Why Would I Even Want to?

Posted on February 2, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

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I recently read a couple of blog posts that made me think about my struggles with major depression and an anxiety disorder over the last few years. The first was written by Staci Shelton of Love, Staci, called U-Turns Allowed. In it she suggests that it is possible to make a u-turn if we find our life heading in a direction that we never intended. The second was called Can you Turn It Around written by Bonita Summers. In her post she puts forth the idea that it is impossible to make a u-turn in life because if we managed to get out of the not good situation, some of what we experienced sticks to us, changing who we are.

In my personal opinion, I believe that there is no going back. Like Ms. Summers, I believe those things we have experienced change us. I believe those changes can be positive or negative.

Thinking about it from the point of view of a depressed person, some of my depression is a result of things that changed who I was when I was a child and as a young adult. Those experiences effected their changes emotionally, and chemically in my brain.

My experiences stuck with me and I was the exact opposite of what I envisioned for myself. My reality did not fit with what I dreamed. In my dreams the person I wanted to be was someone who was full of confidence, and had a positive outlook on life.

My experience with major depression and an anxiety disorder has also left its mark on me as well. Three years of being in a deep, dark depression would leave its mark on anyone. An almost successful suicide attempt, some time in a mental institution, and therapy since May have also changed me.

I am still not the person I envisioned in my dreams. I have resigned myself to the fact I never will be. Nor do I want to turn around and get a “re-do” on any part of my life. Why would I even want to? Unless I could go all the way back to the beginning, before certain life experiences changed me, there would be no point. If I made a u-turn to go back and do over any portion of my life, I would still end up making the same mistakes because the core issues that caused me to mess things up would still be there. I do not even want to be the person I was before my depression. That person was not healthy or happy.

I suppose one could make an argument that if you could make a u-turn in your life you could go back and make right the things you did wrong. I would not want to do that either. How sincere would my apology or acts of contrition actually be, if I had not truly suffered from the consequences of my past bad actions?

The long and short of it, is that I believe u-turns are impossible. What we can hope to achieve instead is a better understanding for what led us to make poor decisions, and cause us to get off track in life. Then we can take that information and make better decisions in the future.

Too Cool For The Spa – Part II

Posted on January 31, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

I am going to finish “Too Cool For The Spa” today. I apologize for not finishing it yesterday, but I just could not stay awake any longer and I had been working on that one post all day long. Some days are harder than others, in staying awake. My depression medications make me sleepy, some days worse than others.

After leaving my brother’s place of work, we were finally headed to our last stop, mine and my mother’s appointments with Dr. Szumstein. Again we arrived early. We got to his office and proceeded to try and find a parking spot in the parking deck. It was very busy, and the only spot we could find was on the very top deck.

This is a picture I took of the Atlanta Skyline from the top deck of the parking deck. If you look carefully, you can see the city of Atlanta off in the distance.

The waiting room at this practice had even more baseball memorabilia than the other office had.

After signing in at Georgia Lung Associates we did not have to wait very long for Dr. Szumstein to call us back. One of the things I like about this practice, is that the doctors actually come and get you from the waiting room. It makes everything so much more pleasant that way, not too mention it gives you the impression that the patients are really cared for there. That is not something you find very often anymore.

When we have appointments together, Dr. Szumstein will put us in the same room. My mother and I had a discussion over who would get the big chair. Neither one of us really wanted it. My mother prevailed in that discussion, after all she is older than me.

When Dr. Szumstein came back into our room, I asked him about taking his picture for my blog. I think he thought I lost my mind, but he did say I could take his picture. He sent mom off to have her breathing tested. While she was out of the room, he asked how I was doing. He knew about my depression and suicide attempt. I had to tell him because many of the depression drugs out there make Restless Leg Syndrome worse, and he has to know so he can make informed decisions about increasing my doses of Restless Leg Syndrome medication. He seemed very pleased to find out that I was doing much better.

Dr. Szumstein is probably my favorite doctor I have ever had. He is a very nice man as well as being a very good doctor. If only one of us is there for an appointment, he always takes the time to ask about the other members of the family.

Dr. Szumstein then sent me off for my breathing test. The technician who did my test for me that day was kind of enough to take a picture of me while I was in the testing booth. This is the test I have to do every time I go to the pulmonologist. It tests to see how well I am breathing and compares the results to previous tests.

Dr. Szumstein came back into our room and gave us our tests results. While he was looking over our information, I told him how mom and I had been comparing our wheezes as we were walking down the hall. She had a whistle wheeze and I had more of a rumbling wheeze. Dr. Szumstein thought this was pretty funny and replied with “Awesome!”

Dr. Szumstein did not seem worried by anything he saw in our breathing tests results, however, my tests results were worse than they had been right after I had gotten out of the hospital for an asthma attack. He also said that in all the time I had been seeing him, I only had one breathing test that was worse than this one. No wonder I have been feeling like crap lately.

The other thing that I really like about Dr. Szumstein, is that he is really good about giving out samples of medications. He knows that even with prescription insurance, it is still expensive to get everything filled. So he gave me and my mother plenty of samples to last us a while.

We were finally finished with all our appointments for the day and we could start back to the house. I believe my daughter was rather happy to be done with all that waiting around for people.

I think my family is rather cool. Instead of the women getting together for a day at the spa, we got together for a day at the doctors’. We are just that cool, too cool for the spa!

As a side note: I think maybe I should put my mother in charge of my schedule since she seems to get every where either early or on time.

Checking Out Is Not Allowed

Posted on January 22, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

I saw my counselor today. I let her know about how I was doing this week. I told her about not getting dressed for two days, and trying to isolate myself. I did let her know that I did not have any suicidal thoughts, or any negative dialogue running around my brain, but I knew that I had been feeling down.

She told me that in her opinion, she felt like the two days I chose to not dress and hide away in my room, was me attempting to “check out” again. She did say that it was an improvement that I did not have the suicidal thoughts, or any negative dialogue in my head.

She confirmed that it would definitely be considered depressive behavior. That kind of disappointed me. The reason it did, is supposedly there is something called depression remission. If you can go a solid year with no depression symptoms you are considered in remission. Of course, me of the unrealistic expectations, was convinced that I had this depression thing licked and I would be considered in remission by next summer. Not going to happen now.

Then it was time to figure out why I was feeling this way. We came up with a few reasons. Basically, what it boils down to, is I have this habit of taking on other people’s emotions as my own. Even people I see on TV. That is why I have not watched anything about Haiti. Someone being angry with me also affects how I feel. It usually makes me very sad, and leads me to a very negative dialogue about myself.

Someone I dearly love has been feeling a bit stressed lately, and down. Plus with my wheezing, I was not feeling good. So those two things got combined in my head, and all of the sudden I was taken on someone else’s emotions and feelings, and I was allowing it to bring me down. Those two days of not dressing, were my way of trying to hide from how I was feeling.

My counselor said she believed that unlearning this particular behavior is going to be one of my biggest struggles, since I do it without even thinking about it and have done it most of my life.

I now have another home work assignment. She is so darn good at giving out home work. What I am to do is when I encounter a person/situation that I know is going to drastically affect my frame of mind, I am to tell myself that this is not my issue to take on. I feel empathy for them, but this is not mine to take on. Just like the home work of finding something positive in every situation, the idea is once I practice this enough, it will replace the not healthy behavior. She reminded me that this was going to be much more difficult than the positive thinking home work, and I absolutely needed to be extremely patient with myself. No unrealistic expectations and checking out as a way to not deal with something is not allowed.

She also discussed about me making some friends that I could count on. She did not care if they were over the internet or in real life. She feels that having more friends would be a good way to have other people besides myself to concentrate on. Also, having friends with people who are fully aware of my mental difficulties, would be more understanding than some people, who I thought were friends, have been in the past. This sounds like another home work assignment to me, even if she did not use those words.

I never was one for a ton of friends. On and off for all of my life I have dealt with depression, this last time was much worse with the suicide attempt that almost worked. So my need for friends has been minimal. The few friends I had before I developed this round of severe/major depression sort of dropped away, because I never returned phone calls or emails. I think they were also at a loss of how to be around me and what to say to me after the suicide attempt.

I know that to have friends, I need to be a friend. Honestly though, when I am depressed, it is just too much work.

A friend of mine that I have not seen in several years wrote me a note the other day, she mentioned something about me and her getting together for lunch sometime. That is something I really want to do. I would like to cultivate that friendship so I have at least one real life friend in my life. She is a good person and I think it would be good for me to step outside of myself and do what friends do for each other.

Lately, there have been a few people I have met around the blogs that I want to get to know better. One in particular I think would be someone who I think would turn out to be a good support for me and I could be a good support for her.

I already know that this is going to provide me with some extra anxiety. I will do what I need to do, to deal with the extra anxiety.

Easy Button

Posted on January 20, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

Have you ever wished that you had an Easy Button for your life and all of its challenges. I have. There have been so many times during the last few months, while I have been in treatment for my depression, that I have wished there was an Easy Button. It would be so much easier for my mind to get better if I could just push an Easy Button and get an instant cure.

Delving into why I am the way I am has been a very painful process. Thinking about how I behaved when my depression and emotions were out of control is not the most pleasant. Seeing the consequences of my suicide attempt and hospitalization on my family, truly makes me sad. An Easy Button would be a great way to not have to deal with all that emotional pain.

I could see myself using an Easy Button for most, if not all, of my mental difficulties. I would be happier, wouldn’t I?

If I had an easy button, I would not have the feeling of satisfaction I get now when I can make it through the day. Nor would I have a feeling of satisfaction for having worked hard at finding something positive about a bad situation. Oh wait, I just realized I would not even have any “real” emotions because I would not have to deal with anything.

As much as I say I want an Easy Button, I think the reality is I do not. I would miss out on to many life experiences. Sure, those experiences can be painful and make me sad, but how would I grow as a person if I just pushed a button all the time to skip over the difficult parts? How would anyone grow if they could just use an Easy Button to not have to deal with the hard stuff in life?

Confession Is Good For The Soul

Posted on January 20, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

Confession is good for the soul is what I have been told. I hope it is, because today is my day to confess.

Since Friday my mental health has not been as good has it has been. It is not as bad as it can get, but that is not saying a lot. I have been down, wanting to isolate myself, quiet, and I have not felt like communicating with anyone. I have a counselor’s appointment Thursday so I will be sure to bring it up to her then. I have been faking feeling OK on my blog and with my daughter. However, even over the phone my husband can tell that I am not in a good frame of mind. I even lacked the motivation to take a shower and get dressed for a couple of days.

Some positives are I am not having any suicidal thoughts, and I am not having a negative dialogue running through my head. I mostly feel disengaged from things.

It could be a normal “down” time that everyone goes through, but it is still a struggle for me to identify “normal” emotions as compared to my out of control emotions. That is why running this past the counselor is a good thing, she helps me identify which category my emotions are in.

So that is my confession. I felt compelled to do it because from the beginning of my recovery process I promised I would always tell the truth about what was going on. Sometimes the person I need to tell the truth to the most is myself.

The Sky Is Falling

Posted on January 19, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

I had yet another children’s book on my mind today. The story of Chicken Little. After re-reading it this morning, I realized that Chicken Little was having a major panic attack. I also realized that there were several things in the story that I could apply to myself.

Not only was Chicken Little experiencing a panic attack, but he was having a panic attack over something imaginary.

“Chicken Little was in the woods.

A seed fell on his tail.

Chicken Little said,
“The sky is falling.
I will run.”

I have had more than one panic attack over something I imagined. Whatever I had created in my mind, became real to me, the feelings were absolutely real. The things I created in my mind that caused me to have a panic attack, were huge. Sometimes it would be imagining my whole family being killed in an awful car accident. Once after I tried to commit suicide in May, and the right medicine mix had not been found for me, I started imagining that my husband was done with me, because he could not handle being married to someone who was mentally ill.

Very much like Chicken Little taking off and running, I can spend several hours pacing the house. not able to concentrate, and crying buckets of tears when I have a panic attack due to something I imagined. Days like that lead me to have many bad thoughts.

Another thing I noticed about Chicken Little and his panic attack is that the longer the panic attack went on, the more details his imagination added to his “story”.

“How do you know, Chicken Little?”

“I saw it with my eyes.
I heard it with my ears.
Some of it fell on my tail.”

I have done the same thing when something I have imagined has caused me to have a panic attack. All it succeeds in doing is making the panic attack worse.

Chicken Little’s reasons for having the panic attack were so real to him that he managed to convince a few of his friends that the sky was really falling. They started having panic attacks, and they started running. I would think that by this point all of those animal/people having panic attacks were feeding each others fears. I know that if I am around people who are anxious or panicking about something, it feeds my own fears and makes things worse. That is one of the reasons I choose to only be around people who are positive and not prone to drama.

The final outcome for Chicken Little and his panicking friends was not very good. They got so caught up in their panic attacks that they lost their common sense. They actually thought a predator by the name of Foxy Loxy was going to help them.

“Foxy Loxy said,
“We will run.
We will run into my den,
And I will tell the king.”

They ran into Foxy Loxy’s den,

But they did not come out again.”

I cannot even count the times that I have had a panic attack and lost all the common sense I had. No common sense means I make very poor decisions. An example of this is when I tried to kill myself. I had been thinking constantly about suicide for months and months but had not acted on those thoughts. When my husband lost his job and and we lost our insurance, we could no longer afford my medications. I had gone to the free clinic in our county, and they were able to provide me with all my medicines except for one. I became very discouraged and panicky over not being able to get that one particular medication. I have restless leg syndrome. It is fairly bad. When I do not have my medicine for it, I do not sleep and my legs get in such bad shape that I am miserable. I began to panic at the thought of how miserable I was going to be for who knows how long. I decided that I could not live without having that medicine. It was at this point I chose to act on the suicidal thoughts I had been having for so long. It was a very poor decision that I made while having a panic attack, it almost cost me my life.

Chicken Little and his friends were eaten. Obviously their situation got worse due to their panic attacks. Often when I have a panic attack, I become paralyzed with fear. I can take no productive action about what is making me panic. That inaction due to panic, makes the situation worse than if I had just been calm and dealt with it.

The original version of Chicken Little was a fable. It has been passed down from generation to generation, in an oral tradition. Fables tend to have a moral lesson in them. I find the things that I picked out that I could apply to myself interesting. I know the “professionals” who dissect stories find different moral lessons than I did. I suppose there is no way to tell fo
r sure what moral lesson the original story teller wanted people to learn from from Chicken Little. Maybe he wanted people to do exactly what I did and find themselves and their flaws in it and learn from it.

The Very Hungry Caterpillar

Posted on January 18, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

Most of you who are reading this are probably familiar with the children’s book, “The Very Hungry Caterpillar”. At one point I had the whole thing memorized from having read it to my daughter so many times. When she was hungry she would even say she was a hungry caterpillar.

That book came to mind today. I was thinking about how much I have changed in the last few years, and how much more change I have to look forward to. How I am in a transformation process, that I do not know how long it is going to last or what the final outcome outcome might be.

Very much like The Very Hungry Caterpillar, who spends most of his time as a caterpillar preparing for a transformation, and in the transformation process itself, I feel as if I spent most of my life preparing for a transformation, or in the process of transforming. For the first time in my life, I actually feel as if I have grown up.

There was a question in one of the memes I did today that asked if there was anything I could change about my past, what would I change. There was a similar question in a meme I did last week. From what I can tell, it appears that I lot of people have something in their past that they wish they could change. Each time I got that question, I answered it in a similar fashion.

Remember when The Very Hungry Caterpillar had the tummy ache because of eating too much of the wrong things? He learned from that experience. I think if The Very Hungry Caterpillar were asked if he could change anything about his past, he would probably answer “No”. He became a different and slightly better caterpillar because of the tummy ache. There is not one thing I would change about my past. Nothing. It is not as if I have had the most pleasant life, far from it in fact. Some things in my past have caused me pain for years, yet they still help shaped who I am now and who I will be in the future.

Would I be as aware of domestic violence issues, if a former spouse had not broken my nose in a fit of rage? I doubt I would be. If something is not in my frame of reference I tend to not think about it. I know I would not be so aware of major depression, its symptoms, treatments, and long term outlook, if I was not living with it myself. Same with my anxiety disorder, diabetes, and asthma. I know without my childhood experiences, I would have no clue about what it is like to live in an extremely dysfunctional family. Those experiences allow me to empathize with people in similar situations, and maybe even be able to provide them with effective support.

Now that I finally feel like I am a grownup, I can see a few truths about myself. I have used some negative past experiences as excuses for my own negative behaviors. When my major depression was really bad, before I started getting treatment, I used the diabetes and asthma as excuses for why I had no interest in going anywhere, instead of being honest with people. To some extent, I have control over my depression. About a year before I started getting treatment for it, I knew there was something terribly wrong with me. I even knew what it was. I chose not to tell anyone about it. I chose to go ahead with my suicide plans instead of telling anyone that those thoughts were going through my head.

I wonder if The Hungry Caterpillar was afraid when he started his transformation into The Beautiful Butterfly? I know that there have been times when I have been afraid during my own transforming process. I have been afraid because, especially lately, I am changing a great deal. It has caused a shift in my family dynamics. I am most definitely not the same person my husband married. That person went with the flow of things, allowed other people to make decisions for her, and did not stand up for herself. Now, I am all about setting boundaries, standing up for myself, and finding and using my own voice to make decisions and participate fully with things, instead of just going with the flow all the time.

My transformation has been difficult for my husband at times. It has caused some friction in our marriage. There have been times when I have thought we were not going to make it through this process together. What gives me hope that we will make it, is that I see him earnestly trying to keep up with my transformation and working on himself as well.

In my head, I keep seeing myself as a beautiful butterfly. Not on the outside, but on the inside. I will have a beauty inside me that I have never experienced before. I will no longer be filled with negative thoughts, emotions, and actions. Instead, I see my butterfly self as someone who exudes peace, tranquility, and positivity. &
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Protecting What I Have Gained

Posted on January 16, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

I do not know about other people who live with depression but I very often feel as if I have less control over my depression when my environment is negative. The negativity could be caused by people’s drama, certain songs on the radio, movies, or even television shows.

Being so new in my depression recovery, not even a year, I know that it would be very easy for me to have a serious set back and lose a lot of the ground I have gained so far in my recovery. In an effort to protect that, I have made certain ground rules for myself to keep my environment as positive as possible.

1. No drama. Family or otherwise. If someone attempts to draw me into their drama, I close off communication. Sometimes permanently, sometimes only temporarily. It just depends on how drama prone the person is. I know how I am. Drama feeds into the anger I have, which then feeds into my rage, I say something I regret, whic then feeds into my depression. Or the drama just flat out depresses me.

2. No surrounding myself with negative people with negative thoughts and actions. I have even gone so far as to forbid negative comments from my family. Constructive advice is good, negative comments are bad. That includes gossiping about others. Gossip is negative. I strictly follow the rule of “if you cannot say anything nice, do not say anything at all”.

3. I always look for at least three positive things for every not so wonderful situation. Sometimes finding three positive things is difficult or impossible, but I always attempt to find those three things. That way I am always guaranteed to have a minimum of one positive thing about every situation. Sometimes the positive things are silly. For example, when it looked like I might have to be in the hospital for Christmas, one of the nurses decided to help me decorate my room and I was looking forward to seeing Santa Claus in the hospital on Christmas day.

4. I will no longer watch certain types of television shows or movies and a lot of times I will not watch the news. This is not to isolate myself, as has been implied by some people, but it is an effort to keep my surroundings as positive as possible. Real life human tragedies cause me to react in an over exaggerated emotional manner. To put it plainly, other people’s tragedies become mine and I react to them as if they were mine. It is debilitating. I am in no way ready to be put in that situation yet. I have yet to watch one single bit of news about Haiti, I see headlines go across my RSS feed ticker. That is enough for me right now.

Same with movies and television shows. If they show human tragedy, I cannot watch them. Recently, I watched my Sister’s Keeper. It was a wonderful movie. However, for a couple of days after seeing it, I was depressed. None of the previews prepared me for the ending.

Following these rules, as best as I can, does help me. What I have gained so far in my depression recovery is very precious to me. I guard it as best as I can on a daily basis. There are days when I do have slip ups and I “break” one of my own rules. I never beat myself up about it. I acknowledge to myself that I messed up and just move on.

“Finish each day and be done with it. You have done what you could. Some blunders and absurdities no doubt crept in; forget them as soon as you can. Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well and serenely and with too high a spirit to be cumbered with your old nonsense.”
–– Ralph Waldo Emerson

If anyone wants to, I would love to hear what other people do to maintain a positive attitude.

Oy Vey

Posted on January 16, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

Yesterday was not one of my better days. I felt very down for most of the day. I lacked a great deal of motivation. Even my blog was difficult for me to work on. I try and write some parts of my blog the day before I want to post them, so I can be sure to get my blog out as early as possible on the day I want it posted. That did not happen. I am still working on even the simplest sections this morning. It is important for me to work, if possible, through those bad days. It takes my mind off of myself and lets me focus on other things. Focusing on other things than myself yesterday was a huge struggle.

This morning started off not as good as I would have liked. I woke up around four in the morning. Buster the boxer was already awake. He was walking around the house. I did not think anything about it and I was drifting back off to sleep. When I was half way asleep, I thought I heard water coming out of a faucet. At first I thought I was dreaming, then I thought it was from a water faucet. Then I remembered we had not left any water on because it was not cold enough for us to worry about. I got up to investigate.

What I discovered is that Buster the boxer had decided to drink a ton of water during the night and filled up his bladder. He knows he is not supposed to go to the bathroom in the house, but I guess his bladder got so full he could not hold it anymore. There was a trail of pee all through the house. I followed the trail and found him by the door. He seemed to have a look of horror on his face, because of the trail of pee, and if dogs could cross their legs, his certainly would have been crossed. He was very happy when I let him out. I was very unhappy at having to clean up the trail of pee.

The culprit, Buster the boxer

Depression And Anger – Two Sides Of The Same Coin

Posted on January 15, 2010 by Margaret Tidwell

As my depression grew so did my anger. I was furious with the world. I saw it as unfair, unjust, and stupid. I never ran out of things to be angry about. I was frustrated by everything.

It was anger that I had suppressed, repressed, inhibited, and kept internalized for many years. I wallowed in it. It fueled my depression. I used it to pass my emotional pain onto others.

The anger gave me an immediate sense of purpose, a weird and sick sort of motivation. As depressed as I was I needed motivation, but I did not need what the anger gave me. It created a cycle of rage and defeatism in me.

The people I took this anger out on were the people who were closest to me. I would say things that I knew were wrong and inappropriate, but I could not help myself.

When I was not angry with other people, I was very angry with myself. It often led to very self destructive behaviors. That in turn led to more depression and anger.

People who have never had to deal with severe/major depression, have a hard time understanding how anger could be a symptom of depression. After all, when most people think of depression, they think of someone being very sad all the time. However, inappropriate anger is a symptom of depression, it is just not as well known as the other symptoms of major depression are.

My anger continued after I started getting treatment for my depression. It only ended when I realized that some of the things I was most angry about, were some of the very same things that were making me so depressed.

I was frustrated and angry and depressed, in part, because I felt I had no voice. I felt that people took advantage of me, or spoke to me in ways they should not have, or made decisions without my input. I know all I had to do was to speak up and let them know what I thought about things or how they were treating me, but that was an impossibility for me.

As a child, I was not taught that I had a voice. I was not taught that I was an equal to anyone. I was not taught that my opinions and choices were as valuable as anyone’s. So not speaking about what was on my mind became a habit. Then I would become angry about what was going on, and how I had no say so in what was going on.

Once I started to realize how my depression and anger were really just two sides of the same coin, I became ready to start finding my own voice. I started off slowly. Putting up a few boundaries here and there. As I built up confidence I became firmer in my boundary setting, letting other people know my opinion about things, and insisting that I have input into certain decisions.

The more confidence I built up in my own voice, the more my anger went away. There were things that I had been angry about that I felt for sure I was going to have to tackle head on to bring some closure to them. I learned that I did not have to do that with everything I was angry about. Once I learned a better way to deal with things now, it was as if my anger about past wrongs evaporated.

For now, for today, I am not angry. For now, for today, I do not get as angry and rage about things as I used to. For now, for today, I have peace, and a positive outlook on my life.

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