Tag: suicide

Suicide Crisis Response Plan

by Midnight Demon, posted in suicide

I hope I am not plagiarizing when I post this plan here on my blog. This is from the Air Force Guide to Managing Suicidal Behavior found here

Crisis response plan:
When thinking about suicide, I agree to do the following:

Step 1: Try to identify my thoughts and specifically what’s upsetting me
Step 2: Write out and review more reasonable responses to my suicidal thoughts
Step 3: Do things that help you feel better for at least 30 mins (examples can include, trying to sleep, play internet games, brush hair 100 times, write in a journal, listen to music, etc)
Step 4: Repeat all of the above
Step 5: if thoughts continue, get specific and I find myself preparing to do something, I will call XXX @ 555-555-5555 or suicide hotline
Step 6: if I cannot reach above I will call my therapist or psychiatrist
Step 7: if I am still feeling suicidal and I don’t feel like I can control my behavior, I go to the ER or call 911 (or whatever the local emergency line is for your country)
I have found having this in my journal useful when I have been hospitalized because it provides a plan of something that they need for discharge. I don’t always carry the paper with me but I do carry my journal.

I’m the Problem

by Midnight Demon, posted in chronic physical pain, depression, suicidality, suicide, suicide attempt survivor

I’m the problem

A few days ago, I got a comment on one of my blogs saying that my therapist isn’t the problem, I am. I was bullshit because how could I be the problem when my therapist was the one freaking out over my suicidality. Then I read my blog that was commented on. The commenter missed the point I was trying to get across and was blaming me for my problems because I wasn’t seeing things “her” way. I was “choosing” to stay depressed and suicidal rather than getting my shit together and moving forward. If only it was that easy.

It got me pretty upset. I have been trying to get a hold of my therapist to get her input. I know she is NOT going to blame me for my problems. The whole point of this blog might be kind of stupid but I can’t sleep and it is on my mind. And I know that I won’t be able to sleep until I get the thoughts out.

The fact of the matter is that I have a therapist that freaks out whenever I bring up my suicidal tendencies or thoughts about death. I find it isolating because I can’t talk about these feelings with her. How can I when she becomes so tense and flips out? I feel that therapy should be a place that you can talk about anything in the world that is bothering you. But suicidal thoughts are so taboo that it is difficult to engage in that kind of talk. I have been through this with my therapist for the past 10 years and it is always the same. She starts talking about things that have nothing to do with my suicidality and I am left feeling alone and helpless. So how am I the problem when I can’t talk about how I feel when I know it will be falling on deaf ears?

This commenter also brought out that I am irresponsible, “choosing” to spend my money on coffee and music rather than my bills, which is totally untrue. I can’t make ends meet because I am on limited income and have more bills than I can pay. So some months I buy coffee and my country music because I think I earned that right. I don’t skip a bill payment because I pay for it. It just means that I can’t get to eat out or pay for groceries. I think I am responsible enough to know what to pay for and what is frivolous. I have 5 bills I am responsible for every month and I pay them even though it leaves me with little left over for things like coffee and music. And I shouldn’t have to explain to the internet what I spend my money on. This commenter just has an assumption that is wrong, all because she thinks she is an expert in financial matters.

I use my coffee spending as a reward and my one joy in life. If that is too much for you Ms. Expert, go suck an egg. I am not going to stop spending a miniscule amount of money for coffee just because you think I am being a big spender. I wish I had the money to be a big spender but I don’t. I am on a fixed income every month and have to make do with what I have. I don’t work anymore because I have chronic pain and mental illness that requires at least two hospitalizations a year. But then, if you think that this is all bullshit, try a day in my shoes. I am sure you will topple over the first hour.

My suicidality makes me a “difficult” patient. No therapist wants to see their client die by suicide. No therapist wants to see their client hurting so bad they want to hurt themselves. It is a challenge to the mental health field. I have worked hard on this blog to tell my story and hope that it helps someone. After your bogus comments, I was questioning whether to continue. But fuck you and the horse you rode in on. I am not going to stop blogging because of your ignorance and high almighty attitude. People need to know what it is like living like this, and living through it, though it is difficult, extremely difficult at times. If you can’t understand it, stop reading my blog and go bother someone else.

Who do you turn to when you have no one to turn to?

by Midnight Demon, posted in bipolar, chronic physical pain, depression, mental illness, psychology

I finally got out of the house today and went to Starbucks. It was a little rough getting there but I persevered. I wanted a latte and by dog gone it, I was going to get one! It wasn’t as sweet as I was hoping it was, but it did it’s job. And I got some writing done while I was cruising through Facebook and Twitter. It doesn’t make any sense right now, but I think I will work on it later tonight to see if I can make it make sense. It was like once I started writing I “threw up” and my brain couldn’t make sense of the thoughts anymore.

Back and bowels are having a fight as to who is going to win the pain shoot out. I almost lost control of my bowels twice since coming home. I fear that if I do, I will commit suicide. I am that vulnerable.

I tried to bring up my suicidal tendencies to my therapist today but she got all panicky so I dropped it. I could tell from her voice she was not going to be listening to me and just freaking out about losing me. I never felt so low as I did in that moment. I felt like I had no one to talk to about my ideas or frustrations to do with suicide. It’s just up to me to deal with, once again, on my own. I can’t talk to my pdoc, she is out of commission for a while. And the most she can offer me is a hospitalization. I don’t need to be hospitalized, least I don’t think I do. I just want to talk about what it would be like with me not in the world anymore to someone non-judgmental and criticizing. And also, not be freaked out by it. My therapist is a good therapist. She has kept me alive the past 10 years, some how, some way. But she still gets fucking juiced up and down right untalkable when I bring up suicide or feeling like ending my life. If I can’t talk about it in therapy, who can I turn to? Sure I have my blog, but last time I posted a post on being suicidal someone hunted me down to make sure I was ok and scared a few people in the process. I was lucky they didn’t call the cops. So now I am hesitant to put that on my blog for fear of being taken the wrong way. And if I don’t have my blog to vent to, what the hell is the point of writing this blog every day?? I have been keeping things neutral since that incident. I keep to myself and I hardly write in my journal anymore. Since being discharged from the hospital in August, I really have been questioning things. I am unhappy in therapy, with the process itself, and I am not sure after 15 years, it is going to change. I know my medication regiment is stable and doesn’t need to be played with. I guess I just miss talking with someone, and having intellectual discussions with people about psychology and suicide. I miss being in academia. I miss having the research tools at my finger tips. (Call me a geek!) But I no longer have that and that makes me depressed. I know that if I were in school and pursuing my passion, I might be feeling better but I can’t afford school. It just costs too much for a bachelor’s education and I don’t have the money. If I didn’t screw up my student loans, I would be going back to school now. It would give me routine and sociability with my fellow classmates. I sometimes feel like holding a cardboard box in the square and say “college tuition” just to see if I would get a response. Be a fun experiment, from the sociological viewpoint.

I have thought of passing this on to my therapist, but I figure why bother. She doesn’t “listen” anymore…

How Country Music Touches You

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

How Country Music Touches You

I have been listening to Pandora for most of the day. I have it on “Terri Clark” radio and I have been listening to all the “old” country that made me fall in love with country, not the rock/rap stuff they have today. A couple of songs in the morning really got to me. By the time my therapy appointment came around, I was very tearful. The songs they were playing was about relationships ending and I couldn’t feel like I was losing my therapist because of the current transportation issue. I was going to see my therapist today but my father interceded. Asshole had an urgent matter that had to be dealt with on his NOW terms. So my sister needed the car to take him where he needed to go. I was pissed that he didn’t call me, because what the hell do I take him to his medical appointments for?? He just is an ungrateful bastard.

So what would have been the last time I see my therapist turned into no trip out there after all. And the songs they were playing just had me thinking that maybe our relationship is over now. But then Faith Hill’s song, “You can’t lose me” came on. I cried harder and when I told my therapist, she said that is our song now. I was already bawling so cried some more. I swear I bawled the first 20 minutes or so of our session. I was just so weepy. I have been up since 0430 so already it has been a long day. I had coffee which gave me the ups but by 11, I calmed down and was just down. Then the songs played and I was weepy. And of course my therapist had to ask how I was doing. Doing awful. I told her the thoughts of suicide came into my head today, just out of the blue, like what if I killed myself. But the thoughts didn’t hang around. My mood just wasn’t “depressed enough”, I guess.

I don’t know what I am going to do about therapy. My therapist doesn’t know that I secretly want another therapist. I just don’t think she is good for me anymore and now that we are not going to be seeing each other face to face for a long time, I can’t help but wonder if the phone is really going to work. I so wanted to be in the same room with her just so she could possibly hold me while I was crying. Realizing that, just made me cry more. I have stuffed animals at her office, a 3 ft bear (Johnny) and two smaller bears (Bucky and Amelia). I miss seeing them, and obviously, my therapist. But finding a therapist, as I learned, is so difficult when you are chronically suicidal. It shouldn’t be like that, but sadly it is. I had called 10 therapists when she first moved to Framingham (the town she practices out of). I couldn’t find one to take me on. Then when I was in the hospital, they found me a center that I could go to. Well, the nitwit was downright scared of me. He was just so nervous. It didn’t work out and by session three, I said goodbye.

I am so drained. I could write about how it sucks not finding a therapist to expand their horizons and just take a chance but I am not in the damn mood. I am tired of trying to find someone that I can count on in the mental health field. Yet there is a therapist that piques my curiosity. Only trouble is, I love his tweets and if I become his patient, I lose him as my twitter buddy. His policy. And I like our relationship as it is right now, though he doesn’t know me from Adam. It’s just that I like his personality. And after reading his blogs, I think that he would be a good fit for me. But I don’t think I can ever cross that boundary. Besides, I am so terrified that he will find an excuse not to see me it prevents me from pursuing the matter. And all the while I was thinking this, I felt like I was cheating on my therapist.

I am at the stage where right now, I really can’t leave my therapist. We are in the middle of important work with dealing with my ex and all she put me through. We didn’t talk about it today. I was too emotional to get into it and she respected my space. Plus, I felt like I was crying over the grief of that relationship, which I never did before. I usually just drank her away, or tried to.

When I was in the kitchen, eating a brownie, I noticed my ankle and foot were swollen again. Pissed me off. My toes looked like Vienna sausages. So I just kept them up. Now they are hurting me. I hate being in pain every single day. Today I looked at a couple of doctors that specialized in the ankle. I couldn’t find a one that wasn’t a surgeon. And a surgeon just won’t deal with you if they can’t cut you. So I am back to square one. I am so frustrated having to find a therapist that is within a 5 mile radius of my house and a foot/ankle doctor that is the same. Why is it so hard when I live in the academic capital of the world??