Relapse?

Most days I just sit and look at the sky and wonder where my life went. Had you asked me 2 months ago where I was going, I could have told you, but now I can't even think about where I want to be. You see, I stepped out of my comfort zone and took a chance, I saved $5000.00 and moved back to the North East, got up here, found out nothing I had planned was going to work out and that is when the depression truly sunk in., of course it doesn't help that my depression doesn't even phase him (although he knows my history with it and what I am capable of doing). But see now we are broke, living at his sisters or a hotel and my depression is even greater than normal.

I found out none of my certifications are good up here.
Jobs are hard to come by everywhere.
Housing is very expensive and again hard to come by with a dog.

And yet here I am still fighting, but at the same time you have to wonder what I'm still fighting for? Everyday I want to harm myself and with each passing moment the stuggle gets worse. I mean currently he is working but I fear each day that will end as I fight to find one. I've got to get back to work and now, not later! Which brings me back to the question, "what am I fighting for?" Why am I going through this stuggle? What am I doing with my life? Where is my higher power leading me? What can I do to change all this sorrow in myself? These are all questions I need to find the answers to so that I won't harm or hurt myself.

I know the main answer and that is, I WILL FIGHT TO KEEP ME GOING! But then you have that nagging question in the back of your mind: how long will Lori keep fighting? I look at my past and realize it has never been for that long, (the fighting I mean). But as I'm sitting here writing this, I know it will work out somehow in the end. Right now as we speak he is in the basement while I am sitting on the deck. He is on his computer, I am on mine and when I try to talk to him he gets pissy and walks away. Damnit Ray, I need some help and I need you! But yet I don't say it. I crave normalcy and don't have it so my mind turns to wanting to drink, do drugs, harm myself, or any other thing I know is not right for me. But at the same time I don't do any of them, instead my mind goes to a darker place. Tomorrow I am taking a job that pays $7.00 an hour, which will realize some of my stress but at the same time, I worry "Can I make it on that?"

Am I being honest with myself? I don't know how much I honestly am, and I constantly sit and ruminate about whether I am or not and how much is bu$% shi^. Am I taking on too much of the blame and being distorted in my thinking?

I can't do my grateful list as I no longer truly remember what I am grateful for besides my son

Dear Mental Illness

A letter to my mental illness....

Have I ever told you how much I hate you? Yet I love you for just as many reasons.

Reasons I hate you:

1) You've taken some of my family from me
2) You've helped me ruin relationships in more than one way.
3) you've helped ruin my life in many ways: example, self-harm, theft, jail, and even by messing up in school.
4) You've helped me ruin the lives of many.
5) You've even helped me hold on to relationships that I shouldn't
6) You've help me forget who I am.

The reasons I love you:

1) You've helped me bring back some of my family
2) You've helped me make over 2000 friends in the last 2 years
3) you've taken my life in a whole new direction (Thank You!)
4) You've helped me see that I am not Hopeless and that I am a good person.
5) Thanks to you I have made some great friends in life and experience some amazing relationships
6) You've helped me see where I belong
7) You've helped me see who I am and who I want to be.
8) Because of you I can make someone's life a better place, as well as mine
9) Because of you I can see clearly where I was and where I need to be.

Needless to say, I am doing great where I am now, even with all of your short comings. That being said, there are still 2 people who I want in my world but they aren't, my son and my father. I need their support, yet don't have it, yet I am grateful for this in my life who are my support systems. If your reading this, you know who you are.

To date, I have started school and am almost on to my Junior year while maintaining a 4.0 (who would have ever thought? LOL), I have certificates to teach 5 different classes, and am currently working on 4 more, and will reach my goal of starting a recovery college at the rate I am going and I owe most of it to you my mental illness. Thank you for helping to push me to accomplish these tasks.

Today I am grateful for:
1) My recovery
2) my friends and the many more I will make.
3) My new life.
4) The ability to overcome my fears.
5) My friends going through recovery and them making it...

New Challenges

In a matter of 3 days I lost 12 hours at work due to medicaid cutting consumers hours. I adore my job, love all my consumers to no end and they know that I would do anything I could for them. Except give them extra hours like the ones they got taken away from them. Technically your not supposed to befriend your consumers, but I saw no way around it. After all their supposed to trust you and accept you at your word when you tell them that this or that worked for you and your trying to convince them to try the same things to help them through their recovery. So I see no way around befriending them.

I make no money off of my job. All the money I make goes towards gas and my hotel room, leaving just enough to pay one bill each month. So it's really not the money I'm worried about. Its the fact that I feel greedy about losing my hours with my consumers. I have made so much progress with 2 of them that I hate to see them back slide all because of their medicaid. So in a way I'm being greedy for them.

I am seeing a pattern here. My writing is all over the place, I'm confused about what I am mad about, which means only one thing. Depression! Course it doesn't help I've been out of medication for over a month. LOL. I think I need to head to bed.

Oh and I made a very bad joke at work today. We were sitting around talking about the P Doc refilling prescriptions and I asked my QP if she thought he would write me a script for my Klonapin. They didn't find it funny. However I had a great laugh when I saw the look on their face. LOL

Sweet Dreams All.....

1) I am grateful for this oppritunity to tell a friend I am sorry after a year and a half!
2) I am grateful for the people I have met through work.
3) I am grateful that school starts again next week.
4) I am grateful for the rain we have had, even if it makes my job harder since this entire area is very flood prone.
5) I am grateful for the Iguana that I rescued who is now happy and content.

Depression sinks in again....

It snuck up on me again. This is the second time in a month that I have been so depressed that I have thought about it 3 times now. Self-mutilating that is.

Things were looking up so awesomely to the point that my mom and grammy felt I was taking on to much. I admit I might have been but I was holding my own, till 2 weeks ago. I took a job 2 hours away from home and was driving the 4 hour round trip daily, until I got a call from a Raleigh Mental Health office offering me a position. SO obviously I quit the long commute and took the shorter one. Well the new company hasn't used me once, but yet they sure as hell have charged me for the training that they have made me take. I'm officially indebted to my new company for $350.00 and have yet to work a day at this point. Can we say cracking #1.

Cracking #2 is that I bought my training manuals, need to make 3 copies of the student manual and 1 copy of the teaching manual plus copies of all the hand outs that I will be using. The kid at the copy center told me it would be about 5 cents since I was getting so many copies, went to pick them up and bam!, triple the price that was quoted. I had counted on 40 bucks, instead it cost me $164.95. I'm in fucking hell by now. Can't afford the cost of the printings and they won't return my manuals till I pay for the copies. The good thing is that they are printed so that when I do get them back, all I have to do is put them together, send them in, wait 10 weeks, and pray they approve them so that I can teach Peer Support Specialist Training.

Anyone know where I can get a loan? LOL

I did apply for a Pepsi Refresh grant, it goes live July first and you can bet I will put a link on my blog so that people can vote for it. I want to train 100 people who would otherwise have no hope at getting a job do something that would be very rewarding to them in the long run, become a PSS. With so many budget cuts, many people have lost their services who were doing so well with the help. Medicare is finally getting ready to pass a definition for the PSS job which will create hundreds of jobs across the state and many other states are following suit since we don't cost as much as an RN or CSAC would. This grant would pay for their manuals, to attend the class for free instead of having to find ways to cover the costs, and so much more. So please when I put the link up, take a minute and vote for my organization.

Cracking #3 would be the fact that my truck payment is coming up soon, again thanks to the job not working me, I don't have it. Cracking #4 is the fact that last month I lost my MAC, got it back by putting it on layaway for double what I lost it for, and now I don't have that payment either. SO needless to say, I am hanging on by a tiny thread that has unraveled down to less then one and it's ready to break.

Why does everything revolved around money? It seems like most days, that is what causes much of my depression. I live with my mom and have paid her 50 bucks in 9 months even though I do contribute my food stamps to the house, but I hate that I can't pay her more since my step-dad doesn't work either, but at least I'm trying.

My grandma told me today that I am her "HOPE", making me feel like royal shit! So when she asked me how I have been doing I just smiled and said "ok grandma". Of course they have been expecting me to get this way, I just don't show them, nor do I let them in on my depression because there isn't anything they can do about it. They hold me to such high standards that I have set myself, that I feel like an even bigger failure when I let them down. I almost went over to the Durham Center today and checked myself in, that how close I am. Hell I still might. I have not had to be institutionalized in 13 years and I feel I am coming that close right now.

I hope everyone has a great day!

Giving Up!

I'm tired of fighting! This all came about with in the last few hours. What started out as a great day quickly turned to shit after I woke up from my nap. I realized that I more then likely wont reach my goal of becoming a Peer Support Specialist due to not being able to afford the classes. I realized that come next week my laptop will probably be lost to the pawn shop to make my truck payment. I realized my grammy more or less has become forgetful or fails to remember things.

Had my last DBT group today. Felt good about leaving them, but now I want them back. Sharonda even had me tell the group the way I felt my outcome has been since joining the group, another person agreed and that felt great that it seems to help other as well. However, I feel lost right now.

Today is also my last day of school until the 12th of April. I did awesome for the first time in my life, but again, I feel empty.

Have I been fooling myself into thinking things were getting better for me? Mental Illnesses fucking blow!!!

Working, Hoping, Praying....

I find myself longing for a job this morning! Something I haven't felt in years.

I want to help other's who are in the same boat I am and for the most part I can't help them till I complete Peer Support training, my Psychology degree or some other means to obtain that job. I finally found a Peer Support Specialist Training group over in Winston Salem, but they charge $250.00 bucks for their course and with my truck payment coming up, I just don't have that kind of cash. It crushes me to feel that helpless!

Besides that blow, this week ended my individual therapy and my group therapy. Again, I am crushed! I was really starting to like both and feel they were finally beginning to help me. Sure I can go back, if I'm in CRISIS mode!!! Which really fucking sucks. Why should someone have to be in crisis mode to get the help they need? The way I see it, if someone is trying to get the help to make their life better, BEFORE THEY GO INTO CRISIS MODE, doesn't it make more sense to help them then as well if they are reaching out for it?

I so am beginning to hate the government more and more when it comes to getting the healthcare help I need!

If I won the lottery, one of the first things I would do is open a pro-bono mental health facility, a grant writer, and a staff who has the same love that I do for mental health. Kind of like Patch Adam of the mental health world. LOL

I have big dreams, big ideas, and I finally see that if I put my mind to something I CAN DO IT! LOL. Never thought I'd hear that come out of my mouth.

I swear I'm not have a Borderline Personality issue,  I'm not in manic mode, and I'm not having grandiose ideas (except for wanting to win the lottery). I'm not having ay of these, I swear. These are just ideas that I have for the future and at some point in my life I just want to see happen. I want to help those who are worse off then me recover, have some form of life, or begin to live again. I'm not trying to cure the world, I just want to help the world. This is my way of being the people pleaser that I know I am, with a catch; to help myself along the way.

5 things I am Grateful for today......

1) To be in recovery and realize that I have actually been for the past 6 years.
2) To finally accept that I am a good person and that I can do great things!
3) That I have a wonderful and supporting mother, even if I don't tell her.
4) That I actually finished the first quarter of school with out dropping out!!!! YIPEE!!!!!
5) For the kisses that wake me up every morning, from my puppy telling me he has to go outside. LMAO

Bipolar Makes the World Go Round

Today is one of those days when everything just feels "blah", if you know what I mean. DBT Group sucked as usual, my life sucks as usual, I'm a broke biotch, and I lack in ambition. Ah but then who doesn't. LOL. At least I still have my humor and that is what counts.

Talked my girl "M" today and I flat out told her I was a negative Nellie. LOL. She came back with different names for. I'll just flat out say what it is to me. But yea know, as much as shit sucks right now, I am still smiling and laughing. To me that's what counts. I know I need to be positive for positive things to happen, but truthfully no one can be positive 24/7 and still be sane. LOL

On a positive note, I asked for something outloud from my buddy, and I got it from another person unexpected. That to me was a shock and it got me to thinking about the laws of attraction and if they were really true or not.

Law of Attraction: The Science of Attracting More of What You Want and Less of What You Don't

Its hard to believe that something so simple could happen like that. If the Law of Attraction is true, why do so many people lead such negetive lives. Something for me to ponder on, as if I dont think about enough deep shit. LOL.

Mom and i rented a very bad movie tonight, I had a hard time keeping my mind on it. But as I was sitting there letting it wander off, I decided to try one of the exercises that I learned in Group and that is when your mind wanders off like that, rein it back in to what you are doing at that point. What I found is, while I can rein it back in, my mind seems to be thinking of itself and wanders off again. In the 2 hours it took to watch that movie, I ended up pulling myself back to it about evey 5 minutes. Tough, but I did it. Makes you wonder if someone might actually know what their talking about. LOL. I'm sure over time and with proper training I will be able to get my mind on the right track. Don't get me wrong, I bet on the occasion my mind will do what it wants, regardless of what I want, but that won't matter any more as I will know how to control it.

I haven't had a thought in my head about cutting lately. Sure the urge is always there, but I have to have the desire if I am going to do something like that and self mutilating has not been on my agenda. I realy don't feel like bleeding right now, sure I could use a good self mutilating session, but thats not where I want to be. I want to be free of mutilating, free of the pain I have afterward, free of the mindset, free of the mess I have to clean up later on down the road. I DON'T WANT TO SELF MUTILATE ANY MORE!!!!!!! On the truth side of things, I know it's not gone from my life, but I know I will beat the 3 years I was clean of self mutilating. I have that strength, that power! I control me, not my cutting.

The Attraction Distraction: Why the Law of Attraction Isn't Working for You and How to Get Results - 

My grateful list tonight includes:

1) I am grateful for wonderful friends. I am up to 3 now. LOL. I'm growing in numbers.
2) I'm grateful for the Christmas Miracle that happened today with positive thinking.
3) I'm grateful for the fact I get to go back to school.
4) I'm grateful that things are looking up for me with my DBT Group.
5) I'm gratefrul for the fact tomorrow I get to take Grammy to get her hair done. LOL.

Have to throw the funny ones in there a time or two. LOL. Okay serious thought now: Wonder if Santa will bring me my Christmas wishes, after all I have been semi naughty this year. LOL. Please Santa, I need that gym membership!

To write another day!!!

Can't get a Psych Counselor, Become a Psych Counselor!

I have done it! I have started applying to schools to become a Psych Counselor. I decided last night that since I am having such a hard time getting one of my own, why not become one. Hell I'm very good at doing the same things they do, I just don't have the degree. I thought about taking the short route and just becoming an assistant to see if that was something I want to do, but I decided no, I need to just jump into this and push myself forward. I need to fight to the finish on this one as this will have a major impact on my life. After all I am 38 and am not getting any younger. So by the time I graduate from a major college with a Bachelor's Degree in Applied Psychology, I will be 43 years old and just starting my life all over again.

I'm proud of myself for taking this step!

I want to help people who ask for it. I have no desire to be in a fancy office waiting for my clients who might be cheating on a spouse and feeling guilty about it, I want the real deal. LOL. I told a friend of mine last night, "My luck I'll be the sap who works for free because people such as myself will come to them." Yes that will be me and I'll take those cases because the people need help, not because I want to be rich.

My heart is huge and it has room for 50 people if they want the care, if they don't then it will be patiently waiting for the next 2 or 3 to trickle in. Thats me in a nut shell. Big heart, big head, and plenty of room for more friends, patients, and family that want to crawl inside. LOL. Will you be my next "victium" er I meant patient. LOL.

Isn't humor a wonderful thing! You can find humor in most things that you do, no matter how bad the situation is, there is always something funny involved in it. Sure you might not think so at the time, but later as your sitting there reflecting on what the situation was, you'll find something along the line that was humorous.

I have this dear dear friend that I met just a few weeks ago online. Her and I have become an insperation in each others lives. I don't think I could face a day without her, that is how much she has become a part of my life. The moral of that; someone can come to you even from far away and without meeting them can make the biggest difference in your life for the good. Thank you my Dear Canadian Friend! You know who you are.

My gratitude list for tonight goes like this;

1) I am grateful for my Friend "M".

2) I am grateful for the desire to go back to school and persue a life long goal.

3) I am grateful for the turkey that I cooked today and for the full stomach that I have.

4) I am grateful my grandma seems to be in blessed spirits tonight

5) I am grateful that I can live another day in a semi-peaceful state.

Now I know some of these might over lap a few days ago here and there, but they are things that deserve to be here.

Till Tomorrow.....