Tag: therapy

therapists and feeling violated

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, Chronic pain, depression

I’m tired. I didn’t get that much sleep last night because I was up in the wee hours of the morning. I then had to wake up early for my therapy session. I feel kind of violated for some reason because she was able to read my blog while we were talking. Usually I send it to her in advance so she can read it but this time, I didn’t want her to read it. But the little snot figured out how to. I then had to talk about what I wrote, which I didn’t feel like doing. I don’t even remember what I wrote. I know the world can see what I write. I know that at least 30 people a day read my blog. But they are mostly strangers to me, if I know them at all. To have my therapist just barge in on my writing, it just felt wrong. I am kind of upset over it but there not much I can do about it now.

Like a commentator wrote, I am not the scumbag of the universe. That was the thing we (my therapist and I) were arguing about. Apparently, she doesn’t love scumbags so I can’t be one. Well sorry but I felt that way at the time I wrote it. I still feel pretty nasty, as in awful low life of the planet that should be exterminated. I guess I am not in good space today and I don’t know why. I still am so sleepy. I haven’t had my coffee today because I am running low on my Starbucks funds. I have to ration my coffee funds till Wednesday. I know I can make some coffee at my sister’s. I made a decent iced coffee the other day. It didn’t wake me up like Starbucks but it got the gears moving so I could type and read a little bit. I do have my Starbucks tribute but it’s kind of late and it might keep me up if I have it now.

I think I am cycling or something. One day I can’t sleep to save my life and the next day all I want to do is sleep. I don’t see my pdoc until next week. These episodes are driving me crazy. I hate not knowing what is going on. And the psychache that I have been feeling has been off the hook. One minute I am fine the next I am in horrible pain. I feel chest pain or a weight on my chest and I can’t breathe normally. It’s not an anxiety attack, I know what those feel like. This is something different and happens when the psychache just creeps up on me to remind me it’s still there. I think that is why I haven’t been able to get anything done that I wanted to. I just have been weighed down with this invisible weight. I guess that is what makes me sleepy.

I have to bitch about my game that I play. I have been playing the same game on Facebook for the past three years now. I like it because it gives you missions to accomplish and it is better than Farmville where all you do is plant things. You still plant things on the Pioneer Trail but now the missions have increased and are getting more ridiculous. The latest one has you having to fill daily orders. The thing is the stuff you need to fill the order has to come from your neighbors and planted for 7 hrs so you really need to jump on this game for you to collect the stupid gold dust I think. I don’t know if I am making sense but the only other way of beating this mission is by buying horseshoes, which means you have to spend money. I don’t have the money to spend for this game anymore. I used to when I had it but now I don’t. I used to call it my entertainment expenses. But I’m broke now and even if I did have the money I am not going to buy horseshoes for a mission that is going to be impossible tomorrow and require more horseshoes. I have three facebook profiles just to play this game, so that I can get the stuff that I need. It’s because every time I request stuff, my neighbors don’t respond. I respond to their stuff, but they never respond to mine. There’s one little twit I just want to tell her you got to give in order to receive but I feel it would be a waste of my time. And she is always begging for stuff. If the stuff she needs I happen to need also, I will get the reward. Other than that, she can keep requesting. I just made it to level 118.

hospitalizations

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, CES, chronic physical pain, depression

Feeling a little bit better today, not as gloomy. I still feel depressed however. I just can’t seem to get away from it. I wish the highs would return. I miss them.

I am the worst grilled cheese maker in the world. I tried, again to make one and burned one side while didn’t cook the other enough so it was soggy with butter. Or maybe I just put too much butter. I don’t know but I suck at making this meal. I even burned my gums because the cheese was hot. OUCH. I don’t think I will be making anymore grilled cheese any time soon. I’ll just have my mother make them! LOL

I am close to making a milestone with my blog. I got another 30 or so views to go before reaching 10K. If I do this before Thursday, I would be happy, least for a little bit. Thursday marks the one year anniversary for my blog. I am kind of excited that I will have 10K. I have been giving updates on my facebook page with the countdown and also with my Midnightdemons facebook page. I even got to reading my own blog because as I have said before, I don’t always remember what I write. Even when naming a blog I have to go through the search to see if I named a blog this already. I have over 300 blogs to far so it is hard to remember sometimes what I write.

Right now, I am working on another paper for Cauda Equina Syndrome (CES). I have noticed that a lot of people find my blog using search terms for CES. I think it would be a great idea if I had a fact sheet or something to tell beginners about this or those that have been newly diagnosed. It can be very terrifying to get this diagnosis and sometimes people just don’t get the care that they need or worse, don’t get diagnosed at all. I won’t go into specifics about the condition but if you are reading this and want to know more, go to http://www.caudaequina.org to learn more about this devastating condition. I have been living with this for twelve years and through my support group, have learned to live with it better.

Today I am supposed to go out with a friend to the movies. He is an eye doctor and works where as I am disabled and don’t work. The last few times he has paid for the movie tickets and I just got the popcorn (which can sometimes be as much as getting the tickets!) But this time I am short on funds. I have just enough just to get my Ativan prescription filled and then that is it for the next week and a half. I will be totally broke. I find it totally humiliating that I am again without cash funds for the third month in a row. I have tried budgeting this time and it didn’t work. When my check comes in, I have bills to pay and food to get. There usually isn’t a lot left over. I might have to cut my Starbucks fund but then I NEED my coffee and need to get out of the house so I can’t really cut my fix. The whole money thing is depressing me. I wish I was still collecting the long term disability but I owe them because I didn’t know you can’t collect SSD and LTD at the same time. So the money I was supposed to get, they are taking until my balance is cut off. Which will be in about twenty months from now, in which time, I probably will be off it. I don’t know what I am going to do then as there is no way I can afford to pay them with my SSD. I guess by then I can start working part time somewhere and have a little extra but I can’t do that now, especially when I am having splits and psychotic symptoms.

I have my meeting with my therapist tomorrow. I am kind of glad I do. I just am having a rough weekend. Thoughts of killing myself are still in the back of my mind and I so want to go through with it. I am just so tired of fighting with myself every day on trying to keep myself from going through with it, tired of putting on a “happy” face so my family doesn’t know I am depressed. Just so tired in general. I know I probably should be in the hospital but they will just kick me out in a few days if not two weeks. It’s really hard to stay past that length of time. The insurance just doesn’t want to pay. I get letters from my insurance (while in the hospital) that “Dr. so and so thinks you should be discharged but if you feel like this is wrong and need further care, talk to your attending doctor for an extension.” I’m like, really?? I am in the hospital and you send these to MY HOME. How am I supposed to refute what you are writing. Though my favorite is when these letters arrive AFTER discharge!! It is comical though not really. Not like I want to really stay in the hospital but I think some time there is beneficial. I don’t have to put up a façade every day like I do when I am home. I can sleep most of the day without it being too disruptive. But I would be lost if I didn’t have my games and my cell phone with me. I guess that is why I fear going in the hospital. I don’t want to lose access to my phone. I would hate not having music because I don’t have a separate MP3 player. It is my phone. I would be so lost without listening to music while in the hospital it wouldn’t be funny. And then trying to have a check in with my therapist would be impossible. I have had that happen to me one hospitalization where I couldn’t get a hold of my therapist and my therapist couldn’t get a hold of me because the floor phone was busy. I hated that. And the only reason they deny you using your phone is because it can take pictures. Like really? I am going to take picture of this place or a fellow inmate? For what? I am not the idiot that has to post 90 thousand pictures on Facebook or twitter or Instagram every single day. I use my phone for its use and for checking email. Sure I will be on twitter and Facebook but it will just be on MY status updates and not someone else’s. I won’t say that John smith is having a bad day and took a nutty and had to be restrained. That is not my place to. Though I did have one hospitalization that a patient actually kicked down the metal door of the unit. That was scary. He was a BIG dude. I was scared of him. He was kept mostly sedated for that reason after that. He was also psychotic. But now that I am thinking about it, so was I. He kept talking on his ipod thingy or maybe it was his phone, I don’t know. But only he was allowed to use it and the rest of us wasn’t. Totally not fair!!

So I guess that is why I am resistant to going in the hospital. I won’t have my cell phone to listen to music and make calls, check emails, and play my games. Seems right to me!

blanket of gloom

by Midnight Demon, posted in blogging, depression

Not having a good day. I had therapy this afternoon. I had to take a pain med before it started because my ankle was acting up. I was kind of out of it while talking with my therapist. I know I got really depressed while talking with her. Seemed like a blanket of doom covered me while we were talking. I couldn’t shake it. I still feel that way. We were talking about my “splits” where I feel like half a day I am ok and then at night the demons come out. She can’t make sense out of them anymore than I can. She doesn’t know if medication can help but she really wants something to be done as she knows how lethal my moods can become.

After therapy, I made myself some lunch and tried to get a nap in but I just couldn’t get into a deep sleep. I had music playing so that is probably why. I still feel kind of sleepy. I still feel depression of gloom over me.

My pdoc didn’t have much to say about my “splits”. She only asked if we were still meeting tomorrow. I HATE when she doesn’t give me any input. I feel like I am spiraling out of control. But no one around me is noticing. I am mostly in my room. Only time I get out is to get food or go to the bathroom as the house is so damn hot. I can’t take the heat of the house or the humidity and the A/C is only in my room. But even when I have dinner with my mother she doesn’t notice a change. The only time I do leave the house is when I go to Starbucks, though I might go to Walgreens to get some snacks.

I don’t know why I keep to myself. I guess it is because there is no one really to talk to other than my online friends. It’s not that I have been purposely keeping myself isolated. I just have no social life. My few friends that I have, have been busy. And with this depression, I really don’t want to really socialize anyways because I just feel so low.

My therapist is keeping a better eye on me now that she knows about these “splits”. She thinks because I keep my self so compartmentalized that the depressive side comes out when I am most vulnerable, when I am ready to sleep. Last night I didn’t stay up too late. I took some meds and added some and was asleep by 0100. I can’t remember if I had a good or bad night. I know that I was feeling a little hyper the beginning of the night. But taking my antipsych med calmed me down.

I don’t know why I feel this cloak of doom. It feels like a weight following me around. I don’t feel pain of any sorts, other than my ankle being a pest. But I just feel so gloomy. It’s awful. I hate feeling this way but I accept it because what else are you going to do? It’s not like you can see this blanket to take it off.

coffee and therapists

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

Went out for coffee today. I didn’t feel like it but I forced myself to. I gave myself an incentive, that if I went I would get something sweet. I usually just get my coffee and maybe a sandwich, if I am hungry. But today I really wanted something sweet so didn’t need that much incentive to get a coffee cake. I like that the baristas are getting my order down pat. I don’t order anything fancy, just my favorite flavor, which is now Kati Kati, grande size but in a venti cup. This is so I have plenty of room for the half and half. I also put in several packets of sugar. I need my coffee sweet, which is why I usually don’t get something sweet.

I did accomplish something today and that was finishing the book why do people die by suicide by Thomas Joiner. I had an autographed copy but lost it on the train the first week I read it. Much to my sadness. The book was good and I learned a few things that I hope I retain. He is a cognitive therapist so he focused on that during the strategies for dealing with suicidality. I really liked the book because it not only dealt with personal experience (his dad died by suicide while in grad school), he also listed empirical data to back up what he was talking about. I am a research geek so I tend to like stuff like that. He also used terms that put people that couldn’t understand the technical stuff into words that people could understand, like how neurotransmitters interact. It was a very interesting book. I also bought another book that he wrote called Myths of Suicide, which I hope to read after I finish reading Lincoln’s Melancholy.

My reading voices are back, thank god. I can’t seem to focus unless they are there. I got a comment from my psychotic while reading blog and this person said that she only hears her voice while reading. I find that so interesting. I never hear my own voice. Unless my voice is male sounding, which I don’t think it is, not yet anyways. But then I do have enlarged ventricles in my brain that cause the voices. Not as large as those found in schizophrenia but enough to have a radiologist comment on it. I had the MRI the first time I was hospitalized when I was sixteen. They ran a bunch of tests on me the whole time I was there, from cortisol suppression studies to psychological tests such as the inkblot. I remember how much paperwork I had to do for the MMPI, the Minnesota Multiple Personality Inventory. I hated that. I did that more than once over my lifetime for various studies I was involved in. It is a LONG inventory. I am glad it is not used in clinical practice, unless you go specifically for psychological testing. It would make for a long afternoon or morning.

I have been feeling self-harm urges the past few days. I don’t know why that is. I just have the urge but usually distracting myself or listening to music helps. I have not cut in years and I like it stay that way, though I still have my “kit”. Even though I don’t use it, I still find it comforting to have it around. I also have been getting urges to overdose but these quickly pass as I just can’t do it in my house. Symptoms of my illness.

The dreaded nerve pain has come again. I really tried not to stand too long while waiting for the bus today to get my coffee. I tried not to jiggle my foot in a way that I know would upset it later. But I did do stretching exercises while I was on the phone with my therapist so maybe that is why it is angry at me. I never know what will make it upset. It’s like an untemperate, abusive person. You just never know what will set it off. The cold. The heat. Wearing socks. Not wearing socks. Moving it this way versus that. It’s a never ending battle. I am so sick of it. I am tired of hurting. And nothing helps curb the pain. My pain meds can only do so much, which is knock me out most of the time so I can sleep. But that is only for a few hours. Once the meds wear off, I am screwed. I wake up and sometimes it take a little but to register that I am awake before the pain starts. Other times it is because I am in pain that I wake up. My sleep has not been good the past week. I keep waking up between 0230-430 in the morning. No matter what time I go to sleep, I always wake up during those hours. If I fall asleep before ten, I am always up four hours later. I can’t stand it. I usually play my games or check twitter. If I am bullshit, I might write another blog or journal if I don’t feel like opening my laptop. Sometimes, I try reading and usually that works to put me back to sleep, unless I am in roaring pain. Then I just stay up until the pain meds kick in to knock me out again while withering in agony.

This week’s AAS blog is about finding a therapist that won’t run away or panic at the mention of suicidal thoughts. I want to laugh and say, have you read my therapist blog? I have had ten therapists run away from me soon as I mention that I have had suicidal thoughts in the past or been hospitalized because of them. Course I am hospitalized frequently so that doesn’t help my case. I have been hospitalized at least eight times since 2008. My last hospitalization was last June. So it has been a year but if these damn voices don’t stop, I might have to go back in. The voices and being suicidal doesn’t mix too well. But getting back to therapists, they can be tricky. I kept on being referred to another therapist, who would then refer me to yet another therapist. Before I knew it, I had ten within a month’s time. I finally gave up and stuck it out with my current therapist, even though I don’t see her in person frequently. I think I will see her next week. I will try and get my sister’s car.

I know why therapists don’t want to take on suicidal clients. They don’t want to be liable. They fear malpractice. They even fear losing the client. But I believe that despite this, with the right treatment, therapists can see suicidal clients. It just takes a little bit of courage and trust, a lot of it. Not only on the therapist’s part, but also the client. The client also needs to have a trust in the therapist that they aren’t going to be dumped in the hospital every single fricken time they get suicidal. The therapies out there that help are by David Jobes, CAMS and by using his suicide status form. Also using the Aeschi model helps. Knowing why the client wants to kill themselves says a lot. By not allowing the client to share his story, he gives his therapist a reason to distrust him. I do hope that there comes a day when graduate schools are mandated to have some kind of suicide preventions/treatment protocols in their curriculums. It shouldn’t be up to the therapist’s own style of interviewing that should be dependent on their suicide knowledge. That and the use of no-suicide contracts should be discontinued as long as something like CAMS is in place or the QPR by Paul Quinnett. I forget what QPR stands for but it is a useful resource.