Put a STOP to it!
18 May 2012 2 Comments
in Survival Tags: anxiety, change, coping, fear, friendship, post-traumatic stress disorder, PTSD, stress, suicide, the life of erin, tips
(written a few nights ago)
Listen to your feelings. They are telling you something. With practice you can learn to deal with anything, even the impulse to commit suicide.
Today I’m visualize inflicting violence upon myself in some drastic way, but not as a way to kill myself. I just want everything to STOP. The greater the force behind that giant STOP sign the better.
Faster than a speeding bullet, more powerful than a locomotive, and able to [jump from] tall buildings in a single bound!
Suicide and Superman have a lot in common. Maybe. I actually don’t know very much about Superman but that tag line captures my impulse towards self-harm.What if we imagined ourselves surviving superhero-style? Our impulse to inflict pain can be equally stopped with a fantasy of being faster than our impulse to die, and counteracting it with something stronger.
I feel better recognizing that I don’t actually want to die but that I want things to STOP. During my treatment for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, I remember learning that if you say, “STOP!” loudly and put your hand straight out to accompany it, it’s much easier to stop your feelings, if only for a moment.
I can handle this. So where do I need to put a few STOP signs in my life?
- I am stressing about my future, because it feels like I don’t have one.
- I am stressing about money, because it dictates my future in many ways, and I don’t have enough money to keep living like this.
- I’m stressing about relationships, because they too will make my future worth living or not worth living.
Those things are big — they are worth stressing about — but not to the point of pushing myself over the edge. And this is where things get tricky, because if I don’t think about my future then my life will continue going in a direction that I don’t want it to go. But must I have my whole life figured out right now? No, no I do not.
Here’s the spot where I can STOP my all-or-nothing thinking, but dammit, I can’t. It’s too much of a habit. Maybe I can at least try to be more aware of thinking in black and white. I can try to think about how much money I need to get through this month or this week or just this day.
What can I do today to make money tomorrow? What’s one teensy tiny thing I can do? I can work on filling my Etsy orders. That’s a start.
And relationships. Well, I feel like being a hermit but at least I have plans to meet up with an old friend on Wednesday. It’s scary but it’s one teeny tiny step.
Now I feel a little better, but not a lot. I’m still really stressed out. But now that I’m done writing this post, it’s bed time. Time to put my worries on the shelf and have some rest. Enter the land of STOP, but not permanently. My bedtime medication ensures sleep, which is nice and predictable. Yes, I’m probably going to have nightmares again tonight but hey, I might not.
And what can I do until I fall asleep? Breathe. Breathe one breath at a time.
My thoughts tonight make me feel insane, but this is how to survive that insanity. Minute by minute. Maybe tomorrow my road will have more STOP signs, more than today’s road. That’s worth looking forward to. Those maybes.
Where do you need some STOP signs in your life?
A Sign for My Window
24 Apr 2012 6 Comments
in Day-to-Day Life Tags: anxiety, coping, depression, life direction, quotes, self-talk, social anxiety
Life feels dark and directionless today. The weather can’t be helping, cold and blowing, rain hissing down from the sky. I feel like a sitting duck, waiting for disaster, which I know is ridiculous. I create my life. Mental illness affects it but I can choose positive thinking to get myself through today. But it’s hard with the sky so dark.
Every once in a while, life brings someone into my life that helps me see the sun. Someone breathes life into my veins and shows me that there’s a lot out there in the world, a lot of goodness that can be trusted. Then life takes that person away and I question whether they existed in the first place. It’s hard to believe in the good when it leaves so little evidence.
But I contradict myself again. There is evidence of good in the world, as I talked about in my last post. I just have to get there and hang on until I do. My problem is that there are so many people around me that are tired of life as well. There are so many of us straining for something better.
I read a quote this week, adding it to my one hundred and fifty page collection that grounds me when no one else can:
[My best tip for overcoming depression is] to regard it as being like the weather. It’s not your responsibility that it’s raining, but it is real when it rains, and the fact that it’s raining does not mean that the rain is never going to stop. The only thing to do is to believe that, one day, it won’t be raining and accept it so you can find a mental umbrella to shield yourself from the worst. The sun will eventually come up.
- Stephen Fry
Maybe I should make a sign for my window that the sky can read and be reminded that some of us down here have had too much rain. DEAR SUN, PLEASE RETURN TO MY LIFE. AND WHEN YOU COME BACK, DON’T YOU DARE LEAVE AGAIN. At least stick around long enough for me to dry off and warm up and sit in peace.
I feel myself in my own way. My self-talk is bad and my self-esteem is worse. Hence my lack of blog posts lately. And then, of course, I beat myself up over that.
Isolation is always a trap for me. I fall into it so easily since I adore doing solitary things like reading and writing and doing art. It felt like my connection with the world was falling away piece by piece and then I got the flu, so all the events I was looking forward to got crossed off my calendar. Now I feel like I have nothing to pick back up.
The solution is there: Go, don’t think, just go and do it and live. Or at least, write.
Proof of Life
16 Apr 2012 7 Comments
in Survival Tags: coping, faith, happiness, wellness
Raise your hand if you’ve been to England.
Raise your hand if you’ve been to Africa.
China?
Australia?
The North Pole?
What if I told you that those places didn’t exist? You wouldn’t believe me, would you? I could argue that if you haven’t seen one of those places or all of those places, how do you know they are real?
You’d tell me that you’ve heard of them, that you’ve known people who have been there, that you know about the customs and the cities and the histories. Even if you haven’t been to those places, it would be impossible for me to convince you that they didn’t exist. There is too much proof.
How about wellness? Happiness? Have you ever been truly happy, depression free, hopeful?
Sometimes I forget that those things really exist. I can think about happiness and feel like I’d probably meet the Loch Ness Monster before ever feeling truly happy.
But other people have been there, they have been happy. Hundreds of thousands of people over the centuries. Millions! They have written music about it, books, movies and plays. They have put their flag in the ground to stamp proof of their conquest, just like Neil Armstrong planted his flag on the moon in 1969.
Emotion is harder to prove than physical measurable things, but it’s as real as anything else. And until I get there myself, I’m going to surround myself in as much proof of happiness as I can. Then, when it decides to make its way into my life, I will not only believe in it, I will recognize it. And I will hold onto it until you get there too.
Down and Out
31 Mar 2012 4 Comments
in Day-to-Day Life Tags: coping, crafts, depression, disability, money, stress
I don’t like sharing that I’m on disability payments to get by. More specifically, I’m on ODSP, which stands for Ontario Disability Support Program. I’m not really ashamed of it like I used to be but it’s just exhausting having to explain it to people, especially when most people are judgmental. Even within the mental health system I have encountered stigma surrounding my source of income.
So I get $1000 a month from the government due to my mental illnesses’ debilitating effects on my life. It might sound like a lot of money but it doesn’t stretch very far. My rent is $650, my hydro (aka electricity) bill has been $100+ this winter, and on top of that is my internet/cable bill and groceries. And puppy food, vaccinations, etc, leaves me with very very little.
Despite living on little money, I know that I’m very fortunate to be supported by the government. Although my parents are also willing to help keep me afloat in emergencies, I really need to be as independent as possible. Money doesn’t grow on trees, after all, and my parents work too hard for too little as it is. Therefore, if you randomly show up at my apartment for dinner I’m most likely only going to be able to offer you bread and peanut butter. I try to sleep in most days, rolling lunch and breakfast into one. I need more money than this.
On ODSP, if you make over $200 a month through a job, the government takes a cut of your earnings. So if I make over $200, the $1000 a month I receive from ODSP gets cut down to much less, shrinking the benefits of earning money. I don’t have a post-secondary school education so it’s hard to make above minimum wage, and right now I can only work part-time due to my mental health.
And as you may know, sometimes having a job requires you to spend a chunk of your earnings on keeping that job. I had to pay for parking daily at my last workplace, and the hours I worked required me to actually eat three meals a day, which upped my costs more. ODSP provides an employment start-up fund which pays for $500 worth of new clothes, a haircut, a work uniform, training costs, etc, but what happens when the seasons change? You need more new work clothes because you can’t wear your new ODSP-sponsored winter outfits in the summer.
To make a long story short, I’m pretty damn broke and there isn’t much incentive to getting a job when I don’t get to keep my full earnings. My last job took a major toll on my mental health so any job I look at now makes me question whether it will hurt me or help me overall. The extra money earned doesn’t seem worth the hassle when so much of it gets squandered away on keeping the job and paying back ODSP.
My side project of doing craft fairs (which never earns me more than $200 so I get to keep that cash after claiming it) is one meager way I can earn money. I do my crafts on my own schedule when I feel well enough, and then every month or two sign up for a fair where I can sell my work.
What sparked today’s rant is that it cost me $30 to sign up for today’s craft fair, and I wound up with the flu so I couldn’t go. No refunds, folks, so there goes my $30 I couldn’t spare to begin with as well as my potential earnings for the day . I understand the no refunds part, but I wish I could get a break somewhere. The last craft show I signed up for was cut down (pun not intended) by a trip to the hospital to get stitches in my forehead.
Sometimes I walk past variety stores and see the signs outside their doors advertising the money to be won in that week’s lottery. I wonder if I might be destined to win the jackpot because karma truly owes me some good things to balance out all the bad. I’m not willing to trade my last few dollars for nothing, though, so I just keep walking.
The Reality of Depression
20 Mar 2012 11 Comments
in Symptoms and Side-Effects Tags: coping, depression, fear, friendship, loss
Depression isn’t just symptoms doctors check off on your chart, like a grocery list for insanity. Doctors don’t know that your world is no longer simple, easy to define.
Depression is the feeling of lead in your veins, dread in your nerves, and sorrow in your footsteps. Your shoes feel heavy, no matter which pair you put on. Your voice becomes a whisper or a howl – sometimes both – yet its frequency seems out of everyone’s earshot. A fog settles over your vision, and you shade in the small boxes on your calendar, light grey on good days, charcoal black on the bad. You wonder why the sunlight means nothing to you now but glare as it sizzles worms on the sidewalk.
Your friends become faceless, each gesture falsified. They speak a language you can’t understand and it exhausts you to pay attention for long. You realize you are alone and that it’s always been that way, you just couldn’t see it before. You drop the strings of relationships and let your past friends float up into the sky like helium balloons. You decide you are too heavy to weigh them down anymore.
You realize how pointless everything is, everything. You sit immobilized on your bed, unable to move to even go to the bathroom. The covers over your head become your only solace.
Sometimes you catch a glimpse of your old life, your old self, like glimpsing a friend through the window of a restaurant. Was that really me? you wonder. Smiling and laughing, replying to people in conversation, visible to the world?
You realize that you have become a ghost. You raise your fingers in front of your face and find they are see-through. You step back in fear and lose your balance. You try to brace yourself against the wall, but you fall right into it, right through it. Wildly you try to grasp people’s hands, anyone’s hands, but they are all out of reach. People walk through you, over you, and you keep falling without noticing a thing. You fall and fall and fall. The pit is deep, no, it’s endless. You scream but you find that you have no voice left.
*
Things can get better. Now I live no longer like a ghost and I have people who do see my pain. I still feel disconnected from them, at times, and I can feel insubstantial but I can now place my feet on the ground. It’s a battle to maintain my balance, but it gets easier with practice.
You can get used to anything, including living with depression, if you have to. I am on medication that works, have a great support system through my doctor and therapist, and have a family that really cares, but I am still depressed. Things are still really hard at times but I’m getting the hang of it. One day at a time, sometimes one breath at a time. There is so much that is still broken but I believe it can heal, no matter how long it takes.
And it really helps me to know that I’m not alone. I’m not the only person to have ever felt this way. Maybe if I can help other people through depression I can help me too. Together we are strong.
Happy Lists!
13 Feb 2012 10 Comments
in Day-to-Day Life, Fun, Survival Tags: coping, friendship, happy lists, lists, suicide, the life of erin, younger self
February is one of the ugliest months for weather but I took advantage of the sunshine today and walked to get bubble tea this afternoon. At the bubble tea shop I wrote a letter to my friend Victorya on pug stationery. In her letter I remarked at how good my mood was, despite it being a Monday. Then I realized that I’d combined a bunch of my favourite things together, and so of course I felt better than usual!
A walk in the sunshine + bubble tea + writing to a friend + pug stationery = Erin in a good mood!
That realization reminds me of something my friend Lisa and I used to do in Grade Seven. We started making these things we called “Happy Lists.” We’d each make a giant list of things that made us happy, mainly small things. Sometimes we’d compare lists after we’d each written like twenty things down. Often we’d hear things on the other person’s list and then say, “Oh, me too!” and add it to our own list.
The idea is hardly unique; remember that scene in The Sound of Music when the kids are afraid of a thunderstorm and so Mary sings that song about “raindrops on roses and whiskers on kittens?” You’ve heard the idea of Happy Lists before because it works!
Sometimes when things are really bad we forget all the stuff that we love. If you aren’t in the mood to make a list when you’re sad, try doing one when you’re happy to refer to the next time you’re sad.
Sometimes when I’m in a terrible mood I see a list and think, “Yeah, well bubble tea is okay but it’s no miracle.” Then I read down the list, feeling a teensy tiny bit better with each item. All of those teensy things add up! The longer the list you have the better.
In the past when I’ve been suicidal I think of some of the things I enjoy that I would miss if I weren’t around anymore. Or the next time someone asks you what you want for your birthday, look at your list! These Happy Lists are always helpful!
Click “More” below to read more of my list and feel free to leave some items from your Happy List in the comments! If you get stuck, try thinking about each of your senses: What do you love seeing? Tasting? Touching? Hearing? Smelling?
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The Carousel
18 Jan 2012 1 Comment
in The Big Picture, Uncategorized Tags: change, childhood, coping, growth, life direction
I forget if I’ve told you that I live next door to a daycare for preschool-aged children. They play in the yard between my building and theirs, and sometimes I’m lucky enough to catch some of their conversations. As I was stepping off my porch this morning I saw a girl in a pink snow suit sort of lounging by the wall. A boy ran up to her and gasped for breath. She asked in alarm, “What’s wrong?” The boy answered, “It’s just SO MUCH FUN!!!” and then broke into hysterical laughter.
I have so much I want to share with you but each topic deserves its own post. I feel a little like that boy tonight, gasping for breath and taking it all in. I wouldn’t say that I’m having a hysterical amount of fun at the moment but I’m definitely at the sidelines, taking a step off the carousel of life to get my bearings.
A new year beginning can give us that time to reflect, as can birthdays, and endings. I experienced an odd juxtaposition today as I located a brand new place in order to say good-bye to people I hold dear to my heart. I almost missed the building at first because the outside wall perfectly matched the slate January sky. And the good-byes were like most, only with an undercurrent of understanding. We aren’t always so fortunate to get to part from others on the same page.
I wish I could be more specific but it’s not for today, or perhaps any other day in the near future. I think I will be able to understand it better myself as time passes and even then it will be complex, both hurt and healing. One thing about this carousel of life is that we can never see the whole picture because it keeps moving, always.
Are you on your carousel or off? Is it time to take a break or is it time to go around for another spin? Take a moment to breathe and feel the ground beneath your feet or just keep hanging on, trusting those strong hands of yours.
Twelve Days of Christmas: Days 4 & 5
28 Dec 2011 8 Comments
in Uncategorized Tags: coping, medication, the life of erin, twelve days of christmas
The past two days have been a bit strange for me since I’ve increased one of my antidepressants, Wellbutrin. My doctor gave me the okay to do so last week but I wanted to wait until after Christmas so any side-effects didn’t ruin my holiday. I feel a little flu-ish today and I did yesterday too, hence not posting here.
I was on this higher dosage of Wellbutrin over a year ago but cut it down after realizing its connection to my chronic headaches. Cutting my dosage down last December helped my headaches but it also increased my depression. I ended up having to quit a job that I loved and the ups and downs of therapy got to me a lot more. I considered going to the hospital more than I had for a while. So, just before Christmas I called my doctor and said that I needed to go back up to my old dosage.
Tonight’s Twelve Days of Christmas assignment is for you to practice some self-awareness by taking a look at your daily life. How has your mood been lately? What daily habits are you happy with and which would you change?
I’m going to talk more about healthy lifestyle habits as we approach the new year, but for now we can reflect on our habits of 2011. Where are you compared to this time last year? Look at your social life, your spiritual life, your work life, and your home life. What is better and what is worse?
For me, I noticed the following symptoms of my depression getting out of control lately:
- frequent feelings of hopelessness
- very depressed mood without a trigger (ie. in the morning I’d wake up feeling depressed, without say, spilling my cereal as a trigger to my mood plummeting)
- little energy and decreased desire to do anything
- feeling more isolated
- not caring about my future
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