Okay I'm back for real this time. :)
Here we go for a hell of an update.
I'm going to split this up into two categories; my mental health, and my professional work.
To start of this year, things were really good. But December, it was a whole different story.
In the approaching weeks and months, things were going quite well, not smoothly, but I was gaining new skills with my psychologist such as modifying my behaviour from negative ones to positive one (will make a follow up post on that!). My moods were still pretty crazy and I was forever chasing highs, in denial that lows would ever come. But they did, and they went, and they came again, and so on.
At the start of December I took a trip to the psychiatrists and had yet another increase in my epilim chrono (depakote/valproic acid/sodium valproate). I told her, like I had every other time, that an increase in my medication would cause a huge depressive episode. I was right, again. The preventative measures and damage control that me and my psychologist planned out for me was working well, as I dragged my sorry ass through hell backwards.
It was god damn tough. And there were two trips to the emergency room.
But I persistent forward, often drunk.
I threw my boyfriend a kick ass birthday party. It was great and I got really, really drunk.
I woke up in a pool of vomit with my eyes rolling around and not being able to keep them in focus. Everything felt like it was moving, and I was slurring my words like crazy. It didn't feel much like being drunk (even though it sounds like it) so this was my first tip off that something was up. I then went up the stairs up to my room and there was empty packets of medication there; I knew it was time to go to the hospital. I didn't even want to die (in a 100% kind of way), but drunken me had royally fucked me over.
So off I went to the emergency room, again.
Goddammit, too many times in one year.
Everything went well, and I'm still in good health. The hospital experience was fine. The food was gross. I felt fucked up and nauseous but I just lay there as you do. The psychiatric nurse however upset me. I eventually had to walk out of the interview room because it was just too upsetting to sit in there. But such things can happened when you're in crisis.
I went back to my hospital bed and I was then told I was discharged. I asked the nurse if it was okay if I were to just lay down and cry for a few minutes. She said it was okay. But she also knelt down besides my bed and told me about her experiences with depression and her brothers experiences. There was such warmth and compassion coming from her, she even made smile.
I was just one of those moments where you know you will never forget that person. It was a very meaningful thing to me.
The following few days I was visited by the home-based crisis team.
On the first visit, there was one nice nurse, who was very sweet, and a mean social worker.
The nurse was very delicate with talking to me and made the effort to validate my experiences.
The social worker told me that I am not trying hard enough, that I need to work for this and that I am dis-empowering myself. I hurt, it hurt so much, I started to tear up. And I cried. But because it was the truth. I needed a kick up the ass and she gave it to me.
Behaviour is where every progress is made and I was putting all of my recovery into other peoples hands; my psychiatrist, my psychologists, my medication, even my boyfriend, but I had forgotten something someone had once told me.
"You can't rely on other people to save you, you have to be your own hero".
And that is so true. I am part of my healthcare team too.
So I tried harder from that day, from that moment on.
My psychologist asked me, how do I know that you wont do anything dangerous again? And I told her something that that mean assed social work had told me,
"No matter how bad it is, no matter how bad, there is always a choice."
I suppose it was a revelation. I'm not saying that this is the revelation that everyone needs to have, because I know that everyone needs something different, but this is what I needed, and life has been a good deal easier since (though the medication helps too!)
My professional work: (nursing studies btw!)
So things have been going really well in college too. And now that I'm finally out of my Winter slow phase (ugh, Winter), I'm feeling prepared and excited about the year ahead of me.
I'm just finishing up probably the most amazing assignment I've ever done, and I stabilized a high mood with good ol' Seroquel just in time to start my work experience/placement, at a long-stay psychiatric unit.
My first day was yesterday, and on the bus there, I was so nervous, yet excited.
From the moment I stepped in there, I knew this was a good place to complete my work experience.
I get on really well with a lot of the residents.
I don't really feel it would be right to discuss the details on here, but essentially the place is like a big family, and the building is more homely than clinical. It's a very positive environment.
I noticed immediately, that I have a nursing style. Which is a totally new concept to me. It's like I can feel my working personality come to life and it already knows how to handle things. Because of my own experience with mental illness, I feel a connection, or an automatic understanding, of many of the residents there. And because I have spent countless hours talking to friends when they are going through things that vary from a little down to absolute shoot-me-now kinda hell, having friends with many types of mental health issues, and my own issues and recovery, if feel like I was highly equipped heading in that door, and I sincerely believe, or hope that I brightened at least one persons day.
As for the residents themselves, they are all superb people. There's characters and sweethearts and kind spoken individuals.
I did make one mistake though. I was nervous so I drank coffee. Which made me more nervous. And at one point it definitely affected my work and my interaction with one of the residents there. I'm worried it made her anxious, it felt like one of those situations where you feed off each other's anxiety and you both end up in a wobbly mess. Anxiety, godammit you suck.
I felt really bad that I brought my own mental health problems with me to work. But next week I plan to make it up to the resident by apologising and offering to go for a walk with her or to the library to look at books.
I got called 'nurse' all day by most of the residents, which was a delightfully surreal experience. I honestly didn't feel much like a nurse, but it was such a great thing to hear.
And so it was the best 'first day' of my life. I can't wait to go back and I honestly miss them already.
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