I'll be up front here - I need people to tell me "it's ok" to do that - because I have so NOT been ok with that concept for 2 1/2 plus years now.
It's all so ... complicated. Summer of 2012, I had a workplace incident of threatened violent death, and I snapped. That was just the icing on the cake anyway, my entire life I have had issues with depression and anxiety, and I grew up in a very abusive home, ugly ugly domestic violence. Summer of 2012, in the course of a couple of weeks, I became a total wreck, massive panic attacks, complete insomnia, hypervigilance, extreme flight response. It was all very PTSD, very classic PTSD.
So, I reached I point I said "no more, I need help" - and that blew up in my face. I went to a psychiatrist and said "I have symptoms X, Y,Z, and I want to deal with it with outpatient therapy, medications, and extreme discretion". I thought tha was exactly what would happen.
Wrong - because I told the psychiatrist I was having a lot of suicidal thoughts, the panic button was pushed, long story short, I was threatened, in a not very professional or very compassionate way at that, with being hauled off, more or less, and stuck in the inpatient ward. There was kinda a compromise, although it felt like total defeat to me, I ended up doing a few weeks at a partial day program/partial hospital progrm.
And in that very moment when I was given a quickie 5 minute diagnosis of bipolar and told to report to the psych ward, I thought "that's it, my life is over." I felt like the shame of that, the stigma, the being locked up would be the end of me, in every meaningful way, career, family, home, assets ... all gone.
Worst of all, to me, it all felt very much like some kind of criminal justice experience, it did NOT feel at all like medical treatment - it felt like I'd done something very, very bad and was being punished for it. Last I knew, if someone is diagnosed with any physical disease, they don't view themselves as "having done a bad thing deserving of punishment".
So, 2 1/2 years later, and in a lot of ways, I have fought a valliant fight to "fix it" - but it's not been the RIGHT fight or the right approach. Because ... I don't completely level with anyone about any of this. Not my therapist, who I gloss over certain things with ... and certainly not the psychiatrist I've seen for about 2 years now --- who only hears glowing reports of how great I'm doing, that the prozac I am on works wonders, and I'm recovering from all of the crap that went down 2 1/2 years ago.
Don't get me wrong, it took a lot of time to find a truly good psychatrist, and the current one is as good as the first one was terrible. It's not the current doctor's fault I lie about things in such a big way.
Why do I lie and paint this rosey picture - because the thought of being labeled "mentally ill" and "bipolar" -original diagnosis, I'm just not sure, I have some aspects of that, but ... PTSD also explains almost everything I do just as well, and in many ways better - so terrified me that I did a Nixonian style cover up to try to "clear my good name and reputation."
There is a real -world problem with this - it's NOT a public relations issue - it's a real-world mental health issue, and, well, I'm pretty miserable these days.
I've been discussing with my therapist, who I see twice a week, the concept of "coming clean" to the psychiatrist and finally saying "ok, I need REAL help here".
If I do that it goes against everything I did for 2 1/2 years, trying to "make it go away" and trying to "clear my good name".
Intellectualy, I recognize that as pretty warped thinking - very distorted - something like PTSD or bipolar or whatever isn't a "punishment" or a "crime" it's a medical condition - I didn't do anything wrong in the first place, I didn't ask for the abusive childhood or the workplace incident or any of the other life stresses that have shattered me - and I have been a good guy all of my life, I have a clean conscience about things in that respect.
So I need to find it in myself to make another leap of faith, say "OK, I have these problems, let's deal with them like rational adults" and realize that doing so isn't going to destroy me ... well, doing it this way is close to destroying me, so a massive course correction is in order.
Help! I need to know that it's "ok to be a little broken" and life will go on even if I have diagnosis X and medication Y in my Blue Cross file.
It's all so ... complicated. Summer of 2012, I had a workplace incident of threatened violent death, and I snapped. That was just the icing on the cake anyway, my entire life I have had issues with depression and anxiety, and I grew up in a very abusive home, ugly ugly domestic violence. Summer of 2012, in the course of a couple of weeks, I became a total wreck, massive panic attacks, complete insomnia, hypervigilance, extreme flight response. It was all very PTSD, very classic PTSD.
So, I reached I point I said "no more, I need help" - and that blew up in my face. I went to a psychiatrist and said "I have symptoms X, Y,Z, and I want to deal with it with outpatient therapy, medications, and extreme discretion". I thought tha was exactly what would happen.
Wrong - because I told the psychiatrist I was having a lot of suicidal thoughts, the panic button was pushed, long story short, I was threatened, in a not very professional or very compassionate way at that, with being hauled off, more or less, and stuck in the inpatient ward. There was kinda a compromise, although it felt like total defeat to me, I ended up doing a few weeks at a partial day program/partial hospital progrm.
And in that very moment when I was given a quickie 5 minute diagnosis of bipolar and told to report to the psych ward, I thought "that's it, my life is over." I felt like the shame of that, the stigma, the being locked up would be the end of me, in every meaningful way, career, family, home, assets ... all gone.
Worst of all, to me, it all felt very much like some kind of criminal justice experience, it did NOT feel at all like medical treatment - it felt like I'd done something very, very bad and was being punished for it. Last I knew, if someone is diagnosed with any physical disease, they don't view themselves as "having done a bad thing deserving of punishment".
So, 2 1/2 years later, and in a lot of ways, I have fought a valliant fight to "fix it" - but it's not been the RIGHT fight or the right approach. Because ... I don't completely level with anyone about any of this. Not my therapist, who I gloss over certain things with ... and certainly not the psychiatrist I've seen for about 2 years now --- who only hears glowing reports of how great I'm doing, that the prozac I am on works wonders, and I'm recovering from all of the crap that went down 2 1/2 years ago.
Don't get me wrong, it took a lot of time to find a truly good psychatrist, and the current one is as good as the first one was terrible. It's not the current doctor's fault I lie about things in such a big way.
Why do I lie and paint this rosey picture - because the thought of being labeled "mentally ill" and "bipolar" -original diagnosis, I'm just not sure, I have some aspects of that, but ... PTSD also explains almost everything I do just as well, and in many ways better - so terrified me that I did a Nixonian style cover up to try to "clear my good name and reputation."
There is a real -world problem with this - it's NOT a public relations issue - it's a real-world mental health issue, and, well, I'm pretty miserable these days.
I've been discussing with my therapist, who I see twice a week, the concept of "coming clean" to the psychiatrist and finally saying "ok, I need REAL help here".
If I do that it goes against everything I did for 2 1/2 years, trying to "make it go away" and trying to "clear my good name".
Intellectualy, I recognize that as pretty warped thinking - very distorted - something like PTSD or bipolar or whatever isn't a "punishment" or a "crime" it's a medical condition - I didn't do anything wrong in the first place, I didn't ask for the abusive childhood or the workplace incident or any of the other life stresses that have shattered me - and I have been a good guy all of my life, I have a clean conscience about things in that respect.
So I need to find it in myself to make another leap of faith, say "OK, I have these problems, let's deal with them like rational adults" and realize that doing so isn't going to destroy me ... well, doing it this way is close to destroying me, so a massive course correction is in order.
Help! I need to know that it's "ok to be a little broken" and life will go on even if I have diagnosis X and medication Y in my Blue Cross file.
