As hard as Krista’s work is, I’m glad she is so devoted to it. We need more Kristas in this world….
Experiencing psychosis is a difficult thing, recovering from it even more so. But finding those people willing to stick by you during it, even those willing to walk into your life at that point – that’s just so special. Thanks, Krista, for all you do. I hope you can stay strong with all you are going through.
The Silent K » Blog Archive » the corner in which the ultimate mystery of things…
For those of you who aren’t familiar, psychosis is an experience that people have where they see and/or hear things that other people do not, and have unusual beliefs that other people don’t hold. Essentially it is a chasm between internal reality and shared commonly accepted reality.
There are times where it seems the families accessing our services are deepened and transformed by the experiences of distress and healing that are happening to themselves and their respective relatives. It is beautiful, moving, and humbling to see families on this road supporting someone, and learning and growing themselves in the process. This job blows my mind everyday. When I decided to take this job on I am not sure I recognized the major life shift it would cause in me, in my personhood, in my outlook on life.
I worked in mental health before too, but it was a different, lighter job in many ways. My heart didn’t hurt as much working there.
In this job, I feel infused with spirit, and deeply connected to the work with such intensity that it creates a very real vicarious ache. The work creates fertile ground for my spiritual practice, but as awe-inspiring it can be, lately it has left me feeling extremely emotionally spent.
There are times when the theoretical/philosophical aspect of the work enraptures me so completely. It feels like my mind is a magnetic sponge absorbing, retaining, and reverberating the vast knowledge and experiences of others who’ve spent their lives studying, writing about, and/or living these unexplainable experiences of the mind.
14 Responses
Inspiring.
If I have unexplained pain, and a cause is only later identified, was the pain imaginary? If someone has perceptions that others cannot find a basis for, does that make their perceptions invalid?
Well, whig, psychosis is sort of like a waking dream. Things are happening and your brain is making up explanations as fast as it can, sometimes faster than it can, so they don’t really make much sense.
The perceptions might be real enough, but they certainly aren’t anything like anyone around you is experiencing. Rather like a really bad trip. Or sometimes a really good one, which is why it’s tough to keep a lot of psychotic people on their medication….
Donna, Western medicine seems to be confused in how to treat this, by denying the validity of the perception and seeking to suppress it, rather than seeking the basis of the perception and seeking to reconcile it with physical reality.
whig- i couldn’t have said it better myself (and thanks for the shout out donna)
Yeah, I know, whig. When really most people’s perceptions are pretty out of tune with physical reality. ;^)
I found most of the folks on the psych ward pretty sane, really.
We live in a synthetic reality, just turn on your television and see. Your waking up from such a dream state causes other dreamers to feel uncomfortable. “Go back to sleep, let us alone.”
Nothing you have ever written has given me cause to doubt your sanity.
You’re right, whig.
“Life is a banquet, and most poor suckers are starving to death”. ;^)
Some of us are beginning to prefer our organic reality over the synthetic version. Well, except for the computers, of course – I rather enjoy those….
Mood imbalance might be corrected organically too. Just FWIW.
Oh, I’m sure most illicit drug use is an attempt to treat mood disorder. It would be nice if more organic treatments were made available, but the powers that be don’t want that to happen.
I’m going through a medication change right now, and trying to rebalance my mood is pretty difficult. Unfortunately one of the drugs that worked best for me, Effexor, has lovely side effects like high blood pressure and high intraocluar pressure, which explains how I got that! And they weren’t required by the FDA to disclose these effects til last year.
But I believe that organic substance would be good for that, too, since it’s a glaucoma treatment. Oh well.
So I’m switching to Lexapro, which is – different. And not effective on norapinephrine. So the serotonin side is covered, but I still feel annoyed with everything. I’m trying some things to fix that like L-tyrosine, which is the norapinephrine pre-cursor. I just started that today, and it seems to help.
I have to practically become my own chemist to figure this stuff out – the doctors are no help. I had to talk my shrink into even trying some of the drugs I take, since they were off-label uses. But I’m lucky I know how to research, and thank goodness for Wikipedia!
If only we lived in a more enlightened country!
I certainly cannot substitute for a psychiatrist, and I am not a medical doctor by training nor certainly am I yours.
I know that many illicit drugs are harmful.
This is an herb, not a chemical. An herb without toxicity at any dose. Not one human fatality in history.
As for the drugs you listed, you should follow your doctor’s advice unless you know what you are doing and do not disregard that withdrawal can be fierce and dangerous for certain things. I don’t advise anyone to ever quit their medications unless under a doctor’s supervision.
Especially if you find them helpful, please don’t take anything I have said as discouragement to taking them.
Since you shared…
So I think that pain is a problem that people don’t know how to express, and especially if you don’t know you have a problem and you cannot precisely locate or characterize the discomfort.
It turns out I have osteoporosis of the lumbar spine and the current debate is whether I should be administered bisphosphonates (pamidronate) to help protect against (further) compression fracture. (Presumably I have already had some compression because there is pain.)
The potential side-effect of the drug is osteonecrosis of the jaw, which isn’t such a happy thing either. And apparently that’s a delayed effect, after about six years.
Currently evaluating alternatives as carefully as I can.
I’m gradually coming to the conclusion that the risk is probably small, and the prospective benefit quite substantial, including possibly significant pain reduction.
I don’t like to talk about how much pain I used to be in. Which is one of the reasons I don’t get too deeply into discussing my own psychology of the past, and for that matter I used to be more conservative and so it’s returning to a consciousness very different from where I am now. I do understand being in a tough mental and physical space.