Reading my blogs or talking to me online, you might think that I am a social butterfly. I used to do well in social situations. I was confident and strong. I was able to go hang out with friends and go to social places. It was no big deal. It was even exciting. But that was years ago. I haven't gone anywhere with a group of people I am not related to in years. Not weeks or months but years....My social butterfly days aren't what they used to be.
I haven't really realized just how much my anxiety has kept me prisoner till Sunday afternoon. I had a bridal shower to go to for my best friend of twenty one years. Yes, you heard me right, twenty one years. Let me start this off by saying I love this girl. We met when we were young and we have remained bff's since the first day she introduced herself to me in our old apartment building. She has been there for me through crappy boyfriends, bad fashion choices, moves from state to state, a failed marriage, being down on my luck and worse with money, depression, suicidal thoughts, agoraphobia, the birth of both of my children, and even still today. I like to think I have been there equally for her too. That is what best friends do, after all. We are so close we don't say bye, we say I love you and we have called each other sisters for as long as we have known each other.
I can't make it to her wedding, which is far away, but I was thrilled to be able to go to her bridal shower. I mean over the moon! I am so happy for her. I had to find a ride there, which my wonderful dad volunteered for. Then I had to get ready, which I pondered on what to wear for a whole two weeks before. The shower was going to be for three hours and I was excited to see her and all of her friends (whom I do not know) and to actually try and be somewhere without the comfort of my husband and kids. Whom, I love more than life but also, many times, serve as a buffer for me. I have less anxiety if I am occupied with them rather than trying to be out and about alone with just myself. And to add on top of that, I am not really someone who has a great deal of experience with parties or showers. This was going to be my first bridal shower. I was nervous because I am not really sure how these things work. I am inept at social functions to a certain degree. I do not know the "protocol" or the rules to such things. I don't want to do anything offensive or off putting. I am so bad at these things that actually have to call my other friend in Texas and ask what the socially acceptable dictations are, like do you have to send a thank you card to thank someone for sending you a thank you card...ect. Seriously, she is my savior on all things socially proper.
We got to the restaurant on time. I walked in and asked where they were holding the shower. I was fine. A little nervous but fine, until I stepped about two feet away from the reception desk. Then the anxiety started to rise. My thoughts were racing....what if this isn't the right place....what if no one likes you....what if your gift is stupid....what if your face betrays your fear and people judge you for being broken and odd... what if you say something wrong...what if you embarrass her by doing something stupid...what if...what if... My heart went from the regular thump...thump to a loud thud..thud..thud..thud, rapidly beating now in my throat instead of in my chest where all of the biology books say it is actually located. My hands started to shake. My feet felt rooted to the ground. My breathing became heavy and labored and then the tunnel vision locked in. I could see my hand holding on to the banister and nothing else. My field of vision got smaller and smaller until all I could see was the wedding ring on my left ring finger. Shining in the light, dancing under the soft ambiance of the restaurant's glow. All of the clinking dish noises and sounds of other people enjoying their meal had stopped. It was silent, all but the voice in my head and the beating of my heart and my labored shaky breathing. The silence of everything else external was deafening to me. I wanted to run. I wanted to flee like a hunted animal running to safety....It was fight or flight and my body was choosing flight. My mind however, was not.
I could feel myself slipping away into full panic attack mode but I wasn't going to just stand there and have a freaking meltdown like a baby. This was not going to work. This was unacceptable. I had been looking forward to this for two weeks and I was going to be damned if I just turned tail and ran now. I was not going to let my stupid OCD take one more thing from me I wanted to do. Not this time. Not today.
I closed my eyes and listened to my breaths. I calmed the voice in my head and then I had a mental conversation unlike anything I have ever had before with myself.
"Not today. You are not doing this today. You can have tomorrow, or next Tuesday, or every day of the week three months from now, but you do not get to have today. This isn't for you. This is for her. You are here to support her on her day and this shit is going to stop right now. I am not leaving. I am not giving up. I am not going to cry and freak out and panic. I am not going to allow you to make an ass out of me in front of my sister on her day and embarrass her. I am not going to let you make an ass out of me and embarrass me on her day either. It is time to stop running and hiding because you are scared. Or you think you are scared. Or things are "uncomfortable". Life is full of scary uncomfortable things and you need to deal with it already. So put on your big girl pants and suck it up! Take a breath. Shake it out. Wiggle your toes and get to stepping, feet. We are doing this. She has done so much for me and I am going to do this for her. No excuses, no issues, and no panic attacks. Suck back in those tears that are trying to form, stop breathing like a marathon runner, stop listening to the stupid what if's. You are going to stop this right now. You are going to walk in there and be her sister because you are her sister and that is what sister's do. Now move."
And the most amazing thing happened. My feet moved. They propelled me to the entrance of the bridal shower. My vision cleared and I could see everything again. The muffled noises of dishes and forks and small talk from other diners came back. My heart was still beating too fast but it was now in my chest instead of my throat. The shaking stopped and my breathing became normal again.
I walked in nervous but not crying or wailing or throwing myself on the floor in over dramatic form. She hadn't arrived yet but once I introduced myself all of her friends knew who I was and called me the sister. I was floored that they all knew about me. Lol. I guess I sometimes forget that I am as equally important in her life as she is in mine. Mental illness sometimes makes us feel less important or worthy than we actually are. That is why I say we are worthy and valid and magnificent, because we are. Even thought mental illness tries to steal that away form us as well. Sly little devil that it is.
I was nervous until she arrived but it didn't get the best of me. I was secretly afraid that her friends would think I was weird or off. That my anxiety disorder was somehow visible to others by just looking at me. That they would think I was strange or judge me. She is such a wonderful person and although, I knew that meant her friends would be wonderful too, I just couldn't shake the fear of being judged less than. I guess stigma is just as much in our own self judgments as it is in others.
Her friends were cool. They were nice and funny. They didn't seem to think of me as weird or strange. They asked me tons of questions about my kids and how my friend was growing up. They were a lot like her, personable and outgoing. I needn't have worried about being judged at all.
So, I had a wonderful time. I got to spend time with my sister and her fiance, whom I equally love. He is so perfect for her. I got to meet her "newer" friends and coworkers. I had good food and cake with butter-cream...yum. I had a blast and she did to.
It just goes to show, that although I can't predict when these anxiety flare ups will occur, I can battle them. I can put my foot down and talk myself into doing what I want. I can demand that I stop allowing this to define everything I do. Because in reality, this is my life not my mental illness's life and I want to live it fully and as happily as possible.
Neurotic Nelly
Showing posts with label combat. Show all posts
Showing posts with label combat. Show all posts
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Thursday, May 1, 2014
While We Wait.....
While reading some news articles the other day I was dumbfounded, disappointed, and just down right disgusted. I have a bizarre love hate relationship with the news for obvious reasons.
But I came across a story I found to be upsetting. I am a mental illness advocate and by that I mean I care about mental illness. And not just about the illnesses as much as those that suffer from them. I should, since I too suffer from one.
What I came across was a staggering statistic about our American veterans. I knew what was going on was bad, but like many Americans I did not know just how bad. I don't know why we don't know this. I have no idea why this isn't plastered across the media, blatantly reported to the masses, or put in the forefront of our subconscious except that I have to believe that is being kept quiet due to stigma. That nasty little bugger gets in the way too many times and it is given too much power.
In World War I and II they called it shell shocked. In Nam the government pretended it didn't exist. We now are more familiar with it's newest term: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
A figure released from the Department of Veteran's Affairs stated that in 21 states or 40% of America they have found that we lose 22 veterans to suicide a day. 22....a day.....The data isn't as accurate as one would hope. After all, there are fifty states in the good ole US of A. There is no data for the other 30 states. And it doesn't take in to account veteran's who have been discharged dishonorably or the homeless veterans. But still at 22, I am devastated. To put it in better perspective 14% of suicides are said to be civilians. 30% are veteran's.
Now I don't know how this makes you feel but it pisses me off. First of all, our veterans were not suicidal when they joined. They were mentally healthy, physically healthy, and over all normal people joining up to a job. They go where we say. They do what we tell them to. The leave their families for months on end and put their lives on the line everyday...for us. Because we ask them to. Because we need them.
They go to places they have never expected to. They see things and are forced to do things that no one can forget, no one can come back from and be the same way they were before their deployment. They come back damaged and haunted and this is how we treat them. They leave a part of themselves over there and come back and are expected to just act normal.
They are supposed to go to the grocery store and pick up odds and ends and not think about the horrors of war. The loss of their brothers and sisters in arms. The blood and gore, the smells, the tastes, the absolute tragedy that war brings to the table. They are expected to come home and be the way they were before a part of them died in combat. They are expected to forget.
Forget things that we have been blessed never to have to see because they did it for us. They took the roll of soldier so we could sit behind our computer screens drinking our exotic lattes and eating our over priced croissants and mumble about how we are not patriotic or how we don't feel like soldiers deserve our utmost respect. Because we don't understand that without soldiers we would not be able to do those things. We forget what makes our lives the way they are. Someone died for those rights. Those soldiers coming back know more about tragedy, loss, and devastation than we could ever even hope to imagine.
They go through their daily lives haunted by the images and emotions. The smell of burning flesh. The taste of blood in their mouths. The dying words of a friend in pain. The having to take another's life. And we just sweep what they went through under the rug. They are supposed to just forget, but how does one forget what is to be human ? How does one forget the life leaving a brother's eyes? How does one forget humanity being ripped to shreds, or blown to pieces, or stolen away? How does one come from a place where every second is wrapped in danger and every moment is life or death and then just feel safe and secure because they get to come home and sit on the couch and watch television? One doesn't and to pretend otherwise ins't just foolish but ignorant as well.
We send our children, our brothers and sisters, our parents to war whole and then pretend that they haven't come home broken. And why? Who does pretending help? Well, I will tell you who it doesn't help. It doesn't help the 22 veteran's who kill themselves every day. One soldier for every 65 minutes. That is 8030 veteran's a year and frankly that is 8030 too many.
I could sit here and talk about how PTSD is a killer and how the fear that being labeled having a mental illness keeps many from getting help. I could sit here and discuss how that to receive such a diagnoses ends military careers and other law enforcement careers. I could sit here and blather on about how stigma keeps us sick, how fear keeps us from getting help, how it hurts even those of us that didn't get mental illness from war and yet what good does talking do?
I fail to understand how this is treated so calmly and nonchalantly. This is our friends, our family members, our neighbors suffering in silence and for what?
The president has issued more money into the programs that help diagnose the PTSD but what good is money if the programs are broken? Did you know if you have PTSD but they feel it was not because of combat experience then you are not covered and sometimes not even given the diagnoses of having it?
What the hell kind of law is that? Do you think that when that soldier went out of her fox hole to save a fellow veteran she paused to wonder if her healthcare was going to be covered? Or what about those that survived the first fort hood shooting. Did you know that many developed PTSD from that event but weren't covered because they did not receive PTSD from a combat mission?
I know it because one of the soldiers came back home after being wounded by the gunman ended up killing himself. Because he wasn't getting the care he deserved simply because he wasn't in Afghanistan when he was wounded. Because it wasn't a mission to survive the military compound...
I am dumbfounded and disgusted by the lack of compassion and understanding of PTSD. I am tired of hearing excuses as to how hard it is to diagnose and treat. I am tired of watching the suffering they go through get pushed aside while they kill themselves to just to find release. I am tired of hearing paltry excuses of why there is a two year waiting list to get disability filed for our veterans. Did they wait two years to loose a leg, an arm, or their mental health for us? What the hell is wrong with this picture?
They put their lives on the line for us and we do not do the same. We do not stand up and yell that this isn't right and it has to change!
I had a thought that the smart thing to do would be to treat every soldier for PTSD. Not the medications mind you(that would be for those that need it), but a therapeutic debriefing. Instead of amplifying the fear of the term mental illness we could just treat them for it and help them learn to reacclimate into society. It makes no sense to make soldiers go into a situation where they are forced to kill and then just pat them on the back and send them home. They need to be reintroduced little by little into certain situations so they can feel safe. So they can get the help they need. I could look up the statistics of soldiers that have PTSD but I don't bother because I don't believe they are accurate. A great deal of people do not seek help because to do so would kill their chances at certain careers and they are afraid that somehow a PTSD diagnoses is a character flaw or that it means they are weak. They want to cling to whatever normalcy they can grasp and they don't want to be thought of as broken. I do not think of them as broken. I think of them as human. I do not believe that a human can go to war and come back unfazed. People are just not built that way. It hurts them and it affects them and as their country we owe it to them to help.
Sure treating all soldiers for possible PTSD would cost more, but you go ask someone who's family member killed themselves if they wouldn't give anything to bring them back. If they wouldn't pay more to help other's not do the same. I know I would. And if we did that we could catch those that fall through the cracks and suffer in silence. We could end the stigma that surrounds the diagnoses of PTSD. We could help bring our soldiers home more whole than they are now. Less nightmares. Less flashbacks. Less walking through the house at night checking the perimeters for combatants. We could save marriages, and families, and even more importantly we could save lives. We could save 22 people a day.....Why isn't this being done?
In a time when we bring home more soldiers and walking wounded than in any other war our country has been in due to medical advances, why are we still operating the mental care the same as we did thirty years ago, or twenty years ago, or hell even five years ago? Why do we continue to ignore the plight of our veterans?
Make no mistake our soldiers carry deep ragged festering scars from combat whether they are visible to the naked eye or not and the deserve to be helped and treated just as much as if those scars were on their skin rather than in their minds. We sent them to do a job and they came back broken from that. We as a country did this to them and we as a country need to stop pretending that nothing is wrong. Something is very very wrong here and we need to fix it. We owe them everything, whether we see that clearly or not it does not make it untrue. We need to figure this out and quickly because while we wait, they die and that is totally unacceptable.
These people need to know that they are not alone. They are not invisible. They matter and their lives are important. They can go on and they can thrive. We owe it to them to give them the tools to do so.
Neurotic Nelly
But I came across a story I found to be upsetting. I am a mental illness advocate and by that I mean I care about mental illness. And not just about the illnesses as much as those that suffer from them. I should, since I too suffer from one.
What I came across was a staggering statistic about our American veterans. I knew what was going on was bad, but like many Americans I did not know just how bad. I don't know why we don't know this. I have no idea why this isn't plastered across the media, blatantly reported to the masses, or put in the forefront of our subconscious except that I have to believe that is being kept quiet due to stigma. That nasty little bugger gets in the way too many times and it is given too much power.
In World War I and II they called it shell shocked. In Nam the government pretended it didn't exist. We now are more familiar with it's newest term: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
A figure released from the Department of Veteran's Affairs stated that in 21 states or 40% of America they have found that we lose 22 veterans to suicide a day. 22....a day.....The data isn't as accurate as one would hope. After all, there are fifty states in the good ole US of A. There is no data for the other 30 states. And it doesn't take in to account veteran's who have been discharged dishonorably or the homeless veterans. But still at 22, I am devastated. To put it in better perspective 14% of suicides are said to be civilians. 30% are veteran's.
Now I don't know how this makes you feel but it pisses me off. First of all, our veterans were not suicidal when they joined. They were mentally healthy, physically healthy, and over all normal people joining up to a job. They go where we say. They do what we tell them to. The leave their families for months on end and put their lives on the line everyday...for us. Because we ask them to. Because we need them.
They go to places they have never expected to. They see things and are forced to do things that no one can forget, no one can come back from and be the same way they were before their deployment. They come back damaged and haunted and this is how we treat them. They leave a part of themselves over there and come back and are expected to just act normal.
They are supposed to go to the grocery store and pick up odds and ends and not think about the horrors of war. The loss of their brothers and sisters in arms. The blood and gore, the smells, the tastes, the absolute tragedy that war brings to the table. They are expected to come home and be the way they were before a part of them died in combat. They are expected to forget.
Forget things that we have been blessed never to have to see because they did it for us. They took the roll of soldier so we could sit behind our computer screens drinking our exotic lattes and eating our over priced croissants and mumble about how we are not patriotic or how we don't feel like soldiers deserve our utmost respect. Because we don't understand that without soldiers we would not be able to do those things. We forget what makes our lives the way they are. Someone died for those rights. Those soldiers coming back know more about tragedy, loss, and devastation than we could ever even hope to imagine.
They go through their daily lives haunted by the images and emotions. The smell of burning flesh. The taste of blood in their mouths. The dying words of a friend in pain. The having to take another's life. And we just sweep what they went through under the rug. They are supposed to just forget, but how does one forget what is to be human ? How does one forget the life leaving a brother's eyes? How does one forget humanity being ripped to shreds, or blown to pieces, or stolen away? How does one come from a place where every second is wrapped in danger and every moment is life or death and then just feel safe and secure because they get to come home and sit on the couch and watch television? One doesn't and to pretend otherwise ins't just foolish but ignorant as well.
We send our children, our brothers and sisters, our parents to war whole and then pretend that they haven't come home broken. And why? Who does pretending help? Well, I will tell you who it doesn't help. It doesn't help the 22 veteran's who kill themselves every day. One soldier for every 65 minutes. That is 8030 veteran's a year and frankly that is 8030 too many.
I could sit here and talk about how PTSD is a killer and how the fear that being labeled having a mental illness keeps many from getting help. I could sit here and discuss how that to receive such a diagnoses ends military careers and other law enforcement careers. I could sit here and blather on about how stigma keeps us sick, how fear keeps us from getting help, how it hurts even those of us that didn't get mental illness from war and yet what good does talking do?
I fail to understand how this is treated so calmly and nonchalantly. This is our friends, our family members, our neighbors suffering in silence and for what?
The president has issued more money into the programs that help diagnose the PTSD but what good is money if the programs are broken? Did you know if you have PTSD but they feel it was not because of combat experience then you are not covered and sometimes not even given the diagnoses of having it?
What the hell kind of law is that? Do you think that when that soldier went out of her fox hole to save a fellow veteran she paused to wonder if her healthcare was going to be covered? Or what about those that survived the first fort hood shooting. Did you know that many developed PTSD from that event but weren't covered because they did not receive PTSD from a combat mission?
I know it because one of the soldiers came back home after being wounded by the gunman ended up killing himself. Because he wasn't getting the care he deserved simply because he wasn't in Afghanistan when he was wounded. Because it wasn't a mission to survive the military compound...
I am dumbfounded and disgusted by the lack of compassion and understanding of PTSD. I am tired of hearing excuses as to how hard it is to diagnose and treat. I am tired of watching the suffering they go through get pushed aside while they kill themselves to just to find release. I am tired of hearing paltry excuses of why there is a two year waiting list to get disability filed for our veterans. Did they wait two years to loose a leg, an arm, or their mental health for us? What the hell is wrong with this picture?
They put their lives on the line for us and we do not do the same. We do not stand up and yell that this isn't right and it has to change!
I had a thought that the smart thing to do would be to treat every soldier for PTSD. Not the medications mind you(that would be for those that need it), but a therapeutic debriefing. Instead of amplifying the fear of the term mental illness we could just treat them for it and help them learn to reacclimate into society. It makes no sense to make soldiers go into a situation where they are forced to kill and then just pat them on the back and send them home. They need to be reintroduced little by little into certain situations so they can feel safe. So they can get the help they need. I could look up the statistics of soldiers that have PTSD but I don't bother because I don't believe they are accurate. A great deal of people do not seek help because to do so would kill their chances at certain careers and they are afraid that somehow a PTSD diagnoses is a character flaw or that it means they are weak. They want to cling to whatever normalcy they can grasp and they don't want to be thought of as broken. I do not think of them as broken. I think of them as human. I do not believe that a human can go to war and come back unfazed. People are just not built that way. It hurts them and it affects them and as their country we owe it to them to help.
Sure treating all soldiers for possible PTSD would cost more, but you go ask someone who's family member killed themselves if they wouldn't give anything to bring them back. If they wouldn't pay more to help other's not do the same. I know I would. And if we did that we could catch those that fall through the cracks and suffer in silence. We could end the stigma that surrounds the diagnoses of PTSD. We could help bring our soldiers home more whole than they are now. Less nightmares. Less flashbacks. Less walking through the house at night checking the perimeters for combatants. We could save marriages, and families, and even more importantly we could save lives. We could save 22 people a day.....Why isn't this being done?
In a time when we bring home more soldiers and walking wounded than in any other war our country has been in due to medical advances, why are we still operating the mental care the same as we did thirty years ago, or twenty years ago, or hell even five years ago? Why do we continue to ignore the plight of our veterans?
Make no mistake our soldiers carry deep ragged festering scars from combat whether they are visible to the naked eye or not and the deserve to be helped and treated just as much as if those scars were on their skin rather than in their minds. We sent them to do a job and they came back broken from that. We as a country did this to them and we as a country need to stop pretending that nothing is wrong. Something is very very wrong here and we need to fix it. We owe them everything, whether we see that clearly or not it does not make it untrue. We need to figure this out and quickly because while we wait, they die and that is totally unacceptable.
These people need to know that they are not alone. They are not invisible. They matter and their lives are important. They can go on and they can thrive. We owe it to them to give them the tools to do so.
Neurotic Nelly
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