March 7... already. Funny how time seems to be flying, until you think about this whole Covid thing, then it seems like time is crawling. I guess it's because we feel like we're being cheated of the time spent battling this thing. It seems like it'll never end.
When I last left off in my blog here, things were looking up. I seemed to have a handle on my whole depression/anxiety/PTSD issues. But then, reality hit. And I took a sharp left turn at the beginning of the year, and I'm struggling to get on the right track again. I'm still not there. It's very hard.
I mused that the holidays are hard on me every year last post, and that's a fact that remains, but I think most of us noticed a difference around us this past holiday season. December in general is a hard month to get through. For one thing, where I work, Christmas season takes a toll on you. But it was even worse this time out because people's tolerance is already being tested with the current restrictions around everything. Still, it did make me stop and think for the first time why I get so anxious at that time of year. I wondered if I actually do have PTSD. There's a friend of mine who was a cop and retired, and told me some stories of why she acquired PTSD herself, and that, I truly believe, is what she has. She experienced serious trauma on the job and her healing is ongoing, but thankfully, paid for because of what her line of work was.
That made me think... she thought actually that I have PTSD. This was a while ago, and I entertained the idea that I might have it, but ultimately dismissed it. Until I started thinking about this last December. And it all makes sense when I realized that, man, a lot of crap happened during the month of December in my past.
When I was a little boy, amongst a family of 6 siblings and my parents, every Christmas almost, I got sick. Like, really sick. The worst being when I was five or six, when all I did through the holidays was barf. I threw up so much that I couldn't get to the bathroom on my own. In the holiday seasons following, I got sick at Christmas some more, until I got into my teens, finally. Dad died when I was 12, so that jumbled up any kind of normalcy life might have for the teen years. But when I turned 14, in the same days when John Lennon died (maybe the exact day, I'm not sure), I spent two weeks in the hospital after being hit by a car and went into a coma for a night. Scary times, for sure, but my God, what Mom must've went through. They did take this particular concussion seriously, because it was quite serious, as you might imagine. I seemed to deal with it okay, until time went on and revealed other issues. But it was a very tough time for me, too. Nightmarish.
So with all of this in mind, it makes sense that the holiday season heightens PTSD symptoms. It's why I withdraw more, get anxious with people, and generally just feel more agitated than I might if it was summer or something. Take, for example, what happened with me a couple of years ago, when during Christmas season at work I took it on the chin from a lot of rude and irate customers. Actually took it on the heel a couple of times, when seniors would ram into me to attempt to make me move. I told Janice about it and I think she half believed me, until she actually saw it for herself one day when one old man did just that. But retail can be a very, very challenging place during the holidays. If you're mentally compromised like me, that just adds more ingredients to the toxic soup. I wound up self-harming myself to an alarming degree, in that it was visible to everyone. I pleaded with my boss at the time to let me have weekends off, since that tended to be when most of my incidents happened. That was rejected, as I expected, and when the new year hit, I made the call to take myself out of work for a week or so. Upon seeing my doctors, they decided to take me off for three months. When I went back eventually, I was finally offered weekends off. That was a bit of a game changer. I stabilized substantially, and kind of reset myself when I went back to work. Still, the point of all this is, a lot of the trouble originated during December.
I don't know why I didn't think of it before. So much trouble happened for me during that month over my lifetime. I even wound up with a bleeding ulcer in December of 84 when I was in my later teens. I was white as a ghost and dangerously anemic, and almost didn't seek help for it until my mother heard me nearly pass out in the bathroom after I'd filled the toilet with blood. I was close to developing a perforated ulcer, which would've been even more serious and potentially more life threatening. Thankfully, the wonder drug at the time, Tagamet, healed my ulcer up and I was good to go in January. I missed school for most of December because clearly, I wasn't able to attend. Anyway, my point being, December has such a stressful history for me, that I stop to ponder that if I really do have PTSD, it flares up the most in that month. I would tell my psychiatrist this info if I actually had one.
Recent revelations have forced me to ponder what to do with myself regarding my health in general. I went to see my ENT over voice issues I was having that were getting progressively worse. As it tuns out, I had 2 polyps on my vocal cords that needed to come out. The doc told me they were 'singer's nodules', which I find amusing, since I'm not much of a singer at all. Anyway, I had to take a Covid test before surgery, which was less than fun. It almost felt like they were trying to impregnate my brain with a cotton swab. They just have to find a better way to test for coronavirus than this, as I know it makes a lot of people hesitate because it's quite well known how difficult it can be. But, it came back negative, so the surgery was a go. It was just day surgery, thank God, and I was in and out of the hospital within two or three hours. But the rest of that day was very rough to get through. I took a bad reaction to what I think was a combination of meds; but I was okay the next day. I was off work for two weeks to let my voice recover. But here's the thing.....
.... It didn't. My voice even seemed to have gotten worse. When I went for my follow-up appointment with the ENT, she sent a camera down my throat and found yet another polyp that developed since the surgery. That started a discussion. She wondered why it just popped up like that so quickly, so she told me she was sending me to a gastro doctor to find out if I have excessive stomach acid issues. I told her that stress is likely playing a role and that I have anxiety issues, without going too far into detail. She told me to seek out a psychiatrist she specifically named - which is one of two in the city, the other one being the one who stopped seeing me. So, I got a burst of optimism about that particular issue. But the revelation that I also have a polyp in my stomach now, along with the mystery polyp in my throat, put my worry into overdrive. I'm still waiting on an appointment with the gastro doctor, which my ENT noted to be as 'semi-urgent'. That's not terribly comforting either. She told me I'll be seeing her in six weeks to figure out when the newest nodule in my throat will come out via surgery, but she wants to get to the bottom of why it's there in the first place, hence the gastro doctor. I'm not extremely worried, now that some time has passed, but I am anxious to get it behind me.
The new manager that I work for isn't turning out to be the source of stress I expected, but changes are happening, and that leaves me agitated sometimes. Still, change doesn't always come smoothly, so I accept that. As it is right now, I don't feel there's any threat to my job security. My new boss tells me quite frequently that I'm doing a good job, so that much is good. I've found that some staff are kind of banding together in support of each other, including me, as we adjust to new things. Still, stress is still a factor at work, which is detrimentally affecting me via digestive issues. The whole Covid mess just compounds everything. I'd be lying if I said I didn't feel a sense of hopelessness as we try to get through this thing. My wife thinks we'll be wearing masks all the time from here on out. It sure feels that way sometimes.
Plus the beginning of the year left a mark on me that I can't seem to shrug off. Suffice to say that my self-image has taken a nose dive that resulted in changes to my behavior that some might see as making me seem more withdrawn, even boring. I recovered somewhat, but my self-image issues are worsening, and I don't know how to pull out of it. As it turns out, the new psychiatrist I was supposed to see won't take any more patients, so I have no one professionally to turn to now, leaving me to self-treat as best I can. I've even been told I'm unapproachable. So I guess I'll get help from..... NO ONE. Despite what Bell's Let's Talk campaign might brag to you about, treatment for mental health is getting worse and worse every year, and I don't see it getting better, despite public outcry.
I'm not writing this stuff to get sympathy or something, either. I'm writing it for the record and for a point of reference. If I ever get to see a professional again, I can point to this blog to help explain things as pertaining to my own state of mental health. Not to mention, to reach out to anyone who might be reading this that they're not alone if they're dealing with similar issues. The fact is, though, I have no fucking idea what to do now. I even wondered if I'm headed for permanent disability over all this. That's not something I want.
I guess I'll have to sit tight and see what my near future appointments serve up as they relate to all these issues. I'll try to be cautiously optimistic.
In the meantime, I give thanks to my family and friends for any support they've shown, and especially to my wife for enduring ... well, ME. I realize all of this doesn't exactly make me look terribly attractive. Not that I ever was.
As a side note, please get your Covid vaccination when your turn comes up so we can all get out of this awful mess we're in. Don't buy into alarmists trying to tell you Bill Gates is trying to plant microchips in you or that you'll turn into Frankenstein or something. Trust science. It's fact based.
Thanks as always for reading. I value every person who cares to check this blog out.
God bless, and stay safe, and don't give in to hate.
