It’s All In Your Head!

What are we so afraid of?  Why does being told ‘it’s all in your head’ fill us with terror and completely write off any sense of being validated as a patient in need of help?

My view is that it’s all about the stigma of mental illness.  Somehow we’ve interpreted the message ‘it’s all in your head’ to mean ‘it’s not real’.  And we’ve done that for very good reasons.

I recently read an article about some work being done in understanding Gulf War Syndrome, which has many symptoms similar to fibromyalgia.  They have found that there is clear evidence of brain damage in sufferers, and one of the hopes is that in developing a test (a fMRI) to diagnosis the illness, it will lead onto the more accurate diagnosis of Fibro and Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

Here’s a quote from that article:

“Many veterans have had difficulties getting benefits and treatment for a service-connected condition because doctors assumed they were either faking it or suffering from post-traumatic stress. “That’s a problem with all physicians — VA, military or civilian,” Baraniuk said. “If it doesn’t fall within their small world of known diseases, then the patient is nuts.”

It’s actually the same with Fibro (and I assume, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome), that patients are sometimes thought to be faking their symptoms, or somehow worse still, thought to be psychologically based… and therefore assumed to be somehow not real.

Maybe I have an advantage because I have both mental illnesses and physical illnesses.  I haven’t seen it as an advantage until now but it must be because I know that mental illnesses are real.  That means that I also know that if a doctor sees fit to tell me my physical illness is psychologically based, then I know that their opinion doesn’t remove my symptoms, and therefore my suffering, being real.

My Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is real.  The Anorexia I struggled with for years was real.  The Depression was real.  The Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) was even real.

They were also ‘all in my head’.  They were all psychologically based, although some of them also affected me physically too.  No one could realistically deny that I was suffering, or that I needed real help to either fight, or manage these conditions.

To add to that, there were very real physical consequences to some of those illnesses.  For example, it is difficult not to accept that Anorexia, as well as being a mental illness, has profound effects on the body which need to be medically treated.  The fact that it is a mental illness does not take away the doctor’s need to treat the patient medically.

If those conditions that I have had or currently still live with, can be identified as psychological but still be treated, then does it really matter whether my fibro is seen as a psychological or a physical illness?  Personally, I don’t think so.  The symptoms are still there, as is my suffering.  Is it ‘all in my head’, or in some other part of my body?  In terms of how it is treated there maybe a considerable difference, but there isn’t a difference in terms of my very real need for help.

My opinion is that the problem with issues addressed by the quote above does not lie with the veterans who are suffering.  The problem is with the medical professional who deem it fit to view that something isn’t real if it is psychological.  Either way the patients with symptoms need help, but it seems too easy for doctors to cast someone aside because their symptoms are from a particular basis.

Even if the doctor wishes to put symptoms down to ‘attention seeking’, my view is that there is still a need for that person to be treated.  Maybe treated differently, but the person still needs help.  Right now it seems that a seeming psychological cause, let alone fake, is simply dismissed often.  That is so wrong.

I actually had a similar issue to this problem a few weeks back with the medical specialist who monitors the auto-immune condition I have called Graves’ Disease.  Graves’ Disease affects a number of parts of the body but primarily the thyroid gland, leading to hyperthyroidism and eventually something called thyrotoxicosis (when levels get toxic and life threatening).

My endocrinologist examined my blood results which indicated that my thyroid levels are currently in a safe range.  The problem for me (and I’d like to think it had been for her too) is that sitting in front of her, I had many of the symptoms of thyrotoxicosis. I can tell you that those symptoms were not pleasant and I was hoping that she would help me to address some of them.  I could accept that the blood tests suggested I wasn’t dying, but I was definitely suffering.

Interestingly she was seemingly interested in helping me to alleviate the symptoms until she went to check my case with her supervisor.  Then she came back and told me that because the blood results were fine, there was nothing that needed to be done.  I was shown the door, and actually later I found she had then formally discharged from the Thyroid specialist service I had been under for several years.

My point is that I was still suffering, but she wasn’t interested.  There’s something wrong when doctors dismiss patients when there is clear evidence of suffering.  Just like the Gulf War veterans.  There is suffering, and whether it is faked, ‘all in the head’, Post-Traumatic stress, or clear sign of physical brain damage (as the fMRI will detect)…  there is a patient who is suffering, who has lost quality of life…  and needs help.

I think it’s sad that the general view is that if something is ‘all in your head’ that somehow the pain and suffering is not real and does not need treatment.  Somehow we need to move away from that view because while it remains, it increases the stigma of mental illness because that too, is seen as not real.  It also increases the likelihood that people won’t seek help when they need it.

But as well as the general population view on this, I am convinced that it is medical professionals that need to lead the way in change.  What they have in front of them is a patient who needs help.  That’s actually what matters.

PS.   There is evidence that the situation with my Graves’ Disease is actually quite common, where the blood results indicate everything is ‘normal’ but the patient reports a very different reality in terms of symptoms.  I’m not aware of a substantiated reason for this though.  Unfortunately many health professionals choose to deny the existence of such an anomaly and so patients end up going without the help they may need.

♦

“Each patient carries his own doctor inside him.” 

―    Norman Cousins,    Anatomy Of An Illness

♦

“A doctor, like anyone else who has to deal with human beings, each of them unique, cannot be a scientist; he is either, like the surgeon, a craftsman, or, like the physician and the psychologist, an artist. This means that in order to be a good doctor a man must also have a good character, that is to say, whatever weaknesses and foibles he may have, he must love his fellow human beings in the concrete and desire their good before his own.”

Auden, W. H.

Related articles

• Researchers tie Gulf War illness to brain damage (usatoday.com)
• The Black Mark Against Mental Illness  (infinitesadnessorhope.wordpress.com)
• What My Doctor Won’t Tell Me (infinitesadnessorhope.wordpress.com)
• Brain Changes Could Contribute to Gulf War Illness: Study (news.health.com)
• Researchers tie Gulf War illness to brain damage (usatoday.com)
• Researchers find Gulf War Syndrome is a real illness (fellowshipofminds.wordpress.com)

Blog For Mental Health 2013

I am joining the project to Blog for Mental Health 2013, a project speared-headed by the wonderful  A Canvas Of The Minds, where some good friends of mine hang out and come up with brilliant material on mental health issues.  I realise this is the second campaign I’ve joined in a week (the other one you can check out on Still Standing Up To Stigma), but I see them as both being important and want to be part of both.  Also when my good friend Ruby pledged me, I just knew I wanted to get involved.

Blog for Mental Health 2013 is catching on like wildfire.  Everyone wants to be part of it and that’s fantastic to see so many bloggers committed to talking about mental health.  So here’s what you need to know:  This is not an award, but rather an exciting project to get a community of mental health bloggers to show that they are proud of their lives, that they are writing for themselves as well as for those who have not yet found their voices, that they are ensuring no one ever has to feel alone when dealing with mental illness. For me, those are some excellent reasons to be a part of this.

The badge that goes with this project, is designed by Lulu and you’ll see that repeated over on the right of this screen.

The next task is to take the pledge, and therefore:

I pledge my commitment to the Blog For Mental Health 2013 Project.  I will blog about mental health topics not only for myself, but for others.  By displaying this badge, I show my pride, dedication, and acceptance for mental health.  I use this to promote mental health education in the struggle to erase stigma.

Step two is to link back to the person who pledged me, Ruby Tuesday of I Was Just Thinking. . . and also co-owner of A Canvas Of The Minds.

Step three is a short biography about my mental health and what it means to me.

My mental health tends to revolve around labels such as Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and Depression with frequent visits of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and eating disorders.  That said, labels don’t actually mean much to me apart from a way for me to identify reasons for some of my behaviours, thoughts and feelings.  I am me, I have a mental illness, and to me, that’s what matters.

Mental illness makes achieving mental health harder than usual.  There are extra bridges to cross, there is stigma to face, and there are battles to win.  But it is possible. 

The mental illnesses that I have are with me for life (BPD is part of my personality) but I view myself as having mental health when I can manage the symptoms and live the life that is important to me.  Right now, I’m doing that and it makes me happy.  It doesn’t mean that there are no struggles, but it does mean I can enjoy mental health just as much as the next person down the street.

Am I crazy?  Probably.  Is it ‘all in my head’?  Absolutely, that’s where my brain resides.  Is it easy?  No, it’s damn hard but living this way is so much more fulfilling than the life I barely existed in over years past.

Being part of this project is important to me, because I know how hard it is to live in this society where mental illness is not seen as okay.  I want to do my bit to spread the word that it is totally okay.  I not only want to make life easier for other people who have mental illness, but I also want to contribute a message that prepares our world to be more accepting of mental illness in the future.  May the next generation not have to fight with stigma.  May they be able to find the acceptance and peace they deserve.

Was that short?  Probably not.  Sometimes I just can’t help myself.  The final step is to pledge five bloggers who have “proven their mettle in my eyes as mental health bloggers”.  Hmm.  Actually this is a bit that I find hard.  I know that it is a way to get other bloggers involved, but personally I don’t want bloggers I could pledge to feel somewhat obligated.  I know obligation is not the intention, but I also know how easy it is for some of us to feel obligated.

So I’m not going to pledge any, except to say that if you write about mental health, even just some of the time (like me) then please consider getting on board with this project.  I honestly believe the more we all speak out about mental health, then the better place we create for ourselves and others to live with mental illness.  So check out the initial post – Blog for Mental Health 2013 and get involved.

One final note from A Canvas of the Minds, if you are getting on board…

“we are launching a Blog For Mental Health 2013 Official Blogroll!  So, in addition to linking back to the person who pledged you, please include the link to the original post in your piece.  As this gets passed along, link back or click here and leave a comment containing the link to your pledge, and we will put you on our Blog For Mental Health 2013 Official Blogroll page!”

Show the world our strength, show them our solidarity, show them what we are made of.  Take the Blog for Mental Health pledge and proudly display the badge on your blog!

♦

“Sometimes the world is so much sicker than the inmates
of its institutions.” 

―    Joanne Greenberg,    I Never Promised You a Rose Garden

Hurtling In CyberSpace

This post was removed on 30 December 2012.

But I still want to finish with a wonderful piece of music, shared with me by my good friends at Bullying Is For Losers  It’s a message I needed to hear yesterday, and will probably need to keep listening to.  I’m not going to hide my True Colours.  Somehow I’m going to find a way through this.

Healing Takes Time

‘Healing of the Paralytic’                      Image credit: Wikipedia.com

In a random moment, of completely unrelated thought, it occurred to me that it is exactly twenty years since I packed up all my possessions, put most of them into storage, rented out what I considered my modest, dream home that I’d only bought a year earlier…  and shifted cities, from Wellington to Auckland (8 hours north).  Twenty years!  Wow!  No one could have predicted was what to follow next.

The reason this is significant to me is that this shift spelt the end of the trauma I experienced from being stalked (you can read more about that in Stalked… But Still Hiding Some Of Me).  The journey wasn’t over, but I was finally doing something people had advised me to do for years.

Leave town.  The reason it took me so long to leave town was that I am stubborn, very stubborn.  And I didn’t want the two stalkers to win.  I felt that if they drove me from the city where I loved living, and away from my friends and family, then they would have won somehow.  I resisted what seemed like the easy option for a long time… until it simply got too much, and I couldn’t take living my life in hiding and a kind of raised alertness anymore.

What I had no awareness of at that time, but now completely understand, is that when the trauma ends, the journey is only just beginning.  I beg to disagree with people who might tell you that now it’s over you can simply get on with living.  It’s finished.

Actually it’s not.  It’s simply a corner I had turned towards recovery.  But the journey would continue to be just as painful for a long time to come.

When I no longer had to keep looking over my shoulder to see if they were there watching, I could relax (actually I had to learn how to stop looking over my shoulder).  And when I relaxed, that’s when the fear struck home.  For nearly 14 years I had lived with the reality, but I couldn’t afford to let myself feel fear.  I couldn’t for many reasons.  Partly I had to remain alert of danger all the time.  Somehow I had to tell myself that I could cope with this, because if I didn’t I would crash, and be vulnerable, not just to the pain, but to the stalkers themselves.  It was a risk I couldn’t take.  It would destroy me.

Now that I was away from the stalkers, it was safe to let my guard down… and weep.  Actually even then it took a while to happen.

I was in a new city, with a great new job.  I was catching up with old friends and making new ones.  For 10 months I was great, and then sickness (Glandular Fever or infectious mononucleosis) struck and then, because I was vulnerable, my mental health completely fell apart. The defenses I had built up over so long could no longer carry me.

I had to think long and hard before writing this post.  The last thing I want to do is discourage others who are fighting their own battles.  Twenty years is a heck of a long time.  I know.  I lived it.  But I think we need to be realistic too.  And to know that taking time is okay.

After all the damage that may have been inflicted on us in a variety of means of abuse, perhaps over a long time, it is going to take time to heal.  The damage probably wasn’t done overnight, and we’re not going to heal overnight.  Just because the abuse (of any kind) is over does not mean the pain comes to an end.  Actually for me, it was only just beginning.

I hasten to add that I haven’t spent 20 years continually trying to get over this, and actually it was about four years before anyone started to use the words Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).  What could be seen was Depression and Anorexia, but unfortunately no one stopped to pay attention to the trauma I had faced for so long.  And actually I was pretty much too traumatised to be able to talk about it.

When a therapist started to talk in terms of trauma, I knew I had finally found someone who ‘got it’.  That was a life changing event, if ever I had one.  This man understood me.  Unfortunately this was in a final interview with him, as my then husband and I were on the move again (actually back to Wellington).  I never had the opportunity to speak to this man who ‘got me’ again.

For the first few years I was being treated for Depression and Anorexia, although it was continually said that I wasn’t responding to treatment, nor did I fit what was seen as classic profiles for these issues.

Cover of A Path Through the Sea

About six months into my treatment, my eldest brother who has always been great at supplying me with books to read, sent me one about Depression.  A Path Through the Sea by Lillian V. Grissen.  It was a very good account of the author’s journey through Depression, and was the first book I read which was a personal account.  It is written from a Christian perspective –  she was a missionary – and if that’s your thing you might find it interesting.  I did at the time.But I was also completely mortified by her account.  She was depressed for two years!  At the time, I had been unwell, and being treated for depression for six months. The thought of two years of this was completely beyond me.  I just ‘knew’ I couldn’t do two years of this hell.

You can probably guess why I mention it.  Because it is now 20 years on.  What more can I say, without depressing every reader?

I took this opportunity of realising the anniversary to ask myself what impact the trauma I experienced was still having on my life.  The first thought was that I still am somewhat scared of the dark and I still clip my bedroom curtains closed at night, so that they can’t fall back leaving a gap.  My cat used to jump up on the window sill during the night and move the curtains. In the morning I would find a gap and be terrified that someone had been watching me through the window as I slept.  I know it’s a little odd, but I can cope with needing to do that still.  If I continue to need to do it all my life, so be it.

What disturbs me much more is the realisation that in spite of all the therapy and healing, every connection with another human being has me (usually unconsciously now) fearing that the result of knowing that person will be more stalking.  Basically I view everyone as a potential stalker.  It’s one of the reasons I married my ex-husband (18 years ago).  As it was, when we divorced some years later, he proved me wrong by not going on to stalk me.  It was only then that I could breathe peacefully.

I hate that I still fear the result of a relationship (of any kind) will be more stalking.  I feel angry that after all this time, it still has such a big impact on me.  I feel angry at the men whose actions taught me react in this way.

That said, I know that being angry isn’t going to help at this point.  I have done the angry thing and I don’t believe it’s what I need right now.  That trauma happened across a lot of years and I built up defenses to protect myself for very good reasons.   Some might say “get over it” but that won’t help me either.  What I need is to be gentle with myself.  What I need is to give myself time.  What I need is to say “it’s okay“.

I’m not saying that healing needs to take 20+ years after significant on-going trauma, and I’m not convinced that it needed to take me 20+ years.  It’s just that for a large chunk of that time I was on a self-destruct mode that really didn’t allow for healing to take place.  There were other things going on too, and there are for most of us.

What I am saying is that healing takes time.  When we’ve been hurt over a sustained period of time, the pain won’t be over when the trauma stops.  It takes time.  I’m no psychologist to be able to say explain some psychological theory.   I just know it doesn’t happen overnight, and I believe it’s important that I be gentle on myself and give myself whatever time it takes.  Hopefully those around me can give me that time too.

♦

“And I felt like my heart had been so thoroughly and irreparably broken that there could be no real joy again, that at best there might eventually be a little contentment. Everyone wanted me to get help and rejoin life, pick up the pieces and move on, and I tried to, I wanted to, but I just had to lie in the mud with my arms wrapped around myself, eyes closed, grieving, until I didn’t have to anymore.” 

―    Anne Lamott,    Operating Instructions: A Journal of My Son’s First Year

Related articles

• Stalked… But Still Hiding Some Of Me (infinitesadnessorhope.wordpress.com)
• What Love Isn’t (infinitesadnessorhope.wordpress.com)
• EMOTIONAL TRAUMA? Time DOES heal. FACT! (arockystrokerecovery.com)
• Warrior Heart (peacesparklejoy.wordpress.com)

Choosing To Be Fully Alive

Image credit: Lk1997863064/Flickr.com

I came across these great words from Dawna Markova:

Fully Alive

I will not die an unlived life.

I will not live in fear

of falling or catching fire.

I choose to inhabit my days,

to allow my living to open me, 

to make me less afraid,

more accessible,

to loosen my heart

until it becomes a wing, a torch, a promise.

I choose to risk my significance;

to live so that which came to me as seed

goes to the next as blossom

and that which came to me as blossom,

goes on as fruit.

Let me explain why they caught my eye.  I’ve spent a lot of years not being fully alive.  There are many reasons for that, and one of them sprung to mind when I read this poem.  Some years ago I had the unfortunate, and very traumatic experience of seeing another person catch fire, and I was unable to stop it happening or even to help.  I’m not going to go into the details because it would be traumatic for me, and maybe for you too, but I read:

“I will not live in fear of falling or catching fire”

You might be able to imagine that after an experience like that, everything about catching fire would catch my attention.  It did.  Any words about fire tend to do that for me, although I can say that at this stage it’s not the traumatic re-living of the event anymore.  Otherwise I wouldn’t be writing about it now.

What strikes me is that back when that happened, it affected all of my senses.  My sight, smell and hearing all caught their own record of it.  What’s more, I could taste the burning in my mouth and I could feel the soot on my clothes.  I guess that’s what you could call experiencing it fully, and as a result it was very hard to get away from.  Not only were all my senses affected that day but also my heart.  The person involved wasn’t someone I knew personally, but a little of the pain they experienced had to touch those who had to watch helplessly.  How could it not?

I have lived since then afraid of catching fire, or seeing the experience repeated.  I don’t even use candles anymore, even though I consider myself to have largely recovered from the experience.  Candles also aren’t such a good idea when you’re living with earthquakes, so again my fear of fire is stashed away with the candles, and I can tell myself that it is ‘sensible’.

I suspect that to some extent I will always be a little fearful of fire, but the thing is that when I start to guard my life from one danger, then it is easy to start building protective barriers around myself from other dangers.  I don’t want my senses to be invaded in such a way that they were.  And I don’t want my heart to be hurt like it was that day too.

That occasion was thankfully the only time I have had to deal with such an event but my heart has been being hurt, and burnt over and over again across the years.  I’m no different from anyone else, and I’m sure most people have had their hearts burnt at times.  It’s just that when it happens repeatedly then you gradually shut down from the world, and that’s what I did.  I shut down so that no one could get near my heart.

It seemed like the sensible thing to do at the time, but I’m realising that when I shut down my heart then I shut down my life and how it is experienced by all of my senses.  I don’t want to die having lived only half my life, and so I’ve come to the conclusion that I have to take a few risks in order to bear the fruit.

I’m not about to light candles because our earthquakes continue (although admittedly they are lessening in their frequency).  A damaged house is one thing but a burnt out house would leave me homeless.

But I can consider my risks, and take a few.  I want to fly.  In any situation that we face there are risks.  I’m not blind to that but I think now I’m at a point where I can jump.  If I don’t fly, then I know there will be people around me now to make sure I have a smooth landing.  I’m still going to be careful.  I don’t want my heart burned unnecessarily.  And when those earthquakes have stopped, I’ll be pulling out the candles again.  It’s time to move on and not be paralysed any longer by my fear of fire.  Fire can be a good thing too, and I intend to experience that.

“We are young, but We already know that in life’s great game those who are
most unhappy are those who haven’t taken the risk to be happy.
And I don’t want to be one of those” 

―    Guillaume Musso,    Que serais-je sans toi?

No Regrets Now

Image credit: cutegirlyquotesandsayings.blogspot.com

Eighteen years ago, this is what I attempted to do.  It was my wedding day.  You know the one that every little girl apparently dreams of?  And every woman remembers back to?

I never really had dreams of what my wedding would be like, and as for remembering back to?  Well actually I can’t remember a thing of it.  I was so doped to my eyeballs with medication, just to get me through the day, that I remember nothing.  All that I have is images in my head, created from photos and a video that was recorded of the day.

The wedding had already been postponed once, when my psychiatrist told me he’d commit me to compulsory psychiatric hospitalisation if I didn’t postpone.  That was about the only thing that would have worked, and it did…  until I shifted and got a new psychiatrist.

Image credit: Cate Reddell

As regular readers may remember I don’t ever put photos of myself on the internet, because of some very real personal security issues from my past (and not because I am trying to hide anything from you).  But I’ve made an exception, partly because 18 years on, this isn’t how I look anymore.  I might yet remove the photo from here in a few weeks time, but in the meantime I hope that people will respect my need for this photo not to go any further.

The photo is me and my Dad arriving at the wedding.  I look happy enough, don’t I?  But moments before the photo was taken, and before my Dad got out of the car, I said to him “please don’t make me go in there.”

I don’t actually remember saying it, but it was loud and clear the day my new husband and I sat down for the first time (several weeks later)  to watch the video that a friend had made.  Woops!

Dad heard it, but he thought I was joking and I guess that’s a problem sometimes when you’re someone who has a tendency to do ‘silly’.  He also didn’t know that I’d said a similar thing to one of my brothers a few night’s earlier.  My brother hadn’t known how to respond either.  He could see how clearly upset I was but put it down to my mental health at the time.  I should say though, that while Dad and my brother heard me say this, I don’t in anyway think they should have done something other than listen, as they did.  It was my responsibility to opt out of the wedding.  I didn’t.

To cut a long story short the marriage was doomed and ended some years later.  It was very painful, but I’ve come to the realisation that it happened, it’s a part of my life, and that’s okay.

What brought me to that conclusion was when my mother was eager to throw out the photos she had of my wedding.  We had rescued them, along with many other family photos, from her home that was destroyed by the earthquakes last year.  She said to me, “you should have left these ones there, I’ll just put them in the rubbish.”  My mother has never been a sentimental person, so her reaction to the photos didn’t really surprise me.  But it did make me think.

Yes, my ex-husband and I should never have got married in the first place.  I believe that was the first mistake.  Actually I seriously doubt I was well enough, and in enough of my right mind, to be signing any sort of legal document.  I was very sick with depression, anorexia and PTSD (the PTSD was a lot to do with why I didn’t listen to my feelings).

At the time we married, I firmly believed that marriage was a ‘until death do us part’ commitment.  So I took that to heart when I realised it wasn’t going to work, and tried repeatedly to kill myself.  I seriously believed that was better than divorce.  Thankfully with some help of a very wise therapist who is now a valued friend, I eventually realised that divorce might not be the ideal, but  I needed to do something to remove myself from a situation that was literally killing me.

The marriage was a mistake right from day one, and I’m not going to go into the reasons for that, because I don’t think that is important.  What is important though, is what I do with the mistake I made all those years ago.  I read a blog recently, where the writer was saying that there are no mistakes in life.  I disagree.

The biggest mistake I made was
to not listen to my feelings…
over and over again. 

I kept calm and shut up… with the aid of a lot of medication.  And I kept doing that throughout the marriage because I gave no value to my own feelings.  I simply thought I was wrong.  I thought I was a failure of a wife, as a woman, and as a person.    I even thought I was a failure as a daughter and sister because my family would be so disappointed in me.  It wasn’t until someone taught me that my feelings mattered, that I started to see that what I thought and felt was valid, and not to be ignored.

So yes, I made some mistakes…  but at this point I can finally say I have no regrets.  Yes, it hurt.  Yes, it was very painful for all involved.   And yes, there are lasting scars for both me and my ex-husband, but I suspect we are both in much better situations now.  I certainly am and while we don’t have contact now I know enough to know that my ex-husband is also now in a much better place.

I also know that I learnt a whole lot from going through all those years.  That dreadful journey has contributed to the person that I am today, and I know that has to be a good thing.

I encouraged Mum to keep the photos.  I don’t know whether she did, but regardless of the disaster the marriage was, it was a significant part of my life.  It happened.  While it’s not something I think about much now days, I’m not going to pretend it didn’t happen.

Sometimes we do make mistakes, but actually good can come from those mistakes, and for that reason I have no regrets.  I need to add though that it has taken a long time to get to this point.  I used to feel physically ill when this date rolled around each year.  But this year I’ve discovered that dread and regret is past now.

So believe.  It does happen.

“Even though you may want to move forward in your life, you may have one foot on the brakes.  In order to be free, we must learn how to let go.  Release the hurt.  Release the fear.  Refuse to entertain your old pain.  The energy it takes to hang onto the past is holding you back from a new life.  What is it you would let go of today?” 

―    Mary Manin Morrissey

International Day of Peace

“A mind at peace, a mind centered and not focused on harming others, is stronger than any physical force in the universe.”

~ Wayne Dyer

Today (Friday) is the International Day of Peace, recognised each year on 21 September.  On this day the United Nations invites all nations and people to honour a cessation of hostilities during the Day, and to otherwise commemorate the Day through education and public awareness on issues related to peace.

I admit that I am less interested in politics in general, and more interested in the recovery and sustainability of people’s mental health, but I have recognised that something that contributes or takes away from my mental health, is when I am disturbed by things I am passionate about.  Peace is one for those things for me.  And I am convinced that a lack of peace causes great harm to the mental health of so many.

The Secretary-General of The United Nations, Ban Ki-moon says:

“On the International Day of Peace, the United Nations calls for a complete cessation of hostilities around the world.

We also ask people everywhere to observe a minute of silence, at noon local time, to honour the victims – those who have lost their lives, and those who survived but must now cope with trauma and pain.

The theme of this year’s observance is “Sustainable Peace for a Sustainable Future”.

Armed conflicts attack the very pillars of sustainable development.

Natural resources must be used for the benefit of society, not to finance wars.

Children should be in school, not recruited into armies.

National budgets should focus on building human capacity, not deadly weapons.

On the International Day of Peace, I call on combatants around the world to find peaceful solutions to their conflicts.

Let us all work together for a safe, just and prosperous future for all.” (1.)

It is the victims of war, and they can be defined in many ways, are the ones I feel most concerned about because they are usually the innocent ones, the one’s who haven’t chosen war, but get stuck in its path.  They are the ones who face years of trauma and pain.  I accept that I have never been in a war zone, and neither do I want to be, but I have been in a war zone in my head (and my body in relation to my eating disorder and self harm).  I know from that how much damage war does and I believe strongly that there has to be another way to solve conflict.

“I am fed up to the ears with old men dreaming up wars for young men to die in.”

 - George McGovern

And it’s not just men.  Only a few weeks ago my country mourned the death of our first woman soldier in killed in combat.  Her death was no worse than the death of the two men who died with her, but it somehow hit home to me, particularly when I watched the footage of the all-female pall-bearer party carry her coffin off the plane that brought the bodies home.

I have complete respect for those who serve their countries in war, but I have no respect for the leaders who craft the wars.  Those who send soldiers to war and create conflicts where innocent people are killed.  There simply has to be another way.

Because of my interest in mental health I keep asking the question, what must war do to the mental health of those involved?  We only need to consider for a moment the statistics of suicide and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) amongst soldiers, but we have little knowledge of the impact on civilians.  It must simply be enormous, and I don’t believe that this impact on either soldiers or civilians is acceptable.

Image credit: Michelle Frost
Blog Blast for Peace

I am just one person, many miles from the conflicts that are taking place at the moment.  I could say, what can I do?  I can’t change anything.  But I strongly believe that I can make a difference simply by raising the issue,  recognising the event today, and hoping for peace.  It’s not easy to change our world, but that is no excuse not to try.  I am going to continue to write about this, and as I have said before, have committed to the Blog Blast 4 Peace on 4 November.  Maybe it’s not exactly what my blog is usually about, but it is something that I feel strongly about because it has an effect on my life (and yours).

**

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.”

 - Edmund Burke

**

“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has.”

 - Margaret Mead

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I’m Just Plain Weird

The Butterfly Emerges                         Image credit: imgpress.com

Yesterday afternoon I had an appointment with a new psychiatrist.  My last one, who I hadn’t seen for two years, had flown the nest and because I needed some advice on medication I was referred to this new one.  Now I don’t have a lot of faith in psychiatrists (no offence intended to my friend who used to be one) because in my experience they leap to the wrong conclusions about me.

I have never been a textbook case of anything, so I guess I make it difficult for them.  And then they are always pressed for time so don’t have the time to really find out what it is that makes me who I am.  So I was a little hesitant and stress levels were rising in advance.  That said, I was also curious because I know I have come a long way in my recovery and I wondered what a psychiatrist would make of it.

What I wanted to do (and got the okay to do) is to come off lithium (gradually), which I have been on for about 10 years.  I want to come off it because it is standing in the way of getting some reasonable medication to treat fibromyalgia, which was diagnosed earlier this year.  I talked about this in To Earn Trust After Past Mistakes.  While lithium has created some real problems for my physical health, it has been great for my mental health and my concern was for what might happen if I came off it.  Would my level of mental health go downhill?  Time will tell.

But of course seeing a new psychiatrist involved the full psychiatric assessment. One and a half hours later this new psychiatrist, who seemed to know his stuff, and I felt comfortable with, told me his conclusions.

I’m weird.  I actually already knew that, but it’s interesting to be told that by a psychiatrist.  Next time I’m asked for my diagnosis, do I say ‘weird’?

He also told me that while he could see I was severely depressed in the past and suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) he didn’t see that there was any label he would give me now other than having some serious attachment issues.  As for Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) he could see that there were aspects of this in me but he didn’t accept that it was ‘the issue’ for me now, as diagnosed two years ago by the last psychiatrist.  We talked about the eating disorder but he didn’t seem too interested in that, accepting that I seemed to have it pretty much under control now.  One thing that he did say is that there were perhaps five or six labels that could be assigned to me, but he didn’t think they are necessary now.  I’m just weird.

Wow!  It’s nearly nineteen years to the day since I was first diagnosed with a mental illness.  I have been collecting numerous labels ever since, although struggling a bit because no label ever seemed to fit me perfectly.  When I was given the dreaded BPD label two years ago it actually felt a bit of a relief, because I could finally see something that actually fit.

Now it seems I don’t have any labels.  This is very odd.  I’m sure ‘weird’ is not in the DSM-IV, although I prefer it to some other labels I’ve had.  Maybe it is in the DSM-V, which is on it’s way.  Obviously (as he said) I still have some issues, that I’m working on in therapy.  And while he was happy for me to wean off lithium he wanted me to stay on the anti-depressant I have also taken for 10 years as a precaution against the depression returning.

This has completely blown my mind.  I think he expected me to dance for joy and I can see that element, but my first statement to him was “so you’re saying I’m nothing“.  Of course he hastened to assure me that wasn’t the case, and then wanted to understand why I would think that.  He then suggested I shouldn’t think too hard about it, and in that he summed me up perfectly.  It was exactly what I was inclined to do.

I am only too well aware that BPD is a personality disorder and is such part of who I am.  My understanding of that has always been that it is not something that one recovers from.  Yet perhaps I have.  I don’t know, and part of me wants to race to another psychiatrist and check that the first one is right.  But as I paid NZ$345.00 for this information today, I won’t be rushing to another any time soon.  At that price once in two years is quite enough.

This information is still sinking in and weird is exactly how I feel.  One on hand it is great news to not have those labels and to know my hard work has paid off, yet for nearly 20 years I have been labelled a psychiatric patient.  And believe me, I did it in style.  If one can call it that.

So what am I now?  Other than weird?  I’m not sure.  Time will tell.  Life is far from perfect, but it is so much better and the butterfly is finally emerging.

“I am spinning the silk threads of my story, weaving the fabric of my world…I spun out of control. Eating was hard. Breathing was hard. Living was hardest.

I wanted to swallow the bitter seeds of forgetfulness…Somehow, I dragged myself out of the dark and asked for help.

I spin and weave and knit my words and visions until a life starts to take shape.

There is no magic cure, no making it all go away forever.  There are only small steps upward; an easier day, an unexpected laugh, a mirror that doesn’t matter anymore.

I am thawing.” 

―    Laurie Halse Anderson,    Wintergirls

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Is It Just Me?

Image via glogster.com

Is it just me?  Am I the only one who feels like I’m stalking people?  That is probably near the worst of things I personally could do to some other human being, and I accept that my reluctance to ‘stalk’, or even ‘follow’ has been heavily influenced by those who had no hesitation to stalk me.

It’s not a nice experience being stalked.  Being followed, watched, talked about, threatened, generally unable to live your own life without knowing full well that everything I do is noted.  I had a shadow hanging over me.  Actually I had two shadows and that just made the intensity greater.

Image via CrunchBase

Recently I (finally) signed up with Twitter.  This is a big step for me.  I knew it would be good to get my blog further out into the wider world but had been putting off the big step for a while.  It took me forever to join Facebook, as a few of my in-real-life friends can tell you.  I only joined because one friend was constantly on at me that this would be a great way for us to stay in touch (we don’t live near each other).  The ironic thing though is that it hasn’t really worked that way.  Sure, she sees my posts and I see hers, I see what she likes and she (I guess) sees what I like.  I see updated photos of her kids and that’s nice.  I can’t believe how fast they grow.  But that’s about it.  We really don’t communicate directly with each other much.  And I have to admit that lack of direct communication, coupled with the ability to simply watch is a little off-putting for me.  Probably some of that is just that neither of us have the time.  I think that’s okay because our lives have headed in different directions that are perhaps hard for the other to comprehend, but I still feel a little sad that it didn’t turn out like it was promised.

Image via CrunchBase

That aside though, joining Facebook was a good thing for me, and as well as putting me back in contact with people from the past, it has also given me the opportunity to ‘meet’ a whole lot of other people who have become very special to me (even though we have never met).  It also enabled me to get involved in mental health support groups.  This was very important in continuing to work on my own recovery as well as now being able to help others.Unfortunately, because I now run two groups on Facebook, I regularly come across trolls, or people who create a false identity in order to create chaos in social media sites.  The chaos that is caused by these people, and I’ve had a few who were expert in their field, puts me off the whole Facebook thing entirely.  I’m not about to leave Facebook because the good outweighs the bad, but it reminds me daily that we don’t really know who we are interacting with across the internet.  Really nothing much can prove an internet identity and I am constantly wary.  Gut feeling counts for a lot but even then, a couple of times I have been badly wrong.

So now I enter into the world of Twitter.  Three days on, and I am following 12 people and I am getting tired already of being asked to follow the New Zealand All Blacks (our national rugby team).  I’m a rare kiwi in that I am not interested in their every move but I suspect Twitter is going to keep asking me to follow them.  No!  Back to the point though, I have this feeling in my stomach that I am stalking those 12 I have followed.  They didn’t give me permission to ‘follow’ them.  I just chose to.  I know what it is like to be followed and frankly I’m not comfortable with it.

The other side is, of course, that while only one is following me so far, I am kind of relieved.  Don’t get me wrong.  If you are a friend I am happy for you to follow me but… maybe if Twitter could just use a different term I might feel more comfortable.  There is also a reverse to this that I must confess.  One person is following me!  Wow! How many people on Twitter have only one follower?  How sad is that?  I know, I know, I can’t be satisfied either way.

(And don’t get me wrong.  I want to interact with both friends and yet-to-be-friends through social media.  It’s just that this voice of caution is always sitting on my shoulder.  I’m also not afraid of anyone in particular.  It’s simply a cloud of, perhaps, irrational fear generated from years of looking over that shoulder.)

I’m going to say this although I fear what your reaction might be.  This bind of not wanting to be followed, yet wanted to be followed is something that happens with real stalking too, and I am only too well aware of it.  Not for one moment would I suggest that being stalked is a pleasant experience because it’s anything but.  Somewhere deep inside, for someone who was full of self hate and doubt, the concept that someone (or two) thought I was worth stalking really did my head in.  When I felt unloved by others in my life there was this tiny voice that said ‘well, they will love you’.  Sick as it is, and I hate it immensely, it’s just one of the many ways that stalking really gets to you.  It becomes impossible to know what is real and what is not.  And they didn’t really love me.  It was an obsession that was anything but love, but the mind plays powerful games.

But again, back to Twitter.

What do I do?  I don’t like the idea of people knowing what I’m doing, without me knowing that they are watching.  Would I be better forgetting Twitter?  Or should I stick it out?  Is it just me?  Even though I have come a million miles forward to recovery from my lengthy stalking experience, am I just letting it trip me up?  If you have any thoughts on this I would love to hear them.  I need some rational input into what is perhaps slightly irrational.

Meanwhile, my Twitter account is set up and my blog posts are going there, but do I feel comfortable? Not entirely.

Image via CrunchBase

PS.  I should add that Skype totally does my head in too, although I can see benefits.  The idea of someone, not physically with me, being able to see me sitting at my computer?  No, that’s way to freaky for me.  No doubt though, like Facebook and Twitter, eventually I will give in to this when I someone gives me a good enough reason to abandon such founded but still irrational fear.

All that said, I don’t find WordPress is a problem, so maybe it is all just irrational.

I’m re-training my mind!
Image via FB – A Beautiful Mess Inside

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He Was One Of The Good Guys

I didn’t pick this music because of it being any kind of popular funeral favourite.  Not until I read the comments on You Tube did I realise it’s use as a symbol of death.  And that almost made me not use it. 

Actually I chose it because my friend was a damn, fine guitarist and I wanted to  use some music that I related to him.

It’s hard to put reasoning to the death of a friend.  I know A’s suffering is over, and whatever you might believe about life beyond death, I have a fair idea of what he believed, and believe much the same for myself.  He will be at peace now, no longer in the pain caused by the cancer.

But he was only three years older than me, and I’ve known him for over 30 years.  His wife is a year older than me (I have known her for nearly as long).  Too young to be a widow.  His two kids are just getting their adult lives under way.  And now it’s over.  It’s just hard to see it all as fair for them.  It’s hard to see it as fair for any of us who have lost a fantastic friend.

My friend died on Friday after a battle with cancer.  He lives in a city I used to live in, but that has meant I haven’t been able to see him.  My brother had let me know earlier in the week that A didn’t have much time left, so I was waiting… but it still hit me as a firm kick in the guts.

A was one of the good guys.  Always.  He was a lot of fun, he was very talented, he had a heart full of compassion and enthusiasm.   I might not have always agreed with his views but I loved the way he was so passionate about what he believed.  I always knew with A that it would be safe to give him my life for a week, and he’d take care of it.  When I had what I might call a pretty skeptical view of most guys, I knew A was great.

We met in the fourth form.  That’s Year Nine in nowadays education language.  A’s best friend was my first boyfriend.  To make things a little more interesting my best friend was A’s girlfriend at the time.  Of course first romances hardly ever last and the four of us went our separate ways, although staying good friends in the same social groups through the local church.  Unfortunately my first boyfriend couldn’t hear the word ‘no’ and so set about stalking me for many years.  I have written about this in Stalked… But Still Hiding Some Of Me and more in my book Infinite Sadness.

It put my friendship with A in a difficult place, because he became the access point to information about me.  But A was a good friend, we did a lot of music together and he wasn’t a friendship I wanted to lose.  A went on a few years later to marry another good friend of mine, so there was another connection to me.  That said, I am totally confident that A and his wife never compromised my safety.  They did absolutely everything they could to dissuade a stalker who was not going to be put off.

To save you from a very long story, I will fast-forward a few years.  The stalker was still persistent and actually on at least one occasion I had to sneak out the front door of A’s home while the stalker was knocking on their back door.  They held him long enough for me to run to my car and take off.

Even though A and his wife did nothing wrong, never put me in danger, and actually were totally supportive of me, I have to admit that this stalking and some other things happening in my life at the time were literally doing my head in.  I also came to the conclusion (probably unwisely) that I would never go back to A’s home.  There was too much risk, and while I kept contact with A’s wife, who by now was working for the same company as me, I never went back.

And when I left that job, I decided to cut contact altogether.  I decided to leave the city we all lived in, hoping that would end things.  I wasn’t cutting contact with A and his wife because they had done anything to upset me but because the danger of the stalker accidentally getting information about me was too great.  I also didn’t like my friends being put in this position.  In my mind I basically ended the friendship with two very special people because I couldn’t see another way of being safe.  We never talked about it, I simply left town.  I was desperate to end something that was wrecking my life – the stalking.

Image courtesy of FreeDigitalPhotos.net 

Now?  I feel a whole lot of things but find I mentally stop myself going too far with any emotion, I guess because I really don’t want to feel it.  There’s a combination of anger directly partly at myself for deserting a friendship with both A and his wife that meant the world to me, but more so I feel angry with the stalker who cost me those friendships.  A was a good person, as I said, one of the good guys (when I didn’t think too many existed) and his wife is a truly beautiful person.  They never knowingly did anything to harm me.  I know that what I did at the time was just about survival, and therefore I can try to forgive myself.  But I lost out on their friendship.  And that has re-activated the anger I feel to the stalker.

I also struggle with an odd co-incidence.  When I was 14 years old, there were four of us.  Myself, A, my best friend and the stalker.  My best friend died some years ago in a car accident and actually that was the last time I saw A.  I ran away from him because also there was the stalker.  Now I even find it hard to say but the stalker and I are all that is left of that group.  There are all sorts of ‘why’ questions circling in my head.  They are impossible to answer.

The irony is that I know if I went to A’s funeral the stalker would be there too.  And I simply couldn’t risk that, because I know it’s still not over for him.

It reminds me that stalking is never just a nuisance.  And it’s never just a joke.  People get hurt, and there is a price to pay for everyone involved.  Mostly the experts say that when the target of the stalker is gone then the obsession also goes.  This time it didn’t and yes, it hurts.  Actually to be completely honest, this has done my head in this time.  I actually thought I was through the pain the stalker caused and the Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms but the past few days I have found myself right back in the midst of it.

I will get through this and meanwhile I am going to try to remember the good times, for there were so many with A.  He had a way of making good times happen, and for that I am thankful.

“When you are sorrowful look again in your heart, and you shall see that
in truth you are weeping for that which has been your delight.” 

~Kahlil Gibran

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