Search This Blog

Friday, October 18, 2019

The Husband

The other part of this equation is the relationship with myself and my husband.
 I don't share so much about this but obviously there are going to be problems.
And when there are, guess what it feeds?
No one is fighting for me
Even though he is,  just in his own way, it hurts because of our differences. 
Too many years neglected, overlooked, under appreciated the way that most good wives are. And yet he has had to endure the intensities of me, so for neither has it been super easy. He does say that how I handle has always impressed him... 
We have always been friends, usually best friends but
Relationships are hard and we have struggled a lot.
Between us I have always been honest and he has learned to be also.
But maybe I am too honest.
...The trait that gets me in trouble. 
So honest that he (husband) realized before I did that I had fallen in love with my therapist. 
But he didn't mind 
he knows how I work 
and he knows that I'll keep it in line. 
Now he minds. I am no longer "in love" with my therapist because he is not my therapist and he will have nothing to do with me ever anyway. But it is stupid and hard that he is still tied to my chemistry and it still hurts so damn bad.
I do not know how to handle all of this.
And neither does my husband. 
I am working on it.
I am
But sometimes I still stumble and fall with my haywire chemistry
which is what the previous entry is about.
Right now what bothers me is the intensity of the stumbles now in relation to the rest of the time.
Now, they are intense in something different. I can mostly keep it hidden that I have bruised a few knuckles fighting me back.
I actually phoned a friend the other day. 
I don't think I have ever done that before in that state.
I keep thinking it's done, gone, I'm good, I can move on, but then silence too long, push back, or off handed remarks, brings something quite scary back out. 
I want to say I am out of the woods and I think I will eventually be... but my physiology still sometimes thinks it is supposed to be rid of me...
This battle at times is so very hard.
I am right now writing from a much better place then I was in my previous entry. 
And as I reflect I see that I did not eat right and slept terribly. I actually dreamt of medical bills...
It is annoying how fragile I am.
TBI realities? I think so. Exacerbated by the medical and therapy gods -arrogant buffoons who own the word ethical and decide who is and isn't worth saving.

...not worth the fight so I write

I’m still struggling.
Still stuck in this place
Because “I will never have anything to do with you”
And he’ll make sure
But you is me and me is you when enmeshed in therapy
It’s overwhelming
Life
My dreams and aspirations
And somehow just writing still helps
It’s better then the image of a gun to the head
Even though that gun is just for cleaning

“Do you really think that”
Asks Dr. She when I tell her “at least if she has she’s in a better place”
Because I know that God will still love her

Why keep fighting?
I sometimes wonder
Just so Dr. She can feel like a hero?
These are thoughts that go through my head
And they bother me
Especially since I am so much more level
...slow...
Sometimes it is taking too long to recover
And I am not worth the fight
So I write

Thursday, October 17, 2019

Bipolarity -The Confusion and Effects

New neuropsychologist is working to get herself fired. I can tell. And while I’m glad she is (because that is what good therapists do) it makes me a touch sad because I quite like her. Today we talked a bit about what I blogged yesterday. How Dr. He is now tied to my physiology, so when I feel push back on medication or that up excited chemistry, I feel him... I am angry about it and she understands. It's like smells that bring back memories etc. She asks if it has faded at all. Yes, mostly but in the intensity of the chemistry it can bring it all back. A tie that was strengthened over the months of my trying to undo it while they kept tying me to it in the denials and neglect of my chemistry. AN then further nurtured by taboo and forbidden.
I tell Dr. She I don't know how the hell I survived without the medication. She wants me to fill in with new passion. And I have and I am. She asks me "so when are you going to become a therapist?" I love that she asks and how she asks because she thinks I'd be good and she knows I've got a lot to offer but need the credentials to be heard.
I also had her read the letters from the Neuroscience Institute. After reading the termination letter from the entire Neuroscience Institute she explained how communication was probably poor. Obviously.
She tells me they obviously terminated me because they felt I was a liability and she says of the letter, “this is retaliation for opening the investigation.”
But I didn’t even want to open the stupid investigation. I did not understand it. I was doing what I felt like they were telling me to do... trying to follow their rules.
And that makes me wonder if the investigation was the intentional scheme from the get go to justify exactly that; the terminating me from the entire facility. I wonder this especially considering these points:
-I had told the patient advocate multiple times that I did not understand the investigation or the point of the investigation,
-I was refused multiple times in person communication with anyone about it,
-and I even asked them to stop the investigation until I understood better or could explain what I was asking for better, but they did not. In fact, at that point, they changed their tone from "you have plenty of time" to "we need it tomorrow by 9:00am" in an email that was sent late afternoon. The patient advocate, **, even said something to the effect of, "we can't just start and stop the investigation at will."
And then the information they came back with did not even match what I was asking.
The confusion and mess of emails sent to Patient Advocate would have been really hard to decipher. The tears and emotion, the begging for help coupled with the statements of, "I don't want him get into trouble," would have most certainly led to confusion. But they refused me in person meetings with anyone. They refused, once again, to see the very obvious problem: that I was reacting too extreme and something was not quite right with my brain; the point I was trying to make. I needed clarification, and I needed a diagnosis or at least medication and I needed it from those who had present during my breaking, who were the professionals, who had agreed to help me and whom I trusted. I was a fool to trust them, yes, but I was also quite broken and trying to go other places was just contributing to the confusion for me and for them (the other places).
What a fiasco. What an ordeal. And I was trying so hard to play by their rules and understand what it was they were saying and asking.
So here is an important lesson to learn and remember if you are a provider: If ever you have an intelligent patent that has always behaved rather well, but suddenly they are too high and too happy and then significantly confused and confusing, no matter their composure, they are really not right in their brain or their physiology. When they are telling you "I am just trying to figure out what is going on with my head." and "I don't know who I can trust. I don't know if I can even trust myself." and if that person just keeps coming back proclaiming their love and their trust, and things like "the message received is I need to be rid of myself" (that one is suicidal, and I really thought they were intelligent enough to understand that) then you should know that they are not stable and medical intervention is desperately needed and it is your responsibility to make sure they get it. 

My daughter illustrated this well
and with her permission I am sharing.
I'll explain. She is in an IB art class and she has to do some projects. One day she texted me a "mock up" for one of her proposed projects. She told me the idea was born from placing a flower cutout over the eye of a face in a magazine picture. She said she liked the imagery and so she started to develop it, not really planning, but letting it evolve. When she finished she told me that to her it represented bipolarity. She asked me what I thought. I love it. And I tell her so. I think it is a great representation.

I do have a little bit of feed back but I think on it for a day or two deciding if it mattered enough to be offered. When the picture comes up in conversation I decide to offer my feedback (or maybe requests) and I say "I want to see the manic side more confident, open and euphoric." Our conversation is sweet but honest, constructive in our acceptance of each other's opinions and I feel, as mom, I have done something right. I am so impressed with this beautiful young lady. She tells my why she does not want to add a slight one sided smile or brighten or broaden the shoulders of the manic side.
First she wants it to be uniform because "there is still uniformity in the two extremes." But what she tells me next takes me a day or two to really understand as she tries to explain the vulnerability and mossy darkness of both sides she is showing. She also says she does not want the bipolarity to be too obvious because it isn't always so obvious and people can and do hide it.
...You would think this girl has witnessed something very interesting to have such profound interpretations... She has.
I see in the picture my pain and her pain and she wants people to see the vulnerability of both sides.
The vulnerability, the exposed, and the trying to cover the raw tragedy that just can't quite be covered up...
Can you see how lucky I am? to have such an amazing friend that happens to be my phenomenal daughter.
And my son I can also thank for profound understanding that has also helped me to survive.
Bipolar or not, manic cannot and will not be denied by these two
and at least I am one lucky mom.