TUESDAY 29TH MARCH 2011
I vaguely remember waking up at around 8 or 9 am on Sunday (I think) and the memories of what I had done only hours before came flooding back. "Oh shit" I thought, "I have to get to the hospital" I have only tiny snippets of time stored in my brain of the events of that day and I can't be sure of which order they occured in.
I remember getting some things together, clothes, my art supplies (heaven forbid I should be without THEM) etc... but I'm not sure if I did this while I was I woke up at 8 or 9am or if I had done it when I woke the first time in the early hours of the morning, while it was still dark and I was behaving like a mad woman with racing thoughts... freaking out and then clearly freaking out my poor boyfriend who woke up to me packing my stuff in order to leave him when he had done nothing wrong. I just wanted to slow or stop my mind. I didnt WANT to kill myself but if it happened in the process I will be honest... I didn't mind. I just had to stop my head. My thoughts which became actions had alreadt caused so much turmoil in the the only thing good left in my life... my relationship. (WHY HE STICKS BY ME I DO NOT KNOW BUT I AM FOREVER GRATEFUL TO HIM FOR IT).
So anyway, wanting to stop MY MIND I began to swallow tablets that had only the day before, been prescribed to me by my GP as a temprary fix to my massive anxiety (they are like valium bu not)... I was meant to half half at a time.. from memopry (as shattered as it is) I think I took about 10 tablets before my boyfriend found me with them in my car and hid them from me (a week later almost... I still don't know where they are THANK YOU MISTER!)
I don't remember much of the next day. I remember waking up and freaking that he had to get me to hospitsl. I din;t remember the car trip apart from him wondering if to call an ambulance. But I didn't want to gain attention from the neighbours or The Mister's pop who lives on this property. I remember I was very wobbly when trying to alk and The Mister helping me. I remember being really frustrated that I couldn't talk to the nurses properly becuzse my speech was so badly slurred and the words just wouldn't come out. I remember being asked the date twice and later being told I had gotten it completely wrong both times. Unfortunately I also remember.... IT DIDN'T HURT AT ALL. Thank goodness The Mister has hidden those meds 'til I need them.
when I finally got to the Psych ward I got to have dinner.. I was starving. The this dude who clearly had more mental issues than me told me he was gonna drop a block of concrete on my head and kept abusing me for being BACK in there as I was meant to join the army?!! Yeah, crazy huh. Poor man. The nurse buzzed the emergency caller thingy, I ran to my room and he continued to lose it... got a little violent etc... and they ook him to ward where he would be more restricted and most importantly... away from me.
I met with 2 doctors and a psycholigist the next day and they said it was 'quite hard to catergorise' my symptoms because I show such a broad range. As per usual they have put it dwn to Borderline Persnality Disorder (with PERHAPS a hint of Bipolar - i doubt it) because of 2 main contributing factors... I have a history of self harm and also, I was sexually abused s a child. Now, I'm not saying I DONT have BPD... but.... what about the other symptoms I have that DONT fit into BPD??!!
It's not a new diagnostic dilemma though... Doctors have been trying to 'CATERGORISE" me for almost 8 years now. each of the many I have see have said I dont fit into just one category. They don't know what it is. So they will just call it:
Borderline Personality Disorder
OR
Bipolar Disorder
OR
Depression & Anxiety Disorder.
They just treat me for one lot of symptoms which aggrivates the other... and so on and so forth.
I must sound like a MASSIVE ATTENTION SEEKER but NO... im not really... I just know myself well enough to know something isn't right and they got the diagnosis wrong.
One doc howver is looking into Anxiety Sypmptoms predominately by the sounds of it. Don't get me wrong the rest of it can be hard but the Anxiety can be crippling at times.
I aso spoke to a Centrelink social worker today about my idea of what I want to do education and business wse and she agreed with me and has arranged for a bit of help for me in doing it. It might take a few years but I WILL GET THERE ONE DAY - I PROMISE!!
The Mister has been in to see me EVERY DAY!! He is soooo supportive. I love him dearly an I love how he loves me so much. Couldn't ask for a better man. He even came in with my mum, step dad and brother on my second day to surprise me. They had driven almost 2 hours!
Ok this is getting way too long now.. so I w ont include all the writings I have done in the last week cuz Im not even half way through them yet lol... (I had a shitload of time on my hands okay?!)
But basically (very) long story short, I gt out after 4 days, and the blogging starts NOW!!
I wanna help people with the same or a similar condition as mine (WHICH HAS BEEN REDIAGNOSED AS "COMPLEX POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER" which makes alot of sense - another story for another day - and aso A LITTLE BORDERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER which is also caused by siMilar circumstances as C-PTSD)
aww dear alrighty.... over and out for tonight.
x
Showing posts with label mental health. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mental health. Show all posts
Friday, April 1, 2011
Monday, February 21, 2011
Mish Mash
There is so much I want to blog but I either don't know what to write or can't be bothered. I wish I had a dictaphone kind of device that could just record and post from my mind. That would be kind of dangerous though I guess, at times. Besides, it would often make little sense to anyone but myself.
I am so over the cycle of ... well, everything. So tired. I wish I could find my plateau. I go through stages where I feel like I have and I make plans mentally and set goals and get active then somewhere, somehow... something shifts and it slowly all falls apart, quite often without me even realising until I am already in the depths the descent.
Most times, I am quite accepting albeit somewhat frustrated that I am realising AGAIN, I have a 'problem' and I haven't broken through the chains it has forced itself upon me like I have always believed and hoped I could.
Some people, in fact most people will be quick to say 'Just Do It' or 'Get Over It' or 'Stop Feeling Sorry For Yourself' or more commonly - 'It's Just an Attention Thing'. I've heard it all, many times. I have also been told I am just lazy or can't be bothered. That's the general populations opinion. When it comes to professionals in Mental Health they don't deny for a moment that I have a 'problem'. In fact - they are quick to agree with me (and yes, I know they DO over diagnose, often incorrectly too). However, it seems that because I can string 2 sentences together, because I have educated myself as much as possible about my mental state and of myself in general, because I do recognise that I need help and go looking for it and that I want to get better... they seem to think that I am 'not that bad'. That I have only a 'mild' case. Look, this may be so to some degree... but just because I have a pretty level head compared to alot of people with mental illness (and also alot of people without mental illness).. it doesn't mean that 'It's not THAT bad.'
I have periods where the very next level of my descent if I got there (thankfully I haven't yet but I have been so fucking close) could quite easily be - suicide. But because I have this thing where when I describe it I say 'It's not that I would do it but I have thoughts of killing myself' it's not really put down to being suicidal. When ok at the time of explaining I may not want to do it but in the depths of my own peice of insanity I am thinking about it but deciding not to.
I can't hold down a job and have NEVER been able to. Not for more than 4 months. I get a job in my 'plans & goals' stage and go hell for leather in trying to improve my life, be somebody and drag myself out of this stupid rut I have been in for as long as I can remember (which is, since the age of 9). I love my job and am excited by it. I am sure to tell my loved ones all about it and how happy I am, how I am finally getting it together. I am unsure if I am telling them because I am trying to convince them or myself. But see, this has happened SO MANY TIMES over the years that they think it's good but know it wont last. I don't quite know WHAT triggers it but eventually I start struggling. Usually, to get out of bed. But even my opinion of it changes. I just don't enjoy it anymore. I start finding more things wrong with it than right. The list goes on. Eventually, I just don't go to work. It starts with calling in sick. Before too long I have too many sick days and I don't even bother to call in anymore, I just don't go back. It's like I just can't face it. Them. The boss or employees. Anyone.
I can barely take care of myself even when things are good. I NEVER stick to routine although I try and I want to. People will tell me I don't try hard enough. FUCK you people. It's hard ok. I'd rather die than live the rest of my life with the feeling I get from trying after awhile to be honest.
It's on the inside that is so mutilated. I heard it described somewhere recently as a 'Silent Illness'. So bloody right. Here's something that nobody can deny is abnormal. I cut myself from time to time. Only enough to draw a little blood. Often not enough to scar. I'm not looking for that and I don't much like pain, only a little when I'm hurting on the inside. Sometimes I'll get a peircing, twice I've gotten a tattoo but I can't do that too often. Yes, it does make me feel better, temporarily. It's like a bandaid. A healthier one than getting myself blind rotten drunk day in day out. Or going out and taking taking drugs and partying myself happily away (until I crash and burn of course, but at least then I'm so tired I have to sleep). I think I have kind of grown out of that now anyways. I too often think about how horrible I will feel after physically. Hell I gave up smoking cold turkey a few months ago and the one thought that has and still does suddenly erase a craving was the memory of how shithouse I would feel in the morning after smoking and how much better I feel now. Physically of course. I think after all these years of not quite knowing WHY I cut myself I have just realised while writing this that perhaps I do it because it's a visual representation (an ever so slight one) of pain that's on the inside. I am externalising it.
I swear I don't do it for attention. Not the kind of attention that 'Attention Seeking' generally labels. The most I am willing to admit it is anything like attention seeking is that sometimes... especially when I was younger it was that I kind of hoped someone would if they saw it say.. 'She isn't coping right now. She needs help.' But over the years I realised that this just wasn't what would happen. I copped alot of negative flack for it. Which of course led me to do what an alcoholic does with their drinking.. hide it. Most times anyhow. Sometimes I simply thought at the time what I do usually when I know I am about to fuck up but just do it anyway cuz I am just that screwed up at the time... 'I'll figure it out later and deal with the consequences then.' Which of course leads to more mind fucking. See for some reason the place I most like to cut is my forearm. It feels better there.
For anyone who actually does read this (which I highly doubt anybody does... I'm on a bit of a rambling downer rant).. so you (HOPEFULLY) see that this is real and not a fake attention thing, I first cut myself at the age of nine, on my thigh where I could cover it. What nine year old does something like that? It is also the age of which I had my first thoughts of suicide. My first thoughts of 'What's the fucking point.' I wrote a poem at the age of 10 or 11. It was written in the first person. As though I were living it. Each verse was about a possible method of a suicide attempt and the last line of each verse described why I couldn't do it that way.
And THAT has been my fear of hanging myself. That is really what has stopped me from doing it. Being afraid that I will realise only too late that I don't want to die. But I won't be able to do anything about it.
I WAS 9 YEARS OLD AND THINKING THESE THINGS IN DEPTH, and I still do. But the fear IS (very very slowly thank goodness) getting less and less.
How THE FUCK do I not have a problem that needs to be taken seriously. The difference between me and someone who has the same diagnosis yet is treated with kit gloves is that I do fucking soldier on. I am patient and wait my turn to be treated properly. A turn that never comes. It's fucking hard ok. It's hard because I know I appear to be normal in so many ways on the outside but on the inside I'm not. I seem to have alot of common sense compared to most people 'with my diagnosis'. I am SO tempted to let it all go and go HERE - THIS IS ME - THIS IS CRAZY and completely give in to it all and just let myself go.
But I don't. My little descents and outbursts and what have you are not me letting go. They are my little explosions as a result of holding it all in and trying as best I can to be normal.
Lol... when I started this blog I was determined that I would keep all this kind of stuff out of it. That I would make it a happy place. Even a humurous place. Also, I don't particularly want anyone I know to stumble across this anyway... let alone with a detailed account of 'the truth'. But - ah well.
You know what actually inspired me to start blogging? And I know in some way to someone this will sound bad but I just never really knew what a blog was.. BUT, I was sitting next to my friend at her place and she told me of this woman her friend in QLD told her about. The QLD woman was a blogger and a blog she followed written by a stay at home mum had an entry saying her husband had a psychotic episode and had done something out of character and was now in a coma and that they were going to turn of his life support. As my friend went to this blog to have a read, it made me think of my own friend that was admitted to ICU only days before and was also in a coma due to him hanging himself. I texted the friend that had introduced him and I in the first place and asked for an update of the situation. She replied that they were going to turn off his life support machine that day. I told the friend that was sitting next to me (as she was still reading) and she asked me what his name was. I told her and she kind of looked at me funny. She was reading his wife's blog. We live in NSW. Coincidence huh?! I have since been following it and feeling for his wife. But not wanting to comment or anything. Just kind of silently watching. I want to comment but in a way I don't feel like I have the right for some reason. I just want to let her know I am thinking of her and her 2 small children. Anyways... that's how I came to writing a blog.
I almost feel guilty though.. about it. Because of the depression thing. What also kind of is affecting me in some way.. although I am not yet sure how... The Mister told me when we very first started seeing each other that around 4 months prior he has tried to hang himself twice but he was really drunk and the rope wasnt tied properly or something so it didnt work. He has struggled with depression he says for about 2 or so years. He is also an alcoholic. But not an in an offensive way. If he hadn't of told me I seriously wouldn't have known. I can't even now that I know him well, tell when he has been drinking. At most I think he might have been?
He has been showing signs of his depression worsening for a little now. Yesterday he said to me that he felt like he didn't know if he wants to burst into laughter or burst into tears. He said he felt like he is heading for some kind of break down and that he was going to have a mind snap. Then he said something that scared the shit out of me. Because of what he told me happened 4 months before we started seeing each other and also because of my own friends recent death (5 or so weeks ago). Also possibly because when I was 16 my uncle tried to hang himself and is now quite brain damged. He said he just hoped it wasn't a really bad one.
I asked if he meant now in the car, in a few days or weeks or months or what? What did he mean? He simply replied, I don't know I'm just putting it out there.. or words to that effect.
I can only hope he is like me in this way like he is like me in so many other ways... that he wont do it really. But how do I know? I don't obviously.
I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DEAL WITH THIS!!
It's not that I am thinking I CAN'T deal with this. That I am struggling myself so it's too much. IT'S NOT. I just don't know how the fuck to do it. What I am supposed to do. I am too scared to do anything because I fear I will make it worse. And I am too scared not to do anything for obvious reasons. I just don't know WHAT to do.
This is not at all the reason for my current descent. I promise. And it's not keeping me down there. It just is.
I am so over the cycle of ... well, everything. So tired. I wish I could find my plateau. I go through stages where I feel like I have and I make plans mentally and set goals and get active then somewhere, somehow... something shifts and it slowly all falls apart, quite often without me even realising until I am already in the depths the descent.
Most times, I am quite accepting albeit somewhat frustrated that I am realising AGAIN, I have a 'problem' and I haven't broken through the chains it has forced itself upon me like I have always believed and hoped I could.
Some people, in fact most people will be quick to say 'Just Do It' or 'Get Over It' or 'Stop Feeling Sorry For Yourself' or more commonly - 'It's Just an Attention Thing'. I've heard it all, many times. I have also been told I am just lazy or can't be bothered. That's the general populations opinion. When it comes to professionals in Mental Health they don't deny for a moment that I have a 'problem'. In fact - they are quick to agree with me (and yes, I know they DO over diagnose, often incorrectly too). However, it seems that because I can string 2 sentences together, because I have educated myself as much as possible about my mental state and of myself in general, because I do recognise that I need help and go looking for it and that I want to get better... they seem to think that I am 'not that bad'. That I have only a 'mild' case. Look, this may be so to some degree... but just because I have a pretty level head compared to alot of people with mental illness (and also alot of people without mental illness).. it doesn't mean that 'It's not THAT bad.'
I have periods where the very next level of my descent if I got there (thankfully I haven't yet but I have been so fucking close) could quite easily be - suicide. But because I have this thing where when I describe it I say 'It's not that I would do it but I have thoughts of killing myself' it's not really put down to being suicidal. When ok at the time of explaining I may not want to do it but in the depths of my own peice of insanity I am thinking about it but deciding not to.
I can't hold down a job and have NEVER been able to. Not for more than 4 months. I get a job in my 'plans & goals' stage and go hell for leather in trying to improve my life, be somebody and drag myself out of this stupid rut I have been in for as long as I can remember (which is, since the age of 9). I love my job and am excited by it. I am sure to tell my loved ones all about it and how happy I am, how I am finally getting it together. I am unsure if I am telling them because I am trying to convince them or myself. But see, this has happened SO MANY TIMES over the years that they think it's good but know it wont last. I don't quite know WHAT triggers it but eventually I start struggling. Usually, to get out of bed. But even my opinion of it changes. I just don't enjoy it anymore. I start finding more things wrong with it than right. The list goes on. Eventually, I just don't go to work. It starts with calling in sick. Before too long I have too many sick days and I don't even bother to call in anymore, I just don't go back. It's like I just can't face it. Them. The boss or employees. Anyone.
I can barely take care of myself even when things are good. I NEVER stick to routine although I try and I want to. People will tell me I don't try hard enough. FUCK you people. It's hard ok. I'd rather die than live the rest of my life with the feeling I get from trying after awhile to be honest.
It's on the inside that is so mutilated. I heard it described somewhere recently as a 'Silent Illness'. So bloody right. Here's something that nobody can deny is abnormal. I cut myself from time to time. Only enough to draw a little blood. Often not enough to scar. I'm not looking for that and I don't much like pain, only a little when I'm hurting on the inside. Sometimes I'll get a peircing, twice I've gotten a tattoo but I can't do that too often. Yes, it does make me feel better, temporarily. It's like a bandaid. A healthier one than getting myself blind rotten drunk day in day out. Or going out and taking taking drugs and partying myself happily away (until I crash and burn of course, but at least then I'm so tired I have to sleep). I think I have kind of grown out of that now anyways. I too often think about how horrible I will feel after physically. Hell I gave up smoking cold turkey a few months ago and the one thought that has and still does suddenly erase a craving was the memory of how shithouse I would feel in the morning after smoking and how much better I feel now. Physically of course. I think after all these years of not quite knowing WHY I cut myself I have just realised while writing this that perhaps I do it because it's a visual representation (an ever so slight one) of pain that's on the inside. I am externalising it.
I swear I don't do it for attention. Not the kind of attention that 'Attention Seeking' generally labels. The most I am willing to admit it is anything like attention seeking is that sometimes... especially when I was younger it was that I kind of hoped someone would if they saw it say.. 'She isn't coping right now. She needs help.' But over the years I realised that this just wasn't what would happen. I copped alot of negative flack for it. Which of course led me to do what an alcoholic does with their drinking.. hide it. Most times anyhow. Sometimes I simply thought at the time what I do usually when I know I am about to fuck up but just do it anyway cuz I am just that screwed up at the time... 'I'll figure it out later and deal with the consequences then.' Which of course leads to more mind fucking. See for some reason the place I most like to cut is my forearm. It feels better there.
For anyone who actually does read this (which I highly doubt anybody does... I'm on a bit of a rambling downer rant).. so you (HOPEFULLY) see that this is real and not a fake attention thing, I first cut myself at the age of nine, on my thigh where I could cover it. What nine year old does something like that? It is also the age of which I had my first thoughts of suicide. My first thoughts of 'What's the fucking point.' I wrote a poem at the age of 10 or 11. It was written in the first person. As though I were living it. Each verse was about a possible method of a suicide attempt and the last line of each verse described why I couldn't do it that way.
- Cutting my wrists - Afraid of the pain
- Taking pills - Afraid of stomach cramps (As I've grown older - I was only 9 - I learnt that you generally pass out)
- Jumping - Afraid of the falling feeling
- Swimming out so far into the ocean that I could not possibly have the energy to swim back - afraid that I would be eaten by a shark instead (I was 9 remember)
And THAT has been my fear of hanging myself. That is really what has stopped me from doing it. Being afraid that I will realise only too late that I don't want to die. But I won't be able to do anything about it.
I WAS 9 YEARS OLD AND THINKING THESE THINGS IN DEPTH, and I still do. But the fear IS (very very slowly thank goodness) getting less and less.
How THE FUCK do I not have a problem that needs to be taken seriously. The difference between me and someone who has the same diagnosis yet is treated with kit gloves is that I do fucking soldier on. I am patient and wait my turn to be treated properly. A turn that never comes. It's fucking hard ok. It's hard because I know I appear to be normal in so many ways on the outside but on the inside I'm not. I seem to have alot of common sense compared to most people 'with my diagnosis'. I am SO tempted to let it all go and go HERE - THIS IS ME - THIS IS CRAZY and completely give in to it all and just let myself go.
But I don't. My little descents and outbursts and what have you are not me letting go. They are my little explosions as a result of holding it all in and trying as best I can to be normal.
Lol... when I started this blog I was determined that I would keep all this kind of stuff out of it. That I would make it a happy place. Even a humurous place. Also, I don't particularly want anyone I know to stumble across this anyway... let alone with a detailed account of 'the truth'. But - ah well.
You know what actually inspired me to start blogging? And I know in some way to someone this will sound bad but I just never really knew what a blog was.. BUT, I was sitting next to my friend at her place and she told me of this woman her friend in QLD told her about. The QLD woman was a blogger and a blog she followed written by a stay at home mum had an entry saying her husband had a psychotic episode and had done something out of character and was now in a coma and that they were going to turn of his life support. As my friend went to this blog to have a read, it made me think of my own friend that was admitted to ICU only days before and was also in a coma due to him hanging himself. I texted the friend that had introduced him and I in the first place and asked for an update of the situation. She replied that they were going to turn off his life support machine that day. I told the friend that was sitting next to me (as she was still reading) and she asked me what his name was. I told her and she kind of looked at me funny. She was reading his wife's blog. We live in NSW. Coincidence huh?! I have since been following it and feeling for his wife. But not wanting to comment or anything. Just kind of silently watching. I want to comment but in a way I don't feel like I have the right for some reason. I just want to let her know I am thinking of her and her 2 small children. Anyways... that's how I came to writing a blog.
I almost feel guilty though.. about it. Because of the depression thing. What also kind of is affecting me in some way.. although I am not yet sure how... The Mister told me when we very first started seeing each other that around 4 months prior he has tried to hang himself twice but he was really drunk and the rope wasnt tied properly or something so it didnt work. He has struggled with depression he says for about 2 or so years. He is also an alcoholic. But not an in an offensive way. If he hadn't of told me I seriously wouldn't have known. I can't even now that I know him well, tell when he has been drinking. At most I think he might have been?
He has been showing signs of his depression worsening for a little now. Yesterday he said to me that he felt like he didn't know if he wants to burst into laughter or burst into tears. He said he felt like he is heading for some kind of break down and that he was going to have a mind snap. Then he said something that scared the shit out of me. Because of what he told me happened 4 months before we started seeing each other and also because of my own friends recent death (5 or so weeks ago). Also possibly because when I was 16 my uncle tried to hang himself and is now quite brain damged. He said he just hoped it wasn't a really bad one.
I asked if he meant now in the car, in a few days or weeks or months or what? What did he mean? He simply replied, I don't know I'm just putting it out there.. or words to that effect.
I can only hope he is like me in this way like he is like me in so many other ways... that he wont do it really. But how do I know? I don't obviously.
I DON'T KNOW HOW TO DEAL WITH THIS!!
It's not that I am thinking I CAN'T deal with this. That I am struggling myself so it's too much. IT'S NOT. I just don't know how the fuck to do it. What I am supposed to do. I am too scared to do anything because I fear I will make it worse. And I am too scared not to do anything for obvious reasons. I just don't know WHAT to do.
This is not at all the reason for my current descent. I promise. And it's not keeping me down there. It just is.
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