Driving myself to the brink

Wow, I am a hot mess. I knew I shouldn't have opened my mouth. I was sitting there feeling panic coming on; hands shaking, heart pounding, stomach acids churning. But I did it anyway. We had just read a story in the Big Book called Crossing the River of Denial, about a woman who realized there was no point in continuing to drink. In there, she says, after losing her job, "thank goodness I was sober or I probably would have killed myself."

So I opened up to the group. "I lost my job four months into my sobriety, and like this woman, I think I would be dead if I weren't sober." I was shaking, my eye twitching, my heart pounding. I don't know what else I said, but I could barely get anything sensible out. I made it short.

This seems to happen every time I open my mouth and talk about anything except how much something costs or whether the newspaper was delivered this morning. I can do work in the store, but I can't talk to anyone else about anything else without bringing on a panic attack.

On the drive home, I knew I shouldn't be driving. I could feel the car expanding around me: the cockpit was becoming large enough for a giant. It was just me and the steering wheel. Everything else was moving farther away from me. Then a bus pulled up behind me and passed to the left. It was so big! The bus just overwhelmed me even in my gigantic car.

I made it to the parking garage. Oh, God, now I have to back in to the tight space. Breathe, breathe. I did it. I shouldn't have been driving. I wanted to stay for another meeting but my dad needs the car. I feel like I should just take another Zyprexa and call it a night.

Don't cut our budget

In the late nineties, early 2000's I worried a lot about hospital bed availability. My mom was constantly in need of one, and it seems that she was always able to find a place just for a night. I never really worried that they take her in; she was always dripping blood by the time it came to that, but I always knew they would release her before anything good could come of that visit. She was homeless and unable to pay anything, and so she would usually just stay overnight. She was never stable when she left.

And now more states are cutting mental health funding so there will be less places for people like her to go. "Budgets for mental health services in some 30 states were slashed an average of almost $19 million in 2009 and more than $24 million in 2010." That's hundreds of beds gone, nurses out of work, and mentally ill people still out on the streets with no where to go to get stabilized.

I don't know what's happening with cuts in our area, but I'm sure it's a lot different than it was. Just look at all the buzz in Texas about cutting their mental health services, again. Lots of states are following that trend, even after the tragedy in Arizona brought mental illness back into the light.

Where do the acutely mentally ill go when they're released prematurely or can't get in to treatment? They go back to families who can't handle them, back to suffering in silence, and often back to the streets.

That's where my mom would go. Back out to the streets or into housing my family paid for, when she could tolerate housing. Luckily, we had the resources to help her. But what about people without resources? Who've alienated their families, or have no family? Without the help of the government, these people end up homeless, in jail, or dead.

So go ahead and cut the mental health budgets. See what happens. Don't say I didn't warn you.

Zyprexa wants me to gain weight

I can feel my body pushing up against my jeans, wanting to burst out the other side. All around the hips the pants are pushing in and up, making burbles of fat roll over my waistline. I swear these pants used to fit. I wore them last week and they weren't this tight. I have a serious problem, here. If these pants don't fit, what about all my work pants?

It's only been 3 days on the Zyprexa and already I can't stop eating. I feel fatter by the moment.

"The average weight gain for an adult or adolescent patient on Zyprexa is 20 pounds in three months. Some patients have put on as much as 60 pounds. 90% of patients on Zyprexa not only put on weight, but on excessive weight." Read that again. See it? 90%. 90. That's almost everyone. Makes me want to give up now.

They use Zyprexa for anorexics because it makes you eat (and, of course, it does other good things). It's like smoking pot and getting the munchies. You don't know what you want, but you'll try a taste of everything just to see if it's good, and then you can't go wasting it....

I wish I could say I didn't care, and just let it do it's thing, but I do care. I don't want to gain weight. Again, we're back to square one: exercise. I can't eat any better, since I'm living on good foods (and the occasional ice cream sandwich or kit kat), but I can exercise. God, just thinking about it is exhausting.

Sleep the day away

Lying there in my near catatonic state the other night, I heard my dad come in to my room, lean over, and turn off the light by my bed. I knew he was there, but there was no way I could have the energy to say thank you. I woke up late the next day, dashing out of my room to get to work, and there he was, still sitting in his recliner. The poor man has insomnia.

He's been awake for three days on around 5 hours of sleep. He sits in his recliner and reads the paper or watches old movies on the movie channel. He waits for sleep to come and it never does.

On the other side of the apartment there's me with hypersomnia. All I can do is sleep. I wake up only to feed, and then I'm back down, sunk into my comforter.

Both insomnia and hypersomnia have nasty side effects, from heart disease to relationship problems. We're a mess of sleep disorders here at my house. I know mine is med and depression related, but who knows what's wrong with dad.

Boring myself

Yesterday I was fighting the nausea and working full-time to keep upright. It was a zombie attack, leading me to sleep the entire day away. And then came today. Today, I've got a little manic energy going on. I can't stop tapping my foot. Tap, tap, tap, go my toes. I'm wandering around the store looking for things to do, and new things to eat. I just want to chew. I don't feel full at all, and I've eaten 2 of those oatmeal bars already.

I can't think enough to think if I feel depressed, still. I'm just here on the surface. I have no feelings. I'm shaky. My nose is stuffy from the Celexa.

Tap, tap, tap. There's nothing on the internet. I could delve into the news, but the world is on fire and falling apart and I want nothing to do with it right now. So what to do with myself? I think I'll check all the laundry tags and make sure everything is priced. Exciting!

Om

Meditation is said to be good for your brain. "The researchers report that those who meditated for about 30 minutes a day for eight weeks had measurable changes in gray-matter density in parts of the brain associated with memory, sense of self, empathy and stress."

Part of AA's suggestions are that you pray and meditate. It's tough, at first, to quiet your brain down, but you're not looking for a perfectly silent brain. In meditation, it's all about sitting quietly and noticing what your body is doing. Concentrating on the breathe, breathing in and out slowly.

There are a ton of guided meditation links and podcasts out there. Some are as simple as listening to rain drops fall or ocean waves. Others are people discussing aspects of life and asking you to relax as you follow along. One of the people I like for meditating is Tara Brach for meditating. She's funny, and tells some good stories. I also like listening to American Indian drums. I haven't found a good website yet, but there are some podcasts out there.

Meditation is a great way to just calm down when you're too far up. Of course, that's the hardest thing to do when you're agitated; stop and be calm. I know I have tons of trouble just getting myself to sit still sometimes. But you can do it. It's good to develop a practice, even if it's just 5 minutes in your car listening to your breathing before you get out and go to work. Or standing in line somewhere, just breath slowly and clean your mind. Meditating doesn't mean you have to have candles lit and a comfortable mat to lie on, though that helps.

I'm late, I'm late!

The snow is crisp out on the vacant lot across from my building. Someone has built a snowman on the tennis courts below. All is quiet on a Sunday morning. And I'm late, again.

I jump out of bed and throw on the first sweater I find in the pile; and there's a pile. My clothes, freshly washed, lie in their hamper and across the bed, waiting to be put away. They've been there for days. Rushing into the kitchen, I grab my purse and find my keys on the counter. Stop. Go back to the bedroom and grab my meds. Can't forget those precious tidbits. Out the door I fly; 11 floors down and into the belly of the building.

Dark. I open the doors, grab the newspapers from the loading dock next door, and turn on the lights. Please don't let there be cockroaches, I think. I check the clock: 9:15. I hope he's not watching the video tapes to see when this place opens. I've been late a few days now. No one would know but me, since I'm the only one here, but I feel guilty all the same.

It's not like me to be late. I'm never late for things. I'm always too early - getting there before the hostess is ready. And now, I'm just so tired. My dreams are vivid, disturbing. I want to cry out but I wake up instead. And then it's late.

I ran out without breakfast, and now everything here looks good. I find a granola bar in my purse and proceed to gnaw it down. Not the same as a real breakfast. And I'm here till 2. What can I eat? Why does my jaw insist on chewing constantly? I must find something. Pretzels: too salty for a lithium body? Oatmeal squares: I could eat 5. My banana is too raw.

So I sit here, hungry, lonely, tired. Waiting for release. My leg twitches to a beat of it's own. Tap, tap, tapping away. I'm antsy.