At The Intersection of Crazy and Parenting

If you're familiar with Dooce, you've heard her say that because she's crazy she doesn't hear and see things the way other people do.  That someone can say something as innocuous as "Hi" and in her head, she hears something else...like, "I hate you."  Yeah, I'm like that.

And I'm like that all the time, every day.  And while I can carry on a perfectly normal conversation with you, and you will think I'm fine, but I hear something that for me, interprets to "I hate you, Laura, and also, you smell bad."  I know, I know, that it's me and not you.  I know that you think we're having a normal conversation and you have no idea that I'm dissecting every nuance of whatever it was that was said.  I'm going over and over it in my head, hearing all the ways I am just not good enough to even be sitting this close to you, let alone presuming to talk to you.

So because I'm crazy, parenting has all sorts of room to reassure myself that I am, in fact, the stupidest person who has ever lived and shouldn't even be allowed to have spiders build their webs in my corners, let alone be in charge of raising a whole other person.  For the most part, I manage to keep my crazy from impacting the midget too much.  Because I know I'm crazy, while I will obsess over whether the midget will end up in a gutter somewhere, saying "If only I had a decent mother..." I also, am pretty good at keeping those fears to myself.  Because, if I'm not careful, the midget will end up  reassuring me (ME!).  Which is not okay and is just going to lead into a whole other round of self-recrimination, that will lead to a downward spiral which will end with me sitting in a gutter...or throwing the midget into the gutter myself to prove to myself that I am, in fact, a horrible parent.

One of the most interesting (Did I say interesting?  I meant mind-blowingly idiotic.) aspects of the crazy as it relates to parenting is that if I see someone on the television doing something stupid, I immediately wonder about how his or her parents feel about it.  It's why, to this day, I can't watch Jackass or any of the stupid spin-offs spawned by it.  Every time I see them doing those stupid, disgusting things, my inner mom thinks, "Please, please, for the love of all that is good in the world, let me be dead if the midget decides to ever do that and televise it."

It also leads to me telling the midget not to do things.  A girl get bullied online in a Lifetime movie?  Clearly this calls for an hour long discussion about what to do if she's bullied online, and what will happen if I ever find out that she's been bullying someone.  And Teen Mom?  Please.  There isn't enough Xanax  in all the world to allow me to sit through that one.

Needless to say, the midget is used to being instructed not to blow up buildings or dismember people or wear dirty underwear, just depending on what we're watching.  However, I apparently offended her intelligence tonight.  We were watching a show about  BASE jumping, as I turned to her to say "Please, don't ever go BASE jumping."  She got that look that all parents of adolescent girls know and hate so well and said "Really?  Really, Mom?  You're going to tell me not to go BASE jumping?  Really?  How stupid do you think I am?"

I couldn't decide whether to smack her or laugh....kinda like most moments with a 12 year old, really.

Wherein I Whine About Being Sick

It's been a long time. I've been in hiding, both here on the blog and in my own life. I've been in pain, been anxious and depressed. I'm currently waiting to feel well enough to go and help one of my cousins with a dehoarding project. Ironic, that I'm the one trying pull myself together to help someone else clean their house when my house looks like someone dropped a small bomb in the living room.

There was a SCENE last night. In capital words with screaming and tears and accusations. We've had this weekend in the works for awhile, my cousin collects stuff in a major way...clothes, movies, crap...just tons of stuff. Shoes she doesn't and will never wear, clothes in sizes way too small that she hopes to fit one day. It's depressing. And this, from me, the queen of the messy house. My mess, though is of a life lived now...not for the someday, "if" future.

Anyway, earlier this week there was an accident...Lily, the rat terrier I've been fostering for months pushed Charlie under the car as I was coming down the hill from my aunt's house. He has a broken pelvis, but with rest he should make a complete recovery. However, it was touch and go, and because the emergency vet didn't get a great x-ray, I spent the weekend thinking I was going to have put Charlie to sleep. It was so scary and awful. Charlie is my baby, my boy...my best friend (well, after the Archeaogoddess, of course). He got me through the break up with the EG. He's the one who is there at night when I'm hurting, when I'm up all night testing the midget's blood sugar, when I have a panic attack and can't find my pills. I love him, and the thought of losing him was killing me.

So, as I've mentioned before stress makes everything worse. Stress causes major flares. I've been flaring all week, and then on Thursday night, the midget had soaring blood sugars that wouldn't correct (fucking adolescent hormones collide with fucking diabetes) and I was up all night...so by Friday morning, I was done in. I slept nearly all day. I was supposed to do my grocery shopping for the meals for this dehoarding weekend, but since I couldn't hardly walk to my bathroom, grocery shopping was out.

So, that led to yesterday, which was nearly as bad as Friday. I was in agony (oh and did I mention the part where my doctor took two days too long to refill my pain meds, so I spent a day in narcotic withdrawal this week, too) and exhausted, but I finally dragged my ass out of the house at around 2 in the afternoon and headed to the grocery store and did not only my shopping, but shopping for the cousin we are dehoarding as well. I had sent a note to my other cousin and my sister-in-law who were coming to help dehoard telling them that they'd better not back out, and I can't say that it was a nice note. I'm not in a good place, and I panicked because I thought that they weren't going to show up, and I've felt so responsible for the one cousin for so long, and I just can't take it anymore. I'm not making it on my own, and feeling responsible for someone besides the midget is wearing on me.

So, of course, the fact that I made a big fuss and then wasn't able to come through didn't go over well. I walked in to a very hostile situation. My cousin was furious that I hadn't made it there earlier, that I didn't call all day and let her know that I wasn't going to be there until then. (Not the cousin we're trying to dehoard, but the other one.) She called me a liar, said I wasn't sick, that I just chose to flake, that I could never be counted on, that I take advantage of everyone.

I flipped. I told her she was a selfish bitch who takes advantage of her sister, and only cares about herself and that I was done. I wanted to leave. I was hysterical at that point. It was an echo of everything that the EG had said to me. It's my constant fear...that people think I'm making this up, that I'm choosing to stay in bed, choosing to not do all the things I want to do.

And then I wonder, how the hell can anyone think that. I was always a flaky bitch, it's true...but I was a flaky bitch who did stuff. I hiked and camped and went on road trips and cleaned my house and went out for dinner with friends. And I'd sell my soul to be that girl again. It kills me when I have to cancel on something because my body defies me. I'm so tired...and it's not the good tired of knowing you've accomplished something. It's an exhaustion that is painful. Breathing takes effort. Typing hurts...not just my joints, but the tips of my fingers, my skin actually hurts.

My sister-in-law made me stay, insisted we all talk it out. And we did, for an hour...but I don't think I made any headway making it clear that I'm sick. That Lupus is real...that I don't choose to stay in bed, that I don't choose to give up everything that matters in my life. There were lots of tears and accusations.

Following, as it did, on this hell of a week, needless to say it didn't help the flare. I'm beyond useless today. The pain pills aren't touching the pain today. I want to scream and cry and I'm holding it together for the midget's sake. I'm contemplating a trip to the ER for a pain shot, but I am terrified to ask anyone for a ride. I can't bear to hear again how I let them down, how I let everyone down all the time, and that even this is just to make people believe me.

And it's stupid. My doctors verify that I'm sick. I know I'm sick, but it took so long to get anyone to believe me that I'm still scared that I'm just crazy, that it's all in my head. This is what chronic illness is, this is what invisible diseases do. I want to wear a sign that says I have Lupus, and Fibromyalgia and RA and no thyroid, and bipolar disorder and panic disorder and it causes me extreme pain and fatigue and a million other symptoms. And the worst part of it...the very worst thing is that I'm never going to get better. I mean, hopefully someday I'll have some sort of remission, or I'll find the right cocktail of drugs to get my symptoms under control, but I'm not ever going to be healed, it will always be a part of me, and looking into the future 30, 40, 50 years down the road and knowing that it'll always be this way...that alone is enough to make me want to burrow down into the bed and never come out...but I do.

Anytime I have any strength I do get out of bed, and I do what I can. I try to live my life the best I can in the gaps between the bad days, the bad weeks, the bad months. I hate that I can't be a good friend, a good cousin, a good mom. I want to apologize for myself all the time, to apologize for the disease, and then I feel like, I'm the sick one, shouldn't someone apologize to me, shouldn't someone come and help me?

I hate being sick, I really fucking hate being sick.

Blog for Mental Health Day.

I logged into Twitter today to see so many of my Twitter peeps (Yes, I have peeps...and no, I don't care what you say, I'm not too white to have peeps or say that I have peeps) linking to blog posts about mental health. Apparently, today is blogging for mental health day. Thank God for the Twitter, or I'd never have any fucking idea what day it is.

I found this oddly appropriate as I'm desperately trying to hold off an imminent panic attack, and as it turns out, since I only take my atavan when I'm having a panic attack, I didn't know I was out of them. So...no calming drugs for me, and I have to get through this one on my own. It's not the end of the world, I've done it before, many, many times. But expecting to be able to reach for relief only to find it's not there is disconcerting to say the least.

I've talked before about my bipolar disorder, how the highs make me chatty, keep me up, can aggravate me or turn me into someone who snaps over every little thing, and the lows keep me locked into myself, too sad, too miserable to talk about it. It sucks and I hate it...but given a choice, I'd take bipolar over the anxiety disorder any fucking day of the week.

Anxiety disorder makes me...well, it makes me anxious..but it's so much more. I feel like I can't breathe, my clothes, my skin are too tight, and are suffocating me. My heart pounds, my brain (never really all that slow or rational to begin with) races at lightening speeds with every paranoid thought you can imagine. I've seen numerous therapists and a couple of shrinks, and the general consensus seems to be that the anxiety is a holdover from a childhood so awful that I spend everyday in a state of anxiety, and, as it turns out, these responses become habituated in your brain chemistry, so now...even though I haven't had the cause for the anxiety in over 20 years, even though the main perpetrator in my childhood nightmare is dead and buried, I still get these bursts of panic.

I've tried everything...meditation, exercise, biofeedback, medication...nothing works. Nothing has managed to put a stop to the panic attacks. I take a medication that makes me so that I'm not so anxious I can't leave my house most of the time, but for these burst of adrenalin that kick off the panic? Nothing works because there isn't a pattern or a trigger (though sometimes thinking too much a panic attack can induce one). Most of my panic attacks occur in the middle of the night. I'm either suffering from insomnia and find myself freaking out...or, far worse, I wake up from a dead sleep in the grips of a panic attack. In those moments, the only thing that helps is the atavan. Otherwise, I doom myself to an hour or more of panic...and it sucks, my friends.

By far, the worst panic attacks are the ones that happen in front of other people. My brain just plays the same thought over and over..."What will people think of me?" I've avoided large gatherings for years just to avoid the chance that it might happen in front of other people. Because, I'm already the crazy one...how bad would it be to be even crazier? Even though the people I'm usually around are family or beloved friends, the idea that they would see me that way? Terrifying. Worse still? That those I love would know just how screwed up I am. Used to be I only talked about this with the exgirlfriend...and occasionally my beloved Archaeogoddess.

In recent years I've been trying to be more open...talking about it here, making jokes about it, because that's how I handle things. And, frankly, the fear monster doesn't seem so bad if you can laugh at it.

I know how hard it is for me to talk about, and I'm one of those people who has no problems discussing just about anything else. Pelvic exam post, anyone? So, if it's hard for me? How much harder for other people...you know, people who have filters?

It's time we take the stigma off of mental health. Just like with my Fibro, Grave's and various other illnesses, I didn't ask for this. I didn't make my brain betray me in the worst possible ways. It's time that we stop looking the other way when people we love are in trouble because we don't want to embarrass them. And it's time for us to stop being so damn uncomfortable with mental illness that we write off friends and loved ones who self-medicate as attention seeking addicts. Mental illness affects not just the one who's sick...it affects everyone around me. And pretending like it doesn't can lead to tragedy.

I'm blogging for mental health today. How about you?



And for the record...that panic attack I was talking about? Just writing about it helped so much...maybe I'll try to remember that the next time I wake up feeling like I'm going to crawl out of my skin.

Just Another Manic Monday...erm...Tuesday...

Let’s talk mania, my friends. The flipside of my bipolar coin. When I was healthy, before walking was a tortuous task, I’d use my mania somewhat productively…clean something while listening to my iPod, do something, anything. I’d do anything to keep my mind from torturing myself…shop, talk, eat, have sex…anything.

But, now, with this body of mine that betrays me, with my responsibilities toward Cass, know I can’t just take off and do something crazy, even if my body cooperated. So now, I lay in bed at three in the morning, my mind racing, replaying conversations from years ago, thinking of all the things I’ve said, or should have said, or wish I hadn’t said.

I lay here in my bed, my brain racing, my body tensing slowly, insidiously, until every muscle is locked, every joint Is tensed and I’m nearly crying from the pain. So, I breathe, try to clear my mind, and relax minutely, and then before I know it, I’m tensed again…teeth grinding, every muscle locked in agony.

I hate it, I hate this. I hate going over and over the end of the relationship with the exgirlfriend, I hate replaying conversations with the midget’s father over and over. I hate remembering every hateful word anyone has ever said to me, but I do it. I dwell on fights I’ve had, I dwell on the ways I’ve hurt people or people have hurt me. I hate remembering every dirty horrible moment of my childhood, I hate remembering being scared and dirty and sad. But my brain won’t shut up. I can’t even read when I’m like this. Forming complete thoughts is nearly impossible. It makes me crazy. I just want it to stop.

In the past I’ve hurt myself, taken drugs, eaten everything I could get my hands on, just to spend an hour in the bathroom purging it from my body. I can’t do those things anymore, but I wish I could find a way to make it stop. I know hurting myself isn’t an option, but it makes it stop, makes my brain slow down so I can breathe, I can think and feel like myself again. I know I shouldn’t hurt myself…I know I shouldn’t, but I want to. So, instead I grabbed my laptop and I’m writing this…trying to reach out, trying to be out and open and honest so that maybe someone somewhere will read this and know that they aren’t alone, that it doesn’t just happen to them, and that each wretched manic night has an end, and it’s a reminder to myself that I am loved and deserving of that love, that people who love me will read this and understand me a little more.

Oh, Finally....

It's been a million years since I wrote a blog post, and even longer since I actually published one. Between Christmas, New Year's and the holiday hang over blues and nasty inflammatory flare, the last thing I've wanted to do was try to come up with pithy and amusing anecdotes about my sad little life.

I had a doctor's appointment about a week ago, and he FINALLY fucking got it...that I'm actually, truly in pain, that there really and truly is wrong (thank you, for something finally showing up in the lab work) and he gave me drugs, and referred me back to Stanford's rheumatology clinic. Which is good for him because if he hadn't I was going to cut that motherfucker.

So, I'm trying to take the drugs as little as possible because, after all, I'm a mom to kid with Type 1 diabetes, and I'm a full time student. (Well, hello, spring semester, where the hell did you come from?) And I'm awaiting the late February rheumatology appointment rather impatiently. I would give just about anything to feel normal again...to not have to psych myself up for five minutes just to endure the pain of standing up...to not be so tired that getting dressed lays me out flat.

I want to talk about something The Bloggess put up the other day...about not being ashamed of mental illness, and "coming out" and letting others who are suffering know that it's okay to get help. I'm bipolar and it took me years to get properly diagnosed because I only ever sought treatment when I was so depressed that someone forced me to admit that I needed help. I'm damn lucky that the years of being prescribed antidepressants that were not intended to treat bipolar disorder didn't send me over the brink and land me in the hospital or worse. It's not that I didn't know that not being able to sleep and talking a million words a minute and spending the rent money on frivolous crap were abnormal, it's that being manic feels good...until it doesn't. I also have anxiety disorder and suffer from panic attacks...it's why I'm awake right now, actually. I woke up in the middle of the night in a full blown panic attack, and though the Ativan has brought me down from the ledge, I have had so many nights when there were no drugs and I was too ashamed or scared to ask for help, and only the thought of what it would do the midget and the Archaeogoddess has kept me from hurting myself.

What prompted The Bloggess to "come out" was the breakdown and subsequent suicide of the husband of a fellow blogger. It's heartbreaking that it ever gets that far, that someone, for whatever reason, is too ashamed or frightened to seek help when something's not right. There's such a stigma attached to mental illness, and there fucking shouldn't be. My bipolar disorder is no less a disease than my Fibro, or my arthritis, but that doesn't mean other people accept it as such, or that I've always treated it as such.

My point? If something's wrong...get help. Staying quiet and suffering nobly is bullshit. And you aren't saving your family and friends by suffering in silence. Hiding that shit from them will hurt them and scare them far more than telling them and letting them help you. Trust me on this.

Come out. Get help.

Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

So, remember that post where I was all zen and happy and shit...yeah...I ran out of time and gas money and didn't get to the pharmacy to pick up my meds and today has been such a fucking roller coaster it's ridiculous. Woke up happy, got sad, got happy, felt serene for about five minutes, then got irritated. My mind has been hopping from subject to subject without actually finishing a single thought. I've been grumpy and teary since the midget went to bed.

I watched an episode of Whale Wars and then half an episode of Pit Boss, and when I started sobbing and cuddling my dogs and trying to figure out how to justify adopting a pit bull, I said...Um...Fuck this...and turned off the television and turned on my iPod and did dishes and some more unpacking and cleaning. I've since taken a sleeping pill and am now trying to shut my brain down with mindless facebook games.

However, while listening to my iPod and singing (screaming) really badly, I decided I really, really wanted to share this song with you, gentle reader. I think if I could just play this on an internal loop 24/7 I'd be so much easier to withstand...

I'm so Zen I'm Like Buddha...well...kinda...

You ever have one of those days where everyone you see and everything you do totally has a theme? That's been the last 24 hours for me. I just feel like I've had an epiphany or a break through...or maybe I'm just manic and haven't realized it yet...ah, the joy of being bipolar.

Anyway...the epiphany is this...No one can make me unhappy, unless I choose to let them. And that's the only power I have. That's it. I can either take your shit and let you treat me like crap and feel bad about myself, or I can love myself enough to say, you know what...Fuck you if you don't like me, if you think I'm too fat or too messy or too flighty. Whatever. That's your issue. It isn't mine, and I'm not going to take your issue on...Got it?

See, last night at about midnight I get an instant message from my cousin, who, from the magic that is Facebook, found her ex-fiance...the one that walked out and left her flat with no explanation, no goodbye....nothing. Just boom...gone. Well, turns out he's married, and she's cute and they look happy. My cousin, who I love dearly, is not a "glass half empty" person so much as she's a..."why is MY glass always empty" kind of person. As though everything in her life sucks and she's the only who has bad things happen.

Now, I love this girl, don't get me wrong. She's funny, and kind and generous and good...but she wallows a lot. I mean a lot...if something happens that's not what she wanted, she ignores all the good things in her life and says "Why does my life always suck? Why can't I have anything good?" Now, in fairness...she's a single mom, has some health issues and very little money (gosh, where have I heard that story before?), but on the other hand...she has an amazing family, a place to live, all of the necessities and quite a few luxuries...But she doesn't want to see that, she wants to focus on what's wrong. And I've been there...I've so been there. It's hard to drag yourself out of that place. It just sucks to be miserable all the time, and yes...it is a choice. Find a way to laugh, to inhabit your life so that when you look at what other people have, you don't ignore all that you have to wish for what you think they have.

Because that's the key isn't it? It's our perception. I told my cousin, yes, I'm sure they look happy in the pictures. Most people don't share the not so good times with the rest of the world. They want you to see the happy, everything's great moments, not the "my kid was up all night, and the dog peed on my only clean blanket and I got a flat tire" moments. Because we all have them, we just aren't interested in taking pictures. It's not a moment we want to keep.

Then tonight I was talking to another friend (that accommodating, picture taking friend, who we've decided to call Sam) and he was sort of having a wallowing kind of a moment, and I was totally on my soapbox with the same blunt realizations I'm giving myself and my cousin. And while I was chatting with him online, I was also watching a silly romantic comedy of the same theme...the "it's all in how you choose to see it" theme. It felt like the universe was just saying..."Yes, you idiot woman, you've finally got it."

Now, in fairness...there's a good chance I'm headed into a manic phase,and that in a week, I'll be all "boohoo, my life sucks" but I'm going to try and keep this centered in my mind, that it's all in the way you choose to live your life. If you've decided to be happy, and that nothing, not that flat tire or pissing dog or empty wallet, is going to ruin that happiness. And then maybe, just maybe...that'll be enough...