Category Archives: Death

Scariest Time In My Life – Part VI

Posted on by
Reply

 This is the next section of how I ended up in a state run psychiatric hospital and my experiences there.

A nurse took me out of the common room and down a short hall way and into fairly small room.  She stayed with me.  This doctor came in.  I had not seen him before, nor did I know his name, I just knew he was the medical doctor.  He looked over my medical files and did not say much too me.  He saw how much medication on was on and started rapid firing questions to me about why I took what I did and exactly what doses I really took.  I did ask him about  my Restless Leg Syndrome medication my husband brought.  I wanted to know if he would write the order for me to be able to take my own medication so that I could be more comfortable.  He said he would.  He wanted to know how long I had had diabetes and I told him that I had been diagnosed over a  year ago.  He then stated that he did not believe that I had any diabetic complications because I had not had diabetes for long enough.  So then I had to explain to him that due to uncontrolled asthma I had been on steroids for about two years (steroids mess up your blood sugar results) so no one noticed I had diabetes until then.  Then he got to the part where it said I was on 30 units of Lantus.  Lantus is a long acting insulin, you give yourself a shot of it every evening.  He told me it was too much lantus and then accused me of lying about the amount I was supposed to take.  He wanted the phone number of the pharmacy I used so he could call and verify that I was taking the proper amount.  He then said he felt I was taking 30 units of Lantus to try and gradually kill myself.  At this time I do not get my Lantus from a pharmacy.  A free clinic I have been going to set it up with the manufacturers of Lantus for me to get a year’s worth for free.  The manufacturers of Lantus send it directly to the free clinic and that is where I pick it up.  I told him that he was more than welcome to call the free clinic if he wanted to, but 30 units of Lantus is less than I used to take.  I used to have to give myself 40 units.  I do not think he believed me, but he also never did call the clinic I had been using.  I felt kind of humiliated after I saw him.  He treated me like and spoke to me as if I was a piece of dirt.  Never in my life have I had a doctor talk to me that way.  When he finished saying what he had to say, he walked out.  The nurse escorted me back to where the rest of the patients were, just in time for lunch.

I am not going to say much about the lunch. They finally had my trays marked for a diabetic patient and thank God for the salad and orange jello on my plate.  The same lady that had stood over me and took the food off of my tray at breakfast time, did the same thing at lunch.  Everyone else had cake, I got an extra helping of orange jello.

After lunch there was more boredom.  We still had our psychologists to see.  By the time mine called me into an office and talked to me I was so bored that I was actually glad to see him.  He asked me how I was doing on the new medication, I was doing fine with it.  He said that he was going to have the dosage increased on Sunday.  He asked me if I took the medication he had prescribed to help me sleep.  I explained to him that I had not because it would have made my Restless Leg Syndrome worse and since I had not been able to take that medication the night before, I did not want my legs feeling worse.  He asked me if I was having anymore suicidal thoughts.  Of course I said no.  Seriously, even if I had, I would not have told him yes.  An answer like that would have extended my stay.  I explained to him again about how I ended up there.  How I took ten extra beta blockers and had tried to call my counselor to get into see her, before things got worse, and the next thing I knew a crisis team was at my house telling me I needed to be hospitalized, and that someone had told the emergency room doctor that I had taken fifty beta blockers.  After a very brief visit with him, I got to go back to being bored.

The lack of activities for a bunch of people who have been deemed mentally ill amazed me.  There was so much arguing and physical fights between the patients, that in my opinion it was caused from everyone being so darn bored.

Finally, we got to walk back to our regular unit.  One of the nurses announced that it was time for an outside break.  Everyone, including me, got very excited about a change of scenery.  However, I was not allowed to go outside.  Since I had just been admitted there the day before, I had not even gotten a status of any kind yet.  Without a status, I could not even take a walk outside, unless I was walking from one unit to the next.  More boredom.  At least with the majority of the women outside, it was much much quieter in the unit.

I got to speak to my husband while they were gone and he let me know he was coming to visit me the next day (Saturday) and my brother and sister-in-law would be coming with him.  I was very excited.

More boredom, yucky supper, and then bed.

At about four in the morning I woke up and much to my surprise one of the nurses was helping someone make the empty bed in my room.  I had a room mate.  She was a little cranky with the nurse, because the doctor who had admitted her had taken her off of all her psychiatric medications.  I do not know why he would do that, but that there are several possible explanations.  The medications she had been taken may have quit working and with some of the psychiatric medications you have to get the old ones out of your system before you start on new ones, the doctor may be trying to figure out what other medication to give her that works better, and finally she may not have needed the medications at all but instead was addicted to them.  I have learned that many of the psychiatric medications are highly addictive and are often abused.  If you know the right things to say to a doctor, they are also fairly easy to obtain.  The doctor had said she could have an anti-anxiety medication, the same one that I was being given, and it is one that is not addictive.

She went to bed, I remained up and attempted to enjoy my quiet time……unfortunately, another patient saw to it that I could not.

To be continued…

Scariest Time In My Life – Part VII
Back to Part V

Scariest Time In My Life – Part V

Posted on by
Reply

This is the next section of how I ended up in a state run psychiatric hospital and my experiences there.

The building I was in had men on one side an women on the other side.  There was a small dining room but no kitchen.  Our meals were brought over by a truck.  On the women’s side the nurse’s station was set up in the middle of the area with a glass partition that went almost to the ceiling.  On one side of the nurses area, was an open area with couches, a TV, the pay phone and a room with a washer and dryer.  The other side had a few chairs and a very, very heavy picnic type table with attached benches.  My room was very close to the nurses station, which provided me with some feeling of comfort. 

With my back against the wall, looking at all those women wandering around, some of them looking very odd, hearing loud voices and shouting, doing my best to not make any eye contact, I was feeling more scared than I have ever been in all of my life. I heard one of the nurses say “Mrs. Mashburn looks terrified”.

Two nurses nurses approached me.  They asked me to follow them into the bathroom and took me in a stall, where once again I was stripped search.  By this time I was feeling too afraid to get upset over yet another strip search so there were no tears this time.  I asked them if they had been able to obtain my medicine for my Restless Leg Syndrome (RLS) and I was told no, that they did not have any.  I was given a brown paper bag, that had a cheese sandwhich and a little carton of milk in it.  I only took two bites of the sandwich, because I did not have much of an appetite.  A nurse went through my bags and took things like my shampoo, and deodorant and put them in the “contraband closet”, and I was only allowed to keep one change of clothes, the rest went into another closet.  The nurse explained to me that I could only get items from the contraband closet when the door was opened, three times a day, so if I needed anything for the morning, I had to plan accordingly.

The charge nurse brought me some linens for a bed and took me too my room.  More gray, and cinder block walls.  I was fortunate, because at that time I had no roommate and I was told they were going to try and keep me from having a roommate as long as possible.  Apparently, it showed on my information that I had an anxiety disorder that made it difficult for me to deal with all of those people and the nurses were trying to make it so I had a place I could go to get away from people.  The charge nurse was very nice and she told me she did not think I belonged there and said she did not think I would have to stay for very long.

In all those long hours since I had left the medical hospital, I had not spoken to my husband.  I was really missing him.  There was a pay phone in the general area of the unit, I used it to talk call my husband.  It was such a relief to hear his voice.  I felt so much better after I talked to him. Just hearing his voice and hearing how much he loved me made me feel better. Since the hospital did not have my RLS medication, my husband offered to drive two hours and bring me mine.  That way at least the nurses could administer it to me that way.  Even though he had driven all that way to bring it too me, I still was not allowed to take any off it.  The doctor did not call them back and have them write up the proper orders until the next morning.

Since I had not been able to take a shower for days, I decided to get my shampoo when the contraband closet opened and take a shower.  I was in for a treat!  I had to put on the same type of sandals that prisoners wear in jail and enter a shower stall that had no curtains or door.  Anyone who walked back to that part of the restroom could see me in all my glory as I showered.  Needless to say, it was the quickest shower I have ever taken.  One of the things I kept thinking, is that between the strip searches and no privacy when you showered, that being mentally ill and in a psychiatric hospital is a very humiliating experience.  Not to mention, I was still very angry over how I had gotten here in the first place.

It was no surprise to me, but I got absolutely no sleep that night.  Being in a new place, frightened and not having my RLS medication just made me miserable.  I got up at about four in the morning.  It was peaceful at that time.  All the other patients were sleeping, the TV was off and the nurses who worked on this shift spoke in whispers.  I also realized that we could start taking showers at five in the morning and I was still the only one up.  That became my routine.  Getting up at four in the morning and then rushing to get my shower done by five in the morning so that I would have some privacy during my shower time.

When it was time for breakfast, I followed everyone to the dining area and got my tray and milk.  When I first sat down there was no on at the table with me, but after a few minutes the rest of the chairs filled up.  I still did not have much of an appetite so I sort of picked at my powdered eggs, and drank my milk and apple juice.  As soon as a one of the other patients realized I was not going to eat my food, she started standing over me, and began to take food off of my tray.  She did not ask, or even say a word, she just took what she wanted, which was everything.  Since she was much bigger than me, I just let her take what she wanted without saying anything either.

After breakfast, we had about an hour before we went to another building for our “groups” and that was where the doctor’s would see the patients.  There was absolutely nothing to do, but watch TV.  While we had been at breakfast, someone had come through and locked the doors to our rooms.  I found a seat near the nurses station (for safety reasons) and parked myself there.  I started observing all the other patients.  Some of them were very high functioning, others could not even bath themselves, and a few could not or would not talk.  I noticed one woman, in her twenties, who was being followed by a nurse everywhere she went, and every few minutes the nurse following her would write down some notes about her.  It did not take long to figure out why this was being done.

The woman’s name was Angel.  I am not sure how long she had been in the hospital, but I believe it had been for quite some time.  I have no idea what her diagnosis was, as she was incapable of telling anyone and of course the nurses would not say.  I just know after watching her for a bit that she was delusional, and violent.  As I was watching her that first morning, even with the nurse following her, she went up to another nurse and punched her in the head.  The nurses there cannot really do anything back to a patient, otherwise they could be arrested.  Angel ended up hitting several other staff members repeatedly and several times she was given injections of medication that was supposed to calm her down.

Right before it was time to head over to the other building for groups, we were given our morning medication.  That is when I started on my new anti-depressant and anti-anxiety medications.  I could see my RLS medication that my husband brought, but the doctor still had not called with the orders yet.  After I took my medicine I went and got in line for the walk over to the “groups” building.  Before we headed over a nurse took the time to let me know that it was in my best interest if I went to the groups no matter what the topic was about even if it did not apply to me.  A list of people who attend the “groups” is kept and your file is marked if you have attended one.  The doctors like it better if they see you have been trying to get along with other people and attend the groups. &nbsp
;

The men went over to this other building as well, so there were a lot of crazy people in a confined area.  Some of them were much more noticeable than others.  There was Moss, who had a little problem keeping his hands to himself when he was around women.  Once, and I mean only once, he tried to get a handful of boob from me, I gave him the stink eye and he did not try again.  Another time, when he was sitting across from me during a group, he looked at me and said “I am the Devil, Fuck You!”  After telling my sister-in-law about that, she said she thought it would make a good facebook status.  There was a romance started, and a woman dumped her fiance for the young man she met in the crazy person hospital.  Angel went around punching more staff members, was given more injections and finally was set off in a room by herself.  Most of the people, men and women, that I met in there, were in there for drug and/or alcohol problems.  I was a most unusual patient for them, as I do not drink at all and the only drugs I use are the ones my doctors prescribe me.

When we were not in “groups” we had nothing to do but sit and wait around for a doctor to see us.  I was scheduled to see the medical doctor and the psychologist sometime that day.  There was nothing to sit on in the general population area, so those of us who wanted to sit had to sit on the dirty floor.  Again, I chose to sit near the nurses station.  Because there was absolutely nothing to do, people got on each other’s nerves.  Quite a few fights broke out, mostly between the men.  Once the fights were broken up the people involved were allowed to stay in the area where we all were and most of the time they would start fighting again.

Finally, I was told that the medical doctor was ready to see me.  That was a strange experience by itself.

To be continued…

Scariest Time Of My Life – Part VI
Back to Part IV

Scariest Time In My Life – Part IV

Posted on by
Reply

This is the next section of how I ended up in a state run psychiatric hospital and my experiences there.

I sat in a chair that was bolted to the floor and used everything within me to keep from bursting out crying.  The sheriff deputy was handing paper work, and my medial file over to someone behind the glass partition.  When he finished with his paper work, he came over and told me it would all be OK, and to remember to cooperate and I would be out sooner.

I looked at my surroundings and everything was gray.  Concrete floors painted gray, cinder block walls painted gray, gray chairs.  I am still holding on by a thread, using all my self control not to cry.  Still sitting.  Finally, a triage nurse takes my vitals, and is concerned because my blood pressure is sky high.  In my head I am thinking, of course my blood pressure is high, I am terrified.  I am told to go back to my chair and wait for a nurse to examine me.

As I am sitting in the gray chair, looking at the gray walls, feeling terrified, barely able to keep myself from crying, I start shaking.  Then one of the men from behind the glass partition came over to where I was sitting and shaking and told me he had to take my picture.  Again, a thought pops into my head, I am thinking they need the picture in case I decide to escape they can use it to track me down better.  Of course the picture was awful considering the fact that I had done a bunch of crying before I left the medical hospital, and I had no make up on and I had not been allowed to take a shower the whole time I was in the medical hospital.  About the time he finishes taking my picture, the nurse who is to examine me shows up.

She calls me into her office.  She tells me that she has to perform a medical examination on me so that I can be medically cleared to go into the regular ward.  Then she tells me that she has to strip search me.  I instantly burst into tears.  My second strip search in less than a week.  So while I am shaking and crying, the nurse conducts her strip search.  When that is done she performs her medical evaluation and I am sent back to the gray chairs in the gray room to wait and see the doctor.

I am not sure when this thought came into my head, but it was in there.  I kept thinking that the doctor at this hospital still had to decide if I really needed to be admitted there, and I kept thinking that once he talked to me he would realize that I did not belong in a psychiatric hospital.  I convinced myself of this.

After a long wait, during which I could not maintain control any longer ad started crying, the doctor finally showed up.  He took my blood pressure again, it seemed the numbers that the triage nurse had gotten from my blood pressure reading earlier was causing them some concern.  My blood pressure was still really high.  The doctor starts asking me questions, a lot of them were about my first suicide attempt and why I was not hospitalized then.  Again, I went through my story of how I got here because of calling my counselor for help and her not being in her office and that I really did not think I belonged there.  The doctor starts questioning the medication that my psychologist prescribed me, he did not do a very good job of hiding the fact that he did not like what my usual doctor had been giving me.  After ten minutes, he lets me know that we are done, and that I am staying in the psychiatric hospital for two to three days, business days not counting the weekend.  I could not believe what I was hearing.  I asked him why and he said “that he felt I was a danger to myself”.  He also wanted to change my medications in a hospital setting.  So then he starts going through the very long list of medications that I have to take for other things, and lets me know that he would be surprised if the unit had the medication I needed for my Restless Leg Syndrome, but he would have them start looking for it.

I go back to the gray chairs, in the gray room.  I do not sit there for very long when two women come up to me and ask me to follow them and go back into the nurse’s office.  Can you guess what they wanted?  If you said to strip search me again, you would be correct.  By now, I am so terrified, and shaking, that I can barely walk.  After they finish their strip search, I am told to get into the back of the security guard’s car and one of the women gets in.  She has a medical mask on her face.  I am then taken to the building where I will be staying. 

When we get to where I am supposed to be, I notice a huge sign on the door.  It basically says that there are patients in this unit exhibiting flu like symptoms and that people are to only come in if they are wearing a mask.  Now I understand why the woman with me is wearing one.  Then I think, what are these people doing, they are sending an asthmatic into a building where there are people who could have the flu.

We enter the building and the first thing that I notice is the noise.  Too much noise.  With my anxiety disorder I have a difficult time handling loud noises, lots of people, and it is even worse when there are loud noises and lots of people in a confined area.  The woman with the mask hands all my stuff over to the nurses in the nurse’s station and I just put my back up against a wall that is in front of the nurse’s station and take in my surroundings.

The best thing I could think of that it reminded me of was of a certain scene from the movie “The Snake Pit”.  “The Snake Pit” is a movie produced in 1948 about a woman and her experiences in an insane asylum, at one point her condition deteriorates and she has to be placed in a special ward called The Snake Pit.  In this ward, the patients are wandering around, making strange noises and fighting with each other.  When I looked out into the room that I had been taken into, it looked exactly like that. 

So with my back against the wall, wringing my hands, my heart in my throat, more terrified than I have ever been before and shaking like I leaf, the reality of where I was finally hit me. 

To be continued…

Scariest Time In My Life – Part V
Back to Part III

Scariest Time In My Life – Part III

Posted on by
Reply

This is the next section of how I ended up in a state run psychiatric hospital and my experiences there.

As I suspected, I had a very sleepless night in ICU.  There was a guard in my room, all that night.  I ignored him the best I could.  I was still pissed off at how things turned out.  I wanted to go home.  I was miserable.

A doctor came to examine me in the morning.  Everything was fine, he said I had to stay hooked up to the heart monitors to satisfy the psychiatric hospital.  He then let me know I was going to be moved to a room on the regular floor, for one more night’s stay, and the next day I would be transferred to the psychiatric hospital.  Other than that, the doctor would not talk to me.  What I did not know at the time, is that none of the doctors or nurses would give any information to my husband either.  What I did not understand yet, is that once you have been 10-13nd, you considered incapable of making medical decisions for yourself, and basically whatever hospital you are in has “custody” of you.

Shortly after the doctor examined me I was transferred over to the regular floor, my guard following me over to the new room.  It was at this point that I found out that if I wanted to go to the rest room that I had to wait until a nurse could come into my room and watch me.  As far as I was concerned it was just another humiliating thing I was going to have to endure.  I know this next part is going to sound silly, but at the time it was a serious concern for me.  It is hard enough for me to urinate with someone watching, I am mentally incapable of having a bowl movement with someone watching.  So I quit eating while I was in the medical hospital.  It was not all that difficult to do, considering how nervous, scared and pissed off I was, I really had no appetite anyway.

The guard I had that afternoon felt it was his duty to prepare me for the transfer to the psychiatric hospital.  He let me know that I would be going in a deputy sheriff’s car, riding in the back, as if I were a criminal.  He told me that I might be able to wear my own clothes, that the deputy who would take me would be the one to make that decision.   Finally, he told me that because of the sheriff’s department policy, I would have to be handcuffed.  The shock that I was in deepened, my fear became stronger, and the thought that kept going through my head was, “This would not be happening, if I had not called someone for help.”  I quit talking after that.

That evening, when it came time for me to take my medication for my restless leg syndrome (RLS), I was again given a dose that was less than half of what I am supposed to take.  I asked the nurse who brought it where the rest of it was, and told her that all my medications were brought over from ICU and she needed to check and see what my dosage was.  Her response was to roll her eyes and to let me know either I took what she brought and quit complaining or she would not give me anything for my RLS.  I got on my cell phone and called my husband and told him what was going on, and the nurse left my room, taking the smaller dose of my medication with her.  I was so very angry.  She came back in and told me that the doctor’s orders were for that smaller amount and there was nothing I could do about it.  I believe it was about that point when I said very loudly “that just because I was 10-13nd, did not mean that the doctor or anyone could make medical decisions about me without telling me what was going on.  My husband was still on the phone and he told me he was going to come back to the hospital to see what he could do.  The guard then told the nurse that if this was going to be how I was going to behave, then he was going to take my cell phone away and not let me have visitors.

When my husband was just about to my room, the guard left my room to speak to my husband.  Apparently, the guard told my husband to calm me down so that I could still have visitors and to make their job easier.  My husband went to the nurses station and asked where my bag of medications was.  That is when we found out that between ICU and the regular floor (which by the way are technically on the same floor), my medication bag was lost.  After an hour of searching, my nurse found it.  After verifying on the RLS medication bottle and realizing that I was correct about the dosage, she called the doctor.  At that point my husband spoke with the doctor and let him know that just because I was 10-13nd did not give anyone the right to change my medication dosage because they were unfamiliar with treating people at that dosage amount.  He also asked the doctor why my other medications had not been administered either.  At that point, my husband found out that as a general rule in that hospital, if you are admitted because you are suicidal they take away all of your medications, and only let you have them back gradually.  After much discussion, my husband was able to convince the doctor that it would be a good idea to let me have all my medications, in the dosages I was supposed to.

After another sleepless night, the day that I was dreading arrived.  The day I was going to have to be handcuffed and transported to the psychiatric hospital.  I spent most of that morning crying and thinking over and over again, how this would not have happened if I had not made that phone call for help when I knew I was headed for trouble.  What helped me pass part of the morning was that I was able to get a hold of a friend on my phone using the msn messenger that is on my phone.  He said some encouraging words, told me I would get through this and everything would be ok.

The doctor came into my room to do one final examination before it was time for me to go.  He asked me how I was feeling and I told him I was “pissed off”.  I also told him I felt like I had been railroaded in there, all because I had tried to call my counselor to get help when I realized that I was in trouble and wanted to stop things before they got worse.  His response shocked me.  He told me that anyone who took fifty beta blockers needed to go to a psychiatric hospital, because I could have died.  I remember saying “fifty beta blockers”, and his reply was “yes, that is what I heard you took”.  I let him know that his figure was inaccurate, and told him I took at the most eleven, my regular dosage and ten more. And that before I took anymore I had tried to get a hold of my counselor and some how ended up here.  My only guess is that the crisis team psychologist told him that I had taken fifty beta blockers.  By now I am feeling that  if I ever do get to that point again, there is no way I am going to call anyone for help, and that the attempted suicide will be successful.  

My husband and daughter showed up a bit later to tell me they loved me and to tell me goodbye.  We found out then, which hospital I would be going to, and my husband was given a copy of the address and phone number.  We decided that my husband would take my medications home with him, so that they would not get lost again.  Soon after they left, the nurse came in and told me I would be leaving shortly and the deputy who was taking me said I could wear my own clothing.  Even though I had already been stripped searched and my bags had already been searched several times, the nurse had to watch me get dressed and the guard had to go through my bags.

After I got dressed, I sat on my bed, trying to maintain control of myself.  The nurse came in with a giant white pill and said that the doctor wanted me to take a potassium pill because my blood work showed my potassium was low.  I did not want to take it.  The nurse asked me if I needed anything and I said “No, just leave m
e alone”.  I am guessing that the guard took that to mean that I was going to become a problem, because he stood up and told me I had no choice but to take the pill.  (I did find out later, that 10-13nd or not, no one could force me to take any medication against my will)  I took the pill.  The guard must have also decided that I would become a problem when the deputy showed up to transfer me, because I heard him use his radio to call another guard to my room as back up.

The deputy gets to my room.  He tells me it is time to go.  He gets my bags.  We start walking down the hall.  I am waiting for him to stop and handcuff me.  I ask him if he is going to handcuff me because I had been told that he would have to.  His answer did make me feel some better.  He said “that as long as I did not give him any problems he did not want to handcuff me.”  We are walking out of the hospital, and I realized he had parked his patrol car right in the drive through area of the hospital, so anyone who is coming into the hospital or leaving the hospital, or even just happens to look out their window can see me getting into the back of it.  More humiliation.  In my head I am still focusing on how things got to this point and how I will never call for help again, if this is the end result.

It took an hour to get to the psychiatric hospital.  There was really no conversation between me and the deputy.  That plexiglass thing that is used to separate the front from the back makes any type of conversation difficult.  As we were driving through the front gate of the hospital, the deputy did take the time to let me know that the more I cooperated with the doctors and staff the sooner I would get out of there.  We got to the intake building and I was on the verge of a panic attack.  I have an anxiety disorder anyway, and with all that had gone on the last few days, I think I was just on the verge of really and truly losing it.  I am not sure if the deputy sensed what was going on in my head or not, but he actually had us wait outside of the intake building for about ten minutes.  I think he was giving me time to get control of myself before we walked in.

The deputy took me inside the intake building, gave someone behind a glass partition my bags and I was told to have a seat.

To be continued…

Scariest Time Of My Life – Part IV
Back to Part II

Scariest Time In My Life – Part II

Posted on by
Reply
This is the next section of how I ended up in a state run psychiatric hospital and my experiences there.

After the crisis team and I arrived at the hospital, and the psychologist left me at the front desk, he went back and spoke to someone about me.  Very quickly, I was taken back to triage and then taken to a room in the emergency department.  At that time, no one seemed to be making a big deal about anything so, I started thinking again that a mistake had been made and it would be straightened out.  A doctor came in, asked me a few questions and then everyone’s attitude towards me changed. 

A nurse came in and told me I had been 10-13nd.  Where I live that means a doctor or a judge has declared you a danger to yourself or others and has committed you against your will to a psychiatric hospital.  Shock began to set in again.  My guess, is that the decision to commit me to a psychiatric hospital had been made before I even saw the doctor.  It had probably been made when the psychologist from the crisis team went back and talked to someone in the emergency department and had left me out front.

I was so mentally unprepared for the things that happened next.  That same nurse who told me I had been 10-13nd, handed me a hospital gown and told me I had to take EVERYTHING off and put their gown on.  I asked if this included underwear and she said it did.  I let her know immediately that I was leaving my underwear on and that was that.  She said that she would have to check with the charge nurse.  She also told me they expected me to be leaving for the psychiatric hospital within a few hours, once they found one that had room for me.  I was told that I would have to go in the hospital gown and not my regular clothes.

The nurse left my room, leaving the door open and within seconds a security guard showed up with a chair, which he stuck in the open doorway.   By this time some of the shock was wearing off and I was getting pissed off.  I really felt like I had been handed a bad deal.  In my mind, I was thinking that all I had done was realized I was in trouble, and called my counselor and some how that attempt at getting help before I took any more pills ended up with me being stuck and guarded, waiting to go to a psychiatric hospital.  In fact, that thought is all I focused on for several days.

The charge nurse came into my room.  The guard left the room and shut the door.  The thought I had was that she had come in to take my underwear away.  That is what I was prepared for.  What ended up happening was much much worse, at least as far as I was concerned.  She told me she was going to have to strip search me.  A thorough strip search.  I remember staring at her for a few seconds because my mind could not fully comprehend what she had said for a few seconds.  I then let her know I am not a drug user, nor do I carry weapons, and that I was in here because I had called for help and I felt that things had gone awry.  I also let her know that she was NOT going to strip search me.  Her response was to let me know that all the security guards in the hospital were also sheriff deputies and she would have the guard outside my door arrest me and take me to jail if I did not let her search me the way she needed to.  I promptly burst into tears.  I sobbed.  I relented and let her do what she needed to do.  It was the most humiliating thing I have ever experienced.  My only consolation was she let me keep my underwear. 

After the charge nurse left my room and the guard was back in his place, the doctor let me know they were going to have to hook me up to some heart monitors since I had taken extra of my beta blocker.  Everything looked fine with my heart, but they did leave everything hooked up so they could keep monitoring me.  At that point, I found out that my husband had been out in the waiting room for quite some time and they had not let him come back to see me.  I asked the guard if he would let my husband come back and he said that he would.  My husband came into my room, I explained to him what had happened, and how I felt that if I had not called for help I would not be in there. I did some more crying.  He was great and stayed calm and calmed me down, and then the guard told him he had to go.  

During all of this time the emergency department had been working on getting me into one of the two psychiatric hospitals in our area.  The hospital that agreed to take me, said they wanted the medical hospital to monitor me for 24 hours, because of the beta blocker, before I could go there.  I was taken to the Intensive Care Unit (ICU), where they decided to start an IV and flush out my system to help get the extra beta blocker out of my system. 

I was getting angrier and angrier because I still felt that all of this was happening because I had called for help, and that things had gone awry.  I really was not pleasant to be around.  I knew I was only going to spend one night in ICU and part of the next day, and after that I was not really sure what was going to happen and when I would be going to the psychiatric hospital.  That also had me very worried. 

I have something called restless leg syndrome (RLS).  Basically, it means that my legs are very uncomfortable, especially at night, and with out my medication sleep is very difficult.  When it came time for me to take my night dose of my RLS medication, I was not given the correct dose.  I was given a much smaller dose.  I mentioned to the nurse that they should have a bag of all of my medication bottles somewhere and they could read it and see what my normal dosages are.  The doctor on call was contacted and he told them to give me the proper dose and I assumed that things had all been taken care of.

After the night medications were sorted out, I settled down for what I knew would be a sleepless night. 

To be continued…

Scariest Time In My Life – Part III

What Difference Does It Make?

Posted on by
Reply
What difference does it make in my life and my family’s life that I have not had any suicidal thoughts in several weeks?  What difference does in my life and in my family’s life that my depression and anxiety do not have as strong of a hold on me as they used to? 

Not having suicidal thoughts for several weeks means, my husband can rest easier and be away from home easier.  He does not have to deal with the constant worry that I will do something to hurt myself.  He will not have to keep explaining to our daughter why Mommy is in the hospital again.  His stress levels will be reduced, his blood pressure will come down, and he will be happier again.  I can work on building up trust with him again.  I will be less cranky and argumentative.  Which means when he comes home from work, he will not have to worry about what kind of argument I am going to start.  I believe we will be closer, because there will be less tension between me and him. 

When my depression and anxiety was very bad, I quit talking to people. I  would just sit on the sidelines and watch as my husband and daughter engaged each other in conversation.  I was not a part of things, and my husband missed me.  He is enjoying it now that I will talk to him and our daughter more, and do not sit silently as much as I used to.  I do not isolate myself as  much anymore either.  I enjoy it when we go places together and they are really having fun when I go with them. 

My grandmother, who I have never seen cry, not even when my grandfather passed away, has cried about me.  She cried because she was worried, and confused about why her granddaughter would want to die.  I think it is incredibly sad that I caused her so much pain.   At least now, she can worry less and I will not reduce her to tears anymore.  She is a loving, caring grandmother and it is unfair that I have caused her to carry such a huge burden of worry for all these months.    She is 82 years old, with a few health problems, I do not need to cause her anymore worry than I already have.  I am looking forward to spending many more years with her.

My brother and sister-in-law can spend less time worrying about me, and helping my husband, and spend more time taking care of their daughter and themselves.  They have been absolutely wonderful.  They have really helped me.  They have made sure that there is always an open line of communication between me and my family, and them.  They willingly listen to me express my frustrations, worries, and concerns without forming judgments.  They have been a huge source of support to my husband as he has had to help me through things.  At least now, with me not having suicidal thoughts, they can relax a bit and not have to sacrifice as much time in taking care of me and my family.                                                                                                          
For me personally, not having suicidal thoughts for several weeks means I feel free.  I look back at how things had been going, and how I had isolated myself, and it feels like I was a prisoner during that time.  Now that the depression and anxiety are lessening, and I am not having suicidal thoughts, I feel as if I have been freed from a prison cell.  I feel lighter.  Having all those thoughts in my head, and the sadness I always had, and the anger I always had, I always felt as if I was carrying a huge load on my back.  Bits and pieces of that load are going away, so I feel lighter.  My stomach feels better.  Every single day I woke up with a huge knot in my stomach because I was so anxious and nervous all the time.  As the day went on the knot in my stomach got bigger and bigger because I would become more anxious and nervous as the day went along.  That knot is gone.  I can wake up in the morning and not start the day already feeling bad.  I feel so much better.

I realize that not every day is going to be a good day and that I could have some more medication issues, but at this point I am more hopeful than I have been in a very long time.  Hope brings on a more positive attitude and  I feel like I am moving away from that dark cloud that has surrounded me for so many years.

Attack Of The Blank Mind

Posted on by
Reply
I have to admit that today it has been a struggle to come up with something to blog about.  I have managed to catch a cold that has settled into my chest.  Besides having major depression, diabetes, and an anxiety disorder, I also have adult onset asthma, so I always get a little concerned when a cold settles into my chest.  I just feel pretty crappy today.  I also have not been sleeping very well, so I have been dozing on and off during the day. 

Right before I was diagnosed with depression and an anxiety disorder, I was hardly ever sleeping.  I had the typical early waking that many people with depression experience.  This lack of sleep is a bit different.  I am just not sleeping more than a couple of hours at a time when I do sleep, and I got at least three nights during the week without getting any sleep at all.  I am starting to think that it is the Effexor causing it.  That can be one of the side effects.  When I mentioned my lack of sleep to my psychiatrist he told me to take extra of my anti-anxiety medication, vistaril, since it is nonaddictive and makes you sleepy.  It is not having the desired results.  I do not want to stop taking the Effexor, since it seems to be working for the depression.  The next time I see my psychiatrist, I will tell him that I am still not sleeping and get him to prescribe something to help me sleep.  He said he would if the extra vistaril did not work. 

Part of me really enjoys being the only one awake at night, part of me does wish I could sleep a little more.  Before I started getting help with my depression most of my time at night was spent crying for hours, researching how to kill myself, and trying to decide if that night was the night to go through with it.  Now, I spend it enjoying the quiet alone time, watching what I want on TV, spending time with my dogs, reading, and just generally enjoying myself.  Hey!  I just now realized that I have not had any suicidal or self destructive thoughts in several weeks.  That is wonderful! I  had not even been aware that I had not had those thoughts until I started recalling how I used to spend my  nights.

That is exactly how my counselor said it would happen too.  She said I would just quit having those thoughts, and would not really notice until sometime later.  Even when  I was taking the other medications and they seemed to be working, I still had almost daily suicidal thoughts, I was just not as obsessed with them as I had been before treatment.  I feel like I have reached a huge milestone in my recovery.  No suicidal thoughts for about three weeks.  I never really believed that there would come a time when I would go so long without wanting to kill myself.

My dogs are my constant night time companions.  Well, they sort of are.  They tend to fall asleep too.  Buster is my boxer, and Minnie is my chihuahua/shitzu mix.  Minnie is younger and smaller but she is the dog that is in charge.  This is what the dogs are doing now, while I am still awake and blogging.

I Am Going to Draw A Line In The Sand

Posted on by
Reply

Today I had my weekly appointment with my counselor. I went with a topic in mind. How do I deal with my resentments, most particularly held against my mother, so that I do not get consumed by my resentments? When I am consumed by my resentments I become very angry and spiral down into a “rabid dog” type of mentality, I am sad, and I know that it contributes to my depression.

As usual, my counselor had a very simple solution, that is going to be super hard to implement. Basically, she said that if I would start being very clear with my mother about what my boundaries were and stuck with the consequences if she chose to cross a boundary, I would feel empowered. She believes that much of my resentment is born out of frustration, because I am not very good at making clear what is acceptable behavior towards myself and what is unacceptable behavior, especially where my mother is concerned. She feels that if I can accomplish this with my mother, that everyone else will be easy.

Let me just put it this way, my mother is a very manipulative woman, who tends to behave in a very passive aggressive/childish way when she does not get her own way. She knows what all my buttons are and knows exactly how to push each and everyone of them, and I always get sucked into whatever game/manipulation she has going on at the time. At times she can be so wonderful and be exactly the mother I have always wanted, and then when I start depending on her and really need her support, it is as if she snatches that away and I am left once again with the mother that makes me feel inferior, unintelligent, abandoned, not worthy, frustrated, disappointed and sad.

My challenge then, is when she is acting appropriate and loving to take it for what it is and remember that it will not last. That when she has has gotten whatever emotional need filled by me, she will revert back to her usual manipulative, passive aggressive self. Most importantly, I cannot change her. I can only change how I react to her. That means I will have to be assertive and set up boundaries to protect myself from her manipulations and behavior. Only when I can accomplish all of that will I be able to let go of my resentments towards her. For my peace of mind and sanity, I really need to start working on this immediately.

_________________________________________________________

Check this news article out.

Study: Over 8 Million Americans Consider Suicide Each Year – Health News | Current Health News | Medical News – FOXNews.com

Posted using ShareThis

My Mind Powers Can Turn You Into A Frog

Posted on by
Reply
During the last few years there is a special someone who had the ability to make me smile no matter how much my depression and anxiety were affecting me.  That person was my little, four year old niece.  She was the one person in my family that I felt had no expectations of me, and just accepted me as I was, good days and bad.  Most of the time she thinks I am pretty funny, but likes to tell me all the time how silly I am.

I was very fortunate when my niece was born.  After her mother had to go back to work, my brother and sister-in-law trusted me enough to babysit her during the day sometimes.  It has always meant so much to me that I had the opportunity to play such an important role in her life when she was so young.  I will always appreciate my brother and sister-in-law for allowing me to do that. 

My niece calls me MeMe.  My family calls me Missy and when she was younger she could not say it properly and it came out MeMe.  I thought it was a great aunt name and asked if they would let her keep calling me that so I could be the aunt with the cool nickname. 

Over time my brother and sister-in-law moved to another house a bit further away and my health started to decline a bit so I could not babysit anymore.  Plus with the depression and anxiety, I could not really get out like I used to.  However, I had opportunities to let her come to my house and spend the  night, or hang out with her a bit.  I loved those times.  She was so much fun to play with.

One time I was bringing her to my house, she saw some cows in the cow pastures around us.  There were a few brown cows.  I told her the brown cows made chocolate milk, and the black and white cows made white milk.  To this day she still talks about brown cows making chocolate milk.  She has such a great sense of humor for a four year old. A few of months ago we had gathered at my grandmothers to cook out and spend some time together.  My mother had bought some bubble guns.  With no prompting from me, she would fill her gun up with the bubble mixture and go shoot her father with the bubbles and then she would always tell him “MeMe told me to do it!” 

She was a life saver when my family had gathered at a restaurant.  Between the depression and my anxiety, being in a crowded restaurant was a nightmare.  I could hardly stand it.  I had brought my niece some toys and a package of punch balls and some bubbles, she really wanted to play with them.  So every so often she would ask me to take her outside on the front porch of the restaurant. Once we got out there, she and I would punch each other with the punch balls (she always declared herself the winner), or we would blow bubbles, or we would just sit there and talk about Disney Princesses.  She and I both like Cinderella the best.  The thing is she accepted me on whatever level I could give her at the moment and if I was quiet for a bit she would play by herself, she made no stressing demands on me.  I know a few adults who could learn a thing or two from her. 

A couple of weeks ago we went to my brother and sister-in-law’s house to hang out, and have pizza.  My niece was just great!  When she saw us pull into the driveway she came running out to welcome us.  She showed me a few of her wrestling moves, and in a discussion that involved me trying to convince her that she should share a stuffed animal with me I learned that she could not because “they were all her favorites”  By the time the pizza arrived she was dressed in a Tinkerbell outfit, carrying two wands, trying to impress me with the “power” that was in her wands.  Again, there was a sharing discussion between me and her about the wands and she let me know that I could not handle the “power” her wands contained and then promptly turned me into a pepperoni pizza.  Then told me that because I was a pizza I could not talk. 

When I was released from her pepperoni pizza spell, I let her know about my mind powers, which I could use to turn her into a frog.  Then I turned her into a frog.  We went back and forth turning each other into frogs and pizza over and over again.  Her wand was waving all over the place, my mind was working very hard with all those frog spells.  We had a lot of fun! 

Once again, that cute little kid brought me out of my own depression and anxiety better than anyone else could do and had me concentrating on other things and had me laughing.  One of the things I am going to do when I have a bad day or days again, is remember “My mind power can turn you into a frog” and think about the good times I have had with my niece.  What a little blessing she is!

Did You Say Pineapple?!

Posted on by
Reply
A few weeks ago, my counselor and I were discussing ways that I could let my family know I was feeling anxious or upset without having to give them a long explanation.  She suggested using a code word.  She said one couple she had counseled used the word pineapple.  So I decided to go home and think of my own code word. 

The day after that counseling session my family and I went Walmart.  At that time I still had not told my family about the code word idea, because I had not found one yet.    As we entered the parking lot of Walmart, my husband and daughter started bickering.  They had raised their voices a little bit, and it was getting on my nerves.  Raised voices in a small area really makes me anxious and we were all crammed into the front seat of our pick up.  I had asked them a couple of times to stop and they had not listened, so desperate for anything to make them stop I suddenly remembered the code word idea.  The only word that came to mind was pineapple, the one my counselor said that someone else used.  So suddenly, with no warning I yelled “Pineapple” as loud as I could. 

The result was an instantaneous silence.  Then my husband, out of shock I believe, started asking me if I “wanted a pineapple milkshake” or did I want to get a pineapple while we were at the store.  I explained to them that pineapple was my new code word for when something was going on that was making anxious or that things were going horribly awry.  My husband and daughter thought this was hilarious and kept telling me what a pineappled up idea that was.  Despite their laughter and making fun of me they did agree to listen for me saying the word pineapple and know that things were not going well.  Little did any of us suspect that something being “pineappled up” would become a regular part of our language around here.   

For example, while I was spending some time in the psychiatric hospital, my husband decided that my daughter was in desperate need of some new bras, so he was a brave man and took her bra shopping.  Things did not go well.  After they got home, my daughter called me and was telling me how it was so hard to go bra shopping with her father, that he pineappled everything up.  Then she said there was pineapple over the whole shopping experience.  In fact she spent about five minutes telling me exactly how her father pineappled up bra shopping and how she was never going to go pineapple bra shopping with her father again. 

Funny how a simple thing like the word pineapple can change how you look at a situation and put some humor in it.