Roles in Interpersonal Relationships!

Boy meets girl
Boy Loses Girl
Man tries to figure out what the hell went wrong.

What is mental illness to me?

A mental illness is neither good nor bad, right nor wrong, it just is. It’s something you either have or you don’t have. Just like high blood pressure, diabetes or benign prostate hyperplasia. People with mental illness are often viewed as downtrodden and uneducated or unintelligent. I am writing a research paper this semester about the rights of the mentally ill and examples of the social and even academic stigmas associated with mental illness are many and varied and not difficult to find. My ACLU membership card is probably expired but it’s in my wallet that’s the important thing.
Anyways, I have this severe mental illness but I don’t feel like I am any worse off or better off than anyone else. You’ve been given the tools to deal with whatever life throws at you and so I have I. I may have more problems or more complex problems but I may have more tools or more complex tools. It all evens out we are all on the same playing field. I don’t want o r need anyone’s sympathy. But it is part of who I am, a big part. When you are talking about your mind being under the control of anything other than your mind, you are either talking about mind altering substances or mental illness. It’s difficult and I take a lot of medication but I function just like you do. I work, I go to school, I am in a functional communicative serious committed relationship, all those normal things, but one conversation with me and I may be described as anything but normal. I was once told by a woman, “Don’t call me anymore and I can’t see you anymore because you are sensory overload for me.” I was a little bothered by this woman leaving me, but hey she was paying me a really big compliment. When my ex-wife said I made a good housebitch she meant in the most endearing way.
I like people who have never seen me off my meds, they always tell me how normal I am and how normal I seem and that I don’t need the meds. Hello! I SEEM (all perception) that way because I am on the meds. So many people just don’t get this. Why is that?
My schedule of course is completely erratic, I don’t go to sleep or get up at the same time two days in a row, I may sleep 1 hour I may sleep 8 or 9, I never know. When I get out of bed in the morning I just don’t know. Years ago I heard that from a woman, “When you get out of bed in the morning I have know idea where you are going to be or what to expect from you.” I was amazed, someone else that understand, “Hell I don’t know either honey, that’s part of the fun.
Whey you are crazy you can get away with all kinds of fun things, indulge in all sorts of deviousness that inevitably are attributed to your mental illness. If you want to believe my kitchen table is really a large clump of industrial grade sulphur then go ahead. I am not going to try and talk you out of it or convince you that you are wrong.
It’s like a psychiatrist with a malingerer, it’s a lot easier to write them a couple of scrips and send them on their way than it is to try to convince them nothing is wrong with them. Hypochondriacs too, these people have said or rehearsed or thought about these things so extensively that THEY believe that these things are true so it would be really hard for a general practitioner to convince that person that nothing is wrong with them. And if I am that doctor I’m thinking, this is a psych issue, not my problem. I’d d the right thing though, pass the buck to some mental health professional and let them try to talk the hypochondriac out of being sick. But how does that work really? They’ll let an illness go, as soon as they find one to replace it.
I was talking with someone about Munchausen’s Syndrome the other day (I’m not sure on the spelling). If you aren’t familiar with it basically a mother causes injury or illness to her child intentionally and knowingly and she gets lots of attention because her baby is sick or hurt or in the hospital. It is a somewhat rare phenomenon. Children learn to talk pretty young, once they can talk you can’t do that anymore, the kid will tell the doctor or the social worked or the random stranger in the ER waiting room what his or her mommy did to him, can’t risk that, means jail time. But there has to be some hard-core sickness at the root of all that, injuring another (your own child) to bring attention to yourself. I suppose these people lack much self-confidence and don’t feel loved and appreciated, and see this as a rational method to get the attention or perceived validation they require. There are other ways.
I was physically abused like many people growing up, but at some point you possess the physical capability to fight back and I did, very young, the abuse stopped abruptly when I fought back. I’m not saying it’s right, but with a child’s mentality I figured if it was okay for them to hurt me it was okay for me to hurt them. I could just stand there and take it, and a lot of kids do. Afraid of losing the validation or approval of a parent they will tolerate horrible atrocities. The stay quiet out of ‘loyalty’ to these people who abuse them.
What a horrible world we live in? What do you think?

Can you Say Anti-Psychotic?

yeah, I agree totally there is something disturbing about feeding a 5 or 6 year old mellaril, or risperdal in large doses so they can cope with the trauma they have been put through. I'm 30 years old I have been through a lot of trauma, some of my own making some not, but at 5 or 6 I don't think the mind is really capable of creating it's own trauma, it can merely react to the trauma imposed upon it. the human psyche is a very fragile thing, I know this as an adult but little kids haven't even developed a belief systems, set goals or even contemplated the future. i have seen children's psych wards and it is always very disturbing.
Anyways, yeah I have schizo-affective disorder, they put OCD on that personality disorder axis, I always get them mixed up. i count things but it doesn't really interfere with my life. I count a lot of things, all the time, for many different reasons but I don't see it as a problem. the professionals basically go along with it, "if you aren't having problems because of it and you can deal with it, then we don't need to worry about that." I don't know if those symptoms would get worse without meds or not. My depression, mood fluctuations, seizures and psychotic symptoms would come back pretty quickly off of meds but I don't really have any way to gauge if the meds help the ocd. On top of counting I havee a thing for stove burners, door locks, seatbelts, and order. I have to have everything planned out. i am spontaneous and impulsive at times but I am an obsessively meticulous planner. This past weekend my girlfriend said that her friend so and so and her husband and three kids might come by at some point during the day. Me of course I ask, "Might come? You don't know?" She didn't. "Well, what time are they supposed to come over." She had no idea. So these people that I don't know may or may not be coming over at some unspecified time. Drove me nuts. I say what I mean and mean what I say, I lay all my cards on the table so everything is fair and balanced and how you deal with it or don't is up to you, I have done my part. Being a programmer of sorts instills that methodical nature but it's pretty extreme in my planning and organization. Being in impulsive and spontaneous are of course in direct contradiction to that, I guess it's just another of the many paradoxes of mental illness.
So about me? I'm 30, in a full time committed monogamous relationship with an incredible woman, she is 18 years older than I am which is just about normal for me. My ex-wife would be 446 now. I can't related to people my age and especially people younger than me. My girlfriends 19 year old daughter lives her with us and I definitely cannot relate to her, anything she is interested in, the thoughts processes or behaviour patterns. I think I was born a generation too late.
One of my more memorable moments in a psych hospital was when this guy decided (paranoid schizophrenic, very paranoid) that I was a homosexual because I have pierceings in both ears. He didn't just decided I was a homosexual, he decides that myself and all the other patients were conspiring togteher to have me fuck him. it was funny at first then this guy just got plain annoying, and I was having my own problems. I am sitting in the dayroom talking to some woman and he walks up the nurses stations and asks for a paper clip, well no can do with the paper clip, half these people want to kill themselves. the nurse calmly and nicely asks him why he needs a paperclip and his response was, "So I can shove it up my ass to keep these faggots from fucking me." About an hour and 15 minutes later he put his head through a plat glass window because Jesus wouldfn't let him make friends." he sustained injuries extensive enough to be transferred to a medcial facility and I didn't see him for along time. I was heavily involved with a group that used to be called DMDA (The depressive and manic depressive association) and sure enough one evening he shows up claiming to be bipolar which couldn't have ben more inaccurate. I would like to state for the record that I have never had the desire to shove a paper clip up my ass.
I also like the unmedicated bipolar old lady. they gave her a one on one and put her in the 'seclusion' room. She was refusing her meds which was why she was so psychotic and delusional and she told the nurse she would only take her meds if they got President Johnson on the phone to tell her that this woman was indeed a real certified RN. I'm not sure how that panned out because I left and went to the chow hall. Three days back on her meds and she is perfectly normal. And the rational that psych patients use for stopping compliance with their medications reall cracks me up. "I was doing good and feeling so much better so I didn't think I needed the medication anymore." Somehow the realization that they are doing god, and stable is BECAUSE they are taking their medication. Trying to explain this to them is futile and wasted energy.
I also like the idiots that try to tell me it's all in my head and I don't need medication. My standard response has become, "Ok, well, I'll stop taking all my meds, move in with you and let you take care of me." Now all of a sudden they really think I need the meds? people are so misinformed it's disgusting.
My thesis statement for my research paper this semester is "The structure of existing laws regarding the rights of the mentally ill is unbalanced, inconsistent, and prejudicial" I have had no shortage of sources, I will have any easy time supporting this claim but there are no real academic papers out there with opposing viewpoints. An opposing viewpoint would be that, "Everything is the way it's supposed to be and the system works." No one is saying that and it certainly isn't true. No one would write a paper saying everything's fine. it would be pointless, the newspaper will never publish and article about an accident free day on state highway 31. No one reports good news, if it's good, it's not really news, no one ever pays any attention to things when they work, only when they fail, why is that?

Apathy and Waking Up!

I am not sure that everyone can relate but this is what it is like for me. I get out of bed in the morning or the afternoon or whenever I happen to wake up and it takes me a couple of hours to convince myself that yes I indeed want to be alive. I am not getting the razors or the .45 out or anything but I wake up just wishing I hadn’t most times. Every now and then I wake up all gung-ho and ready to take on the world. I am a full time student, I run a full time business, I live with a full time girlfriend, there is quite a bit on my plate. This would be quite a bit for anyone but I think it’s a bit more difficult for someone like me with a severe mental illness. I don’t want or need anyone’s sympathy but I wake up wondering why and wishing I hadn’t more days than not. I don’t dwell on the negative horrible feelings in life but those tend to be the things we feel the most strongly and the music I listen to and play and what I read tends to reflect that. It’s not dwelling on the horrible and painful it’s just recognizing that it is there, expressing and hopefully you find someone somewhere along the line that can relate to you, having said that here is some poetry. Song lyrics actually but poetry without the music.

Day after day, love turns grey
Like the skin of a dying man.
Night after night, we pretend its all right
But I have grown older and
You have grown colder and
Nothing is very much fun any more.
And I can feel one of my turns coming on.
I feel cold as a razor blade,
Tight as a tourniquet,
Dry as a funeral drum.

Run to the bedroom,
In the suitcase on the left
You'll find my favorite axe.
Don't look so frightened
This is just a passing phase,
One of my bad days.
Would you like to watch T.V.?
Or get between the sheets?
Or contemplate the silent freeway?
Would you like something to eat?
Would you like to learn to fly?
Would'ya?
Would you like to see me try?

Would you like to call the cops?
Do you think it's time I stopped?
Why are you running away?

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TV, Education and Protest

Now, I am not one to get involved in my community, or go to the movies, or watch the news. I rarely ever listen to the radio. What news I do keep up with I do online and even then it's always a bunch of stuff I don't care about. People say things to me like, "Its really important to be aware of what is going on in the world around you,it makes you a better person." It's so cliche and just makes my appendix hurt hearing stuff like that. I have seen the news and for that very reason I don't CARE what is going on in the world around me. People are killing each other, lying, cheating, stealing, using and abusing. I don't have to watch CNN to know that.

The motivation for this post was a discussion question that had to answer for one of my college classes. We were supposed to watch several network news shows and compare and contrast them, assess them for credibility and bias. Easy enough assignment but I don't watch TV. This is the actual text I wrote for my class below in responses to that discussion question.

would first like to point out my protest to this assignment due to the requirement of watching television. I do not watch television. I own a TV but it's up in storage gathering dust where it will remain for the remainder of my life and probably it's own. Ray Bradbury wrote Fahrenheit 451 in which books were outlawed and they burned them and had severe penalties for persons possessing books. This would be a very reasonable and rational thing to do with television. Ban them, burn them, and incarcerate anyone who is non-compliant.

I watch so little television that I was not even aware of the extent of the so-called news that was on. Every network had these feature shows that covered one topic or the other but basically it was that one topic for the whole show, it took 20 minutes of navigating the controls to find some plain old world news. I watched CNN for awhile, they covered preparation for a pandemic in America, Bush's new puppet press secretary (briefly), plans to bring tens of thousands of troops home from Iraq (I'll believe it when I see it), and a lengthy piece on the funding or lack of funding for a memorial for Flight 93 that crashed in Pennsylvania in 2001. There was some financial bill or the other that congress passed and they took money out of bush's requested budget for war operations and he promises to veto it (no surprise). We also had an analyst that said nothing Bush could do would lower gas prices, which of course doesn't affect me because not only do I not watch television I do not own or operate motor vehicles. Now I watched what I assume would be a comparative show on FOX, they covered the same stories, though they went on about immigration for awhile CNN barely mentioned it. They had the Mayor of New York City, Michael Bloomberg, making a statement about immigration in this country. Why a city mayor has anything to do with federal immigration laws is beyond me. I would venture a guess that none of these experts on immigration have been in South Texas in recent memory. Now this Snow guy, the new press puppet for Bush apparently was previously employed at FOX so that had a lengthy one on one interview with him. Fox seems to take a very conservative pro-Bush stand on things and this was reflected in the questions they asked and the questions they didn't ask of our esteemed white house press secretary. CNN seemed much more critical of everything, the current administration, the war in Iraq, immigration. I hope all this suffices for the completion of my assignment because I am not watching anymore television. I still think we should burn them all and put some books in the hands of these future leaders of America who are raised on 10 hours of television a day. And where were all these people that want to get tough on immigration when Pat Buchanan ran for president? On a positive note, I did run across Sesame Street on a Spanish channel and I was relieved to find out that Maria was still just Maria on the Spanish version.