Tag: suicide attempt

notebook from the past

by Midnight Demon, posted in cauda equina syndrome, CES, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders, physical pain, psychache, suicide, suicide attempt

I am wretched and know not why. I am healthy yet I am ill. There is no diagnostic test to tell where the pain is from yet I want to die from it. I fear that it will kill me. A hundred years ago I’d be locked away in an asylum. This day and age I’m forced to be a functional person with no symptoms of a psychic malady.

Pain that is so bad that nothing can relieve it. Almost as if a pericardial centesis is the only way to drain the pain out but as there is no effusion it will be dry.

This is something that I wrote twelve years ago. I can remember what that pain felt like and wanting to die. It was terrible thing to live through. I talk about the effusion because my heart was aching so much it killed me and I couldn’t breathe.
Quote from Noonday Demon: “if everyone has the capacity for some measure of depression under some circumstances everyone also has the capacity to fight depression to some degree under some circumstances. Often the fight takes the form of seeking out the treatments that will be most effective in battle. It involves making the most of the life you have between your most severe episodes. Some horrendously symptom ridden people are able to achieve real success in life; and some people are utterly destroyed by the mildest forms of the illness”—Andrew Solomon
Merchant of Venice: It wearies me, you say it wearies you but how I caught it. Found it, or came by it, what stuff tis made of, whereof it is born, I am to learn. And such a want-wit sadness makes of me that I have much ado to know myself—Shakespeare

I found these quotes in a journal from 2001. It’s an old notebook of my excerpts from books and other things. I had carried it around with me all this time. Today I was going to write excerpts from Night Falls Fast by Kay Redfield Jamison but I was too tired after I had my lunch. The notebook is worn thin by use. It is probably the only notebook that I still refer to every day. I have my favorite Edgar Allen Poe letter that I copy into every journal that I own. The “I am wretched and know not why” is from there. If you ever read touched with fire, you will understand what it is like living with bipolar disorder and depression and how it relates to creativity. It really is a great book.

Today I am sidelined with pain in my ankle and a migraine that started out this morning. I have been trying to take a nap for the past few hours but I have this restlessness to do something, to write that I can’t quite quell. I chock it up to having coffee today at an early hour. I have been up since about 9 which is my normal time for waking up but I still wanted to sleep more. If you count daylight savings it really was 8 that I woke up at. I have this energy but I don’t know what to do so I went out and now my ankle is thanking me kindly in return by hurting me. I had groceries delivered today, some stuff I forgot from my previous order. I got my steaks that I have been dreaming about for weeks but never bought. I usually don’t crave meat but I haven’t had any other than chicken and fish in quite some time, possibly as far back as the summer!

So to say that I am a little tired is on the money. I also had therapy today that made me think about what I am doing or going to do with my writing for the next few days. I also talked about my writing with my co-conspirator. We have decided to write five days a week so we can have two days off. I am not sure I can do that with my blog as I like writing on it every day but I can take off a day here and there. My next writing assignment that I am contemplating has to do with CES, Cauda Equina Syndrome. I have been meaning to write about it for some time but have backed off due to the embarrassing nature of the content. I still haven’t written much beyond the title of the article. Maybe tomorrow I can write more.

just the back

by Midnight Demon, posted in cauda equina syndrome, CES, Chronic pain, chronic physical pain, depression, mood disorders, physical pain, suicide

I had another easy day today. I didn’t go out despite the temperature being higher than it has the past few days. I did get some work done with my book. But now I feel downhearted. I remember what it was like getting diagnosed with my condition and not knowing if I was going to walk again. I took therapy into my own hands and relearned to walk again on my own with a little bit of help from this therapist and that. It wasn’t until my second diagnosis that I really decided I was going to be the ones making the call to walk again. I have learned to walk three time in my life and hopefully the third time was the last time.

I’m also downhearted because I keep thinking of my ex and what she is up to. But I know it would be too painful for both of us to open a line of communication again. I also been thinking of my other ex as I just wrote about her in my book. I’m not sure if that part is going to stay in it or not but for now it’s there.

I know I should not be so hard on myself for things that happened that weren’t my fault but I do still blame myself for things. I should have stopped seeing the chiropractor when I started to feel better. I should have stopped seeing my ex the minute she didn’t want to be around me because I was loud (second ex). And I should have killed myself in 2005 so I wouldn’t have had to face the last few years of being in horrific pain. Nobody understands what it is like to be in chronic physical pain unless they have gone through it themselves. And no one can tell me that the pain can’t be that bad to want to kill myself because I don’t have cancer. I wish it was cancer because then I know it would be terminal and there would be an end to the pain.

It’s like with the back pain. Everyone asks me how’s the back since I have had surgery. They don’t ask about my leg, foot, ankle, bowels, bladder. Just the back. As if that one thing determines everything else in your life. I know the reason for my foot, ankle, bowels, and bladder problems have to do with my back but the fact is that they don’t think the two are connected. And that hurts. It’s like my leg doesn’t matter only my back. I didn’t get operated on my leg. Just the back.

just a bad day

by Midnight Demon, posted in Chronic pain, depression, physical pain, suicide, writing

Today I had a bad day. I can’t describe more than that because I just am so overwhelmed I might start crying again.

I had my therapy session which didn’t go so well. We ended up talking about basically me getting out of therapy which she wasn’t keen on because she knew my result. I have another appointment with her tomorrow to go over weekend planning. I feel like I am in the hospital but on an outpatient basis. I also forgot I got visual therapy tomorrow. I really don’t want to go but its too late to cancel now. I have no idea what is involved and it kind of is scaring me a little. My eye doc says it just some exercises for my muscles as they don’t like to converge when I am reading, or something like that.

I would say today was kind of productive. I got my groceries delivered, vacuumed, and got my hair cut. I ordered some healthy stuff like steamed broccoli and apples to help cut down on my carbs. Least they will be the healthy carbs.

The weather has been awful today. It has been freezing rain to hail and my back has paid the price. I still can move but I don’t know how long that will last. I have tried all the exercises I know to move my hip extensors but they still feel locked. I know once it stops raining, the pain will go away but right now it sucks! My spine aches like no tomorrow and my scar hurts like a bitch. I used to love the rain. Now the rain hates me. Probably because I can no longer walk in it. I used to love walking around my neighborhood getting soaked to the bone. It was so refreshing. Course my mother thought I was going to die of pneumonia each time I went but I didn’t care. I learned the hard way of not staying in wet clothes though. I did one time and got very sick. I never did that again.

Need for Affiliation

by Midnight Demon, posted in depression, suicide, suicide attempt

Need for Affiliation

We all feel the need to affiliate, to have this connectedness to one another and to have our work validated and to be validated for who we are. When this doesn’t happen, we tend to feel alone and worthless. Over time this builds up and may lead to depression which then leads potentially to suicide.

In his lifetime work, Edwin Shniedman thinks that there are 20 needs that leads to suicide and affiliation is one of those, along with validation. I guess I have been feeling like lately my work has not had too much affiliation. I have not had too many comments like I have in the past and my readership has dwindled. I have tried to figure out why things have been bothering me so much and I think this is why. I no longer feel like I have affiliation with anyone in regards to my work. I haven’t gotten a good job or I have been through what you have been through in weeks. I know it sounds silly, but to me it means a lot. I am not saying that I am going to die because I don’t have this. It just is another reason for my unhappiness. Now that I know this I can bring it up with my therapist and come up with ways of dealing with it. Because we all have these needs, some more than others.