a nap that was longer than I wanted to take. Now I am having trouble sleeping. I am not in a super amount of pain, but just enough to let me know it is there, like it always is. I really didn’t eat much today and I probably should eat something but other than my frozen burrito, I don’t know what to have. I would have cereal but the milk sometimes upsets my stomach. If I am able to afford groceries next week, I will get some almond milk or soy.

I am feeling guilty that my psych feels she needs to keep tabs on me. She wasn’t judgmental about what I wrote to her nor did she panic like I knew some mental health professionals might. She has known me for a long time and I think she knows that even though I get really suicidal I haven’t really acted on it in years. There may have been a few occasions where I have taken one too many doses of things that I told her about that usually lead to a hospitalization or the tone of an email that signaled to her that things were not right with me. I told her how the meds are messing with my cognitions around writing. It is rare that I am writing at this hour (just before midnight) but then this is blog isn’t called “Midnightdemons” for fun. I write around or after the midnight hour.

With technically yesterday being my anniversary of my blog, I really started thinking about what this blog means to me. It has always been my outlet to either share information about suicidal research papers or books that I think maybe helpful. I am not sure if there are any clinicians that still follow my blog as I have turned this more into a chronic pain/depression blog but still talk about the daily chronic suicidal feelings I have. There are some days that I have no idea how I got through them and even if you asked me, I have no answers. I know when I got really suicidal back in May and there were two nights where pain was really bad that I had wanted to act on my feelings in the worse way. I just kept holding out for daylight because then I knew I would be okay but those nights were long and how I was able to get to sleep before those daylight hours or close to it, I am not sure. My psych has been there more for me since my therapist of 16 years left me two years ago. She has been my only rock and continues to be because therapists don’t tend to stay in my life that long. I have no idea how I lucked out with her. I truly don’t. And if she has a reason for that, she hasn’t told me.

There was a lecture that someone posted about psych meds and whether people with chronic mental illness needs to be on them long term as they don’t really know if they work the way we think they do. But there is that medical model of trying to “cure” and to do something to alleviate suffering. Some people will say these medicines have saved their lives. I used to believe that but now I am not so sure. I don’t want to be on them but I know what my life is like off them. I really want to get off the antipsychotic I am on but it took a really long time for me to find something that helped keep the delusions, paranoia, and “bad” voices away. I still have two or three that are my “normal” voices and the one that “reads” to me while reading a book or something. Without this “reading” voice, I cannot comprehend the words on the page. I can read the words but they make no sense to me. I found that when I was on high doses of trilafon, it stopped all my voices and I literally couldn’t function. It was around this time that I had to consistently take an antipsychotic. The voices just got worse as I grew older and with it, took longer to control. I don’t have side effects from this drug but I am just wondering if the Ativan is what is keeping those side effects at bay like it did with the previous one I was taking.

The lecture was interesting. I didn’t finish watching the whole hour and half but just got the gist of what it was all about. It is on youtube though I don’t remember the name of the video.

My pain hasn’t been horrific the past day and a half, which is kind of freaking me out a bit. But because it hasn’t been, my suicidality has been lower than it has been the past few weeks. These breaks are welcome because being highly suicidal all the time is just a dangerous place to be in. Even though I was hospitalized for three weeks in May, I didn’t give up my plan on how to end my life. That is still ongoing. I am just finding that I keep getting closer to acting on it with each flare that I have as the pain just makes me feel so hopeless and I want to escape from it so bad. My psych knows that pain is the principle driver in my suicidality. She understands it, maybe not all of it, but she validates what I go through, which is more than what anyone has done for me regarding it. I am not sure if the therapist will. We are still learning about each other and how she can help me. But it will take some time before that happens. I don’t know if she will ask how my suicidality will be from here on out or if she will just go with it if I don’t bring it up. We haven’t made any plans surrounding it and she hasn’t even said to reach out to her if I am in trouble so I am again not too trusting of her, least not yet. I tend to keep my suicidal stuff private with people. Sure I write about it here but how many people that I interact with read my blog on a daily or semi-daily basis? Some people don’t even know I have a blog unless I tell them. I feel like I have to keep my suicidal thoughts private because I don’t want to end up in the ED or hospital every time I bring them up. That doesn’t help me. In fact, it will just piss me the fuck off, and that is the last thing you should do when you are suicidal.

tough painful week

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

Tough painful week

I’ve had a rough week both physically and emotionally. Monday I semi said goodbye to my psych of 26 years. She still wants to care for me so when she finds another home, she will call me. She is not sure where she will be as she has not thought that far. I totally understand that. I figure it might be a few months but in the meantime I will still be in contact with her either through phone or email. I started having side effects of my mood stabilizer, which is really bad timing as I am not currently under direct care of a psychiatrist. My psych is trying to push seeing someone faster. My pcp’s social worker is also trying to get me to see a gender affirming psych that is joining the clinic. I just had bloods drawn for a level as last time I was barely therapeutic. I am having double vision and just to make sure there isn’t something wrong with my eyes, I am seeing my eye doc next week.

I had PT which was sort of good. On Saturday, I did some stuff around my room. Sunday I did a little more even though my back didn’t like it. Monday I was okay until I was coming home from my psych’s appointment. Back flared up terribly. I was still hurting when I saw my PT on Tuesday. She gave me some decompressing exercises to do. I was really hurting past few days as I have been having pain go down my leg and the pain was near my spine yesterday when I was coming home from the therapist appointment.

The therapist appointment went well. I found out what kind of therapist she is and I think it is going to work out. She loves the Sox and we both have the same favorite player, though she is a lot more obsessive than I am about him!! At one point, I thought she was going to jump down my throat when I was criticizing him and she stopped me before I could say anything. Yikes! I have my next appointment with her the week after next. She is a CBT therapist but also has some DBT stuff. I am going to bring her my copy of Craig Bryan’s CBT for suicide attempters and see if she is receptive to it. If she isn’t, then I guess that will be okay and we can go from there. I will have a hard time with it though as I feel like I have all these things that could possibly help me with my suicidality but I don’t have a therapist to go along with it and it frustrates the hell out of me! I did ask her if she would turn me away and she said no. I was relieved to hear this. Maybe she will work out after all.

My sister had sent me texts Wed saying she wanted to take my stuff upstairs today. I told her no as I knew I would be hurting as I have all week. Fortunately, she decided to go to the beach so I didn’t have to deal with her. We haven’t really spoken kind words to each other since she moved in. I really don’t care as she really hasn’t been there and doesn’t understand anything I have been going through since I have been on disability. I really don’t see this changing. Maybe when the work on the house is done with but certainly not right now.

A couple of hours ago, I used the bathroom. I normally don’t really look in the mirror as I hate my face. Today I did and much to my surprise, I have darker hair around my jawline! The fuzz is becoming darker. I was so excited. I knew I had to post transition pics, which I did on Instagram and facebook. I kind of did on Twitter, too, though didn’t give as big a description. Kind of hard to do when you only have 240 characters. I just sent it out to a couple of people that want to keep track of my transition. I hope when my T gets increased next week, the facial hair will come in faster and darker. I would love to come downstairs one morning and shock the hell out of my mother with a beard. I am not sure she knows I am on T. I sure as hell didn’t tell her. I am not sure if she asked my sisters or if my sisters told her. She hasn’t said a word to me about anything. I have mentioned that I will be having my breasts removed. She didn’t seem to like that at all. Yet she wants me to be “happy.” I don’t think I can ever be happy as I don’t know what the hell it is. I rather be content but the way things are going, I doubt that will ever happen. I forced myself to shower because some icky water fell on me. I have this thing that turns musty smells to water and the container fell on me. I had to shower. I was hurting afterwards. My back wanted to kill me. I started getting suicidal thoughts again. I have been having them on and off since being discharged from the hospital. They haven’t been really bad like they were. I have thought on a few occasions to end it and started to plan it but once the pain backed off, so did the planning. I just wish something helped with the flares. Since changing my meds to something else, nothing has worked for the flares. The 24/7 pain has been lowered. I wake up with a 2 or 3 but sometimes if I have more than a few days activity, I will have ankle/foot pain that is more than I can bear. I haven’t been able to find something to help ease that pain. Distraction works but only to a point. I could watch a movie but soon as that movie is over, the pain returns, sometimes worse than what it was before I started watching the movie. Last night I did five cryptograms. It was really cool as I really miss doing them. I started to remember the hacks. Some were really too difficult for me so had to go to a new puzzle. One quote was perfect for my psych so I sent it to her. I also sent her the transition pics and the excitement about growing in a beard. I half want to shave the stuff off just to see if it would grow back thicker but my friends told me to leave it alone. Hair under my chin is growing more together. Just wish it was in the middle of my chin. There is still a bare spot.

Guess that is all for today. Not sure if I will post over the weekend. It has been difficult finding my words lately, hence the spotty posts. Thanks for reading and understanding.

We don’t have to talk, I just want to hear your voice

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

We don’t have to talk, I just want to hear your voice

So I am going to try and crank this out as the Sox are playing and Luke Combs, Lady A, and Matt Snell continue to break my heart. This maybe long as there is a lot of stuff to talk about since I haven’t written in a week. So grab some coffee or something.

I’ve been battling a UTI (urinary tract infection) for the past week and a half. My pcp did not consult with me on antibiotics so the first course of treatment did not work. I finished on Sunday and Monday I had the foul smelly, cloudy urine again. I had called the pcp office but it was late in the day and no one got back to me. Tuesday I was able to get a hold of the idiot RN and told him my symptoms. I had an appointment with the new therapist and hoped he would get back to me as I was passing blood at this point. My results came back early afternoon but I got no call from my pcp or provider letter. So Wed I am hurting really bad. I am passing blood clots, blood, and mucus and it was extremely painful doing so. Bladder pain was terrible and I kept losing control of my urine as the urges to go were not to be messed with. At one point I waited a bit too long and thankfully had a diaper on because otherwise I would have had a puddle on my rug as I couldn’t even open the door before losing it. I was getting pissed (no pun intended). I called the office and the RN said that I did have infection (ya think) and my doc called in a prescription. Again my doc DID NOT CALL ME! I asked which one and I said I have no effect with that one I need to be on this one. Wed all I had to eat was some Ramen noodles. I didn’t want to eat or drink anything. Thursday I slept all day. I only ate when my protein bars came in. I had wanted to be up before my night meds but I wasn’t so the med alarm woke me from sleep. My mother too had called which annoyed me more than the phone alarm. I had flank pain but it was minor. I had 2 doses of antibiotics. I emailed my psych to ask her if I should go to the ER as I thought I was dehydrated. We fiddled with how much I was to drink but in the end my stomach only took 3 oz (90 mL). I then felt nauseous and I went to bed. My psych wanted me to get in touch with her today. I said ok.

5 am this morning, I woke up with worse flank pain and felt really lousy. It still hurt to pee but I wasn’t passing clots or mucus. I emailed my psych about this and went back to sleep after taking some Tylenol. I just figured it was nothing but maybe soreness from not eating and drinking anything. When I woke up to my morning meds, my psych had emailed back that I should contact my pcp as flank pain is not something you get with a UTI. Shit. I knew it wasn’t but I really didn’t want to go to the ER. I wanted to bake cookies. So I emailed her I would go to the ER as I wasn’t contacting my PCP again to talk with his idiot RN. I have no idea why good doctors have idiot staff. When I got to the hospital, I called his office just to let him know I was in the ED. Within fifteen minutes my PCP calls me and I tell him what was going on. He said that was the right thing and sent me on my way. ED ran tests but in the end it was to drink more (I laughed at this) and keep the course of antibiotics. OK. On the way home, I sent a message to PCP asking him to do some more urine tests to make sure the damn infection I have is fucking gone. I then sent one to my psych. She responded by asking what did they say. I told her and then asked if she wanted me to call her over the weekend. Our last weekend. I haven’t heard back, yet.

On Monday 17 June, I met with my psych. She told me some very bad, horrible news that has left me feeling numb but really angry at the institution we worked at. Her department wanted her to step down from whatever position and she said no. So they terminated her, June 30th is her last day. My last appointment with her is June 24, this coming Monday. I still have not processed it but I tried on Wed to write something. I knew it had been more than a few days since writing a blog. For the first time in almost 7 years, I lost my words. I couldn’t even begin to write about this and still am tearing up about it. I have been thinking about her and all we have went through. Wed night I wrote her something then couldn’t sleep. I didn’t go to bed till I don’t even remember the hour. Must have been late/early as I slept almost all of yesterday. There is no way in hell I could write what the last 26 years have been like in a paragraph or even in one long blog. I wrote two pages until my brain and emotions were fried. Then I kept fine tuning it. Adding stuff, fixing, punctuating, grammar, you name it. After the third go round I said fuck it and sent it to her with a PS saying that this might not be grammatically correct or something to that effect. In the email, I told her to open it at her leisure, maybe with a few tissues and I would bring a box on Monday.

She said I would be assigned another psychiatrist in the adult department, which so far I haven’t. She wants to have a Lamictal level drawn the next time I see my PCP so if he responds to the urine tests, I will ask him then. I have been preoccupied with her leaving and the UTI that I forgot. I tried not to break down though I did shed some tears. She asked if I could come in next week and I didn’t know what to say. She just shook her head yes and I said ok. The end of June is coming and it would be our last time together for a while. She said she is trying to find some other academic home and then when she gets sets up she plans on calling me. She said her email and phone number wouldn’t change (I am not 100% that is true. I know with me, I was cut off the day they let me go. They might have different stuff for MDs.) I thought of making her my marinara sauce, which I am still planning on doing on Sunday. I wanted to back cookies for her. I am hoping to do so tomorrow if I don’t have an all nightery with pain or emotions. Last night, I realized not only did I not have a copy of my second book on ANY of the 8 thumb drives I had, I also no longer have roots holding my tree up. It was a story I wrote that I don’t think I ever published on my blog. It was about my therapist and psychiatrist keeping me here. One of the roots said goodbye for reasons I still don’t know what they were. Now the other root is leaving me and I have nothing holding me up.

Tuesday was a bigger nightmare as I was supposed to meet with a new therapist. I was so fucking nervous because I knew if she didn’t want to take me on or I didn’t like her off the bat, I would have NO mental health services at all, none! So I went to the appointment and she asked me a shit ton of questions. I carefully worded and didn’t elaborate on anything that would lead to my suicidality. Least not until she said I was discharged from the psych unit and I immediately wanted to die. She asked if I was suicidal. I said no and then asked what would I end it when I leave here. I said no. Throughout, she kept on saying my psychiatrist terminated me and I must feel abandoned. When I asked where do we go from here, she asked what did I want to do, like she had no interest in seeing me ever again. That felt so welcoming. Mind you, when she went into the waiting room she called for someone with my birthname. So we didn’t exactly start off the right foot. I told her I had a three session rule and then I would decide if I would stay on or not. Though, if at three sessions I didn’t, there was no where else for me to go. She asked who I would call should I get suicidal and I said my psych and then it dawned on me, she wasn’t going to be there anymore and fuck, I damn near lost it.

I wrote to my psych and said the therapist said I feel abandoned and I said I didn’t. My psych responded saying I may feel that way. I wrote back I would if this was good bye and it is more of a see you later, or is it? She never responded back. Later that day, Luke Combs came out with the song, Even though I am leaving, and I just about lost it. It was perfect to all the stuff I feel about my psych. This cannot be goodbye.

If I don’t write next week, please know it is most likely due to emotional overload and cannot find the words to the hurt or whatever I feel. I see the therapist Thursday.

thoughts of the midnight demon

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

Thoughts of the midnight demon

“I haven’t slept all night as I have been in a lot of pain between my back (low pressure changes) and my ankle/foot. I am sharing with you something I have been sort of keeping from you because of fear of hosp.

Been in a quandary about what you said and what I talked about with a social worker friend. she thinks I should be evaluated. Parts of me agree but the one question, I cannot answer is the “why now…what has changed?” Frankly I don’t know. I wanted to end my life March 29th. I made the decision sometime in January. Since that time I held off for a week because the weather interfered with my plan. I have every thing worked out except the small details of where to leave my benefits pension information, banks, passwords to different accts, etc.

A few nights of despair with pain and psychache caused my plan to be more imminent. I couldn’t stand to reach my means to end my life so when I was “well”, I moved it closer. When I emailed you last night, I was so overwhelmed because I had planned, again, to end things this weekend. I’ve always had a plan and the means to carry it out. I don’t know why I haven’t acted. I know I don’t want to do it in my room. I rather be at some deserted place, which I have picked out but weather has been a factor in me getting there.

I still do not think hospital is the answer. It will not help except to babysit me and maybe give me more time to think things through or maybe work through the hard stuff and see where it leads me, but it is doubtful as the hospital just thinks this is an outpt issue (aka longer term) and once my level of safety is down, I will be released even if my “risk” factors are high.

Maybe Dr. Goldstein’s SW will be able to help me in the short term. I don’t know. I am scared to tell anyone but those I trust deeply (you). When I asked you Friday and you told me why you wanted me to live it gave me some hope to live again. Least for a day and a half. I do have plans for a book. But if I don’t get past these suicidal disturbances (I can send you a paper on it if you like), I don’t see the point in any of it. I am also ambivalent about asking for help because I have been rejected so many times or just have no received the care to reduce my internal struggle. I know this will not be an overnight thing. I know it is not a medication thing either (though I wish it were).

I honestly don’t know what to do. part of me wants to roll the dice and see if I die. Another part wants to attempt so maybe the hospital will take me more “seriously”. Walking in voluntarily hasn’t seemed to help much. I rather avoid the hospital all together and just do something else but not sure what that is.

these are my thoughts. I won’t tell you what my means are or where I am planning on ending things. Just know they are there and within reach. I have no method of planning a date. Any Friday will do, just so I can fuck with the suicide statistics.”

This is what I sent my psychiatrist. I felt she had to know because I sent her an email last night and she called me within ten minutes asking if she should send an ambulance to my house. She is worried about me, to say the least. I am so ambivalent about doing the acting part of taking my life. I don’t have to do it. That part is clear. But I want to do it so the thoughts will leave me, so that I can say I did it and then well, if I succeed then fine. If I don’t, I will be indeed a failure and I will accept the consequences. I have not chosen a very lethal means. I don’t have a gun and I don’t plan on hanging myself. But what I have chosen might end up killing me if I hit the right spot. The more I think about it the more I want to do it. It is like a nagging thing inside my head. I feel like I have two things on each side of my shoulders like in cartoons, one is like a good part and the other a bad part. Each one seems to talk louder than the other and I still survive the hellish nights of wanting to die so damn bad.

I know my means needs to go to someone else, for now. Not indefinitely. I know I should talk with someone who isn’t afraid of suicide and will hear me out when I am suicidal without resorting to hospitalization when I bring it up. I also will not abide by “suicide contracts” basically I am safe until next session without a clear plan on what to do in the meantime. If a safety plan or crisis response plan is not implemented and I am held accountable to actually do it (fuck I am wicked bad at my suggestions and following through because I know best type of thing. I am also bad at giving advice and not listening to it when it involves me). I would like a therapist that is willing to work with me on specific skills to decrease my suicidality like DBT or CBT, brief. But that involves that they actually know how to treat someone who is chronically suicidal or at least, knows chronic suicidal ideations. Otherwise, what good is either of them. CAMS is good (my opinion, the gold standard) but there are very few, if at all, therapists in the Boston area that have this type of training, least to my knowledge. There was a therapist in Cambridge that had the type of training best suited to me but unfortunately the bitch never had the courtesy of calling me back.

I have been up all night. I will most likely sleep all day. I am tempted to send this to my pcp’s social worker and see what she has to say. I will send her the link, maybe. I am very selective on who I let in on my suicidal world.

For those reading this, I am safe. I am not going to kill myself this week. I currently don’t have a specific plan in mind at the moment. So do me a favor and not call the police on me because you read this and said “omg suicidal, call the cops”.