Skip to main content

Just Like Clockwork : Back in the Mire

In 1998 it was bi-polar type II. In 2012 it was Major Depressive Disorder with Anxiety. Now in 2024 it's bi-polar type III (which I didn't even know existed). Is this a cycle thing? A result of supressing the whole COVID thing? Left over hormonal menopause issue? How did I end up here again---off work---depressed and anxious, in the ER---weighing my options between swallowing a million pills or carving up my wrists in the tub.
I don't want to be like this. Which turns into I don't want to be. It's a scary shit show and every place I seek help is throwing darts at a possible medicinal solution to get me back to my overperforming, perfectionist, self back on the stage at the front of a classroom. "You can't expect medicine to solve it all!" Yeah, I can hear you thinking that. I've been in therapy for six months now---as often as once a week and am currently juggling two therapists as I try something new. I used to know this stuff. I regularly advocate for this stuff. I TEACH this stuff in my classes for crying out loud. But now the words, the ideas, the strategies, I can't access them. They don't live in my brain any more. I have spent the last few days reviewing posts from my blog, from so long ago and hear the voice of stranger. Sure she sounds like she's got some stuff going on, but her words talk about meditation, reslience, connection, community and I can't find myself in there. It's eerie to read your own words and not be able to find a place inside you where they sound true. It all sounds like propaganda, some new age hype crap that pops up on your Insta.
When I look around me, all I see on this go-round is people doing things, lots of things, creative things, hard labour, intellectual things, all while seeming fine. They do "all the things" and also travel to exotic places, go camping up north, attend professioal development events in other provinces and smile while cooking summer feasts in the backyard. Sure, you're thinking everyone only posts the good stuff. Stop comparing! But my front window reveals people washing their cars, using elaborate garden gadgets to trim and tidy, walkers with ear buds, families with strollers and dogs. Everyone seems normal, which makes me feel even worse. How is it no one is running through the streets screaming about how life is painful and short and messy and you could die any minute or live in pain and misery for too long? How is everyone tolerating how broken the medical system is---overloaded and sinking----no lifeboats anywhere. Everyone I know is telling me to be patient, observe and don't get attached to feelings, find the flow and they promise with every ounce of their being that it will get better and that I have been here before and got out of it. So I have to trust them. Because I certainly don't trust myself.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's All About the Here and Now

Today is a good day.   I have positioned my laptop on the dining room table in a way so that I can see the bird feeders.  Even through the closed doors I can hear the unique  warble of the yellow finches that have recently begun to frequent my yard.   This morning, cardinals-- the male brilliant in his scarlet coat and black mask -- returned, and as I watched, the male flew back and forth from the sunflower seeds to feed his mate .    Watching the birds gives me great joy and so I am trying to take the time to do this each day.  Were it not for this blog and how it makes me sit down and think, I can't say I would sit still long enough to do this. Taking time for myself is still a foreign concept. It is ironic that I have tried to attract birds to our pet free, quiet yard for years and the first year we have two dogs (one a squirrel/bird chasing terrier who launches hers...
2 comments
There is more good stuff--keep reading»

Keeping Afloat in Darkness - When Robin Williams is Gone

A few weeks ago Robin Williams was everywhere you looked. People were desperate for details; to find the one thing that assured them that his situation was so different from theirs that they are safe; that it could never be them. But if you suffer from depression, the suicide of such a brilliant, successful, individual; part of our lives for so many years and responsible for so many laughs; looks like a leak in your boat. A friend asked me, "Ok but no one knows what the future holds.  Could he not see that?" For someone drowning in the dark spiral of depression, there is no future. There is only now. There is only nothing.  The boat is gone.  You are under. It is not about your spouse or your friends or your kids or career or fans or dogs or anything.  When the darkness squeezes it is all about now.  And now is nothing.  It is bleak and empty and so dark, you cannot see a bottom, or edges or surface ---just darkness. "Some...
4 comments
There is more good stuff--keep reading»

Emotional Echos - Moments in Time

here are moments in time that define you. They are etched in your memory in a way that if you close your eyes you can see them again; feel them again. They are an emotional echo ---so strong, they leave an imprint on your soul. When I was eleven, my favorite "uncle" died suddenly, in my house, while I was off at the grandparents. He and my "aunt" came to town for a week long visit after moving away one year earlier and my parents decided to throw a grand party and invite all their old friends. My sister and I were sent to the grandparents for the weekend, and I was promised the week after we could come home and I could have "Uncle Bill" all to myself! I learned much later that early Sunday morning, my "aunt" woke up when my uncle accused her of stealing the covers. They both rolled back over and went back to sleep. Between then and 10 AM when she work up again, he had experienced a cardiac event (not his first I am sad to say) i...
Post a Comment
There is more good stuff--keep reading»