Bipolarblog.org

1) A Brilliant Madness: Living with Manic Depressive Illness , by Patty Duke Astin
2) Darkness Visible, by William Styron
3) An Unquiet Mind: A Memoir of Moods and Madness, by Kay Redfield Jamison
4) Manic: A Memoir , by Terri Chaney
5) The Bell Jar, by Sylvia Plath
6) The Awakening, by Kate Chopin

I’m having what I’d maybe call an identity crisis because I no longer have a career.  I’m pretty sure I’ve given up teaching for good–I just can’t handle the pressure or the workload.  Spending my nights and weekends grading papers and being dependent on what a bunch of teenagers are willing to do just doesn’t work for me anymore.  I grew up in a family where if I stayed home from school sick I was called a “malingerer”, and was told repeatedly “_____________(my family name) aren’t quitters”.  Now, I’ve quit five jobs in two years, and I’m still trying to figure out what to do with my life.

My most recent experience of being driven to panic attacks after someone busted my windshield (in all likelihood a student who was failing my class) convinced me that I no longer want to teach.  I had never before experienced performance anxiety, but when it came it came hard.  All my education, training, and experience is in teaching, so what am I going to do now?  How can I explain why I happen to live in this small town (which I moved to for a job that I quit because I couldn’t handle the pressure)?  We don’t have the financial reserves for me to be a stay-at-home mom, and I’m not sure that I’d want to be anyway.  After putting my dad through grad school, my mom was more or less a housewife, and I never wanted that for my life.  I need to bring home a paycheck–it’s part of the way I measure my self esteem.  A therapist told me that if we all evaluated ourselves (as I do) based on how productive we are, we’d all learn to hate ourselves since we all must retire someday.  Again, how does an idea like this help me change the way I feel about my own career and my seeming inability to stay stable enough to stay in a job?

When I took my last job, I was only taking 40 mg of Geodon (NOTE: no antidepressant), and I was flying–I was happy and felt like I could do anything, and–moving 8 hours from the locale of our foreclosed home and our pending bankruptcy made me feel like I’d escaped.  Now–even on shitloads more medication–I have serious doubt about my ability to remain stable long enough to withstand the stress of a new job.  My husband encourages me to stay home, keep working with him, and not to worry about it right now, but again–who the hell am I if not a teacher?  What am I worth if I’m not making any money?  Sure, therapy might attempt to help me work through these issues, but I’m looking at years of belief based on my father’s messages to me and my own messages to myself, not to mention society’s messages.  You are what you do, no? 

“There’s nothing of any importance in life–except how well you do your work. Nothing. Only that. Whatever else you are, will come from that. It’s the only measure of human value” (from Atlas Shrugged, Rand 98)]

I’m trying to lose some weight, and one of the good things about Geodon is that at this high dosage, it decreases my appetite.  I would imagine that people who struggle to keep on weight would have to be careful with this medicine for that reason.  I wish I could just take a pill that would fill my stomach, because I hate eating.  Nothing sounds good or tastes good, except for sweets.  I’ve always struggled with my weight–staying anywhere between 10 and 25 pounds overweight, so even though my smaller jeans are fitting just right, I’m still not happy with what the scale says (or with my post-two pregnancies stomach).  I know that I’ll never get the body I’d like just from dieting alone, but I don’t have much energy or desire to exercise.  Even at lower doses, I’ve been able to keep weight off while on Geodon, compared to some other meds.  (See below).

Lithium–the worst! Gained 30 pounds in three months, was told by a psychiatrist, “The lithium isn’t putting the food in your mouth.”  (Maybe not, but it made me feel so hungry, I had to eat all the time).  LIthium also made me feel totally flat–as if I had no emotional response to anything.  Yuck.

Zoloft–moderate weight gain and also the sexual side effect of low libido and difficulty climaxing. Great.

Neurontin (or Gabapentin)–gained 25 pounds over the course of about 6 months.  George W. Bush got reelected around the same time–so I always joked that this was the reason for my depression.

On some meds there have been times where I’ve felt like my stomach just won’t fill up, no matter how much I eat (although I don’t try continuing to eat to try to solve the problem).  I get extremely bitchy when I don’t eat, and I’ve noticed with Geodon, I don’t really get like that either.  I’m trying to lose 10 pounds, but the scale isn’t budging.  Maybe there’s such a thing as a set weight, and my body doesn’t want to get off of it. 

My insurance company (which is actually through COBRA–just another one of my worries) won’t pay for phone sessions with my old therapist, so I’m looking for a local one. I called a couple and two of their numbers were out of service, and left a message for the third one. No word back today.

What I hate about every therapist I’ve ever been to is that they never tell me anything I don’t already know.
“All you can do is your best”, my most recent therapist said to me.
“My best isn’t good enough,” I replied.
“Did you hear what you just said? You said your best isn’t good enough!” she laughed in incredulity.
“Yeah, I heard what I said. My best isn’t good enough.”

“You’re too hard on yourself.” How many times have I heard that?

“It can take years to change your beliefs. Some beliefs cannot be changed,” said a psychiatrist to me recently. “Like if I tried to convince you to change your religion–you probably wouldn’t–maybe even couldn’t do it, right?” Right. So what makes me think that talking every week to someone who doesn’t know me is going to somehow help me. Therapists that I’ve seen have varied from blaming my parents for my problems (which never makes me feel any better, honestly) to recommending workbooks, to telling me I need to take more time to myself–none of it has helped. Time to myself? What would that look like? When I spend time alone, all I do is worry about my future. I have no money to take a yoga or pilates class. I feel guilty spending time away from my kids. With me not working at home with my husband now, I berate myself over quitting my job. Time to myself is the worst.

Increased the Geodon to 160 around March 1st, started the Parnate on January 9th. I’m trying not to be dependent on the Atavan so I just take it when I’m feeling really anxious, or when I wake up in the middle of the night and can’t fall back asleep.

This seems to be a fairly decent medication regimen for me. Haven’t felt manic really since I started it, and the Parnate definitely helps with suicidal thoughts.

One morning I woke up and felt like I’d been sleeping for years. Suddenly everything seemed clear to me, and I wondered how I’d been functioning for the past few months (had I been functioning?)

We drove south for a ballroom party celebrating my neice’s 18th birthday (debut), and I felt like the whole crowd was watching me–even when their backs were turned–aware of what I was doing, what I wasn’t doing (dancing), and all I could do was follow my son around to make sure he didn’t slip outside. He was the life of the party–hip hop dancing, spinning on his knee–luckily my kids aren’t as neurotic as I. Part of my sense of alienation might have stemmed from the fact that everyone in the debut party was wearing red, and we–who didn’t know till we arrived that we were part of the party–were wearing green. Whatever…I was psychotic.

The next day was a barbecue, and I felt the same kind of paranoia and buzzing in my head. At one point I couldn’t figure out how to put a toy bowling game away, so I approached the hostess, my sister-in-law and said–right in front of her friends who are a gay couple–”Could you help me with this? I know it’s a queer question…I mean it’s a queer request…” I couldn’t believe my own mouth. There was dead silence. “Hi,” I said to one of them. “Have we met?” He went on to describe our meeting the previous summer, while I barely heard, fixating on my flub. He got up and quickly reassembled the toy. Awhile later, I approached the two men and apologized for using the word “queer”–it came back from my childhood, so fucked up, I said, “I didn’t even notice,” one of them replied. Could that have been true? Or was he just trying to make me feel better (or worse?)

A day or two later, I tried to go to the DMV to get a new license and became totally confused. Fortunately (I guess), my son had a poopie accident in the car, so I had to leave quickly, but I was overwhelmed by how confused I became at the institutionality of the DMV. Shit, that place is made for people who don’t speak English, and I still couldn’t figure out exactly what I was supposed to do.

I’ve forgotten little things, I’ve forgotten big things. One day I shouted at my husband, “I have to go to the hospital! I have to go to the hospital!” Not having insurance at the time, this was out of the question. My husband called my sister, a doctor, who suggested giving me atavan. I took it, and the next day went to the doctor who increased my Geodon dosage to 160 mg.

I’m reconnecting with my children, and I finally feel like showering and putting on makeup again. I’m still battling some suicidal thoughts, but I’m not thinking psychotically. The main thing is getting to sleep, which can take 3 Tylenol PMs or a tablet of Lunesta, which I hate. Sometimes the Geodon knocks me out, but I always wake up in the early morning without being able to fall back asleep.

Yesterday was a horrible day. The day before was good. Right now, I’m just trying to take it one day at a time.

This is something I wrote in the summer of 07.

I had never before referred to my son as having “special needs” until the day I called a private preschool to explore options for him. Already aware of the choices the public schools offer and not entirely content with the idea of a “special day class,” I briefly described his challenges to the teacher, who told me promptly that her school “wasn’t equipped to deal with children with special needs.” Her program was “small and developmentally appropriate,” she said. I was enraged in an instant. Controlling my temper, as calmly as I could I told her I was offended by her answer. “I apologize,” she said. “I could talk to our school board.” “No,” I said. “Your response has already assured me that your school is not the place for him.”
My son is indeed special. He was born with a rare syndrome that dealt him two holes in his heart, minimal hearing in his right ear, facial palsy on his right, and, most critically, a tiny, little windpipe that required a tracheotomy when he was only five months old. “We’ll all have to hold him. He’s stronger than all of us!”, the doctor said at Jet’s circumcision ceremony (in Jewish culture, his brit). Jet’s strength proved true through near-death and six surgeries. He has to fight harder than most of us. The trach makes swallowing a skill, and talking a talent, but both he is performing. He is the life of the party, wherever he goes. His sense of humor, charisma, and beauty draw attention, not pity. His strength and agility make him seem anything but sick. Special? Yes. Needs? Time.
What could I do with the anger I felt toward this teacher whose cold resolution doused my child? How could I produce something other than bitterness or fear that her rejection might not be his last? I could take the experience and use it to better myself as a parent and teacher. I could learn that as a parent, I must introduce my child by describing his strengths rather than his weaknesses, or, better yet, let him introduce himself. I could learn that as a teacher, I must meet my students, treat each of them as a gift that I have not yet opened: that I must appear pleased with and may learn to love.
And Jet? What will happen to Jet? My dear little boy who is just beginning his life as a student. Will he be treated with compassion and encouragement, or will he be treated as if his condition is contagious, his challenges debilitating, his future set in stone? The hardest thing to accept is I don’t know. I have no control over his condition or how people respond to him; I can only raise him to be proud of himself and of what he can do.