Blog Posts

Update 27.2.2020

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Photo by Emiliano Arano on Pexels.com

And so, we enter week four in hospital.

I emerged from the manic symptoms about a week ago. Pummelled into exhaustion by the high doses of Lithium and antipsychotic medication, and by the manic episode itself. Even in a hospital setting, taking all the right medication, and having good insight into the symptoms, manic episodes accrue a negative energy balance. It means when you eventually recover you are depleted, bone tired.

And this is where it gets tricky:

That exhaustion can mimic rebound depressive symptoms. One improves with rest and dialling back the antipsychotic medication. The other progresses beyond exhaustion to include other insidious signs that envelop you in a black, poisonous mist. Appetite drops off. The words ‘zero fucks left to give’ cast in a concrete block take up residence in your skull. Motivation evaporates and has to be faked until it decides to return in its own sweet time.

For a week now my psychiatrist and I have been watching and waiting. At first, we were both hopeful. We even (stupidly) dared to imagine I could be well enough to discharge by the end of this week. There is a reason we have a policy of never looking more than two to three days ahead when I’m in hospital. It’s because this illness has taught us – there is no point.

My psychiatrist entered my room mid morning today, looked at me back in bed and said

‘This isn’t good. You’re usually out walking.’

I turned towards him.

I don’t like it when his face arranges itself into concern within ten seconds of seeing me. It confirms what I already know. It also reassures me, because it is evidence of how well he knows me.

I have tilted towards depression, in the opposite direction to where I was headed when I was admitted.

This means we change our treatment plan in the opposite direction. We will cut back the Lithium and we will increase one of the two antidepressants I take. We will give it two or three days.

UNLESS…

My mood begins to shift back up before then, in which case I will inform the nurses and they will page my psychiatrist for further instructions. We don’t want to risk another ascent into mania. I’m not reaching for a YoYo or rollercoaster metaphor here, because they both imply the possibility of fun, which this decidedly is not!

The other switch over is the behavioural management of active Bipolar symptoms. For me it means telling myself to do the opposite to what my body wants me to do. So during a manic episode I should seek out quiet environments, be on my own, try not to overexercise. During a depressive episode it means kicking myself out of bed, engaging with others, and above all else exercise, exercise, and then exercise some more.

What a mind fuck.

While I continue to wait out my life in two to three day increments, I don’t feel inclined toward gratitude. But that’s largely depressive symptoms talking. So, I will do the opposite and stubbornly find something to be grateful for. Here we go:

I am grateful that at their current level my depressive symptoms are much easier to manage and tolerate than my manic symptoms were. The intense manic irritability has disappeared, and my concentration and short-term memory have mostly returned…for now.

 

You may also like to check out:

Interruption To Regular Programming

Misunderstood Mania

Mental Illness Doesn’t Respect Deadlines

Visiting Someone In A Psychiatric Hospital?

What a mental illness can teach you about your mental health

 

 

Interruption To Regular Programming

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Photo by Anna Shvets on Pexels.com

I am in hospital, compromised by my standard symptoms that precede a manic or depressive episode. Looking more manic at this point though. The three symptoms are: lack of concentration, loss of short term memory, and pathological irritability.

If you have never been ravaged by them, then listing these symptoms can make it sound as though I am just a bit ditzy and cranky.

So wrong.

It’s going to take it out of me but let me see if I can paint a more accurate portrait of this beast. I am not yet so sick that it has silenced me.

The memory loss and lack of concentration leave my brain moth eaten. Holding onto thoughts long enough to articulate them takes a lot of effort. It is like using tweezers to try and catch tiny fish darting around in a big aquarium.

And the irritability? Surely as a rational, compassionate human being I should not feel so permanently unreasonable. I always insert the word ‘pathological’ in front of this symptom to try and describe just how out of control the stream of swear words is that run through my head when I am surrounded by people within ten metres of my personal space.

I say ‘pathological’ to describe the feeling of having hundreds of mosquito bites, my hands tied, and someone running a feather over the bites while they make fun of me. Sometimes it feels more like I’ve been sandpapered and then doused in lemon juice.

It is excruciating.

I will eventually get better. I always do. I know in time I will have the reserves to write properly again, and I will eventually go home and continue to rehabilitate. But for now, any spare energy is going towards doing what I need to do to get well, and if anything is left over it is going towards giving some moral support to my husband and children. So there may be some time between posts.

I always hope it won’t be too long but have been here often enough to know that it will take the time it takes and focusing on it won’t speed my recovery.

Stay tuned.

You may also be interested in:

Misunderstood Mania

My First Time

 

 

Not So Body Positive

Big cat on the street in the city

I came across an Instagram image of an obese cat recently (not the image in this post). The accompanying caption referred to the cat as a ‘body positive icon’. And it made me stop and think about whether a cat can, or even should be, an icon of body positivity.

I have never felt qualified to comment on the body positivity movement. As someone who lives with thin, white, straight, (mostly) able bodied privilege, I have been reluctant to wade into the hornet’s nest of opinions the words ‘body positivity’ evoke on social media. Until I saw this.

Continue reading “Not So Body Positive”

These Fires

 

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Are racking up an invisible bill.

Most would agree that even just seeing the billowing smoke, the hellish glow, buckled tin roofs, smouldering ash, the ghostly silhouettes of dead animals lining the roads into obliterated small towns, even when viewed from the safe parts of the country and the globe, even when the horror is confined to a steady scroll behind a screen, is overwhelming. The helplessness bruises our emotions. We can be forgiven for making a donation, posting something derogatory about our inept prime minister and then switching off our screens for a bit.

For the fire fighters, the people in masks in boats under those bloodied skies there can be no thought other than surviving one hour or minute to the next. The same goes for the emergency services, the army personnel, those with loved ones in the danger zones, those who have lost loved ones.

But what about the rest of us. Yes, we can donate to the Red Cross or Celeste Barber or any of the other funds set up to try and help deal with this unprecedented crisis. We can go shopping and buy things on a list that are needed by the emergency services.

But then what – what to do we do next?

Continue reading “These Fires”

The Resignation: One Year On

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Just over a year ago I unclenched  and allowed myself to fall. I’d been peering over the ledge of a complete break from veterinary work for a couple of years, eyes scrunched shut against the change. The reality of not being able to do everything at once and do it well, a splinter in my thumb – impossible to ignore.

Continue reading “The Resignation: One Year On”

The Comparison Trap

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Photo by Skitterphoto on Pexels.com

I liken comparing myself to others to a landscape of skin. In some areas that skin is as thick as a crocodile’s. Very little penetrates it. Take social media. I came to it old enough to have a solid sense of myself. My self-esteem and body image didn’t grow up in the glare of Instagram. FOMO generated by someone else’s curated holiday/body/green smoothie/adorable family snaps is foreign to me.

Other tracts of skin are a little thinner but still not easily breached, a bit like a callused heel. My career path and choices have held few twinges of comparison. Maybe in the early years of my veterinary career I did some comparing. But that was part of the trek of working out what sort of vet I wanted to be.

Writing and advocacy work have only evolved in the last few years, and I view other people’s work in these areas as something to either aspire to or steer away from. Yes, it’s comparison, but a cool, dispassionate kind.

Then there are the areas of soft skin, vulnerable, but hidden away too deeply to be strip searched by comparisons. My relationship with my husband fits here, I couldn’t compare us to anyone else, because what we have is as unique as a fingerprint.

Then there’s skin ripped open at unnatural angles.

Continue reading “The Comparison Trap”

Men’s Voices Needed

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I am seeking Men’s Voices

If you are a man or know any men – please read on.

I recently accepted a SANE Peer Ambassador Speaking engagement for a small all-male audience in a male dominated industry (ages 30-50). To be clear, when this opportunity first arose a couple of months ago I applauded the company for their focus on male mental health and then sat back, certain they would find their ideal candidate in a male Peer Ambassador with a background in the trades to take this on.

Fast forward to a couple of weeks ago: No one had applied. It was re-advertised. This time with a note that the presenter did not need to be male. They just wanted someone willing to take this project on.

I gave it a lot of thought. On the surface, the only thing I have in common with this audience is my age. But I am also fast developing an interest in men’s mental health. Over the last couple of years I have supported several men from different areas in my life during episodes of mental illness.

Another strong motivator to learn more about this area, is being the mother of a son. I appreciate his future mental health is not all under my control, but I want to do what I can to secure him the most mentally healthy future I can.

So, I signed up for this engagement because I believe having me speak to this group has got to be better than having no one speak. Having no one, sends the message that men don’t experience mental illness. So wrong. Or it sends the message that if they do, then we shouldn’t be talking about it. Also, so wrong.

I am pretty confident I can do it, with the base knowledge I’ve got now, but I believe it could be so much better if I had the voices of some men to include in this presentation.

So if you are a man or can direct a man to this post who has some lived experience of mental illness and is well enough to offer some insights (or even if you are a man who hasn’t lived with mental illness but has some thoughts), either message me (on facebook or instagram) or email me anitalink73@gmail.com

I’d love to have a casual chat or exchange some emails if preferred. Any information I am given will be used anonymously unless you specifically tell me you would like to be named and/or identified.

I have mentioned in other posts, I am a huge fan of stretching myself outside my comfort zone. I am definitely doing that with this engagement. I gently encourage you to stretch yourself too and get in touch with me. You could make a real difference to other men’s lives by donating your voice.

You may also be interested in:

As Mothers Of Sons

Where’s Your Comfort Zone?

What Defines You?

For me, the taste of my rubber snorkel mouthpiece, the smell of seawater and the sight of pink coral with black fish darting around it, was the beginning. I was about four, snorkelling in the shallows on the Saudi Arabian side of the Red Sea. That defined me. Indelibly.

But mostly, what defines me only does so temporarily. Eventually those moments, decisions and experiences split open and peel away like dead eucalyptus bark to reveal fresh influences and redefinitions.

I remember the first time I felt desired. A look like lightning in the middle of a lake. And a sentence.

‘You are not like other girls. You are better.’

It shaped a part of me that felt proud to be different. We laughed at those ‘other girls’, whose sole ambition in life was wifedom and motherhood, women who threw themselves at him while we toyed with each other. My emotions stayed safely walled off from the chaos of love.

I was defined by my untouchable smugness.

Continue reading “What Defines You?”

RUOK Day: Full Disclosure

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Doing the talking, not the asking on RUOK day 2019

 

How was everyone’s RUOK day? Did you ask anyone? Did you get asked? Did you post or share something on social media about it, and feel good about participating?

As someone who lives with a severe mental illness I felt as though I should welcome RUOK day with open arms, that I should be thankful that someone was paying attention to ‘us’… for a day.

But I didn’t feel what the day wanted me to.

What did I feel? For starters, a little infantilised. And please before people send me enraged messages that that is not how they felt and that I am spoiling the fun for everyone, hear me out.

Continue reading “RUOK Day: Full Disclosure”

Misunderstood Mania

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What do you know about mania?

Everyone knows depression is bad. But does this mean mania is good because it supposedly sits at the opposite end of the bipolar spectrum?

Mania is often painted as the cartoonish counterpoint to depression. Perpetually bright, happy, and fun. But it is not fun. It is the character in a horror movie who starts out friendly but then morphs into someone with sinister, glowing eyes.

Mania assaults your senses.

Continue reading “Misunderstood Mania”