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Monday 28 December 2009

Family Matters

I am sad today for two reasons. One, a lad went missing where I live and his body has just been found.  He went missing last week in strange circumstances and also looked the spitting image (and I mean exact double) of my younger brother.  I feel sad for the family and what they have had to go through - they put up such a campaign to raise awareness and I don't think any one person hadn't checked their cellars, sheds, lofts etc. in the slim hope that he would have curled up somewhere. The second reason is my own family shit. I was washing up and as usual my mind wandered to other things.  I was thinking about all the horrible things my older brother had written to me and the things I want to say to him and my younger brother but probably never will.  Then I opened the post which has been piling up for a few days now.  Yep, there was a Christmas card from my older brother (and wife) with a cheesy message about if ever me and J want to stay we are more than welcome!! I mean, talk about avoiding the issue, just because he is all loved out does not mean that an apology is out of the question.  He has even refused a teleconference with my Psychiatrist and me to sort out our differences, everything has to be on his terms.
Nothing from my younger brother or nephews though........
So I am sad (traurig in German- it is such an expressive word for it) and irritable, gunning for a fight and just in the mood for getting blindly, ridiculously drunk. I cried for a while, and then I was even worse when I opened a small parcel from my mum - she had made me a photobook of photos of me and when they were taken/background behind them.  It was so sweet. I had also spoken to my sister last night and she has had a stressful Christmas which my younger brother has been unsympathetic to. He is so double standards - expects everyone to go visit him and not the other way round.
Ahh, am just narky and sad and feel like I don't fit in anywhere.  Anywhere. And I don't think I ever will.

Friday 25 December 2009

I miss real christmas

I wonder what he is doing now.  Probably never thinks of me.   But I am drinking our favourite wine, thinking of what present I would have got him. Thinking how I don't want to live without him. Never have, any thought of ending it has been because of the pain and guilt.  And the disappointment that I am that crap I couldn't hold on to him, that he walked away and didn't want to work it through. I can't forgive myself ever.  and despiter what he said about we could get through anything, he lied.  But I don't care - my love for him overrules anything.  and now I am the one living a lie. I hate myself, I should have left everyone's world long ago. i am not feeling sorry for myself, just sorry that I hurt someone so much and I can't live with it.  I guess the meds aren't working and my psychiatrist is in America right now.
Why doens't he contact me?
You can't feel guilt without love.

Tuesday 22 December 2009

Emotions Regulation Group

This evening I attended the last "lesson" of the interpersonal Skills module at the hospital down in the valley. I am pretty tired because I started work again last Sunday and am working in Ski school outdoors in a job which requires me to think and the DBT is in Swiss German which is quite hard to follow - all this added together makes me even more tired and emotional so I ended up feeling worse after attending the group. I participated and was fine, but on the journey home I started feeling sad and for some reason it popped into my head that I was only born to save my parents marriage, which failed anyway.  I have always teased my younger brother that he was the "save the marriage" child, but it makes more sense it was me.  Absolutely no idea where this has come from and its completely irrational.
Up until that revelation on the train I had been feeling ....well.....normal.  I mean, I felt like I was living a normal day in a normal mood, not ecstatic, not down, just kind of "baseline" I suppose.  And it felt good.  Maybe this new drugs regime is working.
Going to bed now to cuddle up with my man and my cat.  The rest of the village are out looking for a missing 23 year old who rolled out of the local nightclub (drunk) at 3 a.m. and has been missing ever since.  Kind of a bad idea when it is minus 10.

Sunday 20 December 2009

Work, life and fondue and cheese soup

First day back at work today and it went....well.....OK. I achieved "promotion" on the ski slopes by stepping into my sister-in-laws shoes as a favour to her (she has taken a job in a bar which gives her work the whole year round, an elusive type of contract in a ski resort). I decided that I would give it a go, but despite today going really well I miss the teaching side already.
As for my mental state - I seem OK - yesterday evening I had the physical symptoms of an anxiety attack but in my mind I felt all right - calm, collected, no repetitive thoughts.  I had decided I would go out and socialise before going to work (volunteer) at the local cinema.  I went out, I was shaky, but I managed to sit in a bar all on my own and chat to acquaintances as they came in, in a calm manner, even if inwardly I was feeling uncomfortable. Gold star for me, reduced to a bronze for having two glasses of wine.
As for the weight loss plan - I haven't stuck to it at all and am being very harsh on myself about it, particularly when my boyfriend, who has an aversion to fat people, keeps commenting about my eating habits.  I know he is joking (at least, I think he is - he wouldn't deliberately hurt me) but it still cuts right through me. I have another plan though and hope to go on a detox plan, liquids only.  Surely some of the fat will disappear? I'm just not a good advert for the aerobics classes I teach right now. Eating a cheese fondue earlier hasn't helped - I feel like I have a stone sitting in my stomach.
My Psychiatric appointment last week went well and he reviewed my medications.  He said that the day clinic hadn't followed his instructions to wean me off the Wellbutrin and increase the Lamotrigine, so I have a new drug regime which entailed another trip to the Apotheke  (Chemist) with another prescription for a shed load of drugs.  Can't get enough of them. We talked about ways of tackling the alcohol side of things because it really shook me up losing a couple of hours the week before due to a binge session. There are some medications out there which can help so he wrote me a list for me to Wiki later. Which I did. More confused now - I know to have the willpower is hard for me.  I don't seem to be able to abstain for myself, I need a strong reason to go sober for somebody else.  But there is no-one I love enough to do this for. In this situation then meds would be a good idea (from previous posts you will see that I have absolutely no problem in taking medication as long as it does something to make me feel better.) One medication in particular appeals to me because it shows some side effects of weight loss.  Hmm, antidepressant known for weight gain + medication for alcohol abuse showing side effects of weight loss = back to normal weight?? Of course, the best and newest medication is just out of range of the Medical Insurance budget.  Rather like the NHS, if a medication is too expensive or you live in the wrong postcode area then you might not get access to the latest treatment available.  The drug I could take is simply too new and too expensive and only really used for the severely opiate dependent community.  A seemingly healthy person with mild addiction problems will be helped but a severely addicted crackhead will be chucked these drugs at the drop of a hat.  Sometimes I just don't understand the medical insurance system here - they seem to give loads of stuff free to those who have kids (surely they are more at risk of being ill?) yet singletons like me are denied access to other treatments because they are "too expensive". Hey! I have no kids! My boyfriend never claims for anything! Don't we get a no claims discount or something?
Having said that, the Social office were really helpful to me last week and are going to pay my health insurance premiums for a couple of months. They were practically chucking money at me thank goodness.  I have nearly paid off my debts (yep, got to get good at controlling spending sprees, yet another symptom of my craziness) and it felt soooooo good pressing "send payment" over the internet banking instead of staring at the screen despondently.
I still have thoughts of knives in my head. I seem compelled towards them and I know that if I do pick one up that I will cut myself.  It scares me at the same time.  Not sure how to explain this to my psychiatrist as I am in one of my "I am wasting everyone's time" frames of mind and that my problems and thoughts are insignificant. Which is not the grown up and responsible thing to do.
I wish a friend from my past was here to listen to me.  He heard far worse when he did some work for the Samaritans and I think he would not judge me with this situation. But that's like screaming into a cave - the noise keeps whirling around and around but never reaches anywhere.

Saturday 12 December 2009

Chromium for Depression

UPDATE ON CHROMIUM FOR DEPRESSION
Two small placebo controlled trials have shown a role for high doses (600mcg) of the essential mineral chromium in the treatment of 'atypical' depression, characterized by periods of low mood accompanied with carbohydrate cravings, weight gain and excessive sleepiness. (Docharty J et al, J Psychiatr Pract. 2005 Sep;11(5):302-14; Davidson J et al Biol Psychiatry. 2003 Feb 1;53(3):261-4.) 
More recent animal studies have reported an anti-depressant an d ant-anxiety effect of chromium possibly linked to a serotonin promoting effect
(Piotrowska A, Pharmacol Rep. 2008 Nov-Dec;60(6):991-5;  and Khanam R & Pillai KK. Fundam Clin Pharmacol. 2007 Oct;21(5):531-4). Chromium, which is an essential co-factor for the insulin receptor, has also been shown to reduce sugar and fat craving and tends to promote weight loss
, a fact which in itself would cheer the average dieter up. (Anton A et al Diabetes Technol Ther. 2008 Oct;10(5):405-12) In clinical practice we find that 400mcg of chromium, taken in the morning and a furth er 200mcg taken at lunch, produces a mood elevating effect in those with atypical depression. Chromium appears to work very fast with most people noticing an effect within three days. While a larger scale definitive trial is needed, with no toxicity reported below 10,000mcg, chromium is easily and safely tested in those with atypical depression.

Nightmares

Back with a vengeance and about the usual - me chasing someone and them dropping a bombshell on me that I just won't accept.  Woke up at the 3 a.m. slot, crying and feeling distressed.
Really hard to motivate myself today, but I managed to get myself to go to the post office and for a quick cup of tea to see my friend S, who was working, so I give myself a pat on the back for that.  I came home and busied myself with the housework because if I didn't busy myself with something then I would have fallen apart.  I am now curled up on the sofa watching trash TV but feel on edge so have taken my Zyprexa early instead of at bedtime.
I'm a bit peed off with this Zyprexa.  I have put on 12 kilos since taking it and it just won't shift.  And yet the Wellbutrin is meant to make you lose weight, so I thought they would cancel each other out.  The Zyprexa is winning. so I have decided (after my failed attempt at a crash diet this week) that I will go on a detox, then maybe I will stick to it.  This is closely followed by a week's lemonade diet favoured by Beyonce and one of my idols, Cameron Diaz. and they both look amazing.
Just want to get back in shape, particularly as I only have 2 more aerobics classes to teach before the Christmas break and World Cup Ski race in town.  But I will be starting to teach aquarobics so I think I can use the hotel pool where this will be held.
Wish me luck............

Friday 11 December 2009

Quiet Voice

This gets said to me a lot when I am drinking.  I managed to silence a whole bar with my drunken ramblings on Tuesday. I was pissed off with missing my Emotions Regulation group because I hadn't organised myself with my train and bus pass or money to get there, so had to turn back home. And hit the bar. And the wine was on special offer.  So I drank.
I felt like I was the life and soul of the party, a social butterfly, everyone liked me.
The next day i felt like shit.  I don't remember leaving the bar to go home at all.  I don't remember knocking over the coffee table and contents. I don't remember trashing the bathroom, probably from stumbling around.  I don't remember my boyfriend trying to wake me up when he got in.
And I still don't remember.
I have got to stop drinking. But I don't know how.

Sunday 6 December 2009

Exercise for the soul

It is said that exercise has a positive effect on those with depression and luckily the ski season has started for me.  I spent all of yesterday on the slopes and felt much better for it.  In fact, I felt almost too good which invetably follows a period of being over-confident, loud, obnoxious and "speaking my mind". I elected to go home rather than to my friend's housewarming party, which is another example of how this illness affects my day to day life.  I knew I would "kick off and cause some shit", recognised the signs this time and knew when to quit. Felt disappointed that there doesn't seem to be a cure for that, just management. Then I get scared that this is my personality, that this is who I am but if that is the case then how come I feel so bad about being like that, feeling out of control, hate myself, have no self respect? Maybe I don't know me at all.

Friday 4 December 2009

Feeling better

And just like that, I am feeling on top of the world.  Maybe it has to do with being able to get my reserve medication, I don't know.  But I still miss my old life although my new life has a lot to offer. I think I always will - I just can't seem to get over it.
Anyway today I have been quite sociable which is good, even though the temptation is to stay inside in the warm and snugness of my sofa-duvet.  I have tackled my paperwork and am on top of it. I have been sort of offered a different job in the winter which would put me back on track financially and I am taking time to do my DBT skills book and review my Emotions Regulation group stuff from the other week. Tomorrow I can go skiing for the first time this season which I am starting to look forward (forward!) to. I just hope tonight I have a more restful sleep as I was so jittery yesterday that I couldn't sit still and was forever doing something and then changing to something else because I couldn't concentrate.  This led to a very unsettled night even though I was very tired.
Am hanging on to the positive feelings for as long as I can.

Thursday 3 December 2009

Not good.

Not good today, feeling really anxious and sad. I miss my old life.

Tuesday 1 December 2009

It's still snowing

Is it right to still think about someone in your past when it's clear it's "over"? Sometimes when I compare my current life to before I feel that I'm in a situation that, whatever my situation is, I will always be yearning for something more.
I had "true love" once. I have "love" now.  that's not to say I don't love J, I do very, very much. But it's more like a great friendship than the passionate love I had before with T. But I am very lucky that I have someone who adores me and puts up with all my shit and that makes it hard to leave, if that is what I am thinking at the time.  And then I think if I am thinking that, then I should leave. But for what? I would feel even more lonely than I do anyway.
That's not to say I can't live alone, there are many days when I crave it, but I also crave the dizzy, heady, happy, smiling, passion that is true love.
I had it and I messed up. And I was never given the chance to rectify it or talk it over and purge these demons inside me.
And that's when I want to end it all, because the mistakes outweigh the benefit of life.

J is good for me, he looks out for me, I look out for him and it is comfortable and works, but I could never do to him what happened to me.