This fragile soul
So wrapped up in shame
Lifeless under these covers
Begging for the darkness
Haunting memories cling
To her mind
Play and replay
Painful glimpses
Of her fall from grace
Of her loss of sanity
Not a shred of perspective
To her name
Muted as the burden
Of reality
Of the damage done
Continually slaps her
Embarrassed red face
So it’s another lovely day outside in Mississippi. My youngest never threw up yesterday, so I sent her to school this morning and hope she does okay. I’m going out to lunch with Bob and then to the grocery store, so hopefully if she has any problems, they will go ahead and manifest before that.
Not much is going on today. Tomorrow is one of the local dance competitions. That will take all morning. Then I’m not sure what we’re going to do for the rest of the day. Maybe rest.
I talked to my friend Betsy about her recumbent bikes, and turns out all hers are two-wheeled. But she thinks she knows a guy with a three-wheeled one he’s trying to sell, so we shall see about that She is supposed to get in touch with him for me and see if he still has it.
Hope everyone has a good weekend.
Posted in Read Along
Well folks I felt the fear and I did it anyway – I GOT CERTIFIED!!!!! WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!! (For those of you wondering, the certification is COMPTIA Security +). Somehow I didn’t think I could actually pull it off, but I did!!! All those months of studying and test-taking (over & over & over) have paid off. I took the test yesterday and passed with a 787, about 87.4%. Do I need to say how happy I am?!?! I can’t remember the last time I had such a big goal, and I achieved it. This has challenged me like nothing since college, which is many years in the past. After 40+ ECT treatments, I really didn’t know if my brain could absorb and learn like I would need to. Also, this is a 50-year-old brain! But, I did it! I’m so excited and encouraged! You CAN teach an old dog new tricks! I’m living proof! And, Bipolar Disorder doesn’t get to win here. I am not defeated by my illness. Oh my I am just filled with happiness and hope. Now on to Certified Ethical Hacker with some confidence that I can do it! YEAH!
Originally posted on My Brain Has Hiccups:
[Story by Matthew Schmitz. Article on the website of The Mighty.] [Yesterday, Thursday 30 March, was world bipolar awareness day. Here is an interesting…
A most horrible and horrendous experience, one of the worst I’ve ever had in my life and that is saying something. My son went to a convenience/gas store around 3:30 am to get chips. He got jumped by 10-15 African American “boys”. Didn’t know who they were, he had to defend himself against their assault. Luckily he has taken some Kung fu and is, mashallah, a strapping young man, so he defended himself successfully, jumped in his car and came home. No one did a thing to help him or called the police while this shocking assault was taking place. My husband said a pack of hyenas met a lion last night and it truly is the case. He could have been severely injured or worse. A senseless occurrence, he was minding his own business, just trying to buy chips. They jumped him. Apparently this is a thing in Louisville, it’s called “Wilding” and it happens at the very gas station where he went. We didn’t know. The press used to cover these incidences but stopped a while ago. These misguided, dangerous, awful people, I wish them NOTHING good. I am angry, I am worried to the hilt, I am disappointed that this could happen, my son, my precious son.
Posted in Read Along
Originally posted on A Journey of Faith:
I’ve been trying to change my perspective and to acquire an attitude that is more grateful. And guess what? God is helping me! My goal is to record at least three specific things from…
YES. I am on another rant about the shitty side effects of lithium. Yesterday was absolute misery and it only became that way after I took my medication. Now Lamictal does not induce nausea. Wellbutrin does not induce nausea.
It is ALWAYS the fucking lithium.
Which brings us to the proverbial catch 22 situation. As far as mood stabilizers go, lithium is the gold, silver, and platinum standard. It JUST WORKS.
Unfortunately, it has horrid side effects, which are why many times, I have decided Lamictal alone would suffice rather than spend my time in a nauseated groggy stupor.
My shrink switched me from 300mg capsules 3 times a day because I complained about the nausea. Honestly, the 450mg twice daily tablets have been tolerated way better. I know not to take it on an empty stomach.
Sadly, sometimes, like yesterday, even though I ate before taking my lithium…I still spent five plus hours nauseated and groggy, hating the medication that basically allowed me to have my life back.
Well, actually, Lamictal (lamatrogine) works very well during the seasonal affect months since I am so clinically depressed (very little mania to combat). Come spring, when that lifts and I tend to go manic…Lithium saves the day (in combination with Lamictal).
I just wish to pegacorn it came with fewer nasty side effects. Or at least side effects that are consistent. I don’t eat, I get nausea. I do eat, I get nausea. I take it in the mornings, I get sleep. I take it at night, I don’t get sleep. Seriously, wtf?
Yesterday only improved around 5 p.m. when I cooked supper for me and the spawn and got a full stomach.
It makes me wonder if, for whatever reasons, lithium requires a certain calorie amount on the stomach to ward off the nasty assed nausea.
It’s maddening because I have been taking lithium since 2006. It’s actually the drug that changed everything. Years of misdiagnosis and anti-depressants feeding the bipolar when I wasn’t in seasonal affect depression…thwarted by one medication. I found myself, learned that my disorder was the cause of much of my bad behavior and poor choices.
I don’t give a damn what the Douchebag Shithead Manual says…Much of the behavior bipolar patients exhibit…is NOT our personality, it’s not who we are, it’s a cluster of symptoms we do not control. To say otherwise is akin to saying someone who’s been Roofie’d cannot claim rape. There’s no consent in being drugged and there is no control nor consent when your brain chemicals are running riot.
It does not absolve us of responsibility, but it does indicate diminished capacity. Not that society will ever see it that way.
I watched a show just yesterday that made me see red because a character was on paroxetine (Paxil) and they (the crime scene analysts) ignorantly called it a mood enhancer. Like it’s an illicit drug that makes you high as opposed to correcting an imbalance. And more maddening is that same show (and many, many others), referred to Valium as an anti-depressant. SERIOUSLY? Even fucking Wikipedia can get the drug class right!!!!
Okay, so maybe I get too bent about this stuff but if you’re gonna get all the science right…This is fucking child’s play. FUCKING GOOGLE IT. Otherwise, your paid “advisors” are making your entire show look like a douchebag.
In other news…
I did not take my meds today before I had to go spend 7 hours in the dish. I’ve never been a breakfast person so I resent having to eat before I take the cocktail. I just do it at a later time even if it’s breaking the “same time every day” rule. After yesterday’s hours long nausea…I was just not going there.
I had to drop the spawn at my mom’s. Then I had to go to the ATM for cash, go to the DMV, spend $102 for a sticker (and show I.D., seriously, are there people offering up a hundred bucks for a sticker not to their own car??????), then I went to the shop. (R asked on Monday since he had a doctor’s appt out of town and I agreed cos frankly, I needed smokes and I also needed to not hear my darling daughter’s incessant chatter for a bit.)
For the sixth day in a row…it rained cats, dogs, and armadillos. It’s like fucking monsoon season in the midwest. I wonder if it will even dry out enough to put the new sticker on the car. I sure as fuck don’t wanna risk a hundred dollar sticker not sticking, ffs. Bitch of it is, R can drive around for months on an expired sticker but I bet I wouldn’t make it a day before being ticketed. I am not possessing the Lucky Charms shamrocks like him.
Still…in spite of the gloom dragging me down…I went. I functioned. I even fixed Kenny’s computer as he got a spam popup and actually called the number and they hijacked his computer remotely (How do people still fall for that dead horse???).
It wasn’t a bad day. My kid declared she wanted to stay the night at mom’s. I said sure. After my servitude at the shop, I got a ten dollar pizza from Pizza Hut (I’ve been craving and wanting for 2 weeks but had no money) and came home to binge watch tv shows. My biggest anxiety today, thank pegacorn, was being a little nervous driving Aubrey. Everyone HATES my car simply because the paint job is so worn. I dislike my car because it hates wet weather and idles all crazy, chugga chugga lugga lug. Nerve wracking. Let it dry out and she runs smoothly even if begging for a muffler. (I’m gonna try, Aubrey, baby, I swear!)
Plus side, I ran 2 weeks and filling the car up only took $15. HELLS YEAH! My previous cars, V-8, V-4, took twice that! Cos they were kinda fucked up. Aubrey may not be pretty (and neither am I because the world focuses on weight rather than actual beauty or intelligence) but she or he (I can’t commit to a gender for the car, sue me!) gets the job done in a way that benefits me and the spawn. So why would I worry about the fucking paint job when I FINALLY have a car I am comfy driving? Especially getting this gas mileage.
Maybe I’ m not the crazy one.
So now…I am gonna have a Mangorita, smoke a Marlboro Smooth (thanks, R) and maybe later I will write. Or maybe not.
Today I am not sweating it.
Today I am okay, even if the shitty monsoon weather doesn’t inspire an *up* mood.
I has kittens. They are 6 days old and their eyes are not open yet. But they are healthy lil butterballs and…I could huff kittens and get higher than any drug.
I didn’t say I was in my right mind.
Just functioning. It’s something.
As you can see from the title things haven’t changed much. I’m still not painting, still not doing much. I’m depressed most of the time and I want out of this jail cell but can’t think for one minute of where I would even go and be comfortable.
Now I have to go make my lunch.
Stoned again.. sigh
Sometimes I feel the burden of life is too much. What have I done to deserve this heavy, hellish life? Where is my luck? Good luck? The luck I see so many people possessing. Some people can skate through life without getting a concussion. They can grow up without suffering abuse. They can have siblings, all of whom live to old age. Their families do well. There is not some crisis or other every few days. I am tired. I am exhausted. Lately, things had been looking quite rosy, had been looking up. But once again, it did not last. Someone extremely dear to me was physically harmed by hoodlums. I feel sick, nauseous, not knowing what I do next. How to survive, indeed why survive when there will only be another calamity sooner or later?
And again I sit here and wonder. When does it stop. Does it ever stop? Will me and mine always be used as a cosmic punching bag?
Literally sick and tired. The fight inside me ebbing away, seeping away.
Posted in Read Along
Self forgiveness. I understand this concept in a broader context. I don’t get it when having to relate to myself. A week after my destructive manic episode I’m still trying to pick up the pieces. Mostly I’m pissed off. How could I have done the things I did? How could I treat people the way I did? Again, conceptually I know I was sick and not in my right mind. But when bits of memories jolt me I am ashamed. It’s stings so deep. I don’t remember everything that happened. Almost everyday there is a new revelation. A new stinger inserted in my heart. A new shameful discovery.
Yesterday while visiting my primary doctor, he read me the psychiatrist notes from my brief ER stay. I almost lodged a complaint because I believed no pdoc bothered to talk to me. I was sure I could plead my case and avoid hospitalization if given a chance. Turns out I refused to talk to anyone. Stated I was being wrongfully judged based on past events. I was argumentative and agitated. Hospital bound. There was much more in those notes. I am mostly disturbed I have absolutely no recollection of this interaction. Rather at 4:30 am after arriving at midnight I demanded to know when I would speak to the doc. We spoke at 12:30am. So scary!
This whole disaster plays out in my mind..what I can remember of it. It’s hard for me to reconcile just how out there I really was. I can’t seem to forgive myself..for the phone calls, the worry I caused, my aggressive behavior & demeanor.
I’m supposed to start a new job on 4/18. I just don’t think I’m ready. My memory and recall is so extremely poor. Processing. Decision making. Forget it. I had to send a request to move my start date. I am so embarrassed and disappointed. Why did this have to happen? I don’t know how my future employer is going to respond.
The only way out is self forgiveness. I can’t even begin to know where to start. I try to breathe, but that’s a struggle. I guess I don’t know what self forgiveness truly is.
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