Finding the Right Medication: Let's See What Sticks

Borderline Personality disorder, like any other mental illness, is just that, an illness, and as such it requires specialized medical treatment. Unfortunately, that treatment still isn't an exact science, and what patients are left with is often a seemingly unending cycle of new medications to try. Almost a 'see what sticks' approach.

It gets old, fast.

Not only does it leave you feeling more like a guinea pig than an individual seeking treatment, the process can be long and arduous. From the insecurity of not knowing when you'll finally find the right medication, to the side effects each can cause, to the misunderstanding of friends and loved ones, it's a hard road that, unfortunately, psychiatric patients are forced to march down.

First, each patient responds to each medication differently and there is no one pill that cures depression, schizophrenia, or what have you. This means each patient starts with an essentially blank slate, medication wise, and that treatment must be evaluated and individually tailored to suite the patient. Also, treatment seldom involves just one medication, meaning that many combinations of multiple drugs must be tried and ruled out until the right one is found, seemingly more through trail and error and educated guesses than anything else.These medications often take a period of multiple weeks to begin to show effects, prolonging the process even further.

Then, there are the side effects each of these medications carries. Everything from blurred vision to seizures, or even the Black Labeled drugs, which can increase the symptoms of depression and suicidality. These side effects require the patient to be ever mindful of any changes in themselves and, if found, the patient must then evaluate whether given side effect is tolerable or not.

Even the most vigilant and compliant patient can get stuck in this cycle, as I myself am still going through, and it can take a tole both on the patient and those who cae about them. Often times, friends and family members don't truly understand the often lengthy process of finding the right medications or the nature of the difficulties involved, leading them to blame the patient themselves for not responding to the prescribed medications. Other times, it can lead a patient to become so frustrated that they give up on treatment entirely.

It is my hope in writing this that people will begin to understand that psychiatric treatment is, at best, a long process. There is still not much known about the nature or causality of these disorders and many advancements still needed in the way we treat the mentally ill. It's a slow process, much like treatment itself, but it is a process worth persevering through. Each step, each advancement, however small it may seem, brings of closer to the goal of better health and better treatment.

Hospital Need To Knows: Managing Crisis Situations

Everyone faces crises sometime during heir lives. This guide is aimed to help you manage those stressful situations in a way that promotes acceptance and healing.

• Recognize the problem and ACT.

Disowning the problem will lead to further complications and can often initiate the crisis itself. Accepting and facing the problem head on is the best way to deal with it. Acceptance is key to a healthy recovery.

• Deal with the crisis.

Dealing with the crisis itself can be both intimidating and stressful in and of itself. However, it is imperative that one does so. You HAVE to deal with a crisis, as per above, it can't go ignored without becoming a larger situation.

• Expect some amount of failure.

Every decision invokes some amount of risk, and under the stress of a crisis, you're decision making is likely to be a little compromised. It's okay! Mistakes are part of growing and, ultimately, healing. <3

• Accept your limitations.

In a crisis situation, you're likely to be depressed, angry, anxious, uninterested, or any combination of those things. You might not be able to do the things that were once routine, you might have to stay at a hospital, and you might have a long recovery afterwards. That's okay, too! Accepting these difficult circumstances helps you to take the first steps in your journey to recovery.

Crises are difficult for anyone, and for those of us suffering from mental illness, it can be overwhelming. But remember, you aren't alone and there is recovery. It can take tie, but until you accept that it is what it is, you're stuck at the starting line. Acceptance is the decision to start acting, to start moving towards the recovery you can achieve.

Hospital Need To Knows: How To Know You're In Crisis

It sounds pretty self-explanatory, such as when you're self-harming or suicidal, or if you have thoughts of hurting others, but there are many more subtle signs many people fail to notice until it's too late and they end up involuntarily hospitalized. This list is to , hopefully, help everyone out there from ending like that and to help them understand how to 'watch' their illness.

• Monitor your daily moods/ mood changes, along with any 'episodes'.

- This allows you to better understand what your norm is and can help you identify changes from your norm. It can also serve to allow you to see patterns, such s having a string of bad days. This could be a sign of needing to check in to the hospital for a few days.

• Keep records of your medications, how you respond to them, and any side effects you experience.

- This can be very helpful for both yourself and your doctor. It serves to better understand how your meds are working, and IF they're working for you.

• If you have thoughts of harming yourself or others
• If you have suicidal thoughts or gestures.
• If your medications are causing side effects you can't accept.

I hope this list has been helpful to all of you out there. Remember, knowing your illness in any way and every way you can is th key to recovery.

I will be updating tomorrow with a post on what to do when you're in crisis.

Psych Hospitals: What You Need to Know Before You Go

Let me first start off by saying that I'm fine and safe. I did however spend a few days in the local psych treatment center to stabilize my medications. They seem to be working out well thus far, and I will keep everyone posted. ^_^

Now onto the real topic of this post.

After having seen many people in psych units who didn't know what to expect or how to best use their time during their stay, I've decided to do a 3week of hospital stay related posts. From when to check in, what to pack, what to expect, how to best use your stay there, to what you can do to help minimize hospitalizations.

I hope it will serve to help both people who have never been in hospital settings, to those who are, for lack of a better term, veterans. I feel learning as much as you can about your illness, meds, and treatment options is the best tool for recovery.

Rough night, no sleep in sight

It's 6am and I haven't slept.

It started around midnight. I could feel it creeping in. All those thoughts and feelings that I couldn't ever quite focus on, like something in the periphery of my vision that vanishes whenever i try and get a closer look. I just felt....everything and not really anything.

It always comes on like a wave that sweeps me away with it. I'll feel it building up, and before I know it, I'm lost in this sea of FEELING. It's overwhelming. I felt lonely, bored, hopeless, angry, anxious, agitated, confused, irritated, exhausted, guilty....all at once.

For a while, I just curled into a ball and cried. It's intensely....uncomfortable, this feeling. You feel uncomfortable in your own skin. Hate to sound so cliche, and I hate this song, but it really is like crawling in your skin. After a while, I crawled in bed with my fiancée, who woke up and asked what was wrong. I didn't know and it frustrated me even more. I cried some, but then the frustration took over and before I knew it, I was yelling not to be touched or bothered. My fiancée knows this usually ends in self-harm, so refused to leave me alone and unattended. I raged at him, threw things, anything to be left alone. It got to be 3am.

Eventually, he backed me into a corner and forced me into a hug. I resisted. I yelled, cried, kicked, screamed, but eventually gave in. I sobbed until I couldn't anymore and let him hold and comfort me, even though I told him I had no right to be comforted. I hated myself. Hated what I'd put him through, what I continue to put him through.

We laid together and he held me and talked to me until he fell asleep. I got back up after awhile and he asked if I was okay. I told him not really, but that I was safe at least. He told me to wake him if I needed him.

Changes

Change. It's the only real constant in our ever-shifting world.

And frankly, it terrifies me.

Change brings about the end of something. It brings about transitions, and to me, all ends or transitions mean is failure, loss, abandonment and insecurity. I already feel as if I myself am in some kind of constant state of flux. I never really know how I might feel one moment to the next, what I might care about, what I might want. The only solid ground I have is that which I make around myself, externally. But even that's hard.

My life has been full of changes and instability, as if my inner chaos somehow spills over into the rest of my life. I hate it. I spend so much energy trying to contain it and keep what stability I have made for myself, and yet, it always seems to find a way to fall apart.

Right n0w, I have the stability of a home with a loving fiancée and our three kitty babies (the only children we ever want). I have in-laws who accept me as their own and who are always there when we need help. I have many things to be grateful for, and I hardly mean to seem as if I'm not. And yet, that chaos seems to be creeping in again.

My BPD has been bad lately, and has strained both my fiancée and myself. I've had more days than not when I simply couldn't get out of bed. I've raged at DF (dear fiancée). I've hurt myself on several occasions, which is something I (thankfully) don't engage in much anymore. I even spent last night contemplating suicide.

I know this means my meds need adjusting, and I've been seeing a psychiatrist for a few months now trying to get that in order, but nothing seems to be helping right now. Sometimes I feel like she's just flinging pills at me to see what might stick. All that frustration just feeds into my moods, and I feel like I'm caught in this cycle of disappointment and frustration.

Adding to the stress, I can't work right now, and my DF just doesn't make enough to support the both of us with our medical needs. (He's diabetic.) I've considered applying for disability, but I've never held a steady job, so if I even qualified, the amount I'd pull would hardly even be worth it. There's also the thought of the stigma that unfortunately comes as a side order.

The financial situation is bad enough that we have considered moving in with his parents until we can save some money. I know they'd welcome us and be good to us, but what young couple wants to move back home?

Most of all though, I'm afraid of the changes it all brings. Changes in my disorder, my doctors, my meds, my relationship, and possibly my home. It feels like I'm losing everything I tried so hard to build for the both of us. I know my DF will be my constant, and we've told each other that, no matter what, we'll be there for one another. And yet, I can't help but fear that in the end, he'll just end up being transient like everything else in my life.

I don't know how not to be afraid of that.

Consistency Is Everything

You see it in any treatment program.

Structure and consistency.

It seems to be an integral part of the recovery process. Having a routine provides structure and purpose for the day.

Unfortunately, it's hard to get that when you no longer are in school or can work. It's like the summer vacation phenomenon. Without the routine of classes and assignments, we fall into boredom and laziness. (Unless you're that 2% of the population with drive and willpower.) Suffice to say, I'm not naturally in that percentile.

So, here's my attempt to force myself into a schedule, starting with my blog.

My goal is to set aside time 2 or 3 days a week to write an entry. If it goes well, I might try to post more often. I'm also going to be attempting to structure my days more, such as scheduling meals and house work.

I will be posting my progress, as well as any helpful tools or strategies I find along the way, and would love to hear your insights. Here's some questions to help you start to think about structure and routine in your own life.

Has structure been successful in your life?

Have you struggled to instill and follow a routine?

What are some helpful ways you've found to stick to your routine?

Do you use any tools, and if so, what are they and do they help?

A Journey of a Thousand Miles...

My journey through recovery has been long and arduous, and is (frustratingly) far from over.

I haven't been writing because, frankly, I didn't feel well enough to do so. I don't know that I'm well enough now. However, I feel I need some place to chronicle the events unfolding in my life. Perhaps to share some hope with others, perhaps to simply vent, or maybe as a way to look back and see some glimmer of progress. Maybe for all those reasons.

It's been difficult.

Since I last wrote, many things have changed. I have moved to a new city and now live with my fiancée and our three cats. I'm no longer in school, having left due to my illness in October of last year. I am also unable to work, and this has put a huge financial strain on the both of us.

Fortunately however, I have found a wonderful therapist whom I feel is helping me a lot. She is dynamic with her therapy, and uses a solution-focused technique. she assists me in challenging my thinking and has an honesty that I feel helps me find new perspective. That said, she's not cheap. A main struggle now is trying to choose between quality care, or our other needs. It's sad that anyone should be made to make those kind of choices.

On my plate is also the consideration of claiming disability. As so many with mental illness know, filing for disability can be a very trying, very long process. Just the thought of going through approval stresses me, not to mention wondering if I even qualify at all. Since I've never really held down a job, I've never put in for social security. I'm not sure if I can then claim it at all.

I've also been dealing with trying to find the right combination of meds to help better stabilize my moods. Right now, I feel as if my psychiatrist is just firing pills at me to see what sticks. Sadly, that's not uncommon.

At this point in my journey, it's hard to want to continue on. It's hard to find the motivation to keep walking, or to even know which direction to head. And there are times when my financial constraints limit where I can go even further. Perhaps that's the reason I'm writing again.

I wanted to start this project as a way to help others, never really considering it could be a source of help for myself. Throughout these trials, I am learning the value of having support. It may just be the most important part of claiming recovery. If not for my fiancée and the help and care of his family and our friends, I likely would have lost my way long ago. I'm reminded of the Lord of the Rings (because I'm a nerd, ok?) Even though it was Frodo's burden to bear, he wasn't alone. and without the Fellowship, the journey would have failed.

A BPD Brief, Good Reading

In exploring the various websites on BPD, I found a wonderful resource booklet at the National Education Alliance for BPD's website. You can view the PDF for free here.

"This 20-page pamphlet offers an introductory overview of borderline personality disorder, explaining the DSM criteria, origins, course, self-harm behavior, and current status of treatment. This edition is a revision of the 2001 version of the A BPD Brief. It is the hope of the author and committees that worked on the revision that the pamphlet will be of service to those seeking basic information and treatment providers who need to explain the diagnosis to clients and families."

My First Book Review: The BPD Survival Guide by Chapman, Gratz

As a BPD sufferer, I know it can be daunting to find accurate information on this disorder. The internet and mass media are ripe with misinformation and stigma. Even some very well known books (such as Stop Walking on Eggshells) paint a very negative, and I feel damaging, portrait of what it means to live with Borderline Personality Disorder. I feel it is paramount to anyone's recovery to find accurate and compassionate information on their illness, regardless of diagnosis, be it BPD or breast cancer.

And with such a belief, I began my search for some books that provided just that.

I spent quite a while online looking up various texts and the reader's comments on them, and have selected 3 so far that I felt would be good places to start. I will be reading them all over the course of this month and providing my take and insights into each of them, as well as what I found to be useful, and what I think wasn't so useful.

The first book I read was The Borderline Personality Survival Guide by Chapman & Gratz.

Rating: 5 of 5 stars

This book was just what it says, a guide to BPD. I found it full of accurate, useful information about what the disorder is (and isn't), detailed descriptions of symptoms and short accounts, course of the illness itself, and treatment options and resources. All of this is presented in clear, easy to understand language with compassion and even a little humor. I read this book in two days and have dog-eared, highlighted, and flagged it to death already. I would recommend this to anyone with BPD themselves or a BPD loved one.

However, I would recommend skipping to the second half of the book if you are looking for treatment options, tips and resources, as the first half of the book is dedicated to explaining BPD itself. Some may find this a tad tedious, especially if you're rather well informed about BPD, but for those just starting out and seeking to understand, it is valuable information to have on hand.

My diagnosis: A must have reference for those living with BPD and their loved ones.

I've Decided to Keep On

I had started this blog a while back, but I don't think I was really ready to begin with what keeping this blog would mean and entail. I was still having many difficulties and was very lost as to what I was going to do so far as my recovery. It was like starting a journey without a road map. However, I feel that, even though my map is still a little foggy and incomplete, I'm ready to do this.

Many of you out there are likely in the same place, or have been there in the past. It can be a daunting and confusing place to be in. Perhaps you've just been diagnosed and don't know where to begin, or perhaps you're only beginning to sspect something is wrong. Where ever you're at, I invite you to follow my personal journey through recovery as I document the methods I am working with and my progress, as well as practical tips that I have found useful in my struggles.

I remind you, however, that I am not a professional. I am only someone going through some things that you yourself may be going through as well. I can only share what experience has taught me. I strongly urge you to seek treatment if you have, or suspect you have, any kind of mental illness or other emotional issues. There is help and hope out there.

To Be Aware Is To Be Alive

These words are on a To Do List hanging on my fridge, written in my boyfriend's angular chicken scratch. It's a saying from his work (he works as a chemical dependency counselor at a prison) and he said he thought of me when he'd heard it. I wasn't really sure how I felt about that, or how I really feel about his growing penchant to 'therapy' me. I guess he's only trying to help me the only way he really knows how. I don't think it's him really, I think it's my general distaste for really any form of therapy from anybody.

I get this almost knee-jerk reaction where I want to chock any advice even remotely 'therapy-ish' right into the bullshit pile. Maybe it came from spending my teens getting force fed the kind of advice you find in fortune cookies from doctors who couldn't tell me what was wring with me. Alright, so maybe that sounded a little bitter.

Still, annoyed as it might make me, I keep finding myself reading over that stupid little phrase as I walk past the fridge or get myself a soda.

'To be aware...'

What does that even really mean?

I've rolled it around in my brain since yesterday, when it took up residence on my fridge like some stain I can't get rid of. How can someone not be aware? Well, I guess there's always denial, but I'm not in it....am I? And just what am I supposed to be aware of? My surroundings? Myself?My feelings?

Well, that made any rolling that idea was doing come to a rather screeching halt. My feelings have never been anything I wanted to be aware of. And perhaps that was the crux of it.

I wasn't mad at being advised or 'therapy-ized'. I wasn't upset that my boyfriend felt that I needed to be, because honestly, I know I'm still recovering and struggle with a lot of things. It upset me because I knew the truth in it, and knew that recovery meant being aware and being aware meant feeling things I didn't want to and have never wanted to.

Well shit.

It's not as if I don't want to get over the things I struggle with, and it's not as if I haven't made amazing progress thus far. I suppose sometimes I just get scared of having to face the harder things, the scary things.

I'm still afraid to stop running and really feel it all. I'm angry that I have to go through all this shit to get better. I resent the unfairness of even having these kind of things to deal with. Even now, I'm hating writing out how I actually feel. It's so much easier to be angry than to be hurt. Being angry feels safer, stronger somehow.

Yet, I know in that still rational place that it solves nothing to run away. Running is a way to survive and exist, sure, but feeling...being aware...I guess that really is being alive.

So I Thought About It...

So I was lying awake a couple of nights ago, doing what I suppose anyone does when they lie awake at 3-am. Think. 

And my thoughts wandered to the conversation I had had with my future fiancee, who works as a counselor at a drug recovery center that treats inmates. He's a believer in self-exploration. In writing and expression for healing. Honestly, I agree. I find that in writing the things I am feeling or struggling with, I am better able to handle them, visualize them and conceptualize them, and to find solutions and put the problem away, so to speak. 

And so came the birth of this idea. 

What if I kept a journal regularly? Well, that sounded pretty good, I thought to myself, and yet, I wasn't satisfied somehow. I wasn't sure why really, but as I lie there, letting my thoughts ferment in my mind, I began to feel like I had more to offer with my words and ideas than what they could ever accomplish sitting on a shelf between the bindings of a beat up composition notebook. 

The more I considered it, the more I felt like I wanted to give something, share something, SAY something. 

I wanted to help others like me. 

I'm reminded of two of some of my very favorite quotes. One is from a graduation speech turned song by the name of Everyone's Free To Wear Sunscreen. The quote reads:

"Advice is a form of nostalgia; dispensing it is a way of 
fishing the past 
from the disposal, wiping it off, painting over the ugly 
parts, and recycling it for more than it's worth." - Eveyone's Free To Wear Sunscreen, Baz Lurhmann 

Maybe that's some of it. A way to make something out of my life's experiences, to somehow take the ugliness of my past and use it in a way that benefits the world. Or maybe I'm just an idealist.

The other quote comes from a Kimya Dawson song, Loose Lips. If you saw Juno (and who hasn't?) you might remember it.  The quote reads:

"And ask you what you think because your thoughts and words are powerful." -Loose Lips, Kimya Dawson

I truly believe that, and in a round about way I guess that's why I decided to start this blog. 

I can only hope that this blog will do that. Reach someone, touch someone, or maybe just be a guide for myself. Whatever it becomes, I know that this idea is one that will push me and stretch me, but I guess that's the only way we really grow, isn't it?