Living with mental illness

As much as I wish I wasn't one of millions of Americans and people around the world to live with mental illness the fact is I am.  I suffer from depression, severe anxiety, borderline personality disorder, and let me tell you it really sucks!  You know while all three of those things (there are a few more things like a bit of agoraphobia, and paranoia) the thing that bothers me the most and makes afraid of the world around me is the anxiety.  Everyone has had anxiety at one time or another but when you are like me and have what I have it's a lot different.  

Here is the best way that I can explain it.  Imagine that you are meeting someone for the first time or going on an interview or something to that fact you get nervous.  Now take what your nervous about (you know the butterflies in your stomach) and multiply that by the biggest number you can think of as the worse case scenario.  Now when you are not dealing with the worse case scenario remember what your regular nervousness feels like when you are in some of the scenarios I mentioned above. That feeling that you have the first time you meet someone, or go on an interview, speak in public, go on a first date that is what I feel all the time 24 hours a day, everyday.  When you are someone like me the nervous butterflies never go away!  They are always there; the only difference is the level at which it is.  My normal level is what you feel when you do any of those things.  My higher level get to a point where I sweat, twitch, feel like I'm being touched all over, I stutter, and I am overwhelmed by a fear that no one can understand.  

I was never really afraid of anything that I thought of but when my sickness came to the forefront I realized that I have been afraid of a lot of things that people just didn't know about.  My mom had me when she was in her late 30's so when I was younger I used to worry about her dying.  She always worked but she worked for years with back problems that caused her so much pain and I worried and you know that is a lot for a young kid to worry about.  I used to be afraid about the things that go bump in the night like so many people in the world are but not anymore.  I am more afraid of the world and the people around me than ghosts and things like that.  Since I started writing about stuff like angels, ghosts and demons and shit like that I lost the fear for it and for some reason the role became reversed.  I'll explain what I mean in a minute.

The depression hits when you realized that you are in the middle of a panic attack and you really get depressed when you have such a bad one that you literally pass out.  Unfortunately for me I have at least one panic attack everyday and I have bad ones at lest 4 or 5 times a month and I had one today May 5th 2015.  I passed out earlier from a bad attack and I can tell you when you wake up you are not rested...not rested at all.  If anything you feel like you just went toe to toe with a prize fighter in a 12 round fight.  You're exhausted!  You are completely wiped out from the initial attack and then from the depression.  The personality disorder is what it is all nicely wrapped up into.  

I keep to myself most of the time and I don't go out much because I am too afraid of what's out there but I try and go out at least once a day (usually to walk 4 to 5 miles) as part of therapy.  I want to make something clear: we have heard so much about people with mental illness on television when someone go out and shoots or attacks someone or someplace but not all of us are like that.  I don't have any violent tendencies and don't believe everything that you see on the news or TV about someone who is Bi-Polar and the medicines they take.  Borderline personality disorder is just any word for Bi-Polar and not everyone go nuts.  Just because you take something for depression, anxiety, Bi-Polarism or any other mental illness doesn't automatically make you crazy.  

For example and to explain what I said I would earlier.  After my mother died ten years ago I started to hear and see things that weren't there but they weren't telling me to do anything wrong.  I am not saying that there weren't some that were all nice and cozy but when (if these things were real) realized that I wouldn't do what they were telling me things changed.  Everything that I started to see (call them ghosts, spirits or whatever) whether they were good or bad all seemed to be afraid of me.  I wouldn't hear anything unless I initiated contact first and even then it seemed like whomever or whatever was talking to me was walking on egg shells and being very cautious about what they were saying.  

At first I didn't know what it was and yes I did think I was going crazy but then I realized I wasn't.  Then when the sickness that I had been able to bury for almost 37 years erupted I thought that I was crazy then because of everything and because of what I was seeing and hearing.  However that isn't the case.  While I suffer form mental illness and told by my counselor and doctor that I may never be able to work again I still have my sanity (at least to a point.)  I know the difference between right and wrong, my children that I raise on my own (ten years now on my own) are more important to me than anything and for that reason I will never hurt myself.  

To tell you the truth the anxiety is so bad that I believe that I am just afraid of being afraid.  I don't want sympathy I just wish I had someone in my life (a girlfriend maybe) who would have a shoulder for me to cry on (yes I do cry and no I don't give a fuck if anyone knows because a real man admits anything and everything; a cowardly man hides).  I don't have that in my life and if I do meet someone (because I don't lie) I tell them about what's wrong with me right away so they can get out if they want before we get close.  It doesn't mean that I still don't wish that I had that special woman in my life to be my rock when I don't have the strength to hold myself up.  Now I always bounce back that is a given; I have to because of my kids (I am the only parent they have).  However with every attack and even worse attacks the bounce back takes longer.  Night time is the worst because my children are alone and I don't sleep much (especially after a bad attack) but at night I'm alone.  Now as much as a love my cat "Buddy" and he always seems to sit with me when he knows I'm not doing well it's not the same even though I appreciate my little fur ball.  However I would be lying if I didn't say that I was scared because I am and because the anxiety never goes away neither does the fear.  

Don't judge someone just because they take some medication or see a counselor or doctor for what's going on in his or her heads.  Try to be understanding.  Trust me their is a difference between mental illness and someone that is butt fuck crazy (i.e. the Denver theater shootings a few years back at the "Dark Knight" premier).  That muthafuker was and is crazy but not everyone is like that.  I don't ming letting people know what I have so they can understand that not everyone that has what I have wants to kill someone or kill themselves.  I'm afraid and sad right now but like I said I will bounce back and you will hear from me again.

TheMaximusKane

First let me start with something true: God and the devil are real!  Good and evil exists, so does nature, people, and fee will.  I am sure that there are a lot more things out there that are real but I am here to talk more about what isn't than what really is.  Don't worry I will be writing about other things other than what I listed above in the future from politics and social issues to whatever the hell I want.

Here are some things that some of you might not want to hear.  While the devil or evil influences us God does not.  Let me explain why I wrote that.  Many people are quick to praise God for miracles that happen in life; for example: being saved by a natural disaster, an accident, an attack, or anything bad that could potentially happen to anyone of us.  However what people will never do is blame God for the bad things that happen but oddly enough they don't blame the devil either!  You can't have it both ways.  If a hurricane saves you but not your neighbor does that mean that your faith is greater than your neighbor even if the two of you lead the exact same lives?  

If God influences everything in the world then doesn't he influence those hurricanes and natural disasters as well?  Like I said you can't have it both ways!  While I believe that God (or whatever higher power is out there) is real; I believe that he or she only watches what we do.  For the purposes of making this flow better I will be referring to God as a he.  While I believe that he watches everything that we do and how we react to what comes before us, I know for a fact that he does not make anything happen.  

I grew up a Catholic and I believed everything I read in the Bible and everything that was taught to me in school but when I go to college and grad school I broadened my horizons and thinking.  I decided to disregard the bible because in my reality it is not God's words.  He didn't write it, men did and no I do not believe that these men were guided by Him to write those words.  Take a close look at things that are in there and you just might see what I am talking about. No one can live to be a 175 years old even in today's standards but Abraham is said to have lived that long in the Old Testament.  

Even with all the technology and medical advances that we have made today no one will ever live that long.  I am not saying that it will never be possible in the future because people are living to be over 100 years old now and a lot of people that are older don't even look his or her age.  Back in that time the life expectancy for a man was maybe at most 40 years old.  I already know what you're thinking it was a miracle but really?  

What about Noah's Ark?  We have all been to a zoo in our lifetime at some time or another and the last time I checked all the animals are separated in cages. The reason being is that some of them would eat each other!  How can we believe that Noah was able to take two of each animal into one ship and they all played nice together.  You can believe it was a miracle if you want to but if a lion, tiger, or any other carnivore sees a chicken he's going to fucking eat it.  

Stories are told for generations and with each time a story is told that story because more and more extravagant.  You can prove that to yourself by doing one simple exercise.  Make up a story and tell one of your friends (make sure that the friend you tell has some of the same friends you have).  Wait a while and I guarantee you that by the time the story gets back to you it will be completely different than the story you originally told with only a few truths left in it.  

You have to remember that in the time that these stories and the bible were written the drink of choice was wine (wine get you drunk faster than beer and almost as fast a liquor and at that time think about how potent the wine must have been).  Also during that time while herbs and similar seasoning that we use today was put into their food the seasoning of choice was from a plant called a mandrake.  For those of you who are not familiar with Mandrake; it is a plant that has hallucinogenic properties and would put you on something as close to an acid trip that you could imagine.  Take some of that shit and tell me you wouldn't be seeing stuff that isn't there and making stuff up.  

I am not telling you to stop believing in what you believe because that is your prerogative.  I am just telling what I chose.  I chose to leave behind the words of men and put my faith in God and nothing else.  There are so many things in the bible that do point to the compassion and love that God and Jesus Christ has for all of us but then again there are so many things that point to hatred that men had against things they deemed to be wrong even if they are not.  For me the bible is a book filled with tales of half truths that were written to make people comply with the rules they deemed to be best.  

While I don't believe that the bible is the word of God it doesn't change or diminish my faith in God.  See that is the problem with people today.  They have become so engulfed in the bible and church that they have ignored what they should really be believing in and that's God.  Reading the bible, going to church, synagogue, mosque, or wherever you go doesn't mean that you have faith in God.  You have faith in your religion but that doesn't make your faith in God real or any stronger.  Your faith in God has to come from within and not from listening to someone preach what is wright and what is wrong.  We all have that little voice in our heads called a conscious that tells us the difference between the two.  

People say that "God never gives you more than you can handle" however people get things that are more than they can handle all the time and here's a little secret: he doesn't give you anything.  If he creates a miracle to save someone who has cancer; isn't he the same one who created that living tissue (cancer) and gave it to you.  The answer is NO!  Shit happens and it happens all the time and it is up to all of us to show him how we deal with that shit.  Again I am not telling you to stop believing in what you believe in or stop praying but try and put your faith in the real deal which is God and not the words of men!

I'll be back