Passion

I’m curious what you all think. I mean really lay it on me, tell me all of your thoughts and wishes. Tell me your self-hate speech and what that little voice is like inside of your head. Tell me your positive self speech and what that little voice is like inside of your head. Tell me if you don’t have one or don’t have the other. I’d like to know.

I’d also like to know what you think about your therapist, briefly, sharing a struggle they’ve had in order to relate to something you’re saying. I know some people don’t like their professionals to “get personal” with them, but I’m curious why this is. I’m curious why you wouldn’t want someone who is there to help with your mental health prove to you that everyone struggles in one way or another at some point in their lives? I thought the whole point wasn’t to feel alone?

I salivate over the idea of mental health peers being counselors, therapists, psychiatrist, psychologists, people who really understand and can share their successes with you and how they got to where they are: that to me is inspiration, not a sign of a bad therapist. I don’t think they should sit there and tell you everything about their life, I don’t want to know about the star shaped mole on their husband’s nether regions, but telling me about a coping mechanism they’ve used for anxiety would be helpful.

Maybe this is just me. That’s why I’m sending it out to all of you, what’s left of you at least, since I’ve taken so many hiatus’ from this blog that I don’t know who actually reads me anymore or who doesn’t.

Since I will be giving a speech on peer supportive opportunities tomorrow, I’m in the spirit of talking about it.

How useful would it be that your therapist knew exactly what severe anxiety felt like.

How useful would it be that your psychiatrist remembers what their psychotic break was like.

How useful would it be that your counselor knew exactly how low your energy got during a depression because they’d been there before.

I think there’s a lot of compassion and empathy missing from the system sometimes, and I think a lot of that has to do with not really, truly, understanding what we go through. I think it also has to do with this “just do your job” mentality that happens from working a career too long–at least for some.

I know there was a big difference between the physician’s assistant my dad saw in the emergency room versus the doctors that had been practicing for years. You could tell the P.A remembered all of his motivational interviewing skills. He knew how to connect, he knew how to negotiate, and he did it all with some serious humor. Maybe he’ll just be a great doctor one day. Or maybe it’s because he was new.

Somehow we have to keep that passion up. How should we do that? Should we, as patients, clients, residents, guests, members, whatever you refer to yourself as–should we start a ruckus? Should we remind our doctors why they became doctors in the first place?

Then there are the nice doctors who you do connect with who make simple mistakes. But it’s how they handle those simple mistakes that tells me whether or not they are decent at what they do.

For example, the nurse practitioner who handles my psychiatric medications (yes I am once again back on meds) told me that Abilify’s starting dose is 15mg.

It most certainly is not. How can it be if the first “therapeutic” dose is 10mg? I have yet to mention to her that the physician’s desk reference tells us that anything above 10mg hasn’t really shown any true efficacy in all the studies its been through, that will be a conversation for when she decides to try to take me to 15mg.

When I told her that I wanted to start at 5mg because my body is sensitive to this bullshit (I didn’t say bullshit, but I wanted to), she said oh, okay, we’ll do that–and didn’t argue with me. She trusted that I knew what was best for my body and I respect that. Not every psychiatrist or doctor will do that. Some of them pretend to know everything. Throw some Calculus at them, I bet they forgot how to do it. So they don’t know everything. Ha.

I think this also speaks to be able to speak up for yourself. It’s taken me a lot of years to learn that skill when it comes to doctors, because you want to trust what they have to say, you want to trust what they say is best for you, but the truth is only you know what’s best for you. Sometimes that means no medication, sometimes that means swallowing your pride and your arrogance and quelling your hatred for pharmaceutical systems and taking some form of medication until you can better handle yourself.

I don’t believe anyone is doomed to medication for eternity. Including myself. But I also recognize now that it’s an essential aide sometimes in life.

The point is, speak up for yourself. Don’t let someone, especially a professional, tell you that you don’t know yourself.

Kanye, Toss Me 50 Mill, Let’s Change The World Together

*Ahem*

I’ve been writing on this blog since July 2015, periodically at best, fragmented at best, turned it into a domain I could own, lost the domain because I couldn’t afford it, and now here I am, back to square one, reintroducing myself to the world of rants, vents, and sarcastic musings.

I realized how good of an outlet this place is, and I miss the interactions between new people, old people, and people in general. Fuck building an empire, fuck pleasing people, and fuck everything, in general. I think that’s a good way to start off this post.

In reading back a lot of my old posts, I laughed at my own jokes, humored myself with my own sarcasm, and cherished my vulnerable moments: essentially it was a huge ego trip. Isn’t that wonderful? How conceited can I sound? I could probably be worse if I tried. But what’s life without having a bit of an inflated self-esteem? What’s life without trying to convince the world you’re a god among men? Kanye knows what I’m talking about, right? No? No one? Okay.

Love Kanye. What he say in his new song, Yikes?

“Shit could get/menacing/frightening/find help/ sometimes / I scare/ myself.”

And

“I can feel the spirits all around me/ I think Prince and Mike is trynna to warn me/ they know they got demons all on me/ devil been trynna make an army/ they been strategizing to harm me/ they don’t know they dealin with a zombie. ”

I resonate with that on a spiritual level. That’s not sarcasm.

And, of course, the most influential line of his musical career:

“Scoopity Whoop.”

That song took me to higher levels of consciousness. I sat at the computer listening to Lift Yourself, nodding to an average beat, but that next verse? That NEXT VERSE THOUGH? Damn, I just didn’t really realize, I guess. I don’t think I’ll ever find another set of bars that chills my veins like “Poopity Scoop, scoopty whoopty poop”. Or, whatever.

In 2015 I was twenty years old, barely out of the terrible teens, and in 7 days I will be twenty three, still barely out of the terrible teens I guess, and in my own apartment free of the reign of terror that has been my parents’ apartment. I have good memories and bad memories. The good memories are pretty good, the bad memories are pretty bad. Read previous posts for more info. I’ve basically put the last three to four years of my life in a chronological order on this blog.

I remember writing a post about my predictions for the 2016 election, and how if that base head neurosurgeon Ben Carson dropped out of the race, Trump would win. Well, what happened? Without Ben there to cancel out Trump’s stupidity with his own, nothing could stop Trump. Don’t agree with me? No one’s asking you to, but I basically predicted the future, so . . .

Now what I’m trying to predict is when I will find a competent psychiatrist. I’ve sort of come to the conclusion that it’s impossible. I had a good two months with a county-funded psychiatrist who listened to what I said and, for the first time in my life, found a set of medications that worked well with me, but when they kicked me out of the Mental Health building K because I didn’t want to actively kill myself anymore, because I still had a job, I got stuck with a regular county psychiatrist who, when I told her I’d stopped hearing voices, told me I was lying and sent out a prescription for a higher dose of my medication.

If you’re wondering, I stopped seeing her.

If you’re reading this and are really confused, I’d suggest reading through a couple previous posts. I would also like to remind my audience that not everyone who hears voices hears them all the time, and not everyone who hears voices has/or identifies with schizophrenia–two common misconceptions. And not everyone with schizophrenia hears voices.

The fucking point is, if I tell you I’m not hearing voices, I’m not hearing voices. If I tell you I’m not seeing shit, I’m not seeing shit. If you don’t believe me, go to the back room, take your head out of your ass, and breathe the fresh air of reality, because you’ve been missing from it for too long.

If I don’t want my medication dosage raised, don’t fucking raise it. 

Now, here’s the tricky thing. In leaving that shitty psychiatrist and stopping all my medication, I not only put myself through some serious mental hell, I also lost the ability to find a psychiatrist or therapist at all.

*For global readers, insurance is what the United States scams it’s citizens with to get more money.*

With my propensity to freeze up talking to doctors, psychiatrists, and therapists, I often get help calling for new appointments because the anxiety paralyzes me. So I’ve pushed my family to help me call. We’ve been calling for two months now.

One psychiatrist has gotten back to us, after a week of him leaving voicemails, us leaving voicemails, and both of us missing each other. He asks how old I am, and what’s going on with me. My mother takes the call, and explains what I’ve described, and he suddenly has too many patients.

Every other mental health professional we’ve called and who has called us back and left a voicemail always, always said “I’m sorry, I’ve got too many patients right now” without needing to know any information about me.

This motherfucker said that after he learned what I was going through. What does that make me think? That he can’t take on a challenge. And, if that’s the case, at least have the balls to tell it to my face. Tell me you don’t want to deal with me. Tell me you can’t handle it. If you can’t admit that, fuck you, you’re a coward.

And most importantly, don’t ever waste my fucking time again.

If you’re wondering, most recently I’ve breezed through 5 new diagnoses (not counting the ones I had as a teenager) after seeing 4 psychiatrists and a few therapists since December 2017 (six months total) , and I only found out the most recent one because I sat in my psychiatrist’s seat and read her notes on her computer while she went to go talk to a colleague. If they won’t tell you what they write, read it yourself–a tip for anyone new to the mental health system. Just don’t get caught.

The diagnoses have been: GAD, PTSD, Depression, Bipolar 1, Psychosis NOS from oldest to newest.

Some psychiatrists haven’t agreed with the PTSD–how is that something to refute, anyway? They ruled out schizophrenia and depression with psychotic features. The psychiatrists in the hospital were bent on Bipolar 1 even though I’ve never been manic in my life, the one I saw immediately after my hospitalization wasn’t sure at all what I was dealing with (finally, an honest fucking response). The last one is hell bent on psychosis NOS. They all agree on the depression and the anxiety.

So, what have I learned over these last six months besides the fact that if I’m not actively suicidal and/or psychotic I won’t be taken seriously as a candidate for steam-lined mental health care? Other than, if I’m still working I don’t actually need any real help?

Absolutely nothing.

If I didn’t love my job, I would have quit just to add the dramatics they obviously want.

I welcome myself back into the blogsphere.