A Few Honest Thoughts on Mental Illness

Written by my friend Ash Trent.


I wanna take a minute to talk about mental illness. I have battled with it my whole life, and maybe it would help to hear about it from someone you know. Or don’t know. Either way, I assure you that I am someone.

The shooting at Sandy Hook elementary school last week shook us all to the core. It was a visceral reality check that we wanted to reject, waiting to hear that the media overreacted and the kids were safe. What happened next was an uproar about gun control, school security and finally mental health. Adam Lanza was mentally unstable, and that does NOT make his actions on that day okay or excusable. Adam Lanza is not the issue here. We can’t undo what he did. What we can do is use it to help us prevent a repeat.

You see, mental illness is a treatable and manageable issue. However, the way it is viewed in our society puts a dark shadow over it that makes it difficult to treat and manage. I know firsthand how the insensitivity of this truth can affect someone with a mental illness. We spend our lives marginalized, minimized, ignored and kind of treated like a joke. We’re seen as melodramatic-- “Why can’t you just let it go? It’s all in your head and you’re blowing it out of proportion.” We’re seen as attention-seeking-- “Stop feeling sorry for yourself.” We’re seen as trying to make our situation worse than it is-- “Everyone goes through that! Just go back to work and carry on.”

What’s worse is this is the kind of response we get both from people who truly and inarguably care about us and just don’t want to think of us suffering and from people whom we simply annoy. We get the same responses from everyone, and it hurts! What we have is not just a problem, I assure you. It’s a sickness. Where it comes from, we don’t know. Maybe we were born that way, or maybe we experienced something so terrible that it physically changed our brain chemistry and wiring. And yes, we absolutely have the responsibility to change ourselves and pull ourselves up, because there is no other option. Contrary to popular belief, however, we can’t just shake it off. There are things we need from the people who love us when we are sick.

Let’s start with a basic issue: Depression. I’m pretty sure we have all at one point experienced the godawful curse of the flu. You know, you wake up one morning and you’re just so damn tired you almost can’t get out of bed, you’re aching all over, and you just feel this fog that is intercepting your thoughts so that you can’t put them into action. You feel moody and agitated and you even entertain thoughts of telling your boss to shove that stupid project up his ass. Then, a day or two later, you start coughing and sneezing and you can’t breathe and it’s really, really gross. And it lasts for like two weeks and the whole time you just want to beat your head against the wall. Everyone thinks you’re being a total dick, and you just have to sit tight and wait for it to pass.

Imagine the flu, but you never start coughing or sneezing. Just tired, achey and cranky, and there’s really nothing you can do about it except maybe go to the doctor and eat pills that aren’t really all that effective. Sometimes it lasts a helluva lot longer than a couple weeks... and, just like the virus, you just have to wait it out. And everyone thinks you’re being a dick. That’s what a depressive episode is like. I know it’s similar, because every time it hits me I wonder for a moment if I’m getting the flu. I’m hoping I start coughing and wheezing.

A lot of times when you go through a heavy bout of depression and you try to talk to someone, they’re not exactly...understanding. You’re explaining to them why you’ve been acting a certain way, and it really, seriously is the reason you’ve been what they perceive as “a real bitch/asshole.” Hearing that...it really hurts. You’re not being an asshole or a bitch, you’ve been sick! It’s really a sickness, and you didn’t do it on purpose. Believe you me, when I get that way I would love to just buck up and get over it, and I sure as hell would if I could. I’m probably having even less fun with it than you are. And when I try to explain that I’m so sorry but I just can’t, it’s always the same shit:
“We all have bad days, but we all just deal with it anyway.”“Everyone feels like that sometimes! Just watch a funny movie, that’s what I do!”
“You were fine a couple weeks ago, I don’t know what pissed you off so bad but you better get over it.”“You’re being dramatic.”“You’re looking for attention.”“You’re making excuses.”
“Why don’t you go to a psychiatrist and see if he can give you an antidepressant?”
“Hit the gym! That always cheers me up!”

Listen, with all due respect, we know [most of] you mean well, and we really and truly do love you for it. But we don’t need you to tell us to get over it, because we know it’s not that easy and honestly it feels really bad when we’re told we can just... do that. We know you really believe we can, and we know you can’t understand what we’re going through. We know it hurts you to see us hurting so much, and it scares you that we’re so angry. I promise you that if it were that easy we totally fucking would do all of that. But it takes time, and honestly the best frontline combatant for us is support.

Support doesn’t mean we want you to do things for us when we can’t. Support doesn’t mean we want you to tell us that everything we’re doing is fine, acceptable or okay, because sometimes it just really isn’t. Support means saying, “I know I can’t understand, and I’m not going to pretend I can, but I’m always here to listen if you need to talk,” and then following through with that.

I’ve touched on Depression here, and I want to point out that there are tons of other mental illnesses, none of which are really any better or worse than Depression. Anxiety disorders (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder), Schizophrenia, Personality Disorders, Bipolar Disorder, Autism Spectrum Disorders (although those are more developmental disorders than illnesses), they all feel this way in one way or another. And all of the popular responses from loved ones on the subject hurt like hell.

It gets worse, though. Not only is our legitimate sickness disregarded by people who care, it’s even further disrespected by people who don’t. Even our insurance companies and employers refuse to recognize it. When we need to apply for disability, for instance, sometimes our diagnoses are regarded as “untreatable,” or even worse “not valid,” or they are considered “not debilitating.” A lot of health insurance companies don’t cover mental health, no matter how much money you pay them. Let me tell you, I would work my ass off if I could. I’m not taking work off because I feel like it, I’m taking work off because I’m seriously terrified I might snap and hurt myself. I’m sleeping in through my first four hours of my shift because I literally can’t make myself get up. That’s not just because I’m sad or scared, it’s because it has physical manifestations that make me super tired and very sore. Remember the flu analogy?

When we already feel tired, sad, scared, run down and tired, it just fans the flames when we are so misunderstood and invalidated. People want to know why we’re acting this way, and the answer is a simple “I just don’t know.” It’s a very real sickness, and no one should ever have to apologize for being sick. And yet we are always apologizing so profusely when we’re already feeling bad about ourselves for seemingly no reason. To be pegged as a bitch/asshole, lazy, stupid, entitled, or otherwise weak when you just don’t feel good is not a walk in the park. After all this invalidation, when we do snap, people are left wondering why. What the hell was wrong with that asshole? Probably not enough God. Probably lack of gun control. Probably not enough school security.

I disagree. I think that if our insurance companies covered mental health treatment, if our society didn’t treat us like lepers, or if we weren’t treated as drama queens by the people we want so badly to hear us, we might not spiral quite so far. We get tired of explaining ourselves. We get tired of our cries for help falling on deaf ears. It hurts, and for some of us it makes us unreasonably angry, and then we lose control and people get hurt. Most often ourselves. All the ignorance and insensitivity only adds to what the sickness already does all by itself. We do all we can, and now it’s your turn, everyone. A difference isn’t going to be made in the mental health cause if it’s only the mentally ill calling for a change, any more than it’s going to help if the cows picket the beef industry.

I’m hoping that some people who know me will read this, and realize that this is my life. I have tried time and time again to make something of myself, and it’s just so very hard when I am not afforded the chance to do so because of the challenges I face. I do not consider this an excuse; you all see that I keep trying and I promise I’m nowhere near giving up. I see the struggles I face every day, obviously, and when I see these things in the news, most recently the Newtown tragedy, I know that it’s because so many people lead lives like mine. I know that this has all been said and that some who read this won’t take this seriously either. I just really hope, from the bottom of my heart, that you are reading this as coming from someone you care about, or even would like to know better, and I hope that it makes you think. Let’s treat each other differently, whatever obstacles we face. Let’s open our eyes, and let’s allow love to be the cure.

Weekly Inkblot

Ellie and I will be starting up a new youtube series called "Weekly Inkblot." It will be every Friday at 7pm, and we'll be talking about mental health awareness, what it is, different therapy styles, medication, the struggles with family and friends, and so much more. We will be on air on Google+ Hangout. I'm putting this up because we'd be happy to have other people join us. If it's just us every once in a while, that's fine, but it's always nice to have different perspectives. I'll set up the event every week, so let me know if you want an invite to the events. Come if can, watch if you can't. :)

I'll post the youtube video every week here too.

IOP and Affirmations

Emily (counselor in charge of my group at IOP) wants me to find some pride in the fact that I have been working hard and using a lot of the coping mechanisms, but I told her it's hard to look at it during a bad day and say "yes I've done a good job!" because I don't feel like I have. So she has given me some personal homework: I have to make an affirmation (in this case it's "I am worthy of love and happiness") and I have to say it to myself 3 times a day.

That's definitely not what I believe, but I guess we can use it as an experiment to see if this affirmation shit can work.

Thanksgiving

Happy thanksgiving, and be thankful for the people you love. You never know how long you will have them.

Dear Father

More poetry from IOP.

And no, I don't want a phone call or an email about this. I just need to get it off my chest, that's all. Just let me do this.

What do you think when you see me?

A failure of what I could never be?

A child needing guidance in the night,

A teenager throwing fire into the fight?

Do you have good memories

Or are they all forced pleasantries?

Do you look at me and see my beauty?

Do you see the scars I keep unseen?

Am I that beautiful little girl?

Have I become that precious pearl?

Am I disfigured freak?

Something you prefer not to seek.

With wings too broken to fly

And no more tears to cry.

Do you ever feel a flash of pride?

Or would you rather I always hide?

Do you stop to wonder if I’m okay

Or just hope I just sit and decay?

Do you stop to think of that child

That grew up fearful and wild?

The tiny seed you once planted

Do you wish it could be recanted?

Do you only see what you wish me to be

Or do you really see me?

Just another Wedsneday

We're working on communication and assertiveness in IOP. I keep learning it, and I know it all, I just need to find a way to live it. I need to live with the idea that I will always use assertive communication, but then I get scared or hurt and I hide or I fight. Always fight or flight. It what I've learned and lived. It takes time to change what is so ingrained in you.

Oh Ambien, we meeteth again....

So apparently getting off the Ambien is not going to be so easy. See, a few months ago, (about 2 to be exact) I had gotten completely off the Ambien and everything was going great. The Tylenol PM and Melatonin was doing a great job. Then one night it just stopped working. I tried taking more in the early hours of the morning. Nothing. And so I found myself back on the Ambien out of desperation (that day of no sleep was hell).

I was more hopeful this time because rather than just the Tylenol and a natural sleep aid, I had the Elavil, which worked amazingly for me. I fell asleep easily and it was going well. And just like last time, a couple of weeks into it, it just stopped working. That would be on Friday night. When I took a second Elavil and Tylenol PM in the early hours, I finally fell asleep, but I missed one of the games I was supposed to go to.

So Saturday night, I decide to try with 2 Elavil and a normal dose of Tylenol PM. Nothing. I was tired as hell, but there was no chance of going to sleep.

And so I remember that day of not sleeping, and I got desperate, and took the Ambien.

Tomorrow I have to take my mom, early, to her MRI. I can't just not sleep. I can't fiddle with this right now. It's not a good time. So.... I'm back on Ambien until I can talk to a doctor (which the soonest chance I have to do so would be the end of the month.)

I am so fucking pissed.

To Live

We did poetry therapy yesterday in IOP, and this is what I came up with. I think my grandma was trying to give me a message.

You do not have to be perfect.
You do not have to run your body
so ragged and run down.
Rest my wear child.
Lay your head within my lap
and sleep until the moon is at rest
and the sun calls your name merrily.
You do not have to trudge on.
You do not have to bleed so much
until you are too weary to go on.
Close your eyes to your harsh reality
and feel as soft hands envelope you
in a warm embrace.
You do not have to endure these hardships alone,
hidden from the world.
You do not have to cry so late into the night.
Rest now, for I am here.
I will wrap you up in blankets so soft
and keep watch as you breathe easy,
unharmed, untouched.
You do not have to carry this weight anymore.
You do not have to watch this grey
and dreary world decay before you.
Stop to catch your breath
and I will light the night torch for you,
leading you in to safer pastures.
You do not have to die.
As my light grows dim and extinguishes,
yours will shine brighter.
You have to live.

Whoooosh!

This week has gone by in a blur. Sleep, work, go to IOP, sleep, IOP, sleep, doctors, work, sleep, IOP....

Longer post about IOP to come.

The time has come

Intensive Outpatient Therapy (which I will call IOP from here on out) starts tomorrow!

Bye bye!

I am officially off the Ambien and Trazadone!!!!!! This is huge news guys!

A Letter to my Pain

Dear Pain,

So here we are now, face to face. You have manifested in so many ways in my life. You haven’t just taken my life away from me. You wrapped your icy tendrils around my heart and destroyed what little sense of self I had left.

It’s not even the physical that hurts the most. It’s the self doubts, the lack of self-esteem, the thoughts in the middle of the night that everyone would be better off without me. Thinking that my husband deserves better; he should have gotten the smart, beautiful, driven, and successful girl and instead he got me. How is that fair?

I know that we are to be lifelong companions. It’s like a second marriage I don’t remember signing up for and I’ll never be able to get my divorce. If that’s the case, then we need to set down some ground rules.

First off, you do not need to be in my vagina, so kindly vacate that part of my body immediately.

Second, you don’t get to go on these 3 day parties in my skull anymore. We are done with that.

Third, no really, get out of my vagina.

Finally, you will no longer make me feel like less of a person, like I am useless. I am smart, I am creative, and I am a damn talented writer. Nothing you do to me can take that away from me. It’s untouchable.

I hope we will not have to have this conversation again.

Sincerely,
Emi

Our wedding cake

I don't think I showed many photos from the wedding. I need to get to posting more of them here. But I wanted to show off the beautiful cake that West Side Bakery did for us!

Sleep? What's that?

You know your sleep is extremely disordered when the idea of going down on your sleep aid to get off of it freaks you out so badly you almost run back into the bedroom to get a full pill instead of one-half.

I need to get off of this Ambien.

Wrong hole!

Ugh, I feel so tired and dehydrated. Spent all day yesterday drinking Miralax to get ready for a colonoscopy because there's been some severe bleeding. I just want to go and get this over with. Hopefully it's just a hemorrhoids problem and nothing significant. Hard to say for sure.

Anjonette

My friend is headed into her third surgery for her gastric bypass today. She's going to be fine. She's going to be fine. She has to be fine.

Sexual health (Part 1)

I don't remember if I've ever talked about this on here before, but I think it's something that is very important. I don't think sexual health in those with chronic pain is talked about openly and freely. I know so many people with chronic pain that have sexual dysfunction, for many different reasons: too much pain to have sex, fatigue, loss of libido, they feel ugly because their medications made them gain weight, and so on.

So I want to talk about my own sexual dysfunction.

When I was 12, I was on a swim team. I loved it too. I have always been such a fish in the water, and I loved being part of it. Around that same time, I started the journey of womanhood known as menstruation.

I side eye which ever deity thought that one up.

Anyway, my mom used tampons while I used pads, but we decided that we needed to teach me how to use the tampons so I wouldn't miss a week of swimming every month. Mom showed me how best to situate myself before inserting it, showed me how it should go, and then let me try. It wouldn't go in. Strange. Tried again. Still wouldn't go in. I told mom is was hurting the further I tried to put it in. So mom decided to try it because it couldn't be hurting that much; it doesn't really hurt to put a tampon in, it's just uncomfortable.

I screamed in pain and ran from the room.

Mom felt horrible for not believing me when I said it hurt, and we set the issue aside. She made an appointment with a gynecologist to see what was going on. The woman we went to told us that I was too young to wear tampons and sent us on our way. And so with no other option, I had to quit my swim team.

Fast forward a couple of years. I'm 15 years old, a sophomore in high school, and I go to my mom upset because I've had a slow period for a month with no end in sight, and it hurt so bad. No only was the vagina itself inflamed and hurting, but thanks to the pads, my vulva was red and swollen. At this point we had moved more than halfway across the country, from Cali to Ohio, so we had a new gynecologist. This is when I first started taking Hormonal Birth Control (HBC). My periods go back to normal, and everything seems fine.

Still can't put a tampon in, though. He tries to do a pelvic exam but it hurts too much, so he stops. He thinks it might be the hymen, which is a small, stretchable membrane that goes around the vaginal wall (it doesn't close up the vagina, like many think. There is a hole in the middle.)

So there are 2 options:
1. Try to break it myself.
2. He can cut it.

We walk away from the issue for a couple of years until I'm finally wanting to be sexually active with my boyfriend (around the age of 18). I decide to let him cut it, because I'm too afraid to try and deal with it myself. And how would I know it was broken? Now he has to do the pelvic exam. Just having the speculum in was excruciating. I just keep telling myself that it will be okay and this all to a good end.

Except halfway through the exam he tells me he sees no evidence of the hymen.

What the hell am I supposed to do now? My doctor tells me there isn't much that he can personally do. The only option left is to just try and push through the pain. And so that's exactly what I did. That first time having sex, all I could think of was "please, please, please, finish fast."

And so we decided to just keep pushing through. It took a long while, but finally one night the pain actually subsided, and I could feel good things!

Oh! So this is why we do this!

Every time I have sex though, the horrible pain is there for about 2 minutes until it finally subsides. And so I figure this is how it's supposed to be.

To be continued.....

I'm only vulnerable with you

Just wanted to share my favorite wedding photo.

A day for happiness, a day for grief

I'm currently working on a very long post about sexual health, but today is a busy day, and I wanted to share.

First off, happy birthday to my dear friend Leisa who passed away in June from cancer. She was a beautiful person, and a wonderful friend. Though you are gone, your love remains.

But today is a happy day, and one that should be celebrated, because today my friends Dani and Brian wed. I wish them a lifetime of happiness, and I am so happy that I get the chance to be part of their big day. I have made lots of fudge for the reception, and hope to get many, many good photos to share with them!

I'm still alive!

I need to get into the habit of posting every day. I know I've been hiding. The stress of the wedding sent me into such a weird spiral downward, though for some reason the last month I was doing much better emotionally. I'm doing fairly well now too, other than being extremely messed up by some nightmares, which is more of an internal panicking. (I don't know if posting about the nightmare is a good idea right now just because there are some doors I don't know if I want to open right now. Just know that they are bad!)

Anyway, I'm married now! And I'm so happy.

Health: Worse. But I'm coping. I'm trying to take everything day by day. But I am having some breakthroughs with my sexual dysfunction! I promise I will make a full post about it soon.

The wedding day was not pain free, but that doesn't even matter. I didn't have a migraine (which was my worst fear!) and the day was beautiful. Big posts coming! I promise!

Taking the plunge

Long time no write! Sorry about that, but it's been so busy. After today I'll have more time to write. What is so special about today, you ask? I'm getting MARRIED! We're finally at the wedding day!

Here's to hoping everything goes well and certain family members aren't dicks!

Disability appeal

So we finally got the tapes from my hearing last April which means we can now move forward with the appeal for when I became disabled. I'm waiting to hear from my lawyer now. I called today and she was busy. Hopefully she'll call back soon. We have 25 days to submit all extra information that has been acquired.

For now I just wait.

I have been having a hard time writing much of anything lately. I don't have the energy or the want to. Everything is so high stress and messed up right now. I feel like it might be helpful to let people know that all of this emotional strain does happen when you are fighting a disability case. I think waiting is the worst part. You don't know when and you don't know what will happen, but you know it is coming.

I've unfortunately also been shown, once again, that some friends are not in it for the long haul no matter what they say to you. Be wary, because most will leave. And they don't really care about the damage they cause by doing it. Someone could tell you a million times they love you, but it doesn't make them mean it when you need it most. I will survive this somehow and I will remember.

As Will Smith wisely said: If you're absent during my struggle, don't expect to be present during my success.

Losing it

So I talked to my attorney today on the phone and apparently when I get married, there is a very real chance I will lose all of my disability benefits. And I am not dealing with this well at all. I feel like all of the fight is gone from me. I just want to give up completely.

Update

So, now to do an actual update. I think I've been avoiding it because I don't want to face it. The last couple of months have been hard. I've watched my health decline even more, to the point that dinners have been hard to deal with. That's supposed to be my territory, we agreed when we moved in together. And I have been dropping the ball so hard.

I'm just trying to focus ahead, deal with the wedding details, and try and tell myself it's going to be okay.

Lets talk issues

I'm not the type that usually gets into politics. I vote mostly in the bigger elections, and I stay away from the news channels/sites because it just makes me all so mad. But I am a democrat, and I do watch certain key things (like the health care bill).

But this election has made it impossible to stay out of it. The republican side has some very specific things they are trying to achieve even before the elections happen. So this election I've decided that rather than stay on the sidelines, I'm just going to say what I'm feeling and thinking.

1. If birth control were a male thing, and the men were the ones dealing with it, this would not even be an issue. As far as I'm concerned, men really have no say in what we do with our bodies. When they have gone through bleeding every month, when they have dealt with the cramps, the loss of iron, the emergency room for iron and dehydration, or bleeding non-stop for 6 weeks (or in my case, every other week), then they can have a say. Until then, shut the fuck up.

2. I support Planned Parenthood and everything they do. It is much more than just abortions. They deal with breast and uterus help (cancer screenings included), birth control, STDs, rape victims, sex education, miscarriages, and prenatal help.

And yes, I'm pro-choice.

3. We need to be finding better ways to be dealing with domestic violence, and one of those ways is NOT by making it harder for police to arrest the perpetrator. If they find a woman or man who has visible marks from being beaten, YES the perpetrator should be arrested, and NO it should not only be if the police see the beating happen. What the hell is wrong with you?

4. Yes, there needs to a separation of church and state. And no, you don't get to put your religious beliefs on your employees.

and finally....

5. Gay people are human beings. They deserve the same rights and every else.

Quote

"If you're absent during my struggle, don't expect to be present during my success."
-Will Smith

Lots of work!

Okay, so I have all of the chapters figured out up until 2007. Still a lot of work to do. I'm going to get the outline done, and then write, and then figure out from there whether I need to cut down on chapters (which, based on how many I have so far, I will probably need to. That or I'll need to combine some of them. I don't know.... would you read a book that has around 40 chapters? lol)

I'm doing pretty well with it though. There is a lot I know is worth skipping because it's just silly filler stuff. And then I know certain chapters are definitely necessary. And daddy seems willing to help just by talking to me about all the things that have happened. It's nice to hear other perspectives. It makes it more rounded.

I'm also working on putting all the invitations together for the wedding so all I have to do when 2 months before hits is throw them in the mailbox.

Schizophrenia

So, in the process of working on my memoir, I'm having to go through written journals, posts made on websites, and online journals. I was, for the most part, okay going through the online journals and the written ones. It was when I got to going through some posts on an old website I frequented though that really blindsided me.

I don't want to go into severe detail right now, and I might not even go into full detail in the book either, but there was a time period where the doctors thought I was schizophrenic. I was seeing things, people, that weren't real. They finally came to the conclusion that it wasn't schizophrenia; it was a coping technique. I saw these people because I NEEDED them. I had nobody else I felt I could turn to, and they played that part. After I started on better antidepressant treatment, started talking to my mom, and made real, lasting friendships, I was able to let go of the delusions. And I haven't had them since then.

This is a big part of my recovery that I have hidden from people. I don't talk about it openly, I don't deal with it. I pretend it didn't happen. But it did. And with this memoir I have to face it.

Going through these posts on the website sent me into a huge anxiety attack. I had to take an Ativan to calm it down, but I'm still dealing with the side effects. Just talking about it is bringing up some of the feelings. So I'm going to end this entry now.

I wish I could escape from it.

Insomnia

So, for the past 7 hours, I've just kind of been lying in bed trying to sleep. I think I might have dozed in and out eventually, but for the most part? Nothing. Maybe at total an hour. And I'm exhausted.

My doctors want me to fix my sleep, but how am I supposed to do that if nights like this happen?

Memoir

So here's my plan: I've pulled out my journal, which I have had since I was 15 and in my first time at the psych ward. I'm also going to find the journal I used to write letters to my grandma right after she died. Then I'm going to start meticulously going through my LJ (and probably my facebook). That's part of why I really need to finish my tagging, so I can just do it all by tags.

While I am going through this, I'm going to have other notebooks specifically for taking notes of the dates, what happened, the particulars, and what I can remember that I didn't write down.

And then finally the notes will be turned into chapters.

Ta-da!