In Response to Comments on Previous Post

As usual, the comment discussion led to lots more writing – enough to make a post. Here are some points.
More than one person commented on the “pain” expressed in the last post. That surprises me; actually, despite being numb, at least things are stable. I wouldn’t have thought to describe things as terrible pain; if [...]

“I wept not, so to stone within I grew”

Io non piangea, si` dentro impetrai.
-Inferno, Canto 33
It is 3:40 AM, the witching hour, and my being awake cannot be a good sign.
Of course, I have been awake at this hour every day for quite some time now. Maybe wanting to get up and write is a good sign.
Things here are, well, empty. I suppose [...]

Yet another Shrink’s Line of the Day

Yesterday I decide that I feel bad about quitting the shrink all abruptly and in a rage. That I didn’t want to end like that, if just out of politeness. I really wanted to call and leave a message apologizing, and wishing him a happy holiday. I said that I was going to be the [...]

Enough

I finally wrote what I thought was a reasonable letter to the shrink, since he never seemed to hear what I said…about how I can’t live in the dark about what is wrong with me or how to fix it, that I was deeply hurt and concerned about the borderline thing, etc. I hoped that [...]

Still alive, beyond comfort of man or spirit

Thank you to everyone who left me comments or emails or anything. All much appreciated. Sorry I haven’t written back.
I am, indeed, still alive. In fact, the longer days are making some things easier. But I don’t feel better, am not getting better, am just biding time, this version of bardo, laced with apathy and [...]

I was so proud of her

I saw a patient the other night with a ton of psych meds in the ER for something unrelated. She was neither young nor old.
(Incidentally – definition of “a ton of psych meds” = more psych meds than me.)
And she was totally normal. If I hadn’t read the list of meds, I never would have [...]

I did not see this coming

The latest in my escapades – no essays or deep thoughts or medical stuff here, just my personal update.
The anxious racing episode, naturally, crashed into a depression that hit hard and fast. Or maybe not so fast, but I didn’t feel it until it was out of control.
I think I am more and more becoming [...]

Here we go again

New appointment.
New level of truth telling by me.
New drug.
One (low) dose of fluvoxamine down.
Hours later: paralytic sleep, the kind where you know you are asleep but can’t move and can’t wake up.
Woken up by nausea. At the same time, phone call from work.
Vomit for 15 minutes, not very successfully. Do not feel better. (It’s central [...]

Crying at the shrink

I did cry at the shrink’s the other day, and that was strange, because I’m usually so hard and in control. But I was so strung out by anxiety and three days of no sleep from the bupropion that it took me a few minutes to even calm down enough to talk (this kind of [...]

Don’t let me slip away

I want to write a post about a self-harm patient I saw last night. (Seriously – I guess the message for what I should be doing with my life is clear, medical treatment for crazies. I went maybe 9 months without seeing any psych patients and then this stretch of them just when I’m ready [...]

Cyclothymia as a personality disorder; hormones and moods

I have had a partial response at least to the bupropion. Because of the anxiety it causes, I haven’t been overly eager to up the dose so I am still on half a normal dose. I can’t get anything done and feel bad a lot of the time, but I am not wallowing in my [...]

Another psych patient. Could the signs be any clearer?

Another psych patient just fell on me last night. (Not the two other cases I didn’t write about.) We had split the night up and gone to bed – two hours and twenty minutes for each of the three of us on call. Two patients came in on my watch with abdominal pain. One was [...]

What is the universe trying to tell me with this?

As far as how I’m doing, it’s close to an exact copy of this post, so I won’t go into it. I had a very nice call night, though, now that I’m feeling slightly better. Actually, it was a horrific call night, in that patients kept coming in nonstop for the whole night. The volume [...]

Psych Meds I Have Taken

Someone recently  blogged a full list, I thought it was kind of interesting, so once again, I’m bumping a substantial post down the ladder for this one. Here is my list; feel free to add your own:

Prozac (when it was new and pretty  much the only thing on the market)
Zoloft
Nortriptyline (my wonder drug, which I [...]

Physical Versus Mental Illness

In an unpublished email, Milo wrote this comment to me:
Personally speaking, i passed a kidney stone last year, and being dead honest here, i’d  much rather the physical illness than having a paranoid episode… i really really do. i tell you one thing Sara, the pain was absolutely horrendous, but no one laughed at me. [...]