My Home...My Brain

I have been thinking about my brain lately.

Now there is a strange sentence. Who is the "I" who thinks about the brain which makes the "I" possible in the first place? Or is it the other way around?

No matter. As I was saying...I have been thinking about my brain lately and I have surmised that it is an odd brain indeed. However, it is the only brain I have so I might as well embrace it.

Tried Prozac for a couple of weeks as you well know. It was a trip. I was having some medical "coincidences", so I opted to cease taking my medication. So I don't know what would have happened over the weeks had I continued but I did get a glimpse of life for me on Prozac. It was definitely doing something in there.

Mostly I felt tired and lethargic but who knows if this was the meds or my MS. I felt jittery in the mornings but this feeling faded within the first week. I seemed to sleep more and eat less.

Mood wise...there was a brief (several hours) within that first week where I felt spectacular. I felt GREAT as in Tony the Tiger G-G-GREAT! As a matter of fact...I was feeling so darn chipper that I telephoned friends to tell them the news. One friend who has been on many different anti-depressants was a bit worried that I was turning manic. She also told me this feeling probably wouldn't last...I would calm down and just feel normal good...whatever that means. She was right...this initial "euphoria" didn't last and was replaced by....more of a mental sluggishness. I remember trying to sit down and do my bills and having to stop in the middle as I literally could not think any more. I have never had this happen, even with my MS.

The sluggishness ended and I seemed to hit an even plateau where I said to myself...
"Hey...I am not sad." but then thought as well..."I am not happy either." I just was in this straight line state of...okayness. It seemed everything was equal in my mind. "Wanna go for ice-cream?" might bring the logical response of "Sounds good to me." But likewise..."Wanna watch endless re-runs of Scooby Doo?" might produce the same response. All possibilities for activity sounded equally as viable. Not only was I becoming lethargic but rather apathetic as well.

I found my sensitivities dulled in that things that would normally irk me would produce a spock like conclusion of "I should be upset by that but I don't feel so upset." Likewise a compliment or good happening would elicit the logic of "Yes this is good and a happy thing" but I wouldn't be feeling the corresponding feelings. It was as though the emotional exclamation points which had been so prevalent before, were mostly omitted.

And then I noticed the biggest change of all. My mind was....quiet. Eerily so. It seemed like the tv station of my brain was on the static white noise channel. I felt good as nothingness goes. I noticed that when I woke up, my thoughts were not banging against the gate waiting to be released. I merely....woke up...my eyes open to this new leveled terrain with no hills or horizon.

These feelings and changes were totally unexpected for me. What I had been expecting was either no change at all for that period of time, or else a very slight difference, perhaps in me being more goal oriented (which was the case when I took SAM-e). I also feared mania but that didn't happen either except for one afternoon of several high spirited hours.

When I stopped taking the Prozac, I noticed some things after only a couple of days. One was...my appetite came back. I was hungry again! The second big change is how my mind operates.

On a "normal" day for me...my mind is whirring faster than the tazmanian devil on speed. I woke up one morning and my mind declared, "I'm BACK!!!" with triple exclamation points. I had my usual background music in my head which I had lost during my stint on Prozac. It is just a thing for me to always have a song playing in my head...it is a different song everyday....I don't know how my brain chooses the varying melodies but it does. Today's song is Vacation...all I ever wanted...vacation time to get away...by the Bangles right? The BIG VOICE is back too...of the "I" of my brain who insists upon getting attention, "Hey LOOKY HERE! What about this thought? and that thought and then there are those thoughts you need to think about....HURRY HURRY!" Then there seems to be the quiet me who sits in one corner of the brain just overseeing what is going on, sort of like the Wizard of Oz, the me behind the curtain. And of course there is the librarian with the random card catalog she flips through complete with reels of film-like memories and sensory images. It is a virtual party in there complete with karyoke and colorful streamers of thought.

It isn't always a party of course, and especially when my moods come to turn frivolty to despair.

But this is the brain I have been given. I have to find a way to live here and function in the world. There is a certain comfort here...I know the place well. It is home to me.

prozac update...day four

Here we are at day four of taking prozac.

and...i feel normal. normal as in low energy and a tad irritable self. today it feels like i haven't taken anything. yesterday i could feel something happening with my mood but not today. i feel like cinderella...after midnight. back to this again.

it is so hard to figure this stuff out as i have my moods and cycles of moods and i also have the MS doing things...and then you add a medication. which is what? we don't know i guess until time has passed.

it is only day four..i know it sometimes takes weeks for any big changes to happen.

more than a few people have asked me why i am doing this finally. i am now 43 years old...i have lived with my depression all of these years without benefit of any meds. this was HUGE for me to finally do this.

part of my reason was the MS. i have read research which shows that prozac may help with multiple sclerosis in delaying having more lesions. i will find that research for another post. also i have read and my neurologist told me that it can help with the fatigue of MS. don't take what i say here though as cold hard facts...please always research for yourself and ask your doctor. i am just reporting what i have read and what my neurologist has told me.

the other reason for my wanting to take something was an increase in the fluctuations in my moods possibly caused by the MS. it seems to be causing me to have more moods if that is possible. my lows were coming faster and i was sinking more. i want to do better...feel better...and be there for my family. it is time to take more responsibility for my mental health.

And lastly...my youngest son who has autism is now taking Prozac. this too was a gut wrenching decision. he is nearing adolescence and his moods were becoming debilitating for him...horrible bouts of crying upon awakening for no apparent reason and phobias so strong that he didn't want to leave the house. saw a neurologist who recommended prozac and...by golly it works for him. does it make everything all better? hell no. there are still many challenges but at least he is not suffering as he did. seeing him go through this process...i wanted to go through it with him. my neurologist told me that if one person in the family does well with a medication such as prozac...there is a good chance that another family member will too. makes sense...as we share some of the same genes.

and it is just time. i wanted to at least try this option. it is no panacea...no cure...no miracle i am sure. just a tool to help me so i can function better. i hate pills. i really do. i am not one at all...by any stretch of the imagination...to jump at the chance to take a pill. more than anything i wish to be normal...feel normal...but i am the way i am.

such a stigma still about mental illness. and it makes me pissed off. clinical depression is a biological disease...just like diabetes...or any other chronic physical disease. having a mood disorder isn't a character flaw. it isn't something you just snap out of. i want to keep saying these things...to educate...to inform. someone you know may suffer from clinical depression. it may be you.

i will give you more updates as the days pass...

Prozac update...

This is the third day of taking Prozac and...I gotta tell you the truth...

I FEEL GREAT!

seriously.

I do have to be careful it doesn't throw me into mania here but I do feel great. I have never felt this way. It is like I woke up to the world. Colors seem brighter. I feel like I can literally see with more clarity. I feel like doing all the fun things I have never done before.

The first two days...the only things I felt were a sensation of dizziness when I would get up too quickly and...some definite lethargy. I felt very tired but that may just have been my MS. No stomach troubles. I am taking it with my breakfast. My libido...definitely still there...no problems yet.

I felt a little strange today...like being in a vacuum..a bit of nothingness and them whooosh....came some good feelings.

I like it! I really like it so far!

All these years not trying this...wow. So far so good...just gotta watch my manic side and...make sure I can feel all my feelings. This is a totally different experience than taking the SAM-e. With SAM-e I felt like doing things...had more energy...but the emotional component wasn't there so much. Prozac is making me feel good.

We shall see! Thumbs up so far me mateys!

Taking the Prozac Plunge

Well kids...it's that time in life to face the music. I have been battling my moods now for decades without the help of entering a pharmacy. But now...I have this Multiple Sclerosis gig going on and things are a little more "interesting." At a time when there seems to be this backlash against mood medications...I am finally ready to take the plunge. You know me...always late to the party.

I am not anti-meds. I was in the helping profession. I saw how very necessary they can be. I suppose I was just anti-meds for me. I couldn't imagine myself taking something which could potentially alter my brain functioning and mood. My brain is all I have you see...and I don't want to be messing with it.

Too...there is my childhood history of growing up with a mother who has schizophrenia...and seeing the multitudes of pills she had to take...each one extracting the life from my mother. She suffered from vision loss, tremors, confusion, and more from her daily pills. And they seldom helped. It seemed nobody cared about her...about us...except to give her more pills. I began to hate them as they were a poor substitute for real help.

So here I am years upon years later....staring at a pill on a paper plate. I ate my breakfast and sat and comtemplated this blue (generic form) entity before me. I sat there for about twenty minutes...carrying the pill to my mouth and then placing it back upon the plate.

It seems a defeat to me in some ways. And I know this is the wrong way to look at things...and realize I am only talking about me...and what this personally feels like for me...nobody else. I just...hate this. I hate needing help. But I will state here today that yes I do need help.

So I took the damn pill.

I wanted to tell you all so that I could report first hand...what this is like to a mood medication virgin. I will leave out no detail.

I will leave you now with the lyrics to the old rolling stone classic...Mother's Little Helper. Except...mine isn't yellow...it is blue. :>)

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What a drag it is getting old
"Kids are different today"
I hear ev'ry mother say
Mother needs something today to calm her down
And though she's not really ill
There's a little yellow pill
She goes running for the shelter of a mother's little helper
And it helps her on her way, gets her through her busy day

"Things are different today"
I hear ev'ry mother say
Cooking fresh food for a husband's just a drag
So she buys an instant cake and she burns her frozen steak
And goes running for the shelter of a mother's little helper
And two help her on her way, get her through her busy day

Doctor please, some more of these
Outside the door, she took four more
What a drag it is getting old

"Men just aren't the same today"
I hear ev'ry mother say
They just don't appreciate that you get tired
They're so hard to satisfy, You can tranquilize your mind
So go running for the shelter of a mother's little helper
And four help you through the night, help to minimize your plight

Doctor please, some more of these
Outside the door, she took four more
What a drag it is getting old

"Life's just much too hard today,"
I hear ev'ry mother say
The pursuit of happiness just seems a bore
And if you take more of those, you will get an overdose
No more running for the shelter of a mother's little helper
They just helped you on your way, through your busy dying day

Functional Dysfunction

I have always known that something was up with me. I have never felt...well...normal. But then again I dare anyone to clearly define what or who is normal. I am thinking more and more that we are all on some sort of mental health spectrum.

Look at what has happened with the disorder of autism these days. The spectrum is wider than ever, with growing numbers of people being diagnosed who would have never been diagnosed with this before. People we would have thought of as geeky or a little off center now have "autism." I hear stories about Einstein and even Bill Gates as being autistic. Poor Einstein has been adopted by many groups as having all sorts of disorders I am sure he never gave any thought to while alive. I am not sure what to make of this trend. I am thinking that I don't like it as you end up with so many people competing for services when clearly there are folks who have far more impairments than others.

Should someone who has Asperger's Syndrome(a mild form of autism) and is high functioning, holds a job, and gets along in the world adequately speak for someone who, at the same age, is non-verbal and needs constant care? Should they really be thought of as the same group bearing the same label?

It is with this over generalization of labels in mind, that I am reluctant to say what I am about to say.

I am feeling much more than a kinship with those who have bi-polar disorder. I believe it is a spectrum disorder as well, and now this is being reflected in the DSM to diagnose and differentiate between mental disorders.

There is a great danger to diagnosing oneself. You can now go on-line and look up symptoms and find all sorts of could be's. I must say, however, I have had some experience. I *knew* about both my son's autism (I had worked in the field though) and I also *knew* that I had MS long before anyone officially told me.

Yet my mood has bewildered me my whole life. I had been diagnosed with depression years ago in my twenties but nobody has ever spoken of Bi-Polar Disorder. Then again, most people don't talk so much about the highs as a problem. Why would anyone want to feel less happy, less energetic, and less productive?

I have always tended to relate well to others on the mood disorder edge. I have had more than several friends who have close relatives with Bi-Polar I Disorder. I would listen to their tales of a mother, a father, a sister, or a son....who might get up at three in the morning to prepare a four course breakfast, dance on top of their car because they felt like it, attempt to sell their house without their spouse's knowledge, quit their jobs to drive cross country only to end up homeless, exercising for eight hours, buying large ticket items like pianos...even when they didn't know how to play the piano, being so upset that they might hide under their desk at work, fly into rages at slight provocations, and making suicide attempts that ultimately lead to hospitalization. We tend to hear about the extremes and then in comparison we always think...no that is not me. That has never been me.

But then we come to realize that there are gradiations...levels of severity. Mood disorders will not manifest in the same way for everyone. Many people who have mood disorders hide them well. There are people who function well to the outside world, but are dealing with an inner hell.

I feel I am one of these people. I have never been hospitalized. I have never engaged in too risky of behaviors. Whatever it is I have has not led me to lose everything. I am fortunate that I have never hit a rock bottom mood. Yet this in between, every day, cycling between moods has been extremely difficult.

The closest answer I have come to recently to explain what I am is Bipolar II. While I have never experienced the euphoric extreme highs of mania....this term of "hypomania" is a darn descriptor of how I do feel some days. It is always within the realm of functional behavior and in my opinion this is when I feel the best. I am energetic, full of personality, creative, and ever productive.

I found this on the web to help explain:

"Hypomania

Technically, this is literally "little" mania — the familiar symptoms but less so: Mood much better than normal Rapid speech Little need for sleep Racing thoughts, trouble concentrating Continuous high energy Overconfidence

You may have noticed that "delusions" have disappeared from the list: these are by definition not found in Bipolar II. A patient who has had the above symptoms repeatedly, without having delusions, is much less likely to lose contact with reality (including abnormal perceptions such as auditory hallucinations, which are common in bipolar mania) than a patient who has experienced delusions.

"Bipolar II" is technically the combination of hypomanic phases with separate phases of severe depression If the depressive phases are only mild, the term "cyclothymia" is used."

And then this:

"Roller coaster depression

Many people have forms of depression in which their symptoms vary a lot with time: "crash" into depression, then up into doing fine for a while, then "crash" again — sometimes for a reason, but often for no clear reason at all. They feel like they are on some sort of mood "roller coaster". They wonder if they have "manic-depression". But, most people know someone or have heard of someone who had a "manic" episode: decreased need for sleep, high energy, risky behaviors, or even grandiose delusions (‘I can make millions with my ideas"; "I have a mission in space"; "I’m God"). So they think "well, I can’t have that — I’ve never had a manic episode".

However, the new view of bipolar disorder means it’s time to reconsider that conclusion. Hypomania doesn’t look or feel at all like full delusional mania in some patients. Sometimes there is just a clear sense of something cyclic going on. (For a striking version of this, read a patient's account). Some mood disorder experts consider depression that occurs repeatedly to have a high likelihood of having a manic phase at some pointFawcett, especially if the first depression occurred before age twenty.Geller, Rao These two features--repeated recurrence, and early onset--are also included among the bipolar "soft signs" below: not enough to make a diagnosis, but suggestive, especially if they occur with several other such signs--even if "hypomania" is not detectable at all!Ghaemi "

This information was gleaned from this site about mood disorders which I found to be most helpful.

The last thing I want to do is misrepresent myself or minimize what anyone else is going through. I peer over the edge of how much further I could fall during a depressive episode and also how much more I could fly into a dysfunctional and life threatening euphoria and I realize that the scope and range of mood is seemingly infinite.

Some people have to endure such extremes and although I get a glimpse of their world I can never truly know what it is like. I only know my world.
I am here...I am some outlier of a data point....off-center....neither here nor there...in some sort of limbo world of ever changing moods.

Does one really need a new label? Hell no. Believe me, I have enough on my plate as is. I certainly don't go searching for dysfunction. But it seems a relief to me to know that there may be a name for this. There is some logical explanation for the days of being on top of the world and the next....cascading to the depths of despair. It helps me to know that there is a reason for this hellish chaos.

This is my stuff. My moods. My issues. I am responsible for me. But it also helps tremendously to understand what I am dealing with. And now I know I am not alone.

Meds, meds, meds

let's talk medication shall we?

i will do a post later about Sam-e....which has been very helpful....but perhaps time limited in its effectiveness as demonstrated by one case study...me.

lisa and jim....you had some really good comments about meds....i was wondering if you could repeat them here.

i am talking about meds for depression. i guess it doesn't matter the origin of the depression: caused by multiple sclerosis or the drugs to combat MS or just straight up depression.

I will pose my questions here:

What, if any prescription drugs do you or have you used for depression? We will talk about natural supplements in another post or posts.

1. How long had you used the medication?

2. What side effects did you experience and please don't hold back about discussing sexual side effects.

3. What happened if you missed a dose?

4. Were there dangers of other meds, vitamins, supplements interacting harmfully with your med of choice?

5. How long did it take to make a difference?

6. Could you easily get off the drug if you wanted to? Or is there side effects of sudden withdrawl of the drug?

on another note....

if you here for the love fest...see post below. the topic is kissing. :>)

on my way back...

okay...i am actually feeling good enough to write. yesterday i couldn't even imagine it. this rollercoaster ride is quite a trip.

the conclusion i come to about moods is...how very biological in origin they are. so that is part of the picture. certainly other things come into play. yet i wonder how the world can look so very different from one day to the next.

it is like the depression rips open a black hole where you can see all these things you wish you didn't. and then as it dissipates...the hole closes up and the blinders go on and...all those bad things go swirling into deep dark space. you know they are there but you can no longer see them...they seem so far away.

i like to do repetetive things when i am so depressed. sometimes cleaning helps if i have the energy. i didn't this time. and sometimes just re-directing the brain to absorb anything else helps. this time i found solace in doing word searches. it was painful really. my brain didn't want to work. didn't want to re-focus. but i bent it into shape by finding stupid letters making up words...like a computer...filling up the evil space with something meaningless. i found an emotional void.

and this is utterly silly but i also found solace in watching an old sitcom i love...will and grace. i had gotten an asked for DVD collection of their first season and...i just began watching them back to back. i found myself laughing despite myself. just something else to distract me from pain and bad thoughts.

sometimes talking and writing helps but sometimes all that does for me is it wears a stronger groove into my depression...it deepens it. and i can't believe i am saying this. i do believe in talking about what ails you. and denial is bad and so on. yet...there is something to be said for re-direction and distraction. the problems will all still be there. but who says you have to solve everything in one day. and isn't it better to tackle those problems when you feel better mentally? in the meantime...rest...give yourself comfort...do things to get out of your mind (safe and good things).

and too...during those bad times...i am a quite the bitch. yes true. depression doesn't always manifest in weepy wails. sometimes it makes one...well...nasty. duct tape would be a good device for me on some days. i feel much better hiding that part of me away...protecting others who may innocently get in my way. no depression ain't pretty. this ain't no party...this ain't no disco...this ain't fooling around. :>)

i think i am better at this than i used to be. i remember my college and grad school days where my moods would cause me much hardship because i lacked the insight to predict them. okay i still cannot predict my moods...but i do have more...foresight now? back when i was in school i remember having so much energy on some days...weeks...where i could do no wrong! i switched schools on a dime...i changed my major...taking all sorts of classes i had no business attempting. one minute i was a psychology major and then next...i was in nursing. (ended up switching back) i would do things like...if there was a group project and the others in my group complained about not having the time to do their share...why...i was right there to say..."sure i will do all your work for you...not to worry!" i once did a group project that was supposed to be done by five people...solo. i would...not study...pull all nighters...and get away with it all. and then my mood would change. i would sink. and then i wondered how in the hell i would survive doing any part of what i was once doing with such ease.

i laugh now because i still do this to some extent although i do now exercise caution when i am feeling more well. just because i think i can do it all one day doesn't mean i can nor can i sustain that high energy. i should not sign up for all the classes, volunteering, social stuff that i feel i can do when feeling well because when i sink...i know i won't be able to do squat. i have to think do-able...moderate...to match all my many moods.

anyways...i am back to babble. i am feeling better...not totally there but definitely better and having the energy to express myself here.

i sure hope you all are doing well and i will be by to visit you soon.

and yes we shall get back to our love theme.

more to come!
merelyme

A most relevant "discussion"

Wow...controversy on my blog.

Cool.

For all the gory details of said discussion view the post before this one. There are some very "interesting" comments.

I am going to highlight the main one which became the focal point of debate. And here it is:

buffalodickdy said...
"I, like most people have been depressed. That being said, I know how bad it can make you feel- and how little that makes a difference in what the world expects of you. I am not an optimist or a pessimist. I am a realist. You must give before you get. You must never let people know you are down, as they will see a whiner. You must show strength you didn't even know you had- to get respect, instead of pity. Respect is huge- go get some!"

Very interesting.... :>)

My most immediate reaction is to say that this is my blog and I will talk about whatever bloody hell topic I choose to talk about. I do want to talk about depression and I will continue to do so. There is a fine line between expressing one's "opinion" and delivering a personal attack and it is clear to me that this individual had/has crossed the line. I am not one to tolerate such nonsense so fella....the cyber road awaits you....don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.

My second response was one of puzzlement. I wrote a more generalized piece about depression...mainly citing references from a book I am reading about this topic, and trying to elicit conversation about questions posed from this said book. Surely not a post to get one's dander up so overly emotionally. This commenter took the post very personally as some sort of affront to his world views and I can only conclude that the man "doth protest too much." A psychological analysis would most likely reveal that this is a person who is afraid of their own times of feeling depressed and feels ashamed somehow. That shame translates into a projection onto others who remind him of it. Feelings of inadequacy can make people say the strangest of things.

After those momentary reactions flashed through my head, I came to the conclusion that this was a grand opportunity for others to say their piece about views on depression. And thank you to all who did come and very genuinely state their opinion. This is good...as it brings this topic to life. It isn't just about a passage from a page in a book about depression....this is about real people and how they cope and manage with this sometimes debilitating mood disorder. This stranger's comment is symbollic of what is out there in family member's and friend's attitudes about mood disorders.

I was and am shocked that such a neanderthal attitude still exists, but it clearly shows the need for more education and training to the general public about depression. I just assumed that everyone was pretty much on the same page by now in this day and age.

Let me re-state that his comments could have come from your mother, your father, you siblings, your neighbor, or co-worker. There are still many folk who do not understand the nature of depression, what it is, what it is not, and how to help themselves and/or others.

And I will say very vehemently that I do not believe this commenter's advice is a good strategy. In fact....not at all.

It is good to talk about it. It is good to tell someone you trust about your feelings especially if those feelings are leading to thoughts of harming oneself. Keeping it all in is not such a good idea as it limits your options of truly getting help.

And I especially take issue with the notion of "strength" as being defined as basically shutting up and putting up. This is not strength....this is fear. In my opinion, strength is the ability to be able to allow yourself to be vulnerable....to take those risks necessary for growth and connection. As my friend Mark so eloquently put it...this other stoic John Wayne approach to emotions is...well...."bullshit."

And likewise it isn't healthy.

I have had much trauma in my life and one of the issues I used to have was that I couldn't feel anything. Even as a very young girl I didn't show pain because to do so made me fearful for my survival. I remember my mother who was severely mentally ill....being hauled away in a paddy wagon one day when I was just five years old. I watched her scream my name as police pushed her into the car and I didn't cry. Not once. As a matter of fact, I joked with the policemen. Was I "strong"? No not really. I was just in shock. I remained in shock for a good portion of my life recounting horror stories and laughing as I told them, without any appropriate emotion. It took literally years of therapy work before I could show those emotions.

There are other instances where someone actually acts upon their feelings and they commit suicide. Is it really so "strong" to not tell someone about those feelings? Do you think those family members left behind thought..."oh well...at least the one I loved was strong and didn't show their sadness." No...they aren't going to say that.

Depression is not a source of shame. It isn't a form of personal weakness. I can cite so many extraordinary people who have suffered from depression. Did Lincoln lack self respect? Was Michelangelo weak of mind? You look at the world of musicians, artists, actors, writers, poets, and even and especially comedians....and many of them will be found to suffer from depression. I suppose they are all weak and soulless too.

So be cautious of the advice given by this commenter. It is not the truth about depression as facts demonstrate. It is just an opinion....a dangerous one in my opinion....but nonetheless I am very thankful he did make it so that we can talk about this openly.

I am going to leave you with a lot of information coming from many different and varied sources, I hurriedly found on the internet and so easily. This is all out there and black and white. I assumed most people already knew all this but I am finding out otherwise.

You can be sure I will be posting lots more on this topic. More to come!

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FACTS ABOUT MOOD DISORDERS

A Common Myth Proven Wrong
For many years there has been a common myth that depression is due to a personal weakness or lack of will-power. Many think that a depressed person can simply "snap out of it" by using will-power.

This is NOT True!

Depression involves a chemical imbalance in the areas of the brain that controls mood and emotion. It is a physical illness similar to diabetes or high blood pressure. A person with depression is not able to use will power to control their moods any more than a diabetic can use will power to change their blood sugar levels. This chemical imbalance may result from many different factors. People suffering from this illness often require medications and / or therapy in order to recover just as a diabetic requires insulin in order to regulate blood sugar levels.


Are Depressed People Lazy? NO! NO! NO!

No, they are not lazy! Physical symptoms are associated with depression which cause people to feel profoundly tired, and extremely unmotivated. Many people find it difficult to get out of bed in the morning and may sleep excessively during the day. In some cases they might find it difficult to fall asleep and may even awaken frequently during the night.

Another common symptom is reduced appetite resulting in weight loss or increased appetite resulting in weight gain.

Some people may even experience headaches, constipation and general aches and pains. These physical symptoms are real and often debilitating. They cannot simply be thought away.
Besides the physical symptoms, depression is also accompanied by changes in mood. People have a persistent feeling of sadness and are often unable to find pleasure in activities they once enjoyed such as hobbies, family activities, socializing, etc. Some people may have less or no desire for sexual relations. Sometimes intense irritability is also experienced which may result in short tempers and lack of patience.

Thought patterns often change. Negative thoughts, pessimism, guilt, hopelessness and helplessness are feelings often experienced with this illness. Many people have difficulty remembering, focusing and / or concentrating, and self-esteem and self-confidence is usually very low.Symptoms of anxiety are frequently prevalent with many people suffering from depression. This often results in excessive worrying, nervousness, restlessness, panic, and difficulty with sleep.

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"It is important to realize that depression is a true illness or disorder. It is not a sign of weakness nor does it affect those with a "lack of willpower." Depression strikes all walks of life, and does not discriminate due to race or age. It does however, affect twice as many women as men."
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Depression is not a passing mood. It is not a personal weakness.
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"Depression affects about 19 million people annually in the U.S. alone. Some of the most prominent and well-known individuals who have suffered from a depressive disorder include Alexander the Great, Napoleon Bonaparte, Abraham Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt, Winston Churchill, George Patton, abolitionist John Brown, Robert E. Lee, Florence Nightingale, Sir Isaac Newton, Stephen Hawking, Charles Darwin, J.P. Morgan, Barbara Bush, Ludwig von Beethoven and Michelangelo. Not exactly people who just sit around feeling sorry for themselves."

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"Myth: You can will depression away. If you can’t, then you’re weak."

"Depression cannot be willed away any more than heart disease or diabetes can. It’s caused by chemical changes in the body, which cannot be overcome simply by positive thinking and grim determination. Given how much stigma is still attached to mental illness, seeking help for depression is an act of courage and strength — not weakness — on your part."

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"Let's demolish these five popular misconceptions about depression:

Myth #1 - You Can "Snap Out Of It

"Don't you just hate it, when you admit to feeling down, people tell you to "snap out of it?" Isn't it amazing, the impatience that develops in those that are up and don't want to be bothered with someone who is down? To them, your pessimism, your anxiety, your timidity (and possibly your full-blown depression) seem a perverse personality quirk that you yourself could easily correct if you just tried to "rise above it." In other words, they see your low mood level as a personal failing of yours. That's because despite overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary, people still believe that dysthymia and depression are psychological disorders - are "all in your head". They think that "mood is a state of mind" and therefore must have a purely psychological cause - for which a psychological remedy must be found. Even you yourself may have held that mistaken view on occasion. In effect, they assume that you're "programmed wrong" - and they suggest you go and have yourself reprogrammed. This makes it hard to open up to anybody about low mood levels such as depression (although depression is a serious and possibly life-threatening affliction). It makes it even harder to admit to the lesser condition of being dysthymic (shy or timid, just slightly depressed) because "come on, no one ever died from it!"

On top of it, haven't we ourselves bought into the story that how we feel is our fault? That we would simply "snap out of it" if we weren't such wimps? Let's get really clear about this: You cannot snap out of it. To "snap out of" dysthymia or depression is a physical impossibility. It makes about as much sense as asking someone to "snap out of" diabetes or an underactive thyroid gland. "

"Mood is NOT a state of mind. How you feel is NOT your fault. You can NOT "snap out of" a low mood."

Talking to Depression: Part One

I have been meaning to talk and share about a book I had gotten out of the library about depression for some time now. I see the book needs to go back soon so I better get with the program!

The book is called, Talking to Depression: Simple Ways to Connect When Someone in your Life is Depressed and is by Claudia J. Strauss.

I cannot say enough good things about this little book. But I will try here. I think this will be a multi-post theme as there is much to cover. I want to highlight some of the most poignant parts of the book for me and then I wish to discuss those parts and how they relate to my own life and I invite you to do the same.

Let's start with the chapter...Seeing Through Their Eyes. This was a particularly helpful chapter in that they ask questions of folk who suffer from depression so that their answers may be read by people who are trying help.

Here are some of the questions and answers and feel free to answer these yourself in a comment.

1. What does depression feel like?

some of the answers from the book included:

"A lack of hope"

" Unable to bear the thought of any more pain, for any longer."

" Empty. A zombie. Staring at walls, but not seeing anything, not thinking anything. Blank."

" Angry, Reliving nightmares over and over. But they are real."

"A feeling of incompetence, incapacity."

Care to add to the list?

Let's see...I personally would include:

* A slowing down of everything. You are trying to move through the day and it requires energy you do not have.

* You ache inside and out. You grieve. You mourn.

* You feel as though you cannot tolerate another minute of it but you know you have to.

* You seek validation from the world and others for your feelings of hopelessness and worthlessness. You get mad when people negate your views.

* There is such an inertia to it....you don't want to do anything. Nothing interests you. Nothing feels good or gives you pleasure. You sit and wait for it all to be over.

And these are just off the top of my head.

The million dollar question is next....Where does it seem to come from?

Some of the respondants from the book said:

" I wish I knew."

"Failure"

"Abuse"

"Stress"

"It started with grief. It turned into this."

For myself...I would answer that I believe much of mine to be inherited and biological in origin. I think certain folk have a predisposition to it and then bring on the environmental stressors or hormonal/chemical imbalances and...voila....you got yourself a depression. I believe it to be multifactorial.

I think for those of us who have had a lot of loss in our lives...lots of emotional trauma and/or abuse as children...it can be particularly bad for us. I think those early traumas mess with the wiring and responses of the brain.

Some of it is cogniton...relying upon old patterns of thinking about things especially pertaining to hopelessness and helplessness.

Current grief and loss certainly can trigger it big time as well as anniversaries of grief times. Christmas seems to be the worst for so many people.

Sometimes it is related to the seasons...lack of light....shorter and darker days.

Duh...I forgot the obvious. MS can cause depression and not just because you are sad to have it...I mean it can cause it...biologically. Also the meds for MS can cause depression as well. Are we having fun yet?

But mostly....who knows? It just comes. It just is. None of us with depression want to be this way. It is extreme suffering.

Much more to come. I hope this is helpful so far. Please comment on these first two questions if you can relate.

New Link and more...

I started off saying in my last post that I was curious how others felt about the whole "positive thinking" adage as far as physical illness goes. During my on-line research I mostly found it being applied to cancer patients. There is some thinking that one can visualize their cancer away. My personal thoughts are that this type of suggestion does more harm than good and I found both doctors and nurses who would agree with me.

I do believe that there is a body/mind connection with illness...absolutely. Stress, for example, can cause a host of ailments and can contribute to or exacerbate others. Nobody is advocating being a miserable S.O.B. but neither should someone dictate positivity as a requirement for physical health.

There are some folk who can say what I am trying to say far more eloquently than I can and The Dinosaur Doc is one such person.

Here is his link to an article he wrote entitled, What could be wrong with positive thinking? I would absolutely encourage you to read it. What really got me was the quote at the end of a woman who died of cancer. When we talk about physical illness in our society, we use this battle imagery of people fighting a war. We describe the people who die as having lost their battle and the people who live as heroes who conquered their disease. I feel it is an unfortunate terminology. Everyone who has to deal with a chronic disease is a hero in my book regardless of outcome or outlook.

In our society we take things for granted. We toss around cliches as though they are gospel and don't think twice about, are we really comforting with our words? Are we helping or harming? Are we compassionate or judging? Are we sometimes only really trying to minimize another's pain so we don't have to think of our own? Advice such as "Oh just be positive" or "Get over it" or "Don't dwell on the negative" have very little actual value for either getting physically better or for providing emotional comfort. These sorts of statements only serve to make the recipient feel more isolated and unwilling to share. In addition, it places an unfair burden upon the person who has illness to feel guilty if they cannot feel a certain way or cure themselves with happy thoughts.

The following are two articles written about this topic, the first is by a doctor specializing in treating cancer patients and the second was written by a nurse also helping those who have cancer.



By Jimmie Holland, M.D.

"The Tyranny of Positive Thinking," by Jimmie Holland, M.D., is adapted from the recent book, The Human Side of Cancer, Living with Hope, Coping with Uncertainty, by Holland and Sheldon Lewis. Dr. Holland is a physician/psychiatrist who has counseled people with cancer over the past 24 years at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, in New York City.


The Tyranny of Positive Thinking

As a physician/psychiatrist who has counseled people with cancer over the past 24 years, I have learned a lot about the difficult things people have to cope with when they have any kind of cancer--the negative and frightening meaning of the word cancer (particularly leukemia or lymphoma), and the feeling that people look at them differently. A patient said to me,"I'm not Joe anymore, I'm Joe with cancer." And they must cope with the distress of symptoms of the illness and its treatments, which is enough in itself, but that gets coupled with dealing with the nagging fears about the future.

It began to be clear to me about ten years ago that society was placing another undue and inappropriate burden on patients that seemed to come out of the popular beliefs about the mind-body connection. I would find patients coming in with stories of being told by well meaning friends, "I've read all about this-- if you got cancer, you must have wanted it." Others said, "I've been told that my personality must have caused my cancer and I guess I just didn't handle stress right in my life." Even more distressing was the person who said, "I know I have to be positive all the time and that is the only way to cope with cancer-but it's so hard to do. I know that if I get sad, or scared or upset, I am making my tumor grow faster and I will have shortened my life." These people didn't come up these ideas on their own--they got them from many places in our current culture: books, tabloids, talk shows, and TV. These ideas have come out of interest in the mind-body connection, based on research showing that stress can affect the immune system. The connection is carried further: if stress affects the immune system, and the immune system has something to do with cancer, then stress must cause cancer. This oversimplified pop psychology is typified by an article in the National Enquirer about Jackie Kennedy. The headline was "Stresses in Jackie's Life Led to Her Death From Lymphoma." It is important that people know that research simply does not back up these ideas. The only way that personality becomes a factor in causing cancer is when your personality leads to a life style that puts you at greater risk of cancer, such as smoking and sun exposure, raising the risk of lung cancer and melanoma. Obviously, also important is the fact that your personality leads you to have a rational approach to health, like diet and exercise, and that you followup in a timely way any significant suspicions of cancer with a consultation and treatment.

I felt some one needed to advocate for patients who were having to deal with these negative attitudes and I set out to set the record straight in my recent book about the human side of cancer, outlining what is myth and what is reality, based on what we know from research on the mind-body connection and cancer. Barbara Boggs Sigmund, mayor of Princeton in the 1980s, wrote an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times that I very much admired for her courage to fight back when accosted with these attitudes. She suffered from a melanoma that developed in the back of her eye. In an article titled, "I didn't give myself cancer," she spoke of her rage at self-help books that suggested "I had caused my own cancer out of lack of self-love, a need to be ill, or the wish to die and that consequently, it was up to me to cure it." She spoke against the theory that "cancer cells are internalized anger gone on a field trip all over our bodies" or that "rah-rah-sis-boom-bah, I can beat the odds if I only learn to love myself enough."

The attitude that "you caused your cancer" is very much related to a common psychological method we use in dealing with a catastrophic event or illness, namely we "blame the victim." We look for a rational cause as to why it happened--often concluding that the person must have "brought it on himself." That allows us to say, "Well, it couldn't happen to me--it was his own fault." It produces a false sense of security that we can prevent events that are actually beyond our control.

So rule number one in coping is: "Don't believe you brought cancer on yourself." The research does not show that either personality or how you handle stress in your life raises risk of developing cancer. This is one of the myths that makes coping more difficult these days..

Rule number two is: "Don't believe that you have to have a positive attitude all the time and that sadness or worry will shorten your survival." This tyranny of positive thinking is also related to the "mind over matter" ideas of our society. It is unrealistic that as you cope with nausea, fatigue, and worry and sadness, that you can be positive all the time. Yet, zealous believers in positive thinking may make you feel guilty when you find yourself crying sometimes. There is no evidence that if you do become "down" at times, it affects your tumor. If you are surrounded by the "positive attitude police," tell them to get off your case and be realistic--and offer them The Human Side of Cancer to read to get the facts straight, separating facts from beliefs.

It is also important to remember that our ways of coping with adversity (and illness is just one more example) are as different as our DNA and our fingerprints-each of us copes in a unique way because of our genetic makeup, our temperament, and the events in our lives that shape how we cope and see the world around us. Some people are innately optimistic--the positive thinking idea fits them well-they see the glass as two-thirds full! But just as many others are pessimistic by nature--the glass is only one third full! I recall Ernie who never believed for a moment that his treatment for lymphoma would help--he went through each treatment, telling me that he wouldn't make it. If the positive attitude told the story, Ernie shouldn't have made it. But 10 years later, he is healthy--and just as pessimistic about life as he had always been!

The problem that comes from this paradigm is that if the positive thinker's illness begins to worsen, the immediate response is guilt that "I wasn't strong enough the fight the disease." This is an unfair burden for a person who has coped and with courage and grace. There are many other factors that determine outcome, many that we don't know. I have seen positive copers who didn't make it and negative pessimists who did--which simply says that personality and coping isn't everything.

Surely we need much more research in this area of mind-body, which is developing in the new, small field of psychoneuroimmunology. While stress does affect the immune system, there is no evidence that the blips produced are in the range of those that would affect tumor growth. We will know more in the future, but for now, the studies do not support the myths about psychological causes of cancer and the role of emotions in tumor growth. The mind-body connection is fascinating because people hold such strong beliefs about it. I have come to feel that it is very much like religion. There are people who are "believers" and all the data in the world couldn't shake their faith. "Nonbelievers" simply are those who would not likely believe in the mind-body connection, even if the data were produced.

I strongly advocate that people use whatever beliefs or activities they find helpful - like relaxation, meditation, religious and spiritual approaches. Prayer is likely the most widely used of all interventions to help in coping.

What matters in the long run is that you find a view of illness and way of coping that is comfortable. Whether it involves believing or not believing in the mind-body connection is far less important. We have found that how you cope will likely be similar to how you have coped with major problems in your life. Don't allow family and others to tell you that you are "doing it all wrong," and that you must be more positive and cope in a new way that is foreign to your natural style. The old adage, "Don't change horses in the middle of the stream," is quite apt here. If your way of coping starts not to work, however, it is wise to seek counseling with someone who is familiar with the problems of people with cancer, like the social worker, psychologist, or psychiatrist (when medicine is needed for anxiety or depressed mood or poor sleep.) They can help to reinforce your familiar and proven ways of coping and offer you some ideas about how to approach the problems of illness to make it less upsetting and a little easier for you to deal with them.

Bottom line--identify your own beliefs about the mind-body connection and use them as they are comfortable for you, based on your temperament and your natural ways of coping. Remind your family and your doctor that they are most helpful when they respect your well-honed way of coping and respect your need to express how you feel, even if it isn't positive!

This article is based on the chapter, "The Tyranny of Positive Thinking," in The Human Side of Cancer: Living with Hope, Coping with Uncertainty, by Jimmie C. Holland, M.D., and Sheldon Lewis, published by HarperCollins and available in local bookstores, Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com.
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Being positive
Many people with cancer feel that they should "be positive". You may also be told by other people to "think positive" if you feel low or tearful, or want to talk about a difficult topic like the chance of the cancer being cured or making a will. These comments are not always helpful to you - in fact, often they are very unhelpful.

Some people are afraid that feeling sad or having negative feelings may delay their recovery or make the cancer grow faster, or make it more likely to come back. This is not the case and it is natural to feel frightened, upset and sad when you have been diagnosed with cancer or are having treatment.

Even if you have finished treatment, you will still have times when you feel very sad and worried, and find it difficult to enjoy life.

When you talk to other people who have cancer, even the most positive of them will admit to low times, when they felt depressed and anxious. No one can be positive 100% of the time, so it is important that you do not feel that you must always stay on top of things, when you really want to say that you're finding it tough.

Being positive does not mean feeling happy and cheerful all of the time. It is actually a very positive thing to acknowledge when you feel tired, anxious, depressed or angry.

People with cancer have to deal with issues and situations that are very frightening and very challenging - and more than likely to cause distress and tears.

It takes great courage and strength to face some of these issues. Facing the issues, rather than choosing not to deal with them, is an act of great bravery. Positive thinking is not about avoiding looking at the negatives. There are a great many negative aspects of having cancer and dealing with its treatment:

It can be a life-threatening disease.
You may lose part of your body through surgery.
You may have changes to your body, such as hair loss, due to treatment.
You may lose some independence and freedom.
You may lose friends who cannot face up to your illness.
You may lose important work contacts.
You may have to make big changes to your life.
These are very real losses and will obviously have an effect on you, and the people close to you. They do matter and you have a right to worry about them and be upset by them.

Being positive also means that it is OK to cry and say how you feel when the going gets really tough, it all feels too much, and you wonder when it's all going to end. Tears are a natural response to distress - they may be a very important release for you.

Positive thinking means different things to different people, but generally it is about facing up to the cancer, confronting it and dealing with it. People do this in different ways.

Some will want to take a very active part in their treatment, reading all they can, surfing the internet, talking to lots of people, and becoming a very active participant in their treatment. Some people will be content to let the doctors and nurses give the treatment and trust them to do their best. Some people will want to carry on as normally as possible and avoid thinking about, discussing or talking about the illness and its treatment - they know what is wrong with them but prefer not to talk about it all the time.

There is no one right way to deal with cancer. Each person finds their own best pathway. If you feel tired and sad, it is good to acknowledge that and not feel that you have to change it. It is important to remember that all feelings and thoughts pass, and you will feel better at some time in the future.

Recently, many people have tried to find out whether positive thinking can make treatment more successful or prevent cancer coming back. This is a very difficult issue to research and is still not well understood. It is not known whether positive thinking directly affects the growth of cancer.

Although the development of cancer may be influenced by our thoughts, feelings and attitude, it is also influenced by many other things such as our environment, our diet, and our genetic and physical make-up.

It is important to remember this, because if you believe that you need to be positive to get rid of the cancer, you may think, if it comes back, that it is your fault because you were not positive enough.

Other people can also make you feel worse by saying that if you fight hard enough you can overcome cancer. If your cancer does come back or cannot be cured, it is not your fault: it is because cancer is a very complicated illness and modern treatments cannot cure all cancers.

Some research studies have shown that people who wanted to fight their cancer were more likely to be cured, or live longer, than people who did not feel so positive. This is possibly because people who can deal with cancer in a direct way are able to take more advantage of what is on offer in terms of both conventional and complementary therapies. However, this is not the same as saying that 'positive thinking' is a necessary part of your treatment for cancer.

It is important that you are able to talk honestly about how you feel, and cry if you need to. This can help to release tension and stress and can even bring you closer to the person you are talking to.

If you find it hard to talk honestly to people in your family it may help to find someone from outside to talk to, such as one of the Cancerbackup nurses, a counsellor, or a cancer support organisation

Comments from the Dinosaur doc's Blog

I will give you guys a link to the Dinosaur Doc in my next post. You simply must read his post about What is Wrong with Positive Thinking.

The comments alone for this post were so right on that I had to take some of the information provided as I don't want to lose it.

One commenter on his blog posted this about studies done about positive thinking and the impact upon physical illness and survival:

"In a 2004 study by Penelope Schofield and her colleagues at Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre in Melbourne, Australia that involved 204 lung cancer patients, there was no evidence that a high level of optimism prior to treatment enhanced survival. However, the study underscored the importance of optimism in relation to quality of life. Those patients who were more optimistic were less depressed and more likely to adhere to treatment.

Another new body of work goes beyond just looking at a positive attitude and is examining its biological underpinnings by studying immune function and stress hormones. So far, the findings are similar to the Schofield study, indicating that successful coping is not necessarily about having a positive outlook or striving for a cheery disposition. Rather, coping in a way familiar to you (which could involve anything from stress relief to exercise) can prove beneficial. In fact, if someone is a natural curmudgeon, then continuing to be a curmudgeon may be the very thing to help lower stress, bolster the immune system and, possibly, influence the success of the cancer treatment".1

The article "The Challenge of the Positive Attitude" was from the site: http://www.thewellnesscommunity.org

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The following was another comment by an anonymous poster. All I can say is right on sister!

"I believe it adds insult to injury to tell a person with a serious or chronic problem to just think 'Positive'! As if the person needs one more platitude."

What it reminds me of is when older men admonish a young woman to always smile as though it is owed to them. It is condescending and rude.


From the author of Nickle and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich wrote an article about the positivity cult so entrenched in our society. Having survived breast cancer, she was more than annoyed by the positivity entourage.

Here is a link to her article.

And lastly here is a small passage from that article which really resonated with me.

From Pathologies of Hope by by Barbara Ehrenreich

"But what is truly sinister about the positivity cult is that it seems to reduce our tolerance of other people's suffering. Far from being a "culture of complaint" that upholds "victims," ours has become "less and less tolerant of people having a bad day or a bad year," according to Barbara Held, professor of psychology at Bowdoin College and a leading critic of positive psychology. If no one will listen to my problems, I won't listen to theirs: "no whining," as the popular bumper stickers and wall plaques warn. Thus the cult acquires a viral-like reproductive energy, creating an empathy deficit that pushes evermore people into a harsh insistence on positivity in others."

Exactly.

Trying to make sense of it all

I was doing a bit of research to find what others thought of the whole "positive thinking" phenomena with respect to physical illness.

Before I share some of my findings let me preface this with, believe it or not I am a positive person. If I wasn't, I surely would not have survived my life thus far. I was raised by a schizophrenic mother in the inner city, lost my father when I was four to alcoholism, I lived in poverty, was homeless, abused, neglected, and this was all when I was but a child. My teen and adult years...well those are some other stories. What I am trying to say is, Multiple Sclerosis is just the tip of the iceberg for me. I had had to survive many things as I am sure you all have as well. Everyone has their stories to tell.

At any point in my life I could have given up, settled into poverty, crime, or even suicide. But I didn't. Sorry for this abbreviated version of things. It certainly is better to show than simply tell but I have a point I want to get to believe it or not. What helped me most to survive some extreme situations wasn't so much this cliched "positive" crap but rather...hope. When you lose hope you are done for.

I feel I am much like Houdini. Let me explain. As we all know Houdini was a famous magician capable of amazing escapism and daring feats. What you may not know about the man is that he had an interest in true magic, and particularly the supernatural. In those days it was common for people to do the whole seance thing and make "spirits" come out of the woodwork. Well Houdini made it his mission to debunk these frauds. He would come and disrupt the illusion. Whereas his magic was acceptable because people knew it was, indeed, an illusion, he didn't like it when people were passing off illusion as truth. And I don't like it either.

Yet part of Houdini wanted to believe. It made him so angry to see these charlatans trying to give people hope of some sort of an after life when all they were showing was an illusion. They were making a mockery of people's hopes.

I know this is a lot of jumping around with my topics here but I promise to tie everything together.

When I found out my son had autism, it was as though the crystal ball people had been recycled from beyond. All of a sudden you are rushed by a crowd with miracle cures. Well all ya gotta do is sit on a golden egg while beating your breast and eat these special granola bars. And by the way...I can sell you the special golden egg and granola bars you will happen to need. I became so sick and tired of hearing about the special vitamins or exercises or oxygen therapy, or riding dolphins or eating herbs to cure autism. Excuse my french but give me an F***ing break. The thing was...there was sometimes good and beneficial treatments but you lost sight of them because of all the crazy cure hooplah. When you toss out everything...there just might be something good that you miss along with all the quackery.

So here I am today. I am both a realist but hopeful too. I do wish to believe in some magic if you want to call it that. Oh boy wait until I do start to talk about the synchronicities. I have been called a hopeless dreamer, a pollyanna, and also a harsh cold realist in the same breath. Truth is...I am both.

And part of dichotomous me would love to believe in my power to change the world with my own thoughts. I would love to believe in miracles and magic. I would love to believe that I have so much control. The other part of me is angry at illusions and my willingness to ever entertain them.

Now back to the notion of "positive thinking." What it is not. Being positive doesn't mean you get to be delusional. Being hopeful and delusional are two different entities. Living with my mother and her multitudes of delusions made me loathe illusion. I won't put up with it. I need the truth of my reality.

But here's the catch...we don't always know what the truth is. I don't have a crystal ball. Nobody does. I don't know what the future will bring. Many outcomes are possible.

We just don't know and the not knowing can be the basis for crazy making. We all have to blindly leap into the future. Nobody knows their fate...not you...not me...maybe not even God. And if he/she knows we are certainly not privy to that information.

So we have to make do with now and sorting through the chaos to find things which help and make sense. This is where I am right now with all this. I am trying to process how I feel. I know I am grieving some but exactly what am I grieving for? What have I lost and what will I lose in the future? I know I have to accept but what part of this do I accept? I know I have to move forward and act and do things which will help me to overcome but what does that look like exactly? Where does my foot land as I take that first step? Where am I going and why?

It is all a process and this is just the beginning. It is what we humans have to do to survive. You pick yourself up and begin again. And again....and again and....

On being "positive"

I am not sure how we got here but I sure have gotten to thinking about this topic now and what the word "positive" means in the world of health. I began writing about my symptoms of MS and then about coping mechanisms and somehow we have a theme rising out of nowhere of the importance of positive thinking. Let's examine this shall we?

Let's take cancer as an example. One of my close friends has cancer right now. She talks about it...courageously. She has a website about her experience. She uses humor, information and facts, and her experience to help and inform others. I would never imply, insinuate, or instruct her to always be "positive." This would be insulting not to mention condescending. It assumes that she is not positive already. It would also assume positivity is the panacea of feeling when you have a chronic illness. You don't go around demanding everyone in the population be "positive" so why is such a particular request for those who have a physical illness?

People will feel as they feel. The one thing you can never dictate to someone else is how they should feel. The emphasis is upon the word should. Judgements about how people should feel are never acceptable or helpful.

When you have a chronic physical illness (and I am about to tell you that most of us eventually will have one if we don't already now) you are going to feel all sorts of emotions. You are going to feel in shock. You are going to feel pissed off. You are going to feel sorrow and grief. You may even experience guilt. And I am here to say that is all okay and normal. As a matter of fact, it would be abnormal to not feel these things.

Most people, when faced with having a disease, are not going to be La-la-la-ing across the fields like a smurf on coke. If so then there truly is a need for a funny farm.

The true meaning of being "positive" for me means...you are going to feel crappy at times, curse the universe and possibly God, cry shreik and yell, and then you will get up again to face another day. You will find ways to survive. You will find ways to channel your grief and anger into other energies...possibly creative ones. You will adapt and grow. You will use your experience to help others going through the same thing. And on a really good day you will reframe the experience and find meaning. And believe it or not the actual reason behind this blog right here is because I do find meaning in this experience and I want to share that with you.

However, it is ill advised to go about telling people what they should feel under this circumstance. It is just plain wrong.

I think instead of this cliched "positive thinking" we use as a strategy for every ailment or challenge, I would like to promote instead, the notion of emotional resilience. Emotional resilience goes beyond thinking happy thoughts. Emotional resilience would include the strength to allow yourself to be vulnerable. True strength isn't about avoiding messy or "negative" feelings. True strength is acknowledging that you do have them and allowing yourself to feel them. This stoic silent solitary person devoid of all emotions constructing a log cabin in the middle of the prairie all by themselves is a myth. We are all human. We feel things. And what's more, we all need help. Thus we share and lean upon each other. We are INTER-dependent creatures whether we want to think so or not.

I am sitting here thinking of the emotionally resilient people I know. None of them have fake smiles plastered upon their faces. A lot of them are downright cantankerous. It isn't so much about some superficial positivity as much as the strength and desire to perservere. The emotionally resilient person is not afraid to face fear. They are afraid but they do it anyway.

So where did we get this notion about "positive thinking" anyhow? I think we have this myth that if we set our minds to anything, that we can do it. Is this really true? Do we have limitations? Is life truly a mind over matter game?

I am thinking about this news article where a group of people were led out into the desert on a hike for a wilderness survival exercise. Here is the link. The man ended up dieing because the group leaders wouldn't give him water as they wanted him to finish his goal. They believed in the power of positive thinking to overcome bodily need. Bullshit. The man died because of their insanity.

It is my belief that we use this myth of positive thinking as a way to feel that we can control everything. Well we can't. This is the reason for the serenity prayer. Sometimes we have to relinquish control. And this is a scary proposition for most people.

There is a lot here to digest. I am going to keep going with this topic as I feel it is really important. There are really two separate things to discuss here.

My main point if you don't get anything else out of reading this is:

1. You don't preach to others how to feel. You never tell someone how they SHOULD feel a certain way because a. It pisses people off and b. It is just not too damn helpful. It is belittling, insulting, and condescending.

and...

2. I want to investigate the truth about "positive thinking" when it comes to how it can truly help with physical and/or mental illness. Can we really think our way out of being sick or being depressed?

It is funny because on another day I would probably debate the other way. For example...I own the film...What the bleep do we know. If you haven't seen it, it is a wild ride through metaphysical new-agey beliefs about changing our realities through our beliefs. And believe it or not...I found myself enchanted. I would love to believe in some of this. But for me I always seek balance. There is a grain of truth to everything. I want to see how I can best utilize knowledge so it works for me in my life.

I am glad I wrote this. I have been processing this for awhile. I have much more to say about this and other topics...coming up soon.