DAVID GILMOUR O6.03.1946 -

HAPPY 64th BIRTHDAY TO THE MOST BEAUTIFUL OF THE GODS OF ROCK - Shine on you crazy diamond!

KEEPING IT REAL

I cannot stand liars, especially people who are fully aware of what they are doing. It must get to a point where they are ultimately living a lie - you lie enough about the little things it soon accumulates. I know a few people like this & I struggle to maintain freindships with them. I mean it's practically dellusional - and I'm supposed to be the one with mental health problems. It must be exhausting keeping track of all the fabrications, wouldn't it be nice to just tell the truth for a change never minding what others think?

Winston

"I don't like standing near the edge of a platform when an express train is passing through. I like to stand right back and if possible get a pillar between me and the train. I don't like to stand by the side of a ship and look down into the water. A second's action would end everything. A few drops of desperation." - Winston Churchill (1874-1965)

I understand perfectly Winston.

DID YOU FORGET TO TAKE YOUR MEDS?

I haven't been too well lately, blood results have shown that my Thyroid function is terribly low yet again which can explain why I've been feeling so tired with aches & pains over the last 2+ weeks. My mood hasn't been the best either - with little to no motivation most days. Nights have been a battle to get to sleep including one episode of halluciantions, something I haven't experienced for over a year. So what to do? - more medication! I am now on Duloxetine (SNRI) 120mg, Lithium (mood stabiliser) 500mg twice a day, & Olanzipine (antipsychotic) 5mg at night - & of course the 100mcg of Throxine for the thyroid problem. My psychiatrist is looking at changing the Olanzipine to Seroquel, something I'm all for as it apparently has less side effects.

I'm putting the call out to others who are being treated for Bipolar - do you have to take so much medication? Sometimes I feel like taking these meds is the equivallent of a frontal lobotomy, but then again what is the alternative?

TIDINGS

Well my Christmas was a very quiet affair, I had to work Boxing day so I couldn't indulge too much in the frivolity. Working at an aged care home it was sad to see how many of the old souls "hated" Christmas, how it can be such a lonely & sad time for them. Out of a total of 40 residents only 2 went "home" for Christmas - cause lets face it, no matter how hard you try, a nursing home is never really a "home".

Christmas is also a time when all the relatives come out of the woodwork to visit - bearing gifts. What will they bring this year I wonder? .....yet another tube of hand cream perhaps? or maybe a new pair of slippers? No, Nana hasn't got dementia, it's just been so long since she's seen you that she's forgotten your name! Oh how ashamed I am to be part of a culture that relegates their elderly to institutions. These people deserve to be taken proper care of at home, not cloistered together & banished away behind closed doors. I just hope I can take care of my parents one day, the way they took care of me for so many years - it'll be a privilege.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

Happy Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Happy endings

Anyone who knows me or has followed this blog would know that this year has been quite a dreadful one. But I'm happy to say that I am know feeling quite good. I have been back at work now for almost a month & I'm actually enjoying it. For once in a long time I feel I can make plans for the future......I feel I actually have a future. It feels good. I've come to life.

BUTTERFLIES

I almost wish we were butterflies and liv'd but three summer days - three such days with you I could fill with more delight than fifty common years could ever contain.

- John Keats -

Is that okay?

I saw the psychiatrist today, and it was aptly noted that I had slid "backwards" so to speak, perhaps "downwards" is a more appropriate descriptor, since our last meeting. Late last week I had an attack of dread in the early hours of the morning & all my confidence, my sense of worth, was shaken to the core. The doctor believes it is due to starting work again & if I'm honest with myself I'd have to agree with him. Today the psychiatrist asked me what I dislike most about nursing - & I responded with the usual grievances of regimentation & a general lack of caring by other health care workers, but he didn't quite believe me.....& then I started to sob (yet again) & I said "maybe it's all the death.....the decay". And it was out there - that word "DECAY" - the moment it was out I knew I shouldn't have said it, it opened up a plethora of psychological insights. And so the doctor & I had yet another discussion about my existential dilemma - he must get so tired of listening to me. So my SNRI has been increased yet again & I now have to consider a life without nursing. I have to give this new job a fair go first though, but if I can't do it - I can't do it.

Besides the nursing, I've also been feeling somewhat dejected due to......wait for it......Facebook. I knew on the outset that I should not have even signed up & now I wish I hadn't. Facebook is completely and utterly impersonable; the chat function being the only facet that has any merit. The only problem is it's addictive, I did make contact with a dear old friend & we were chatting on a regular basis then one day she just stopped. Now I spend an hour or two each night waiting for her to come on line....stupid I know. Then there was another friend who I began to confide in & then they said they "had to go" & dropped out suddenly - if these conversations were conducted in person or over the phone there is no way these things would happen. Yes, I know I'm being too sensitive & perhaps even a little selfish too but I'm just expressing how I feel....is that okay?

ODE: Imitations of Immortality

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,

The earth, and every common sight

To me did seem

Apparelled in cellestial light,

The glory and the freshness of a dream.

It is not now as it hath been of yore;-

Turn whersoe'er I may,

By night or day,

The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

- Wordsworth

BACK TO WORK

After all the misunderstanding I was successful with the job interview and I start work next Wednesday. My mood has been pretty good for some time now and my only battle is with the tiredness that I get as a side effect of the medication. I will be working 3 days a week - one early & two lates, Saturdays; Sundays & Mondays. It's a lovely new facility and the staff seem happy and pleasant enough. I'm looking forward it all, it will be a challenge to be in a leadership role again.

THE HIGHWAY MAN

THE wind was a torrent of darkness among the gusty trees,

The moon was a ghostly galleon tossed upon cloudy seas,

The road was a ribbon of moonlight over the purple moor,

And the highwayman came riding—

Riding—riding—

The highwayman came riding, up to the old inn door

-Alfred Noyes-

ON THE UP SIDE

Today was a great deal better, at first I lay in bed wanting to cover myself in darkness but the noonday sun just wouldn't allow it. So I got up, and went for a walk. Chapel street was abuzz with activity - people getting in early with their Christmas shopping. For all the side effects that come with my medications at least now I don't spiral down uncontrollably but rather I slip down and am then able to climb my way back up again. And I'm able to do this with little effort, without becoming fatigued.

MELANCHOLIA

I've been pretty down today - the worst day I've had for quite awhile. You start to think the depression is no longer there, that maybe you can cut down on some of these meds you're taking....but Alas! you have a day like today. A day where you wish with all your might that you could just disappear. I had a job interview on Tuesday, it was a casual encounter over coffee and at its close I was assured that I would be contacted that afternoon - three days later I still haven't heard from them. I rang up today to talk to the lady in question & she was away - til next Wednesday! I was informed that she would be contacted and that she would ring me back this afternoon but again no call came. Yesterday the negative thoughts started to creep in - that no one wants to employ me etc etc, despite the actuality of me being way overqualified for the position. And then the anger - of people not keeping to their word and of being sloppy and disorganised. I know they seemed awfully busy and as an employment agency had a lot of other job seekers to deal with but I can't stop myself from thinking negative thoughts. I go through the motions of CBT but still it's THERE! At least it's reactionary, and the lows are nowhere near as bad as they used to be. Let's hope it passes soon - that's one thing you can always rely on, that everything passes with time.....everything including me.

FRIDAY 13th: A Witches Incantation

"Double, double toil and trouble;

Fire burn, and caldron bubble."

MY SHELL

I want to dedicate the following passage from Emily Bronte's "Wuthering Heights" to a dear & treasured friend of mine. My sincerest hope is that one day you will allow yourself to be loved....this world is too dark & lonely a place to walk through it alone.

While enjoying a month of fine weather at the sea - coast, I was thrown into the company of a most fascinating creature, a real goddess, in my eyes, as long as she took no notice of me. I never "told my love" vocally; still if looks have a language, the merest idiot might have guessed I was head over ears: she understood me, at last, and looked a return - the sweetest of all imaginable looks - and what did I do? I confess it with shame - shrunk icily into myself, like a snail, at every glance retired colder and farther; till; finally, the poor innocent was led to doubt her own senses, and, overwhelmed with confusion at her supposed mistake, persuaded her mamma to decamp.

By this curious turn of disposition I have gained the reputation of deliberate heartlessness, how undeserved, I alone can appreciate.

WILD THINGS

ROCK ISLAND BEND - Peter Dombrovskis

"In Wildness Is the
Preservation of the World"

-Thoreau-

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

Would you dance with the Devil in the pale moonlight?

Would you offer you throat to the wolf with the red roses?

THE TREE OF FORGIVENESS

Riddled with remorse I reach out.

Naked, I plead for forgiveness.

I turn to run & hide, ashamed -

afraid that I have been rejected....once again.

But you grab hold, & won't let go

don't let me go

....don't let me go

ETERNAL

"called back"

- epitaph of Emily Dickinson-