Tag: suicidality

Starbucks and Drink Made Wrong

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

Starbucks and Drink Made Wrong

After I had breakfast this morning, I really wanted to go back to sleep. But instead, I forced myself to catch the next bus and headed to my second home, Starbucks. I ordered my drink to the new guy, which was the same person I had yesterday, a Hazelnut latte with mocha drizzle. Instead I got a hazelnut mocha latte. I just shook my head and drank the drink, which was way too sweet for me. If I do order such a drink, I usually ask for 2 pumps of mocha and 2 of hazelnut to try and cut down on the sugar. I didn’t throw a tizzy like I wanted to. I was already in a sour mood because I read a comment on one of my friend’s posts about anxiety. According to my friend’s friend, “Jesus commands us not to worry or have anxiety”. As someone who suffers from occasional anxiety attacks, I found this preposterous. I was very upset about it and wanted to say something but just continued to scroll through my Facebook feed. I can’t believe such ignorance exists in this day and age.

So that put me in a bad mood already. Then my mother called asking if I had any money, which I guess she wanted me to buy her eggs or something on the way home. I told her I was el broko until next week. I came home and thankfully she didn’t ask me to go back out again. My ankle is hurting despite taking a pain med before leaving the house for my second home.

I wrote in my journal most of the time while at Starbucks. I still am irate at the care that I received at the hospital. I see my psychopharm tomorrow and I am kind of nervous about seeing her. It will be the first time seeing her in almost a month. I wish I could say that I am a changed person, but I still feel the same, minus the heavy depression and suicidality. My mood has lessened to the point where I can function again. I have my interests back. Though I am kind of pissed I have an extra page worth of missions in my game that I play on Facebook. In some respects, I am better, but I can’t say it was because of the care I received. I am not saying I was treated poorly. I just wish that some of my issues were dealt with rather than being put off till tomorrow and not talking about it. I pretty much felt that I was just being babysat and checked on every 15 minutes, 24/7 the whole time I was there. I got more help with the contact person than I did with my case manager and attending psychiatrist. I was lucky though. I was half expecting a psychotic break as what usually happens after a deep depression passes. But I guess the hypomania took care of that. I do take an antipsychotic, so I am guessing that prevented the break.

I didn’t make too many contacts with the other patients on the floor. I did connect with one patient and we text one another. I haven’t heard from her today but she is getting discharged today. I might text her later today to see how she is doing. But if the relationship doesn’t continue, I can understand. I have had many experiences with friendships that form in the unit that don’t continue past discharge.

Next week I will be sending off my books to the AAS for review. I am kind of nervous about it. My book is very personal and intimate and powerful. I wrote about my deep emotions and all that goes into being suicidal. The fear of this being criticize is what keeps holding me back from sending it. But I know that if I don’t send it, I will never know how a professional will view my book. It is important that I put my book out there to a professional organization yet I know the downfall of it. My biggest fear is that the books will be sent back with a rejection. But I never will know unless I try, right?

I still need to email the editor of the AAS blog and see when my piece is going to get posted. It has been months and I still have not seen it posted. I know there are many stories to be told, and the blog is only published weekly, but I still think my piece on chronic pain and suicidal thinking should be posted. It is an important topic that often gets ignored.

Do I

by Midnight Demon, posted in suicide attempt

Do I

“Do I” is a song by Luke Bryan, one of my favorite male artists. Every time I hear the song, I wonder if my therapist and I are still a good fit. I think we are as we have been together for so long, but I often wonder if I am too much for her to bear or that I am a burden to her.

I went to Starbucks for the first time in four weeks. All my baristas were gone from the Davis location. I was so bummed not to see familiar faces. I hope they were off that day or just on vacation. I will be super bummed if I have to deal with new people. I will go there tomorrow and see how they make a clover coffee. I won’t order their reserve, just the Pike. I seem to like that better than their regular iced coffee, probably because it is made fresh.

I am still feeling good. Today on Mental Health chat on Twitter, the discussion was bipolar disorder. I have been diagnosed with bipolar as I have had some hypomanic episodes. I have never been full blown manic. I had one episode while I was in the hospital. I was really jocular and upbeat. I was also really racy and despite taking Ativan regularly, it still didn’t alter my mood. This lasted until I took some pain meds and then I crashed, hard over this past weekend. It was fun while it lasted and I wish I still felt that great. I felt like nothing could touch me. Suicide was furthest from my mind and I felt like I was on top of the world, even though I was in a psych hospital. It was very strange. I was expecting to go down, but I wasn’t expecting to be “that” down. I was really tired and just needed to rest but I was too restless to actually sleep. I took a prn to calm down some and finally was able to get some rest. Everyone was telling me I looked tired and down. With my anticipated discharge on Monday, I was thinking that it was not going to happen. I really didn’t want to leave the hospital feeling the way I did this weekend. It was such a major depressive episode that I didn’t want to chance leaving the hospital and then acting on my thoughts. So I had to practically beg to stay one more day. My case manager asked me why I wanted to die. I told her to end the pain and the indignity that I was feeling with my disability. I really just wanted to say “are you fucking kidding me”? This hospitalization, I experienced everything I do when I am home. I crapped my pants, leaked urine, was suicidal more than a few times, and was overall, severely depressed. The hypomania was a godsend. I just wish it lasted longer than it did. But it never does and the longer it lasts, the worse my depression is. I think I had a total of 12 hours of it. Not long enough to do any financial damage or anything, but enough to let me know I was alive again, that something inside me wants to keep going no matter what the suicidal thoughts might be.

My writing partner has suggested that I write a book about coping as a suicide attempt survivor. I have been giving it some serious thought and I think I can write it. I don’t know if I am going to write it in blog form or book form yet. Depends on how much I can actually write. But a large part of what works for me is already out there but people don’t utilize it. For example, I gave the crisis response plan (see this blog about it) to one of the patients because it was less confusing than what the hospital was giving out about distress tolerance. The hospital uses DBT type of works, which is fine for some people but may not fit for everyone. And, who the fuck is going to look at a piece of paper when they are in crisis mode?? I know I am not. I have been there too many times. But I have found that the crisis response plan has been helpful to me since David Jobes uses it in his work with suicidal patients.

One of the mental health counselors was interested in my book and the SSF, Suicide Status Form (see my comparisons of psychological pain scales for more information). I wish I could publish it on my blog but it is not available in electronic form and I would be violating copyrights. I use this in my therapy when I am suicidal. It helps because it gives my therapists some way of knowing which areas are causing me to want to die. I think it would be wonderful to use in an inpatient stay but I don’t get to make those types of decisions. Anyway, this MHC and I were talking about it and it was so good to talk about clinical stuff with someone again rather than just stuff about me. It was like being back in academia again where exchanging ideas is so important for learning. I just wish my treatment team was on board with my ideas for my treatment than just saying that I have to stay away from suicide stuff. I told them that I can’t. It is apart of me like breathing. I am always thinking about what is best for me and I am always searching for an answer to end the suicidal thoughts. Just telling me to stop is not going to work. I read clinical stuff as well as blogs because I want to keep abreast of the latest research. Even though I am no longer a member of the AAS, I still keep up with the suicide research. I wish I could afford their membership but I am on such a fixed budget that I can’t. I also would love to have the archives of suicide research journal but again, I can’t afford membership. It totally sucks. I was hoping that the sales of my book would provide me with additional income but it hasn’t taken off the way that I wanted it to. I have not reached my goal of selling 100 books, though I am half way there. While I was in the hospital, I sold two books. Not my personal copies, just through Amazon. I did bring one with me to give away but I never did. I still have it. My book signing has not gone well. It brought extra income just to buy food and the essentials. The struggles of the writer. I just have to find the right audience to get my book sold.

I am planning on getting my book reviewed by the AAS (American Association of Suicidology). It will be sent out next week along with a book for my editor. I have been meaning to send it out but things always seemed to get in the way. I wasn’t planning on being in the hospital for so long. I really thought I was going to stay a few days and that would be it but they had other plans when I told them I was going to kill myself when I got out. Hospitals tend to frown upon that. I put them in a “bind”. Sorry, but that was how I was feeling. I really was in bad shape and all that I was feeling felt normal to me. Looking back, I see that I wasn’t as rational as I thought I was. I guess that small overdose was the wake up call for my outpatient treaters to put me in the hospital.

home

by Midnight Demon, posted in depression, mood disorders

I am home from the hospital. I am feeling less suicidal than when I first came in and the case manager said I did a good job in staying an extra day to sort out my feelings. I was apprehensive about leaving but now I am okay and in my bed, which I missed very much. I am writing this on my laptop so it won’t take me five years to crank out a blog and it will be comprehensible as I won’t be using the touch screen on my tablet. God that was good in a pinch but aggravating to type on as it distracted the flow as I had to correct stuff as I was typing it. Like it would correct “three” with “there” when I really wanted to say Three. I supposed I should have used the number but I didn’t think of it at the time. Silly me.

I have my prescriptions being filled. The bad part is that I won’t be getting them tonight as the pharmacy is backed up. I am going to try and pick them up around 8 before they close as I will need the new blood pressure pill they put me on. My blood pressure has been high and so has been my pulse. I know it’s most likely because I am stressed and overweight, but one thing at a time. I am going to try and lose some more weight but it’s hard. I really am hungry right now and want to munch on things. Worst part is that there are cheese doodles that are calling my name. But I am going to be a good boy and not think about it. I know I gained a few pounds while I was in the hospital because I ate out of boredom. I just hope I didn’t gain too much or my PCP is going to have my head! And it is going to be harder to lose the weight than gaining it. I wish losing it was as easy as gaining. It sucks.

I forgot that I spent my last twenty bucks so I am fucking screwed in paying for my pills. I might have to borrow money from my sister, again. I hate doing so because she has her daughter’s college tuition to pay for. I just feel bad asking her for money. I don’t get paid till next week and I can’t go a week without my meds. That will not be good.

My mother is making stuffed chicken so I will have my first home cooked meal in a month. I can’t believe that I spent almost four weeks in the hospital. But I needed to be there. I really had no idea how sick I was. I just hope it stays this way, least for a while. I really don’t want to go back and I doubt that I will. I just miss my therapist and can’t wait till she is back next week. We have a lot to catch up on.

Runaway Train

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, depression, mood disorders, suicide

“Can you help me remember how to smile
make it somehow all seem worthwhile
how on earth did I get so jaded
life’s mysteries seem so faded”

These are the lyrics to Soul Asylum’s Runaway Train. These lyrics have been resonating with me over the past few days. The meaning is quite clear. I feel I don’t remember how to smile. Life seems jaded, far away from me. Another line is “somehow I’m neither here nor there” I ave been struggling with my alter Mr. Hyde the past few days. Last night he really wanted to come out and play. So I let him write yesterday’s blog and the lyrics to this song for my therapist. He seemed satisfied.

Runaway Train has been my favorite song since it came out in the early 90’s. The lyrics touch me very deeply. It’s a song about abuse, neglect, and the need to escape these things. Yet not matter where we go, they always follow us. Like the lyrics state “Runaway train never going back, wrong way on a one way track, seems like I should be getting somewhere, somehow I’m neither here nor there”

Every time hear the song my heart aches because I can never escape the pain. One of the tracks is “bought a ticket for a runaway train, like a madman laughing at the rain, a little out of touch, little insane, Just easier than dealing with the pain.

I interpret the ticket with suicide and how pain is dealt with. Suicide, for me, has always been my ticket out of this world. I read about it to understand it better. I write about it to feel better. Yet I know one day I will lose the battle, like Robin Williams, and take my own life. There is no way I can educate my family for my loss. For they refuse to acknowledge that I have mental illness. According to my sister “there is no mental illness on her side of the family”. This was said three weeks after my last hospitalization for depression. It’s tough to deal with. Yet I have no strength to educate them after all these years. I am surprised my brother in law hasn’t called me. But then, he, too, is in denial about things.

The last line of the song always gets me. It says “I runaway but it always seems the same” And it’s true. No matter how many times I have a depressive episode, it’s like my first and aways feels like it’s never going to end. Then I remember, usually by the scars on my wrist, that things were worst. Things always seem the same with depression but they never really are. Each episode takes a piece of you that cannot be replaced or taken back. Each episode tears you apart ad brings you to the edge of suicide nearly every time. And it hurts in ways you cannot describe. So I am on the one way track, trying never to go back, but I’m neither here nor there.