Coping

I’m angry at how our enlightened society tramples all over people for things that they can’t help.  Many undesirable qualities individuals possess are nothing more or less than what they were born with, raised to, or predisposed toward through no fault of their own– and sometimes you can’t scrub those kinds of things off or rub them out so easily. 

 

 What’s with the judgment, rejection, and pure anger that people dish out when confronted by these things? Worse, why the terrible silence? It’s as if saying anything about these things out loud is the equivalent of stripping naked in public and pointing out bruises and bleeding gashes. People cover their children’s eyes, turn away, or tackle you and wrap you up and put you away. Maybe they’ll laugh at you, pretend they didn’t see you, point you out to a friend, get sick to their stomachs. Maybe they’ll talk down to you or just smile and nod. Or they ignore you and your scars and pretend that everything is normal because they don’t believe in bruises and gashes, or the doctors who stitch them up. They are appalled that you would be so uncouth as to go out of your way to seek medical attention for imaginary injuries. You must be looking for attention, you sick creature. Heaven forbid that anyone should notice your pain and be tricked into caring for you. Worse, someone out there might be making big bucks pretending your injuries are real by mixing up a vat of lies to humor your ignorance. “Thank God I’m normal,” they’ll tell you, “I’m not stupid enough to shell out money for doctors who claim there’s something wrong with the blood oozing out these wounds I refuse to acknowledge. You’re fine. You’re no worse off than the rest of us. Get out of that hospital and get back to being productive like the rest of us miserable people, Idiot!” Properly shamed, you pull a t-shirt over the loose shreds of skin along your back, wincing with pain, and continue to stumble through each moment of the day with the shirt sticking to your back, pulling open any chance of blood clotting you may ever have had. They must be right, after all. You don’t hear anyone else whining that they’re bleeding. Blood is normal. Maybe you are not, but you’d best get busy pretending that you are so that no one else is offended by your laziness.

 

I’m talking about depression, mental illness, mental disorders, emotional disorders, delusions, derangement, disturbed minds, emotional instability, insanity, loss of mind, lunacy, madness, maladjustment, mania, mental disease, mental disorder, mental sickness, nervous breakdown, nervous disorders, neurosis, neurotic disorders, paranoia, personality disorders, phobias, psychopathy, psychosis, schizophrenia, sick minds, troubled minds, unbalanced minds, unsoundness of mind, sheer craziness – choose your weapon.

I mean, term.

We talk about diversity and acceptance, tolerance and compassion, but we do not often use any of these terms in voices above an undertone when discussing someone who is challenged or confronted with them in their real life. It’s uncomfortable. Perhaps we’re afraid it’s contagious? It is sometimes inconvenient for us, and often awkward or uncomfortable. I kind of liken it to having been raised by a racist parent and then going out as an adult and trying as hard as you can not to be a racist yourself. In a way, there’s no such thing as overcompensating for that. How can you love all kinds of people toooo much? But you are always self-conscious, always wondering if you are saying and doing the right thing, and trying so hard not to offend. What I’m saying here is that not everyone is uncomfortable with the subject of mental issues because they despise the people who have them, but they are uncomfortable all the same.

 Imagine how uncomfortable the subject of the conversation must be. How hard it must be to admit that they have any kind of difference from anyone else, or to draw attention to it, or to get help for it. Plenty of people out there are walking around with all kinds of problems and not seeking help. The statistics are high, but I imagine the REAL numbers must be astronomical. We deal with unpleasant people all the time who make us either squirm or want to punch their faces in. Probably it’s not entirely their fault that they’re like that, but how the hell are they supposed to expose themselves as less than perfect in this hardened, injudicious society in order to get treatment? It’s like one of the last remaining forms of condoned racism or abuse (along with violence against women, since the Act has been repealed. That’s right, America – Let’s continue to take steps backward).

Sometimes some things just need to be said. Maybe it’s the teacher in me; maybe just the survivor, but I should be able to explain to co-workers why something gives me an anxiety attack right in front of them, or to Human Resources why I can’t tolerate certain conditions (and shouldn’t have to) without losing my job.  I should be able to mention it without embarrassment or shame, and without judgment, disbelief, or outright laughter. And so should anyone else with any other mental condition that they need to address.

     Oh, and while I’m at it: Let me just point out that it is NOT a handicap. I’m not so sure I like the terms disorder, illness, instability, disturbance, malady, mania, disease, sickness, unsoundness, unbalance, or most certainly not crazy.

 

It’s a challenge. Sometimes it can even be a gift. If anything, it is a part of me, it’s not going away, and neither am I. Instead, I’m going to write about it. I'm going to write about it precisely because it is so hard to talk about. I used to have conversations with my friend Bill, Veteran of Vietnam, about these things. How nice to know that someone else understood what I was experiencing. The validation.

So I may have hinted at it or outright mentioned it before, but I have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

There.

In black and white.

I think possibly in this society that the only thing worse than admitting that you've got a "condition" like this is admitting that you're lonely. People don't know what to do with the information. (And if you admit to them that you're lonely, God forbid, they might actually feel obligated to do something about it. At least with PTSD I've got like the cool mental disorder. Vets have it and stuff. Very cool) 

 

Probably a lot of women have it - one in three, my therapist says.

It's caused by experiencing extreme violence at some point in your life. Some people get it; some people don't. I've been prone to all sorts of madness since a fairly early age. Think of it as a continuation of that time in 7th or 8th grade (both?) that all my hair fell out. I'm a sensitive being, apparently.

Tough, though.

God, I'm tough.

I pull it all together and I look great every single day.

About a year ago, I had a major Post Traumatic Episode that started with months of sleeplessness and ended with me nearly killing myself.

To be clear, I don't want to die.

I love my children and I love so many things about myself. With my writing and painting and teaching, I have so much potential. I love people - all kinds of people - and yes, I love them too much. And I love life in great bright swaths of sound and color; frequently. I frequently love my life.

It's just that the PTSD symptoms can be so harsh at times.

Basically, they change the way you respond to stress.

Your responses don't necessarily match up logically with what is going on.

It's like layers of my past are superimposed across the face of everything I experience.

 

Symptoms (via PubMed Health website)

Symptoms of PTSD fall into three main categories:
1. "Reliving" the event, which disturbs day-to-day activity

• Flashback episodes, where the event seems to be happening again and again
• Repeated upsetting memories of the event
• Repeated nightmares of the event
• Strong, uncomfortable reactions to situations that remind you of the event

2. Avoidance

• Emotional "numbing," or feeling as though you don't care about anything
• Feeling detached
• Being unable to remember important aspects of the trauma
• Having a lack of interest in normal activities
• Showing less of your moods
• Avoiding places, people, or thoughts that remind you of the event
• Feeling like you have no future

3. Arousal

• Difficulty concentrating
• Startling easily
• Having an exaggerated response to things that startle you
• Feeling more aware (hypervigilance)
• Feeling irritable or having outbursts of anger
• Having trouble falling or staying asleep

You might feel guilt about the event (including "survivor guilt"). You might also have some of the following symptoms, which are typical of anxiety, stress, tension:

• Agitation or excitability
• Dizziness
• Fainting
• Feeling your heart beat in your chest
• Headache

I've had a lot of these symptoms for years.
Ignored them.
Eventually that caught up with me.
Because I want to live, I've been getting all the help I need with a combination of medical and mental counsel. I'm trying to build coping mechanisms and a support system, for these are the way toward living with this condition more comfortably.
And that, my friends, is the best prognosis they give you.
It's not something you ever "get over."
You get to keep these symptoms for the rest of your life.
So, basically, after this entry, I don't plan on complaining much about this.
It is what it is.

 

When I walked in to see the counselor on Monday it was so intense it felt like the climax of that horrible Ordinary People movie that Mr. Reese made us watch for his psychology class in high school.

There was supposed to be some big, dramatic reveal at the end where I confessed what the Big Problem REALLY was, and then sobbed a bit, and then everything was gradually all right again.

I don't remember all we talked about, but I'll try to hit the highlights.

 

I remember coming in there and trying to talk to her about what was really going on in my head. I'm actually very good at talking about myself. I get sick of myself, though, and sick of talking. Sometimes it seems like I'd get quicker results if I lit myself on fire and danced at a crossroads somewhere.

She was like, "Go ahead. Talk to me. Spit it out. You can't shock me."

Oh no?

Well, I still have the power to surprize her, that's for certain.

I had brought in emails that I sent to my family while I was experiencing the worst of the most recent PTSD Episode.She read the emails and immediately zeroed in on the suicidal thoughts, as well she should.

And here's the thing.

I don't know why I want to die, so when she asked me outright, I didn't know how to explain it.

A long-held sense of worthlessness.

Fear.

Pain.

Hopelessness.

Switching from 2nd shift hours and meals to regular hours and meals right at the same time as getting on new medication?

Not at all.

None of the above.

Or maybe a little of all of it, but mainly it's that when I have an "episode," I'm not in the same frame or plane of mind as I ordinarily operate from.

The therapist thinks working at the factory re-traumatized me, triggering a bunch of crap that had settled down to the bottom like Chai spice and that even though they've laid me off I'm still experiencing the effects.

Apparently you get to suffer quite awhile before things feel normal again.

 

I told her that I was scared because I actually only had enough pills to get through thate day and then I needed to get back to my sister Thea, who had intercepted them from me at the car and doled out only so much and no more.

Smart cookie, that Thea.

She didn't yell or cry - just held out her hand and asked me to give her all the extra pills that I'd tried and my body had rejected in one side effect or another. I didn't need them all - just the most recently prescribed, and I'd already told her earlier in the week that my therapist thought I should leave the extra ones with her.

I was just hoping she wouldn't notice I'd grabbed them...

"What were you going to do with all those pills?" asked the therapist.

"I wasn't going to take them -" I started.

I stopped.

I admitted, "I just wanted back-up. Like a Plan B."

I fell silent, thinking of my dark little apartment with the walls so like my bedroom growing up. I still had to go home to that, after our time was up.

"Why?" she asked, looking sad. "What is it, Heather? What is so horrible? What's wrong?"

I whispered loudly, "I don't know!"

She looked at me as if she felt I did know, and wasn't telling her.

 

Well, what was I supposed to tell her? She knows my father was a mean drunk and I got molested by a boy that I'd trusted when I was seven and that I'd been re-abused and traumatized by my ex-husband and then was homeless and that I've been rebuilding my entire life up from scratch ever since. I ask you, what more does she need to know?

 

"I'm trying to think - nothing specific - I'm trying to think - I'm trying to tell you - "

"It's okay," she said soothingly, "You're okay. You're safe here."

It was really hard to believe her.

it was crazy.

I was actually starting to panic and hyperventiliate, and my voice was sounding weird - like a child's voice - like Lucy after a nightmare, Lucy alone in the dark.

I started telling her about all the weird, off-the-wall crap from my week staying with brother-in-law Paul and sister Thea in Grand Ledge...

Paul's mom rearranging some flowers behind me while I sat on the couch with Lucy watching t.v. I could hear the rustling. Hear it. Close. Suspicious. I knew what the sound was - a gentle sound - but it rustled at me. I wanted to turn my head and look but the sound wasn't meant for me and there was no need to look. I got all anxious - heart pounding, worrying because I felt like I should be responding in some way and instinctively it would have been to run out of the room or to duck. I could feel all the muscles in my neck tightening, trying to button it all back up again and keep up the facade of normalcy while all the while wanting, waiting to be dead. If I'd been home alone I'd have curled up into a ball and wept, but the thought of Paul's mom being all horrified at these naked emotions kept me still. I mean seriously, if I were to start bawling in front of her I think it would be as horrifying to her as if I had thrown up

on her shoes.

 

Every night I'm over there I go to bed eyes wide, heart pounding - afraid of I don't know what.

What I might hear.

What's going on under the surface.

Only there's nothing there.

it's frustrating that I know nothing is there but I still can't sleep, like I'm afraid it will come in the night after I've closed my eyes...

And sometimes it does.

 

In the van on the way from picking up Lucy last weekend (Thea was driving), I kept having to cover my head with my scarf because the light and the noise was upsetting me so badly.

 

I'm telling the therapist about these odd, disconnected things, and suddenly I'm feeling light-headed and my heart rate speeding up and eyes stretching wide. I'm clutching the arms of the chair and I can hardly breath as I start yelling at the therapist "I'm scared! I'm so scared!"

And I feel such shame and embarassment over having exposed that side of myself - the side that doesn't look and sound absolutely perfect - or even quasi-normal. Whatever the hell normal is supposed to be.

And she has me take deep breaths and is talking me through it, telling me that I've experienced severe trauma in my lifetime -

(Trauma? What trauma? I'm fine!)

- and that these things I'm telling her - all of them - are textbook PTSD and perfectly understandable.

Normal.

Not crazy.

Not crazy?

I re-read my description of the conversation and I have a hard time believing it.

Sounds a little crazy to me.

I want to know what the flowers and the lights have to do with anything.

 

But I guess at least I know that sometimes I freak out at certain lights, sounds, images, attitudes from people - whatever - and that it's sort of like a light gauge on my inner dashboard: Check Engine. PTSD under the hood.

 

I really was hoping it would be more like Algebra, where if you have A and C, you will know what B is.

Nope.

Doesn't work that way.

 

And it is taking FOREVER to figure out what do DO about the symptoms once I've identified them. Stay in the moment. Don't freak out. Don't have any out-of-body experiences. Easier said than done.

I disassociate within a flicker of my eyelid, and half the time don't even realize I've done it; it comes so naturally.

I mean, my friend Bill - He knows if he goes into the woods at twylight with a gun in his hand, he's going to think he's in 'Nam.

So what does Bill do?

He never goes deer hunting.

There's a connection.

 

What am I going to do?

Maybe I can't sit upstairs in a wood-panelled room with people fighting down below.

Too  much like my teen years.

Maybe it's all of Manistee.

I spent some dark days in this little town, but I've always loved the place itself.

Maybe I just need time to adjust to my meds and get on a regular schedule for myself, subbing and seeking full time work that's less abusive and abrasive than the factory. I've half a mind to start painting that mural at the child development center, get involved in the art institute and PFLAG, plays at the Ramsdell - continue work on my Master's Degree. Write. I'm always writing.

 

According to my therapist, I'm not going to just keep snapping back to normalcy at the blink of an eye like I've been trying to do.

It takes time.

It won't happen overnight.

i have to be patient with myself.

Makes me want to go "ARRRGH!" like a Charlie Brown comic.

How does a person ever get a decent job with all this crap going on?

My therapist referred me to Michigan Rehabilitative Services, but it's been months since I had my orientation with them, and I haven't heard a thing since. My therapist hasn't heard from them, so she reminded me of that old adage about the squeaky wheel.

 

I'm angry.

I am one of the people of the world who wants to do a lot very much.

I have dreams and goals and ambitions, and I've always worked very hard to achieve them.

I do not feel that I have time to stop and take care of all this crap that I didn't want and certainly never asked for. It's bad enough that I was a prisoner in a dead-end relationship for so long and feel as if I'm already reinventing myself from scratch at an age when most people I know seem to have settled into their careers and are doing quite well by themselves.

 

But I have to stop.

I have to stop and determine that I am worth the time and the effort.

I'm certainly not worth much without it.

And for God's sake I have to stop making everything so bloody hard on myself.

 

How do I do that?

I've been thinking about that a lot.

 

My doctor told me recently about a vet he knew of who hid under his bed for over thirty years - literally hid under his bed - and had never told anyone about it. I imagine he was alone. Otherwise, it seems like a wife or friend might have said, "Hey - come out of there. It's all right. Let's have a hot bath and a nice cup of tea."

 

How do I make things easier for myself?

Obviously, I reach out.

I admit it.

 

 

 

I build up a circle of friends who knows my strengths and weaknesses and loves me anyway.

I take the consequences.

Truthfully, I'm afraid of descrimination.

I'm afraid I wouldn't be allowed to teach, or that maybe I'll be alone all the rest of my life because no one is going to want to take all this on.

I have to keep reminding myself that I am so fearfully and wonderfully made that those who really know me see something truly beautiful. Something solid and real. If I got to know myself a little bit better, I think I could hold on to that.

A therapist tells me that once I have learned all the proper coping mechanisms (and unlearned the improper ones), it will become easier and easier to deal with the symptoms of the PTSD. Therefore, if you are suffering from the same condition, there is hope for it even if there is no cure. Sadly, it took me many years to develop all the wrong coping mechanisms, and it will take as many months as years to defeat them. That would equal roughly three years of therapy before I can walk away feeling less scathed. It's still an improvement upon not walking away at all.