June is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Month. While PTSD gets the most airtime in regards war veterans, there are a good number of civilians who deal with non-war PTSD.
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Category: Mental Illness
The Science News Cycle
Just saw a tweet from a Mental Health advocate I follow. It had a link to an article that talks about biological basis for depression. the title of the article is
Study Shows Why Stress Triggers Depression In Some, Resilience In Others
In huge letters like that. It made me chuckle and I braced myself for what I was going to read. My, oh my, aren’t we ambitious?!!! Also, it made me think of this:
Anyway, here is the article: Study SHOWS WHY. If you keep reading, almost all the way down you’ll find this sentence (emphasis is mine):
The researchers are excited by the findings, since they seem to confirm this biological basis for depression.
The findings seem to confirm the hypothesis. Now, how do you go from “seem to confirm” to “study shows why”? Yeah, chuckling here still.
Unfortunately I don’t have access to the actual paper but I did get to read an editor’s comment, the equivalent to step 2 in THE SCIENCE NEWS CYCLE cartoon by Jorge Cham of PhD Comics. While the first line is as follows, “Researchers identify neurons that determine whether an individual will be depressed or resilient” the editorial still talks in terms of “help explain” and “may lead”. Which is of course a lot more sensible, as any scientist would let you know.
And mind you, the study used a mouse model for depression (yeah, torturing defenseless cute little mice). That doesn’t remotely mean the human brain works in the same way. SIGH
Hurry, let’s all grab our tin foil hats!
When The Beast Breaks Free
I write this with tears in my eyes.
I have talked before about my anger issues. As a child and a teenager I was angry all the time. I didn’t know why I was angry. I just was. Even worse, I didn’t even know I was angry. I wasn’t aware that anger was burning deep inside me, killing me from the inside out.
I didn’t get into fights. I didn’t hit anyone. But I was much too stern and I kept everyone at arm’s length. The smallest of things was enough to set me off and I’d yell an angry retort and stomp away to go simmer in my room.
Being a gifted child didn’t help either. To me, everybody was utterly stupid and I looked at pretty much everyone with contempt. It is quite normal for everybody to see themselves as the norm. I didn’t think of myself as gifted. I saw myself as having a “normal” intelligence. So, if I was a regular, average kid , then everybody else had to be stupid because, how else do you explain the fact that they don’t understand things as easily and as quick as you do? Math class was the worse. I was always angry during those. I couldn’t understand how my classmates didn’t understand such basic concepts. It took me a while to realize I was smarter than the rest. It probably didn’t happen until 6th grade, when the nuns started to assign students to me for tutoring. I don’t know how we all survived that. The poor other kids, because I didn’t hit them for being slow and I, because I managed to not hit anyone and not call anyone names. My charges were terrified of me, but they improved. And the more they improved, the more the nuns would assigned more girls to be tutored by me. By ninth grade, girls were coming to me out of their own volition and I helped them all. I started to get an inkling on how to control The Beast, whatever it was. How to keep it at bay.
Stupid Scumbag Brain
I just had an accident.
Not that kind of accident, you goofs. This kind of accident:
Butterfingers Petrilli attacks again.
Committing myself* [again] to be mental [again]
*See what I did there?
My second year pledging my commitment to be mental! WOW
Time flies. And Ruby’s & Lulu’s baby is growing fast too! And we’re all so proud…
Follow up and Day Hospital
I’m upset so might I well blog about it, right?
Besides, I suppose I owe you all an update on my mental health.
I am home now. This is how it happened:
First, I got off ward privileges. It meant I could go for walks up to an hour a day, as long as I remained on the hospital grounds. That meant I could get a reasonably good coffee from Second Cup and enjoy the lovely Fall weather.
Then I got a day pass, which I spent with my daughter. I came home, play with the kitties, shaved my legs and my armpits, fell human again, and went for a lovely walk along the canal.
Last, I got a weekend pass. That meant going home on Friday at 2 pm and coming back to the hospital on Sunday at 9 pm. Then I’d be evaluated on Monday morning and it everything went well, go home.
Well, everything did go well, and I came home on October the 7th – now and outpatient, with a bunch of medication and an appointment for the Day Hospital program at the Civic Campus for October 16. Yes, that’s today. I’ll get to it in a bit.
Incidentally, during that weekend, my daughter and I finally went to see Star Wars Identities, the Star War exhibit at the Aviation & Space Museum. It was out of this world (pun intended). I highly recommend it if it ever goes to your town and if you are a Star Wars fans and a geek like me.
Damn You Stigma
In case you are out of the loop, I am currently at the hospital. Been here for almost two weeks now
But not just any hospital.
I’m at the 4 North Mental Health Unit of The Ottawa Hospital, General Campus.
Yes, that’s right. I am in a physch ward.
Now, there was a time when I would rather have died than let people know I had a mental illness. THAT’S THE STIGMA.
I would have not voluntarily gone to a hospital to admit myself . THAT’S THE STIGMA.
If hospitalized, I would have lied about the cause of my hospitalization. THAT’S THE STIGMA.
Well, I know better now. I know there is no shame in having a mental illness. I know that admitting my mental illness(es) sometimes get out of control is a brave thing. I know that reaching out for support when I need it, is not only good great but that is actually the RIGHT thing to do.
[NOT FROM] The Other Side
Or at least not from The Side I had in mind on September 20th.
Allow me to explain.
September 28. My father’s birthday.
Or would have been, anyway. He’s been dead for a couple of decades now.
What’s ironic is that I spent his birthday in a psychiatric ward. About two weeks ago, my mental health started to decline and particularly after a very difficult session with my psychotherapist in Tuesday, Sept 17. After that, it was all downhill and I got to the bottom of the pit quite quickly.
By Friday, September 20, I became suicidal. Fortunately for me, I happened to be talking to a friend on Facebook due to the fact that she was organizing a fundraiser and I was donating an item for a silent auction.
She noticed something was not quite right and asked me about it. I lost it, told her I was suicidal and that I thought I ought to go to the hospital. That in fact, I was intending to go and admit myself as soon as our chat was over.
She immediately volunteered to drive me there. She asked me where I was thinking of going. I said the Royal. She said she thought the Royal didn’t have Emergency anymore. She told me to stay put, that she would find out for me and then take me there.
She called back five minutes later. Yes, indeed the Royal didn’t have an ER anymore and that I should go to the Ottawa Hospital, either the Civic Campus or the General Campus.
Knowing the General from my graduate shool days, I chose that one. Ten minutes later she was at my door. But while I waited for her, I published The Other Side. Continue reading
The Other Side
Pain and nightmares. Nightmares and pain.
Screams in my head.
Darkness ahead.
See you on the other side?
Because
Because there was a time when I would have rather die than admit I had a mental illness.
Because I’ve had people telling me I was lazy because I couldn’t get out of bed on a bad day.
Because unfortunately, we live in a world where if you break your arm, everyone runs over to sign your cast. But if you tell people you’re depressed, everyone runs the other way. That’s the stigma.
Kevin Breel: Confessions of a Depressed Comic
TEDxKids@Ambleside – Photo by Josh Hemond – Kevin Breel (7) (Photo credit: JoshRHemond)
Related articles
- Kevin Breel: on Depression and Mental Health (ruoxiangchau.com)
- I wish I had cancer (summersolsticemusing.wordpress.com)
- Mental Illness: An Excuse For Bad Behaviour? (summersolsticemusing.wordpress.com)
Summer Solstice Musings 