RealMental

By Heather

The other afternoon, I’m in my office with the door mostly shut, singing along to Biggie’s greatest hits “I love it when you call me Big Poppa …” when a colleague/friend knocks on my door to rehash some gossip. It was the type of gossip that makes my blood boil because it’s childish stuff being done by a woman in her 50’s. Though practically routine with this woman, I can’t help but become offended at her lack of class and blatant rudeness, all of which are a manifestation of being jilted ages beforehand. But I suppose you can take the mean girl out of high school but can’t take high school out of the mean girl. Par for the course.

As the story is being relayed and I’m feeling more and more offended, my coworker mentions the mean girl’s craziness. She points her index finger at her head and circles it around while rolling her eyes; the international sign. As she says this, I remember the time and rummage around in my bag for medication. She laughs and continues the story while I try to get to some happy place in my mind. I feel my anxiety coupled with anger rising which won’t lead to intelligent discourse or the ability to roll my eyes back and scoff at some hag who didn’t get what she wanted thus taking it out on everyone else. Anxiety and anger will lead to me losing my shit. I’ve been there and done that more than enough times. It was my rather ‘capricious’ (to put it nicely) behavior that led to the medication.

As the story continues, I use the ‘c’ word and pop a klonopin. It’s that time of day and I’ve been instructed to take my benzodiazepine consumption seriously. I relax and sit back in my chair to hear the rest of tale; while smiling inwardly, for after four months, I’m still amazed at what medication can do. I was once incredibly dubious to the thought of medication and those who took it. What an embarrassing thing, to be forced into drugs because of erratic – nay psychotic – behavior, I would scoff. Why couldn’t people just control themselves? I’m one of ‘those people’. One who just can’t control herself at times, because I just wasn’t built that way.

So I smile inwardly and finally am composed to the point where I’m not on the verge of tears but just blasé as to the mean girl’s behavior and particular cruelty towards me.S Suddenly rational enough to realize that I can only control my reactions to her garish behavior and just do my job. Because I may have my issues, which, by the grace of God, can be helped by medication and therapy, but she’s just a bitch and there ain’t shit that can be done to help that.

I’m still about 17% iffy on the whole Bipolar II diagnosis, but I will say this: if I don’t take my L & L–lithium and Lexapro–I will put a cap in your ass.

I’ve never experienced the good side of mania, if there is one, which is arguable; I don’t become wonderfully productive, I don’t spend, I don’t feel superpowerful. I have agitation and rage. So life is pretty much about bouncing between depression on the one hand and agitation and rage on the other, and sometimes if you’re lucky you get them both together in a mixed state. When I’m depressed I hurt myself. When I’m manic I might give your ass a Boston Beatdown.

People don’t expect a Boston Beatdown from me, probably because I’m a suburban mom and kind of a little woman, but I can keep a smile wheat-pasted on my face while I assail your kneecaps with furious anger. I will hurl invective in the east Texan hyphenated-compound tradition: you shit-ass pig-fucking butt-sucker. I said something in a session yesterday that made my therapist laugh; you know how Dan Rather gets when he flips out? Well, it just made me angrier, such was my impotence, my insignificance, my inability to be menacing while boiling with rage inside.

Yesterday after kindergarten dropoff I went to a nearby coffee place to work, and I realized something: Adults in public are so noisy! A shit-ass pig-fucking butt-sucker two tables away was braying into his cell, wanting the number of that girl Melissa in Round Rock and then calling her to tell her about his upcoming bus trip in Central and South America and how he had to exchange a plane ticket for his brother. I was furious that I had come to a quiet place at last, had sat down, and had been assaulted by useless boring information broadcast by a shit-ass pig-fucking butt-sucker. I was ready to beat his ass down. And Melissa? Girlfriend, he didn’t ask you one question. No “How are you today, Melissa?” He’s a dick, possibly a narcissist. He wants to talk about himself while you go, “Wow, that sounds awesome.” I should have beat his ass down.

But I didn’t. Instead I came home and realized I’m several days behind in my L & L. I’m still acclimating to getting the household ready in the morning at 7:15. I’m distracted by profound struggles over going to school. The cat meows at me. I have fifteen things to do at once, and while none of them are individually insurmountable, their multitude edges me closer to a nervous breakdown. I deal with my child’s chronic health problem. I forget mine.

Watch out.

I was driving home tonight, about 15 minutes ago actually, and it occurred to me that I can’t remember not adding an imaginary caveat to the question; “how are you doing?”. When good friends ask how I am, I usually say “pretty good” or even the daring “okay”, but in my head I am adding things. Like I am ok, but last night I thought about how good it would feel to not exist, or I am fine, but I secretly scratch the back of my legs until they bleed. Sometimes I feel propelled to tell the truth, but I feel that such circumstances are not a time for honesty. I think that most people who suffer from some sort of mental illness get very good at faking normal or ok, or even funny! and nice! and chatty! I guess I should say, that I am pretty good at appearing to be a high functioning, dare I saw somewhat awesome, person.

I wanted to post a quick history here on RealMental, since that is the first-ish thing I want to know about people.

p.s. HUGE shout out to LeahPeah for wrangling this and involving me.

I am 37 now, so the where and when and hows might occasionally be fuzzy, but for now, this is how I got here.

I started with a diagnosed panic disorder at 18, while in university. I had suffered from it since I was 13, not being able to sleep away from home, not being able to go out to do social activities after dark, only watching tv shows that were set somewhere sunny. Seriously. I spent 4 months at an outpatient at the university hospital, 4 hours a day, 5 days a week. Turned out to be very interesting, but not so effective. Ultimately proper medication helped. I ended up going more than halfway across the country to finish school. Not without bumps, but so so so much better. I often felt depressed, but figured those feelings were just me, part of me, who I was. Not good enough, thin enough, smart enough.

I was off of my medication (Nardil, total old skool med), for a few years before I went back on for more general anxiety with panic attacks. Wee! I ended up going back on during a very stressful time in my life, first serious (but good) relationship, I had just met my biological mom (i am adopted), and I was getting married in a year or so, and lets face it, my brain is buggered, so it was time to go back on. My general physician was taking care of my meds, but she ultimately sent me to a psychiatrist to help. I went back on the Nardil and felt better. She also gave me ativan (for emergencies) and a few sleeping pills if I remember. Read more »

So I heard they took you in. Don’t worry. It happens.

Not trying to spread gossip, but in case Perez Hilton is right about why you’re there…well, that happens, too. Mental illness happens. And when it happens you work the program and get off suicide watch and get fresh-air break, and eventually you get your shoelaces back and can go home and start over, which is the closest thing this life offers to a miracle.

I can see you as the intense and possibly troubled middle brother. You’re the Dignan.

Plus side: Your family obviously loves you–I met your brothers doing press for The Wendell Baker Story–and I absolutely guarantee you that women find troubled geniuses fascinating, especially if they’re Scorpios with big noses and publicly-documented buttlicking fetishes. I’d hit that.

The drugs are initially constipating, but sometimes straining to excrete is better than wandering around in the wilderness like Margot Kidder. Also watch out for dry mouth. Get some flavored lube for the buttlicking stuff. I can’t lick a stamp anymore. My husband is sad, but at least I’m not a greasy stain under the Highway 183 flyover.

So there you have my advice to you, or to anyone else reading.

By Dad Gone Mad

One of the great things about recovering from a mental illness is the semi-regular opportunity one has to sit in the psychiatrist’s waiting room and try to deduce whether the other patients are more or less batshit than you are.

It’s fun because it’s simply not the kind of game people with other illnesses and ailments play. Would a man waiting to see his cardiologist scan the waiting room, wondering if perhaps the old guy across the room reading the four-month-old issue of Auto Upholstery Weekly has a more life-threatening aortal blockage than his? Do women waiting for their electrolysis appointment try to see if the other ladies in the room have fuller moustaches? Of course not. It’s just not done. But when you’re a looney, it’s somehow a comfort to know (or at least believe) that there are others in the room who are worse off that you (sort of the opposite of penis envy).

The first time I ever walked into to a psychiatrist’s office, I expected to find people banging their heads against the drywall or drooling all over the pages of Highlights For Children or quoting Jack Nicholson to the receptionist: “PUT YOUR HAND IN THE AIR, CHIEF! DON’T YOU WANT TO WATCH THE GAME, CHIEF?” But it wasn’t like that at all, and part of me was disappointed. In fact, the only real crazy person I saw that day was the psychiatrist himself — a balding, sweater-wearing old man with a thousand-mile stare who talked in barely audible whispers and appeared to be simultaneously under the influence of a valium, Milk of Magnesia and Grey Goose. Needless to say, I found a new psychiatrist.

The new guy is of Middle Eastern descent and his receptionist has gargantuan breasts. She speaks to me very nicely, in a practiced, polished, professional tone that seems to say, “If you’re severely disturbed and homicidal, I hope that my sexy voice and this up-close view of my enormous cans will convince you to walk away and kill someone other than me.” The waiting room is bright and spacious and loaded with pamphlets about antidepressants that contain happy, supportive phrases like “not feeling yourself lately” and “get back to being you.” This doctor, whom we’ll call Dr. Dingleheimer, seems to attract a more affluent mix of crazies, and in the half-dozen times I’ve been there over the years I always have a good time deconstructing the white-collar psychos and projecting various ailments and lifestyles onto them. It makes me feel better about myself to imagine that they are, in fact, certifiably wacko.

There’s a woman sitting next to the magazine rack. See her? She’s here seeking treatment for a unique kind of behavioral disorder — the kind where anytime someone says the word “chicken,” she stands up, tucks her hands under her armpits like wings and begins to cluck. “Buh-kawk! Buk-buk-buh-kawk!” Such a sad, misunderstood chick. Dr. Dingleheimer’s Prescription: 95,000 mg. of Wellbutrin before bedtime (may be taken with or without food) and for God’s sake, stay away from all KFC locations.

Oh, and see that man over there by the window? He’s here because he has trouble with childhood memories of his father, the kind of man most would describe as an overzealous Little League dad. He was pushed so relentlessly by his father to excel at baseball that he came to believe this was the only way he could earn his dad’s love. The man is in his late 40s now. His father died over a decade ago but the man still walks around wearing a batting helmet. He had thick black lines tattooed under his eyes. And whenever he gets nervous, he begins to chant “Hey, batter, batter, batter. Hey, batter, batter, batter. Swing!” over and over again. Naturally, these issues have had decidedly negative affect on the man’s love life and his work as a librarian. Dr. Dingleheimer’s Prescription: 600 mg. of Zoloft eight times a day and start rooting for the Chicago Cubs (which would break just about any baseball fan’s enthusiasm for the game in no time flat).

And then there’s the man who is in with Dr. Dingleheimer right now, a man who likes to curse and make funny noises so much that he pretends to have Tourette’s Syndrome just so he has an excuse. Before he went in to see the doctor, he was sitting here looking for nudity in the January issue of Cosmopolitan, going, “Woop! Fuck it! Click. Click. You’re an asshole. ASSHOLE! Wooooooop! Fuck it!” It’s a nice show, but it gets a little old after 15 minutes. So now he’s in there with the doctor and I can hear his antics through the door. Dr. Dingleheimer’s Prescription: For starters, SHUT THE FUCK UP!

See? I’m not so crazy after all.

Throughout my life, I have dealt with lesser and greater levels of depression and anxiety. I remember sitting on my bed and feeling a general, aimless sadness as young as the age of two. I was suicidal at nine. At fifteen, the voice of a young male resided in my head for several months. In my early twenties, my issues escalated to such a point that I finally found myself a psychiatrist and was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. A second opinion pegged me as manic depressive, and a third as schizoid affective, all within a two-year period. I have been on and off several different medications in an effort to deal with emotions and delusions that are occasionally more extreme since my early twenties than they had ever been before that point.

I suffered intolerable side effects with each drug I was prescribed, and so from August 2001 until January 2007 I tried to live mainly medication free aside from a trial flirtation with St. John’s Wort. The sad fact about St. John’s Wort, according to my research, is that not only was I supposed to stay away from old cheeses, red wine, beer, yeast, and strangely enough, pickled herring, but it lowers the effectiveness of the birth control pill and increased my skin’s sensitivity sunlight. Old cheeses, red wine, and beer are three major comestibles that make my life worth living. I would never kick a wedge of blue cheese out of bed for drinking beer.

After living for five-and-a-half years without prescription medication, I found myself completely bottoming out last winter. During the day, I cried at work, thought that everyone I knew was talking behind my back, often believed I was too ugly to socialize publicly, and lost my ability to concentrate on tasks for any length of time. At night, I lay awake unable to stop my brain from running through all the ways in which I had failed myself and others during the day. Sleeping usually meant three hours of catnapping and trying to swallow the bone that seemed to be stuck in my throat. As is common when my depression and anxiety get the better of me, I lived in constant pain and had to take large doses of pain medications just to keep from weeping.

It was not until I spent a week at home sick because I spiked a fever every time I thought about leaving the house that I was willing to accept that I needed to try medication again. When your partner suggests that extended work leave combined with a hospital stay might be the answer, it is time. I made an emergency appointment with my doctor, and after talking with her about the length of my symptoms (since 1975) and family history (largely undiagnosed but obvious), she prescribed Celexa for my condition. It took me a lot of courage to fill that prescription and take that first pill, because I had visions of dry mouth, suicidal urges, and electrical zaps dancing in my head from previous medications, but I took a deep breath, threw the little white pill into the back of my throat, and swallowed.

So far, it is one of the best things I ever did for myself. I am generally happier, more creative, and more relaxed. I say generally, because this psychological lift has been tempered by my recent bout with cervical cancer, which has thrown in a whole world of complication, but that’s how life rolls. Before this medication, I could not have said that.

I am still skeptical of prescription medication’s actual usefulness in a lot of cases, but I am far less anti-pharmaceutical than I used to be. Any time that I have missed a dose or two and am treated to another taste of how I used to feel every moment of every day, I wish that my medication could take human form. Neither it nor I are perfect, but if it didn’t smell like paint thinner, I would lick it all over and ask it to go steady.

In early February, after several years of trying to no avail, I found out that I was pregnant.

My initial reaction was very mixed, I was happy but I was also horrified. I kept thinking of how screwed up I had felt for most of my life, of how unpredictable my depression could be, and worst of all was the question that kept me up nights in the beginning: What if I pass my disease on to my baby?

Also, through a delightful cocktail of Lexapro, Adderall, and various sleep aids I found myself in the most peaceful and genuinely functional state of mind and I was scared to death to start the long walk, retracing the path back to uncertainty and despair, back into the bowels of my illness. I stopped the Adderall and sleep medication immediately crossing my fingers that doing so would not send me into a tailspin.

My husband and I had discussed the possibilities of my remaining on my anti-depressant during my pregnancy many times in the past. What we had to weigh was the unknown effects of the drug on the baby vs. my ability to survive being pregnant for nine months. How far would I regress in that amount of time? Point A in this journey, before I found an anti-depressant that worked for me and before I was diagnosed with severe ADD, (minus the “H”. Hyperactive I ain’t.) was a place I didn’t care to return to. My days back then consisted of paralyzing panic attacks, confusion, insomnia, terror, deep sorrow and a daily urge to put myself out of my misery.

When I called the doctor’s office to schedule my initial prenatal visit I was informed that my primary care physician had transferred to another city and that I’d need to establish another one. At the visit with the replacement doctor I was sternly scolded for even considering the possibility of remaining on my anti- depressant during my pregnancy. The doctor refused to refill my prescription for Lexapro saying that there just wasn’t enough evidence about it’s effects on fetal development for him to feel comfortable with it.

Mercifully, a few days later I had my first visit with my OBGYN who said that there was no evidence that Lexapro, in therapeutic doses, would have any ill effect whatsoever on the baby. She confirmed my fear that tossing the anti-depressant could be not only dangerous for me, but unhealthy for the fetus. She was kind and supportive and understanding and honestly I don’t know what I’d have done had it not been for her. I think I might have stopped my medication altogether.

Seven months later I have no doubt that I made the right choice. (that is to say, the right decision for me. this is a highly personal decision and I don’t believe there’s a definitive “right” or “wrong”) I have been experiencing symptoms of depression for months now- insomnia, mild panic, racing thoughts, etc., but thanks to the anti-depressant I have been able to cope with them. I know that they will pass. They have not become my reality. For the most part I am calm and centered. I feel at peace. I know my baby experiences my emotions and I’m so relieved that what she has experienced during her time in my body has been mostly positive. Mostly comforting. Mostly sane.