Some Reflections on Recovery

 So Michael and I have returned from shopping and although I had a wonderful time at the stores, I found I got tired after a couple of hours and now my tummy is upset I’m guessing from the milk in the Starbucks coffee…it’s really, really strange, suddenly I’m having all these digestive problems from suspected dairy products, something I have no allergies to and for the record, I have always had a cast iron stomach that can handle anything. So I’m suspicious, naturally, and wondering if I need to go back to only black coffee and perhaps pay doctors out of my limited checking account to run tests on some mysterious new dairy intolerance?

But I’ll try to forget about that for awhile, and instead focus on what I’m realizing right now: my recovery from my mysterious “episode” last October/November is apparently going to take much longer than I ever expected…I’m at a point now where I can barely tolerate any televised news or news on the radio; and exposure to ads has been getting questionable too. I’m not sure if I can watch movies without trying to suss out Hollywood’s agenda…why is all this strange stuff happening to me? It’s as if I’m on the exact same trajectory I was on in 2016-2017 (sick in October 2016 and hospitalized; sick in January 2017 and hospitalized; sick in April 2017 and hospitalized; finally stable around July 2017). I’m convinced my meds are correct and I’m totally sane; I’m not using any alcohol, weed, or other mood-altering drugs. What is wrong with me?! I guess I just feel in my bones this great imbalance in the world and I’m trying everything I can to stay afloat in this sea of chaos. 

I’ve now had to leave the den so I’m not around the television at all, something I’ve never had to do before. I’m wondering if it was just too much for me to be at Easton? Probably most definitely, I think I was exposed to all those stores, merchandise, people, it just wore me out, I could barely walk at the end of the day, desperate for that Starbucks coffee to quench my thirst and give me a much-needed lift. Dear Michael, he may appear cheap and gruff, but he spoiled me today and he’s doing what he can to make me comfortable and hopefully recover soon. He’s even ordering Indian Oven for dinner tonight (after a lunch out at Mercury Diner!) and I feel so fortunate and blessed.

I guess deep down I’m scared that I will really get sick again and be forced back in the hospital. But I think Dr. Levy knows what he’s doing and will have matters very much in hand to prevent that. I know now that it takes a few days for the Risperdal increase to take effect, if I can just hold on and not panic and get myself some place with absolutely no stimulation I can weather the storm until I get stable. If that means getting myself to a bedroom at mom’s or even here with earphones on listening to ocean noise then I’ll do that. I’m not at that point right now, but certainly I learned today that although I had been thinking I was recovered I’m definitely not.

I’m subsequently frustrated and wondering how long this road to recovery will last…I know that when you are in the hospital they keep you on 4 mg. Risperdal (my current dosage) so perhaps it’s as if I’m still in the hospital (even though I got out around November 11). I guess tonight I’m going to take it easy—I did just have some creamy Chicken Korma and a lassi and my stomach doesn’t feel upset so maybe I don’t have a dairy problem after all?

I am feeling somewhat guilty that I’m upstairs apart from Michael, but he wants to watch that TV news and I just can’t tolerate it. More fear factor being pedaled, making all of us frightened and after what I went through last Fall I just can’t be around it. Sweet Michael, he just popped in the bedroom and hugged me. That silly man with the long gray-white hair and Air Jordan’s. Lol. Whoops, I’m feeling something working it’s way through my intestines…sweet Jesus, is this the Kroger heavy whipping cream I used in the Fettuccine Alfredo last night? I just don’t know what’s going on with my GI tract, this is all inexplicable to me…

So let me segway a bit and talk about trauma. I know going through psychosis is traumatic, not necessarily for me during psychosis (as I was manically high and feeling grandiose), but afterwards, when you get flashbacks to the psychosis that come at unplanned times. I think this is why I may never be able to tolerate watching football again, because the TV stations insist on replaying over and over again the unforeseen injuries (and in slo-mo!), it’s just reliving the trauma over and over again. Why do they do this?! And I’m realizing that over-stimulation right now for me (like highway driving and to a milder extent, being at a big shopping center) is kinda trauma-lite right now. So I’m feeling majorly, majorly sensitive right now and subsequently put myself in this near quiet bedroom in an attempt to gather my wits. (Solitary confinement,  anyone?)

Both Dr. Levy and Richard Fetter have told me I now have a severe fear phobia and it is going to take months to recover. I blame the news, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, throwing myself into ketosis, political strife, and I’ll even throw in Kanye West because Michael got obsessed with him and got thrown off the rails himself. You know I want retribution (perhaps restitution) but You Can’t Always Get What You Want so here I find myself, under bedcovers, fully dressed, wondering how long it’s gonna take before I feel normal again. Sigh.

I’m starting to come to a chilling realization that what if I can no longer watch or read news again? I’m praying it doesn’t come to that, but unless they institute some major changes I’m not quite sure how I can handle it. Sure, I can use mom and Michael as my sources if I don’t want to be totally in the dark. Dammit, I just want to get back to a position where I can listen to/read it safely! I want to be normal! But when right there in blazing headline on ABC Nightly News is the lead story of how a kindergarten kid shot his teacher, how in the hell am I supposed to get better being exposed to this sick stuff? Who’s weaponizing here, the kid or ABC—who runs that news program, what right do they have upsetting all these viewers tuning in during the dinner hour? Gee, could it be ABC is in bed with the Democrats, who want stricter gun legislation, and also sleeping with the teachers’ unions? Yes, I’m sick of it all.

How many months do I have to spend hiding up in this messy bedroom, unable to tolerate the TV, increasingly unable to tolerate noise? Perhaps this is just a bad day, I tried to test the waters with Easton, but as I always knew, that place just isn’t for me maybe. Who knows. We’ve always got, “There’s Always Tomorrow For Dreams To Come True” so I’ll remember that. Thanks for reading, whoever you are. Probably just me and that’s ok. Sweet dreams, pass the chocolate.