Lots of changes happened in my life since my last post on my blog and as with all changes, I needed time for the dust to settle to be able to see where I'm standing now.
The biggest change is that I'm now in part-time therapy, one focused on mood swings, psychoses and related effects. This therapy will hopefully enable me to deal with my bipolar in a better way, so I can build up strength to address the PTSD and MPD/DID. Yes, I still have a very long road ahead of me, but the journey has finally started after waiting a year and a half.
I find it hard to think of what this therapy has to offer, like quite a few in a predicament like mine, I already have employed many 'tricks' and ways to try and moderate the extremes of my mood swings. So I end up helping most of the group members, while trying to find ways to look differently at my own palette of moods and feelings. So far I didn't find any, but what did change was perspective on my life.
Now I really don't care how and when I finish all these therapies, if at all. My sheer complexity that made a relatively renowned institute turn me down for treatment sex months ago did cause a dent in my confidence for getting 'better'. The gradual change in my perspective was prompted by a relatively simple question, "What does it mean to be 'healed'?"
Some twenty years ago I would have replied something like 'being able to work, have friends, start a family with 2.5 kids and a dog', but twenty years ago I didn't know the extend of my mental issues and complexity. Although I must admit things were less complex at that time, now three failed (abusive) marriages, eleven moves (of which several international), twelve jobs and loss of many friends were added into the mix.
Almost exactly two years ago to date, a therapist asked me "What do you want your life to be like in ten years time?" I couldn't answer it at the time, I got as far as "I can name a few things I would like to have accomplished. But other than that, I don't wish for much. I don't need to be rich, if my family and I have a normal healthy daily life with no debts, I'm happy on that part." Now my situation has changed so much, that the family part has fallen off it. In a way it still hurts on some level, I miss the children, but I don't miss my ex at all.
Both questions caused a lot of thought, back then and now. So what does it mean to me to be healed?
I gave up on thinking about the pressures of society to be a valuable member. Screw that, I fought my way through life, working since I was twelve and for what? At first supporting my parents, then supporting my boyfriends, partners and ending up with almost nothing when my life crashed into the ground, leaving me shattered, battered and an ideal candidate for a closed wing of a mental hospital. (Which I did end up in for a while.)
I've shifted my goals over the past months. I don't need a family to be happy, I don't need wealth, just enough to support myself suffices. I'd love to live somewhere out there away from civilization, provided I have an internet connection and ideally a knight in shining armor who checks in on me from time to time. I'd reward him greatly for it.
That still doesn't quite answer the question, I know and I'm getting to it now. Healed for me means I can deal with my mood swings without ending in the extreme highs and lows of my bipolar, having a certain level of control over who controls my body and passing of information between the individuals that form my system, having found a level of peace with my past and the things that caused the PTSD, and last but not least, having found an even better level of acceptance and ways of dealing with the psychoses that crop up when I experience stress.
One part of this mess I wouldn't like to change, my lack of grasp on reality. Reality and fantasy are equally valuable to me, reality because it keeps me alive, fantasy because it enables me to feel a happiness I otherwise couldn't. The lack of a firm grasp on reality allows me to 'live' the fantasies in my head or even on digital paper. I never realized it as much as I do now, it's my fantasy world that actually keeps me going.
Even now I feel the depressive down slide underneath my conscious efforts to focus on the positive things in life, but the smile that my fantasy puts on my face makes it bearable, in some ways even preferable, since the strength of the depression makes the intensity of my fantasy world stronger as well. It is a powerful force that many creative people employ(ed) and I fully understand the scope of that now.
My financial and administrative life is still a mess and not properly in order, but I did get paid something and managed to keep my home and eat a bit more healthy now.
Now I'm on the start of a new change, my psychiatrist and I discussed the use of Seroquel (Quetiapine). Both she and I were of the opinion it wasn't quite suitable for me and she offered several options, but I went with her gut feeling about Natrium Valporate, even though that won't affect my psychotic effects. I started to switch meds last night, slowly diminishing the Seroquel while upping the Natrium Valporate over the course of the coming weeks. I'm curious to find out how those two differ for me.
You might wonder why I'm not asking something to address the psychoses, it is actually not as bad as it would be for someone else, I suppose. I must have been around 4 to 6 years old when I experienced my first psychotic episode. At the time I thought I saw ghosts, not surprisingly considering they did look like shadowy silhouettes of people. The effects of floors turning to seas and walls becoming flimsy curtains that move in the wind were also present rather early on. They don't frighten me anymore, I had nearly 40 years to get used to those effects and accepted them as part of my life. Every appearance of the ghostly shadow figure does shock me for an instant, until I realize what is happening and I am able to 'ignore' their presences. When I had a couple of days amidst my hallucinations two years ago I was at my wits end, fearing I would never regain control over reality again. Of course I did and it wasn't until someone mentioned that these shorter phenomena aren't part of normal life experiences but in effect are psychoses, that I started to view them as a problem. Now I'm stepping back from that idea, they're only a problem if I want them to be. When the floor turns into a wavy sea, I only have to take one step to realize the floor is there even if I can't see it as such. Now that is a big win for me.
What also is becoming a win is the knowledge that most of my manic and depressive episodes are chemically malfunctions in my brain. I'm well on my way down into a depression, but I still manage to escape reality by diving into my fantasies and write or try to make something artistic. Having a conceptual mind I am unable to create realistic visual arts, so I experiment with the abstract, not my preference though, I'd love to be able to sketch the beauty of nature, but again I found some acceptance for my limitations.
I tend to think that the year of isolation from the world enabled me to settle my basics in me. Now that I'm in therapy I notice the influence of the stress of just being there. My mood swings became more pronounces and the psychotic effects worse, but I'm determined not to give up. The therapy itself doesn't offer me much at this stage, I'm mostly helping others rather than focusing on myself. I know a lot of cognitive 'tricks' to keep me going, some of which I have shared here and there on EP.
Last but not least I like to mention another shift in focus. I don't fight against my illnesses any more, I fight for myself. I know I need to learn I'm worthy, I have a right to exist and above all that I'm so much more than the collection of my illnesses. It's still a long journey, but it is definitely worth it.
