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Resentment and helpless self-help
My last post was pretty dark. I promise this one won’t be nearly as dark, but it’s not going to be happy flavored either. It’s just another day that I need to let some stuff out. These days I feel like a soda can that has been dropped. I’ve let so much pressure build up, and I know that the only way to fix it is to pop the tab and let some of that pressure out, but I also know what happens when…
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FRIENDSHIP - Have a wonderful Sunday evening
God is a woman and she’s a cat.
Gave a description of myself to DALL-E and I’m not disappointed.
Some are just for fun
why are so many people like this? lmao
Some are wholesome
Some are based on therapy
Mental health and parenting
Mental health and parenting
My last post focused on the first time I tried to get help for my discombobulated brain. In this post I am going to talk about the first time someone else tried to get me help for my mental health, which ended up being far more harmful. When I got into middle school, things started getting difficult. that is a time in all of our development where we begin to move away from the bright colors and…
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My last post focused on the first time I tried to get help for my discombobulated brain. In this post I am going to talk about the first time someone else tried to get me help for my mental health, which ended up being far more harmful.
When I got into middle school, things started getting difficult. that is a time in all of our development where we begin to move away from the bright colors and ‘you can be anything you want to be!’ mentality, to starting to learn that we have limitations. When you think about it, it really is like hitting a brick wall. Academic subjects get more difficult, your fellow classmates begin developing their personalities, and puberty draws nearer whether you want it to or not.
I was a very shy kid in elementary school, and this didn’t change as I got older. In fact, I began to really dig into my own self mental isolation. Nothing seemed to make sense. I was terrible at school, and I was constantly fighting my internal demons about my gender identity, which I wouldn’t be able to put into words until decades later. I have mentioned before that I don’t come from a family that has any respect for mental health. The typical suck it up, I didn’t need help and I turned out fine approach that many adults, who, did not turn out fine, like to take. In fifth grade I was given a nickname from my parents that I would never shake, even the last time I spoke to them in my late twenties, they still referred to me as Grumpy. They called me this because they interpreted my shyness and awkwardness as just being, well, grumpy all the time. For Christmas I would get shirts, magnets, pictures, anything they could find bearing the likeness of Grumpy, from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs. Again, It’s not that I was grumpy, I was just in my own head 24/7, but even so, nobody ever bothered to ask why I might seem grumpy.
With the necessary backstory out of the way, let’s jump ahead to that same summer after my first year in college where I had tried to sneak into counseling to get some help. I think because I had been away for so long in college, my parents were even more aware of how quiet, sorry, ‘grumpy’ I was. Without consulting with me, my mom approached me one day and said,
“I made an appointment with the doctor, your dad is going to take you to figure out why you’re such a grump all the time”
I gave a lazily agitated “…ok” and before I knew it I was in the car on the way to see the doctor. I didn’t speak much with my dad on the way, the older I got the more awkward I felt around him. I remember feeling a mixture of relief and embarrassment. By this point in my life, I had a pretty good idea that my parents were lost causes when it came to getting help. I read between the lines of what my mom said, and what it felt like in my head was “You’re always an asshole, we’re going to see if a doctor can give you something.” So, I was embarrassed. I was relieved because this time, I was going to see a real doctor and not a religious nut masquerading as a counselor. Even though my parents intentions were not good, it seemed I had inadvertently caused them to get me some help.
We get to the doctor and when we head back to the exam room my dad did most of the talking. To his credit, he did try and talk about my struggles in school, but the main focus was ‘can you make them less grumpy?’ Much like my experience with the ‘counselor,’ whatever excitement I had quickly disappeared. The doctor opened some web page on his computer and read off a bunch of feelings.
“Do you feel sad a lot? Tired? Hopeless? Do you have negative thoughts?”
What am I in a Prozac commercial or something?
I answered ‘yes’ to all the questions he read off, and when he was done writing some stuff down, he handed me a prescription for Proza- dammit, I am in a Prozac commercial… He didn’t explain much beyond ‘You have depression.’
Just like that, the appointment is over and we’re on our way to the pharmacy. Still feeling embarrassed over the situation, and not being too thrilled that my doctor didn’t talk to me but rather asked a bunch of generic questions, I was excited to finally try something, anything that would make my head make sense. If you’re not familiar with Antidepressants, some take a few weeks to build up in your system and take effect. As we got closer to the end of the summer there was a pretty noticeable difference. I was a little more talkative, I didn’t have this constant awkward feeling in my brain, and I seemed to have a little more vibrance in my outlook. This felt like a huge step in the right direction so, happy ending! Right?
Summer ends and I head back to college. Nothing went any better for me academically or within my own major, but this time around I just didn’t care. I wasn’t really sad or down, but I happily didn’t care about anything. I would sleep through class and think ‘eh, better luck next time!’ I would fail an exam and forget about it within an hour. I pretty much hung out with friends and slept in a dorm but was skipping the rest of college. I remember hearing a joke about Prozac when I was younger where it was called Fuckidol, because it literally makes you go, ‘ah, fuck it’ when any problems arise. I didn’t realize at the time how badly this was affecting me, I was just super happy to finally be social and have friends. That part was great!
I want to be very clear here, I don’t in any way think Prozac, or any antidepressants are bad. They can be immensely helpful and have been huge positives later in my life. What was bad was being dragged to a doctor and put on a medication with no resources or insights as to how it would make me feel. It was literally ‘take these and you’re fixed!’
I came home for winter break and things picked up where they left off. I was being fun and social and the general vibe in my family was that I was finally ‘normal.’ Until one day…. From starting the medication until this point, every day wasn’t happiness and rainbows, I still had days where I was feeling down, just a lot fewer. My parents and I went out to get some groceries and I wasn’t feeling particularly talkative that day. I didn’t need to be there, so I was mostly just people watching and looking at random foodstuffs. Out of nowhere my mom turned to me and said,
“Are you going to have this attitude all day?”
It was like a kick in the stomach.
“I don’t have an attitude. I’m just not feeling very talkative.”
“Bull, you have been in a mood all day. What’s your problem? Did you not take your pills today? You’re being an asshole!”
I had no idea how to respond to that. Seething with rage, I knew it was best for me to just walk away. I made some laps around the store until they were done shopping and met them at the exit. My mom was now giving me the silent treatment, and after an awkwardly quiet fifteen-minute drive home, I went straight up to my room where I stayed to the next day. Luckily this was my last day at home before going back to school for spring semester.
I would normally leave to go back pretty early in the morning. As was typical of my mom, she acted like yesterday didn’t exist. We said our goodbyes and then off I went. My first stop was at our local gas station to fuel up for the drive and grab some snacks for the road. When I was all set to go, the last thing I did before pulling out of the parking lot was empty the bottle of Prozac into the trash can. I was convinced the only reason I was taking them was for my parents to not think I was an asshole, so, fuck ‘em.
So, no happy ending here, but I did learn some valuable lessons. The primary of which was to be extremely careful of anyone trying to get me help. I didn’t know how to differentiate between someone who wanted to help me, and someone who wanted to help me be more tolerable to them. I didn’t know it then, but what I needed more than anything was for someone to hear me out. I needed someone to help me work out what I couldn’t work out on my own, and not judge me, but believe me.
Thank you.
Mental health and parenting
Mental health and parenting
My last post focused on the first time I tried to get help for my discombobulated brain. In this post I am going to talk about the first time someone else tried to get me help for my mental health, which ended up being far more harmful. When I got into middle school, things started getting difficult. that is a time in all of our development where we begin to move away from the bright colors and…
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😳 <- this emoji but without the blush or romantic connotation. im not blushing im staring you directly in your fucking eyes
if you excuse the bad editing it would look like this
The first time I tried to get help for ADHD was awful
The first time I tried to get help for ADHD was awful
I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was twenty-seven. I’ve known what it was since I was young, but I never thought I had it because all my behaviors were explained away by the ‘adults’ as just being lazy. I knew other people legitimately had it, but me? I guess I was just lazy. I wrote in an earlier post about how I became a “very successful D student,” this was because despite being so lazy, I was…
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Full text to save you a click :)
I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was twenty-seven. I’ve known what it was since I was young, but I never thought I had it because all my behaviors were explained away by the ‘adults’ as just being lazy. I knew other people legitimately had it, but me? I guess I was just lazy. I wrote in an earlier post about how I became a “very successful D student,” this was because despite being so lazy, I was working exhaustively to barely maintain that D average. Things would only get worse despite my attempts to get organized. I still struggled to focus on one thing at a time and I was struggling on a whole new level in college.
Every day felt like a blur. My schedule was packed, I had a fairly work-intensive major that meant being busy Monday through Friday from 7AM to 10 PM. I never seemed to get the hang of it and just dragged myself through everything. There were some half-hearted attempts – I would print my schedule, try to use Google calendar, make lists, all that normal ‘organizational’ stuff. Nothing ever seemed to stick for more than a day, and I always ended up with random notes everywhere and a schedule posted from two months ago on the wall. I couldn’t settle my mind enough to focus on any one thing. I would be thinking about my schedule while making a note about what type of list I should use. I didn’t have a concept or process for one thing at a time. My brain defaulted to all or nothing, which one hundred percent of the time ended up with me being overwhelmed and finding anything else to distract me from how distracted I was. It was exhausting.
The first time I legitimately tried to get help, I took some bold steps but ended up landing flat on my face. I had just got home from my first full year of undergrad feeling demoralized and like I was destined to never figure out how to do school. I used Google to look for a counseling clinic in my area that was cheap enough that I could pay for a session out of pocket. I was on my parents’ insurance and our coverage was fantastic, but I couldn’t risk the humiliation of them seeing a counselor on their bill. My family was never big on mental health, and I was positive I would be met with the suck it up and get over it routine, while becoming the butt of even more of my families jokes for years to come. I found a small place about twenty minutes from my house and even braved a phone call to ask how much a consult would be. I don’t remember the exact figure but $70 feels about right. Cool.
I pulled up to the clinic and immediately started feeling both ashamed and sketched out.
Am I really about to walk in this place and say, hey! I don’t understand anything! help!
I couldn’t even put my finger on what it was I needed help with. I couldn’t just say “I suck at school!” and let them take it from there. First, what if they think I am just begging for drugs? Second, they will probably say ‘LOL yeah lots of people do, here’s your bill!’ I was so excited thinking I might finally get some help that I hadn’t taken the time to think about what help I needed. That was the shame, but I also said I was feeling sketched out. This is because I noticed that there were crosses on their building. wait, am I at a church? It didn’t look like a church, but it kind of felt like one. I guess there are a lot of Saint this-and-that hospitals, so maybe this is just a satellite campus…for a hospital…in what looks like an old house….Well, I’ve come this far, I won’t turn back now!
I took some deep breaths and gathered myself before getting out of my car. I get to the door, which has a ‘Please come in!’ sign, so I push it open and – ah fuck, it is a church. I was met in the hallway by the ‘counselor’ who was a woman in her mid-fifties. She looked like someone whose favorite pastime was yelling at cashiers for not having an extra penny. She was trying to appear warm and inviting, kind of like when the Trunchbull invited you to her office to see the chokey. She led me back to her office, well she called it an office, I would call it a living room with a computer desk. I rambled for a solid ten minutes about what I was seeking help for, which was really just word vomit dressed up like a stream of consciousness. She asked what I have tried so far, but when I was responding I could tell her eyes were blank. It made me think of my mom. Whenever I would try and talk to her, you could see it on her face that she was absolutely tuned out. It’s that look where you’re not even pretending to listen. When I had finished, she looked at me for a few moments and said,
“I see! I noticed you didn’t mention your relationship with God”
Now it was my turn to tune out. She kept talking but all I could do was sit there thinking what. the. fuck. is. this. shit? If religion and/or God is what helps you – that’s great! I have all the respect in the world for you! But in that moment, I was pissed. I was looking for legitimate mental health counseling, and this woman – from phone to table, had only one thing on her mind, and it was not about helping me.
I was nineteen when this happened and wouldn’t be brave enough to seek any form of therapy or counseling again until I was 27. I thought about if from time to time, sure, but I could never get the memory of that experience out of my head. There was one silver-lining though, she didn’t charge me the $70.
Thank you.
The first time I tried to get help for ADHD was awful
The first time I tried to get help for ADHD was awful
I was diagnosed with ADHD when I was twenty-seven. I’ve known what it was since I was young, but I never thought I had it because all my behaviors were explained away by the ‘adults’ as just being lazy. I knew other people legitimately had it, but me? I guess I was just lazy. I wrote in an earlier post about how I became a “very successful D student,” this was because despite being so lazy, I was…
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Obsessive Creativity
Ten years ago, I spent an entire summer capturing the beauty of sunsets through time-lapse videos. Admittedly, I’m using the term capturing very loosely here. The quality of my videos was not great to say the least. I used the built-in time-lapse function on my Sony Handycam and a shaky tripod that was held together by duct tape. While I was clearly no Spielberg, the memories of those nights…
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kitty
30-ish and Quitting: My Journey to Better Health
30-ish and Quitting: My Journey to Better Health
Throughout my twenties I always told myself it’s fine, just quit before you’re 30. I of course knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but that was a bridge I would cross when I got to it. Well, I got to it, and I turned right around and thought now just isn’t the right time. I have made a couple half-hearted attempts this year and made it two or three days, but once things got stressful, I would start…
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For anyone who doesn’t want to click the link :)
Throughout my twenties I always told myself it's fine, just quit before you're 30. I of course knew it wasn't going to be easy, but that was a bridge I would cross when I got to it. Well, I got to it, and I turned right around and thought now just isn't the right time.
I have made a couple half-hearted attempts this year and made it two or three days, but once things got stressful, I would start smoking like a chimney with the excuse 'I'm just not in a good enough place right now to handle this.' Like everything that is worth it in life, I needed to realize there is never a good time, and prolonging things only makes that never even harder.
It's a scary thing to quit. Nicotine withdrawal, aside, smoking has been a part of my life for nearly 18 years. I started in my young teens, doing my best to hide it, and became more open and careless about it when I got to college. Whenever I was worried, stressed, sad, or lonely, smoking was there. It was five minutes alone with my best worst friend. Five minutes to unplug and get away from everyone. Five minutes to just...be.
Of course I in no way want to glorify smoking with this post, but I won't get into all the unhealthy and dangerous side effects, because it's 2022 and everyone, smokers especially, are keenly aware of the dangers. Instead, I want to use this post to say goodbye to an old friend, a toxic (literally) friend.
I am now six days without a cigarette. I can't say that I feel amazing, but I do feel better. I know that the headaches and queasiness will fade in time. I think I read somewhere that once you get past the first two weeks, it gets much easier. I'm kind of excited for that. I am doing this completely cold-turkey because that is what's right for me. I don't have the attention span to sort through the best quitting aids, or the pro's and con's of this-and-that. For me, I work best through brute force when it comes to big changes. To quote a professor I interviewed with years ago for my masters program, I've got gumption. Still not entirely sure what that means, but I like it.
Sure, I am excited about the health benefits of quitting, and not going into the office smelling like an ash tray, but what I am most excited about is change. This is the last holdover of what I call my past life, three decades of self-destruction. It is going to be tough but worth it.
I may not have quit before I was 30, but I should know by now that deadlines aren't always my thing. Years from now I will be able to look back and say I quit when I was 30-ish, and be damn proud of it.
Thank you
30-ish and Quitting: My Journey to Better Health
30-ish and Quitting: My Journey to Better Health
Throughout my twenties I always told myself it’s fine, just quit before you’re 30. I of course knew it wasn’t going to be easy, but that was a bridge I would cross when I got to it. Well, I got to it, and I turned right around and thought now just isn’t the right time. I have made a couple half-hearted attempts this year and made it two or three days, but once things got stressful, I would start…
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