Are You My Mother?

Who am I now? I keep thinking of my eldest brother's favorite book Are You My Mother. A Dr. Suess book. I don't even consider Oldest Brother a member of my family and doubt that he does me. But you remember little things. Like how my mother says my favorite song as a child was "Rockin' Robbin" and Teacher's was "Born To Run" or some other song by 'The Boss'. But I associate Oldest Brother with "Are You My Mother" and so I can't help but have him in my head, in the background, as I try to figure out who I am.

I talked to Hunter the other day and tried to explain that who I am seems so undecided, so kaleidoscopic. Simply a Girl with the disorder, SAG without the disorder, SAG with the disorder but without the medication. Who knows what I was meant to be. I could have never have had the onset of "fucked up" and been a different person. I could have had the onset of "fucked up" and ignored it and been a different person. Instead, here I am, someone who has been dutifully medicated for, let's see, at least 6 years. For at least six years I've taken the meds because I know I need them. I know they help me function and lead a "normal" life. I function, I work, I'm productive, I'm not crazy. Still, I do sometimes wonder where I would have ended up if I'd never realized my problem, if I'd never taken the pills. Dead or hooking under and overpass, I'm sure, but still, one wonders.

It's hard to live a life that is controlled by medication. At least it is for me. Without my downers I might spiral into mania. Without my uppers I might slip into depression. If I feel too sad or too happy I have to wonder if that is really how I feel or if I just need to take a pill. I can never trust my own emotions because they are biologically unreliable.

On most occasions, I don't even think of it, I just take my pills like vitamins. But I guess the divorce hit me hard and as I try to figure out who I am now, I wonder who I could have been if not for genetics. If I wasn't bipolar, would J and I have had a happy life? If I wasn't bipolar would we ever have worked at all? Multiple Sclerosis never factors into it because he was my biggest supporter. It's my mental condition, I believe, that drew us apart. Not even that but personalities. Still. One wonders what other life might have been out there if only for a normal regulation of neurotransmitters. MS is just a the icing on the cake.

I sometimes think the MS is easier to handle than the bipolar.

Mending the cracks

I had a bit of a nervous collapse yesterday and ended up spending the day at home, on the couch, watching episodes of Nero Wolfe and occasionally crying and shaking. It was no fun, obviously, and I was ruined for the day, totally incapable of doing anything. If I wasn't on the couch I was in bed reading. Someone knocked, loudly, on my door and I almost had a panic attack. I lay very still, trying to control my breathing, waiting for them to go away. Then I got up and shut my bedroom door to have an added layer of protection between me and the world.

The reason this happened is pretty basic and can be summed up by blaming it on "life". The specific factors involved are MS, my separation from J, and Manager. That should be enough without my going into it. I will, eventually, but I'm not exactly Miss Mental Wellness 2012 right now, although I'm far better than I was yesterday. So instead of talking about the specifics of what brought me so close to the edge of sanity, I thought I'd share the two things that helped me get through the day.

The first is short and incredibly sweet and is due to Boss who said the following in an email to me:

"As I tell my daughter - now is the perfect time to make a clean sweep of bygones and what could have beens and go forward and enjoy what life has to offer because you deserve so much more than what has been dealt to you up until this point."

Tell me you wouldn't be loyal as fuck to a woman like that?

The second is courtesy of my friend Hunter, who made me laugh throughout the day by chatting with me on and off and telling me about his birthday (which it was yesterday). I'm not going to go into it because I haven't been able to figure out the best way to put the story into words in order to have you grasp the hilarity, but I did want him to know just how thankful I am. I will say, however, that it involves an annual physical exam. Hunter knew how fucked up I was and so he graciously shared an embarrassing moment in his life (and one he goes through every year on his birthday) while I laughed uproariously and had to keep trying to smother myself so neighbors wouldn't hear. I only wish he kept a fucking blog so he could tell his own story as I don't know that I'd get it right.

I've said before that I am incredibly lucky and grateful to have the friends and loved ones that I do. Boss, who is a good friend and former employer, and Hunter, who is hands down my best friend, fall into those categories, friends and loved ones. Not only were they incredibly kind to me whilst I was freaking out, they made me feel like it was OK that it was happening, and offered me support in their own way. Boss offered me encouragement and love. Hunter offered me laughter and a way to pull me out of myself just long enough to perk up and feel a bit more like my old self.

I don't know if I'll get back to my old self exactly, although I expect I will do so. But continual support and hilarious stories are the best medicine I think I've ever had. And fortunately for me, I have a lot of people who offer me their support and I'm pretty sure that between Hunter and J, I'll never be without laughter.

And now I have to start relying on myself again and I have to take myself in hand. I have to get out of bed (it is 11:10 after all) and take a shower. I have to go to the cable company and drop off my cable box, which I should have done last week.  I have to play with Johan and make sure he is happy and OK. I have to start going through the motions of life again and stop just laying around indulging myself. $10 says I make it to the cable company and then shutter myself back in my apartment huddled in bed.
 

Would I, Wouldn't I?

The shots have gotten a lot better. I still have some itching but I don't freak out like I did. Actually, I was driving home from work, dead tired and knowing that I had to go to the pet store to buy things for my lord and master, The Destruktor, when I realized that I don't think about the fact that I have MS like I used to. I had a delivery of medication at work on Thursday and forgot about it, leaving it in the break room refrigerator. I just don't obsess like I used to. This is, obviously, awesome and to be expected, and I'm over the moon that it has only take a few months, but it got me thinking about my other chronic and life long problem, that of bi polar disorder.

I haven't read a great deal about mental illness. Yes, I have a BA in Psychology and I find that subject fascinating, but I mainly enjoy individual and group psychology as it applies to human dynamics. I don't go scouring journals to read up on treatments or anything. But I did once read that many of those who have suffered from unipolar depression for years often are afraid of the drugs, not because of side effects or anything, but because, well, without the depression they've suffered for so long, who are they? Don't quote me, as I'm probably wrong, but I feel like I learned this from Elizabeth Wurtzel, one of my favorite authors.

It got me thinking. If someone came and told me that they could make me no longer suffer from bi polar disorder, would I accept that offer? I don't know. We often think about what we would tell our younger selves and if I could speak to 17 year old Cat, I would definitely scream "get help!There is something wrong with you that is treatable and you don't have to be so unhappy and fucked up!" I would do that to keep from having the memories of embarrassing times, of humiliating times, of stupid decisions. But 17 was a long time ago. I'm still proud of 22 year old Cat for recognizing the signs of bi polar disorder and seeking treatment, even though I wasn't very good about taking my pills for some time. But it has been seven years since I've been on the puppy uppers and doggy downers and they've done wonders for me, even if I don't have the same brain chemistry as a 'normal' person.

Would I accept the offer to no longer be bi polar now? I don't know. If someone said they could take away the MS without replacing it with something worse, I'd jump on that shit like I'd jump on Jude Law's cock. But bi polar is different because at this stage, I don't remember what it is like to have anything different. I don't remember what it was like to have emotions and moods and feelings without the control of pills.  Someone once asked me, someone who knew of my 'condition', if bi polar individuals are more self absorbed than others. I didn't take offense, not right away, but just considered the question and responded "I don't know. I no longer know what it is like to be NOT bi polar."

And that's really it. This is what I know. Maybe I'd be really great, really smart, funny, witty, and wonderful. But maybe I'd be stodgy and boring. Maybe I'd be a version of me that I didn't know. I wonder what would be worse, being a me that I know that people didn't like, or a version of me that people did like because I wasn't really me anymore.

The fact of the matter is that right now this isn't really something I have to deal with because science hasn't figured it out yet. There are simple questions that I can answer readily, such as yes, I would like to be just a bit taller, a lot thinner, have a bigger rack, have better hair, be more poised, sophisticated, and controlled. But I think I'd be happier having those things if I could still be me, even considering how much of me I dislike. I'm familiar to myself, as we all are, and as much as I rail against and complain about it, it's what I know.

Right Brain Wrong Brain

Yesterday was clearly not one of my better days. Despite the fact that I've been taking medication regularly for years, I still have intensely low moments when I feel devoid of any joy, color, or reason. I met my first day of 2012 with one of these moments. To be fair, it wasn't simply a matter of my screwy brain this time. There were two events that precipitated my melt down and, because I'm so wholly oblivious at times, I did not prepare myself.

The first occurred during the early afternoon when J came over to pick up his new health insurance cards. He also took a number of his belongings that have been stored in my office since he left in July. I told him that there were a few crates I had to go through because they had both of our belongings. He civilly but coldly said "I'd appreciate if you would take care of that as soon as possible." I felt like he'd hit me. We didn't laugh once when he was here and it was all business. I walked around for hours reminding myself that I had no right to be sad and asking myself if it was better for him to hate me.

The second event happened in the evening when I was giving myself an injection. Everyone thinks I have a great attitude about having MS but I still have my moments. I flipped out and called my mother and just sobbed because I don't want to give myself shots anymore. My thighs both have sore spots, large lumps, from where I assume I must have hit the muscle. My right thigh has a red mark that I'm fairly certain is a burn from an ice pack. So I called my mother and told her that I didn't want to do this anymore and that I didn't think it was fair for me to get all the 'weird' problems when my brothers don't seem to have anything at all wrong with them. I wouldn't wish for either of them to have MS, of course not, but I will occasionally get very self pitying and cry about how it isn't fair.

So that's what happened, or at least, what I think happened in my easily primed brain. Sometimes I am incredibly tired and want to just give up. I used to assume that we all had times like that but I'm beginning to understand that what I think about is a bit different. I don't think about running away from my problems by going on a vacation or quitting my job for something in a different industry. No, I think about just quitting entirely and killing myself. Right brain. Left brain. Right brain. Wrong brain.

Suicide can be a very selfish thing and that's generally what keeps me from coming up with actual plans. I think about the people who I would hurt, especially those who have had a hard time recently. I think about how unfair it would be to make my family deal with something like that; not just the me being dead bit, but the dealing with hearing the news, dealing with the logistics of death (removal of my body, what to do with it, notifying relatives, dealing with all of my belongings). I think about how Johan might be neglected for days before someone found me and how he might not like wherever he ended up.

But I also know, or at very least hope, that these intensely low moments will fade away eventually and that if I'm patient and stick it out, I'll get back to the self that enjoys life and is more likely to joke or giggle than sob and despair. I can cry and be upset and wrapped myself in blankets on my sofa and be distraught but if I just wait, if I can just wait a god damned second, it will pass. The terror that it might not is the most difficult part of these moments but I am absurdly good at avoiding thinking about things that scare me. 

Writing so as to have a record helps with that fear because if I can look back and see that I've been through this before, I'm more likely to feel certain that I'll be OK again. I find yesterday's post incredibly embarrassing. I don't know why and I don't care why but I do. However, I know myself well enough to know that I have to leave it so that the next time my wrong brain takes over, I can look through my posts and see that I'll come through. It was one nightmarish day out of how many perfectly fine days?

Death Rattle

Do you ever seriously think about suicide? About how you really can run away from your life forever? I do. I sometimes just think, "fuck this, fuck all of this" and think about taking the pills washed down with vodka, that would help me end it all. I suppose that is surprising, given that I'm a cutter but I'm afraid of pain so I would never take my wrists as a way out.

But I think about it from time to time. How much better it might be if I just killed myself. Killed myself. That sounds awful doesn't it? I love life. I love all that life has to offer. But sometimes life is just too much and I want to stop it. I want to stop the feeling, the experiencing, the living. Sometimes I feel that going to sleep forever and having my brain stop would be the best thing.

I'm not going to do it right now so please don't call my mother and make her worry. I know that I have an obligation to a few people and that to kill myself would hurt them. I also know that my life is fantastic and that I have nothing to complain about. It's just my stupid, worthless, broken brain.

But it hurts. Sometimes it hurts all day, ever day. I am on medication but that isn't enough to combat life, I suppose. Someone said, and was correct, we are all born with a death rattle.

The Age of Bi-Polar Disordered Celebrities

Can you name these famous faces?

 

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