Denninmi
Denninmi's JournalI'm back just to mention something.
I spent my entire therapy session Wednesday discussing my initial psychiatrist's appointment of Aug. 22nd and subsequent events with my trusted long-time therapist. In great detail.
It was her opinion based on everything that transpired that I was the victim of a physician who committed flagrant ethical violations. As a result, my circumstances are far worse than they should be.
I have researched possible courses of action. I intend to file formal complaints with the Michigan Department of Licensing and Regulation and the Michigan Chapter of the American Psychiatric Association. Within the next weeks, by the end of 2012, as soon as I can gather any evidence and put together an affidavit documenting my experiences and a brief of relevant administrative case law for the state and ethics rules for the APA.
I did nothing to deserve what happened to me. As I said before, I went to this dr. with the expectation of help and left there being made to feel like a criminal, completely degraded and destroyed.
Pick my soundtrack for a Friday evening bike ride.
I'm planning on about a 20 mile ride tonight -cold, crystal clear skies, and nothing but miles of smooth pavement ahead.
Help me pick tonight's soundtrack for the stereo (yes, I have a Bluetooth wireless stereo mini-speaker on the bike, and just picked up a Garmin GPS).
TIA!
Hey, all. An apology and kinda a goodbye.
Here's the deal -- I have been beyond way over the top lately. That one weird post I made Saturday was so embarrassing I just self deleted the thing.
I keep trying to make sense of all of this, from the start to today. Some of it is senseless, it seems to be just the expression of fear and shame over and over again.
In fact, I have been posting so much on here it seems to be all I do at times. If it had a point, I guess it would be a different story, but often no point at all, as I said above.
Also, I'm not sure at this point if this is helping, I am beginning to feel like it makes it worse because it allows me to wallow in my own despair, and that is not working for me.
I need to grow up at age 47. Bad things happen in the world, to good people, and I still consider myself a good guy in spirit if not in fact despite all of this. It seems so unfair, because it is unfair, and crying over it won't stop it, if it happened it happened.
I found myself upset again tonight driving home over something so simple yet full of meaning. I used to listen faithfully to NPR during my commute, All Things Considered has been like an old friend since my college days in the 80's. I haven't even turned on the radio for months, I just listen obsessively to pop and rock on my iPod. Tonight, I turned it on for a few miles, and had to turn it off because I couldn't stand to listen, it made me sad for everything I feel like I lost.
I keep thinking about Hester Prynne of 'The Scarlet Letter' fame. I feel like I have a big mark on my chest, MI for mentally ill. And that everyone knows it. I really do feel like a parolee, too, like I will always be scrutinized in all of my actions. And I don't like that at all. It makes me ashamed of myself, and it makes me feel like I have lost my freedom. One of the reasons I was always attracted to Democratic politics and liberalism is because it is founded in the concept of dignity and freedom of self-determination of the individual supported by the better angels of human nature. I even lost that, when I went to vote, I did it absentee ahead of time. My excuse was I wouldn't available. The real truth, it used to mean so much to me, and this year I was voting blind, I had no idea about the down-ballot races or the ballot proposals. I didn't even know which judicial candidates were D's and which R's, and I know I voted wrong on some of them. And that hurt, too.
I don't know how I will ever get rid of the feeling that I did something gravely wrong. I keep being told by some people it is just a biologically based condition, but I myself feel it is a grave moral failing on my part. I don't know if I can conquer this, or if it will conquer me. Again, it seems so unfair, my father was a monster, I always tried to be the opposite of him to the best of my ability, and now I am what he was, a monster.
And I don't know if I can trust the mental health system. It seems to me that it does as much harm as good, and that it tears people down faster than it builds them up. I have met so many people in this experience who I thought were just trapped in a downward spiral forever. After multiple hospitalizations and drugs and therapy they are barely functional and can't even see the daylight.
I didn't want that to be me, but I really on the continental divide on this one, I feel it could go either way. And I don't know how to avoid falling over the edge into darkness when it seems like everything reminds me of my shame and everything takes me down.
I don't know what will happen. I need to take this up with the pro's I can trust. Maybe it will help.
Thank you for everything. Your friendship really has meant the world to me. I am going to stay away for a while. If things improve and I find a path out that allows me to look myself in the mirror again, I would like to come back and share that. And I won't entirely disappear, I need my MFM fix in the Lounge, it lets me forget for just a minute.
Thanks and bye.
Not sure why the ups and downs (NOT a rant).
I am really puzzled as to why I'm having such ups and downs. Ok, I am willing to concede it could be a symptom, but I highly doubt it. To me it seems like just a flood of emotion coming out during a very stressful time. I am entitled to that -- people going through traumatic events, such as having a terminally ill relative, or in the middle of a messy divorce, often behave this way, and it doesn't mean they are mentally ill, it just means they are human, and need some reassurance and support at a bad time in their lives.
I do want the roller coaster of emotion to stop. No denying that.
It strikes me as very odd that mental illness is the only category of disease for which our medical and legal system allow, and even condone, forceable treatment and incarceration of patients against their will. No one does this to cardiac patients, pulling them from their homes and lives and forcing them into quadruple bypass surgery if they fail to eat right or exercise properly or stop smoking. So, why are we as a group singled out, not only for involuntary treatment, but also involuntary detention and the subsequent maltreatment from the greater society? It seems so unjust to me.
I had a very good day yesterday, nice long ride to and from my training session, clear progress being made there, then came home and got a lot done. No one is going to tell me it was mania or psychosis or whatever label anyone wants to put on it, I was doing the same things millions of other people in this country did yesterday, some play, some chores, all good.
Never again am I going to be so weak and vulnerable that I allow some event, big like my experience with psych. #1, or small like the comment of the nurse, to crush me emotionally and force me into doing something against my will. I don't need a parole officer or nanny. I'm a big boy, no, I'm a grown man, and can take care of myself.
Final thought, I was thinking of all of this, the good and bad, and I realized one good thing coming out of this train wreck is the fact I can see in myself that my problems are far from insolvable. Thinking about the people I was put in with at the hospital, I realized it was like triage after the crash of a passenger jet. So many severely wounded people, severed limbs, massive head injuries, sever burns, and I was walking among them with my wounds, a sprained wrist and a one inch gash on my forehead, and despite the wounds and the trauma of it all, I was helping them. Which I really tried to do at the hospital, of course I had bad times, but I was also the cheerleader and coach trying to make them, and myself, feel better.
Profile Information
Gender: MaleHometown: Metro Detroit, Michigan
Home country: USA
Member since: Fri Feb 29, 2008, 09:30 PM
Number of posts: 6,581
