The thoughts just never stop
They just keep on coming, with little relief on the horizon. I know what will end up happening, I will end up crashing one day soon and then my thoughts, every single last one of them, will evaporate into nothingness.
And with the help of my medication and change of diagnosis from the doctor, I have indeed been less up and more, well, down. I feel like taking a nap all the time. Alas, I will not get to take one, and will need to tough it out.
The rushing thoughts subside, like the change of tides, and I suddenly feel a wave of normalcy on the edge of my consciousness. Following an episode of mania, I always welcome the normalcy that ensues.
Sent from Shea's iPad
Friday, June 25, 2010
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
What I'm currently working on in my spare time.....HAHAHAHA.....What spare time?
Chapter 1, Prologue
It was one of those crisp evenings, and on nights like this, I could remember how it all started. Abruptly, without warning, I had gone from a happy college kid, to someone who feared fear itself. What made it all the more disturbing was the lack of sleep. In one instance, I was tired, but could not sleep, then I would lay there in my dorm room bunk bed and stare out the window at the beautiful Gettysburg College campus and listen to the chirping of birds, which normally was a happy sound. The sound of these birds, however, took on a demonic and meaningful (to my ears only) shrill chirp. After a few hours of laying there, eyelids clicking, trying desperately to sleep with no sign of the sweet relief coming, I climb out of bed and check the time while I reach for the telephone by the TV set. The clock read 6:45 am. It was finals week as I neared the middle of my college career, end of my sophomore year. Just three more exams to take, I thought. But at that point I was in trouble. Not the kind of trouble you get into with the law or with a girl you date, no, I was in over my head, and it would be a long way out of a deep, dark hole.
I was going to call my mom, but even as I dialed the numbers, I couldn't remember what her number was and the numbers on the keypad looked all mixed up in a jumble of mathematics that I couldn't figure out. "Ok, you can do this," I thought to myself. I reminded myself that anyone that had not had a wink of sleep in 72 hours would probably be in similar shape. Finally, after several attempts of punching in random strings of phone numbers, the phone was ringing, I was calling for help.
"Are you feeling all right?" my room mate would ask me. "No, not really," I would respond as the very fabric of time would be in my perceptions, intermittently speeding up and then back to a slow crawl. Every outside stimuli, like someone calling to their friend from far away or a car honking it's horn, had some insidious purpose for doing so, in my mind. In fact, they were all just cogs in a grand master paranoid delusion that made up conspiracy theories and confirmed their validity with every passing moment. my friends, they just got to enjoy life, free of the burden of schizophrenia and its poison to my thoughts. For me, well, I was just stuck in a racing auto bon of thoughts with no slowing down in sight.
It wasn't until my mom arrived and picked me up that I felt my first pang of relief, if just for a moment. The next 11 years of my life, as it turns out, would be a roller coaster to recovery through medication, doctor's visits, brief hospital stays and an ever increasing ability to cope with the symptoms of my brain disease. I have come so far in coping with the disease that I look back at those first few years that I was in an ominous dark cloud that would hang over me, to a sense of clarity. Whereas, at first, I would not know what to do or how to handle the symptoms as they struck me, I now have a heightened awareness of those same symptoms and have developed almost what you would call an action plan in order to deal with each type as it comes. This is the story of my journey to the abyss of schizophrenia and back.
Chapter 2
One thing that we often lack in Mental illness specifically, is insight. A little bit of understanding or the word insight as it pertains to mental illness is needed here. Insight is often not a hard concept for us to grasp normally, with a regularly functioning brain, that is. Now imagine that you are entirely a prisoner in your own mind. Imagine a world warped by the many perceptions and thoughts cutting sharply through your neurons like a lightning bolt.
Put another way, is this--imagine that you are a world-renowned lecturer and you have the biggest audience of the best academics at a speaking engagement before you. You have zero time and absolutely no way to predict what will happen next. Like someone just jabbed a razor-blade through your temple, the most painful headache that you have ever experienced suddenly hits you as you are standing in front of, lets say 5,000 extremely intelligent people (you the most revered among them) and you have been stopped dead in your tracks. Just like the lecturer has no insight, most likely into what brought on his terrible migraine, those with mental illness have no insight into what causes the pain in their thoughts.
You see, every day of a functioning schizophrenic's life is the big performance in front of onlooking peers, coworkers, colleagues, Vice Presidents and subordinates- not to mention your family, friends, neighbors, and whomever else you may come in contact with every day. All the while, you are attempting the impossible, like the world-renowned lecturer that needs some Advil, those with mental illness need to sort out and set filters for, the excruciating psychic pain that they are feeling......all the time.
Chapter 3
As I stepped off the plane in Frankfurt, Germany, I entered the airport thinking to myself, "This is my dream, to travel to Europe during college." And I was right, it was the summer of 1998, after my freshman year at G-Burg and now I could feel the wind in my hair. We then shuffled into a bus, that is, myself and 15 other kids from around the country, were all here on a missionary whose purpose was set to inspire churches in eastern Europe to make a difference. And this was a highly selective group of which I was one of the chosen few.
Yes, I had six weeks of travel, culture, food, singing and fun ahead of me and then my whole life to enjoy thereafter. As far as the Youth Mission Chorale and the missionary trip were concerned, I was right on. After that, however, I had no idea that the future would hold a major psychic break one short year later.
That bus trip to Switzerland, was a gorgeous display of hillsides set in with rivers and snowy peaks and lush green valleys. As the landscape rolled along, I sat by the window, completely taken in by what I witnessed passing before my eyes, and I heard, "just wait till we get there, Meringen is known for it's beauty," a beautiful female voice said.
I turned and replied, "I can't wait- you know I have never been abroad before this." then: " Have you? I'm sorry, I don't recall your name?"
"That's ok, it's Katarina," the blue eyed blond from Dickenson college, it turns out, that was right down the road from my institution.
"Nice to meet you," I said, with a little swagger, since I really meant it.
"You too, hun."
Silence
"Have you traveled much in the past?" I asked, just trying to make casual conversation, although my heart was fluttering with the flirting excitement.
"Yes, but just to Russia, Moscow is an extraordinary city, it's too bad that we are not headed there this trip."
"But you have to admit that this trip is going to be spectacular," I hoped.
"Oh, yes, definitely"
And as abruptly as Katarina had struck up a conversation, she moved on to her next social adventure, a man, whom I knew for many years, Mark Miller.
"Ok, see you later!" I managed to blurt out.
She gave me a big, toothy smile and waved. Yup, this was going to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience abroad. I smiled back at her and gave her a half-wave as she made her way on the moving bus up three rows of seats to where Mark Miller was chatting with a heavy set young man with curly dark hair and glasses to complete the look. On his feet, I noticed a pair of worn out looking berkenstocks.
This trip, while it was going to be a life changing experience and a highly selected few got to experience it, heck, we were even going to be staying at wonderful accommodations while on our trip--but the icing on the cake was that most of the cost of the trip was subsidized heavily by the Global Board of General Ministries of the United Methodist Church. The end result to my parents, who were footing the relatively small bill for me to come, was less money than it actually cost to fly Luftansa Airlines on the round trip from JFK to Frankfurt. A mere defray for the Methodists, who were obviously putting up some pretty big bucks to send the "chosen few" for a six week tour of the Baltic States and St Petersburg, not to mention a two week stay in Switzerland (one of the most gorgeous settings in the world) in order to rehearse the songs we were going to sing in 7 different local and world languages.
Yup, this was going to be sweet.
Definition of Schizophrenia
Mental illness is a disease of the brain, a chemical imbalance, a result of a neurotransmitter misfire in a billion neurons at the same time. But I can tell you that from my perspective, from one who suffers from it each and every day, it's defined a bit differently. First there are the delusions, the hallucinations, the never ending-and sometimes impossible to "turn off" brain activity. Then there is the guilt, an overwhelming feeling that you somehow caused yourself to be and act this way. Of course, we have all had experience with the oft described self-neglect of those with schizophrenia. To top it all off, for all that you are going through, you cannot tell anyone around you what is going on. No. You must selectively tell a chosen few who act as both a caretaker, friend, confidant and sounding board for your warped perception of the world around you. For if you did tell everyone that you came in contact with, eventually, you would find yourself very lonely and outcast. Indeed, a person with Diabetes, another biological disease that is also very manageable through medication and insulin, may tell just about ANYONE they want about their condition and what they go through. Any reasonable person listening to this diabetic tell their story would feel sympathetic to that person. The schizophrenic, on the other hand, if they were to tell just ANYONE about their affliction, would most likely be treated as an outcast at best. After all, what can a reasonable, rational person do to relate to a psychotic episode? Nothing, because these symptoms are extremely specified to someone who has mental illness. To be fair, each and every one of us has an occasional period of feeling a bit down-in-the dumps. But to truly appreciate what someone with mental illness goes through, try visiting a psyche ward of any hospital, and tell me that mental illness is somehow just a part of the human condition.
Of course, since these dark hours in the dorm room of my sophomore year at Gettysburg College in 1999, I have come a long way. Instead of getting lost in the dark shroud of mental illness, specifically schizophrenia, I navigate the ins and outs of all of the nuances of the horrific disorder.
It was one of those crisp evenings, and on nights like this, I could remember how it all started. Abruptly, without warning, I had gone from a happy college kid, to someone who feared fear itself. What made it all the more disturbing was the lack of sleep. In one instance, I was tired, but could not sleep, then I would lay there in my dorm room bunk bed and stare out the window at the beautiful Gettysburg College campus and listen to the chirping of birds, which normally was a happy sound. The sound of these birds, however, took on a demonic and meaningful (to my ears only) shrill chirp. After a few hours of laying there, eyelids clicking, trying desperately to sleep with no sign of the sweet relief coming, I climb out of bed and check the time while I reach for the telephone by the TV set. The clock read 6:45 am. It was finals week as I neared the middle of my college career, end of my sophomore year. Just three more exams to take, I thought. But at that point I was in trouble. Not the kind of trouble you get into with the law or with a girl you date, no, I was in over my head, and it would be a long way out of a deep, dark hole.
I was going to call my mom, but even as I dialed the numbers, I couldn't remember what her number was and the numbers on the keypad looked all mixed up in a jumble of mathematics that I couldn't figure out. "Ok, you can do this," I thought to myself. I reminded myself that anyone that had not had a wink of sleep in 72 hours would probably be in similar shape. Finally, after several attempts of punching in random strings of phone numbers, the phone was ringing, I was calling for help.
"Are you feeling all right?" my room mate would ask me. "No, not really," I would respond as the very fabric of time would be in my perceptions, intermittently speeding up and then back to a slow crawl. Every outside stimuli, like someone calling to their friend from far away or a car honking it's horn, had some insidious purpose for doing so, in my mind. In fact, they were all just cogs in a grand master paranoid delusion that made up conspiracy theories and confirmed their validity with every passing moment. my friends, they just got to enjoy life, free of the burden of schizophrenia and its poison to my thoughts. For me, well, I was just stuck in a racing auto bon of thoughts with no slowing down in sight.
It wasn't until my mom arrived and picked me up that I felt my first pang of relief, if just for a moment. The next 11 years of my life, as it turns out, would be a roller coaster to recovery through medication, doctor's visits, brief hospital stays and an ever increasing ability to cope with the symptoms of my brain disease. I have come so far in coping with the disease that I look back at those first few years that I was in an ominous dark cloud that would hang over me, to a sense of clarity. Whereas, at first, I would not know what to do or how to handle the symptoms as they struck me, I now have a heightened awareness of those same symptoms and have developed almost what you would call an action plan in order to deal with each type as it comes. This is the story of my journey to the abyss of schizophrenia and back.
Chapter 2
One thing that we often lack in Mental illness specifically, is insight. A little bit of understanding or the word insight as it pertains to mental illness is needed here. Insight is often not a hard concept for us to grasp normally, with a regularly functioning brain, that is. Now imagine that you are entirely a prisoner in your own mind. Imagine a world warped by the many perceptions and thoughts cutting sharply through your neurons like a lightning bolt.
Put another way, is this--imagine that you are a world-renowned lecturer and you have the biggest audience of the best academics at a speaking engagement before you. You have zero time and absolutely no way to predict what will happen next. Like someone just jabbed a razor-blade through your temple, the most painful headache that you have ever experienced suddenly hits you as you are standing in front of, lets say 5,000 extremely intelligent people (you the most revered among them) and you have been stopped dead in your tracks. Just like the lecturer has no insight, most likely into what brought on his terrible migraine, those with mental illness have no insight into what causes the pain in their thoughts.
You see, every day of a functioning schizophrenic's life is the big performance in front of onlooking peers, coworkers, colleagues, Vice Presidents and subordinates- not to mention your family, friends, neighbors, and whomever else you may come in contact with every day. All the while, you are attempting the impossible, like the world-renowned lecturer that needs some Advil, those with mental illness need to sort out and set filters for, the excruciating psychic pain that they are feeling......all the time.
Chapter 3
As I stepped off the plane in Frankfurt, Germany, I entered the airport thinking to myself, "This is my dream, to travel to Europe during college." And I was right, it was the summer of 1998, after my freshman year at G-Burg and now I could feel the wind in my hair. We then shuffled into a bus, that is, myself and 15 other kids from around the country, were all here on a missionary whose purpose was set to inspire churches in eastern Europe to make a difference. And this was a highly selective group of which I was one of the chosen few.
Yes, I had six weeks of travel, culture, food, singing and fun ahead of me and then my whole life to enjoy thereafter. As far as the Youth Mission Chorale and the missionary trip were concerned, I was right on. After that, however, I had no idea that the future would hold a major psychic break one short year later.
That bus trip to Switzerland, was a gorgeous display of hillsides set in with rivers and snowy peaks and lush green valleys. As the landscape rolled along, I sat by the window, completely taken in by what I witnessed passing before my eyes, and I heard, "just wait till we get there, Meringen is known for it's beauty," a beautiful female voice said.
I turned and replied, "I can't wait- you know I have never been abroad before this." then: " Have you? I'm sorry, I don't recall your name?"
"That's ok, it's Katarina," the blue eyed blond from Dickenson college, it turns out, that was right down the road from my institution.
"Nice to meet you," I said, with a little swagger, since I really meant it.
"You too, hun."
Silence
"Have you traveled much in the past?" I asked, just trying to make casual conversation, although my heart was fluttering with the flirting excitement.
"Yes, but just to Russia, Moscow is an extraordinary city, it's too bad that we are not headed there this trip."
"But you have to admit that this trip is going to be spectacular," I hoped.
"Oh, yes, definitely"
And as abruptly as Katarina had struck up a conversation, she moved on to her next social adventure, a man, whom I knew for many years, Mark Miller.
"Ok, see you later!" I managed to blurt out.
She gave me a big, toothy smile and waved. Yup, this was going to be a once-in-a-lifetime experience abroad. I smiled back at her and gave her a half-wave as she made her way on the moving bus up three rows of seats to where Mark Miller was chatting with a heavy set young man with curly dark hair and glasses to complete the look. On his feet, I noticed a pair of worn out looking berkenstocks.
This trip, while it was going to be a life changing experience and a highly selected few got to experience it, heck, we were even going to be staying at wonderful accommodations while on our trip--but the icing on the cake was that most of the cost of the trip was subsidized heavily by the Global Board of General Ministries of the United Methodist Church. The end result to my parents, who were footing the relatively small bill for me to come, was less money than it actually cost to fly Luftansa Airlines on the round trip from JFK to Frankfurt. A mere defray for the Methodists, who were obviously putting up some pretty big bucks to send the "chosen few" for a six week tour of the Baltic States and St Petersburg, not to mention a two week stay in Switzerland (one of the most gorgeous settings in the world) in order to rehearse the songs we were going to sing in 7 different local and world languages.
Yup, this was going to be sweet.
Definition of Schizophrenia
Mental illness is a disease of the brain, a chemical imbalance, a result of a neurotransmitter misfire in a billion neurons at the same time. But I can tell you that from my perspective, from one who suffers from it each and every day, it's defined a bit differently. First there are the delusions, the hallucinations, the never ending-and sometimes impossible to "turn off" brain activity. Then there is the guilt, an overwhelming feeling that you somehow caused yourself to be and act this way. Of course, we have all had experience with the oft described self-neglect of those with schizophrenia. To top it all off, for all that you are going through, you cannot tell anyone around you what is going on. No. You must selectively tell a chosen few who act as both a caretaker, friend, confidant and sounding board for your warped perception of the world around you. For if you did tell everyone that you came in contact with, eventually, you would find yourself very lonely and outcast. Indeed, a person with Diabetes, another biological disease that is also very manageable through medication and insulin, may tell just about ANYONE they want about their condition and what they go through. Any reasonable person listening to this diabetic tell their story would feel sympathetic to that person. The schizophrenic, on the other hand, if they were to tell just ANYONE about their affliction, would most likely be treated as an outcast at best. After all, what can a reasonable, rational person do to relate to a psychotic episode? Nothing, because these symptoms are extremely specified to someone who has mental illness. To be fair, each and every one of us has an occasional period of feeling a bit down-in-the dumps. But to truly appreciate what someone with mental illness goes through, try visiting a psyche ward of any hospital, and tell me that mental illness is somehow just a part of the human condition.
Of course, since these dark hours in the dorm room of my sophomore year at Gettysburg College in 1999, I have come a long way. Instead of getting lost in the dark shroud of mental illness, specifically schizophrenia, I navigate the ins and outs of all of the nuances of the horrific disorder.
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