Fears of Abandonment?

Last night I had a dream:

...I dreamed that a friend of mine decided to stop taking her medications (in the dream MAOI's and Ativan). She phoned me and told me to watch for them in the water flue beside my house. Every morning, first thing in the morning I would go to the flue and there I would find her 4 perfectly preserved pills sitting on the edge of the water. I felt suicidal, so I began hoarding these pills.

One day when I went to pick up the pills there was a note beside them. It had been torn in two, along the bottom. I pieced it together. It was written by my friend and read: "Dr X will be seeing only 9 patients a week. He will no longer take new patients and will stop seeing the patients he has until he sees only 9 original patients"

I was desperately sad, and severely depressed. I needed help. I wanted to kill myself. I was planning on taking the hoarded medication, not because I thought he was leaving me, but because I was depressed. The only hope I felt was in my therapy sessions with Dr. X.

I had an appointment the next day. I got to his office and found a man in his office. Dr X walked in and didn't say anything to me. Inside I was getting angry, because clearly he knew he was going to dump me as a patient and he wouldn't get rid of the other man in the room. Someone knocked on the door and two women came in. Dr. X began reading the paper, the 3 others began talking amongst themselves. I tried to talk, but no one was listening and I felt uncomfortable bringing up Dr. X's impending departure and my impending suicide.

I was becoming both distraught and absolutely furious for the way I was being treated in my appointment (i.e. ignored, other people in the room, no respect for my privacy, Dr. X obliviously reading the paper). I could not bring up my suicidal thoughts, or my hoarding medication, because I was afraid he would think I was being manipulative and trying to make him not leave me. No matter how much I knew this was not true, I could not stop believing this is how the information would be perceived.

I started yelling very loudly at him..."Are you leaving your practice? Am I one of the 12 patients? Why are you ignoring me? Can't you see I am having trouble? Can't you see I am not well yet?

He looked at me and said he had found money in his child's account. $45,800.00 (maybe $43,800.00??unsure). He had figured out that financially he did not have to work like he did anymore.

I asked him if I was going to be able to see him. He ignored every question I had, and everything I said except he told me I was being unreasonable for wanting the others out of the room. That if they stayed in the room maybe I would get better.
I raced out of the room, climbed out an open window and took all the pills I had hoarded.

Disdain

I had two dreams the other day about Dr. X. rejecting me. The theme in both was the same, but I can only remember the details of one:

In the dream I have met a man and am enjoying his company. Soon I discover Dr. X is his good friend. After a few days the man dumps me while we are in some kind of theatre or concert venue. Dr. X is sitting beside this man when the man breaks up with me. As I am getting up to leave Dr. X gives me an intensely hurtful look of disgust and disdain; a look that betrays his hatred of me and his loathing for me.

The look sends me many messages, all awful. His look tells me I am not good enough. I am stupid. I am laughable. I sense there is a huge line drawn between him and people like me. I am not worth anything. I am worthless. I do not belong anywhere near "people like him". (successful, knowledgeable, intellectual people)

I woke up on the verge of tears.

I feel that way quite often. Like I am less of a human being than others. That I am bad and disdainful. That others are so much better than me. I sense a divide between people who are well, intelligent and successful, and myself, like I have failed at what is expected of me; that I have not met the standards for valuable people.

In my appointment Dr. X asked me if I recognized that this isn't the case..no I don't. I suspect it is the case but people only talk about it behind my back. That people I know laugh at me, think I am a bad person, think I am completely messed up, think things like if they weren't friends with my husband I would not be worth seeing.

I know some people feel like this, feel the divide between me and them. I see it when they talk with me. I felt it in my choir on Wednesday. Like I was trying too hard to fit in. At one point the two sisters next to me, who I thought liked me, started talking in sign language a few times when I made mistakes. I am certain they were making fun of me. That made me feel intensely self conscious, sad and lonely.

I feel like I will never be normal, never fit in, always be "outside the circle"; that circle where the people who matter , or people who count, exist.

False Prophet

I had a dream last night:

I was with a group of people (old colleagues, friends etc.) and a man came into our group and told us he had control over all of our existences. He chose when we would die and how we would live.

To prove this to us he took us all into a swimming pool, and from the deck, with nothing attached to him and the water, he proceeded to shock and almost drown each of us.

We fell into line. We believed he had godlike powers. We believed he held our life in his hands.

He met with us the next night and told us we were all going to die the next night. He told each of us how we were going to die. As we knew he was all powerful we waited as our fate was sealed by his words.

My fate was to die by electric shock in the water the following evening. I was terrified and felt like my fate was completely out of my control. I became apathetic, gave up, waited to die.

While waiting I saw him begin to kill other people. He seemed to be torturing them and heading them towards a slow, agonizing death. I became very afraid, so afraid that I felt frozen by my fear: helpless, powerless and standing still waiting for a cruel death.

Something about the terrifying way he began killing people eventually awoke a power in me I did not know I had. I began to think the prophet was false, that it was our inaction that was allowing him to have all this power over us.

I began talking with the others about my beliefs. At first everyone thought it was impossible to change the future. Everyone felt the prophet was in complete control and there was nothing they could do to change their fate.

I explained to them he only had power over us as long as we continued to believe and act as though he did: if we challenged his hold on us we could make him go away.

Slowly people stood up and began challenging him. They told him his power was false, that his power was dependant on our giving up, on our believing we had no power over him, no power to change the fate he had determined for us.

He became furious and made us all go into a small lecture hall, intent on destroying us all. In the hall he began to tear our theory apart, dismissed it, showed us how faulty it was.

We began challenging both his words and the physical nature of his power. He kept trying to hurt us, but we never gave up. After a while even the people who continued to disbelieve our theory and their power began to fight back against the prophet.

He killed two people, but as we fought they began to come to life again. He became weaker and weaker with our offensive tactics. The more we disbelieved, vocalized our disbelief and showed him our power the less powerful he became. By sunup we had become so powerful in our offense that he died right in front of us.

• I think maybe the false prophet is my depression/anxiety. I was thinking a lot about suicide last night. Planning my own exit. Thinking to myself about how to die painlessly, or at the very least, quickly. Finally getting complete relief (that is what the "false prophet", depression, was telling me).
• The idea of knowing when I die and how seems comforting to me, in the way it might comfort a follower of a prophet who could both foretell and cause my death.
• As I plan suicide there is always some small part of me that wants to hang on, that believes I can change, that sees some amount of hope in a bleak situation. This is my offensive tactic, believe in hope, believe my future can change, challenge the seemingly obvious fact that I am destined to allow my depression to kill me. Challenge the fact that I have no power. Stay and fight against what seems a foretold ending.
• When we challenged his words and his physical power over us, it is my subconscious challenging the seemingly physical nature and power of my depression. I was especially having trouble yesterday with Valium withdrawal. It was very physical...shaking, twitching uncontrollably, insomnia, extreme tensing of muscles in my neck and shoulder area, my awful mouth movements: tongue curling, pushing against my bottom row of teeth, feeling like I have sores in my mouth and on my tongue from it moving around in my mouth so much; clenching teeth, pursing lips uncontrollably, all returning with a vengeance. I felt/feel so powerless against all this, yet something inside me keeps helping me to quit the medication. I do have some control. I am not powerless.

God, please make this false prophet disappear in the coming year. I really, really need the relief.

How I Left Work

Sara, over at "My Sad Alter Ego", posed a couple questions to me in the comment section of my last post.

She asked:
"...do you have a post on here about when/how you decided you needed to stop working? How do you get to that point, and more importantly, how do you know when you do? I always am wondering this. "

I do have some information willy-nilly throughout my postings, but nothing in one post. I will try to provide my experiences about trying to leave work in this one post.

First, some background about me. It is important to know who I am, because it plays into the difficulty I had leaving work. I am a worker. My entire life I identified myself as a worker. I AM what I do. Even when I worked at a fast food restaurant in high school, or was a chambermaid when I first left home. I always work exceedingly hard and take pride in what I do. Even when I hate my job/s I always give 160% plus. So leaving work was an incredibly tough decision, and remains a difficult and guilt ridden decision for me. That being the case, it was imperative that I leave work. I would have killed myself if I had not.

Second, I joined the organization I worked for out of university, because I had acquired a huge debt load going to university. I am terrified of ending up homeless, or having absolutely no money. This has much to do with my parents divorce and the subsequent difficulties my Mom had finding a job and affording to live the first few years after my Dad left. I would say I have phobia of being jobless, homeless and penniless. Because of these "phobias, I took a job that had nothing to do with what I was educated in. I cried almost everyday on my way to work for the first few years. I knew I had "made a deal with the devil" to pay my bills.

Third, As I stayed with the company, because of my work ethic and my creativity I began to work my way up the corporate ladder and started to move into corporate teaching. The money became better and better, the challenges more exciting and I found my real love was teaching. The problem was I did not fit into a bureaucratic organization. The structure and bureaucracy were overwhelming and soul sucking.

The problem was, by the time I recognized this I was making so much money that for the first time in my life I felt fairly recognized financially. I am definitely not a material person. It was not material goods I was seeking. It was "financial safety"
Also, I had experienced several depressive episodes, and began having anxiety attacks partly due to, and I would suggest increasingly due to, some of the organizational behaviour I was experiencing within the company. My self esteem was getting worse and worse and the "financial security" I felt I was experiencing was not true.

The problem was in the corporation I worked for there was no such thing as financial, or job, security. I believe, and I still believe, that the organization had a "plot" at it's core. The plot was to make every employee believe they were expendable so each employee would work harder. You may think this sounds like paranoia, but the company would restructure jobs and positions and departments, and lay off people so often, yet pretty much keep everything the same and then hire new people after all the kerfuffle, that it really seemed like they were trying to bully people into working harder.

Bullying terrifies me and I spent almost the whole time I worked there afraid I would lose my job, and for good reason. The organization restructured and cancelled positions I worked in on a regular basis and then made me "apply" for the new...almost identical job. The underlying message was always that I may not be the successful applicant. I stayed though because of my financial phobias, but also because in the last 6 or 7 years the jobs I took were so interesting at least 1/2 of the time.

So... After several MDE's that lasted months, to up to two years, with some stretched of good times in between, in 2001 I became more depressed than I had ever been. For the first time in my life, despite seeing several therapists and my family doctor finally trying to prescribe anti-depressants, I was finally referred to a pdoc, because nothing was helping me. That was in 2001.
I spent once a week going to therapy with him. We tried several medications while I was working. I became more and more despondent. It was increasingly hard to work while trying to find medication/s to help me. I had been having a lot of suicidal ideation the entire time, but by 2002 and early 2003 the ideation was turning into clear plans, and was getting worse and worse and more violent. Dr. X and I discussed my leaving work over and over, but he never pushed, because he knew work, even though it was stressful and much of it was not "me". There was a huge part that helped me thrive.

In early 2002, through to 2003 my job position was restructured, and I was forced to apply for the newly developed positions each time. I managed, despite increasing depression, because in the building I worked in there were approximately 400 people I knew very well, having trained most of them. I had a really tight group of people I worked with, my boss was amazingly supportive, I was allowed to lower my work week to four days which seemed to let some pressure off as I could sleep/wind down for 3 days on the weekend.

In late 2003 I applied for and received a new (read old) job. It was highly stressful and included travelling and working with upper management, executives and the V.P. I was told to move to a building where I knew know one except my boss. Suddenly I was extremely isolated and so stressed out I began planning my suicide. I planned to hang myself in the handicap washroom (because I could lock the door). Everyday I would go to the bookstore near my work and look for books on how to commit suicide. I would surf the net at work trying to find ways to commit suicide. I walked into my coffee shop before work one day and the band Nirvana was playing on the t.v. screen. I was sure Kurt Cobain was telling me to commit suicide. After many weeks of this increasingly suicidal ideation I managed to tell Dr. X what was happening.

In that appointment he said: "what do you need to leave work? What forms need to be filled out? I will fill them out right now and we can fax them." I declined. Work was so busy and I cared so much for my boss. I could see she was overwhelmed and I could not leave her in a lurch.

That week I almost (purposely) stepped out in front of an oncoming bus. The only thing that stopped me was my compassion for how the driver would feel. The thoughts and plans of hanging myself became unbearable and obsessive. On top of that, I suddenly stopped comprehending anything at work. It was as though my work was written in some other language. I also became increasingly afraid to interact with people at work. Literally, so afraid, to the point of that I became increasingly paranoid that everyone was out to hurt me, or make me feel stupid, embarrass me, or that they were ridiculing and talking about me behind my back. I sat there almost all day, crying, distraught and unable to do anything.

Then I had a dream. I wrote about it in the post "Transformational Dreams" People who have followed my blog know that I take some of my dreams very seriously. Some of the most important revelations in my life have come out of dreams. This was one that told me to leave work.

The dog in the dream, the one I first kicked and then later saved from drowning had the exact strawberry blond colour hair as me. I was the dog I was kicking and watching drown. I had to be the person who saved myself. At first I heard the messages in the dream. Then a few weeks later I listened to, and acted on the messages.

The next appointment I had with Dr. X asked me if I thought the whole gigantic corporations was going to collapse if I left? Suddenly, I saw the absurdity in my fear of leaving the organization. There would always be someone to step in and do my job. Dr. X told me I needed to tell my boss exactly the types of thoughts I was having. It would be hard to say, and harder for her to hear, but she needed to understand how sick I was.

Three weeks prior I had made an attempt to tell my boss I needed to leave work due to my illness. She felt I simply had to much work on my shoulders and volunteered to hire a previous, trusted coworker to help me. I thought that might be a viable solution, so we tried it. It did not help. My thoughts of suicide did not dissipate. I was too sick to keep working.

The next three weeks I slept all weekend, every 3 day weekend. The second I got home I went to bed. My body was shutting itself down.

So I wrote in my journal: : "I will tell [my boss] I have to leave work tomorrow" (Monday). I wrote exactly what I was going to say over and over and over. I got to work and thought I was going to throw up. I couldn't do it. I tried to push myself again the next day. Couldn't do it. The next day I was determined. I walked in the door straight up to my boss. I told her I needed to talk with her privately. I sat down and then I told her I was going to commit suicide if I did not leave work. I told her about all my thoughts and that my pdoc was insisting I leave work.

She seemed really mad at me, and I was devastated. She wouldn't talk with me all day. She was one of my favourite co-workers and I had so much respect for her. I was devastated.

The next day at lunch I sat down beside her and apologized for having to leave. I told her I cared so much for her and the work, but I needed to protect myself. I said I was very sad she was mad at me. She began to cry. She said she was not mad, she was afraid she would never see me again. We both cried. I promised her she would see me again. I left two days later thinking I was just taking a few weeks off. However, I remained, and remain, to ill to return to my workplace.

On top of everything else I had so much external which made it an easier transition (albeit still year and a half decision). My pdoc was and has remained, unconditionally supportive. My Mom, when she was alive, and my sister's were very supportive and pushing for me to take care of me. Also, my workplace also has a Long Term Disability program, and I qualified for my country's disability program. Knowing my financial situation was going to remain stable until I was able to work again helped me take the leap and leave to take care of myself.It was the most difficult decision I ever had to make. It was life changing. I have spent many, many hours thinking I did the wrong thing. I know however, that I would not have survived had I stayed a week longer. I was too sick.

That was in early 2003. Five and a half years later I still struggle with wanting to work, but slowly I am learning to believe I am building a life that is better for me. I would never have discovered my love for art, or that I could draw, let alone that I was a good drawing instructor. I would never have learned that I loved to paint. Had I not made the decision to leave work I know I would either be dead, or even more severely depressed than I have been (I cannot imagine what that would look like?).

The pressures and responsibilities of work were incompatible with working towards becoming more emotionally resilient. It took a long time for me to get beyond the loss of my work, I still have moments where I feel guilty about having to leave, but I know now, in my heart, it was the only decision I could have made. The dream I had a couple weeks ago: "The Wolf Returns" reinforced, I am hoping for good, that I made the right decision. The recent dream told me my old life is over. It has ended. It is time to look forward. The black wolf in the dream ended my old life. My new white puppy is the beginning of my new, improved, and desired life.

Until leaving work I have never, ever had the opportunity to learn what I loved to do, to actually decide what it is I want to do. Leaving work woke me up to a difficult and terrifying existential search; an existential journey that has challenged my inner being to the question "Who am I". I am not sure about that answer yet, but I know the answer is important to my well being. My leaving work allowed me the opportunity to move closer towards the discovery of who I am and who I am meant to be. These have been questions I have struggled with since I was a small girl. These are the most important questions in my life and I know the answers will be the biggest catalysts towards wellness I will ever achieve.

Sara, I hope you are able to take care of you better than I was able to take care of me. Your health is more important than any job in the world. Without your health you have nothing. That much I know.

The Slow Pace of Acceptance and Change

I am so tired I feel literally sick, but I cannot sleep. 1:30am wide awake, 2:30, 3:30, 4:30 still wide awake. I started taking a low dose of Trazadone on top of everything else, but it hasn't helped me sleep and makes me feel really awful in the morning. Even more tired than before.

Part of it is the puppy, but I wasn't sleeping even before I knew of or brought the puppy home. Unfortunately, it's not that, "I feel so happy/wired I can't sleep". The kind that happens when my mood shoots up.

No, this sleep is my old, "I have a millions ruminations going through my head and my mind won't shut up, so I can't sleep" insomnia.

Today was my first day teaching a "Teen Group" at the Art Clubhouse. It was during the hours I regularly take a nap 4-6/7. I was so tired, until I began and then my enthusiasm and energy kicked in. Thank god. The class was really good and everyone seemed to be enjoying themselves. I also have a really great helper...which makes such a difference...YAY!

I see so many improvements in my life over the past few months. Actually, I look back, and even before any medication helped me I now recognize that I have been slowly improving over the past few years. The problem is the lability in my mood is such that when I feel good I feel I will always be perfectly well, but when I crash I feel like I am never going to be well.

I am trying really hard to accept I have a mental illness; to say to myself, "My fatigue is a symptom (of the medicine or the illness...who knows), my memory problems, concentration and word finding problems. my sleeplessness and sleepiness...they are all symptoms. Are these better than wanting to die all the time? Yes.

So life is improving, but I am trying to allow myself to accept that life has changed dramatically for me, and needs to change even more for me to become "well" (whatever that means). I am a different person because of the experiences with depression and anxiety I have gone through over the years. My functioning is different than it was. That is hard to accept.

I truly believe my old life is gone. I think my last wolf dream told me that, but my new life is just beginning and hopefully despite the side effects/residual symptoms it will be a life worth living.

I may fall into a depression again, but I think I have some skills now that I didn't have before, and I have a pdoc I trust and know is right for me. I know he will help me even if I get fully well and become sick later on. I also am working hard at integrating myself into a community that matters to me.

So I'm sickly tired, but I am much better off than I was. My being able to say that proves the point. I think my Mom sent me my new puppy as a symbol of the beginning of my new life. The black wolf killed the old me, and the white dog will protect and help the new me grow.

I say my Mom instigated the change, because my puppy came from a breeder named "Casamoonen". Casa means house...I see the name as "house of the moon". My sisters and I all decided when my mom died she became the moon. (which is full tonight by the way). Every night I step outside and see the moon and say hello to my Mom. My new puppy was sent to me by her. I believe that. He is a messenger sent to help me with my transition into my new life.

It is strange how I get sent all these messages in dreams, in life, in everything around me. Does this happen to others? Do you get sent messages that you feel compelled to heed or follow? It happens too often for me to ignore.

Today is My New Birthday

(Photo: by Aqua, "Transformation", August 2008)

In respect of, and to reinforce the powerful message, Wednesday's dream , "The Wolf Returns", sent me: Today I am changing my life. I am throwing away the old me and moving in a different direction. From this day forward I am reborn.

I will never feel any remorse or guilt over anything I did in the past. I accept that I did what I was able to do at the time. I will never again feel guilt for being depressed, or on disability for depression. I will accept that I did not cause this illness. It happened and all I can be expected to do is try to make myself feel better. I will also accept that sometimes my illness makes it difficult to do anything to help myself. During those times I will do whatever I CAN do to keep trying.

As of today here is the new me:

• I am a painter.
• I am an artist.
• I am a writer.
• I am an art teacher.
• I am a photographer.
• I am creative.
• I am disabled by my depression right now, but I am NOT my disability.
• I will accept my disability income as a blessing and a gift that allows me the opportunity to grow into the human being I am meant to become.
• I will be here today, and present now.
• I will not worry about tomorrow.
• I will soak up today.
• I will see all the beauty in the world, like a new child, through my new eyes.
• My life will be full of beauty, and I will recognize that.
• My new life will be full of love and I will pass that on.
• My new life will be full of compassion, for myself and for others.
• I will accept my mental illness as the catalyst, the mother and the origin of, my new and improved life.
• I will embrace my depression like a mother embraces a crying child. I will hold it, and care for it, and accept that the crying may pass, or it may not, but the crying child is always a beautiful being trying to express his or her needs to the world.

The Wolf Returns

(Photo by Aqua, Grey Wolf at Grouse Mountain)


I could not both get to sleep and stay asleep on Wednesday night. My anxiety is increasing and with that my sleep is getting worse again. I slept in snippets of a half hour here, and an hour there. After a pattern of waking and sleeping I woke at 4:30am and finally must have fallen asleep sometime between 6 and 7:00am, because I had an awful nightmare right before waking to go see my pdoc.

I dreamt my two sisters and I climbed towards the top of a mountain. The final climb was a set of stairs that zig-zagged up to the top of the mountain. Atop the mountain was a huge modern building, not unlike the building I used to work in.

We went inside and instantaneously I began being attacked by 3 coyotes who were trying to bring me to the ground so their big, pure black wolf companion could finish me off. I was trying to protect my sisters, but none of the canines seemed interested in them. The coyotes kept grabbing my hands and arms, and trying to attack my head; kept trying to force me to the ground. All the while the black wolf was stalking me, waiting for me to slip to the ground so he could pounce on me. I kept fighting back, calling to my sisters to help. It appeared no one would help me.

Suddenly I looked up and my sisters were behind a counter with the coyotes on the other side. My siblings were negotiating our release with the coyotes and offering them food in return for our safe escape. The coyotes agreed and told my sisters to leave through one door and me to leave through another a bit farther down the hall.

I saw my sister's safely on the outside of the building, but as I went to go out my door I saw the black wolf standing on the other side of the glass door; waiting to kill me. The coyotes told me to open the door and let the wolf in, quickly slip out and slam the door shut.

I did what they said, and the wolf slipped in, and I out. However, as I shut the door I quickly realized that the door opened outwards and it would be easy for the wolf to simply push the door open and come after me. I saw my sisters had disappeared and knew they were safe.

I began to run in terror. The wolf pushed the door open and began chasing me down the stairs. I was running so fast my feet were not touching the stairs. I was hanging onto the handrail and leaping from stair landing to stair landing. Each landing was 6 stairs apart. I was becoming dizzy from the switchback like staircase. I misjudged one of the landings and flew over the railing and into the abyss of the mountain gorge below.

The wolf followed me, but I was dead before he got to me.

I woke absolutely terrified.

Interpretation ideas?

The Coyotes: They are trickster figures. Figures who, in North American First Nations mythology, facilitate our seeing the lighter side of life, who sometimes have noble purposes, but also sometimes are playing with us and can be cruel. They represent the uncertainty of life, the uncertainty of the direction life can take us. They can bring light to dark situations (in fact the Raven...a trickster figure in Westcoast First Nation's mythology tricked a princess into opening a box that contained the sun, thereby releasing light into the world. ("The Raven Stealing the Sun" myth).

I run into coyotes on our farm all the time. They are a symbol of hope for me. They seem to appear when I am desperately depressed and need a reminder that I can survive this illness. It seems strange that they seemed to be doing the opposite in my dream..trying to facilitate my death. Although maybe my death is the only hope I have?

Or maybe they are referencing my being saved by a symbolic death? The death of my old life; the life I keep clinging to, the life that drags into feeling guilty for the new life I am trying to make for myself? My change from doing what I think is right, into having a life filled with doing what I WANT to do.

I know in the dream I wanted to survive. I fought and fought when the coyotes were trying to bring me down (but maybe I was fighting there lesson to allow my symbolic death, my important change, to happen. I ran hard from the wolf to try to save myself. It just did not work. I died anyways...and not even from the wolf, from a mistake I made. (my misjudgement of where the stair's landing was.

The Wolf: He has never appeared to me as pure black before. Throughout the dream I knew and felt it was symbolically important that he was pure black. He was impending doom, stealth and pure fear. He was patient in his efforts to bring me down. He waited, not once interrupting the coyotes efforts to drag me to the ground. He was over confident that he would succeed in killing me one way or another.

Dr. X and I discussed my dream. He said I needed to challenge the wolf. I get that, but what is it I am supposed to challenge? What does the wolf represent? If it is death, that is an inevitability...it would be futile. It could be my depression...but I don't know how to challenge it any more than I do. This dream is haunting me. It is telling me something. It feels so important. I cannot stop thinking about it.

Maybe the challenge is to STOP challenging the inevitability of real death (and the impending fear attached to that that comes from feeling like I will not achieve what I need to achieve, (.i.e. death anxiety) which is the cause of much of my life's anxiety and I think my depression. I fear I will not complete my purpose on earth.

Maybe the challenge is to ACCEPT my symbolic death, the death of my previous life, the fact that I am changed by my depression, by the difficult experiences I have encountered with each Major Depressive Episode...especially this latest one. I am changed. My old life is dead. Let it go. Move on bravely to my new life.

The wolf is black, because unlike all the other frightening wolves in my dreams who chase me and try to kill me and never quite succeed; this wolf succeeded, and the death of my old life is FINAL.

Religion, Mysticism and Spirituality

This post is inspired by something my pdoc wrote, and also a discussion we had last week in my session. We were talking about spirituality and the difficulty many of us have (me included) with the dogmatic beliefs found in all kinds of religions and spiritual beliefs. Before I begin this post I would like to mention that I think whatever your spiritual beliefs are is certainly not an issue with me. I believe we all have the right to believe what ever it is we do.

I know for my Mom, her belief in God played a huge part in her allowing her to have both a better life and accept her particularly difficult death. Her belief in God strengthened her every step of the way. I am so happy she had God's love to turn to when she needed it. This post is not about telling anyone what is or is not right, or wrong. It is simply a post about my beliefs, lack of beliefs and struggle to believe in something beyond this one plane of existence and experience.

I am not sure what I believe. To me insisting there definitely is a God, or insisting there definitely is not a God are both impossible statements to prove. So for me both fundamentalism (in any religion) and atheism are equally difficult positions to logically hold. This does not mean either are not correct; simply that no one can prove either the existence or non-existence of God.

I would say I am agnostic but hopeful their is something beyond this existence. I really struggle with the idea that everything begins and ends here in the world we experience on a sensual level. I also have had so many experiences that point to something beyond the scientifically proven and accepted theories of evolution and existence. They happen too often for me to ignore them. Maybe there is some kind of mystical force running through our lives.

Believe me it is very difficult for me to say that last statement. I am vehemently opposed to believing things with no proof, but sometimes my experiences seem to be showing me the proof and I keep ignoring the messages. Maybe there are "instances" where people are connected to another plane of existence, or experience beyond the here and now. No I am not being delusional. I'm just trying to understand what I experience.

After last weeks session it happened again; something that felt like a communication had taken place between my sister and I with no words being spoken. My sisters, and my Mom when she was alive , seem particularly in sync with one another, despite living very far away from each other and not talking that often.

In my last session Dr. X asked me what I was working on with my paintings. I told him am working hard to develop a series of conceptual paintings based on extreme close ups of images, taken out of context. Anyways, as our conversation ended we somehow got onto the topic of "foresight"; the ability to see/know something before either it happens, or before you have any knowledge of it happening.

I was telling Dr. X. how it seems like too many things happen to me this way for me not to have some kind of foresight. The last thing he said to me before my session was up was, I do seem to have foresight and he has seen proof of it.

I have dreams that come real, especially about animals dying...which is awful. Years ago I dreamt my cat was drowning. I went outside at 4am in my rain gear and found him dead in a puddle at the side of the road. I dreamt about dead dogs laying in the ditch and woke to find my neighbours dog dead. I dreamt I would find my cat that had been lost for 8 months and told my husband in the morning to look for him...he laughed and told me I was out of my mind...but at 10:00 am I got a call saying he had found the cat, but under the shed. Unfortunately, he was dead.

Last week, when I came home from my appt, there was a message from my sister. I called her and she asked me if it would be possible to paint three paintings based on parts of zebras for my nieces newly decorated bedroom. She didn't want whole Zebras, but exactly the type of paintings I had been thinking about (I never told anyone before D. X). It was strangely familiar to have things happen magically right when I am thinking hard about them. I don't believe in this stuff, but it sure seems like something/someone wants me to.

Death Anxiety

Aqua, "Destination Unknown" (linocut 1/5) 2007

Me: (Among a list of other things) "I have been sleeping a lot. I'm not sure if it's because I am tired or I just can't face doing things. I feel like I just don't want to do anything, or I have too much to get done and it's overwhelming. I can't face all the things I have to do, so all I want to do is sleep."

Dr. X: "Tell me your list of things you want to accomplish."

Me: (Completely misinterpreting "why" he is asking this question, because all I am worried about is losing him) "Why? Is this so if I need to be seen by someone else they will have a list of all the things I need to work on? So, they will know what I need to address in therapy?"

Dr. X: (Looking really perplexed, but trying hard to hide that) "No, you just said you were sleeping a lot to avoid things, or because you were avoiding getting things done. I was wondering what those things were."

Me: "Oh! Getting a job!"

Dr. X.: "You have a job. (referring to my volunteer work)"

Me: "I mean a job where I get paid; where I stop being a drain on the social services system; where I can take care of myself; where I don't rely on anyone else. All I ever heard from my Dad when I was growing up was how awful "those" people were (Hippies, the unemployed, anyone who wasn't working and paying there own way, anyone who needed help from anyone else). I have internalized my Dad. On top of that all I'm hearing from him and my one sister right now is do more and you will feel better, or (from my Dad) Why don't you get a job? A "real" job. Get it together."

Dr. X. "You are working at a real job. The system sets it up so you cannot win one way or the other. Maybe the Art Clubhouse should pay you a higher wage, so it would be seen more as work and more valuable by you and by others, where it could help support you. The big thing here though is your internalization of your Dad's criticism."

Me: (Feeling cared for and supported by Dr. X, but dejected; like I will never be a valuable human being). "I know. I am doing things that are important to me. If I worked for $10/hr doing something I felt was meaningless or purposeless I know I'd be even more depressed. I just never thought I would end up like this. I always thought I would move up the ladder in life (always moving forward, getting better jobs, getting ahead). I never expected to be on disability, to not be working, or to be unwell. I always thought I would do something with my life."

Dr. X: Silent (His specialty: a safe, reflective silence...like he is when he waits for me to figure out for myself that I am not thinking clearly)

Me: "I guess it is like the print I made for you last year..."Destination Unknown". (Thinking to myself how making that print for Dr. X may have been eerily full of the bizarre sense of magical foresight I seem to have sometimes. I made it to represent my struggle and how it is taking me in directions I never expected; and often didn't want, to go, but he clearly sits on that same bus with me now...that I never expected).

I was driven to make that print for him. I felt I had to give it to him. I messed it up so many times and did it over and over until it came out right. An intense dream created the metaphor of a bus taking me in an unexpected direction; I added the Raven; a trickster figure. He is devising, overseeing and fully intending whatever outcome occurs.

None of us knows which way our lives are headed. None of us can foresee the outcome. We are all on that bus whose destination is unknown. That scares the hell out of me.

Dreams of Death

I believe my dreams are telling me that it is okay to die. Yesterday I fell into a deep sleep in the late afternoon. Suddenly, I was in my truck driving on the freeway. I was speeding, driving 120-130km/hr and passing all the cars. I began to feel like I was falling asleep at this speed. As I began to lose consciousness my foot pushed harder on the accelerator; 130, 140, 150km/hr. My truck began driving so fast it was unstable. I could feel it begin to shudder. I felt myself losing control of the vehicle. It began weaving in my lane.


At this point everything became a blur and I had one eye barely open. Everything was foggy and going in slow motion. I felt drugged and felt I had no control over how I was driving. I knew I was going to hurt someone else and to save them I managed a slight movement to take my truck into the grassy median. As I did the truck began to flip and I began to crash. I woke up with my heart and mind racing, shaking in the same way I would have had this really been happening. It took at least a minute or so to get out of the dream state and realize it was not real.


I fell asleep at 7:30am this morning. I was walking along my road. I could barely walk there was so much snow. Cars were speeding down our snow covered, already narrow, water-filled ditch lined road. A van passed another car, missing me by inches. I gestured angrily at the driver. It looked like he was going to stop and chase me. I began running towards home, but looking back I saw he kept going. I kept running, but was going to fast on the slippery road to turn into my driveway. As I passed my driveway I gleefully leapt into the air, spun around and landed splayed on my back with my arms open like a snow-angel in the soft snow bank at the side of the road. My eyes were closed when I landed. I lay there for a few moments and then opened my eyes.


When I opened my eyes all the snow was gone. It was a warm sunny day. I lifted myself up and started walking towards my driveway, but it was not there. I looked ahead and did not recognize any of the houses. I thought to myself, "I'm not very observant sometimes, I must have walked farther down my road than I thought, and it just looks different from the perspective of walking, as opposed to driving, down the road".

So I walked on and I came across a woman. I asked her if this was "X" road. In a British accent she said no it was "Y" road. I asked her if she knew where the intersection of "X" road and "Z" road where. She looked puzzled and said she had never heard of them. I started walking again, but kept wondering how the snow could have disappeared and how I could be on a different road than I had been before. I began wondering if I was dreaming. It was so real though that I thought there is no way I am dreaming. I still was suspicious it was a dream and I tried and tried to stop the dream, but the road ahead of me never changed and if it was a dream I was trapped in it.


Why do I think my dreams were about my death and it being okay to die?


The First Dream:

• The first dream I believe was a metaphor for my committing suicide. When depressed I often drive at high speeds hoping I will crash. The only thing that has stopped me from crashing is the fear I will hurt someone else, or that I will survive in worse condition than I am now.


• In real life I worry that my suicide will harm other people. I think this dream reassures me I can commit suicide and take steps to ensure my family (like the drivers around me in the dream) will be safe and okay.


• In my dream I woke up shaking and fightened, but during the dream I was exceptionally calm (that extreme relaxation you feel when you have taken medication that makes you finally relax and let go). I felt ready to go.

The Second Dream:

• The second dream was about being in hell and ending up in heaven.


• I hate the cold and the winter. When I ran and "gleefully" jumped into the snow bank into the guise of a snow angel I was leaping from hell into heaven. The angel being the being by which I made the transformation.


• When I awoke all my surroundings were unfamiliar, yet it was sunny and a gorgeously warm day. That is my idea of heaven.


• Perhaps the British lady was a representation of the Anglican Church, the church I was brought up in?


• This dream felt like a reassurance that my fears that if I commit suicide I will go to hell are unfounded. I don't really even believe in this stuff...but there is a small part of me that fears..."what if it's all true?"


• The dream represented being lost, even at home, where I am supposed to feel safe.


• It felt like God would understand that I am lost where I am...even when I am at home.

Destination Unknown

A linocut print I made last week to represent my dream. The raven on the bustop is a trickster figure. These westcoast First Nations symbols bring light to dark situations. They lead us in directions we may have avoided because we did not have all the knowledge needed. They make us aware that life is unpredictable, but neither good or bad, simply different.

I had a dream:

Throughout the dream an old Bauhaus song was playing in the background: "...Bela Lugosi's dead, the bats have left the bell tower, the victims have been bled red velvet lines the black box, Bela Lugosi's dead..."

I was at the University. I got on the bus to go home. When I saw my stop I rang the bell, but the bus drove right past my stop. I rang again and it just kept driving by all the stops. I became super stressed out because I had two essays and an exam the next day. I did not have time to be wasting it on trying to find my way home. The bus drove and drove and soon I had no idea where I was. I began to cry. My crying turned into unconsolable sobbing. I just wanted to go home and do the work I was supposed to do. The bus finally stopped and let me off. I was hours away from home and had no idea how to get home from where I was.

• I see my dream as a "death anxiety" dream. The song is full of imagery of a coffin and death. I am terrified of wasting the little time I have on this earth. My depression feels like it is forcing me to do this.


• Death anxiety encompasses that fear that you have not completed what you are here for, that you are not living the life you are supposed to live.


• Dr. X. said he thought the bus might represent my life going in a direction I never expected, a direction different from where I thought I would be going.


• I feel he's right on many levels:

1. I am derailed by my depression. I feel it has stopped me from doing the things I wanted to do, from being as successful as I know I could have been if I had not suffered from so much anxiety and depression.


2. Had I not been depressed I would never have left a high paid, but truly unfullfilling and soul sucking career...so my depression has led me away from that, which is good on many fronts.
   
3. Had I not been depressed I would never have had the time, or the inclination to become artistic. Something about the sadness inside me and the struggle I face feeds my creativity. I'm not saying "mental illness leads to creativity"...I hate that stereotype. Mental illness made me so sick that I had to leave work and being the workaholic I am I had to fill my time with something. I've always been creative, but never really artistic...more "crafty". The time away from work, and an Art Clubhouse for mentally ill people in my city helped me nourish my artistic side...and I love it.
   
4. My crying in the dream because I wasn't going to be able to finish what I wanted to (my essays and exam) is parallel to my grief over losing my job and the life I thought I wanted. I am finding the only thing I wanted in that whole situation was financial safety. The bus is hopefully taking me to a different place where I can still feel like I contribute and feel like I won't end up mentally ill, no job, broke and living on the streets.
   
5. The dream is telling me my destination is simply different than the one I expected and maybe it will be better for me.

Breathe Deeply This Magic Elixir

Early last week I had one of those dreams that seem to be passing me messages. The kind I know I need to listen to:

I had 2 kids and an ex-husband. The ex-husband was violent. He drove by the kids and I and then he began chasing us. After a long, terrifying chase we got away.

We went home. It was supposed to be safe, but I worried the ex would find us. The doorbell rang. I was sure it would be him.

I told my husband not to answer the door, but he did anyways. It was my brother. He too was violent. He was also mentally ill. He had schizophrenia.

My husband invited him in. He needed a place to stay. I was scared.I didn't think it was safe to have him in the house.

I opened the door to the basement and I pushed my brother into the darkness. The basement was terrifying. I locked the door behind me.

After a few hours I got up because I knew my brother would be scared. My husband gave me an elixir. "Place two drops in your hair and it will put him to sleep", my husband explained. I was worried I would breathe some in. Just before I went downstairs I placed two drops in my hair. When I reached him he got up and came to hug me.

As he hugged me he smelled my hair. He loved the smell and breathed in deeper; as he did he began to slip into a deep sleep.

I felt so sad that I had to drug him to feel safe, but it worked. I did feel safe and I fell asleep as soon as I crawled into bed.

1. First I have no exhusband and no kids. My pdoc pointed out that a very close friend of mine has 2 kids and a husband so evil he would stalk her if she ever left him...(well the "evil" part was my word).
2. I am my brother. I'm mentally ill and sadly I feel I have a huge and uncontrollable capacity for rage when severely ill and I am really afraid I may have a capacity for violence in that state.
3. I especially have violent and obsessive suicidal thoughts in this state. Therfore the violent men may represent those suicidal thoughts.
4. I think him having schizophrenia represents me having an mental illness that is clearly an illness and accepted by mainstream people as an illness (vs. depression often being seen as a lack of strength of character, or as my fault, or its change within my grasp).
5. Maybe I am the brother because my Dad was full of rage and anger and sometimes violence. I see that trait as masculine. I hate and fear that side of myself.
6. Pushing my brother into the basement = my fall into my scariest depression...angry, agitated, violent suicidal thoughts...and there is no escape when I am there...the door is locked.
7. The locking of the door may also represent locking out my mental illness (the female me feels safer when the door's locked).
8. "I felt so sad that I had to drug him..." = my sadness about needing medication to help me and about being mentally ill in the first place.
9. However, on some level "the elixir" represents my desire for a drug that will calm me, allow me to sleep and to feel safe.
10. "Place two drops in your hair and it will put him to sleep"...reminds me of the magic potion in the old fairytales Snow White, Sleeping Beauty, The 12 Dancing Princesses etc. In these tales each falls into a deep "deathlike" sleep. I find it interesting that I am both the one afraid I will fall asleep (i.e. afraid of death) and the one transferring the "death" elixir to myself (i.e committing suicide). This whole transferring of the elixir represents my ambivalence about suicide.
11. The metaphorical me (the mentally ill brother) loved me and reaches out to hug me. It is poignant that I am killing my loving self. Interesting that such a loving gesture comes from one I perceive to be so violent. I guess all that violence goes when you die...but all the goodness goes when you die too.
12. The metaphorical me loved the smell of death...like me...I love the idea of death setting me free.
13. Also, he breathed that death in deeply. He really did want to die. Do I?

I Know Who Lila is.

Ha, ha...last night as I was going to bed I realized who Lila was in my dream.

• Lila was a girl I knew who became a camp COUNSELLOR


• Lila is my family DR


• Therefore: Lila is a Dr. and a Counsellor

Lila = Dr. X (he's my Pdoc and therapist/counsellor too)

So I thought...why am I trying to save my psychiatrist in the dream? or is Lila a shape shifter in the dream?... because at the same time Lila went outside two wolves appeared...and when I was trying to get her back in the house...a pile of clothes was left at the door when a wolf snuck into the house.

Am I concerned that my pdoc isn't completely on my side? I don't think I'm trying to save my pdoc. I think I am afraid of losing him, because in the dream I go to great lengths and at great risk to myself and others I hold the door open for a magical 10 seconds hoping he will come back inside.

My counting to 10 represents how the unpredictable nature of my illness makes my important decision making almost impossible. For example, how do I decide to get a job, or even quit my old job, when every time I seem to begin to begin that climb towards wellness I end up crashing and burning a few days or sometimes a week or two later?

So I am left making my decisions by other means...i.e. counting to 10 and praying I've made the right choice. It is impossible with my illness to make a rationally based decision so I am stuck making decisions based on dreams or some kind of magical thinking.

I know if I could just get my mood stable I would make these choices and move on with my life. I think that's where my fear of losing Dr. X comes in. If I just get stable I won't need to see him anymore...and I would really miss him and his support. I wonder sometimes if my connection with him is so strong that it impedes my growth? He says I can continue to see him, even when I become well, but I think he just says that so I don't not get well for fear of losing him.

Wolf in People's Clothing

I have been having vividly realistic and frightening dreams over the past few weeks. In a few of them I have been violently violated and I swear I can feel the pain and the sensations and smells from the dream sequence seem to linger when I wake up. When I do wake I am absolutely terrified. Last night I again had a nightmare. It wasn't about being raped, but it was nonetheless terrifying.

I dreamt I was in my house. The house had an open design with windows everywhere. I went outside and out of the corner of my eye I caught a glimpse of a huge black and grey wolf. I was scared and went back in the house, but I thought I might have imagined it.

It was after dinner and my dog Bert had to taken for a walk. I started to take him. He peed, but as I was about to take him farther a wolf stepped out of the woods. I put the lead on Bert, and, even though I knew the walk was important, I backed up and quickly went into the house.

It was dark, the house was now an office of the huge corporation I worked for before I became too ill to work. The windows and sliding glass doors were wide open. I glimpsed a gigantic (3X normal size) wolf. It's hackles were up and it was snarling and vicious. I ran and locked the door, closed and locked the windows and sliding glass door, but I was terrified it was going to break through the glass. I started to close the blinds, hoping the blinds would create the illusion of a more solid wall, rather than a window.

Two more wolves came snarling out of the trees. At the same time I heard someone say Lila had gone outside. I was terrified and yelled, "get her back in here". I ran to the back door and started letting people in - but I knew the wolves were coming.

I started counting down from 10 and was going to permanently lock the doors when I reached 1. I reached 1. People were pouring in, but I knew the wolves could shape shift and was afraid some of the last people would be wolves.

As I reached the #1 I went to slam and lock the door and simultaneously I looked down and saw a set of clothes crumpled on the floor. I knew there was at least one wolf inside the building. I woke from the dream absolutely terrified. Heart racing, sweating and afraid to get out of bed for at least 2-3 minutes.

I have had these wolf dreams before and they are always so frightening. Usually the wolf has me pinned to the ground and is growling ferociously in my face, about to tear me to shreds, when I finally wake.

What was the dream about?

1. Before I fell asleep I had been thinking of returning to work part time...the wolf could represent the job that terrified me, filled me with anxiety and depression and threatened to kill me (via suicide).
2. The wolf could be my LTD insurance company as I am so at odds with being paid for being ill from a job that I know I cannot return to , even if I become well...because I will become ill again.
3. I had been thinking of how I could survive on my government disability...about the hidden costs of giving up my employer's disability...the cost of my medications for example (the wolves were hidden in the woods, kept appearing magically and disappearing in the same way)
4. I was thinking about how I haven't been depressed (but instead extremely anxious, irritable and not sleeping) for 3 weeks, no depression = a return to work...but would I survive that?
5. I was thinking about my depression disappearing, reappearing, the unpredictable nature of the course of this illness and how it makes it hard to make a decision to quit work, try something new, or return to work, or stay off work and on disability. The wolves in my dream are unpredictable like this...magically transforming, disappearing, reappearing etc.
6. Lila...I once knew a girl named Lila who went on to become a camp counsellor and saved a six year old from being dragged out of camp by a cougar. Lila is also my g.p's name.
7. I had been thinking about what Dr. X. thinks about what I am able to do, or should be doing now that my mood is better. Of course, my first thought is he thinks I need to work...and that scares me because I am afraid I won't stay feeling better.
8. I think all the glass in the house and the corporate office represent people watching me, tracking me, judging me...my old fear of being spied on and seen to be more competent than I feel...and in the end forced to go back to work before I am well.
9. Shape shifting wolves: again...my fear of those around me (Dr. X., husband, insurance company, company etc.) transforming into the enemy and forcing my hand when it comes to working.