Too Easy to Trigger

I hate being so easy to have my buttons pushed.

Thank You

For the suicidal end to a peaceful couple of days.  I know I'm no good for my kids.  I just didn't need you to remind me.

Where Do You Get Off?

Telling me I'm selfish.  I focus on what I need to be doing and what I need to be doing so that I can get things in order for my kids.  It is not my fault your struggles are hard.  Mine are too.  I will run my life the way I see fit. You run yours.  Stay the hell out of my business.

Calm but Irritated

Today.  Things are calm. The roommate is staying to themself.  The kids are not running wild today.  It is nice outside.  I'm just boring time until we can get back to the city.  We have to deal with a family services investigation here.  It should be closing as the investigations in this state are 30 days standard and we are right on that time.  What seems to be of concern to the worker is that I will not release my psychiatric records.  I have given them permission to verify that I am receiving treatment and that I am going to my appointments.  But for me to be comfortable being honest with my providers I can't have information going right back to some third, or fourth parties.  The caseworker seems really thrown off that I don't want to release my record.  If the case/investigation isn't closed before we go back to the city, a new state will become involved and a new investigation will be opened.  It is really irritating.  So far nobody has found anything they were looking for and at this point I consider it all harassment.  Blah.

Watch "What Borderline Personality Disorder feels like...(TRIGGER)" on YouTube

Peaceful Day

It has ended up being a peaceful day.  I managed to go with the roommate to the store for groceries and some birthday and Halloween goodies.  I managed to get thru over an hour of shopping.  Then I helped cook stuffed bell peppers.  Mmmm.  Cooking is always distracting.

Hanging in There

So far, I'm hanging in there in this waiting game.  I'm not sure if we are going to be able to pull together some sense of a party for the kids on Saturday.  I'm not sure how much longer we can stay here.  But so far, things are peaceful today.  My head and chest still hurt.  It's odd that my head is hurting since I just started Topamax for my migraines.  I've had a three day headache, and that is as long as I've been on Topamax.  My fingers and feet are all tingly too.  Let's just say I'm thankful for the peace.

Feeling the Stress

I am feeling every last physical part of anxiety.  Yesterday my head hurt all day.  I was nauseous and since last night my chest has been tight and has hurt at times.  I am definitely taking the klonipin right now.  It isn't helping much.  It is comforting being around the kids after having been gone a couple of days.  I just know we don't belong here and I feel it to my bones.

Pins and Needles

Well, I'm back on pins and needles, back in the house with the kids and the roommate who doesn't want us here.  I've been home nearly an hour and its been uncomfortable to say the least.  Ah, deep breath.

So many hard decisions

I am in a hard spot for appropriate housing and have no leg to stand on.  I still can't handle the public.  My counselor and friend suggested working in the bar is retraumatizing me.  It is the only work I've been able to tolerate the last few years.  I could slide into another personality and escape reality or things going on in my head.  I think up until my most recent trauma, it was also a place to blow off steam and full of people just as messed up as I am...or so I thought.  Working at the bar last week showed me I am definitely more messed up right now than the others you usually find around the bar.  I have applied for disability because of my diagnosed mental illnesses.  It's just a waiting game now.  Now I am losing the temporary housing arrangements I had for my family.  Being unable to work and having a very small income that is fixed has left me stranded and at the mercy of others.  Now I have to move on because I've been around too long already.   I feel frozen.  I could go to the city we call home and where more mental health resources are available for me, but I have no where to go there other than a couple of very short term offers from great people.  It will be a waiting game to get into a program that offers assistance.  I completely cannot function on my own at the moment except at my home duties, and we have no real place to call home.  We are in between.  It fluctuates from day to day and somtimes hour to hour with the friend we are staying with.  One moment it is "stay until you can get housing" then the next, "get the hell out".  That isn't helping my sense of security or safety right now.  I know a person can only give so much and I am much, much appreciative for the help thus far.  But the yanking me around on we have to go then can stay then go is just racking my mind.  I am trying to get into assisted housing for mental illness, but there isn't much for families.  I have the option of going into a rehab detox family residential program (pot would be the reason for admission), but I don't really want my kids to be around other people detoxing from more serious addictions.  I shield my kids as much as possible from the symptoms of my mental illness.  And I don't want to go fully exposing them to that world.  I just left a spouse for addiction and don't want the kids around it. That will be the last resort, as in if we get kicked out of where we are.  So many decisions, and they all affect my kids.  This is knitting up my gut.

Mondays

It is finally Monday.  I look forward to being able to go to my support group and therapy.  Right now, it is the support I've got.  I think if I was able to fill my friends in on a little of my illness I may get some support, but I don't want to share that much with anybody I know.  I don't want to feel that vulnerable....or mental.  Ok, I feel "mental" anytime, but don't want those close to me to see it.  Surprisingly, I have managed not to run off my closest friends over the last few years.  Relationships?  I've destroyed them all.

So I do have a friend with me this morning at the psychiatrist.  I just got finished seeing the doctor.  Change of meds.  We will see how this goes. 

Ahhh.

Herbal release

Shell

Today I'm calm as hell on the outside...about to bust inside.

Unsettling Feeling

I have been feeling so ill today.  My outlook is so bleak.  I am at a real low today.  I have been so suicidal.  It's all just in my head but it is miserable.  I'm ready to cut, burn or pierce just for some release.  I'm not going to work tonight. I seem to have lost the light of the light at the end of the tunnel.  I feel inadequate as a parent, that I am a constant disappointment to my little ones.  They are oblivious that I am more than a little off.  Maybe my oldest knows I have some problems, but has not seen my symptoms.  I feel like they would be better off if I wasn't their parent.  The other part of me knows my perception is off and they are happy healthy kids.  But today, now, I don't think they need my shit.  I don't feel like this is ever going to end.  It is pure agony.

Nerves

Bad nerves, nauseous, shakey, hard to breathe, ugh.  Of course, it is time to go in to work.  I think I'm aiming to be late tonight.  Oh pills, please kick in.

Release

I have got to find some.  I feel like my brain is about to explode.  Taking care of the kids kinda keeps me in go mode and I internalize so much stress.  It just quietly stews throughout the day.  Even though I've been nervous about going to work the later it gets, I am kind of wanting to go be away from the house.  I have been avoiding taking benzos all day, but I still don't think I can handle the crowd.  I'm going to wait and see how I feel.  Usually, I get to work and I have to sit in the parking lot and wait for the frigging pill to kick in.  (It's that way with going grocery shopping or any errands where I have to deal with people too.  I actually have vomited in the parking lot when I went to get out of my car at the store one day).  If I don't go, I will lose my job.  I'm sure a different job would help, but this is the old fall-back, maybe an addiction.  I'm not an alcoholic, though I can and have had my mini binges.  Alcohol just isn't my thing.  Maybe the drinking part of me is somebody else...I don't know.

Where Is My Brain?

Ok.  I went to pay the power bill and got home a couple of hours ago.  I left my keys in the car...running!!  It took me two hours to realize it...when I needed my keys for something else.  Wow!  And I wish I could blame it on being stoned but I simply wasn't. 

Looney Tunes

What a roller coaster detoxing from these meds is.  I'm going through my motions at home but I am aloof.  I can't really put together the last few days.  I had a couple of errands to run with others and I stayed in the car when it was possible. I didn't want to go anywhere.  I have been nauseous all day.  I'm definitely not myself.  If it wasn't for the kids I would probably be staring out the window or driving til I couldn't drive any more.  (One of my mostly impulsive dissociative ways of coping, sometimes planned to clear my head).  I think that is part of what's racking my brain...I have so many strong impulses right now and its taking everything I have to not act on them.  I have to keep up for the kids.  They really do keep me going. 

WHOA!

The last couple of days I've been out of it. I still am. It took me an hour to gather things for the shower. I feel like I'm somewhere else and I definitely don't want to deal with people. I am trembling. I feel like I'm going to puke. I stopped taking my medications. They were making me sick. Amazingly, my arms which have been broken out and itching horribly for over a year now are not itching and the sores from scratching are healing too. But I guess I'm withdrawing from the meds, but I think it is for the better. So far its just a stir crazy, floating and shaking feeling. After I burned a wasp sting that itched horribly it all came clear. The meds were making me sick and itch. The burn stopped the itch, in a manner of speaking. Now that isn't going to become a habit, but I think I see some piercings or something not damaging coming. My friend E does piercings and it looks like I should go see him. Accupuncture would be great. I just don't have the money. It was great to have a release or super distraction, even if it was brief, from my turmoil inside. I should take better care of myself. It's just that it itched and wouldn't quit throbbing, and burning the stinger (which I could not get out) stopped it all in more than one way. So now I wonder what I am going to pierce.

Back in The Bar

Well, it was back to work last night.  I decided not to drink.  That lasted, oh, a couple of hours.  I did pace myself.  I came home with a great case of the hiccups.  Today was a massive hangover and digestive disaster.  I haven't been able to eat all day.  Drinking so wasn't worth it but it did help with my nerves.  I have a real hard time being in crowds.  Fortunately there wasn't much of one.  I made a little money.  Maybe I can get enough saved up to move us back to my city.  Currently we are in a small country town that offers little. 
I don't want to be working at all...not lazy, I just don't do well with people here lately...that and psychotic features don't go too well with the public.  At the bar, people are there largely to relax and unwind, and just as many messed up people as me.  And I still freak out as I pull into the parking lot.  I am scheduled for tonight and don't know if u can do it.  The way I feel right now, there isn't enough Xanax in my bottle for me to walk back in the doors at work.

**********************

So its time to leave and I can't find it in me.

The Gulf

In high school I wanted to go to medical school.  I did start school, but thanks to the symptoms of one of my disorders combined with life's challenges, I am not finished.  I am persistent.  I am several years in on a four year degree.  I am very well rounded thanks to not being able to make up my mind on a major.  Well the major has been set for two years now and I still have two years to go in the coursework I need.  I only had two years then...lol.  Need I mention that I still have a graduate degree to go?  It seems as though who I am and who I really want to be aren't merging too well.  This leaves me feeling so empty.  And it is frustrating.  I feel like kicking and screaming that I can't seem to achieve my goals.  I've forever been working on them and forever getting nowhere besides piled up in student loan debt.  I am starting to realize and feel the limitations of my disorder(s).  I feel more disabled than I ever wanted to admit.  I don't know what keeps me so determined to finish this degree.  I feel like I'm putting myself through hell and setting myself up for failure.  I'm just not sure if I fail this spring at going to school, then it's going to devastate me.  I try not to think about failure, but the past has shown that I have trouble finishing what I start.  And if I put school off anymore, I don't think I will ever finish.

I see me finishing my degree(s) as a ticket out of some of my insanity.  Just getting there is well.....

Triggers and Tickers

If you would, imagine a news channel with the tickers for the stock market rolling across the screen...news tickers too.  That is kind of what my mind is like.  Sometimes I can't focus on the main event for all of the constant different thoughts that pop up.  Last night about a minutes worth of another victim's story hit real close to home.  I stepped out on the story but can't get those few words I heard and images from my own harrowing experiences out of my head.

Ticker is flashing that and the mess with Dad...and my living arrangements...and many other standard stressors that come with being a single, broke, stuck-in-a-rut parent. 

Pushing Through the Burn

The last couple of days have been painful.  I got nowhere with Dad. Maybe he is gone out of my life but I can't sit here and worry about it. I spent a lot of time alone the last couple of days.  I am feeling boggled down by my illnesses and am trying to see the path out.  The next few months are going to be extremely rough, with new beginnings.   Some options seem down right scarey.  Starting from the bottom with the children and no second parent to be there.  Thankfully they are small and so resilient.  Today is my middle child's birthday.  SD hasn't the first present, but thankfully isn't old enough to set high standards for the big day.  There will be a party in a couple of weeks.  That brings me some relief.  I'm sure my expectations are much higher than SD's.

****************************

I have a new friend, J.  J is bringing me a world of, wow, energy for one.  I hope my mess and I do not bring J down.  J seems very strong.  Maybe a good friendship wouldn't be a bad thing.  Maybe an end to all of this isolation.

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I am rebirthing me.   Personal growth and rebirth is akin to the pregnancy, labor, delivery and post-partal period.  With all of that and a normal pregnancy for a normal mother there can be tremendous emotional growing pains, not to mention the pain of actually giving birth.  Personal transformation comes with joys and with tears.  One thing that helps with the birth of a child is a plan.  In the birthing world it is called a birth plan.  In the rest of the world we call them goals and contingencies.  Of course, the ultimate way to decrease fear and pain is through education.  The more a mother knows what physiological events are transpiring as she is birthing, the less fear and anxiety.  I'm going to have to do the same for myself.  I have a fairly good idea of the inns and outs of my diagnoses.  I do need to get my plan going.  What are my next steps?  What are my goals for the next couple of months and how am I going to attain them?  How do I keep my children from suffering my ups and downs?  The rebirth of me is an event that takes a lot of heart, a lot of courage, strength and support.  I'm working on pulling that all together currently.

I like it here.

Maybe this blog will help with the wonderful symptom I like to call the coke bottle effect.  Maybe somebody will stumble upon it and find some morsel that will do them a little good.  I hope nothing here triggers anything for you.  I try to keep the details of my traumas to myself.  When I have time to sit down and mess with the page I will put disclaimers and all that kind of stuff.  If you know me, please refrain from mentioning my name or location or personal stuff.

That is out of the way now.

I was going to refrain from getting highly emotional, but I AM highly emotional.

Today was difficult.  My father, for unknown reasons has decided to cut ties to his children.  I'm in a swim after that one.  Why now?  He was the last family member I am in touch with other than a sister who shares my traumas and disorders.  I have questioned how healthy our relationship is but never saw it as unhealthy until tonight.  It hurts so badly and I feel so much rage.  I keep calling and he doesn't answer.  How can he just chose to walk out on us as adults?  Yay!  Another traumatic event to add to the year of my life.  Hmmph.

Ha ha

Death

Nightmares, dreams, whatever you call them, death is certain. PTSD comes with flashbacks and nightmares but some of them can be downright disturbing.  I recently dreamed of death.  My children's deaths.  In one dream my middle child seriously injured my youngest to the point of death.  It was horrible.  Then there are dreams where we all died in car accidents, bizzarre things.  It seems everywhere I turn there are funeral processions, people dying.  Even my own mortality seems so real.  Even at a young-ish age.  One thing is for certain, and that is death.  Some die old, some die young, some healthy some not.  So why do I find myself in such a funk?  Why does everything death related seem to stand out? So ominous?  Hmm, I wonder if it has anything to do with Halloween.

Marijuana

My best friend for 8 years.  I've been consuming pot in one form or another since October 16, 2003.  Today is our anniversary.

What would have been different if I hadn't been smoking.  I mean it has been nearly everyday since I started, with a couple of exceptions around the time my children were born.  I spent the first six and a half of those years self-medicating with pot and no psychiatric medications.  The last year and a half I have been on medication and can no longer use the excuse of self-medicating.  Is it time to quit? Of course the frequency of indulging should go down.  I've heard it said that some things should be saved for celebration.  What is celebrating?  I did just get the kids off to bed...is it time to celebrate?  Or should I celebrate Fridays?  Is abstaining in the cards?  If I don't have the strength then, AMS, it must be a problem.  My problem is that everything can't stand still inside my head.  Pot slows it all down.  So I guess you would say I'm still contemplating.  Just how much sanity could I stand to gain from quitting?  What do I stand to lose if I don't quit?

Safe Place

I close my eyes.  My senses run wild.  I feel the sun at my face, warming me...my shoulders, my chest, my legs and the tops of my feet.  I feel my hair blowing with the wind.  I feel the tiniest of grains of sand as they each one by one strike my calves.  My toes are burried each by the mounds of sand brought by the modest, warm wind.  The smell of salt envigorates me and illicits fond memories of similar escapes in the past.  The waves crash with certainty.  Gulls sing their song.

This is my peace...my escape...if only I were there right now.

Please post your safe place journeys.

Splitting and Integrating

The two or more of me.

I overheard a couple of good friends talking...about me (and me)...while I was standing there.  These are the dearest of friends and would have said this to my face had I not been walking away.

So I have been in so much deep thought lately, before this conversation I overheard.  I have known I have dissociated and split on numerous occasions.  To what degree is what I am wondering.  When I was 14 I started going by a new name.  With that new name came a new identity.  A new style.  A new attitude.  Was that when I split?  I am aware now of the duality that came with my adolesence.  I definitely didn't see it then.  Since reaching adulthood, more identities, styles and attitudes which seem to come from nowhere.  Now, there are the identities that came with work, but there are so many different people others know me as when they meet me.   Those who are patient enough to stick around get to see the many different sides of me, not just the many roles I fill.

I thought I had it all hidden.  I thought I had it all figured out.  I have lost days, conversations, events.  Keeping my "crazies" all to myself is what I have been aiming for, but as I get older, as my recovery is supposed to be moving along, I seem to be exhibiting more and more symptoms, especially the last two and a half years.  I have so many times where friends have reminded me of things I did.  Of times when I just wasn't myself.  A few of them have seen me psychotic.  I try so hard to keep that hidden, but that's not such an easy thing to hide.  More and more frequently I'm losing track of time...wondering how I got as far as I did while I was driving.  "Wow! How did I get here when I was just 100 miles east of here".  That was just last week.

So to integrate, I feel I must first figure out who I am, and who I am.  I have to be familiar with all of me before I can weave myself into an integrated multicolored, multifaceted cloth.  Am I just splitting or am I dealing with a few different me?

What did I overhear?  That I have multiple personalities?  They know something I don't?  They either know nothing about me or they are completely right.