The Many Of Me

Before I get too far into this post, I need to let you know who is writing – well, sort of. It’s not Abigail, and it’s now anyone who’s name you would recognize. Just saying, it’s not Abigail.

A therapist told me about a song from a movie that pretty well says who I am. The Beaches who sang “The Wind Beneath My Wings” So, yeah, I’m the wind beneath someone’s wings. I encourage her and share her sorrows and cheer her victories. When she is down, she’s a little less down because I’m there to lighten her load. Guess I should also let you know that I’m not an adult yet, either.

So, now for the post.

We’ve been thinking about dedicating the book to the psychiatrist who diagnosed us. He got unexpectedly extremely ill and had to retire early. We miss him a lot, and we really want to dedicate the book to him. If not for him many times over the book would never be more than a dream.

But here’s the glitch. If we write his name in the book, there are a good many people who would immediately know who we are, or at least be able to figure it out without too much effort. How do we express our great appreciation without undermining our efforts to keep our identity secret? The only thing we have thought of is to write the dedication and identify him as the psychiatrist who diagnosed us; and then give him a complimentary copy of the published book. If you all have any other suggestions, we would be open to considering them.

Ooops, that wasn’t the concern to write about, was it. Sorry about the confusion. (Shifting gears)

This round of depression has been one of the worst we have ever had. We get a few days of fewer tears and uncontrollable fixation w/ cutting/self-harm/suicide. Then when we think we can trust that things are getting better, some complication comes up or else the bottom seems to drop out and we are right back into the thick of it again.

These are issues we truly believed we had beat – that they were in the past permanently. It’s very disheartening to keep getting dunked deeper and deeper into muck we thought we had defeated and were in our past.

The latest complication is my blood work came back showing very high glucose levels in the blood. We happened to mention it to our EMDR therapist who told us this is a serious side effect that is common with the newest med we were put on to control the strong urges to do self harm.  Our feelings have been very mixed about taking this med anyway, because it seems to help significantly by doesn’t last very long. Tomorrow morning we will see the psychiatrist who will have already been informed of my blood work results because our therapist felt it was too important to chance us forgetting to mention it to her. Since she is new to the team and the list of all the meds that have caused numerous negative reactions is not completely documented, she may very well want to try a different med. Trouble is, we have been on the entire list of psych meds that can be used to treat depression, manic depression, as well as some others. I feel like a badly stained shirt that is highly resistant to all stain removers and is very delicate and easily damaged.

So this is not a very encouraging post, I’m afraid. Perhaps tomorrow will turn out better than I fear and I can write something more cheery. Hopefully I will get a chance to post about it soon.

Blue is such a pretty color – why does it have to be associated with depression? It’s been an extremely “blue” day for us. We have tried repeatedly to work on simple craft projects – things that normally bring much joy and satisfaction, but not today. Today they brought only frustration and discouragement.

My beloved has been gradually getting stuff out of the garage that was tossed in there years ago when we had to crisis move all our belongings and many of them were tossed in the garage or basement. It’s kind of nostalgic, kind of gross, and kind of exciting all wrapped up into one.

Over the past week or so people have been commenting to me how much better I sound and look. I don’t know it that comes across through the internet, or maybe if I lost it with this most resent deep dunk into the pits. All I can do is ask for your prayers that I can get out of the miserable moodiness.

I need to keep it short tonight. But I pray God’s richest blessing be poured out upon you in great generosity.

Wish I could say when this all will get better and I will be able to post with consistence that I want to.  It seems like each time I try to make progress in getting to a more functional state the rug is pulled out from under my feet.My body tortures me with migraines and sick stomach. I have little to share because I’m forced to bed/rest much of the time. No progress on teeth. Just a frog in a kettle waiting to be fried.

My therapists seem to feel this blown-out-of-the-water depression is a sign of progress.  Others have come and done their work, each one needing a chance to heal. Now they have decided I am well enough to;

I’m thinking they might we worried that they made the wrong choicel

The new med, Zyprexa, that was added to the Lorazapam to help emotions are out of control.

The truth is that it causes a very fuzzy fog to develop in my head and I find it very hard to type.All my crafts that I’m used to using to calm down and center through darts at my  heart because every attempt any of them I end up undoing everything I did or

I feel very useless – very much like a burden – a stinking, putrid piece of rubbish,

the worst part is My oldest son is getting married in a few days, and I don’t know if I will even be fit be seem;

I’ve got to sign off now – just not coherent enough to make sense;

Time moves slowly by. Still my Beloved must work from home in order to keep watch over me that I do no serious self-harm. These issues that were defeated and dead are resurrected and powerful once again. It is very hard not to feel completely defeated – just to give in to the desires that continually drive me deeper and deeper into depression.

I have a new doctor – a psychiatrist again, to add to the others. My general practitioner did exactly what I presumed he would do – back out of all responsibility for psychiatric prescriptions. However, he also did something I never imagined he would do – and I never would have requested. He gave me two sources of direct access to him bypassing his nurses altogether. He did this in response to my expressions of how much more complex and painful it was for me because he did not respond personally to my pleas to talk personally to him. Under normal circumstances I would never presume to do this; but he had specifically said to me that he understood there were things I would say to him that I cannot express to his nurse and that he would be available to me in a crisis situation.

Along with the psychiatrist came a new drug to use in conjunction with the Lorazapam. It works, but it makes me completely unable to function – even more so than without it.

Even as I type I hear the confusion and contradictions. I hate not being in command of my thoughts and body.

I cry out my petition to the only One Who understands and can truly rescue me from my predicament. I know that tomorrow is another important day – another EMDR session. What I say in that session is critical because the EMDR therapist is the one who recommended this psychiatrist to the insurance company and the two of them will talk following the session to decide what else needs to be done about my current crisis.

I know there is a war going on in the spiritual realm for my survival, and prayer will make the difference between what will and will not be done about it in the medical realm. Please pray with us for Holy intervention and victory.

I’m sorry, but I didn’t realize it was September instead of August until I filled a mountain  of forms at the new psychiatrist’s office yesterday. Consequently, all the resent posts dated 8/ something were really 9/ something

Being off Prestiq is helping. The med added yesterday has also helped – well, sort of anyway. I guess I can’t expect things that dominated my life for decades and have only been defeated over the past few years to evaporate into thin air jut because I started a new med to help with it.

In all honesty, I will have a better idea of how  hard I will be able to fight this after the appointment with the gp this morning. I’ve lost so much ground because of this one man who I trusted completely and who really let me down big time. I have to mend fences with this man today. I NEED him on my team. I’m just not sure I can do what I need to do to make that happen.

There is more that needs to be written, but I just can’t do it right now.

Later (btw. been Abigail writing)

What a modge-podge of complex combobuation!!

A friend came to comfort me today, and she pointed out that it really has been months of compiling circumstances that have brought me into the depths of depression I currently am in. Starting with a couple really major operations on my teeth, frequent migraines caused by extra pain that those surgeries caused, poor nutrition and complicated eating struggles that keyed into many decades of eating disorders I have only gained victory over in resent years.

Added to that I took a number of my pieces of art work to show to my therapist. It was the very first time I , Abigail, have been permitted to view those pieces myself – always before other personalities have been very quick to come out so that I never had the opportunity to see them myself. That may seem strange to you – why would there be such a high priority placed on protecting me from viewing that work? But if you stop to realize that some of those pieces are very explicit views of childhood sexual assault, among other things. I am the birth personality, so the things portrayed in those immages present an extreme paradox of reality. Do I accept those images as expressions of things done to me or witnessed by me  – as actual historical fact? Do I deny them as fabrications and in doing so deny the exsistance of my other personalities?

People, I know I am stumbling over keys and misspelling words like crazy in this post; but the implications are just too huge to bother with such trivial matters. If those images represent real occurrances, they stand in sark defiance to life as I have known it; If they don’t, then where did they come from? Isaw no movies or images on TV that could account for them. It was an amazing act of trust on the part of my alters to permit me to view these images. I’m not all sure what/why/ this was the chosen time to permit my viewing; but I bilieve it strongly ties into the confrontation I had planned for my younger sister. Confrontation is probably too strong of a word. It seemed to me to be necessary to approach my sister to receive the freedom I felt I needed to move forward with writing the book. Now it seems quite evident to me that I will never have the freedom to heal that broken relationship or resolve the years that have pierced my aching side for many years now. I don’t know how to move forward with writing the book without it so it seems to me that the door to my life mission has been slammed in my face and locked. The agony is all too much to bare.

Added to that, I felt the depression coming on stronger about 2 months ago and thought it might be worth while to start on a new antidepressant to get me through this rough time. Unfortunately, my body reacted opposite to the ussual response to this antidepressant, so it was intensifying instead of getting better. My dotor whom I have grown to trust explicitely really majorly let me down in the way he dealt with (or better, refused to deal with) my bodies reaction and wouldn’t even talk with me about it. I have felt terribly abandoned (one of my core issues from earlies childhood) and have resorted to very destructive thinking and self-harm, even to the point of engraving my suicide note into my flesh. As I sit here and write this I have preparations made and plans made to carry out my own suicide. I don’t want to do it. I’m just feeling like I’ve been left with no other option.

Please pray for me. It’s all I can ask.

Anyone who follows this will note that it’s been a while. I keep trying to stay somewhat up-to-date but seem to keep getting stuck on side paths. This one is a round of deeper depression than I have struggled with in quite a while. Maybe I bit off more than I could chew by tackling the primary topics I have mentioned lately – specifically how to handle the time of our life that remains the most unresolved. and presenting some of the art work we have done over the years with our counselor. I’m not actually sure if I mentioned that last part here on the blog or not.

Anyway, about two months ago I felt that my usual coping mechanisms for depression that are part of the ebb and flow of life for me were not working. I have been on every kind of antidepressant they have available as well as several other psych meds. Everyone of them failed on one level or another. Some of them caused rashes or other symptoms that clearly indicated an allergic reaction. Some caused symptoms to worsen instead of improve. Some just didn’t work. Unfortunately, we weren’t good about keeping track of all of them and neither was my psychiatrist who is now retired; and physicians and insurance companies don’t want to take my word for it that a specific medication has already been tried and failed. Reluctantly, I tried a newer medication that was related to one I had a bad reaction to. It hasn’t worked out well at all.

I don’t know how this will all work out. Each day is a huge struggle to get through. I’m extremely thankful for my beloved husband who has been absolutely wonderful through this whole ordeal, supporting me all the way. I know God is still in control and will not abandon me in the midst of this storm, but I am blinded to know how or where to put the next foot forward.

I wish I could wrap this up in a nice little optimistic bow for you all, but I just have to sign off. Prayers are gratefully requested.

First, I have to tell you that I’m not Abigail. I’m a teenager who had some pretty serious issues. I want to tell you my story – well, at least part of it. But first I want to explain what happened last night that got me riled up.

Our beloved husband and dearest friend in all the world often spends time reading out loud with us – sometimes I read to him but mostly he reads to me. One of the types of books we like to read about are books about Amish. We have read a variety of authors who write on this theme and have been pretty pleased…until last night.

Have you ever had someone in your life who occasionally would approach you with one arm extended towards you and a hearty smile on their face as they walk briskly over to you, looking like they intended to enfold you in a warm, loving embrace. But the other arm is hidden from sight behind his back and balled up into a tight fist. You let them approach in expectation of a warm embrace but when they get close enough to hug you the fist comes out and punches you hard in the stomach or back. Then they (and often their buddies who were standing around and were in on the joke) laugh uproariously at your vulnerability and gullibility to fall for the joke again.

We have had several persons like that at different times in our life. Cruel and hurtful people who thoroughly enjoyed making us look foolish. One of them was our first husband.

So what does this have to do with reading Amish stories together w/ our Beloved? Last night we ended a trilogy and at the very end, right after the two heroes of the stories finally got married, The last chapter felt like the author gave us a huge punch to the stomach – for no other reason that he was the author and could end it any way he liked. But it took our breath away. It brought back countless times a brother, a husband, a boyfriend, a pychiatrist did the very same thing, and I cried the rest of the night.

Tomorrow I will tell you my story, if I get an opportunity at the computer again that soon.