hospital
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Day three of orientation for my new job – also the last day. I had clinical content, part of a whole slew of legal regulatory requirements. I wasn’t thinking much of it – it’s all review, I’ve been doing this 15 years – till the instructor got to restraints and whipped them out in front
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I got decent sleep today, with medication I slept seven hours and only woke up twice. I had a terrible dream despite the prazosin medication I take for nightmares. This wasn’t so much a nightmare as it was a memory. I dreamed I woke up tied to a bed in the hospital, and subsequently fighting
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I’m already at my two month mark for IOP. I can’t believe it. Today started the module I’ve been simultaneously dreading and looking forward to the most – distress tolerance. As Dr Black and the therapist in IOP explain it – emotion regulation is for day to day life and utilizing coping skills. Distress tolerance
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I had a good laugh yesterday when a letter from the mental hospital came. I was curious at first, wondering what on earth they could have to write me about, as opposed to email or call. A survey? I did one of those at discharge. A follow up to see how I’m doing? No, it
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I am exhausted! But I am also damn good at what I do. I didn’t mean to be, it just happened organically. I’ve been at my local VA hospital as a lowly CNA for ten years, with the help of supported employment and a case manager. I started working for an agency back in January
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During my second week in the hospital, I finally called my mother. What a disaster. I had been stabilizing pretty well on medication changes and Dr Floura’s careful dialing in of the right doses and times. I had learned a lot about myself and that this depression was largely existential in nature, exacerbated by my
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“How are you doing?” “I’m good, I’m good. I called my brother; I need his help. I can’t do it alone anymore. I don’t know what I’m going to do about my living situation. I want to move out. I think I’ll move out.” “How about the meds, any side effects?” “Just from that artane
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As I started to stabilize just slightly, inching a little closer toward cautious optimism, I had a terrible reaction to a medication that was supposed to help me with extrapyramidal symptoms. What follows is some of my writings while psychotic. I don’t remember writing any of it.
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My first few days in the hospital passed in a blur, a fog of medication adjustments, sluggish pacing, and intermittent crying. I felt most suicidal, yet safe. At least that’s what I reported in my daily nursing assessments. It’s a strange juxtaposition of feeling – that given the chance, I would kill myself, yet in
Documenting my journey through the mental health system 