Spring!

So I had a great conversation with my friend Jacque today... about why it's so damn hard for me to visualize being able to finish this school course and actually find a job again.

I was hospitalized for depression in Nov. '08, after a suicide attempt.  It was not a cry for help, because I truly did not believe that there was any help to be had.  When you're in that place, there just is no viable solution.  And I was so exhausted, in all the ways you can be exhausted: physically, mentally, emotionally.  I only lasted as long as I did because I knew what a selfish thing suicide is.  But it becomes a viable option when you believe you have nothing left to give, and that's what I believed.  Sometimes I still feel that way, and that feeling is all tied up in work.

I've always worked.  I like working.  I like having a job where I feel I can contribute something meaningful to my world.  Working with kids was always my dream, and working with kids with psychiatric troubles was the exact right fit for me.  Until it wasn't; and then I grieved that loss like it was a limb.  Our program went to hell, and I had to get out.  Insurance wouldn't pay for the kids to stay long enough; a corporation took over our program and sucked the life right out of it.  Medical model at its finest... drug 'em and send 'em home.  It broke my heart.

I was able to find a position at a residential center for boys in Eugene, and I came to love that program, too, although it wasn't mental health.  But slowly, it got more and more difficult to get out of the house and get to work.  And then one day I just could not make myself get out of bed one more time.  And I thought to myself, well if I can't work, then it's over.  So I wrote a note, took every pill I could find, and went to bed.  And work up several hours later vomiting, which saved my life.

They call it a Major Depressive Episode.  I've read stuff - a lot of stuff - about depression.  It runs rampant in my family; some of my siblings also had some major mental illnesses that involved psychosis, but I have been "lucky" in that regard.  I started taking antidepression medication in 1998, and that has kept me fairly functional.  Until it didn't.  But even with all we know about depression these days, it's still not an exact science... and there's still a real stigma attached to mental illness.  So those of us who need the meds have a real love/hate relationship with them.  I take them every day, now.  But I hate it.  Even though they really help me.  It feels like cheating.  And all the Prozac jokes don't help, let me tell you.  I used to suffer shame in silence when people would make the jokes.  These days I speak up.  Nothing like ten days in the "bin" to cure you of your illusions.  And I decided when I was there that I would not pretend any more.  I am what I am.  Me and Popeye.

Anyway.  Back to the subject of work.  That episode, or breakdown, or whatever you want to call it, has badly shaken not just my confidence, but my perception of who I am, right down  to the foundation.  I can no longer state unequivicably, " Hey, I can do that!"  I don't know what I can do, now.  And so I don't know who I am now.  I'm living on unemployment, and thank God for it.  I'm taking the medical coding course like I'm going to use it, because I have to believe that I can, or what do I do?  But can I?  Am I someone who can work 40 hours a week now?  Sometimes I still have trouble just leaving the house, or taking a bath, or doing the dishes.  It has been a long, slow climb, and it feels like I'm only half way up the hill.  What if I can't get any further?  It's pretty scary.

I'm 57 years old.  I'd dearly love to retire, but I have no means of income.  Planning has never been my strong suit, and I worked at jobs that paid almost nothing, because our culture doesn't pay well for treating the mentally ill, unless you're a Doctor or a Nurse, and I'm neither.  I never cared; I don't need much to live on.  But truthfully, I did not expect to live this long.

Well. More later, its time for homework.
Thanks for listening.