DON'T DRAG ME DOWN

When you're in recovery, you have to make choices within your life that will help you stay above the hole. You must learn your limitations, take your medications, go to therapy when needed, and choose what type of people to spend your time with. In a previous blog, I wrote about choosing positive friends. It is also important to be aware of relationships with people who also suffer with mental illness. Especially ones who are at the bottom of the hole, who refuse help or are in denial.

When I attended group therapy for Borderline Personality Disorder, they warned us to be careful about making friends with other group members. I was confused by this. What was wrong with making friends with someone who understands what you're going through? Wouldn't it be a comfort to finally have someone in your life who knew what you faced each day?

Later on, when I joined a mental health group, I became friends with a girl who also suffered with depression. At first, it seemed like a comfort to have a friend who understood what it was like to be at the bottom of the hole. When I reached recovery, she was still at the bottom. Her world became like a drama. Every time we got together, she went on and on about her horrible life. I never got a chance to talk about myself. That's when I realized why they warned us to be careful about making friends with others suffering with mental illness.

I didn't want to abandon my friend while she was down, but I realized I needed to set up boundaries. I had to limit the amount of time I spent with her and talked with her on the phone. I had to make it clear to her I could not always be available when she needed me. I also told her I would be supportive in her struggle to reach recovery, but if she was not willing to work towards the light, I could not help her.

I had to protect myself from being dragged back down into the hole. The only way I could do that was set up boundaries. It became very important to me to stay well and not let anyone take the light away from me.

I learned that I could not be friends with those who refused to get help for their illness or were in denial. The best I could do for these people was to educate them about recovery and mental illness and pray that in time they would find their way to the light. If I invested myself into trying to lead them towards help, I would only be dragged down. You can't help those who will not help themselves.

You can be a friend to someone who is ill without losing the light by listening and educating them, but also by protecting yourself. Knowing my limitations and setting boundaries with others who have mental illness allows me to continue to stay within the light.

ARE YOU A FIGHTER?

In order to recover from mental illness, you must have determination, strength, and willpower to live a healthy life. You have to fight harder than you have ever fought in your life. Facing your mental illness is one of the most difficult challenges in your life. In order to fight, you must educate yourself about your illness, take your medication as advised, participate in therapy, and do any homework your therapist suggests.

When I found out in college I had depression, I collected pamphlets, I checked out books at the library on depression, and when I got a therapist, she gave me a video on depression. I needed to understand what my illness was and if I could get better. When I got sick again, years later, and found out I was a self-injurer and I had borderline personality disorder, I researched online and at the library and I bought books on my illness. Through research my life began to make sense. Many of the problems I had as a child had a reason. I wasn't a freak; I was ill.

Once I understood my illness, I became determined to live a normal life. In order to reach recovery, I had to fight. Fighting meant going to therapy and learning to change my way of thinking, to look at my life in a different light, and to take my medications as prescribed. Most importantly, I had to want to get well more than anything in the world and I had to learn to believe in myself. In order to believe in myself, I had to love myself, which was a struggle of its own.

A friend kept telling her psychiatrist what medication to put her on and took herself off medications when she thought they didn't work. By doing this she only made herself sicker. I found that even when medications didn't seem to be working, I had to stay on them and allow my psychiatrist to change them. I also learned I had to try many medications until I found one that worked. By being patient, I did find one that has helped me reach recovery and stay within recovery.

I spent my life drowning in negativity and believing I was ugly and worthless. My thoughts dipped into darkness and raced uncontrollably for many years. I burst out into angry episodes and broke things. How could I change all that? Within my heart I knew the only way I could learn to be positive and control my thoughts and episodes was to go to therapy and do the homework my therapist gave me. I had to fight for my right to be happy and to find the positive side of life.

So dig deep down in yourself and find the willpower to fight. If you can't find the power within you turn to God and ask for his help. By fighting, I am living a wonderful life and I have found true happiness above the hole, in the rays of the light.

I COULDN'T LET GO OF MY THERAPIST

When you find a therapist you are compatible with, you develop a very special relationship. Many become attached to their therapists. The therapist is the person you tell your darkest deepest secrets to, even secrets you don't tell your best friend. If you want to get better, you can't hold anything back. Your therapist becomes more than a professional who listens to your problems, and when that therapist leaves, your world turns upside down.

After my ex-boyfriend kicked me out, I started seeing a therapist named Linda. I came to her as a wreck. When I first started seeing her, I cried at each session and was injuring. In time I told her about the abuse I was subjected to by my ex-boyfriend and the torment I faced in school. With a lot of work, I stopped injuring and started to rebuild my life. She helped me reach recovery, she taught my husband how to handle my illness, and she came to my wedding.

After my marriage, I went a few years without therapy, and when I had a setback, I went back to Linda. I saw her for about 13 years when she told me she was taking a job as a counselor at a college. My heart dropped. Tears threaten to spill.

I felt like I was losing a best friend, a confidant and much more. I told my husband I didn't want another therapist. I wanted to quit therapy completely. It was like my world shattered. I thought I couldn't go on without Linda. I felt I needed Linda and she was turning her back on me. Linda, in my eyes, was abandoning me like many of my friends did in the past. I cried in Lou's arms and he reassured me Linda was moving on with her career, not abandoning me.

On my last day of therapy with Linda, I wrote her a note about how I felt. She reassured me that the therapist she was referring me to would take good care of me, and if I didn't like her, I could try another one. She explained to me she was leaving to better her life, not to abandon me. She told me I was her success story and she would never forget me. She said she had confidence I was strong enough to get through this and my new therapist could help me.

I started seeing my new therapist within a couple weeks. We discussed the feelings I felt about Linda leaving. She told me what I was feeling was normal. A relationship between a therapist and her client is special. It takes time to grieve over the loss of such a strong relationship. She explained that it was okay to grieve, but I must also be willing to move forward towards recovery.

I still miss Linda, and I'm still getting used to the ways of my therapist, but I am continuing to move forward into the light.

WHO AM I?

While our minds are conflicted with darkness, we begin to question who we are. We confuse our illness with our identity. Sometimes we think we are our illness. We believe the sadness, irrational thoughts, uncontrollable emotions, and other symptoms we have are who we are. We become blinded. We can't see the person we are beyond our sickness. We allow our mental illness to define us.

When the darkness filled my soul, I started to question who I was. Was I a sad, hopeless wreck? What kind of person was I? Someone who cried often, someone who hurt herself without understanding why, or someone who burst out into emotional episodes. I wondered how anyone would want to be with or hang out with a person like me.

If this sad, emotional person was who I was, then what reason did I have for living? Why would God let such a person exist on earth? I lay awake at night wondering why God even made me. Was my purpose to hurt my family and friends? Was it to live at the bottom of the hole? I started to think I was my illness and it defined me as the person I was. I couldn't see beyond it. My depression and borderline personality disorder no longer seemed like a sickness, but character traits.

I felt like I had no control over my life or my emotions. I found myself falling into one bad relationship after another and I felt like that was all I deserved. At times, my lips spit out angry words to the people I loved the most. I threw things and broke stuff. I couldn't see beyond my inner pain. Awful things clouded my thoughts and I couldn't think of anything else. I saw myself as a hopeless mental case.

My friend Cheryl called my illness, “The Bad Bug Guy.” This helped me to look at my illness in a different light. I suddenly began to realize my illness is something separate from who I am. I was not a mentally ill person, but I was and am a person who has mental illness. In a mental health group I joined, they told us, “You are not your illness, but you have an illness.”

My friends and family told me I am a kind, caring, and loving person. Those are my characteristics, not the sadness, emotional episodes, and other symptoms of my sickness. It took me time to convince myself that I am a wonderful person who happens to have a sickness.

With the help of my therapist, I started listing the positive qualities about myself. In time I was able to find myself. I learned what kind of person I really am and that God has a purpose for me on this earth. He allowed me to struggle so I can share my experience with others. I am much more than a mental illness and so are you. Knowing who I am helps me stand in the light.

DEVELOPING HEALTHY COPING SKILLS

While dealing with the darkness that blankets your soul, it's important to find healthy coping skills. Many times, while mental illness plagues our minds, we develop unhealthy ways of dealing with it like self-injuring, bottling up feelings, bursting into angry fits, lashing out at family and friends, and so on. These methods only push us deeper into the hole.

Some good coping techniques are:

• Problem Solving. Find friends, family, or a support group to help you find ways to deal with past and present problems. (I talk out problems with my husband.)
• Stay Calm. Don't scream, cry, or become violent over situations. (I realized I think more clearly when I'm calm.)
• Talk about feelings or write them down. Don't keep your feelings bottled up inside. Let them out to a trusted friend or on paper. (I keep a journal to write my feelings and thoughts in.)
• Find the positive. Instead of dwelling on the negative, think about and list the good things in your life. (When things look hopeless I remind myself of the good things I do have.)
• Be proud of your accomplishments. Don't think of your illness as a failure, but look at it as a challenge you will overcome. Even the small-things like making it through a day without injuring-are accomplishments. (I'm proud to say I have not injured in 13 years and I am in recovery from mental illness.)
• Find a hobby or craft. Finding something you like to do such as a craft or hobby. A craft or hobby can be relaxing and it can also keep you busy so you're not thinking too much. (Writing and wood-burning helps me keep busy and relax me.)
• Develop a support system. Gather up friends and family members you can turn to when times get rough. If you don't have friends or family, find a support group. (My family, some friends, and my husband are people I can turn to in a time of need.)
• List negative thoughts and turn them into positive. Fold a piece of paper in half. Write negative thoughts on the top of one side and positive thoughts on the other. Write down your negative thought like, “I'm a worthless, loser” and on the other side write, “I'm a kind and successful person.” (This taught me to look at myself and things around me in a positive way.)

Some of these coping techniques and more can be found at http://www.haveigotaproblem.com/download/191/How-To-Improve-Coping-Skills. Learning how to deal with the emotions and thoughts that fill you will help you reach recovery. Using unhealthy skills only makes you feel worse. They did for me. The more I bottled up my feelings and injured, the darker and deeper the hole of depression became. I felt like there was no way out. When I started going to therapy and began to learn many of the above healthy coping techniques, I started to climb the walls of my hole until I reached the light.

I still use some of the above skills to deal with rough times in my life and they keep me dancing in the light.

ARE YOU STRESSED OUT?

Stress can play a serious role in deepening depression or other mental illnesses. It affects everyone, even people without mental illness. When the mind is plagued with sadness, stress becomes magnified and begins to take over the body and mind. It makes you feel like you have no control over your emotions, body, and life.

In college, I worked hard to pass my classes while struggling with a learning disability. It took me a long time to read chapters for homework, and I had to study extra hard to pass tests. I couldn't concentrate and my thoughts began to race. My muscles tightened and my shoulders and neck became sore, causing me to have a headache. The harder I pushed to make good grades in my classes, the more stressed I became. I became frustrated and I felt as if I had no control over my body, college, and life. I spent hours in my room, alone, falling deeper into the hole and injuring.

When I was at my worst, small things stressed me out like buying new shoes, choosing friends, or deciding what to eat. I felt worthless, like I couldn't do anything right. My chest tightened and it felt as if someone had shoved a fist down my throat. Then I got into an abusive friendship and the stress increased. I started dry heaving and throwing up. Keeping the friendship and the idea of being alone if the friendship ended, stressed me out also. I lost my appetite, I couldn't sleep at night, and when I did sleep I had nightmares.

During my path to recovery, my therapist helped me identify the different things in my life that caused my stress. Things like bad relationships, worrying over finances, doing a good job at work, and my health. When I first started working my job, I got sick with the flu and bronchitis often. I learned that the more intense I felt, the weaker my immune system became. Once I was able to learn techniques to relax, I was able to handle the rough patches in my life better.

Stress still plays a big role in my life, but I have learned to handle it better. I have also learned to avoid it when I can. I don't work full time because I know it would be too much for me to handle. I have ended unhealthy friendships, I talk over finances with my husband, and I try to avoid conflict. With my illness, I know I have limitations and I find ways around them.

When I do get stressed out, I write in my journal, I listen to a relaxation tape, I take deep breaths and slowly let them out. I also turn to my support team such as my friends, family, and husband. With the techniques I have learned in therapy and the help of my support team, I can take stress by the hand and dance within the light.

SYMPTOMS OF SELF-INJURY

Self-injury is serious and should not be taken lightly. It's both an unhealthy coping mechanism and a silent cry for help. If a person mentions wanting to injure, take him or her seriously. People do not hurt themselves for attention. They injure because they are sick and need help. There are symptoms you need to look for to identify a self-injurer.

The symptoms are:

• Scars from burns or cuts (I never cut deep enough to leave a lot of scars.)
• Fresh cuts, scars, bruises, or other wounds (I cut myself, scratched myself, and tried burning myself.)
• Broken bones
• Keeping sharp objects on hand (I stored sharp objects in my dresser.)
• Wearing long sleeves and long pants even in hot weather (After I injured, I wore long sleeves even in the summer.)
• Claiming to have frequent accidents or mishaps (I had a lot of excuses for why I had cuts and scratches.)
• Spending a great deal of time alone (I usually injured in my room or in a place where I was by myself)
• Pervasive difficulties in interpersonal relationships
• Persistent questions about personal identity, such as “Who am I?” or “What am I doing here?” (I frequently questioned the reason for my existence and who I was.)
• Behavioral and emotional instability, impulsively, and unpredictability (I was not stable, and I was fine then a mess within seconds.)
• Statements of helplessness, hopelessness, or worthlessness (I felt like my life was a hopeless mess and I hated myself. I thought I was worthless.)

Arms, legs and front of torso are common areas of self-injuries. I injured on my arms because I knew I could hide them. If you notice frequent injuries in these areas and any of these symptoms, encourage your friend or family member to get help. If you see symptoms in a teenager talk to his or her parents, a teacher, or school counselor. If you have these symptoms or thoughts of hurting yourself, find help. Tell someone you're close to and seek therapy.

I found these symptoms at http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/self-injury/basics/symptoms/con-20025897. There is more information at this site that can help you understand self-injury. Recovery is possible.

I set myself a goal of going a year without hurting myself, and now I haven't self-injured in 13 years. My therapist taught me healthier ways to cope with my illness and stressors in my life. Thanks to therapy and determination, I dance within the light of recovery. You can too.