Posted by alexandra_k on July 3, 2015, at 19:55:59
In reply to Re: 1 down, 3 to go, posted by alexandra_k on June 30, 2015, at 22:53:27
I went to visit my Mother the other day. It wasn't so bad. Except that the house was so cold that it physically hurt. We are taught to pretend that it isn't cold. Yeah. So very much cheaper that way. Anyway, I brought back some stuff that I had stored there.
I read my old file notes. Not all of them. The first couple weeks of my first admission are missing. There are other chunks, too, but most of them are there. It was weird reading them. I remember there were points at which I did read them along the way. At the time I remember feeling all indignant about this and that. That they had interpreted things in this or that way or that they had written things that weren't true. But I didn't feel that way about any of it. I guess the memories have faded. Into the second year... It was like I was reading file reports for someone else.
I have my school reports, too. Most of my High School ones are missing, but I have the ones from Primary school. And I have my Plunket book (pre-school).
I see why I was diagnosed with BPD. Looking pretty borderline, even to me. There was definate staff splitting going on there, too, with respect to clinicians who had empathy for me and clinicians who saw me as being manipulative / working the system and who wanted me to be terminated because contact with the service only made me worse.
Now... I see their point. The point of the 'evil bastards', heh. I wasn't intentionally being manipulative, but... Well... Linehan did a pretty good job, indeed. I really did do the best I could to cope and I really didn't know any better.
Reading my psychology notes... My first psychologist really went in to bat for me. Amazingly so. But she was... Kinda OCD in her CBTness. She couldn't sit with me in silence and... Just listen. To anything. She had to get to work in reframing it or whatever. She meant well, really, she did, but I couldn't handle anything. I'd forgotten just how fragile and helpless and... Passive and dependent I was back then. I felt safest (happiest in some peverse way) when I was sectioned in seclusion. I figured strategies for staying in hospital like kicking at the doors or attempting (in a way that I knew would likely fail, yes) in order to get sectioned again instead of discharged...
And 'the voices are screaming at me' was a language clinicians seemed to understand (admit and observe) but 'i feel horrible' wasn't... And then I got all confused in myself about whether I was telling the truth about hearing voices or whether I was making up stories. Whether I was a lying manipulative person or what... And I felt like a horrible bad person, yes. And I didn't know whether I was making up stories or not. Whether I heard voices or not. I just knew that I was hurting so bad and I really and truly didn't know what the hell else to do in order to have any hope in gettin gthe only thing that seemed to help me. A seclusion cell. I guess. And the limitied inter-personal contact of a single person (1:1 staff time) of a walk around the yard and a cigarette...
A calming environment.
Anyway...
I wonder if I would have liked a straight jacket. I bet I would...
I guess the point is that I feel at peace with it, now. Some of the clinicians were helpful, some not so much. Some of them were helpful in their intent, some of them not so much. I did do best in DBT. Mostly because of the security of the 1 year contract and the structured session content (so I didn't have to provide that) and the education stuff on emotions was helpful because I thought you were supposed to label them by introspection and I couldnt' really do that before all I had was 'alright' or 'not so alright' or 'f*ck*ng horrid'.
I really have come a long way.
The funniest thing... Plunket was fine. No delay in any milestones or problems with any motor skills. Reading words and saying alphabet around 3... Handwriting was remarked on as messy... Lots of careless errors and too much haste more generally. I did quite well in math - but I distinctly remember cheating on my times tables test so they would quit harrassing me when I was about 7 so maybe I learned to cheat? I don't know...
Then about lack of organisation... Messy...
I have this thing where I find it hard to get started / hard to get motivated to get started. Then once I'm started it is equally hard for me to find whatever it is so I can stop. I started going on walks because keyworkers initially made me... Then I really got into it... I didn't want to cook so they made me make spaghetti... Then I wanted to make a chocolate cake... One of them almost got me playing badminton (but I didn't want to - of course)... More vigorous exercise would have helped me, for sure.
Anyway... I really am able to feel objective about myself... Which is good. And... I don't feel burning hatred or whatever for doctors x and y and z anymore. Doctor x... Was right. Only... HIs solution was to... Leave me to die. I guess. Abandon me. Take away the only place I knew of to go to for help. I guess... Without that place (the hospital) I may have made better progress on making the other ones work out better for me. University. In particular. But I do need support when times get stressful... Typically... The holidays. Those are hard times for me. After the first week... All the unstructured time then... That's when I disintegrate. Because I don't have anything to hold it together for. Yeah.
My Biology grade got changed from a B to a B+. I requested all my exam scripts (which I always do) and then it got changed from a B to a B+. Odd. If the board of examinors altered it... If it were somehow disability adjusted that would have happened before I was given notification of my final grade... I... Don't trust things here. This country... Very corrupt... I don't think I'm being especially delusional or paranoid or whatever. Anyway... I suppose a B+ is acceptable in the sense of being a neutral contributor to my required average. Looking back through test 1... Quite a few things... I trust they graded it properly but some of those things... Are they really wrong? I guess without a herd I'm easy pickings...
FFS.
Isn't the world a wonderful place?
poster:alexandra_k
thread:1076978
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/social/20150604/msgs/1080192.html