I am watching so many Brits now I’m picking up British slang. When I say, “Taking a piss” (kind of meaning “pulling your leg”) you can worry about my up and moving to the UK. (Nevahhh!)
Tristan’s Birthday
Today is my first baby’s 40th birthday. It’s just shocking how fast time flies. He was just put in my arms a minute ago. I love my boy so very much!
“Operator”
I’m working on a post that is now interminably long called “Operator” which is based on the Jim Croce song. I like it a lot, but it’s more intricate than I expected. Who knew that word could lead down so many rabbit holes?
The Clock
The fucking clock continues annoying me endlessly. The blue numbers are often in licking blue flames, jumping out of the clock’s face. I wish I were an animator so I could animate what I see. It’s frustrating I can’t show you all this dancing and flashing, the numbers with a life of their own.
I can’t help wondering why it is the clock that’s tormenting me. Am I not in the moment enough? Do I need to watch my time more closely? What’s going to happen when NaNoWriMo starts in 12 days? Will I really be “against the clock” then?
Hallucinations
I have mild hallucinations elsewhere. (Can hallucinations be considered “mild?”) I continue being in a deliciously energetic place, so can only assume it is the high end of hypomania. I am sleeping more, so that’s good, but I am continuing to be somewhat impulsive and weird. Work is benefiting greatly from my productivity, so there is that.
Oncology Report
My labs at the hematologist/oncologist were relatively good. My doctor was shocked at my 70 pound weight loss. I keep being asked if I had a gastric bypass. “Yes. In 2001.” They ask, “A revision?” Nope. I just quit eating Uber Eats and all processed foods. 70 pounds in 5.5 months without starving or denying myself food is pretty damn good. I am proud of myself!
I do need an iron infusion, but that’s no big deal. I’ll have that done next week. Then I don’t see her until the end of December. Wheeee!
My Iron Infusion IV… pic from my vantage point.
Scrivener
Off to Scrivener to do some NaNo prep. It’s rushing closer and closer!
NNWM = NaNoWriMo – a few of the projects I need to do for November.
Sometimes when I don’t think there can be anything weirder than what I’ve seen, smelled, felt, new things materialize.
No sooner did I tell my psych yesterday I was not having Auditory Hallucinations, they pay me a visit.
Today’s Fun
I could smell the inside of my Flipper lunchbox from first grade all day long. It was there, then gone, sometimes there for half an hour, sometimes a flash. Olfactory hallucinations are odd because I would swear the item/scent was right under my nose. It isn’t a memory thing, it’s a real scent. Like lunchbox perfume. No idea what brought that to the forefront. I have not been thinking about first grade or lunch. I didn’t even know I still had that scent-memory!
My clock numbers have become floating 3-D. They float out of the clock mechanism and glow a beautiful blue. They are usually red.
I am trying to think of the name for the blue. Azure.
I had to keep YouTube off today because Steely Dan’s Aja was playing around the room. I did just watch a documentary about the making of Aja, but I didn’t expect my mind to bring the studio into my room. If I closed my eyes, I could hear the speakers in the corners near the ceiling and one floating speaker in a horseshoe around my head that followed me around the house. I had no headphones on. Aja was not on anywhere, TV or stereo, Alexa or radio. Yet, it was as if I was engulfed in the music. You would think I would love a studio surrounding me, but it was disconcerting after awhile. I put my headphones on, trying to play some Queen, but Steely Dan would have none of that. I surrendered and put Aja on and that made a Steely Dan cacophony for a few minutes, but I concentrated on what I had in my ears and the other music faded eventually. If I put anything on but Aja, the music came back. Loud. Insistent bitch, that Aja. That one album has been playing for 18 hours now, headphones on or off. Good thing I love it.
The visual ants seem to be fading, thank goodness. They have not been replaced with other insects, so I’m happy about that. I still feel them crawling on me, but at least when I look where I feel them, I don’t see them too often. I hate things crawling on me, so am way glad to see the ants fade into nothingness.
That’s pretty much been my day. I tried to meditate and/or nap, but Aja could not take a breath with me and I just laid there singing “Black Cow.”
The last 2 weeks have sucked even worse than when I wrote on July 13, 2017. Tears. Tears. Never-ending tears. The suicidal ideation is coming more often and is more vivid than when I started the Paxil. And the damn hallucinations are back.
sigh
Almost all of my time is in bed, either curled in pain (another post), staring at the ceiling or sleeping. I leave I Love Lucy on in the background. Sometimes Friends. I’m listening to Mists of Avalon (a book I love), but when I listen in bed, I fall right to sleep. I’ve replayed Chapter 6 four times already.
artist: Edvard Munch
An Odd Sorta Depression
When looking for images about depression lying, I came across several pieces like this one below:
Not sure if I’m just more familiar with my depression than when I was younger or if it has really shifted, but I do not hear the lies the girl in the image does… nothing negative about my body, how alone I am in the world, how fat/ugly/sick I am. I did when I was younger, but not anymore.
I just feel sad. An overwhelming sadness. A pall of melancholia that separates me from the rest of you. I cannot even touch what I am sad about except for the endless distress I have about our country because of 45. But this joylessness is deeper than the fear-for-our-lives kind. I feel like I’m under the thick glass of my Nana’s cake pedestal, so close to others, but unable to penetrate the barrier of dreariness to make a connection.
Medication Changes
The psych doc upped the Paxil to 30mg after 2 weeks on 20mg. He said he still might have to increase it when I see him in 2 weeks. For fuck’s sake, can’t this stuff take effect already? I hate this waiting part.
I have weaned off the Cymbalta. Is that the reason for this huge dip? Who knows anymore. He wanted to increase my Risperdal, but I refused; the eating is out of control with more Risperdal… can’t abide by that.
An aside: I despise the new packaging that seems to be taking over the medication world. I am not stupid, can follow directions, but they are incredibly difficult for me to get into. I’ve asked the Pharmacy to open them for me and then I rip the inner blister pack out, throwing the outer box away. If you haven’t see them, let me introduce you.
“Follow these 3 simple steps,” it says. Push the blister pack all the way in, then press on the “lock release button” on the left . Finally, pull the sliding pack out at the same time as pushing the spot on the left. I wish it was as easy as they make it sound! It’s almost worse that rubbing my head and patting my belly at the same time.
Suicidal Ideation
I’ve had lots of suicidal thoughts. A friend stayed with me one night when they were especially bad, reminding me every few minutes that Depression is a Liar. Hearing that, knowing it for certain, is what kept (keeps) me going. Hearing that so-and-so loves me doesn’t do much for my mindset because I rationalize that away easily. Depression Lies, however, works wonders.
The thoughts of suicide are so enticing. They call to me seductively as if they were sirens on the ocean’s rocks.
“A suicidal person may not ask for help, but that doesn’t mean that help isn’t wanted. People who take their lives don’t want to die—they just want to stop hurting.”
When I had my first serious clinical depression in my late teens, I didn’t understand the “wanting the pain to stop” aspect and teetered really close to the edge of death.
As I got older and had some decent therapy, I was able to verbalize the inner turmoil and excruciating emotional pain that was drawing me towards dying. Understanding that I didn’t really want to die, but just to stop hurting… a pain that went so deep as to injure my soul… I was able to cling to those brief seconds of “medication will help remove the pain… hang on a little bit longer.”
Medication and therapy have not failed me yet.
Working/Not Working
Work has been nearly impossible the way I feel. I can do one call, then need 2 hours off to regroup. The calls are easy, mostly with regulars, but the energy expenditure exhausts me. Even writing this post has taken 4 days so far. Ugh. I need to be able to work!
Okay, I need to get this out to you all. It is not a cry for help, I promise. I will not hurt myself, have no plans to. It’s just those random thoughts that flow through my mind… sometimes like heavy cinder blocks and others like wafting vapors. As long as they continue moving on the conveyor belt, I think I’m okay and headed towards healing.
So much crap in the news… you can look for yourself if you want to… but I have to quit watching and reading the news lest I end up in the Psych Hospital. I knew I was watching/reading a little bit more each day, but today I watched the clock, too, and stopped counting at 6 hours. Of news.
My hallucinations have gotten really bad, they are almost constant. And I have felt increasingly depressed. In fact, for a few days, I have wondered if I should take myself to the hospital because of the suicidal ideation that’s been flashing through my mind… way too often.
I know it is all a direct result of the pain of watching what is happening here in the United States, in the Americas, in the world.
I wish I could do something.
Right now, my something to do is save my own life.
I closed my Facebook tonight (it is always on my desktop), took everything political off my Tumblr page (including unsubbing from anything political) and am putting myself on a News Blackout.
Navelgazing Writer 