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Archive for the ‘The Fear’ Category

According To Our Latest Findings- You’re Super

Posted in Anxiety, CBT, DID, Dissociation, Dissociative Identity Disorder, emotions, Fantastic CPN, hypervigilance, insight, Internal Communication, MPD, Multiple Personality Disorder, Spiderman, The Fear, The Smallest House in The World, Triggers, Twitter, Uncategorized, tagged , , , , , , on July 26, 2012 | 20 Comments »

I don’t think  I’ve ever detailed my virulent hatred of CBT (cognitive behavioural therapy) on the blog, I talk about it a lot on twitter and as some of my poor victims will know, I used to practise it there.

In times of distress I was always available to offer therapy, mainly along the lines of-

WHY ARE YOU DEPRESSED? OTHER PEOPLE ARE FAR WORSE OFF; SOME HAVE DEAD PETS. JUST STOP IT!

And

YOU ARE EMPLOYING MAGICAL THINKING. JUST STOP IT!

And

YOU’RE NOT BEING PARANOID. PEOPLE DO HATE YOU- BECAUSE YOU’RE RUBBISH. JUST STOP IT!

I’m in semi-retirement from my CBT practise these days, though rest-assured, should I spot you indulging in a little black and white thinking, mind-reading or catasrophising then I will point it out and insist you desist.

It may surprise you to know that I’m not a trained CBT practitioner, but I am a quick learner and managed to pick-up quite a lot during my own very brief dalliance with the technique. I had three sessions of CBT before I was declared too mental; I don’t remember much, in fact all I remember is

“WHY WOULD YOU MAKE YOURSELF VOMIT? THAT’S JUST STUPID”

Which as you can imagine was enormously helpful for someone who at the time was attempting to ‘regulate their emotions’ by throwing-up every morsel of food she ate. I waited 9 months for some harridan in a maxi-dress (she may have been a psychologist) to berate me for being mental. I’ve never been so glad to be declared ‘un-helpable’ in my life, being discharged was a gift.

CBT was never going to help me; I’m quite capable of berating myself, I don’t deny I sometimes indulge in all the common cognitive distortions but I’m a multiple so I also know when I’m doing it, why and what to do about it. I can administer CBT to myself. It doesn’t make me any better or help at all in any way but I know I should keep doing it or everything will go completely wrong and end in disaster. Furthermore it will all be my fault; I know others will blame me for everything as they all think I’m rubbish anyway.

There is one psychotherapeutic technique with a cognitive basis I don’t despise completely- reframing. I love a good reframe. I often reframe my days in order to make myself feel better; I’m quite the Polyanna and on balance, probably wear my rose-tinted spectacles as often as I wear my shit-tinted ones. At this stage I probably would lose the will to live by 10am most days if I didn’t paint everything with rainbows-

Forget an entire day- it must’ve been rubbish anyway.

Got lost in Tesco- accidentally found the stationery aisle.

Haven’t been out of the house all week- didn’t run away to Paris/Newcastle.

Drank too much wine- didn’t mix with benzos.

It’s a useful technique but there is a danger that a reframe can become a wanky platitude. The two run very closely together, I’ve sketched a graph to illustrate.

I can also spot a reframe a mile away so often feel patronised and invalidated, sometimes this is justified. Back in the day of the frequent dissociative trips that ended in police involvement, MHAs, helicopters, trips to A&E and the bin etc the Fantastic CPN would always comment “but you came back and you’re ok”. I’m not sure what my response at the time was, these ‘trips’ left me confused, terrified and ashamed but the fact I was still alive was supposed to be enough to comfort me when it was quite clear I had completely lost control of my mind and my life. So reframing, whilst useful can also be a tricky balancing act.

The 7 year-old has returned home, earlier than I planned. I’m not entirely sure how this came about but I’m sure there’s a paper-trail somewhere. Today I finally have a man coming to fix the TV- you can’t have a 7 year-old child in the house with no working TV, well you can if you

a)     dislike children

and

b)     are happy to provide round-the-clock entertainment

I’ve mentioned before that this kind of situation, where I have to allow a stranger to enter the smallest house in the world is very challenging for me. I don’t imagine for a second that the TV man presents any real threat (other than to the bank balance) but I am crippled by hypervigilance.

I have extremely keen senses- all of them, they are my useless superpowers. I’m always on the lookout for signs of danger, be they real or imagined. I am permanently primed, ready to freeze, flee or have a complete meltdown at the first sign of peril. It’s not a good way to be, physically or emotionally- hypervigilance makes me mental, bonfire night in this house is probably similar in many ways to bonfire night in Battersea Dogs Home. I can’t just stop being hypervigilant and so, at times I hate myself for it.

I clearly needed some sort of reframe, so you can imagine my unbridled delight when I found this article that confirms that I am not only super-human but Spiderman. I have nothing to fear from the TV man, unless of course his name is Norman Osborn…….

click image to read article

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Helping The Help

Posted in #MadParisJolly2011, art, Awesome Psychiatrist, bipolar, blogging, communication, crying, depression, diagnosis, DID, Dissociation, DSM, emotions, Fab Psychologist, health, hospital, insight, Internal Communication, labels, Lovely GP, manic, medication, mental illness, MPD, Multiple Personality Disorder, NHS, psychiatrist, stickers, suicide, The Fear, therapy, Told you it wasn't like Stephen Fucking Fry, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on May 25, 2012 | 23 Comments »

Two years ago today I wrote this blog post

Ever wish you hadn’t asked?

Some time last year that post was edited and the link within changed- the link was originally to the Wikipedia entry on DID (which incidentally I think is rubbish). I know why it was changed and for the purposes of this post it doesn’t really matter. What does matter is that for two years I’ve known I had DID, the nature of DID means that I didn’t always know I had it and often didn’t think I had it- but I do and I’ve known for a very long time.

This post is dedicated to all the psychiatrists, psychologists, nurses & doctors (and there have been many) that have met me and treated me in those two years; I know many of them read the blog (though strangely they never leave comments). Even if you’ve never had the privilege of being involved in my ‘care’ if your profession brings you into contact with human beings, you may learn something too so please read on.

I can’t believe you all missed it, it was hardly subtle and I did, very kindly point it out on a number of occassions. You all need to learn about dissociation and dissociative disorders, you all need to find the courage, humility and confidence to do what’s right for those in your care. If you don’t know what you’re doing- admit it and find someone else who does. Listen to your patients, accept what is true for them, however distasteful, frightening and anxiety provoking it is for you. Put your egos to one side; ignore the flawed politics of the system you represent, stop damaging people who have been damaged enough, admit you got it wrong. If your manager/colleagues/profession are unsupportive- call them out on it, stand-up for yourselves, stand-up for your patients.

It’s too late for me, the damage caused by your mistakes is huge- but there will be others and you owe it to them, to your profession and to yourselves to ensure you don’t do to them what you did to me.

Don’t make anyone else have to fight the way I had to fight to get the correct diagnosis, care and treatment- for that fight was very damaging. Don’t assume that you know more than your patients, for all your qualifications it is the person sitting opposite you who is the expert on their own mind. Listen, believe and accept, if you can’t or won’t, have the decency to find someone who can and will. I hope every one of you has learned something from me and I hope some of you will go on to learn more in order that you can do your job and do it well.

You hold peoples lives in your hands, you have great power- but always remember what Spiderman said……. or Voltaire if that’s your bag, he said it too but Spiderman says it better.

A multiple never forgets

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To Whom It May Concern

Posted in bipolar, communication, crying, Eating Disorder, emotions, high, insight, mania, manic, mental illness, suicide, The Fear, tagged , , , , , , , , , on September 14, 2011 | 39 Comments »

As I write it’s Wednesday 14th of September 2011, just after 8.30pm. My day has been unspectacular, especially by my own standards of late. I woke before 4,30am, on the sofa in the same clothes I had worn and slept in since Monday.

That paragraph sounds much like the beginning of one of those posts on depression I am so loathe to write, it’s not.

My mood remains “elevated” but it’s not the colouring-in, book writing elevation that we all like so much. This elevation can be fun, it gets me through the long days, the kids love “manic breakfasts” (bacon and pancakes- sometimes real sometimes imaginary), laundry gets washed and occasionally dried on the same day, I am (I like to think) funny, fun and engaging for my twitter audience. My energy levels are high and more than ever I miss my stupid car (it’s still in Newcastle) as there are so many places I want to go- usually to buy stuff- usually stationery. Mostly I just want to run away.

However this kind of elevation also brings with it a mix of anger, fear, rage, irritability, distractibility and anxiety that turns most days into a waking nightmare. I can’t concentrate on anything; basic conversation is beyond me and anything anyone says winds me up to a point I can’t hear them over the noise in my head. Writing this is a huge struggle and I’m not even sure what to say.

I am consumed with anger and rage at the slightest stimulus, be this political or personal. I get so overwhelmed by these feelings I end up going mental in some of its most basic forms- laughter, crying, a mixture of the two, fixating on rhyming words, taking risky walks in the dark alone, rocking back and forth, pacing or becoming completely immobile. All the while my thoughts are fast, jumbled and largely useless. I am easily confused and inclined to forget things, going out presents the ever-present danger of getting lost

We’ve been having the fine/ill debate regarding my mental health on twitter for some time now; for the most part I insist I am fine with fleeting moments where I confess I feel less than well. Many others have told me I’m not very well and haven’t been for sometime. I have had some advice to the contrary, the kind of advice that suggests I’m being somewhat self-indulgent and need to simply “stop” doing what I am doing. I can’t even comment on that advice right now except to say, maybe those who say that are right?

Every health professional I’ve encountered recently has gone to great lengths to tell me that they are “concerned” about me and that I am “very concerning”. This concern makes me feel guilty and I am going to extraordinary lengths to no longer be a “concern”. My attempts are superficial however and mainly involve lying about my mental health and telling people what they want to hear. I feel vindicated in doing this as I very quickly discovered “concern” never mutated into anything useful for me.

I don’t want to be a concern, I want to be fine.

I don’t think I am fine but I’m not entirely sure what to do with this revelation. I think  the part of me that surfaced over the last few weeks and tried to destroy me is on her way back (I still argue that starving my body kept her quiet) and I’m not entirely sure what to do (early signs are the drugs inventory and purchase of new razor blades). I am currently safe though it’s through conscious choice at the moment. I still don’t really know what happened over the last few weeks but I know I very quickly got to a point where I had very little say in my own safety. How do you keep yourself safe from part of yourself, a part of which you have little awareness until you see the cuts on your body or have to talk your way out of yet another MHA?

I don’t know where I’m going with this, I’ve just read it, it’s not one of my better pieces, (actually it’s shit) but it’s going up on the blog as I think it may be a cry for help whilst I am still able to do so.

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Premeditated Murder- Part One

Posted in Anxiety, Awesome Psychiatrist, birthday, blogging, depression, diagnosis, duloxetine, Eating Disorder, emotions, illness, labels, lithium, mania, manic, medication, mental illness, psychiatrist, stability, suicide, tea, The Fear, Twitter, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , on September 4, 2011 | 31 Comments »

As I mentioned in my previous post I am considering taking lithium again. This was not my idea, in fact it comes way down on my list of ideas somewhere after “stick pins in my eyes”, “swim in a crocodile infested pond”, “go to a Miranda Hart gig” “listen to Demi Lovato”, “eat offal”, “take up card making as a hobby”….you get the picture.

Lithium is the idea of my Awesome Psychiatrist, a gentleman I was very lucky to be referred to and even luckier that he found me “interesting” enough for him to continue reviewing my diagnosis (diagnoses?) and treatment. It is not surprising that in light of recent events he thinks it might be time to try and introduce some sort of chemical stability into my chaotic life.

I trust the Awesome Psychiatrists completely, I did instantly, I have no idea why, I usually make mental health professionals work very hard indeed to earn my trust. The Awesome Psychiatrist is very skilled and very experienced he is a “designated national specialist” according to one website, I’m not actually sure what this means but he’s a nice guy, very funny, gives me tea during appointments and laughs at my jokes, all good qualities as far as I’m concerned.

In spite of this I am still in a quandary over taking lithium again, for reasons I will explain, some perfectly rational, some possibly less rational but no less pertinent for me.

I have taken many psychotropic medications in the past, so many I’m not sure if I can remember them all but I will try- bearing in mind I only came to the attention of the psychiatric profession (this time around) in January 2010 this is quite a list-

Fluoxetine

Venlafaxine

Olanzapine

Quetiapine

Aripiprazole

Carbamazepine

Lithium

Agomelatine

Sodium Valproate

Duloxetine

Various benzodiazepines

Various hypnotics

I took propranolol in an attempt to counter the tremor lithium gave me- it made me almost blind

I was also once prescribed Risperidone for about 20 minutes but never took it

These drugs were in various dosages, in various combinations at various times, I stopped taking anything on the 19th of January 2011. I started taking Agomelatine on the 16th of  March and stopped taking it some 8 weeks ago for reasons that will probably soon become clear. I could write a blog post on each one and the reasons I hated it but this post is about lithium.

So I’ll start with the rational reasons I don’t want to take lithium again.

Lithium has many nasty physical side-effects; in my experience it causes agonising leg cramps, nausea, dizziness, constant fatigue, headaches, disabling whole body tremor, constant thirst, an insatiable hunger and accompanying rapid, uncontrollable weight gain. I don’t cope well with physical ailments, I tend to ignore most physical symptoms, preferring to ignore the fact I actually have a body at all. Feeling ill all the time forces me to acknowledge I have a body that is more than just somewhere to apply pyjamas. It makes me very uncomfortable. When I look back at diaries or blog posts I am reminded of just how dreadful I felt whilst taking medication. I accept I was over medicated, poorly medicated and poorly monitored but I have no confidence this won’t happen again. I would be mad to volunteer to make myself physically ill again.

Drug-induced weight-gain is tortuous, for anybody, for someone who likes to be in control of food as much as I do it’s even worse. I have managed to crawl to quite a sound footing in terms of eating disorder recovery, most days I eat three proper meals a day, snacks in between and have managed to make it through a whole month without any self-induced vomiting. No mean feat for someone who appeared hell-bent on starving herself to death a short time ago. I remember the incredible lithium hunger so well, I would be drop-down-dead starving almost all day, it never went away. I can’t help but think introducing a drug that messes with my metabolism would be self-sabotage at this stage.

Lithium is a mood-stabiliser, yes it helps prevent extremes of mood but it also has a tendency to cancel out all the ones in between as well. I functioned on lithium but I was without thoughts, ideas, feelings or reactions. I was empty; I am in danger of straying into the less rational reasons for not taking lithium so I will direct you to this post written by a much loved friend on the subject, she explains it better than I ever could.

So those are my experience-based, rational, understandable reasons for being reluctant to take lithium again. If I have the words and the courage I will try and explain the other reasons. I would appreciate anyone reading to let me know that they nodded and said “uh-huh” throughout this next bit as opposed to laughing aloud or further questioning my sanity, I have awareness that my beliefs are a little skew-whiff but this does not stop me believing them.

I often joke about being “poisoned by the medical profession” in fact during my first consultation with the Awesome Psychiatrist I made him promise not to poison me, I make it sound funny- I am deadly serious. I believe the medical profession want to poison me and make me something/somebody I am not. This belief  has some basis in fact, after my diagnosis there was a tendency to attach pathological labels to all my past behaviour. All the things I did, all the things I achieved were painted with bipolar, taken away from me, turned in to symptoms as opposed to qualities.  I believe that the psychiatric profession do not like me being who I am (or perhaps rather who I can be when not hooped-up on mentalism?) I am tempted to self-censor here as I know that what I’m about to say merely supports my diagnosis but I will go ahead. The psychiatric profession want me to be the same as everyone else, they want me to conform, be normal, be boring. I haven’t quite made up my mind if “they” (ie- everyone else other than me in the whole world) feel envious, threatened or just don’t like me, either way I know they want to drug the Zoë out of me.

The way I feel about this is paradoxical to my general feelings of self-loathing and I can’t really explain that other than perhaps by referring to that shameful symptom of bipolar- grandiosity. It is my understanding that grandiosity is a symptom of a manic state though and high or low I feel exactly the same way about lithium and exactly the same way about what “they” want to do to me. Even when I am crushingly low I would rather be dead than take lithium.

Simply thinking about taking lithium again makes me panic, it gives me the fear I shake and sweat, my heart races and I start scurrying around inside my own head. I have got as far as allowing the Awesome Psychiatrist to start the process, I am still in control, at this stage I have no intention of taking it.

I believe that in voluntarily taking those tablets I would essentially be killing a part of me. This sounds like a standard case of “missing the highs” and maybe it is, it feels much scarier and final than that though.

Lithium mutes the Zoë in me, it leaves behind a fat, trembling body inhabited by functioning parts, things get done but we don’t “do stuff” (“stuff” being a handy catch-all word to describe the stuff  Zoë does). Having re-read that (very long) sentence I am aware I am possibly making little sense, except perhaps to myself. It’s 3am I should probably stop and have a milky drink.

I don’t know what to do about this situation, I clearly cannot continue the way I am, I am just not safe- in either mood state and I accept that I am unwell (though I am willing to argue as to just how unwell I am). However I know that if I take lithium, the author of this blog will die and I suspect she’ll take the twitter account holder with her, I will still exist in some form but I won’t be living.

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