Yes, I do Remember Your Sister's Cat's Name

Last night I watched season 1 episode 12 of Masters of Sex, an episode in which many events occur, but what stood out to me was one of the characters, Barton Scully, deciding to undergo electroconvulsive therapy (ECT) as a treatment for homosexuality. Now, of course, this did not leave me thrilled that in the not too distant past such measures (or any measures) were taken in an attempt to cure homosexuality, but what left me troubled was the discussion held between Barton and his wife about the memory loss caused by the procedure. I don't know how many sessions of ECT I have had, at a guess, I'd put it around 50, I've had 12 just in this admission. The conversation between Barton and his wife upset me because she was expressing her fears that he may no longer remember the important and pleasant events making up their marriage. This has happened to me, not with a marriage of course, but my entire life is patchy. Back in 2014, I had an assessment performed on my memory as I was very concerned about the volume of things I was forgetting, the conclusion was that while I had significant memory loss, it was a result of severe depression, not ECT. I can't argue with this as it is a fact that severe depression has an effect on the memory, but I do fear that it is indeed caused by ECT, in which case the most effective treatment for me is causing me to forget the name of a person I met five minutes ago, where I went last weekend, the plot of a book I'm half way through - but have had a two day break from, or today's date, even though I looked at it two minutes ago. I regularly find myself embarrassed by my inability to remember something; I pretend I know what people are talking about quite often, hoping they don't catch on that I've got no idea who or what they're referring to. I went to a kitchen tea yesterday; the hens for the same bride-to-be was three weekends prior, most of the same people were there and other than the few that go to my church, and so I see regularly, I recognised no one. Forgetting people new to me isn't uncommon and it makes me wonder what else I've lost from my memory, there are things I know I've forgotten because people have tried to talk to me about them and I can't, but what else is there? Are there some amazing events from my life that are just gone? I think there are. This may be a benefit, but I have few memories of my Dad, well lots of bad ones, maybe it would be less painful recollecting him if I had some good ones to balance the bad with.

I don't remember when I had my first course of ECT; I do remember just this snippet of conversation with my psychiatrist when he suggested it. "What! They still do that?!" and his response explaining that these days it's done under general anaesthetic and with a muscle relaxant. It's not like One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest. If you're interested here's a little documentary that I think is quite accurate, skip to 5min if all you want to see is the actual procedure. Having never seen it live I can't say for sure, but I've been told the muscle relaxant makes the seizure so minimal in the body that all you can really see is twitching in the toes. The set up here is different to where I go, and mine is a lot more casual and modern, but I think generally it's the same as this video. Despite all the memory loss, which I can't even know for sure is from the ECT I don't think I regret choosing that path, maybe even if I could still do maintenance I'd be on fewer drugs and in a better general state. To conclude this post. I just don't know.

Seven Weeks And Three Days

It looks like this is going to beat my longest admission of nine weeks. I'm now at seven weeks and three days in here, plus the six days I spent in the medical hospital.

I've had two courses of ECT - that's 12 sessions and unlike usual they did nothing to help. My doctor has put me on a new drug - Reboxetine (Edronax), I'm still on a fairly low dose, these things have to be increased slowly and also take a while for the results to become evident. I'm looking forward to seeing if it will have any positive impact on me on a higher dose and with more time.

I can't function at the moment; I'm spending the majority of my days lying face down on my bed hugging a pillow. I missed lunch today, but I went out for coffee and a muffin with a friend; that will be my activity for the day. By the end of the outing I was exhausted (If you're reading this K, I really did enjoy seeing you). All I could think of was bed by about the halfway point. Yesterday I remained in my pyjamas until about 4pm, maybe later. The most I did was watch 3/4 of an episode of Bob's Burgers, I could watch the rest now but writing this is taking all of my energy - so don't expect this to be a good read, not that they're ever fun!

Since my last post, many physical things have changed. It turns out my wrist was broken - well fractured - it was the pisiform. The GP here in the clinic said that in her 36 years of practice she's never seen a fractured pisiform. I had a month in a cast, but it's getting re X-Rayed tomorrow because we suspect it's not healed. I really don't want more time in a cast.

I had an ultrasound that found a large ovarian cyst that needs to be removed due to its size; often they can be left, but not this one. I think this will be my 6th surgery.

I had a chest CT scan because I was coughing so much I was vomiting and struggling to breathe, it was suspected to be a flare up of my asthma, but it doesn't look that way. Still, I'm on four inhalers for now. The CT came back clear.

I don't think I've felt this depressed for a very long time, not for long periods, there are always very short stints, but this is consistent. I can wake up and think " Oh thank you, I'm okay" and then as soon as I see the first person or hear a noise the flatness re-appears and the dark thoughts return. I've promised myself that I will never go back to a certain public hospital, which is where they send sectioned patients from here, so I have that motivating factor not to injure myself either in the hospital or while out on leave. I have suicide plans but the only one that will definitely work will traumatise someone else, so I don't want to do it. If I try one of the ones that may fail I could end up back in that awful hospital. So despite feeling intensely suicidal, I'm actually quite safe.

A few weeks' ago a minister from my church and a man from my small group came to take communion with me; I was very touched by that. I value communion greatly; I find it to be a physical reminder of what Christ has done for us and a physical way to connect to the church, not just your own, but the entire Christian church. It also forces prayer and reflection prior to taking it, both being things we can cast aside due to other things in our lives. I have plenty of time to pray, but I spend it feeling so caught up in how awful I'm feeling that often the best I can manage is "God please forgive my sins and please help me"; sometimes even just "God I need your help". I know God would rather us acknowledge we need Him than try to do life on our own, so I try not to feel too guilty about my lack of prayer life, but I would like it to be more substantial.

That's all I've got to write now.

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Bye.

Not Quite The End

Almost two weeks' ago, Sunday the 4th of September I took 231 Seroquel 100mg tablets (23.1g). I wasn't planning on waking up, but I did. After taking them I sent a message to my doctor, not asking for help, just to thank him for looking after me for 5 + years. He immediately called me, and I answered. I wasn't at home as I didn't want my housemates to find my body, he talked me into telling him where I was, and he called an ambulance. I really did want to die, so I know I shouldn't have answered the call, but I also didn't want to be alone. I spent the next five days in an unconscious / semi-conscious state with lots of hallucinations. I had a few falls because I kept trying to get out of bed when I couldn't really walk due to the drugs and a seizure brought on by the drugs. My arms are looking more normal now, but they were very bruised, and there is a bone in my wrist that was suspected broken in one of the falls, but the X-ray came back fine.

I've been in my usual psychiatric hospital since Saturday; I was very lucky that they were able to get me a private room the morning after discharge from the medical hospital. I just flatly refuse to come into a shared room no matter how urgent it is, it's not therapeutically beneficial having to tip toe around, and I don't like being in complete silence, so I usually have music playing, something that a roommate wouldn't be too fond of. Because I had no medication for the whole five days I was in the medical hospital (I also didn't eat until the Thursday night) there have been some alterations to my usual meds, the biggest being I'm totally off Seroquel, and they halved my Lithium. The Lithium is being returned to its normal dose as of tonight, thankfully! A few years' ago my doctor tried to take me off Lithium and it was a disaster, I went a little wild. At the moment on the lower dose I'm very flat and don't want to do anything at all, I've spent most of today lying on my bed listening to music either staring out the window or at the wall depending on which side I'm lying on.

I've had all the preliminary tests for ECT done, so I can start at the end of next week if my doctor approves it. He's in London at the moment so I won't see him until Wednesday. I like the doctor who's filling in, but it's not the same as having the opinion of someone who knows me so well (and probably saved my life). Usually when I have ECT I'm severely depressed, which you'd think I am at the moment given that less than a fortnight ago I tried to end my life, but it's not quite that despondent feeling I'm experiencing, it's more so just flatness and profound hopelessness; still I think ECT would be beneficial, so I will be asking for it and if he says yes we can go straight ahead.

I sent off an enquiry about getting a therapy dog today. The restrictions on me getting just a regular dog are that I spend so much time in hospital so it's unreasonable to ask my housemates or Mum to look after it for me. Also I'm renting, and though my current landlord would probably approve a dog it would restrict future houses I could apply to rent (ours is being demolished next year). A therapy dog is allowed anywhere, including hospital, and landlords can't say no. I'd benefit from a constant companion, someone to talk to (even if it can't necessarily talk back) and the responsibility of taking it for walks and generally caring for it. My housemate, R would be concerned about the safety of our chickens with a dog, but I think it would be well trained and not likely to eat or chase the chickens.

Carrot

I don't go to one of those churches with flashing lights, smoke machines, music designed to hype you up and sermons that always have you leaving feeling special. I don't agree with artificially bringing on hysteria in order to fake a spiritual experience, and thus raise attendance. But I do feel in need of a little carrot, it seems like my church is all stick. None of us will ever be good enough, but we don't need to be because when God looks at us he sees Jesus' blood rather than all our inadequacies. I like communion for this reason, it gives us a physical reminder that we are cleansed, not by our own achievements, good works and lack of sin, but by His blood. We only do communion monthly in my congregation (I'd like fortnightly), I've started putting the dates in my calendar so I actually go that week. The most reminding I've had lately that God actually loves me has come from an elderly woman who forced her company upon me in a cafe, and whom I later bumped into whilst serving at a dinner for the underprivileged at her church.  People say encouraging things, but it usually feels just like words which the last seven years of my life bring doubt upon; this woman has the gift, gets under my skin.

At the moment I need affirmation of God's mercy. I'm still in hospital, as it doesn’t feel safe to go home. There's enough of me that wants to live that I'm not absconding and going home to kill my self, but left to my own devices at home the strong, negative power within me would have me dead in a couple of days. The sensible thing to do would be to go home and immediately grab my drug stash and hand it in to my pharmacy. I can't. The part of me that wants to stay alive is small and scared of living; so it needs an exit plan. What I need is the assurance that God's mercy is greater than the sin of my final act on Earth being murder of self. I don't believe that if we fail to confess a sin we are not forgiven for it, we can't remember everything we've ever done and thought. So perhaps suicide is just another un-confessed sin. It does take away from God the power to teach through suffering, and perhaps (but I believe unlikely) to glorify himself through healing. But suicide is much like dying from any disease, it's the illness that kills you. In my case BPD, depression and anxiety. Is it a sin to die from an illness? A friend, K, learnt a lot about grace last year and has given me droplets of it. I think God understands. And I think we've got church and small groups quite wrong.

The Count Stops At 106 Days

106 days out of hospital, the longest I've lasted since this whole debacle started about six years ago. Well, 106 days out of psych hospitals I should say. I've had two ED admissions; one of 24 hours a few weeks ago and I came out yesterday after about 31 hours.  Both times I took an overdose, this time it was a lot more and I mixed it with another medication. In short, I ended up in ICU, unconscious and intubated. My throat and chest hurt from the intubation and I have a large bruise on my chest from where they did a sternal rub on me. I was a little worried about my liver as I turned jaundice for a while, but it seems to be okay now. I've got a room at the clinic tomorrow; I don't know what awaits me there. I didn't see any of this coming, I thought my at-home stint would last a lot longer.

I don't usually tell my Mum when things like this happen, but since I was unconscious they called her as my next of kin. She was unimpressed, but I wasn't planning on her finding out. I know it seems selfish to do something like this to myself, something that would obviously upset any mother, but I'm really not in control when it happens. I called my DR beforehand and he told me to take a PRN, I took the strongest safe combination I have, it would usually put me to sleep, or close enough, and then I'd wake up two hours later feeling much better. It did nothing at all this time. The stockpile was calling my name and I listened. I had what I thought would be enough (Seroquel 60 100mg tablets - 6 grams and 7 Stilnox) to get a few hours of being unconscious, but it seems I came a little closer to death than expected. I can't even say I won't do it again. It feels bad every time, and when my Mum does find out she gets so panicked, somehow that's not enough to deter me. At least now I know that if 6g can do that the 38g I have left can finish the job if I just stay away from hospitals. I'm not planning on doing that any time soon, it's just a safety net.

Change

If you read my last post you'd know we were expecting a new housemate, V. Well she decided to move elsewhere, but God seems to provide for this house, good housemates have always come along when needed. Within half an hour of R putting a note on Facebook and me on Gumtree we had two replies, both from Christians. We met both, and both would have worked but we went with S as he has lived with R in the past and we all gelled really well. He's been here about three weeks now and he's a pleasure to live with.

Things are really weird at the moment with my illnesses. I ended up not coming off the Dexamphetamine, instead we actually increased the dose. I seem to be okay. Every few hours I get a strong urge to cut or suicide but I never even get up to go towards acting on them. The constant emotional pain is gone and I don't know what to do; it's been my companion for seven years. I find myself hoping for its return because I don't know how to be well. Let's not go too far though, I'm not happy, just not on the brink of tears and feeling terrified of myself constantly. There's this feeling of unjustified uselessness; I feel lazy because I've not been terrible for about 12 weeks, so I feel there's no excuse for the life I'm living, or not living. I must remember it's taking 8 different medications to keep me in this state and it's still not good, just not bad. I'm only awake for about 11 hours a day. Somehow it still feels like I have more time on my hands, maybe because I'm not usually having naps and taking sedatives during the day. I don't like the extra time, I'm not up to working and no one is free on weekdays. I've been spending a lot of time watching Netflix, reading and when I can muster up the courage doing a little work on my novel.

I haven't forgotten what it's like to feel like death is the only option, or that I don't deserve to have skin, but I now feel like if I were to kill myself it would be my own action rather than something I was forced to do by my illness. The difference between a cancer victim dying from their illness or from voluntary euthanasia, both ways they died, only one can they be held accountable for. Why I would wish for those feelings back I don't know, maybe so I can end things without guilt or fear, maybe just because this okay time is so foreign to me. I don't know.

Welcoming V

We’re getting a new housemate, as our relatively new J - who will be greatly missed - is off to get married very soon.

I’m not long home from a session with my psychiatrist; we talked about an admission at the end of next week, just as a respite, but I refused because I don’t want our new housemate, V’s first impression of the house to be “Oh, one of them is in a psychiatric hospital, well that’s just great!” She knows I have depression and spend time in hospital, as we all agreed she should know something about what to expect from me, but I didn’t mention the BPD and anxiety. It’ll come up in conversation, but not until I’m ready. BPD’s a crappy diagnosis with so much stigma attached to it; and because I have the co-morbid conditions of depression and anxiety I can’t really separate symptoms to adequately describe the experience. I can give you this: Right now my mood is about a 4/10, but largely I’m numb, urge to cut 7/10, urge to OD 8/10, but strength to refuse urges: 8/10 for OD and 7/10 for cutting, so it’s unlikely I’ll be doing either of those things today. I have things on this weekend I’d like to be conscious for, but I could get away with some cuts.

I just worked out that by the date I feel it’ll be acceptable, with the new housemate in mind, for me to go back in I will have been out of hospital for 12 weeks, that’s a very long time for me. I’ve had the one night in Short-Stay after the Seroquel overdose, but we’re not counting that. I may not last till 12 weeks, but I don’t want to scare V away. Really I should have gone in a couple of weeks ago when I was very low and used that time as a respite as well as a safety net. I’m a little scared that by postponing the admission I’m going to have a meltdown and destroy things with V more than my absence would have. Choices.

May

For once I’m not writing from hospital, or straight after an OD, or freshly stitched. This is just a few little updates and thoughts.

I had a meeting with one of my church’s ministers a few weeks ago to discuss the many things about church and Christianity I’m struggling with. One of his suggestions was to arrive at church late so I miss the big chunk of worship right at the beginning. Worship makes me feel very isolated, I feel separate to the congregation, like they’re having this two-way conversation with God and actually feeling Him and I’m just standing there watching people sway, raise their hands (not much of that in my church) and I’m just reading words off a screen, analysing them for their scriptural accuracy and then sometimes repeating them in my head as a prayer if I think I might mean it. I can listen to a sermon, my concentration doesn’t always hold out, but it doesn’t get me distressed; worship has me wanting to run away, it really highlights to me how numb I am. I arrived 25 minutes late last night and I’d missed the Bible reading at the start of the sermon, so I might try 22 minutes next time. There’s still the three songs at the end, I could leave early but then I wouldn’t get to talk to anyone.

I had about eight weeks on Dexamphetamine, I’m still on it but reducing the dose by half a pill a week until I’m off it; it’s an ADHD drug, but with some people it helps with mood and energy, both of which it did for me. I felt the best I have for a very long time, I cut down the amount I was sleeping to about that of a normal person and was starting to look for a little bit of paid work. Then it stopped. My doctor told me it may not last, so I wasn’t really surprised, but I think I wish I didn’t have that good period because it’s made the come-down really hard, I had that glimpse of what things could be like and now it’s gone. All of last week I was in emotional distress, I woke up holding back tears every morning (I can’t actually cry even if I want to, so only metaphorically holding them back) and got through the days in a zombie like state. Since Saturday it’s just been numbness with a touch of distress here or there, but that wishing for death, crushing sort of feeling has eased. I can’t keep this up, it’s been about seven years now that feeling numb is akin to most people’s feeling good, there is no good, it’s numb or feeling like I have to die or tear off my skin.

Just to add another great thing to my life, I’m having minor surgery on Thursday to remove a giant cell tumour from my right middle finger. The surgeon said it’s 95% likely to be benign. I sometimes get a little bit worried, but it’s a tiny percentage. I’m totally fine about dying, but there are better ways to go than cancer and the horrible treatments that come with it. I won’t have much use of my right hand for a week after the surgery as my finger will be bandaged and I won’t be able to get it wet. My left hand is stupid; I’m not looking forward to brushing my teeth left-handed.