Goodbye 2011
I am so glad to say goodbye to 2011. I'm not looking for any kind of pity party or anything, but, quite honestly, 2011 has probably been the worst year of my entire life. I've been struggling with so much and so constantly that there have been several times that I was just done and didn't think I was going to make it. Thankfully I have a handful of extremely close friends and I have a family that have been very supportive of me. I'm hoping that maybe in writing this blog, 1: I'll feel some sense of closure by being completely honest with myself and be able to move forward in a way, and 2: maybe help somebody else out there who is struggling with some part of anything I've dealt with and doesn't know what to do.
Those of you that know me very well, know that I have struggled with depression and anxiety for most of my life. My parents took me to doctors and psychiatrists and therapists when I was a kid trying to figure out what was wrong with me and what to do with me. I was diagnosed with different things, such as Intermittent Explosive Disorder and Hypoglycemia. Which I recently found out were probably not the case. But I'll talk about that in a bit.
So this year I kind of hit my rock bottom. Now that's just my rock bottom. Thankfully I didn't get as bad as I probably could have. I know a lot of people that go through much worse before they are able to pick themselves up. But it got bad for me personally. I started spiraling back in January. My therapist recently asked me what I thought had started me going downhill, and I had already been thinking about it, so it was fairly easy for me to pinpoint.
At the beginning of the year, my two best friends in the whole world, had discussed the possibility of dating each other. Now, this probably doesn't sound like a big deal to most people, but our situation is hardly normal. ;) The three of us have been best friends for many, many years. I'll call them P and J. ;) P and J are both gay, and I refer to them as my gusbands. (gay husbands, for those of you not so quick on the uptake) I am very close to both of them, yet my relationship with each of them is very different. First of all they have both absolutely ruined men for me....they are both such genuine, kind, caring guys who are so dear and important to me and I would do anything for either one of them. They’ve both been there for me always, with open arms and without judgement of any kind. I always compare every guy I ever date to them and they never compare, so I probably should stop doing that. :o)
I should probably also point out that P is the only person I have ever been in love with. Many years ago, before he came out of the closet, I was certain he was the guy I was supposed to marry. And he had mentioned it a couple of times....but I think that was just because of the pressure he was feeling from church, etc. because that's what he was expected to do. But I'm not going to go into that here and now because my purpose today is certainly not to offend people. So anyways....long story, semi short....J was in town for a week or so and both of them were coming to me separately, asking me questions and advice about the situation. J was staying with me, so in the mornings before P would get there we'd talk about stuff, and then after J would go to sleep, P would stay later and we'd talk about stuff. But they hadn't actually talked to each other. It became a bit of a stressful situation for me. Which I know they did not intend for that, it's just how my brain reacted.
I wasn't sure how I felt about the possibility of them dating. On one hand it was perfect. On the other hand I knew I would somehow always be left out, even though it was unintentional. And what if it didn't work out? Would I have to choose sides? I couldn't do that. So they finally talked about it one of the last nights that J was in town and decided not to date. I was both sad and relieved at the same time. Then we all talked about it together. I know part of the reason was because of me. Part of the decision was because they felt it wasn't worth risking any of our relationships. Which has left me feeling a little bit guilty at times. I know it shouldn't, because I'm not the sole reason....but it does a little bit. So something during that very emotionally stressful week triggered something in my brain that kind of made me shut down in a way. But they both know I certainly don’t blame them for any of this and we’ve talked about it since. It just is what it is and I love both of them to death.
One of the hardest, and constant things I've dealt with throughout the year is medication changes. Late in 2010 I had finally got into a local clinic's psychiatry program after being on a waiting list. Ever since then, I have been changing medications or changing doses of medications every couple months, trying to figure out the right combination. I've had some crazy side effects and crazy withdrawal symptoms that I wouldn't wish on anybody.
At one point I was sleeping 20 hours a day. And at the opposite side of the spectrum one gave me insomnia. Some that would make me sick anytime I tried to eat anything. Some that make me want to eat everything in sight. One that gave me migraines. A couple that made me super irritable and short tempered. One that made me stutter and not remember words. One that just made me a zombie....I would just kind of sit there and exist. (which would have been horrible if I was on that one during the zombie apocalypse...talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time) One of the ones I'm on now makes soda taste flat. And they all make you dizzy. Every single one. Just weird stuff. And the withdrawals are worse.
Part of the problem I was also having is the fact that the psychiatrist at this clinic I have been dealing with is somebody that I do not like. And I've felt that she has not listened to me. At times I would practically have to get into arguments with her to get her to give me what I felt I needed.
One good thing that happened, and I can not thank my aunt enough for setting this up for me (another person who has been incredibly supportive of me through all of this)....was when I took a trip to Utah back in August. I was able to meet with a friend of hers who is a clinical psychologist and pain management specialist. He was just the nicest person and invited me to his house to chat. He was able to tell me what I had after only talking to me for about 20 minutes. I was Bipolar. Which I've always thought I probably was. Other doctors had mentioned that as a possibility, but never officially diagnosed me.
If you don't know exactly what that means.....the easiest readers digest definition of bipolar: Giant mood swings. You go between the high mania parts which consists of euphoria and super energy to the super low of major depression. With a lot of people the mood swings may only occur a few times a year.
More specifically we talked about the fact that I am probably rapid cycle bipolar with possible mixed states. Which means that I personally can have the cycle so quickly that I can literally have both the mania and the depression at the exact same time. While he was explaining this to me I just remember feeling like a light was clicking on in my head. Yes! Yes! Yes! That's exactly how I feel! Nobody has ever explained it to me like that before. Apparently that particular diagnoses is pretty rare and very difficult to diagnose. So now I knew what was wrong with me.
Then came a rush of emotions. Happiness to finally know. Sadness to know that it's going to take time to treat. Anger that nobody could ever figure it out before. I'd been living for 30 years, taking how many medications that were doing me absolutely no good. Because if you are bipolar, taking just an antidepressant can actually feed into your mania. And he told me that all the things I had been diagnosed with as a child and teenager, they are now finding out are possible misdiagnoses for people that are bipolar. Yay, I was a guinea pig.
So when I went back to my psychiatrist here and told her what this other doctor had said, she didn't want to believe it. Her response was "well, I don't really think you are bipolar because you don't hear voices or have hallucinations." SERIOUSLY!??!!? I'm not telling you I'm schizophrenic! And then she also made a comment about not liking to "put labels on people." Well guess what lady....you became a psychiatrist. It's your freakin’ job. I'm asking you to put a label on me and send me on my merry way. It took me really putting my foot down and basically telling her that I don't trust her and flat out telling her that I don't think she listens to me, to put me on the right medications I needed to be treated with for bipolar.
So since the first half the year I was getting medications that weren't helping (and dealing with the crappy side effects for no reason), I was pretty much just feeling defeated all the time. Whenever I would be feeling manic I would spend insane amounts of money on the STUPIDEST things. Like, seriously.
Did I need 150 glow sticks? No. Not even remotely.
Have I used the wood drill? Saw? Drill? See I don’t even remember what it is. No....it's still sitting in box it was delivered in, not even opened. At least I'm assuming that's what's in that box...maybe I should check.
Did I need a Roku? Well, I could use it, but I haven't opened it.
Do I need 100 Sharpies? Yes...that ones not stupid. You can never have too many Sharpies. That was a trick question.
I also spent probably thousands of dollars on music....but that’s acceptable I think. Music is so important to me and at times music was the only thing that kept me going. So if you ever need to load up an iPod.....give me a call.
If I wasn’t manic spending money doing online shopping a lot of nights would be spent just pacing in my room. I would just be super anxious. A lot. All of the time. If you’ve never experienced anxiety....probably the best way to describe it, at least the way I feel it, is like a giant weight sitting on or pushing on your chest, so that you have a hard time breathing. And a feeling like everything is closing in on you. And some of your senses are kind of heightened. Like noises seem 10 times louder than they really are. And sometimes for me this would last for days. Or sometimes I would have a full blown anxiety/panic attack where it would escalate to the point where I thought I was going to explode. And maybe that is the best way to describe it....you kind of do explode. I would hyperventilate. I would shake. I would not be able to stop moving. And sometimes it would be so bad I would find that I would actually start biting on the knuckle of my thumb. I didn’t actually realize I was doing this until after the fact.....like it was my brain’s way of trying to focus all the pressure that was trying to escape into one place. The first time that happened it really freaked me out. Like I wasn’t crazy enough already....
Sometimes I would just need to drive. Just that feeling of moving would help a bit. But that could sometimes be a double edged sword, because if I was having the depression part too, it would be hard to get the thoughts out of my head of wanting to just ram my car into the giant tree or off the cliff I was driving by.
Then there were just the depressed days. The days I just didn’t feel motivated to do anything. I would just lay in bed. Literally just lay there. Stare at the walls. Sleep. Some days I would watch tv shows or movies. But even that seemed like too much effort at times. And laying in bed for long periods of time is not a good thing for my back pain that I have from my car accident a couple years ago. It just makes it worse. And I’m fully aware of that....but in that state of mind I didn’t even care. It was a vicious cycle.
I found myself often cancelling on friends. Even to do stuff that I loved, like going to Disneyland. Or just dreading going places that I had already spent the money for, like concerts or Broadways shows.....even though I knew I would enjoy it once I was there. It just seemed like so much effort to go. But the thought of having to pretend I was okay in front of people was so daunting. Always having to put on a smile when inside I felt like I was constantly drowning. And the thought of all the people that would be wherever we would be going was sometimes really stressful. Although, I can’t lie...I still have a hard time with that. I just went to Disneyland today and it was super crowded and I was pretty anxious for most of the time I was there.
If you are somebody that deals with depression, you know that some days you just kind of feel numb. Well, that's basically how I felt most of the time. So I started to try to find ways to self medicate or to try to feel something. Anything. I developed some pretty bad habits involving drugs and alcohol. Again, not as bad as I could have....I know some people get pretty bad into drugs and what not. I was always able to function on things I was doing. But I was pretty consistently high over the last year. And I would probably be an alcoholic if I could afford it. Not that I could afford the drug habit at times. Both are a pretty expensive habit. There were even times when I abused the medications I was prescribed. Especially once I found out they weren't doing me any good and my psychiatrist wouldn't listen to me. I quickly learned that crushing up one of my klonopins and sniffing it up my nose would give me a quick high and get rid of my anxiety a lot faster than taking it the way I was supposed to.
I also found myself browsing Craigslist more and more frequently looking for random guys to hookup with. NOT my proudest moments. Sooooo stupid and dangerous. I’m lucky nothing bad ever happened. But, again, just looking to feel something....and that would always give me a rush. Probably because it was so dangerous.
I came to the realization that I had a serious problem when I was keeping a lot of this from even my best friends. Because normally I tell my best friends everything. They know everything about me. And if I was ashamed or embarrassed to tell them something about myself, something was not right. So obviously something here needed to change.
So one other good thing that came of this year is that I finally found a therapist that I LOVE. Which is pretty crazy, considering I have no insurance and I found her at a low income clinic. I have been to several over the years and I have never really liked any of them. I've never had one that I trusted 100%. So I was never 100% honest with them or myself, which really doesn't do anybody any good. And it always was just kind of a game for me when I would go in, to see how much crazy I wanted to let them in on. I had decided this time, before even going in actually, that I needed to fully commit and be honest about everything, and then it turned out that it was a good fit, so it just worked out all around.
So she has been helping me a lot the last couple of months with all of this stuff. Things seem to be going well. And now that I may actually be on a combination of medications that are possibly working I’m more hopeful. I've been on a higher dosage for about a month now, so I won't know for sure for a couple more weeks, but so far so good. I know there is still quite a stigma attached to being on the type of medications I'm on, and I always had a hard time with that as a kid and teenager. But after going part of my life not on anything and then through this year not on the right ones and seeing how low I got, it's worth it. I would recommend to anybody that thinks it might help them to try it. Even a low dose of something could do wonders. Not everybody is as crazy as me and needs the whole pharmacy ;)
I will say I do believe that everything happens for a reason. So maybe I needed this crappy year for the good parts to happen. Maybe I wouldn’t have gotten the help I needed if I hadn’t gotten as bad as I did. So in a way, even though it was the worst year, maybe it was the best year. And, as I said earlier, I’m so grateful for my close friends and family that have helped me through everything. Obviously P and J for all they do for me, H for always giving me a place to crash when I need to get away and for everything else, L, L, M, and K. You know who you are. Thank you and I love you all. :)
And here’s to hopefully a better and healthier 2012.
Those of you that know me very well, know that I have struggled with depression and anxiety for most of my life. My parents took me to doctors and psychiatrists and therapists when I was a kid trying to figure out what was wrong with me and what to do with me. I was diagnosed with different things, such as Intermittent Explosive Disorder and Hypoglycemia. Which I recently found out were probably not the case. But I'll talk about that in a bit.
So this year I kind of hit my rock bottom. Now that's just my rock bottom. Thankfully I didn't get as bad as I probably could have. I know a lot of people that go through much worse before they are able to pick themselves up. But it got bad for me personally. I started spiraling back in January. My therapist recently asked me what I thought had started me going downhill, and I had already been thinking about it, so it was fairly easy for me to pinpoint.
At the beginning of the year, my two best friends in the whole world, had discussed the possibility of dating each other. Now, this probably doesn't sound like a big deal to most people, but our situation is hardly normal. ;) The three of us have been best friends for many, many years. I'll call them P and J. ;) P and J are both gay, and I refer to them as my gusbands. (gay husbands, for those of you not so quick on the uptake) I am very close to both of them, yet my relationship with each of them is very different. First of all they have both absolutely ruined men for me....they are both such genuine, kind, caring guys who are so dear and important to me and I would do anything for either one of them. They’ve both been there for me always, with open arms and without judgement of any kind. I always compare every guy I ever date to them and they never compare, so I probably should stop doing that. :o)
I should probably also point out that P is the only person I have ever been in love with. Many years ago, before he came out of the closet, I was certain he was the guy I was supposed to marry. And he had mentioned it a couple of times....but I think that was just because of the pressure he was feeling from church, etc. because that's what he was expected to do. But I'm not going to go into that here and now because my purpose today is certainly not to offend people. So anyways....long story, semi short....J was in town for a week or so and both of them were coming to me separately, asking me questions and advice about the situation. J was staying with me, so in the mornings before P would get there we'd talk about stuff, and then after J would go to sleep, P would stay later and we'd talk about stuff. But they hadn't actually talked to each other. It became a bit of a stressful situation for me. Which I know they did not intend for that, it's just how my brain reacted.
I wasn't sure how I felt about the possibility of them dating. On one hand it was perfect. On the other hand I knew I would somehow always be left out, even though it was unintentional. And what if it didn't work out? Would I have to choose sides? I couldn't do that. So they finally talked about it one of the last nights that J was in town and decided not to date. I was both sad and relieved at the same time. Then we all talked about it together. I know part of the reason was because of me. Part of the decision was because they felt it wasn't worth risking any of our relationships. Which has left me feeling a little bit guilty at times. I know it shouldn't, because I'm not the sole reason....but it does a little bit. So something during that very emotionally stressful week triggered something in my brain that kind of made me shut down in a way. But they both know I certainly don’t blame them for any of this and we’ve talked about it since. It just is what it is and I love both of them to death.
One of the hardest, and constant things I've dealt with throughout the year is medication changes. Late in 2010 I had finally got into a local clinic's psychiatry program after being on a waiting list. Ever since then, I have been changing medications or changing doses of medications every couple months, trying to figure out the right combination. I've had some crazy side effects and crazy withdrawal symptoms that I wouldn't wish on anybody.
At one point I was sleeping 20 hours a day. And at the opposite side of the spectrum one gave me insomnia. Some that would make me sick anytime I tried to eat anything. Some that make me want to eat everything in sight. One that gave me migraines. A couple that made me super irritable and short tempered. One that made me stutter and not remember words. One that just made me a zombie....I would just kind of sit there and exist. (which would have been horrible if I was on that one during the zombie apocalypse...talk about being in the wrong place at the wrong time) One of the ones I'm on now makes soda taste flat. And they all make you dizzy. Every single one. Just weird stuff. And the withdrawals are worse.
Part of the problem I was also having is the fact that the psychiatrist at this clinic I have been dealing with is somebody that I do not like. And I've felt that she has not listened to me. At times I would practically have to get into arguments with her to get her to give me what I felt I needed.
One good thing that happened, and I can not thank my aunt enough for setting this up for me (another person who has been incredibly supportive of me through all of this)....was when I took a trip to Utah back in August. I was able to meet with a friend of hers who is a clinical psychologist and pain management specialist. He was just the nicest person and invited me to his house to chat. He was able to tell me what I had after only talking to me for about 20 minutes. I was Bipolar. Which I've always thought I probably was. Other doctors had mentioned that as a possibility, but never officially diagnosed me.
If you don't know exactly what that means.....the easiest readers digest definition of bipolar: Giant mood swings. You go between the high mania parts which consists of euphoria and super energy to the super low of major depression. With a lot of people the mood swings may only occur a few times a year.
More specifically we talked about the fact that I am probably rapid cycle bipolar with possible mixed states. Which means that I personally can have the cycle so quickly that I can literally have both the mania and the depression at the exact same time. While he was explaining this to me I just remember feeling like a light was clicking on in my head. Yes! Yes! Yes! That's exactly how I feel! Nobody has ever explained it to me like that before. Apparently that particular diagnoses is pretty rare and very difficult to diagnose. So now I knew what was wrong with me.
Then came a rush of emotions. Happiness to finally know. Sadness to know that it's going to take time to treat. Anger that nobody could ever figure it out before. I'd been living for 30 years, taking how many medications that were doing me absolutely no good. Because if you are bipolar, taking just an antidepressant can actually feed into your mania. And he told me that all the things I had been diagnosed with as a child and teenager, they are now finding out are possible misdiagnoses for people that are bipolar. Yay, I was a guinea pig.
So when I went back to my psychiatrist here and told her what this other doctor had said, she didn't want to believe it. Her response was "well, I don't really think you are bipolar because you don't hear voices or have hallucinations." SERIOUSLY!??!!? I'm not telling you I'm schizophrenic! And then she also made a comment about not liking to "put labels on people." Well guess what lady....you became a psychiatrist. It's your freakin’ job. I'm asking you to put a label on me and send me on my merry way. It took me really putting my foot down and basically telling her that I don't trust her and flat out telling her that I don't think she listens to me, to put me on the right medications I needed to be treated with for bipolar.
So since the first half the year I was getting medications that weren't helping (and dealing with the crappy side effects for no reason), I was pretty much just feeling defeated all the time. Whenever I would be feeling manic I would spend insane amounts of money on the STUPIDEST things. Like, seriously.
Did I need 150 glow sticks? No. Not even remotely.
Have I used the wood drill? Saw? Drill? See I don’t even remember what it is. No....it's still sitting in box it was delivered in, not even opened. At least I'm assuming that's what's in that box...maybe I should check.
Did I need a Roku? Well, I could use it, but I haven't opened it.
Do I need 100 Sharpies? Yes...that ones not stupid. You can never have too many Sharpies. That was a trick question.
I also spent probably thousands of dollars on music....but that’s acceptable I think. Music is so important to me and at times music was the only thing that kept me going. So if you ever need to load up an iPod.....give me a call.
If I wasn’t manic spending money doing online shopping a lot of nights would be spent just pacing in my room. I would just be super anxious. A lot. All of the time. If you’ve never experienced anxiety....probably the best way to describe it, at least the way I feel it, is like a giant weight sitting on or pushing on your chest, so that you have a hard time breathing. And a feeling like everything is closing in on you. And some of your senses are kind of heightened. Like noises seem 10 times louder than they really are. And sometimes for me this would last for days. Or sometimes I would have a full blown anxiety/panic attack where it would escalate to the point where I thought I was going to explode. And maybe that is the best way to describe it....you kind of do explode. I would hyperventilate. I would shake. I would not be able to stop moving. And sometimes it would be so bad I would find that I would actually start biting on the knuckle of my thumb. I didn’t actually realize I was doing this until after the fact.....like it was my brain’s way of trying to focus all the pressure that was trying to escape into one place. The first time that happened it really freaked me out. Like I wasn’t crazy enough already....
Sometimes I would just need to drive. Just that feeling of moving would help a bit. But that could sometimes be a double edged sword, because if I was having the depression part too, it would be hard to get the thoughts out of my head of wanting to just ram my car into the giant tree or off the cliff I was driving by.
Then there were just the depressed days. The days I just didn’t feel motivated to do anything. I would just lay in bed. Literally just lay there. Stare at the walls. Sleep. Some days I would watch tv shows or movies. But even that seemed like too much effort at times. And laying in bed for long periods of time is not a good thing for my back pain that I have from my car accident a couple years ago. It just makes it worse. And I’m fully aware of that....but in that state of mind I didn’t even care. It was a vicious cycle.
I found myself often cancelling on friends. Even to do stuff that I loved, like going to Disneyland. Or just dreading going places that I had already spent the money for, like concerts or Broadways shows.....even though I knew I would enjoy it once I was there. It just seemed like so much effort to go. But the thought of having to pretend I was okay in front of people was so daunting. Always having to put on a smile when inside I felt like I was constantly drowning. And the thought of all the people that would be wherever we would be going was sometimes really stressful. Although, I can’t lie...I still have a hard time with that. I just went to Disneyland today and it was super crowded and I was pretty anxious for most of the time I was there.
If you are somebody that deals with depression, you know that some days you just kind of feel numb. Well, that's basically how I felt most of the time. So I started to try to find ways to self medicate or to try to feel something. Anything. I developed some pretty bad habits involving drugs and alcohol. Again, not as bad as I could have....I know some people get pretty bad into drugs and what not. I was always able to function on things I was doing. But I was pretty consistently high over the last year. And I would probably be an alcoholic if I could afford it. Not that I could afford the drug habit at times. Both are a pretty expensive habit. There were even times when I abused the medications I was prescribed. Especially once I found out they weren't doing me any good and my psychiatrist wouldn't listen to me. I quickly learned that crushing up one of my klonopins and sniffing it up my nose would give me a quick high and get rid of my anxiety a lot faster than taking it the way I was supposed to.
I also found myself browsing Craigslist more and more frequently looking for random guys to hookup with. NOT my proudest moments. Sooooo stupid and dangerous. I’m lucky nothing bad ever happened. But, again, just looking to feel something....and that would always give me a rush. Probably because it was so dangerous.
I came to the realization that I had a serious problem when I was keeping a lot of this from even my best friends. Because normally I tell my best friends everything. They know everything about me. And if I was ashamed or embarrassed to tell them something about myself, something was not right. So obviously something here needed to change.
So one other good thing that came of this year is that I finally found a therapist that I LOVE. Which is pretty crazy, considering I have no insurance and I found her at a low income clinic. I have been to several over the years and I have never really liked any of them. I've never had one that I trusted 100%. So I was never 100% honest with them or myself, which really doesn't do anybody any good. And it always was just kind of a game for me when I would go in, to see how much crazy I wanted to let them in on. I had decided this time, before even going in actually, that I needed to fully commit and be honest about everything, and then it turned out that it was a good fit, so it just worked out all around.
So she has been helping me a lot the last couple of months with all of this stuff. Things seem to be going well. And now that I may actually be on a combination of medications that are possibly working I’m more hopeful. I've been on a higher dosage for about a month now, so I won't know for sure for a couple more weeks, but so far so good. I know there is still quite a stigma attached to being on the type of medications I'm on, and I always had a hard time with that as a kid and teenager. But after going part of my life not on anything and then through this year not on the right ones and seeing how low I got, it's worth it. I would recommend to anybody that thinks it might help them to try it. Even a low dose of something could do wonders. Not everybody is as crazy as me and needs the whole pharmacy ;)
I will say I do believe that everything happens for a reason. So maybe I needed this crappy year for the good parts to happen. Maybe I wouldn’t have gotten the help I needed if I hadn’t gotten as bad as I did. So in a way, even though it was the worst year, maybe it was the best year. And, as I said earlier, I’m so grateful for my close friends and family that have helped me through everything. Obviously P and J for all they do for me, H for always giving me a place to crash when I need to get away and for everything else, L, L, M, and K. You know who you are. Thank you and I love you all. :)
And here’s to hopefully a better and healthier 2012.
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