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Dr. Bob is Robert Hsiung, MD,
bob@dr-bob.orgShown: posts 1 to 10 of 10. This is the beginning of the thread.
Posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
fact one: i dont deal with loss very well... all other facts rescinded... i cant eat, i cant sleep, i wake up if im lucky at 6:00am, tossing and turning, on the worst nights i cant sleep at all, hungry and depressed, mind racing with thoughts... i feel like im going crazy, when i seem like im getting better something touches me, a memory, a reminder, and im gone again... i feel locked in stasis with meds that do nothing, the meds that seem to work for me, the anxiolytics they want to drop... i feel like i want to disappear, i feel like i want to run away, i feel like clawing my eyes out, i wish i could have been closer to ground zero, i wish i could have done something, i wish that this was all a dream... i wish i wish i wish...
Posted by Alii on April 25, 2002, at 11:41:27
In reply to falling apart... i dont know what to do..., posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
I wish peace for you Kid. I wish no one here had to experience the pain and losses we do.
I wish I had answers.
Um....is there anyone in your support team(doc, therapist, family, friends) who can help
you find a few grief resources?I speak as someone who shut down in order not to experience grief (hey, I was young, it
was survival, I love myself for having the smarts to do that!)This grief is so freaky weird now (many, many years later) but in the readings I have done
on grief and trauma I have found comfort that if others can find a way to experience it and
get it out so that it isn't suffocating then I can too.Again, none of my healing goes according to schedule (impatience is my virtue) and I'm so
afloat in-between states of relative stability that catch me in a few months and I might be
back to the sourpuss: ain't nuttin gonna work ever.I've had glimpses. Glorious glimpses of release with some grief. And I don't like being
teased so I continue to work on ways of patching up Alii.Hugs to you too Kid....
--a.
Posted by Gracie2 on April 25, 2002, at 15:47:05
In reply to falling apart... i dont know what to do..., posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
The first thing you have to do is to get hold of yourself. HOW to do that is the $64,000 question.
I think the reason we are unable to overcome depression is because we lose sight of any goals we once had, or because our goals have changed and we have nothing new to take the place of our original goals. (Again, I know I'm taking liberties when I refer to "we" or "us".) Sometimes it is all we can do to get out of bed in the morning and perform the tasks necessary to go on living...we have no energy left to think about the future. So every day is bleak and meaningless, with nothing to look forward to.
A self-help book that I read suggested that, if you simply cannot come up with any goals, it is much easier to identify the things you do NOT want to be or do, and to go from there. Since I work in the medical profession, I started to observe my thoughts about the patients I see during the course of my days. One simple and obvious thought was that I dislike patients who smell badly and who show up for scheduled appointments with torn and filthy underwear...or no underwear.
Another thing I strongly dislike are patients - usually older patients - who have completely given up trying to do the smallest thing for themselves. I've had patients who have come in with a broken toe and insist that they cannot move themselves from the wheelchair to the table, although there is nothing else wrong with them. They wish to be lifted bodily from the chair while their limbs dangle like wet noodles. As I get older, and as my own back gets more prone to injury, I have less and less patience with this kind of behaviour. At times I have become so angry that it has taken a mighty effort to stop myself from shouting, "Listen, you get yourself out of that f****** chair right now!"
Of course, I have never done such a thing. All competent medical professionals are able to "switch off" their feelings of disgust, sorrow,
nausea or horror, at least long enough to get the job done.So there is a starting point for me, however small: to stay clean, and to help myself when I possibly can. I think this is relevant because in the midst of a crushing depression, it is easy to forget about basic hygiene and to rely on others to take care of us. Even if we are lucky enough to have someone to attend to our every need, we do ourselves a disservice by acting helpless, as eventually we start to believe that we ARE helpless.
Let me tell you, there is no substitute for plain soap and water. Somehow it is even worse when people - again, usually older people - attempt to cover up a lack of basic hygiene with perfume or cologne. While working with these people, it is difficult not to snort and shake your head like a horse. I learned a long time ago that you cannot smell yourself, that your nose quickly becomes accustomed to your own scent. Most women know that if you can smell your own perfume, you are killing everyone else. Conversely, when I am next to someone who smells nice, with clean, fresh hair, I always enjoy it and I think, here is someone who takes care of himself or herself. Even if it is an illusion, it's a nice one. That's why I am always bemused by a person who is 50, 60, or 70+ years old and still has not learned this concept.
I cannot resist telling this story. A long time ago, when I was in Army basic training, we were required to bivouac in the woods for a week, and during that whole time we were allowed to shower only once. It was July in South Carolina, and temperatures regularly soared over 100 degrees. Naturally, we were kept busy with much strenuous excersize. Only after marching the 20 miles home and cleaning our weapons were we permitted to take a real shower with soap and shampoo.
A couple of the things we did while we were out on bivouac was to qualify on the rifle and grenade ranges. I had "boloed" on the grenade range, which meant I had failed to throw an acceptable number of grenades within a target area. In order to graduate with my company, the following week I had to march back out to the bivouac area and re-qualify on the range with another company that had been in the woods for most of the week. I was instantly revolted by the smell of the other soldiers...the BO in the air was indescribably rank and cloying. Yet, I must have smelled the same way myself just a week before, and not once had I been offended by my own smell or that of the other women in my platoon. There was also the lesson of other soldiers who did not practice good hygiene when showers were available. It was common practice to drag them into the shower and scrub them down with a toilet brush.A few weeks ago -24 years later - I went to visit a friend at her new house. I marveled at her spotless white carpet and was awestruck by her bedroom, which displayed huge expanses of expensive polished furniture, including a canopy bed perfectly made up with, believe it or not, a
tray of china tea-things sitting on the middle of the bed. I said, "My God, are you expecting a photographer from House & Garden?" On the way home I worried that my own house was at the other end of the spectrum. With 4 people, 2 dogs and a cat living in a house that is over 100 years old,
things are often messy and there is a lot of painting and plastering that needs to be done. As often happens, my housekeeping reflects my mental state, so things pile up. But having a showhouse is not particularly important to me at this point-
maybe when I am better. Maybe.Right now I am searching for a reason to get well, to stop torturing myself, to stop distressing the people I love. Recently I read this quote:
This is the true joy in life, the being used for a purpose recognized by yourself as a mighty one; the being thoroughly worn out before you are thrown on the scrap heap; the being a force of Nature instead of a feverish selfish little clod of ailments and grievances complaining that the world will not devote itself to making you happy.
-George Bernard ShawAs a goal it is a simple start - being clean, wearing fresh clothes, having nice-smelling hair. Beyond that, learning to not be helpless, to helping myself, to being able to handle any situation that arises, to not being a feverish selfish little clod.
Once I have that down I hope to build on it - maybe going back to school, learning about something that interests me, making new friends (I have pretty much driven away most of my old friends), losing weight, taking better care of myself, maybe even...being happy.
-Gracie
Posted by Lini on April 25, 2002, at 16:13:59
In reply to falling apart... i dont know what to do..., posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
i think you just have to fall apart . . . and then put yourself back together. i am not sure there is another way to go through grief, except through it. the depression feels like maybe its not worth getting through, but i'm hoping, for you, that it is.loss means that there was something worth holding on to. there will be something worth holding on to again.
This is where I say thank you Mandy, and others, for your thoughts a few nights ago, when I forgot all of this, when i had to go back to the hospital . . .but it finds you again, the hope of it all, and takes you to the next place. and here i am, hoping you'll hold on too.
all the best to you,
the L
Posted by mist on April 25, 2002, at 23:49:39
In reply to falling apart... i dont know what to do..., posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
I don't know what to say that will help so I will just say that I think you're a very talented poet. You're the real thing. What that has to do with how you're feeling—nothing—but it's still worth saying.
Your poem for sar (Southern Comfort) made me cry. I am so, so sorry about your loss, the loss of a beautiful person who meant so much to you. I don't know what your relationship was but just from reading your posts and hers I can see why there was a connection. Not anything I can name, just something.
>
> fact one: i dont deal with loss very well... all other facts rescinded... i cant eat, i cant sleep, i wake up if im lucky at 6:00am, tossing and turning, on the worst nights i cant sleep at all, hungry and depressed, mind racing with thoughts... i feel like im going crazy, when i seem like im getting better something touches me, a memory, a reminder, and im gone again... i feel locked in stasis with meds that do nothing, the meds that seem to work for me, the anxiolytics they want to drop... i feel like i want to disappear, i feel like i want to run away, i feel like clawing my eyes out, i wish i could have been closer to ground zero, i wish i could have done something, i wish that this was all a dream... i wish i wish i wish...
Posted by wendy b. on April 26, 2002, at 0:10:15
In reply to Re: falling apart... i dont know what to do... » kid_A, posted by Lini on April 25, 2002, at 16:13:59
Lini,
That was a beautiful post, hope you are continuing to feel much better, and,Kid,
I am thinking of you often. I am still broken up over Stacey... Can't even talk about it to the shrink or the family ('it's someone you've never met, how can you...') But I can know in my soul that she lived IN ME. And she knows how awful you are feeling right now, and she wouldn't want that. She was a loving person, so generous with her true self. So I know, I think I know, the heartbreak. Krazy Kat (Kelly) would like to talk more about it, so maybe you can try to say how you feel and we can pull you back to the land of the living (or at least almost-living, or living better...). But sleep, please sleep, and the idiots who are taking you off the benzos need to know you need sleep if you are going to feel any better at all... I wish you peace... Please write more.
Wendy
>
> i think you just have to fall apart . . . and then put yourself back together. i am not sure there is another way to go through grief, except through it. the depression feels like maybe its not worth getting through, but i'm hoping, for you, that it is.
>
> loss means that there was something worth holding on to. there will be something worth holding on to again.
>
> This is where I say thank you Mandy, and others, for your thoughts a few nights ago, when I forgot all of this, when i had to go back to the hospital . . .but it finds you again, the hope of it all, and takes you to the next place. and here i am, hoping you'll hold on too.
>
> all the best to you,
>
> the L
Posted by CtrlAlt n Del on April 26, 2002, at 0:28:56
In reply to falling apart... i dont know what to do..., posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
Hi sweet,I feel useless , can't give any advice , others here are better at that...just saying hi . I can't take away the pain but I'm thinking of you.
take care.....
Posted by Zo on April 26, 2002, at 3:50:04
In reply to falling apart... i dont know what to do..., posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
Can you keep checking in, regularly? Are you up to that, so we can be holding the space for you, with you? You don't have to interact. Just come and say something, once every day.Zo
Posted by Krazy Kat on April 26, 2002, at 10:38:14
In reply to falling apart... i dont know what to do..., posted by kid_A on April 25, 2002, at 11:25:36
Posted by Krazy Kat on April 29, 2002, at 17:05:59
In reply to you are in my thoughts... (nm) » kid_A, posted by Krazy Kat on April 26, 2002, at 10:38:14
if you want to contact me via email:
perrofeliz at ivillage dot com
doghappy at ivillage dot com
i'm gone for the next 5 days or so but will be checking email tomorrow.
i hope you're o.k.
- kk
This is the end of the thread.
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