This is How We Do It...the "Hard Work"

…by putting one foot in front of the other

I frequently am asked "how did you do this? How do I heal? How do I let the past no longer control my today? How do I get past this pain that never leaves me?"

Today I wanted to share a post that I wrote last year that was a storyboard of the path and process I followed to do the "hard work" of my healing journey.

Go here to read this post. There are quite a few links I'd like to invite you to click on and follow...each picture or soul collage has its own page and story behind it. There is also some Poetry and other examples of expressive work that I used to facilitate my journey from there where I lived in that dark place to here where today I live in the light:) 

What's the "hard work"?

Its the work in which I willingly entered into the pain of the past to finally experience it in a state of conscious awareness instead of avoiding it...and trust that I will survive it.

Its that place where I had acknowledged that the coping mechanisms where I was "acting in" or "acting out" that had protected me in the midst of the pain but no longer were serving me well as it had become the proverbial ball and chain that interfered with my ability to run the race or live my "best life".

Its that place where I learned how to no longer be a victim and desired to live far beyond survival. 

Its that place where I stopped avoiding triggers to cope and manage them and I began seeing them as the teacher that had shown up - because I was now the student who was ready.

Its that place where I realized that the only way out of this pain...

was to go through it

that I might finally 

live beyond it. 

Heres that link again where you can read this post and view its many links here:Whoops! I Did it Again! Using Creativity...

 Seek Knowledge, find Wisdom, live your Truth!

"story"...or "Story"?

Everyone has a story. 


And it was when I learned how to tell the difference between "story" (little s) and "Story" (big S) that I began to understand the power of 


Story.



"story" I came to view from a writers perspective as "backstory".

"story" lays the groundwork, tells who the players are, give atmosphere and lays a foundation for the ending, like in a novel.

Its the framework for a creative ending.

But - if the entire novel is written only about the "backstory" that lays the framework the last chapter never gets written.

We are stuck in WRITERS HELL....

That file on our hard drive that is never quite finished

and causing us all kinds of irritation

or distress.

It is when we move from laying the groundwork, setting the stage and telling the backstory to telling about the emotion, the experiences and the drama behind our feelings about the 'story", like when we

 step to the edge of the mountain,

that we begin to see how the story might evolve and in time come to a conclusion worthy of a pulitzer...

so to speak:)

Throughout my journey, when I was stuck on "story" that focussed on what others had done or things that had happened TO me - I was stuck in anger, resentment, hatred and rumination...

not resolution.

I was stuck in the pain of the past. 

In time, I learned to recognize this was where I was at by who and what my focus was on. 

If the focus of my story was on the things that had happened; the people, the places, the things going on that I'd had no choice in - well, those were things that I could not change. 


(God, grant me serenity....)


These were those things I was truly powerless over - people and past circumstances.

That was backstory; the details, the players...the who, what, when and where of my bigger "Story" and the framework for the final chapter. 


It was in shifting my Story to be about me, my anger at being violated, my power and my choice taken from me, to feel both the anger and the grief, to tell why this was important to me that I was able to move myself into, through and out of the healing process and

give meaning to the backstory by telling MY story.

Getting entangled in "story" made it impossible to tell my "Story" and write that new ending where I am

no longer 

a victim

and much more

than a survivor

where I am

creating and living my best life

each day....


in spite of the past I'd had.



See the post: It is Unwritten....(today is where your book begins:))



 Seek Knowledge, find Wisdom, live your Truth!

Part of My Story..."The Day I Found Hope"

Photo Credit

Over at Beyond Meds, Gianna Kali has made it part of her mission to give voice to those who have found their way from "illness" to create their own life of "wellness".

And today I am honored to have part of my own story added to her rolls.

An excerpt from "The Day I Found Hope"...

In hindsight, the doctor who forced this washout of the psychotropic drugs I had been on for the fifteen years previous, had forgotten to tell me the physical, emotional and mental hell that I would go through for a long time in this withdrawal process as my body returned to a natural drug free state. A very long time.

Over the next two and a half years I would often wonder if withdrawing from psych drugs was similar to withdrawing from heroin or meth – but then decided this had to be much worse. If it was street drugs that had altered my body and brain for the past fifteen years I would have been able to go to a residential facility for up to a year perhaps. Instead, I was discharged after seven-day inpatient stay and told I was now diagnosed with yet another personality disorder and no longer needed the drugs. Seven days.

Seven days in which I had slept a total of about four hours as my body began the long process of learning to live without the drugs that I had been dependent on for sleep – but never had really worked as insomnia had become my norm almost immediately after entering the mental health system and starting the daily regimen of pills.

But – surprisingly at the time I wasn’t angry with him. In fact I was grateful.

You can read the entire article here

Warning: To abruptly stop taking psychotropic drugs is extremely dangerous and can at times be life threatening. To proceed with this process demands one be fully informed of both the process and the consequences. For more information about the withdrawal process go here.

Please read my disclaimer here.

To read more recovery stories go here and here.

Knowledge is Power and Truth Sets Us Free

'You may not yet be able to bring your unconscious mind activity into awareness as thoughts, but it will always be reflected in the body as an emotion, and of this you can become aware." --Eckhart Tolle The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment Page 22

As I sat in the office of this new therapist, I wondered just what the hell I had gotten myself into. I wasn't sure about this person. She seemed a bit "new agey" and that didn't mesh well with the ideals of the religion I had submitted to for 10 years where pretty much anyone who didn't walk, talk, think, breath and do the way the leaders of the church did were to be shunned and said to be of the devil himself.

But I had left religion - not faith mind you, but RELIGION ie a faith based on "doing" over the spiritual connection that I found in simply being and accepting myself as I was without judgement - I had left that 15 years ago. Imagine that. After 15 years the brainwashing and judgement still crept into and affected my ability to have a mind and opinions of my own.

I don't recall the exact conversations of those first few months as I was still struggling with memory recall after being on potent psychotropic medications these past 15 years so while I was free of the religious conditioning I was still under the affect of the drugs I had been prescribed. Thankfully, over time my ability to remember, recall and attend, the psychosis and paranoia faded as my body and brain returned to their natural drug free state.

What I do recall of this day and conversation that was actually several weeks and perhaps a couple of months into this new therapy relationship was her saying "So just try being aware of those thoughts" as I told her how my head was spinning and I couldn't even leave my apartment to do laundry without a complete meltdown.

And this is where my journey turned down a new bend as I practiced with mindful awareness and began to learn how to listen to and trust my own thoughts, emotions/feelings and connect to my body and to my "self" after a lifetime of being defined by others.

So today...just try being aware of those thoughts. Without judgement or ridicule of yourself or anyone else. Just for a moment....listen

to you...

and just

be.

Whoops! I did it again! Using Creativity...

Whoops! I did it again!

Well - sort of!

Finding creativity after a lifetime of "stuffing" anything about me that expressed my individuality or and sense of “self” has not been the easiest part of this journey (you can see my bio here). But - I have taken some steps to do that through a variety of mediums throughout my journey.

One of the first that I posted online was my storyboard. There are 5 collage cards and the interesting thing is that when I set out to do this activity, I had no plan in mind. Yet - when it was finished, I realized that I had told my story in this series. The first I titled "Disconnected".

The second in this series portrays how I felt in the midst of the worst of this part of my journey. "A Shadow" of who I might have been - but in hindsight...I see that also was only a shadow of all that I could - and will - become.

"Fragmented" is an expression of how I felt I had no defined sense of self; no "me" to speak of. This is during the time when I made the choice to take my journey into my own hands as I stepped to the top of the mountain, my arms open to what may come, trusting the process as I stepped off the edge. I was ready to do the "hard work"...the emotionally wrenching grieving of a life I would never know. Little did I know that this healing process would take me to the life I never knew that I could have.

Grieving...what was...and wasn't is the process that I have followed to find my way out of the legacy of hopeless and helplessness that comes so often with trauma of any kind. It was a time of finding the "how" behind learning to "let go" of all that I could not change in my past or control in my future. It was where I began to find the peace that passed all of my understanding. The joy of living that comes with living in the truth that set me free.

"I Am Free" exhibits the freedom I have found as I have followed this simple although not easy process to claim my right to exist, to breath, to stand tall. And it all began because I believed that I would "find something to stand on...or learn how to fly" ...I am now in flight:).

My post, "Was it worth it?" is where I posted one of my first "self portraits" as I began to use charcoal drawing to begin to learn how to express what I was feeling. I drew this portrait near the beginning of a new leg of my journey as I entered that place of willingness to step out of my shame and begin to claim my world, my life...as my own. This was that place within the process of my storyboard where I learned that it was safe...and I learned how to grieve the past and embrace rather than avoid the pain as my path to freedom from the darkness. This is what the "hard work" looked like for me...Today I cried...and was set free. This drawing is now in a frame on my wall where I am reminded each day of that sacred place where I found - and took - my freedom.

"Haiku" is my journey into poetry. This poem is the simplest and most beautiful description of the healing path that I have followed. Tears...wash the soul free.


I Believed is my version of the wonderful Patrick Overton poem that inspired me to keep moving forward when I thought I could not take one more step or endure one more moment of pain.


I have also done some writing of fiction based on my experiences as well as I have some non fiction things on the stove that are not quite ready to be served just yet:) And today...I wanted to post/share what I did yesterday with my iphone camara and the photo editing software on my mac. Nothing fancy schmancy - but it just goes to show that we all have some sort of creativity within us and it doesn’t have to be museum quality to qualify as “expressive”.

And, for me anyway, my creative expressions will typically connect me to whatever it is that I am focused on at the moment; whether I am consciously aware of it – or not. I can use my creative forms of expression to identify how I am feeling when I do not understand why I am being sullen, sad, irritable or even ecstatically happy. I can use my creative work to indicate and learn to identify an emotion or resolve a triggered situation that I cannot yet name.

So - yes; I guess I "did it again" as the story goes:) I used photo's to live in my now and build a bridge from my past pain to my present awareness and acceptance. 


What's the story behind these pics?

I have my story but you may have one too; what do you see when you look at these photos? What story from your own journey comes to your mind?

This is where your beginning may be. This is the story you might find a way to express today that will be your catalyst to finding your own freedom and creating your own new story.

And while we might hope and wish that doing this once or even twice might be the “end”…oftentimes each story takes us to the next and the next.

So how do I know I am done – or at least making some progress?

When my expression became less of pain and more of joy and peace and acceptance of what is instead of rumination over what never was or what “could” have been. When I could begin to sit with mine or another’s anguish instead of trying to “fix” things that are not broken but need only to be experienced and expressed. When my energy became my own, when I could claim my life power and create with intention my best day each day, even when it’s raining or storming around me. When I could think of the past…yet stay in the present.

It will be the truth that sets you free.

visit my photo album on facebook here...

Like the little engine that could...

It began with the idea that I could.

The very first lesson that I received on the idea of self empowered healing from "mental illness" was during that week in the hospital in September of 2007. (You can listen to this part of my story here on Blog Talk Radio with Michele Rosenthall of Heal My PTSD)

A Note: keep in mind, I had continued to read and study mental health issues for years but had been dismissed by my previous providers when I asked if I could ever live and function on my own, without "meds" and lifelong "talk therapy".

So while I had believed and hoped all the years in this system that I could find my way out of this dark place, like many others, I trusted and believed it when my doctor and therapist told me that this was something to be managed for the rest of my life.

Hint: if anyone is telling you "you can't"...this does 3 things. 1. it puts them in control and 2. it re-enforces that I am incapable and re enforces that false belief of helplessness to change or better my situation and 3. it creates an unhealthy dependency and re enforces that state of perpetual victimhood and hopelessness as we continue to believe that the power to heal lies with someone or something outside of myself. (more on this another time...)

For more information see Michele Rosenthal's post of March 8th 2010 on Knowing when to seek a different kind of help.

I was very literally going through withdrawals from all the medications that I had been dependent on to make it through each day. There had been a mood stabilizer, an antidepressant or two, the pain killers, muscle relaxers...etc).

Over time the medications were changed and dosages increased as my body developed a tolerance to them. I believe it was this tolerance that saved my life but that's another story...

I had become used to not sleeping years before as the racing thoughts and nightmares took their toll on my mind and ultimately my body as it began to break down from lving in the stress response for so many years without relief.

The doctor was asking me how I was sleeping. I told him I wasn't sleeping but that I would stare at something - a light through the crack in the door, a spot in the wallpaper, the frame of the door to make it through the long nights. I said that I was wishing for sleep...but sleep would not come. In other words, I was using dissociation to cope with my insomnia.

In one sentence he said something that changed my life, altered the course of my journey.

"You know that you don't have to go there, you don't have to follow those thoughts."

I was stunned. That had never occured to me before. That I could choose to not follow the racing thoughts?

My mind went back to the first time I told a "mental health professional" that I wasn't sleeping, that I was pacing my house like a caged lion, waiting for an attack from my abusive husband who had been stalking me for the past year. You can read more about my journey into the mental health system here.

The solution I was given was the beginning of my dependence on things outside myself to "fix" me; I was given an antidepressant.

I was told and I believed, trusted blindly the word of the "professionals"; that my brain was now broken and irreparable. That I would need "meds", psychiatrists and a therapist for the rest of my life to "manage" this "illness" that had cropped up out of nowhere.

That night in the hospital I still did not sleep. I knew that in stopping the meds it would take some time for my body and brain to adjust to functioning without drugs in my system. So I was patient.

But I practiced "not following" the racing thoughts, instead creating a picture in my mind where I felt safe and at peace. This is where I would direct my thoughts as I learned to become aware of and redirect the movies, pictures and voices that played out in my mind.

Just as in the beginning I was willing to do anything to get better, to make the nightmares and voices in my head stop, to not be so overreactive to normal everyday life stressors that could send me over the edge - I now had a new hope that I could truly "get better".

I took this one little idea - that I could choose where my thoughts went - and this became the foundation for this new path that I would follow in my journey to find myself and create the life of my choosing that I am living today.

For the rest of my stay in the hospital I did not sleep more that an hour here or there before the nightmares and racing thoughts would wake me and cause me to walk the halls of the psych ward as my body began to adjust to it's new drug free state. In fact it took nearly a year before I slept for more than a few hours at a time without waking.

It has now been 2 years and 6 months since that fateful turn in my life when this doctor told me those words that changed the power structure in my mind and provided me with a new hope that I had the power within myself to calm my mind and find peace.

Today - most nights I can sleep a full 8 or 9 hours uninterrupted. But this doesn't just "happen". It takes a conscious effort to live this new life each day. This doesn't happen just because I "wished" it or wanted it or someone told me to do it, but rather because I make a conscious effort each day to be aware of my whole self; what I'm thinking, what I'm feeling and making a choice as to what I will do with that information in my chosen actions.

"I think I can. I think I can. I think I can. I know I can."
— Little Engine That Could

DO NOT STOP YOUR MEDICATIONS ABRUPTLY. There are some serious side effects and withdrawal symptoms when psychiatric medications are discontinued even with tapering off over an extended period of time that can lead to an increase in both emotional instability and cognitive distress. Do your own research; talk to your doctor. Make a plan. But it is very dangerous to attempt to discontinue psychiatric medications abruptly. If you need more information on this topic please visit: www.bipolarblast.wordpress.com for a really great library of info and resources. 

Each of us has our own path to walk. This is my journey. That does not mean it should be yours. My hope is that this blog will provide you some information that will help you to begin to ask your own questions, find your own answers and encourage you to live the life you choose for yourself each day.

The Keys to the Magic Kingdom

The keys to the magic kingdom.

Thats what I thought I was looking for all those years that I struggled with "managing" the symptoms of post trauma stress like the unexpected anger or feelings of rage, the depression and mania as I swung from one extreme on the range of emotions to the other. There was no middle for me; it was all or nothing.

The social angst that I experienced if I left the safe cocoon of the little world I had created in my head and my home became incapacitating. The most basic of human interactions became unbearable. The nightmares required medication to sleep but did not provide relief or peace, only a chronic state of lethargy.

The noise in my head was at times unbearable to the point of not wanting to die but not knowing how to live beyond this. Dissociation once again became my saving grace and my best friend as I floated through life day after day, year after year.

Emotional swings became my common ground as I fluctuated from the depths of depression to the highs of rage or overexcitement. Guilt and shame permeated my being for not being able to control my behavior as I swung from one extreme to another.

The hyper-vigilance was "paranoia" and what others might have termed irrational fears or psychosis was the reality I lived in every day as I battled a war long ago over yet still raging in my head although forgotten and buried amidst the chaos of my mind.

I existed solely to orchestrate and control my life and my environment in a vain attempt to avoid further emotional or cognitive distress that would surely come if I didn't. My life was consumed with getting away from the past - at the expense of my future.

I didn't know what was "wrong" with me - yet ultimately what I discovered was there was nothing wrong with me at all but that I was experiencing a normal human reaction to "trauma".

I simply did not have enough information to make the choice to move beyond being a perpetual victim or to get past living in "survival" mode where symptoms are managed instead of the freedom to create the life of my choosing outside of the nightmare of "mental illness" aka PTS.

The keys to the magic kingdom.

Do not exist.

What I found is that the solution to healing from the past is first, not easy. In making this decision to begin to face my past, to grieve what was my truth...well, I knew there would be times that it was going to feel like a dark and lonely road.

I accepted that no one else could walk this part of my journey for me. That I would face the demons of the past one by one, standing my ground as I determined to come out of this battle a whole person no longer fragmented or tormented.

Second, this journey is not a "quick fix". There is no pill, no book, no therapist or doctor that could "fix" me. I spent years depending on others to provide me with the answers, believing that if we could tweak my prescriptions a bit here and a tad there that in time I would be "better". That if I could only get my therapist to "understand" then he/she would be able to provide me with the magic map that would lead me out of this dark place.

Yet by becoming dependent on things, circumstances and people (regardless of the certificate on the wall) outside of myself to provide me with my answers and offer my life direction and purpose, that I was forfeiting my own power and sacrificing my own potential in the quest to have someone or find some answer outside of myself that I knew would be "the answer".

As I depleted all other resources about me - my family, there were no friends to speak of as I could not tolerate the most common of social interactions, doctors, therapists, the emergency admissions to the psychiatric ward of the hospital that would give me only respite for a moment - but no relief - ...I came to the conclusion that I was down to one thing; one resource. Me.

I accepted that there was no-one that could put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

There was no pill that would make the nightmares and the noise in my head stop.

There was...me.

And I determined as I looked back on my journey to this place where I now stood and accepted that I was my resource. I was my solution.

I stopped fighting.

I stopped resisting.

I started learning how to walk this walk and knew deep within myself that I was going to make it. I didn't know how exactly but I knew there was more to life that what I had been living.

Within my own self, I slowly walked up to the edge of the mountain, tears running down my face. I spread my arms as I stepped to the edge and knew deep within my being that there would either be something there for me to stand on - or I would learn how to fly.

And I haven't looked back.

Thank you for dropping by and reading a bit of my story and the steps I took to begin to reclaim my life. Read more about me here and what this blog is about here.

Next post: Like the little engine that could...finding self empowered healing through the awareness that I could choose to change my thoughts and how this was the beginning of changing my life.

Photo credit/source: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rammorrison/481677631/

Michele and Susan at Blog Talk Radio

Last evening Michele Rosenthal and I had a great conversation about how in finding acceptance we can find freedom from the emotional and psychological pain of trauma. You can listen to the broadcast here: Why don't survivors want to do the work to heal from PTSD?

This was a great conversation and opportunity for me to share just a bit of what my journey has been like; how I had been misdiagnosed for over 15 years and how I began to find my way out of the darkness and despair of trauma.

This discussion was a spin off from a post that Michele had done in September of 2009 in her column Meandering Micheles Mind. You can read that original post here.

As Michele often has said at her blog site about the healing journey; while everyones trauma is unique, the trauma experience...the result or outcome of a traumatic experience....is universal.

We - you and I - are not alone in this journey and all we have to do is take that next step that is in front of us today to continue on the path of self discovery.

You too, can fly.

Stay tuned; more good things to come!

A bit of a rant, part of my story...how I became suicidal

Ok; typically I do not get on a soapbox about medications. While I have my own opinion about using "medications" to manage the symptoms of emotional and cognitive distress, I don't consider it my job to tell anyone else how to live their life or walk their journey.

But - today over at Bipolar Blast there was a post about how the use of medications corrolates too often with the suicidal thoughts that become the reasoning behind using them to begin with.

So I am not going to go into a rehash but ask you to take a look at the post over there.

What I am going to talk about here today is how I began searching for help while going through an unbelievably difficult year.

The details are not important in this context but on the list of "life stressors" I had a 100% score - no wonder I was feeling overwhelmed and shut down ie what the doctors called "clinical depression" (which was an iatrogenic drug induced depression caused by the stimulants I was prescribed - see the story below for the details). 

 What I have since learned is simply my brain and body telling me enough already - take care of yourself. (the stages of grief/loss/change)

But back to the post I mentioned...

What I realized as I read this post was that I was not the only one who had NEVER had a suicidal thought in my life before taking these "medications"... and here I learned that I was not the only one who had had this experience.

My story; I got connected with a well meaning woman from NAMI (who by the way is funded by the pharma co's - check out Senetor Grassleys recent report here) - in order to help me to receive "treatment" she COACHED me to tell the nurses and doctors at the hospital that I was having suicidal thoughts in order to be admitted to the inpatient ward (where I thought I would find help, compassion and solutions...instead I learned how to be a "compliant" patient.)

I remember the day very clearly; it was December 1993. About 10 days before Christmas. In fact it is one of the last days that I remember clearly.

It was the day I gave up.

As she coached me to tell the nurses that I was feeling "suicidal" and having "those thoughts", I remember thinking that I did not want to do this, but - if doing this would help the doctors tell me what was wrong with me, help me find an answer to what was going on with me, then I would do it. I was willing to do anything to find relief; even lie about feeling "suicidal". I remember feeling completely defeated and ashamed to having to resort to lying in order to get "help".

How did this all start?

Several months earlier (fall of 1992) I had seen a psychiatrist who told me that if I took the powerful stimulant medication Dexedrine that I would no longer have an anger problem (duh - abused, violated, neglected and then asked what I had done to "make" the abuse happen, told I had "made it up", was lying...good cause for some anger wouldn't you think?).

After talking with me on the phone and a (very) short meeting in his office he instructed me to try the Dexedrine. He told me that this would help me to "concentrate" and it would calm my "anger". (Another post another day on my experience with ADD/ADHD issues perhaps).

The Dexedrine started a downward spiral into psychosis and depression. I quickly dropped from a healthy size 12 to a near skeletal size 0/2. I'm 5'9" tall. Do you think I could look pretty psychotic and like I was abusing these drugs? Yup.

I began experiencing insomnia that led to more psychosis, paranoia and in time, mania that was eventually diagnosed as "bi polar" "disorder". At the same time my husband was stalking me and harassing me with "hang up" phone calls several times each day and his presence in my life was always just beyond the reach of the restraining order.

I wasn't sleeping. I wasn't eating. I experienced my first panic attack and thought I was dying. I paced my home in a state of hyper-vigelance not knowing when my husband might surprise me again or what to expect. I blew through $10,000 in less than a month at one point. (this was my first serious run in with drug induced mania).

This was the beginning of how these "medications" created this serious "mental illness" that had to be "managed" with "medicine" for the next 15 years. Years that I will never get back.

The next "medicine" that this Psychiatrist prescribed was Desipramine. An old time anti depressant. Within a few months I ballooned up to over 200 pounds. Along the way Ativan was added to the mix for the drug induced anxiety that was being fed by the panic attacks and hyper-vigelance of being stalked 24/7 for nearly a year. 

Between these 3 medications and the level of extreme stress I had experienced over the past 12 months - well, we had the makings of a future psychotic, paranoid, unemployed welfare recipient and lifetime subscription to the revolving door of the psych ward.

Over the years, more medications were added to the cocktail, doses were changed periodically when I complained I was not seeing improvement since as I was told by my doctors, "psychiatry is more and art than a science". If only I'd known then just how true this statement was.

That afternoon as the sun shone outside and I sat sobbing on the corner of my couch in the home that would soon be foreclosed on (I had not been able to work during this time as I could no longer think or function in this capacity since beginning these "medicines").

That afternoon was the end of my life as I knew it as I gave away my own power and accepted what I was told; that I was simply "broken" and irreparable. That this was the best I could hope for now.

I am not going to tell you or anyone else how to live your life or go off meds. I am not saying that anyone is out to "get me" or that there is any conspiracy going on.

What I am saying is check your gut. Don't trust blindly. If that is where you are, then thats where you are and there is nothing wrong with that.

But for me - that was no longer enough.

Is there a "biological" component to the cognitive and emotional distress we can face when we are overwhelmed with life or having come out of an abusive or traumatic experience?

Yes.

There is a physical and chemical stress response that is a NATURAL response to feeling overwhelmed or threatened. (This can be especially difficult for those who have experienced child abuse since we don't develop the skills to manage life and the related stressors. Survivors of child abuse or neglect may not develop that internal sense of power that we are in charge of our life and can live in a chronic state of hopelessness and helplessness, dependent on things outside ourselves to guide our lives.)

But this is a NATURAL response to some not so normal life circumstances and I have concluded that I am not "ill", "disordered" or in need of medications to "fix" me as I am not "broken" but rather injured. I was not in need of "medicine" as much as to simply feel safe.

Medications in low doses may have their place in helping us to cope for the short term. UPDATE Nov 2013: I no longer believe this after spending 6 years in horrible withdrawals from psychotropic drugs and learning how to resolve my distress as normal human experience; there are numerous ways to bring a state of calm to an individual that do not include neurotoxic chemicals. But - when they become the answer to an invisible "disease" that has no biological beginning and no ending - they become more of a life sentence than a solution. ****

When the pills we take create more and new symptoms to be managed with yet another prescription - perhaps it is time to look deeper for our answers.

It is possible to mend or "heal" from the emotional and cognitive distress that has become known as "mental illness"?

It is not easy to face what I would rather forget.

It is not easy standing up for myself in a system that tells me I am less than someone who is "normal" or if I complain that this "treatment" or "therapy" is not working and I am labeled as non compliant, resistant, paranoid etc etc.

It is hard work to go through the emotional healing and learning the developmental life skills, experiences and education that I did not get in my upbringing.

But as one who has become a mentor to me in this journey has put it - it became more painful for me to NOT change than it was to go through this pain in order to get out of that dark place.

caveat: I do not expect everyone to have the same opinion as I do. This has been my journey. Thank you for respecting that.

DO NOT STOP YOUR MEDICATIONS ABRUPTLY. There are some serious side effects and withdrawal symptoms when psychiatric medications are discontinued even with tapering off over an extended period of time that can lead to an increase in both emotional instability and cognitive distress. 


To safely withdraw from psychotropic drugs one must be responsible to understand both the process and consequences of this choice. 

For more information and resources to safely plan and prepare to reduce or withdraw from psychotropic medications please visit www.proactiveplanning.us or send a message requesting information to: proactiveplan@gmail.com

****October 2011 - I am going to update this and change my position. I no longer believe that these drugs have benefit other than short term reduction of symptoms that may allow someone in distress to sleep and regain their footing. Long term use of these drugs can result in severe and life threatening iatrogenic (doctor induced) disease and physical metabolic disruption Ref: the 25 year disparity in life span that is caused in those who use them. Not to mention the loss of quality of life caused by living in a drug induced state of chronic sedation.****

This is my walk..

Everyone has a story. Everyone walks their own journey.

This poem is my ode to those who found this journey too difficult to complete, especially for my Mom who gave up in 1976; a time long before the consequences of abuse, neglect, addiction, power and control issues and violence were recognized or even acknowledged as trauma.

There is no pill to take my pain

no-one to ease my shame

this is my journey

mine alone

to walk, to share...

to own

there is no pill to take my pain

no-one to ease my shame

there is no magic spell out there

to make this a burden

one can bear

this is my walk

and mine alone

deep within my soul

I see

all the damage

done to me

a wound

a mark

left in my being

that which is

so deceiving

it lies to me

it says "you're mine"

but it doesn't know

that I will shine

one day I will

you know I will

for if I live

or if it kills

this is mine

mine alone

a story

a burden

ofttimes to bear

that takes a soul

who did not fare

as well as I did

on my path

for those I speak

now and will be heard

you died

I lived

I will not spurn

the blood you shed

the life you gave

for this I speak

and I shall shout...

that all can heal

there is no doubt

I am not a can of soup

Hmmmph.

Today I'm struggling with finding my voice. I feel fear at speaking up and voicing my true thoughts and opinions. I fear being judged and ridiculed for having an opinion as for too long I lived in a family system that discouraged any form of autonomy. Yet - I am choosing today to not accept this as my story any longer.

For too long I wore the labels that others gave me; at the expense of developing any sense of self or feeling of control over my life or life choices.

As a small child one label I wore was "brat"; others were stupid, selfish, idiot. In time more labels were added to the list like whore and slut (thanks dad).

When I was married "bitch" was added to the list.

And when I got away from the violence in my marriage I became a "victim".

When I entered the mental health system - a whole but injured person - I was given the label "mentally ill", "addict" and "alcoholic" to wear along with the sub-labels of "depressed", "bi polar", "dysthymic", "paranoid", "psychotic" among others.

And I wore each and every one of these labels very, very well. I carried the shame and believed that I was "less than", that I was broken beyond repair.

And today I am speaking up to say - I am not a label.

I am. Period.

I exist and I have every right to exist, to breath, to experience a world and a life that knows no boundaries, to decide what kind of person I will be, what kind of future that I will live.

Today - I write my own story and continue to shed the labels that in the past have left me feeling helpless to improve my lot in life and hopeless that I even could have a life of my own choosing.

Today - if I was to wear a label I will choose it. And today I would choose to "label" myself as curious, intelligent, caring, wonderful, kind, considerate, empowered, brave and courageous....

Today - I am and I am free.

"I Am Free"

This is the final card in this storyboard series. This part of my story reflects how my view of myself as this new, free - and beautiful - strong but gracious being, poised as though in a flight of freedom in dance. This card is the epitomy of the words that I have clung to as I walked this dark path of healing from my past as I took that step "into the darkenss of the unknown and believed that one of two things would happen....and I began to fly..."

Grieving what was...and wasn't

I call this one "Grief". At this stage of my journey I was ready to face my past and accept what was my reality of abuse and neglect. I was ready to face that ambivelance that I felt toward my parents and other family members. I began to let go of that fantasy/dream of the happy family and especially the "daddy" that I never had.

Fragmented....but free

This is my 3rd collage card of the 5 series that I call my "story". This one has two main ideas. The first is that I felt completely fragmented, like the many tiles that are the construct of this one building - yet I knew that I was one distinct person. For a long time I didnt seem to have a stable "self", but rather I had many different ways of being and interacting with the world. But - I always believed that I would find my solution to this feeling of fragmentation and was ready to take that scary step into the unknown (the door at top right) and believed that I would find something on the other side to stand or or I would begin to fly...