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Tag: writing
Weird dreams again and the SSF
I am having a horrible day. My day literally started at 0100. I slept for a few hours, from 2200 to 0100 and I was up for the night. I went back to sleep around dawn. Was up for a few hours and then tried to get back to sleep around 0800 or 0900. Fail. I finally gave up around 1130. In the times that I did sleep, I had another weird dream about children and elevators. It was winter time and we were going to take the children sledding but the elevator malfunctioned and we ended up at a hospital that was at an airport. I don’t know what that is about. Absolutely makes no sense. Other than me possibly wanting to get away either through an airport or a hospital admission. I don’t know.
I had therapy and we talked about the weird dream and me not sleeping. I told her I am getting to my wits end. The heat is not helping. I still have to clear a path for my bro in law to install the AC. Maybe I will do that after I write this blog. We also talked about my suicidality and the need to attempt suicide. I don’t know why I feel like this. I just feel like everybody will be better off without me. I just feel so low and useless. I know my sister needs me because I have to pick up my niece next week. She doesn’t have the after school program anymore. But I just hope my ankle doesn’t flare up other wise I will be in pain and I am not looking forward to that. I just wish I wasn’t in pain every single day. I have not had a “day off” from pain in weeks.
So because I am thinking of an attempt, my therapist is taking out the old SSF to assess where I am at. She will do this assessment tomorrow. The SSF (Suicide Status Form) is an assessment used to assess and evaluate suicidality. In addition to this assessment, it also lists goals of treatment that both the clinician and client agree upon. The beauty of this assessment is that it allows collaboration in the treatment of suicidality rather than have the clinician be the expert. And the assessment is easier for the clinician as it also lists all the necessary documentation you would need for a session such as Axis diagnosis, progress notes, and date of next appointment.
The SSF was developed by a suicidologist, my idol, Dr. David Jobes. He developed this assessment so that clients that were suicidal did not get “lost” in the system and were treated as equals in their treatment, rather than have treatment as usual. To learn more about this, check out his book on the subject, Managing Suicidal Risk. It is a great book and also teaches you how to score the assessment at the end of the book. There are also classes you can take. His assessment tool follows under his framework, CAMS, Collaborating and Assessing Management of Suicidality. I write a lot about his work on my blog because I can’t stress the importance of suicide prevention. And this is one tool to do that.
So my therapist is pulling out this assessment tool on me tomorrow. I am not happy about it. I know how to “cheat” on it as I am the one to bring it to her attention. She is not proficient in promoting it despite my several attempts for her to go to Jobes’s workshops. She feels, like many therapists, that her training is adequate (it’s not) and she does not want to be a suicidologist. I am not asking her to change her ways, just add to her skill set. Every time she brings it out, I cringe because I know she doesn’t use it all the way through and that pisses me off. I feel like it is a waste of time because it is not used properly.
boat scenario
I had a sleepy day today. I took my mood stabilizer to try and get me out of this pit I am in. Needless to say, I didn’t leave the house today. I wanted to get a coffee and work on my next book but it doesn’t look like that is happening.
I got rudely awakened a little after 8 this morning. It was a collector and I was not happy. I should have yelled at them but I was half way between awake and dream land so it would not have been good to talk to anyone in that state. I still am having bad dreams. My therapist can’t figure it out. I have decided not to take abilify this week. And now she is freaking out because she knows what that does to me. But I can’t afford it this month. I will take it like every few days and see if that helps. I am not psychotic right now so that is good. Probably because I am so sleepy. I am going to try and stay up to watch the Sox game but no guarantees on that.
I canceled my PCP appointment for tomorrow. I just can’t see him right now. I know I should but there is no point as my symptoms are better. I just have my pdoc appointment this week, which I will keep. I still don’t know what the point of keeping the appointment is but whatever.
I had therapy today and we talked about a therapist’s letter to a suicidal person. It started off open and caring yet toward the end it felt like it was demanding and off. It was really weird. I have highlighted it for you to see. My therapist thinks I should write a response blog to it. HA yea right. What am I going to say? You want to know my suicidality yet I know you will panic if I don’t go along with what you say? Or are we in this boat together? One of my therapist used a boat scenario with me. She had me swimming around the boat and her trying to pull me in but I just never could get in because I couldn’t trust her. She never jumped in after me. So we were always separated by things like trust. I would rather drown than trust her and she would just watch. Not a good feeling when you are in crisis. And of course with that therapist, I always ended up in the ER with my suicidal thoughts. So much for not panicking.
I have had a lot of therapists over the years, before I saw my current one. There were lots of reasons why the relationship didn’t work out. None of them had to do with suicide. Most of them had to do with life choices. A marriage, life change, budget cuts, residency ending and the like. Some therapists I fired because they were too stupid to understand that I was suicidal. I had this one therapist, a psych resident. I told him I wanted to get a bottle of pills to kill myself. He then asked if I was suicidal. Nope, just want the pills for a joy ride, WTF, seriously??? What part of I am going to kill myself does not translate into being suicidal???? I dumped him and then found another jackass. I thought she would be the “one” as she has been in the business for years. That all ended the time I was upset about a fight my sister and I had. Instead of dealing with me, she wanted to know about the social status of my sister. Yup, here is your sign, you are fired! The weird thing was is that she said I would never be able to find another therapist, that she wouldn’t refer me to anyone because we still had “work to do”. Well you ain’t doing it with me lady. I don’t remember if we ever talked about being suicidal. I don’t know that I ever left my guard down enough to let her in. She was already therapist number 8 or 9. I have had seen 12 therapists since 1991, thirteen if you count the really freaking guy that kept sweating whenever I brought up being suicidal.
As much as my current therapist bugs me, we are a good fit. I taught her some stuff and she taught me some stuff. It’s always been an open relationship, though it was tough in the beginning. She never hospitalized me though, all throughout my treatment with her. We mutually agreed on going in the hospital. And we have been together for 13 years now. Ultimately, the decision for the hospital was mine. I knew what to say to get me out and I knew what to say to get in. I know the rules have changed some since the first time I went in. It’s a lot tougher to stay in than to get out. Hospitals don’t like to keep you now a days, even if you have good insurance. But I think if you make an attempt, you stay longer than if you didn’t.
Saturday blog 4
Saturday Blog 4
I started doing this blog to ease into writing just once a week but it hasn’t turned out that way. I have been having a rough day staying awake. I woke up at 0230 after some dreadful dreams and could not go back to sleep afterwards. My sleep all week has been turned upside down because of these weird, disturbing dreams I have been having. I hope they go away but I am exhausted because I can’t sleep.
Today I forced myself to sleep a few hours by taking a couple of ativans this morning around 10ish. When I woke up it was about baseball game time. The Sox lost to the Indians. It was a very close game but fucking AJ sucked today as a catcher and batter and we lost the game. He is the one player on the team I do not like. I don’t know why.
I did go out to get my prescriptions. I got some candy because I felt like having something sweet. I should have bought the big bars of candy and not the mini bites. The mini bites are dangerous and can be eaten very quickly. I already have like 4 left in the small bag. They will be gone by the end of the day. My mother went to a graduation party. I hope she brings home some cake. I haven’t had it in a long time. I love cake! Not the frosting, well a little bit of frosting, but not much. I saw on Facebook a cool cake that if I make it to my next birthday, I am going to have my mother make. It is a loaf cake and if she makes her marble cake with vanilla frosting it will be superb.
I haven’t done anything to do with hygiene today. I don’t feel like brushing my teeth and I don’t feel like showering. I should brush my teeth as it has been a few days but we’ll see. It is just so hard to do when you are feeling down. The sox losing didn’t help my mood. My foot is still hurting from going to the game the other night. I still wasn’t in the mood to go. I think I need to be back on the Cymbalta. Since not taking it, my mood has slowly hit rock bottom. Course I keep forgetting to take the mood stabilizer in the morning. I am not good at taking meds in the morning/afternoon. One of the dreams I had (and there have been at least two) had me being in the hospital just to regulate my meds. I don’t take that many, just a half dozen or so (not including my Ativan or pain meds or other stuff that I take). If I take everything, you are looking at at least 20 pills. I would list them out to you but I don’t want to bore you.
I hope that I am “awake” when I talk with my therapist on Monday. It has been a LONG while since waking up in the morning and feeling awake, not rested, just awake and wanting to start the day. Lately, I have been awake but groggy and sluggish. I think it is most likely due to waking up at 0230 most mornings and then going back to bed around 5ish. I usually write when I am up. If I am up to it, I will blog but usually I don’t.
My latest favorite song is John Legend’s “All of Me”. He performed the song with Jennifer Nettles and Hunter Hayes at the CMT awards. I wish I still had it so I could show it to my friend in Canada who does not have the channel. But I deleted it after the show thinking someone would post the video on Youtube but they have not yet. I am sure CMT will post it on their website as it was a great performance.
I told my writing partner that this week I will be editing my second book. I won’t put it out in the same format as before. I think I will go with smashwords or Lulu to see if I get better sales. It will take me awhile to save up to pay for their services. I hope it will be worth it. I won’t be using an editor this time around because I think I can edit a few pages of stuff myself. My second book is just a collection of short blogs and a short story dealing with darkness.
I have not sold any books for the month of June. I am sad by this. I am going to try and put out an ad or something in the local newspaper. I have to do something to drum up sales. Using Twitter has not helped me as much as I thought it would. I am still hoping to find the right audience. I think once I do, the book will sell like hotcakes.
midnightdemons7 
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