1. You are not alone.
2. You are not at fault.
3. Try to get your family member to go w/ you to your doctor or therapist (I know this is unlikely).
4. Try not to judge them as they judge you (this is perhaps the hardest thing to do).
5. Cut them off or at least minimize contact.
6. Tell yourself that you’re doing the best thing for yourself by distancing yourself from unsupportive family members.
7. Use “objective detached compassion.” Try reframing the relationship by understanding that they might think they are being blamed about your disorder (your family members probably feel threatened).
8. Understand that it’s your family’s problem, not yours.
9. Change the subject when your family gets critical.
10. Let your family know that you hear & understand what they’re saying, but that the choice of how to cope w/ your disorder is yours alone.
11. Kill them w/ kindness. Respond to criticism as though they said something positive.
12. You can choose to be content – you can’t control your family; you can only control yourself.
13. Make goals for yourself. As you meet those goals you’ll feel better about yourself.
14. Make a list of all the supportive friends in your life.
15. Have a support person w/ you if you decide to confront your family.
16. Living well is the best revenge.

Scuttling across the floors of silent seas

~T.S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock 

My last trip to the hospital humbled me. I even prayed at one point. I have decided not to experiment with medication anymore. I’ve had enough. I had hoped at one point that I could work my way through psychotic breaks with out medication. For some reason I thought it would fix me once and for all.

I’ve had to reconsider what recovery is for me. I once thought it meant without drugs and without symptoms. Maybe when I’m much older that will happen. Just not now. So what does recovery mean for me now? I think it means making some kind of contribution to society, with or without medication. I’ve only recently begun to feel well enough to volunteer. I’m hoping to volunteer at a food pantry regularly. I need the structure of a schedule. I’m also doing volunteer work for a drop-in center I used to work for and for a peer run support group I attend. I’m tie-dyeing t-shirts for the drop-in center to give out on Christmas. For the support group I’m selling members’ unwanted items on Craig’s List. I haven’t started either project yet. I guess I’ll start this weekend.

Part of recovery for me means having a routine. I’ve sort of set up a routine for myself, but it often gets disrupted. For instance I wanted to go to yoga class at the gym, but since I had trouble sleeping last night I overslept this morning and didn’t go. Volunteering or having a part-time job would help me establish a routine. A set time for going to bed and waking would help too.

Another component of recovery is a support group. I have that. I attend the peer support group and AA regularly. I have people I can call when I need help or just to socialize. I have a wonderful, supportive husband.

I’m learning in therapy how to tolerate distress. Instead of expecting no symptoms, I hope to minimize them instead. The medicine I take helps, but they certainly aren’t magic pills. My therapist has me practice mindfulness daily to control being overwhelmed by symptoms.

Pursuing my hobbies and interests promotes recovery. If I’m focused on making a piece of jewelry or writing a story or poem then I can’t focus on self destructive thoughts. Having hobbies gives me something to look forward to.   

I’m not sure which of these components of recovery helps the most. I think I need all of them. The lack of routine seems to be hurting me most right now, but I’m working on it. I need to call that food pantry about helping out. If they don’t need me, I’ll try elsewhere. Persistence is part of recovery, too.

I feel tremendous pressure to never go back to the hospital & am considering what I need to do to accomplish that. First thing I need to do is to be honest with myself. I often tell myself, “This is not mania.” when it clearly is. I guess it feels too good. I also lie to myself when I first begin to hear voices. Next time I’m calling my doctor or therapist right away. I will at least tell my husband. Which reminds me of the second thing: I’m going to have to learn to lean on my husband less & reach out more. My AA sponsor is also a therapist so I should use her more. I have plenty of close friends I could call. The third thing I need to do is put forth effort in therapy. I’m learning how to tolerate my emotions better with the type of therapy I’m in (DBT).

I need to ask my therapist if he thinks I have Borderline Personality Disorder because the hospital therapist told me I’m clearly not. I don’t want my therapist treating me for something I don’t have. If he thinks I’m BPD then I need to find a new one.

I think therapy will help me to handle my PTSD better so that it doesn’t trigger my bipolar symptoms so much. I feel as though I’ve been caught up in a vicious cycle of being triggered & then having an episode. I think my psychosis is really a bunch of twisted flashbacks. So if I get my PTSD under control I won’t have these psychotic episodes.

I’m very concerned that my disorder seems to be progressing. It’s scary & frustrating. Most bipolars get better with time & I can’t understand why I’m not. My regular psychiatrist has considered schizoaffective disorder as a diagnosis. Luckily, he ruled it out. There’s a pecking order among the mental illnesses & schizoaffective is definitely beneath bipolar disorder. BPD is even lower than schizoaffective. I’m sorry if it sounds harsh, but that is what I perceive.

I hope the DBT helps me. I’ve even prayed & I’m not a religious person. Anything to get better.

Like a rollin thunder chasing the wind

Forces pullin from the center of the earth again

I can feel it.

            ~Live Lightning Crashes 

It’s been awhile since I’ve posted. When I started this blog I was working & going to graduate school. Now I’m on disability & have dropped out of school. I’m not unhappy with this at all. I’ve gone back to the thing I love: metal work. I work mostly with sterling silver. I’ve made several pieces already & have several more planned. My friends & strangers keep telling me to sell my work, but I’m not proficient at it enough yet to feel comfortable parting with what I’ve made. Each piece is a step forward & I want to see my progress.

Another thing that happened was both my grandparents died. They were married over seventy years. The memorial service was surreal & very stressful. A man who molested me over a period of five years while I was growing up was at the service. My mother had invited him. She has this twisted fantasy that it’s all a misunderstanding & someday I’ll be close with him. I froze at the service when I saw him. I let him hug me. I couldn’t do or feel anything at the time. In the days after I judged myself very harshly & ended up in the psych ward of the local hospital. So much for all the EMDR therapy I went though. I changed therapists. I hope one day to have no reaction to this man & to feel at peace with what happened so many years ago.

In other ways my parents show love & tenderness towards me. So I know they love me. There is either something going on between my parents & this man or something happened to my parents in the past that makes them unable to process what I’ve been telling them. I just want to accept the situation because there is nothing I can do to change it.

In spite of my misgivings I’ve been working on jewelry for my mother. The pieces have stones that my great-grandfather cut & polished. It gives me a sense of connectedness to make these pieces. My mother will wear jewelry with stones her grandfather made in settings made by her daughter. I’m making some jewelry for my cousins as well.

It’s not the cutting or soldering that’s hard when I make these pieces. It’s setting the stones. It’s a lot harder than it looks. I have to worry about wrinkling the silver that holds the stone in place. After I finish, I think about my grandmother, her father, & my mother. I wonder about what I don’t know that made them how they were or - in my mother’s case – are.

On a previous posting I said I was tired of hiding. Now that I’m not afraid anymore I can tell you my name is Jody. Vrba is the name of a man who escaped a Nazi concentration camp & lived to tell the world about it.

Jumper                                                Third Eye Blind

I ended up in the hospital for the second time in as many months. I made the decision to medically withdraw from graduate school. I may go back next year or I may not. It’s too soon to tell. I’m not even stabilized yet. There’s one good thing that came out of this: I signed up for a course in metalsmithing (metal fabrication) at a local art center. I start on January 10^th. I ‘ve already pulled out all my tools, stones, & sketches. There’s only one thing that is bothering me. My hands shake whenever I do fine motor movements like writing or stringing beads. I haven’t done much beadwork, except at the drop-in center for the mentally ill where I volunteer once a week. Another positive thing: I’m more open – especially about the bipolar disorder now that I don’t have to put up a front at school & at my internship. There’s a local peer-run support group that has a discussion board component & I post all the time now about the details of my daily life. It’s a member’s only board, but I have my full name on it & I’m honest about what’s going on. I feel much more relaxed & less guarded. In return I’ve received a lot of support I wouldn’t have otherwise received. I’ve made several new friends too. I show up once a week at meetings; it has really helped me process a lot of stuff & get support. I’m glad I have these two gifts from what I thought was ruin.

I have decided to apply for a medical withdrawal from graduate school and not go back for at least a year – if ever. A few of my instructors are disappointed. I guess I am a little bit disappointed also because I have really good grades (4.0) and belong to two honor societies. Mostly, however, I am relieved. I just can’t deal with school right now.

I’m tired of being in the closet about this disorder sometimes. I know I’m not all about my diagnosis, but it feels that way sometimes. I like being open with people, but I’m really hung up about the mental illness stigma.

I’m glad parity passed. Maybe things are changing to the point where I don’t have to feel like I have to hide anymore.

            I’m having trouble setting boundaries. I’ve had this problem before. There should be an alarm that goes off inside me in response to certain situations, but it doesn’t – at least not in the beginning when it would be easiest to set limits. So the other party doesn’t get the signal to stop and they keep pushing.  After some gross trespass something inside me finally snaps and I become anxious and then later I become enraged.

            I have been through therapy but have not been able to fix this. I don’t know how to fix it. I can’t expect other people and organizations to demonstrate acceptable boundaries unless I teach them what those boundaries are. I haven’t figured out how to catch problems in the beginning.

            To be fair, I did try to set some limits with the organization and person I’m having trouble with right now. I just wasn’t effective I guess. I’m so angry right now and I expect the situation to get worse. I wish I could go into more detail.

            I told my therapist about my problem and she demonized the organization. This doesn’t help me. Sure, the other party is out of line, but I have trouble setting limits and recognizing when someone is being inappropriate. That is what needs to be addressed.

            People with long standing PTSD have troubles with interpersonal boundaries like I’m having. I think it’s because they aren’t taught proper boundaries when they are young. It’s not second nature to them like it is for regular people. I have improved at setting boundaries. The situations I used to get into years ago were much worse than the one I’m in today.

            I’m not blaming myself. I keep thinking, what excuse does the executive director of the organization I’m having trouble with have? I did try to set some limits earlier, so this is not entirely my fault. There is another organization I volunteer for and I have been able to set limits with them and so far they are respecting them. But there have been other times speaking up hasn’t worked and most of my anxiety today comes from not knowing how my present situation will turn out.

            I wish I could be more specific, but I think it’s a bad idea to name names or go into too much detail. The specific situation doesn’t matter as much as the overall pattern.

Pepper ~ Butthole Surfers

There’s a certain channel on my satellite radio that should be called, “All angst, all the time.” It’s 90’s grunge music and I insist on listening to it even though it makes me think self-destructively. I should listen to the vacuous electronica station instead, but it annoys me these days.

Part of the reason I am down is because of the weather. It was raining and overcast for a week. No wonder grunge music originated from
Seattle; it rains all the time there. I wasn’t the only one to react depressively to the weather. Many people I know did as well. I think numerous studies have established the relationship between mood and weather. I could look into them, but I’m not motivated.

Another factor affecting my mood has to do with being triggered a lot lately. The triggers are coming from my 12 step meetings because of what people share. It should be a safe place and usually I feel perfectly comfortable, but not lately.

I went to a 12 step text study this past weekend and found fault with the text. Everyone venerated what was written, as if it were divine. The problem I had most was that after telling readers to develop their own conception of a higher power, it proceeds to tell the reader what that conception should be. Which is it? A chapter of the text was written by an atheist, so the event organizers refused to cover it. Finally, the text says it is a suggestion on how to stop drinking, but the organizer said, “It’s not a suggestion. These are musts.” He also stated people who don’t get “the program” will either die drunk or commit suicide. 

For a few hours it made me wonder if I had a better “program” than I wouldn’t be feeling depressed. Maybe that was what my illness was – “a bad program.” I discussed this with my friend who came to the event with me. She said it was nonsense. The old Buddhist proverb came to mind about how a rigid branch will break easily, but a yielding one will not.

The sun is finally out. The clouds have passed – at least for now. 

Seems like I’m a brand new man
Than when the day began
Seems like brand new I’m gonna be
When the day is through with me

I’m changing, changing, changing
Rearranging and I’m acting strange
Seems no matter what you do,
Life got a way of turning around on you. What’s your version ~ Groove Armada 

I picked this Groove Armada song because it is a piece of heaven. I traded a bunch of old CDs to get a hold of it after hearing it on Sirius’ Chill channel. All of the song lyrics that I pick to start each blog I choose because of their melody. Writing down the lyrics makes the song play in my head. Perhaps it’s pretentious to open with song lyrics, but it keeps me focused on a theme. My attention shifts constantly – so many things interest me. I have a fairly strong identity; I just like to take in as much information as possible before I decide to act. Of course, I’m referring to when my mood is baseline and not when I am manic. I’m trying to post every Sunday, but I doubt I will achieve this. Today I was supposed to be working on developing training materials for an agency, but it’s obviously not getting done. Earlier I went shopping – for Christmas presents. Here in
Florida you buy clothes at the end of summer because they are on sale and you can wear them all year around. I didn’t really have the money, but I have to spread Christmas spending over several months.

I belong to a local peer run support group that has an online discussion board component. The other day I noticed there was a list of famous people who supposedly have – or had – Bipolar Disorder. These sorts of lists annoy me for several reasons.  Many of the people on the list are artists. Artists are notoriously aware of the extremes of emotion that many people feel and express it. That doesn’t make them bipolar. A lot of the artists and authors on the list are dead and have been diagnosed post-mortem. Need I say more about that? 

I am reading The Soloist and I think that has made me more sensitive about this subject. The book affects me deeply and I identify with it. My own life went horribly off track mostly because of my illness and I am bitter sometimes. I keep thinking I should’ve been able to get my act together to go study under a particular metalsmith in Iowa and go on to Cranbrook in
Michigan to get an MFA.  

Part of the reason I wound up studying Social Work at my local university is because I wanted to do for others what wasn’t done for me and what was done for the cellist in The Soloist by the news columnist. I needed a case manager! People at the drop-in center where I worked supposedly have case managers, but they are lucky to see them once every six months.          
Florida ranks 48^th in spending on mental health services, but I’m not sure spending even matters. In New York – a state that spends much more than
Florida – a woman who was committed to a psych hospital died after waiting over 24 hours for a bed. People in my peer run support group have waited over thirty hours for a bed. Last year one patient killed another at a local psych unit.  

I can’t wait to graduate. I’m going to take a short term special topics metals class at either Arrowmont school in Tennessee or Penland school in
North Carolina. Then I’m going to find work so I can afford to rent studio space to do metal work on my days off. In fact I’m going to polish a pendant I made several years ago and never finished this afternoon. I’m going to get my life back and pray for a revolution.