This Unending Path of Mine

Ridiculously Superficial Friendships

This year has not started out easy for me. I no longer attend therapy or take medication. My friendships have all either died or are withering away. Every single day is a struggle for me and I don’t talk to anyone about it.

Memories from my childhood and teenage years have been flooding my brain. Some are new recollections, others old. In response, I have been practicing self-blame, harm, and intense criticism. Hinting at this damage has been unsuccessful. Beginning to bring it up resulted in numerous changed topics—like my health was no longer important anymore.

So that is exactly how I am feeling now… Unimportant. It’s been easy for others to forget what I was talking about or that I was talking at all (despite how serious and meaningful the topic was to me). For whatever reason, my stories, pain, and feelings are no longer much of a concern.

It’s all bullshit. I sit here, pretend to give a fuck, and wait for the moment I get to leave.

One of those moods…

I’m in one of those moods again. One of those moods where I just feel so deeply alone. What I hate most about these moments is how empty I feel. I almost wish I could feel devastating amounts of sorrow or pain, just so I would know what it’s like to feel something. It’s just the numbness that kills me the most. When I’m deeply hurting there is always that sort of righteous feeling, it kind of makes up for the pain. Then there are the numb feelings, which are empty… no strong feelings whatsoever. I keep thinking about hurting myself just to feel something again, to make me feel more ‘alive’. Perhaps if I was surrounded by a better support group it wouldn’t be so hard. Everyday I am reminded of how unwanted and forgettable I am. Nothing feels sincere anymore and I am giving up on even trying to develop friendships, relationships, and the like. Truth is, people are fucked and I cannot stand being here much longer.

Top 2 reasons I might give up on meds…

80% of young white middle-class women are on antidepressants and anxiety medication.

That percentage is ridiculous! Part of me wants to scream at society and ask why the fuck do so many women need these meds? Are we telling women not to change their problems or be angry and just numb their feelings with meds? Face it, things in this world are fucking shit sometimes. Of course women are depressed when they are underrepresented in positions of power, make less money, and are objectified. 1 in 4 women is sexually assaulted, 54% of sexual assaults are not reported to the police and 97% of rapists will never spend a day in jail…. As women are terrorized, of course we are depressed and anxious. Even by our friends with rape jokes, victim blaming, and the like…

I am suffering the side effects without healing.

After increasing doses and changing medication, I just can’t seem to find a medicinal cocktail that is right for me. So far I have suffered extremely blurry vision, irregular heartbeat, loss of breath, chest pains, lack of sleep, and suicidal thoughts. Some of these things I have not yet brought up to my doctor because I thought they were due to my lack of athleticism. Who knows though, I’ll talk to them about it once I get back to school.

Life Update

I have been telling myself for weeks that I should be updating this blog, yet I continue procrastinating writing here. Even this entry is putting off what I really want to talk about… In sum though, here is a small update on my life.

It is winter break from school right now and I am home with my family in MA. Before break / during finals, I was so stressed out/exhausted that I canceled my last meeting before break with my therapist and stopped taking my medication. Speaking of medication, I had been switched to Zoloft and was started at around 25mg and brought up to 100mg (I even took a higher dose accidentally for a bit). It did not help me the slightest bit, other than bringing back the blurred vision. I probably should have consulted my doctor about stopping, but I just didn’t care. As for how I am feeling, I really am not doing well. I have been having thoughts of self-harm and dying, plus several other negative feelings. I haven’t had a meaningful conversation with anyone in weeks and I feel very alone. Shit with my roommate has not improved and I think I am beginning to let go of trying. I feel like a shell of a person. My feelings range from empty, to depressed, to extreme loneliness. I just feel so different than everyone else and left out because of it. I stumbled across this Henry Rollins video that COMPLETELY describes my feelings. In the video, Henry reads a chapter from one of his books. It’s called “I Know You” from Black Coffee Blues. Check it out at this link http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JazGszb1ktg at around 7:20 or read bellow.

“I know you
You were too short
You had bad skin
You couldn’t talk to them very well
Words didn’t seem to work
They lied when they came out of your mouth

You tried so hard to understand them
You wanted to be part of what was happening
You saw them having fun
And it seemed like such a mystery
Almost magic

You thought that there was something wrong with you
You’d look in the mirror and try to find the flaw
You thought that you were ugly
And that everyone was looking at you

So you learned to be invisible
To look down
To avoid conversation

The hours, days, weekends
The weekend nights alone
Where were you?
In the basement?
In the attic?
In your room?
Working some job - just to have something to do.
Just to have a place to put yourself
Just to have a way to get away from them
A chance to get away from the ones that made you feel
so strange and ill at ease inside yourself

Did you ever get invited to one of their parties?
You sat and wondered if you would go or not
For hours you imagined the scenarios that might transpire
They would laugh at you
If you would know what to do
If you’d have the right things on
If they would notice that you came from a different planet

Did you get all brave in your thoughts?
Like you going to be able to go in there and deal with it
and have a great time.
Did you think that you might be the life of the party?
That all these people were gonna talk to you and you
would find out that you were wrong?
That you had a lot of friends and you weren’t so
strange after all?

Did you end up going?
Did they mess with you?
Did they single you out?
Did you find out that you were invited because they
thought you were so weird?

Yeah, I think I know you
You spent a lot of time full of hate
A hate that was pure sunshine
A hate that saw for miles
A hate that kept you up at night
A hate that filled your every waking moment
A hate that carried you for a long time

Yes, I think I know you
You couldn’t figure out what they saw in the way they lived

Home was not home
Your room was home
A corner was home
Anywhere they weren’t, that was home

I know you

You’re sensitive and you hide it because you fear
getting stepped on one more time
It seems that when you show a part of yourself that is
the least bit vulnerable someone takes advantage of you
One of them steps on you

They mistake kindliness for weakness
But you know the difference
You’ve been the brunt of their weakness for years
And strength is something you know a bit about
you had to be strong to keep yourself alive

You know yourself very well now
And you don’t trust people
You know them too well

You try to find that special person
Someone you can be with
Someone you can touch
Someone you can talk to
Someone you don’t feel so strange around
And you find that they don’t really exist
You feel closer to people on movie screens

Yeah, I think I know you
You spend a lot of time daydreaming
And people have made comment to that effect
Telling you that you’re self-involved, and self-centered

But they don’t know, do they?
About the long night shifts alone
About the years of keeping yourself company
All the nights you wrapped your arms around yourself
so you could imagine someone holding you
The hours of indecision, self-doubt
The intense depression
The blinding hate
The rage that made you stagger
The devastation of rejection

Well, maybe they do know
But if they do, they sure do a good job of hiding it
It astounds you how they can be so smooth
How they seem to pass through life as if life itself
was some divine gift
And it infuriates you to watch yourself with your
apparent skill at finding every way possible to screw it up

For you life is a long trip
Terrifying and wonderful
Birds sing to you at night
The rain and the sun the changing seasons are true friends
Solitude is a hard won ally, faithful and patient

Yeah, I think I know you”

Long overdue update

I have been beyond unmotivated to write… I’m still going to therapy and taking medication (which has changed) but nothing seems better yet. I will be posting more about this later.

Medicinal Update

I had been off citalopram for a week and starting today I am back on but with 10mg instead of 20mg. Hopefully this lower dosage is equally as effective, but without the side effect of blurred vision. We’ll see how this goes…

Counseling Session #10

This session occurred on Thursday, September 27, 2012. I was looking forward to this session in particular because of the stress I had been feeling over my medication and side effects. I kept thinking of my therapist and all I wanted to do was go to session and update him on what was happening to me. Even though I had told my best friend and the psychologist, I didn’t feel enough comfort or validation in my feelings and fear. I felt if I talked about these feelings/fears to my therapist I would feel better. I suppose I did feel some sort of comfort in this past session, but I left feeling a little disappointed.

Medical update

I began session by updating my therapist on the meeting with the psychologist, my side-effects, and the stress/fear I was feeling. We didn’t spend a great deal of time talking about these things that I can remember. I don’t really remember how my therapist reacted to all of it. I think he did validate my feelings by stating how this added stress must be a lot for me, or something. Again, I don’t remember what he said to me but I do recall feeling a little disappointed since I had looked forward to expressing this information to him.

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy: Observer-self / Judgmental-self

My therapist was telling me about cognitive behavioral therapy (which was somewhat familiar due to my minor in psychology/sociology). I might end up butchering this summary of what he said though because 1) I don’t really remember it all and 2) I didn’t really quite understand it all. So here it goes… There are two parts to your mind/self. The first is the observer-self, which can just sort of look back and separate itself from your thoughts. My therapist related the observer-self to people watching. Say you are sitting in a café, watching a couple argue. You can observe and assess how true each side of the argument may be. The same thing can happen within your own brain. While having all these chaotic thoughts, the observer-self can step back and assess these arguments. The development of the observer-self has been used to help people with depression and anxiety. It isn’t about changing your thoughts, but more just acknowledging their existence as thoughts, how true you deem them to be, and what evidence you have to base that conviction on. Apparently just by doing utilizing the observer-self, people have felt better about themselves. As for the judgmental-self, I am a bit more confused. I didn’t really understand the difference between the judgmental-self and the observer-self. I think the judgmental-self is what one utilizes to assess themselves. For example, “I am not pretty” or “I am not capable of ________”. How true are these thoughts? Does your view of yourself and your capabilities hinder you in anyway? I used the example of how I wanted to call out of my volunteer position that night because I didn’t feel like I would be good at what they had asked of me. This negative judgment of myself was more than just a thought, it was hindering me from doing something. There was MUCH more about this, but I really just don’t remember what else he told me.

Verbal expression vs. Emotional expression

This discussion was particularly interesting though frustrating for both my therapist and myself. He was trying to explain to me how there is a difference between feeling emotion and stating what emotion you feel. For example, I can say I’m frustrated, but where do I feel that in my body? Apparently I don’t have a good grasp on emotions because I cannot pinpoint any sort of emotion within my body and I often cannot describe emotion. My therapist mentioned how I felt anger towards the psychologist. I reminded him how ‘anger’ was not the correct term, as I do not ever feel ‘anger’. He reminded me that while maybe I do not notice that I feel this emotion, as a human being I must be capable of it. I cannot think of one time in my life when I felt the emotion of ‘anger’ but according to him, I just never knew what it was. I am so ‘mute’ to emotion that I cannot recognize feelings. I may say things like, “I feel frustrated” or “I am happy” but those are empty words for me. I can verbalize my thoughts on things, but I do not have any grasp on the emotion behind these words.

What will it take to make me feel happy?

My therapist asked me this question and I hadn’t the slightest clue how to answer it because I really just don’t know. I answered something like, “just to stop feeling so negative” because I wanted to answer his question but there is more to it than that. I just don’t know how to describe it. This is related to the verbal expression vs. emotional expression discussion. I don’t even know what ‘happy’ is or how to determine the feeling…

Activities

I was clear with my therapist that I didn’t really understand everything he was explained to me. I felt terrible I couldn’t grasp it because he tried to explain it in so many different ways to me. He asked me if maybe a more verbal activity would be preferred for next session, which I agreed to. He ended up emailing me two questionnaires to fill out for next session that would help with 1) identifying with particular thoughts and feelings and 2) the observer-mind and when it is and is not noticing thoughts, feelings, and activities. Hopefully this method will help me understand him better…

Medical Consultation Follow-up (9/25/2012)

Yesterday I met with the psychologist again to discuss how the medicine has been working for me. I had one HUGE concern with the Citalopram, which was how I have been experiencing blurred vision. Mind you, I haven’t been on this medication very long and my eyes were fine before I started. Now I can’t seem to see text anymore, more so at night though. This was extremely troublesome for me because I had 3 exams this week that I needed to study for and I really couldn’t focus on studying because I couldn’t read my damn notes or the book. I was even more concerned that I wouldn’t be able to read my exam during class, which ended up happening. Though I found if I looked away for a bit and then back I could re-focus my eyes, however, I had to keep doing this. So I expressed all of this concern to the psychologist who really just responded with a, “Yes, that can be a side-effect”. He gave me several different options, (1) Stop Citalopram and try a new antidepressant, (2) Continue using Citalopram and see if the blurred vision goes away, or (3) lower the dosage of Citalopram. I chose the latter… So he wrote me a new prescription for 10 mg rather than 20 mg and said I should stop taking it for 48 hours before I introduce the 10 mg medication into my system. Also, the blurred vision should go away once I stop taking the medicine (aka it isn’t a permanent side-effect). However, I haven’t taken it since Monday night and my vision is still a little weird, but I do suppose it isn’t as bad. Lastly, I did express to the psychologist how I wanted to stick with Citalopram because other than the blurred vision and slight nausea, I liked how it balanced my mood and I did feel like it was working for me.

Counseling Session #9

This session occurred on September 20, 2012. I am so far behind in keeping this blog updated… It’s really hard to write about these things when I have classes, work, and homework to do after they occur. I pretty much forgot most of went on last session anyway, so here is an extremely brief summary.

Crying

I wanted to re-touch on this topic. I found it odd that though I would never cry for myself, I could ball my eyes out for others. For example, if I watch a movie that addresses LGBTQ issues, or if my celebrity idol gives money or prizes away to people in need I might burst out into tears. I just didn’t understand how empathetic I could be, yet when it came to my own feelings I just wouldn’t express anything. My therapist said such empathy for others was normal…. But what does it say about my feelings towards myself?

Communication

I also wanted to re-touch on the topic of my communication issues. I don’t remember exactly what I brought up- other than I wanted to strengthen my communication skills. My therapist suggested talking to professors about it, which I almost completely dismissed. I told him how I have this one professor who is AMAZING and everything I wish I could be- but she scares the shit out of me because she is so intelligent, intense, and witty. We talked about what it might be like for me to speak to her about communication and participation. I think I’d die.

“How are things going with us?”

Again, he asked me this question. I answered that I wasn’t sure what the next step was for me. I felt like I had told him everything already and had run out of topics to express. He first explained to me how excellent my communication was with him just then, which made me feel really good. Then he told me how the next step would be to further analyze previous topics. He asked me if I would like to do an activity next session, or if I would like to read some book (I forget the topic). I agreed to both of these things and then that was it.

Medicinal Update

My school’s health center called me last Thursday after my counseling session and had written me a new prescription for Citalopram. A few different steps occurred and then quickly changed from there. First, I was told to go to Pharmacy #1 and I would be covered by school insurance rather than using my parent’s insurance and dealing with all that shit. Then Citalopram would only cost me around $5 if I did that. Then I was called back to be told that if I went to Pharmacy #2 I would not need insurance of any sort and it would only cost me$3.99 a month indefinitely! However, after a week of taking Citalopram I need to have an EKG done. The EKG is to make sure my heart is okay because Citalopram can cause SEVERE damage. There were a few more problems with figuring out the prescription / insurance but everything is sorted out now. I filled the prescription and tonight is my second night on Citalopram. Unfortunately, I am on my period so I cannot tell if I have cramps and can’t sleep due to my period or from the medication. Aside from the nausea, I feel weird. Maybe it’s because I am insanely tired or maybe these pills are already effecting me. I just hope my heart remains healthy.