WHAT IS SUCCESS?

Success can be measured in many ways. Some measure it by their highly important jobs, how many expensive possessions they own, or how much money they make. Others think you're successful if you have won a lot of awards or achieved the highest promotion. I define success in a different way: success is when you stand up to an illness, when you achieve goals you set for yourself, when you can hold a job even when others think you can't, and when you make small steps towards recovery.

While struggling with mental illness, I found even the smallest steps I took could be considered acts of success. Forcing myself to get out of bed and go to work when I was falling apart inside was an accomplishment. Taking a friend's challenge to go a year without injuring was success. Admitting I had an illness and finding help was an accomplishment. Each small step I took towards getting well I relished and celebrated because those were the hardest steps in my life I had to take.

Recently I celebrated twenty years at my job. It's not a prestigious job, but it is a good job. I've worked through deep depression and cried in the bathroom. I faced customers with a smile, when I was contemplating my death. A therapist and friends told me I should go on disability, but I refused. I wanted to work even when I felt as if I couldn't make it through another day.

Now I struggle with anxiety attacks and aches and pains from working the same job for many years, but I continue on. Each and every day I reach out and touch people just by listening and talking to them. I find this to be very rewarding. The hug I get from my ninety-year-old customer puts a smile on his face and warms my heart. An elderly lady that comes in gives me a hug and tells me stories about her departed daughter, gives her comfort, and makes me feel good. These are the reasons I continued for twenty years to face my illness and go to work. This is what I consider part of my success story.

Each step I have taken and I continue to take within my process to reach and stay within recovery is a story of success. You, too, can create your own success story by choosing to reach for recovery and celebrating each step you take towards climbing to the top of the hole. Everyone is successful in his or her own way. Each person has had a struggle to face, and it is how you choose to stand up to it that makes you successful. Who cares how many worldly processions or how much money you have? That doesn't count in the end. It's how hard you work, how you face your struggles, and how determined you are that creates your success.

I cherish each new step I make, and I celebrate all my successes-even the small ones-and this helps me stand tall within the light.

I CAN'T TURN OFF MY THOUGHTS

Have your thoughts ever raced through your mind like a herd of wild bulls, rushing at you all at once and ramming you with their evil horns? You fight them, you try to think of something else, you try to keep busy, but they keep racing through your mind turning your stomach in circles. You feel out of control and hopeless.

My husband asks me, “Why don't you believe me when I tell you everything will be okay?” The only answer I can give him is, “I can't turn off my mind.” It's not just the worrying that gets me; it's the gush of endless thoughts.

When bill time comes around, I start worrying if we'll be able to pay all our bills. Lou tells me not to worry, we are always fine. First the worries begin; then my thoughts start to race through my mind. They become out of control.

We will go bankrupt. I can't do anything right; I'll probably mess up our finances. We won't be able to afford to make it through the week. We'll lose everything. I'm a failure. I can't even do math without a calculator. Everyone in high school was right; I am worthless. We are going to end up homeless and broke because of me. The thoughts go on and on. My stomach twists into a tangled mess, my muscles tighten and I can't sleep. I also start dry heaving and sometimes I get sick.

No matter how hard I try, I can't stop the thoughts. They seem to be in control of me. I feel like I'm drowning within a mixture of thoughts and emotions. I clench my teeth in an attempt to hold in a scream of anguish. My emotions become so strong they hurt. I wish there was a switch in my head to shut my thoughts off. In my mind, the simplest situation turns to the worst thing in the world because of my endless thoughts.

After all is done, once I go through the checkbook, everything turns out fine. We make it through another week and all our bills get paid.

The racing thoughts also start up when I'm tired and stressed out. They hit me like a tidal wave at the worse moment possible.

In therapy I learned that the only way to take control of my thoughts is to fight them. I try to focus on positive things, I try picturing myself sitting on a beach or someplace relaxing and I try to keep busy by working on my memoir or doing house work. I work on changing my thoughts around and I reassure myself that Lou is right, and everything will be fine.

I still struggle with racing thoughts and sometimes they get the best of me, but I continue to fight them. The more I fight them, the less frequently my thoughts race and this helps me stay within the light.

LIFE THROWS PROBLEMS IN YOUR WAY

Sometimes life gets complicated and tests your mental wellbeing and strength. This world is full of ups and downs. You never know what life will throw your way. It seems like you solve one problem and another one comes up. When this happens, it's how you handle it that makes all the difference.

Last year I went almost 6 months with a boot on my foot. I went to physical therapy for almost as long. I had foot surgery and got an infection in the surgery site. When I finally healed, I thought my life was back on track. What else could go wrong? Then about 3 months ago, I started having pain in my knee while walking down stairs and in my shoulder each time I moved it. Once again, I was sent back to physical therapy.

After 3 months of therapy, my therapist said I was doing well and I only needed to do one more month. I thought, “Great I'm getting better therapy will be over soon and I will be back to normal.” Then about two weeks ago, life spit in my face and my shoulder started hurting more. My physical therapist suggested I go to the doctor. The doctor suggested I may have an injury and I had to get an x-ray and a MRI.

I started panicking. What if I need surgery? What if I have a serious problem? If I need surgery, how would we pay our bills? Why is God letting this happen to me again? Am I being punished? Wasn't what I went through last year enough? I can't do surgery again. Tears threatened to spill and I swallowed them. Once again I started magnifying the situation. I lay down on my couch as thoughts raced.

When my husband came home, he held my hand and reminded me not to worry about the future. He told me to only worry about the present. He was right. My pain could be something simple, but by worrying about it, I was making it into a huge problem. I decided to try and focus on other stuff, like taking my dog to get her nails cut, Lou taking me to lunch, working on my writing and watching my favorite television show. Keeping my mind busy helped me push my problem aside.

I remembered what my mom told me, God never gives us more then we can handle. This was just another challenge I had to face. A challenge of my strength to face my mental illness. It's only with God's help and my inner determination I can handle what is to come.

Life is never easy and things always go wrong just when we think everything is good. Turning to my husband and friends to remind me of the positive and turning to God for help is what keeps me in the light.

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.