oh the places we will go

I feel inclined to write often. I intend to write on very good days, but that rarely seems to happen. It seems that I manage to make time and make it a priority on the not so happy days anymore...

So I suppose it goes without saying that I am not so up today (but I'll say it anyway).

I am over all fine and happy enough most of the time. I am glad to have rather steady and much more consistent moods and personalities (yes, that is meant to be plural). But sometimes I wonder and sometimes I am not sure if this (my metal state) is where I am meant to be. Sometimes I feel anxiety sneaking in, trying to reestablish it's regular presence. Sometimes I miss the more intense ups in their various forms. Sometimes I am not sure if "this is normal" or do I need to up a dose before my brain gets too far ahead of me.

Over all I am glad. I think it very likely that my shorter hours spent sleeping and the way that I have been able to safely let my guard down in so many ways is starting to catch up as I may have let it down a bit too much (as it so often goes), but only a bit . I suppose things are always going to be a bit more complicated. But then again I think the psychology of every individual is very complicated and in that I am no different. I must say that, if anything, I am lucky to be so aware of mine and how to handle myself realizing my weaknesses and knowing the boundaries and when I am getting to close. I think in many ways I am probably ahead of the game. Maybe I am overly confident but I have had a lot of practice...
Yet, then again, who knows what age has in store for me.

Life is always an adventure. One Grand Adventure

and I intend to enjoy.

here today, gone tomorrow

I feel like writing, though it has been awhile and likely nobody reads this anymore anyway. that is the beauty of this world wide web, you can write to your hearts content, pretending there is someone out there listening, and hoping that maybe just maybe you will make a difference somewhere to somebody...
What a great outlet we have in the Internet. See I feel better already.

I have been thinking as well as not thinking and at times trying not to think. Anxiety is creeping back in. It may be that I am a bit tired. It is nice that I can stay up much later and not crash (or explode) multiple times the next day... but then maybe that is how it sneaks up on one. Hypersensitive at least keeps things from sneaking.

I am feeling rather hollow...
I think about my brother everyday. I went for awhile with out. There was a bit of time where when I did think about him I believed he was fine and when I would remember that he had died I was sure it was just a weird dream. It wasn't real and I liked it that way... Until I'd see the plants in the living room and the few little things that I have out, like the little framed picture my other brother gave each of us of him (deceased brother) as a boy on one of our family camping trips in a dry field holding matches (that was (name with held)him) and then it has to be real. Though I still really didn't believe, sometimes certain the plants had come from somewhere else. When I found the picture and poems that were a tribute to him for his funeral that is when I lost it. I put that out. I suppose I should live in the "real world" and remember what really happened. But I don't want to.
It bothers me.
Once a doctor said something about religion/my beliefs keeping me alive (instead of actually killing myself when that was really the only thing that made any sense at all). He said something about others of the similar backgrounds claiming that. But I am bit different (the Dr. has also told me that) and truth be known I believe it is said religious convictions that contribute as much as the detract from the desire to die. Sometimes religion bothers me. I see the need and understand and all that, I even agree with much, but lately I am tired of feeling like we live only to die.
I am tired of everything being about an afterlife. I am tired of feeling like I have to do and be so much more then I am.
I wonder if my brother ever felt any of these things. I wonder how much feelings of, being a failure and/or wanting to be done with it because we are merely living to die anyway and since he knew he was so far from "perfect" then what is the point and he felt done, contributed to his current condition.
I am not done. I am just tired of living to die.
I am mad that my brother shot himself in the head.
I am annoyed that I take drugs everyday just to feel like this and yet not taking them is so much more annoying or at least difficult.
I want to run away to my warm sunny beaches with mountains behind me and forget about everything and everyone...

well I suppose I feel a bit better now pretending that my voice and heart might be heard.
good night sweet Internet world.

Oprah and Bull@#%*

E-mail to friend turned therapy blog entry:

I read an article in Newsweek about Oprah. The title was something to the effect that "Oprah may not be so good for your health." I really liked it and was impressed that any one in the media would dare breath even a remotely ill word against the omnipotent Oprah. The article was basically about how all things on Oprah are not always completely accurate. They hit on the "Secret" crap she has pushed and endorsed and it was refreshing to hear that others out there realize that just because Oprah says it does not make it gospel and just because someone successful can market an idea does not make it true. I wish that we really could be and have whatever we want just by vibrating positive thoughts but unfortunately it just doesn't always work that way, no matter how hard you believe and practice and all the bull... I get annoyed any more at having that type of "conviction" shoved down my throat and held over my head telling me that all negatives in my life are a result of my lack of putting out positive thoughts, beliefs and energy. It is just the re-packaged idea that "you only have problems because you are a sinner" or "you lack faith." And if that be true then I suppose I really am just a pathetic sinner of a thing. But it is also quite possible that these ideas, when taken too seriously or held onto with extreme conviction can result in some interesting sanity issues for some of us...

I totally just broke into a "write for therapy" session. I think it is the relief that you are well coupled with my Oprah experience of the day that led me down the path to express and confront the feelings and idea that I think it bullshit that we are completely responsible for all the troubles ourselves and/or families may have. That and I still hate to take medication. It is always very tempting for me to think "all I need to do is think more positive." when the reality is that was kind of a huge part of the problem, thinking that I could think myself out of "it." Though I really believe in energy work and the power of positive thinking and so many more things all I can say is; can't we be realistic about it people? seriously.

and that is all I have to say about that.

PS, two and a half plus months and counting on what has seemed to hold as an even kill.
mood stabilizer appears to be helping.

out with old in with the new... over and over and over and over... again

Though December was OK, I think, once again, I thought I was doing better then I really was... though no shrimp in the closest. definitely on the high side of moods.

Christmas snuck up on me and was hard.

I found myself abandoning my in-laws a few times (in the three days we were there) just to wonder into the red rock.

Christmas day was melancholy for me. I went to find batteries and just couldn't head directly back and found myself driving aimlessly in the direction of the most uninhabited red rocks in the vicinity. I found a beautiful area with a canyon that was just a bit of a walk from the road. I had to hop a fence to get there. I tore my pants going between the barbed wire, then headed to to the hills...

I stayed for what ended up being a few hours. I found a nice little secluded canyon where I stayed talking to people who weren't there, God and Jason, the mountain and myself... I didn't feel that anyone but the mountain was around to listen. I felt as if Jason was aware of me but not close... it was OK though. Sometimes we need alone time.

I found a beautiful picturesque piece of sandstone with rough circles of different beautiful colors. Though I knew this was it's home it seemed so overlooked and unappreciated in it's surroundings so I accepted it as a gift from the mountains and/or higher powers.

I struggled. feeling flat, dull and boring for a couple of weeks. Realizing that I have been floating off into outer space and embarrassing myself many many times this past year.

I started having dreams about my decieced brother that were vague and distant (though it is still always nice to see him).

In one dream, probably the only one that I remember any detail about, he was alive. It was the past, before he had gone. We (his family) were all unsure what to do, what we could say, how we could stop what we knew was coming and yet hoping that by not mentioning it we could somehow do something to change the outcome... It was heartbreaking.



Since then I feel like I have finally woken up (though that has been much longer then just the past year). I feel grounded. It is nice to feel like I am part of the world and not like I am watching life and the world from the other side of the glass.
I am on a mood stabilizer now and it has just been within the last few weeks that I have increased to an amount that would make any significant difference. I hope that this will help me stay grounded a little... no, a lot, better.
Though it was filled with many grand adventures, I am glad that the past year is over. I am not a hundred percent sure where I am at in the grieving process, maybe a bit in denial, or maybe I am just accepting of it/about it. I am really not sure... Either way, they can both be productive coping strategies. I am sad, I might be a tad angry, and it is bizarre, but I am done with living to die. I am ready to live to live. I don't want to be worried all the time about how fragile life is and consumed with thoughts of the after life and what it may look like. I want to live today for today, for myself and whom ever may cross my path that day. I want to live for the adventures and enjoy all of them, big or small.

I hope that I may stay here a while... though one really can not know where life will take them...

And though I have likely been here before it all seems new... I suppose that is a bonus, it keeps life interesting if the same old things always seem new.

Cosmic Realms

Here's the thing...
Sometimes I float off into outer space
(you might call me a space cadet)
and when I return back to earth I am often embarrassed...
I have been going back and forth for awhile now...
Sometimes I am not sure who is feeding whose insanity.
I hope that people will not take this personally,
what ever that may mean.

I am finding the ground again.
I hope I will stay here awhile.

I am tired of living to die.
I am alive,
and that is where I want to be,
in the here and now.

Merry Christmas

I am dynamite.
I am glad that I am somewhat intelligent.
I am glad that I was raised with very well defined and high set standards and values.
I realize more and more how lucky I am.
I am glad that my intelligence, values, standards, and expectations of others helped me to not act on so much of the insanity in my head.
I am glad that I always somehow had an sanity chip that somehow managed to hold the chaos together, even if it was a very small chip.
I am glad my sanity chip never broke... (completely)
I am glad that there are "engineers" who have helped my chip function better and helped to sort out the chaos.
I am glad that I was not just let go but that one man, an officer of the law "over-reacted" to my warped sense of humor.
I am glad for my family and friends. That I have people who relate. That I have people who don't always relate but are patient with me.
I am glad for Christmas and the reason for it.
I am glad for a God that has given me a beautifully bizarre and complicated life... Otherwise I'd probably be bored, and likely quite destructive.
I am glad that I can see this and appreciate it.
I expect miracles
and sometimes I get them.
Life is good, friends are good, family is wonderful and I am happy.

It's just me

Sometimes things people say and do get me thinking. Sometimes things I say and do get me thinking... But I'm pretty much always thinking so maybe it would be better said that they can direct my thinking.
Sometimes I say and joke about being "crazy." I am rather open about my mental health issue's these days and maybe I need to be more careful. Though I'd like people to just see it for what it is, accept it, embrace me for who I am, and then laugh with me about it, I realize we still have a long way to go before things of this nature are understood well enough to reach my ideals.

So I've been thinking about what I am and how to explain it to people that I may have frightened so that they understand.

Before I was so keenly aware of what a "mental" brain potentially looks like I'd say I was most certainly at risk of many "mental" things. Such is the case with everyone you meet, you really don't know what's going on in someones head, possibly even your own.

In my head there was a lot of noise. That may be the best way to explain it.
I would have racing thoughts and I would have flashing thoughts. I once went to a concert where they had a video playing that was basically flashing different images, only staying on them long enough to know that they were there. I liked that I could point out to my husband "that is what it is often like inside my head, images flashing almost constantly."
Fortunately for me I am a very logical analytical and practical person. Unfortunately for me just about everything I see and learn sticks around somewhere in my head even if I can't utilize it productively. Which I usually can't do in this state because there is too much going on and it takes all my energy just trying to sort through the excess amounts of crap floating, whizzing and crashing into each other freely inside that little head of mine. But all the imaginative things I have been subjected to and all of the logical things I have been subjected to in addition to spiritual, religious, social, etc, are each formulating an argument, analyzing and trying to process all things I encounter, seen and unseen. I remember in high school thinking I had a small sanity chip that somehow held all the chaos together keeping it from destroying me.

Now maybe all this noise is what cases my anxiety issues but there are times, even now when my mind is not so out of control that I can feel that "anxiety" just right below the surface. The best way that I can explain this is something like endorphins rushing up in response, or random, to events that do not merit such a response. Anxiety can also be excessive nervousness or worry, but maybe it is these responses that case me to worry and be nervous.

Then I can get stuck in ruminating thoughts. I think that might better fit me over the term obsessive. But ruminating thoughts that last for days, weeks, months and even years may have then turned into an obsession... but then again I am not sure. All I know is the old cliche "just get over it" somehow does not magically work when one is sincerely stuck in genuine rumination. Rather it just adds another element to the rumination and helps the ruminater despise them self or whatever they may be ruminating over because they aren't "just getting over it".

Then there is the issue of ups and downs. Highs and lows. This is the most interesting, most fun and most awful of all. There are times when I didn't "suffer" so much from these "episodes." It is possible that all that noise is the cause of these. The possibility being that one side of my brain wins an argument causing an upward swing but then the other side fights again and wins causing a down all the while the "real" me, somewhere in there, gets a chance now and again and I get to experience level. That's an idea but the ups and down seem present even with medication though not as severe. It is also possible that they follow a hormonal cycle as they are quite regular. I am not sure about this "instability" at all but I do know that I like it to be less extreme since floating off to euphoric plains, though fun, can be dangerous and sinking down to the hell that is within me is not fun and takes every ounce of strength to fight. As early as high school I remember being afraid to be too happy because I knew what it would be followed by.

These things are not so frightening to the outside perspective and apparently easily hidden, intentional or not. They are not so dangerous in early stages. Had I not been made aware and had I not started to look into some of the suggestions that were made to me then I'd still be accepting them as part of who I am and I'd still be headed down that slippery dangerous slope to "insanity."

But I am not yet insane and I don't think I'm even on the path anymore as I have done much to understand these issue's and amazingly medication gets rid of most of it.
The noise is gone, likely focused into one voice that is my own. The flashing thoughts are a distant memory. Though I may think about things a great deal, my thoughts are progressive and if they are not productive or become undesirable I can change them or be rid of them. At times it may require some effort but it's possible. The anxiety seems to come in forms that, to me, seem what they are intended to be for, to help keep me in line when I might be heading off. An example: at the store I want to buy something that we really don't need, anxiety about finances will keep me in line so that I am not buying excessive amounts of toys and crap that we really don't need.
As for the ups and downs, currently they are still present though much less severe. We (being my doctor and I) are working on those because I'd like to be more level. I'd like to be a bit farther from the edge. In addition, when one thing is slipping it is quite possible the others will be following.

So this is a long entry but I'd like my friends to be at peace with my "crazy." I hope that they can accept me and know that they can trust me.