Nearly a Year

Nearly a year since my last post. A lot has happened and a lot hasn't happened.

We suspected that I was having a bad reaction to Simvastatin, which I was taking for high cholesterol levels. Each shoulder was causing considerable 'discomfort.' Long story cut short...X-rays, MRI scan, disclosed considerable damage inside each shoulder joint. "You have a badly torn ligament and a very badly torn ligament," said my surgeon. Both shoulders are in a bad way. Story gets shorter...now on a high dosage of morphine twice a day. Taking physiotherapy exercises specific to the shoulder joints. I have to work at the exercises or I'll end up needing a couple of operations. My local hospital has a poor record for MRSA infections in patients who need invasive surgery.

Change topic...back into photography. If I can't get to somewhere, I can use the zoom lens on one of my digital cameras to get me close. I want to use my electric mobility scooter to allow me access to street scenes, whereby I can bring a different perspective to photographic images. Everybody knows what it's like to see pictures of views taken at our respective heights. The 'trick' I'm after is to get a completely different slant of street scenes; from a child's view, or a beggar's view, or a wheelchair user's view. Taking colour images that can be altered to B&W later on in the computer.

This link might work for you...it's my Fuji site and my gallery as of the present moment. I've tried to upload to Picasa, but they want your life history and a degree in how to fettle computers before I can even get my stuff into a gallery in Picasa.
http://www.myfinepix.co.uk/gallery/19591

B.A.D. and Panic Attacks

Having used Breathing exercises for several months as part of the meditation regime (Not really the correct word to use there) I have managed to decrease the number of panic attacks. I have been able to go up for Communion during Mass without having taken diaz. For 12 months I had to take diaz., in order to feel OK when it came time in the service to stand up, join the queue and shuffle along slowly in order to receive communion. Progress has been made.

The next step forward is to conduct the readings at the hospital chapel without having taken diaz. It will all depend upon how I feel in myself upon one of the chapel services.

Avoiding caffeine and sugars does make a difference. I cannot sleep at night if I have taken either or both, prior to going to bed. They do cause problems in the mind!

I AM (John Clare 1793-1864)

I am!

I am! yet what I am none cares or knows,

My friends forsake me like a memory lost;

I am the self-consumer of my woes,

They rise and vanish in oblivious host,

Like shades in love and death's oblivion lost;

And yet I am! and live with shadows tost

Into the nothingness of scorn and noise,

Into the living sea of waking dreams,

Where there is neither sense of life nor joys,

But the vast shipwreck of my life's esteems;

And e'en the dearest--that I loved the best--

Are strange--nay, rather stranger than the rest.

I long for scenes where man has never trod;

A place where woman never smil'd or wept;

There to abide with my creator, God,

And sleep as I in childhood sweetly slept:

Untroubling and untroubled where I lie;

The grass below--above the vaulted sky.

As a B.A.D. sufferer, this greatly evocative piece by John Clare meshes very closely with my own 'condition.' I 'feel' I am in his mind, with the emphasis on the I am.

Panic Attacks

I've had several of these over the last couple of years. Totally frightening.
Even carrying the knowledge of what is going on in them only partly dispels the suffering they bring. It's all down to adrenaline being used up and then I can't have another attack until the body has replenished its supply. The vicious spiral circle of the self fulfilling attack is a difficult circle to break.

I am using Tibetan Meditation to teach my mind to allow complete relaxation on demand.

Breathing exercises are a tremendous tool in combating the advent of an attack. I can recommend the Samye Ling Buddhist Monastery in Eskdalemuir, Scottish Borders, for its Courses and teachings on how to cope with today's frenetic world. The setting is beautiful, and the pressures non-existent. It is a long drive for me to get there, but it is well worth the time and effort.

I have found that several people I have known for many years also had to endure similar dibilitating episodes. The condition has no barriers to victims. Although, those who have B.A.D seem to be particularly susceptible. It 'spoils' everyday excursions. Even shopping can become a dreadful and fearful experience. I continue to use the meditation as my main method of coping with this problem.

I shall keep a news update on my progress. Should anything be truly useful I'll post it in here as soon as possible.

Refreshed

I've had some real problems getting back into this, my Bipolarity Blog. However, after 24 hours of sending and receiving internet access data, I'm back in the throws of my Bipolarity Blog.

Two new poems...both concerning my internal doors, avenues, aspects, confinement

MEDS


Down unlit, unswept alleys wherein the lost abound
In temper, angst and brain-fog shackled blind and bound
Awaiting thirst and hunger, soon to tread their path
Dreams now bent on conquest, or, empathy with Plath
Ungripped by winter's clench with her residues of loss
Throwing caution to the now, the future, and their dross
Write me soon a missive, an abstract, or a tome
Fulfil these empty pages which yet score this cursor's roam
I crave the flights of fancies and the firework displays
The buzz, the fizz, crescendos, of my old bipolar days
These meds, with their sea-anchors, haul me back to port
Killing any vestige, of my old bipolar sport.


FREEDOM

Below our senses, concealed from view
Beneath all sight, embraced, yet True
Unglimpsed within our mindfulness
Freedom lurks 'neath Caxton's press

Cast the seed through hall and hearth
Scattered down knowledge'd path
Plucked and groomed, in thoughtful nurture
Alas 'tis scorned as second nature

Given Life, respond in kind
Creating self and open mind
Follow seasoned, quick and dead
Existential choices bred

To take this gift and in its granting
Acceptance of constraint and parting
Freedom's Life while all persuading
Carries chains with links unending

Give me Freedom, give me choices
Give me bells, and give me voices
Stand beside the drums of thunder
See my foes distraught and blunder

Let my grasp outreach my span
Let me be an honest man
Take my past and false renewals
Take my oath to suffer fools

Grant me patience, understanding
Grant me peace in Life's partaking
Dispense with cant and masked delusions
Freedom's surge brooks no intrusions

I want to ride the train of thought
Behaving as all others ought
I've spurned a thousand, thousand pleas
I've rendered Justice to her knees

They claim me for their very own
Did they forget my bloody throne
Flayed in every market place
Flaunted now before my face

Wooden stocks for slaves a'selling
Wounds through generations telling
Where's the fruit and where's the gain
Oh, that Freedom comes with pain

I sat with kings and lay with logs
I supped the best and fought with dogs
My purse was full, my heart distended
Truth was far from truth defended

False the tale and false the man
False the tongue since Man began
False my wails against the wall
To turn my back as children fall

False the cry to help and aid
False the tyrant self-displayed
False the shouts and lizard's tears
False the promises of years

False the schemes which never feed
Real the hunger, feel the need
Listen close it's written large
Hear the deaths in reportage

Freedom take me in your chains
I now surrender any claims
To rail and rant, to howl and scream
For Freedom is but just a dream

Increasing by 50%

Meaningful talk with my Psych., and the outcome is a 50% increase in BP medication. He told me what it can do and what it cannot do. My questions were in line with the questions he is asked regularly. I take some 'comfort' in this, because it means that I am not alone in my view of: the world, my illness, my medication, my fears, my personal expectations etc.

He confronted me with my outlook on how I behave in personal relationships and made me examine my approach to problems and using the 'no' word. He has personal experience in this matter. Therefore I give his views far more credence than I would normally do.

My 'survival' techniques were correctly performed when I plummeted a week or so ago. My positive reaction to a negative need was just what he wanted me to do. I have to be vague here because of deep personal turmoil. I can say that what was a possibility/probability, became a non-starter.

The pain of the mind is as bad as the pain of the body. Seeing a broken leg makes it easy for onlookers. Not seeing a broken mind makes it impossible for anyone but the sufferer. I'm now on 'increased' help. Let's see how I get on.

Coping with the un-cope-able

A truly bad 2 weeks!! Two events 'conspired' to bring me to my knees. Each event was instigated on its own, but being together, they put me on the receiving end of a double smashing of my mind, my emotions, my self esteem, my self confidence, my days. No steps forward and 5 steps back!
I was swirling around and down the upper edges of a cone shaped miasma; unable to stop myself as I plummeted down, whilst trying to claw onto the side of the cone. I needed urgent help and the Samaritans were my saving lifeline.
Not a life threatening episode, but a blood-letting 'need.' How to cope with the dark days of the un-cope-able? Knowing the release of blood brings euphoria of an unnatural kind. Feeling the pain releasing the anger of what cannot be fought. Taking the mind away from the devils in the brain. In short, diversionary tactics for a mind in torment.
I'm to see my 'specialist' in a couple of days and I want to know what can be done with my medication. I feel that the problem comes under the 'label' of clinical depression rather than Bipolar. It isn't a mood swing, it's a nosedive into a pit.

Summer Solstice

Summer Solstice

During the Summer solstice
When Gemima was in ascendancy over Andripodes
I chanced upon a soothsayer of yore
Hunched darkly over a small unlit coal
She begged for a match and kindled my interest.

Rat-tailed hair lolloped down her form
Hiding any eyes in her possession
Twitching stick creatures clambered through her locks
Rendering comb and brush redundant
Grease allowing a sliding motion for them

One by one and two by four
They toured the labyrinthine folds of follicle and knot
Her zoological head spoke more of her than words could
Heartbeaten questions poured out of me,
“Will I meet my love, settle down, have a family and return to Hydra?”
“Yes, yes, no, where?” she replied.

I slumped on my haunches
Befuddled and flumuxed at her response
“Who, where, why not and Greece,” I snapped back.
“Young man, you take heed and note what I say.”
“Not any longer, how, I’ve no pen and paper,” was my retort.

“You poor simple fool,
how can you manage heartbeats, love and answers when amnesia encroaches in this quest?” was her rhetorical reply.
Beyond doubt I was lost
Unfit to assuage my dreams
I was undone, bereft and quashed
in a moment

The grey cells of Bipolarity cannot be tamed
when musings strike without warning
Seasons, places and people take on other forms
In an endless round of flash and dash from there
to here and onwards in frenzied leadless surges
I digress
I stop
I draw breath


I crave peace

This is so apt.

How will you know I am hurting,
If you cannot see my pain?
To wear it on my body
Tells what words cannot explain.
–C. Blount

SI

I found this some time ago and it is extremely accurate.

"Self-injury:
is best described as a coping mechanism. You will find that self-injury shares similar
co-morbid illnesses and behaviours as those of alcoholism, drug abuse, and sexual
promiscuity to name a few. Realize that many of us fear hurting others with our pain,
which is why we turn it back onto ourselves. We don’t have well-developed, healthy
coping mechanisms for stressors in our lives. If we reach out, we want to heal.
But it takes time, and the unknown scares us. Do not threaten us with ultimatums if
we don’t stop the behaviour cold turkey. Self-injury is not the disease; it’s a symptom.
Self-injury is the part you see on the outside. The real issue is what lies beneath
the surface. And beneath that surface is not just pain, but beauty."

I think it came from an American lady, who was totally honest and open about her 'situation.'

And this is from another lady:
My scars are too real to explain away — but they have kept me going. My SI is not an
art form, a fad, a statement for others to see. It is my coping device, used at nearly
'un-cope-able’ times. It’s a part of me that has given me strength.

16 years ago

My father died 16 years ago
The operation was a success
The post-op care was exemplary
The 10 days of Intensive care, exhausting
The tubes, everywhere
The emotions, likewise
The bed, needed
The options, none
The outcome, bleak
The liver, failing
The kidneys, dying
The blood, pernicious
His arm, warm
The switch, off
The loss, indescribable

During the falling of leaves

During the falling of leaves
‘tween dusky Angelus
and the bursting Sun
I think of you

Last prayers to rising
Heavy lids through dreams
Slippers to alarms
I think of you

Sinking to waking
Vixen’s cry to cockerel
Off to switch on
I think of you

‘neath covers to suits
cotton to linen
cocoa to coffee
I think of you

I think of you

Sunday 21 January 2007

Hypnotherapy...it took me to places I remembered. It took me to times I remembered. It took me to emotions I had buried as deep as I was able.
Incidents, events from my past emerged from the pool.
What emerged in wrapped angst was how terrible incidents and events had been. Fear, loss, anger, terror, victim in place and childhood, shredded through me like a chainsaw in slow motion.
No, I shall not recount the moments here.
Suffice it to say that I know where, how and why I carried the scouring scars that wept and poured over me through the past twelve months.
What I can say is that other people were total, utter bastards.
What I can say is that I am greater than them, now.

Friday 15 December 2006

A while since my last posting. I have not been determined enough to put fingertip to keyboard. The medication has kept me in a glass prison. I can see out. I don't relish being outside the glass.
Venturing to supermarkets, traffic queues, crowded places, now renders me ashen/white, cold, very cold, sweating, terrified, with IBS bursting at my seams.
It's all in the mind. I have no physical trigger for this lesion. Somewhere, sometime, I had a traumatic event. It lay deep and buried in my subconscious. Was I left lost and alone as a child?
I know that TM creates peace and safety within the mind. I know that hypnotherapy can disarm fears, phobias, anxieties, stress...
I'm on a course of hypnotherapy.
The trauma has grown from deep within, each time a similar episode has happened. Eventually it surfaced into the open conscious mind. The Panic Attacks are out in the open. I work around them. I have great faith in the power of hypnotherapy and I shall prevail.

Monday

Television programmes are highlighting BD at the moment.
What can I gain from watching them? (Rhetorical) I am not alone in having to struggle with myself about not taking the medication. Medication means no 'highs.' And oh how I miss them. Most sufferers decline the medication in preference for the sizzling electricity of the magnificent High.
During a High, the need for any medication at all is silly. Through the 'lows' the wimpering for some solace is pitifully painful.
My 'lows' have been noticeable by their absence. Just one or two, here and there. But my creative tipper-truck that empties tons of ideas and words onto my pages has vanished.

I'm on the medication but I'm still unsure of how much I want to be on it.

Tuesday

Several weeks, nay, months have gone by since last I wrote.
I have had no inclination to put keyboard to screen and I did not write, just for the sake of writing.
This Blog is a focus (if possible) upon manic depression, my manic depression. I am not yet convinced that I have Bipolar. Oh yes, I was given a 'label' to attach to the illness. I took the 'label' gladly. This enabled/empowered/released me to focus upon one solitary aspect of what ails me. I was given free rein to fall into myself.
I am in the process of climbing back up.

I’ll Be Along Soon

I’ll Be Along Soon

Tears for you
Tears for me
Arms holding love
Wait to be filled
No rush, no time
Ticks the soundless clock
So tired of living
Weak, wan and old
Take me to you
Release my poor soul
Unworthy of love
I’ve sinned, cried and died
Deeper within me
Than mortal has pried
Your will is my will
My heart’s out of tune
Hold, heal, enfold me
I’ll be along soon.

CRIMSON DELIGHT

CRIMSON DELIGHT

Juice of the soul
Juice of the mind
Deferred gratification
Months in the making
Pain in the bearing
Delight in the flooding
Gaining control
Controlling the gain
Watch me ridding
My world down a hole
I’m fighting back
At this body’s taunts
Choosing MY time
Pain in flood
Relief in euphoria
Feelings
Focused deep
Whatever the hurt
I can hurt more
I take the pain
Showing true anger.

See it,
Feel the life
Flooding back in.

My fix?
I’m fixed
For now.

#15

I made a discovery today. I found the core of me. I didn't like what I found. Don't get me wrong here. There is nothing nasty or evil!! It is me, with everything stripped back and the skeleton of my personality exposed for me to look at. The skeleton is flawed.
I cannot write here of what I found. I'm still waiting to come to terms with it myself.
So much is now explainable of what course my life path has taken and what cause created the seed which produced a flaw in the skeletal infrastructure.
I now know who I am. It hurts me and it releases me in equal measure.
It came about through a Hyper episode which lasted for about an hour. My hope is that I can grab hold of that which releases me and begin anew.
This will have to be discussed in depth with J.
It is so important and I need careful guidance.
It does not explain my Manic Depression, but it does explain me.
It does not explain my arthritic spine.
It does not explain my BCC.
It does not explain my possible Sleep Apnoea.
But it does explain me.
Know thyself? How many of us can answer that question.
I feel a bit like I did when I was diagnosed with Bipolar. There is a sense of relief. What it is, isn't pretty, but I now know what it is.
I must discuss this with J.

#14

J visited earlier this week.
The wide ranging discussion supported the fact that I cannot focus solely on one or two matters. My thoughts spark off one another, causing more sparks to dive into deeper recesses of my conscious and subconscious mind, memories, feelings, episodes etc.
It has been described as being like the ball in a Pinball Machine. It's firing off in all directions with only a small chance to try and control some of the movements. This is what it is like when I'm in a creative writing burst. Dozens of meaningful thoughts, related and unrelated, fire up and through my mind like a series of small rockets being lit at a firework display, but all firing and bursting into a mass of showering sparks and colours, at the same time.
Thoughts, so powerful and pertinent in their own way, to one or many of the other words, ideas, and images surging up and through my mind. They don't come into my mind as such, they are passing through at great speed. Grabbing hold of them and writing them down is a race, to catch them before they're gone forever. They never return. There is so much, that I cannot remember most or any of them, just the feeling of flying and soaring in a sky full of fireworks. Bloody fantastic. It's like throwing yourself into the Sun and burning up in an ecstasy of creative flames.
So, you see, I cannot focus on one or two matters. We discuss 'stuff' and my mind sets off on a pinball trip through my life.
How to cope? Music lifts me. Heavy rock one day, classical cello the next. 'Status Quo' to 'Tous le matins du monde.' 'Rock Anthems,' to 'Boccherini.' Use music as a friend in need.
Don't lose thoughts/ideas, use the voice recorder.
Much more was discussed, but it was hardcore personal pain and my coping mechanisms for bending with the whirlwind. Too vivid and too true of life to be written of in here. Yet.

The morning after the visit was a bad morning. You can't open old, deep, torn, ripped, wounds without getting payback. Counselling is a lift-shaft. The lift has a counter-balance. The rush up has to be balanced with the weight of the pain diving down. I was on the counter-balance, dropping like a stone and already half way down when I woke up. I've read other people's experiences of the 'morning depression.' It's nasty and vile and black and it hurts your mind like you don't want it to, ever again. But it does return, return, return...

Do I want to pay the price for the plummet with the soaring flights of fantasia? Do I want the 'fantastic' to be paid for with the excrement of depression? This is Bipolar!!!! Medication to cut the plummeting 'couterweight,' can castrate the surging 'creative thoughts' of the hyper episodes!

Enough. I've written enough for the moment. I'll stop.