Category Archives: mental illness

Nov 10 2012
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adventure, cancer, mental illness, renew

Where the Magic Happens

It was a great day.

A comp day from a thoughtful and smart manager, it started out with good pain at the premiere of season two of therapy. Turns out, the crying can be explained in one word: grief. ‘Ambiguous Loss‘ precisely, as the phrase has been coined. While we haven’t lost our mom in body yet, we lost a lot of her personality on September 26, 2008 to a stroke. Since then, more and more is lost to her unrelenting Schizoaffective Disorder every day. We are caught between the loss that was and the loss that will be.

Lost has been the innocence that S and I will actually live what we’ve joked about for years – old and senile, rocking in chairs on a porch. I made S promise that I get to go first.

I will likely lose my mom and my best friend within the next year. It is overwhelming to prepare for the worst while hoping for the best. But, that’s what therapy is for…

TB and I then embarked on what would become an impromptu Choose Your Own Adventure day. First, we ended up eating wings at the sports bar. From there we spent down three of the last gift cards from the wedding, saw a movie, planned out the Christmas season over coffee, had a chair massage, priced out my new computer, bought new shoes, purchased a tree topper for Christmas (I’m so excited), and tried new sushi rolls for dinner.

It was heavenly.

The movie was The Perks of Being a Wallflower. It was so, so good. So good. Difficult subject matter at points [spoiler alert] dealing with sexual abuse, but it rivals my long-standing favorite movie, Rudy.

I’d like to start living more in the moment. Seizing life. More days like yesterday. Opportunities in which cozying up on the couch and living vicariously through movies and television would have been fine and safe, but not magical like yesterday was.

Oct 30 2012
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mental illness

The Panhandler’s Dog

In the past decade or so, the downtown panhandlers in our fair city have embarked on an urban sprawl. It was weird when they came five miles south of downtown to my neighborhood but it was even stranger to see them twenty miles from the city on the off-ramp to my parent’s house.

I used to get irate with these folks. I viewed them as lazy.  I’d see the same guy when I left in the morning and returned at night.  Seriously?! I just worked my butt off at work and you spent 8+ hours begging?  Really?!

Preconceived notions and stereotypes are usually corrected by one of two ways: education or experience.

I started a job two years ago and learned about poverty. I learned that while I’m thinking about and planning for my life ten, twenty, thirty years from now, a person living on the streets can’t see past today.  He’s thinking about a dry, warm place to sleep tonight. Retirement plans?  Savings accounts? Pfft.  He’s more worried about if he’ll eat tonight.

Then there’s the issue of ‘lack.’  Lack of education. Lack of address. Lack of clean clothing or a place to shower.  Lack of healthy relationships. Lack of resources.

The greatest misperception of a person who is homeless is that she chose that life.  The biggest lie about a person addicted to substance is that it’s his fault.  Sure, there are always exceptions to the rule, but the vast majority of people who are homeless or addicted to drugs or alcohol comes down to one thing our society shuns: mental illness.

If breast cancer is the prom queen, mental illness is the redheaded stepchild not cool enough for the AV Club.  Sure mental illness is scary and uncomfortable – just think about what it’s like in the shoes of the person living with it. Imagine not being able to control your own brain.  Let’s call mental illness what it is: a brain cancer. It’s just like cancer: they can’t control it and they sure as hell don’t want it.

Oct 29 2012
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cancer, mental illness, reduce, renew

‘Malaise,’ It’s Hipster for ‘Depressed’

Malaise sucks. Being an advocate for people with mental illness is easy, the idea that I might be clinically depressed, well…that’s a whole other pill to swallow.  It can be twisted and presented as a digestible ‘situational depression malaise’ because after all, my best friend will die of cancer and it’s a Vegas crap shoot which ailment will soon claim my mom’s life. Clinical or situational, it’s hard to be happy in the middle of feeling helpless and out of control.

TB and I were working on our homework from ‘marriage continuing ed’ last night.  We had one simple assignment: list the things that are exciting about having a baby.  Two hours, puffy eyes, and a half a box of Kleenex later, I still didn’t have an answer…or any clue as to what the hell was the root issue of the crying.  The only answer I came up with is that the idea of something else needing me, taking from me, being a bigger priority than me – is just overwhelming.

Even though I want a family, I’m not excited to have a baby. Rather I’m completely exhausted by the mere idea.

So, we’ve moved the goal post on babies.  And while the OMG moment here might be realizing that I will feel indefinitely helpless and out of control with kids, I still need to figure out how to manage feeling helpless and out of control since I can’t do anything about S’s cancer or my mom’s mental illness.  And, dammit, I’m tired of life under this cloud of doom and gloom.  I want to be happy and vibrant and lively again (like I was when TB first met me – before the last five years of Schizoaffective Disorder Bipolar Type, strokes, cancer, PTSD, etc.) and I want to learn how to not ride the roller coaster with my loved ones, but instead be there for them when they get on and off.  And I have no earthly idea how to do that.

So back to therapy I go…

Aug 27 2012
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adventure, cancer, mental illness

It Starts Today

Seven days ago, I was getting a massage and the masseuse asked what I do outside of work. I’ve always had a great answer to that question ranging from race training or a new painting to a great adventure or new project. But I didn’t have an answer this time. My life is incomprehensibly busy (much of the activity happening in my brain) but none of it was about me.

It’s time to make a change. After eight months of intense dealings with other people’s Schizoaffective Disorder and Stage IV Melanoma, it’s time to refocus on Number One. Mental illness and cancer will continue to play a large role in my life as they are leeching life from my mom and my best friend respectively, but these parasites can’t be the sole reason I rise in the morning. Yes, the odds indicate that mental illness and cancer will probably win. But these moochers will not best me.

I’ve been working with a therapist for nine months. The dust is settling and I’m starting to see results through the haze. Between once again learning the tough lesson that life is too short and finally starting to break free of the cycle of a chaotic youth, I’m finding my footing and I’m finding my freedom.

With that, I’m blindly embarking on the greatest adventure of my life: me.

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