Blogs
This weekend I had the privilege of co-housesitting with my wife for a lovely couple with an adorable pup named Lola. Lola, being a pup, doesn't suffer from adult attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), though she was as excited as I was to run circles around the dining room table with a toy in her mouth. My last final of physical therapy school was Friday, my adult ADHD having been pushed to the limit with five finals during the week, Lola provided some much needed animal Zen.
I’ve always been cursed with really painful headaches and occasional dizziness. Typically, I try to push through the pain. However, recently I experienced the worst dizzy spell of my life, which sent me to the doctors. My whole body felt disoriented and my eyes were constantly in and out of focus. I felt nauseous and everything around me would not stop spinning, even when I closed my eyes.
This dreadful feeling reminded me of how our minds feel when we are trying to tell ourselves not to self-harm – our thoughts keep on spinning and twisting and all it leads to is pain.
Depression remission can be brief, lasting mere days. If you're lucky, depression remission can last weeks or months before a depression relapse occurs. It is important when your depression is in remission, to make the most of it. Here's how I do it.
Greetings From The Bipolar Babe - Your Fellow Stigma Stomper
Hello, my name is Andrea Paquette and I am known as the Bipolar Babe in the mental health community. My website is www.bipolarbabe.com and my mandate is to stomp out stigma. Having been diagnosed with bipolar disorder at the age of twenty-six, I know what it means to face stigma internally and externally. It is my desire to share my personal experiences of living with bipolar and explore how I have dealt with stigma throughout my life for the past 11 years. I am genuine and honest, as if you were a close friend of mine. I promise to share all stories candidly, and I hope you will be my friend soon in this wonderful online community.
We only live once, but once is enough if we do it right. Live your life with class, dignity, and style so that an exclamation, rather than a question mark signifies it!~ Gary Ryan Blair
As trivial as it may seem, small behaviors can really impact your mood. The more we spiral into the negative thinking patterns, the more it affects our view of the world and our self-esteem. When a toxic environment takes over or unhappy thoughts to engulf your mind, it leads to anger, resentment, frustration, and bad vibes.
Not only is it difficult to make the decision to enter a mental health or addiction treatment program, but the financial aspects of seeking care can cause some roadblocks for a large number of individuals. Even for those who have mental health insurance coverage, it can be a daunting task to determine how you are going to pay for a mental health treatment program.
Our mentally ill child, Tim, 19, sometimes forgets his coping skills for schizoaffective disorder symptoms. Generally, he reaches out and talks to one of us parents when he's having a tough time before things get out of hand, but sometimes he forgets. He forgets what to do when he feels paranoid or unloved.
For a long time after my trauma I felt sucked into the darkness and despair of grief, loss, fear, anxiety and the frustration of the same question I repeatedly asked myself,
"Who am I now?"
It seemed that trauma and PTSD symptoms had branded me for life and there was no way to:
go back to who I'd been before (I was right about that)
go forward and become someone new (I was wrong about that)
What do we do when we get stuck in that place??
When I got my dog, Digby, I had no idea how much he would help me with my depression. Standard recommended treatments for depression pretty much never recommend getting a dog or spending time with a dog, but maybe they should.
I believe she will only be able to rid herself of her demons, and hopefully her BPD as well, when she's ready to confront the abuse of her father. If she can put the blame where it belongs, she may stop projecting that victim/perpetrator cycle on the present men in her life. These demons are a metaphor for the purgatory she has created for herself. That reality has consequences in the real world, but it need not be real in the tangible sense. Exorcising her demons will require the expenditure of real physical energy and probably the destruction of aspects of her personality. If this ever happens, and it's possible but not probable, then these demons will evaporate. They are only as real as one's personality is real. In short, reality is not the question, it's what you make of the things you feel to be real.