Some thoughts on stability . . .

It's awesome.

That's it.

Nothing more to see here.

Okay, there is.

If you've been following this blog at all, you know how much shit I've gone through. You know about my total of 4 hospitalizations. My self harm (my arm looks like shit, by the way). My very real brush with death. You know about how every single day of my life is a struggle against my brain. And there are some things that you don't know about - the things that I don't share here because they're too personal or awful or embarrassing.

Which is why this post is kinda special.

Because I finally feel stable. More than just stable - I feel good. I feel like me. I'm actually feeling happy and joyful and upbeat and positive. I'm enjoying life.

I'm enjoying life.

That's huge, y'all. I have hated life for the last 2.5 years. Hated it. I knew for certain that I would die by my own hand - it was just a matter of when (and that almost happened the end of May).

But now . . . Stability. Happiness. Hope.

I think there's a couple of reasons for this. First and foremost, Brintellix. A brand-spanking new antidepressant that I've been on for 2.5 weeks. The first week and a half sucked. Royally. Mood swings and uncontrolled rage. But then something magical happened: it worked. I started feeling better. The anger lessened. My mood improved. I started feeling like me. Me.

And second, trauma work. As much as trauma work sucks (and it does suck), it's helping. I'm identifying triggers, working past them, learning coping skills, and learning forgiveness.

These two things are feeding off each other and I'm continuing to improve. That's not to say I don't have my moments - I'm still bipolar after all and my mood can change in an instant - but I'm definitely coping with that more effectively to where it's not debilitating like it was before.

This all feels so very strange and wonderful. I honestly never thought I'd reach this point. I'm so glad I did.

Brintellix

I figure I might as well put this out there - I was started on a new medication. I know, I know, that's going against what the doc in Boston recommended, but the reasoning makes sense.

At my second appointment with my new pdoc, she recommended that I start Brintellix, a brand new antidepressant. Her reasoning is this: I've been on lithium and lamictal for 2.5 years. I've been on geodon for 7 months. These meds are working well for my hypo manic symptoms - I haven't had hypo mania since I was hospitalized in November. I'm as stable on these meds as I'm going to get. But they're obviously not doing much for my depression since I'm still struggling with it. We need to get something on board to work on that.

She gave me 4 weeks worth of samples and wanted to see me again in 2 weeks. I didn't want to take another med. I was scared of having a horrid reaction to it like I did with the Depakote. And it went against what Dr. Schulman said.

So I didn't take it.

And then my depression was pretty bad for 2 weeks. I was apathetic and anhedonic. I cut. A lot. When I saw my pdoc again last week, she again brought up the Brintellix, saying that I had to decide how depressed I was willing to be. She said it was ultimately my choice, but that she strongly recommended it. And we wouldn't know my reaction unless I tried it.

I was scared. The appointment put me in a foul mood. At home, I discussed everything with hubby who then pointed out how miserable I am and how much I hate life. How I don't find joy in anything.

The following day I started the Brintellix.

Today will be day 7 on it (I take it at night). And I have to say, I think it's working. The past 3 days I've felt better (Saturday, Sunday, Monday). More like myself. More happy. It's been refreshing. Yesterday I was actually a little hypo manic - which was great except for the racing thoughts and later in the evening when I turned into a raging bitch for no apparent reason (which poor hubby took the brunt of). I had energy, I got a lot of shit done, I laughed hysterically. It was mostly good.

Today I'm a bit apathetic, a little down, but every day can't be great.

I'm hoping the Brintellix works without putting me into a full blown hypo manic episode. I see my pdoc on the 27th and will be getting a script for it if it seems to be working. I also hope I can afford this medication - it's brand new and my insurance might not cover it. If that's the case, no Brintellix for me. We'll see.

A Strange Kind of Confusion

I'm trying to figure something out and the answer is eluding me. Which is frustrating cause I like figuring shit out.

And overthinking things.

Here's my conundrum:

I have this overwhelming sense of emptiness. This void of feeling. It's nothingness and it's often all-consuming. Along with it comes feelings that everything is pointless and hopeless and stupid and why should I even bother trying. I hate it.

And when I do feel, it's all icky feels. Pressing hopelessness and despair, feeling down - not completely depressed - but down. Hyper irritability, anger, and anxiety.

All of the above are symptoms of depression. Not suicidal depression, not anywhere close to where I was last month, but depression none the less.

But I've been thinking. What if what I'm feeling isn't the absence of feeling? What if what I'm feeling is kinda "normal"? Think about it - I've been in a heightened emotional state almost constantly for 2.5 years. I've been feeling extreme versions of emotions for so long that maybe, just maybe, not feeling extreme emotions feels like nothingness. That not feeling the extreme emotions leaves me confused and flat and empty feeling. Because I can feel some happiness from time to time. I am able to joke. It's just that it's very fleeting. It lasts mere minutes.

Because "normal" people, people without a mood disorder aren't happy all the time. Being happy doesn't equate to always being happy. There is a normal range of emotions throughout the day, right? And normal people feel blah and meh at times - that's not unique to me.

But I think about this - from talking to people about this, I've been told, time and time again, that what I'm experiencing is not what they experience. That most people, when alone by themselves, don't constantly think that life isn't worth living. That most people don't have this overwhelming sense of emptiness and that their life isn't, and never will be, complete. And therefor that they'd be better off "not around". This is what I've been told by many people (I've polled a lot).

These feelings, however, are common with people with a mood disorder. Which leads me again to thinking this is depression related.

Back and forth I go. I truly think it's a little bit of both. I think I'm still very much in a depression. The symptoms truly do point to that. But I also think that I'm confused and don't know what to do with the absence of extreme emotions. Me feeling normal, stable, is a scary proposition for me because I don't know how to act. I have to completely reinvent myself. Discover who I am all over again.

 And, honestly, being stable is boring. There. I said it. Feeling everything so deeply is a bit exhilarating - even when it severe depressive emotions. There's a saying for bipolar disorder: It is both a blessing and a curse to feel everything so deeply. Because feeling everything to the extreme is so much more invigorating. I don't even know how to describe it. Even the depression - the depth of emotion is staggering. I have 2 very good friends who are bipolar and they feel the same way. Many people on my bipolar support group feel the same way. It's a double edged sword - you crave the emotional extremes even though they are often terribly destructive.

I don't really want boring. I don't really want "normal".

But I don't want this feeling of nothingness, pointlessness, hopelessness, and emptiness that seems to go along with, well, me.

I don't even think this post makes much sense. It's rambling mostly. Me trying to sort through my thoughts.

Weird day so far . . .

I woke up this morning with the feeling that it was pointless to get out of bed. I was wide awake, which is unusual (the past few weeks I've been horrifically groggy in the mornings), but it just seemed stupid to get out of bed. I mean really, what was the point? My son is at his grandma's, I'm home alone, I have nothing to do until I see my pdoc at 5, so what's the point? Nothing really matters anyway.

But we have a guy coming to clean our ducts, furnace and air conditioner today so I needed to be up and showered. So I got up. And I showered. And I had breakfast and coffee. All I could think about was cutting or burning so I decided to make myself do something. I tidied up, folded laundry, dusted, and cleaned my office. I got my son's sheets in the wash and our comforter in the dryer.

It's 10:45 and I again have nothing to do. The duct guy is here. I can read, but I don't really feel like it (and I've got 6 hours to kill). I could try drawing but that just seems too daunting a task. Nothing I draw comes out right anyway and I get frustrated to the point of wanting to destroy something.

I want to get rid of stuff. Like, a lot of stuff. Trash it, give it away, sell it, whatever. Everything feels cluttered and we're going to need to downsize anyway.

I'm still apathetic but I'm restless. I didn't sleep well and I'm tired but I have this nervous energy. I hate it when I feel like this. Like life is meaningless and I'd be better off not participating in it. I'm not suicidal, I just want to disappear. Not exist for awhile. Obviously, I can't do that. So I'm just kinda stuck. Feeling like crap but not really feeling.

I hate not feeling. Well, the past few weeks I either have icky feels or no feels. Both are bad. I keep thinking that I'll even out, that Dr. Schulman will be right and I'll be okay and everything will even out. He said to give it at least 3-4 months. But then I think, feeling like this? For another 3-4 months? Can I get any fucking reprieve? Trauma work fills me with the icky feels. Triggers fill me with the icky feels. And when I'm not feeling icky I feel empty and dead inside. This is no way to be. And I keep thinking about how I get to deal with this for the rest of my life. Maybe my pdoc was right - maybe I do need to be on something for depression. The Brintellix like she recommended. But I'm scared to try something new - I have a bad track record with medications.

Oh well. What can I do? Keep plugging along and hope for the best I guess. Every day is a new day, and just because today is crappy it doesn't mean tomorrow will be crappy too.

I officially started trauma work

And it kinda sucks. And by "kinda sucks" I mean it's pretty awful and I'm not looking forward to this every week.

But it has to be done.

Today was my first full session of trauma work. It started with a brief recap of my past week and a half (which has been damn crappy with break downs, self harm, and tons of icky feels). Then M said, bluntly, "So let's talk about your childhood". I didn't know where to start. There's so much and it's overwhelming.

I started with my mom's fractured ankle. She fractured her ankle last Friday night falling down her stairs (I can only assume she had been drinking - she's done this before). I took her to the orthopedist yesterday and it turns out she needs surgery and can't drive for 6 weeks. Which means I'll be helping her around. Which means I have to have more interaction with her than I want to. Which raises my anxiety level and icky feels and makes me angry and uncomfortable.

I had a crap day yesterday. I only got one hour of sleep and I was in a foul mood. Then the above happened. I spent most of the afternoon crying uncontrollably. I wan't so badly to self harm. I had decided that anytime I feel like self harming I'd draw a butterfly on my arm instead. I ended up with 9 butterflies yesterday. I shredded 2 lawn chairs and threw them across the yard. I sat outside listening to music while it sprinkled on me (I was hoping for a downpour) trying to calm down, crying off and on.

And then something dawned on me. I started thinking that I was having a PTSD overreaction to something. Namely, having to help my mom out was putting me in the position of caretaker to her - the role I played growing up, taking care of her when she was drunk. Even though the situation for helping her out is different, emotionally I'm going back to when I was little. I'm dealing with childhood feels.

I told M this and he agreed that it was very probable that this is what was going on yesterday. It was a good segway into our discussion. Now, I'm not going to go into detail about what all was said. Not publicly. I'll probably write about it separately as I try to process everything.

One thing that did happen during therapy is that I emotionally shut down. I became guarded. I didn't want icky feels to flood me. This is something that I shouldn't do - I need to feel these things in order to process them, and I shut down. I'll be trying not to do that next week. I think I just had such a crappy week with feels and crying and such a horrible day yesterday with feels and crying that I couldn't take it today. So I shut down.

We spent our last 10-15 minutes talking about horses and horseback riding (I went riding last Saturday). It was a good way to decompress and try to release some of the icky feels.

This is hard, y'all. Trauma work sucks. I know it's necessary and that's fine - we'll muddle through as best we can. And hopefully I won't get thrown into a mood episode in the process.

Annoyances with Creativity

There's something that's been bothering me for a bit now and it's really getting on my nerves: my lack of creativity. It's gone. Just . . . gone.

Some of you reading this may not know that I'm an artist. I draw, paint, and sew. My artwork is a huge part of who I am and is something that brings me joy, helps me escape.

And now it's gone.

My creativity started to suffer shortly after I was started on Geodon. My inspiration started to slip, my muse dried up, and my desire all but left me. For a couple of months I forced myself to paint - Chinese brush style paintings like this one:

(That's my horse Chance, by the way, who we had to put down in December.)

But I couldn't do anything else. Nothing else would come out. 

I haven't painted or drawn anything for a month now. Not because I don't want to - I do - but it's like I can't. I want to be able to sit down and draw and paint and feel good about what I'm doing. But it's not there. I have no inspiration, no muse. I have no desire. I have no vision.

I decided that I would force myself to sketch a little every day - even if it was horrible or lame - I would sketch every day in hopes of getting my inspiration back. I'm struggling with this. I sit down to my sketch pad, pencil in hand, and stare at the blank page. Draw a dragon, I think. Pencil touches paper and nothing happens. Think. I try to flesh out basic shapes but I don't see what I'm trying to draw (in my mind's eye). How about a fox or a horse then. Again, pencil to paper and nothing flows. I try to think of a pose, I try to picture the anatomy, and I'm left with stiff, abstract shapes that suggest they might be something. 

As if this weren't bad enough, I have something else going on - apathy. I want to draw and paint so badly but at the same time I could care less. My desire is gone. Any joy I get out of creating is gone. There's no real motivation because I don't get anything out of it and I struggle with it anyway. 

And I fucking HATE this. You have no idea.

I think my problem is 2-fold. On the one hand we have Geodon, which took away my creativity and my libido (Geodon is an asshole). On the other we have my depression, which I think is very much alive and well in me. The depression brings with it the apathy and the lack of joy. 

No wonder I can't create art.

Not only can I not create art (which is the hugest blow to me), I also can't write. And I don't mean blogging - obviously I'm blogging. No, what I can't write is my book or poetry. I've been wanting to write poetry but nothing - and I mean nothing - comes out. I'll get 2-4 lines and I'm dried up. There's nothing more. I'll sit down to work on my book, fingers poised over the keys, and not one word comes out. I just stare at the screen, my mind alternately blank and racing and nothing gets written. 

This is all so very frustrating.

Tonight I'm going to try sketching looking at reference photos. Just animals. Maybe that will help. I won't have to think about poses. I'm going to keep trying to spit out lines of poetry - maybe something will flow eventually. I'll keep trying to work on my book - as daunting and futile that it seems. 

It's all I can do.

Apathy and Anhedonia are my Friends

And I hate these friends. I wish they would go the fuck away.

If you don't know what apathy or anhedonia is, google it.

The week after my hospitalization was filled with depression and despair. Then came Boston where I was warned that my moods might get a little screwy. And they did get screwy - I cycled through depression, irritability, giddiness and feeling okay several times a day. Fucking tiring.

But now . . . for the last week . . . I have been either irritable or nothing. I touched on it in my last post, my icky feels. I just can't shake this numb feeling. I've felt it since last Friday. Almost a full week now. I have the hyper irritability - I've got that emotion down pat - or I have this all encompassing nothingness. This lack of feeling. I try to feel. I force laughter, I force myself to be upbeat (which is all fake - I don't feel any of it). I force myself to talk, to not be as withdrawn as I feel.

And it's not really working. All I want to do is lay on the couch and stare at the ceiling. I want to not exist again.

Tuesday I had no choice but to do something, to interact - I was volunteering at the riding center all day. But I was a hollow husk. Yesterday I forced myself to do things. I had to take my son to therapy, I had acupuncture, I met a friend for pie and coffee. But other than that I just kind of floated around in a numb haze.

Today is looking to be, uh, not good. Today I have more feels and they're of the bad variety. They're of the depressed, self destructive variety. I've spend all morning on the verge of tears but I can't actually cry. Maybe it would help if I could. I want desperately to not exist. I feel like everything is pointless again. I'm always going to have these stupid fucking mood swings to deal with so what the fuck is the point of continuing on?

I want to self harm. I want to burn myself again. I have a string of 4 very noticeable burn marks from Monday on my left inner arm and I want to add to them. I want to feel the searing white flash of pain. I want the momentary adrenaline rush. More importantly, I want the outward expression of the pain I feel inside. I'm hoping my previous burn marks scar. I want the reminder.

It's taking every ounce of self control I have to not burn myself right now. I'm writing this hoping that it will help dissipate the urge. I may try going downstairs to box. I remind myself that self-harm serves no purpose and can even makes things worse. But I may end up burning myself, I don't know. I'm trying not to.

I feel like I don't know what to do with myself or my life. Right now, at this moment, everything seems so bleak. I'll be dealing with these swings my entire life - which is daunting and depressing. I have all this fucking trauma work to go through in therapy which is daunting and depressing. I have no desire/inspiration/get no joy out of my artwork anymore which is depressing. I'm getting no joy out of life right now which is depressing.

All of this is the apathy. All of this is the anhedonia. All of this is part of a possible major depressive episode. I'm hoping not. I'm hoping my brain is just in shut down mode from the whole depression/suicide/hospitalization thing and that soon it will kick into gear again. Who knows, maybe this is my new baseline. Whatever the fuck it is I want it to stop.

Also? All of these thoughts, these words I'm fleshing out here, represent several errors of thinking, or, cognitive distortions. Namely, catastrophizing, fortune telling, all or nothing thinking, overgeneralization, and disqualifying the positive. There are 10 "official" cognitive distortions and I'm practicing 5 of them right now. Intellectually, I know this. Intellectually, I try talking myself out of these, point out the flaws, counter them. But sadly, it's not helping. That's part of the problem with me - I know this shit. I recognize it and work against it. I try. But I still fall prey to it and it makes my mood cycles worse. I've been working on all of this so much in therapy over the past year and still it gets me.

I don't know what else to say. I hate being so negative but that's where I'm at right now. I'm trying not to ruminate, I'm trying to counter my distorted thinking, and I'm trying to not burn myself. I see my new pdoc at 3 today so maybe that will be helpful.

Ugh. I'm tired of having shitty feels or no feels. Fucking brain.