Surviving Mental Illness – Winning the War?

Winning the War?

Cutting Myself

I don’t really remember how it began, but I took a razor and started slashing at my wrists. My intention wasn’t suicide, but if I had hit an artery, I wouldn’t have minded. My therapist referred to this action as a “dance with death.” He said it was a first step towards suicide.

There are two components that I have noticed when self-cutting. For one, there is a rush of endorphins that surge after a physical painful experience. And two, my mental depression now has a physical manifestation. I could put on a fake smile and use a cheerful sounding voice, but the cuts on my wrists tell the true story.

One night I cut myself so badly I had to go to the ER for a major laceration of the thumb. The blade had slipped and went right through the thumbnail. I hid my other cuts from the emergency personnel, but I’m sure they knew what I was up to. But I put on a fake smile and a cheerful sounding voice, and they didn’t ask any more questions. Perhaps they really didn’t want to know? Who can say?

Medicinal Change

After this, I immediately let my psychiatrist and therapist know what had happened. They immediately put me back on Lexapro and then a mood stabilizer called Ambilify. Within days after being taken off of Cymbalta, the urge to harm myself quickly disappeared, and I haven’t intentionally hurt myself since.

By now, people at work knew I was still an emotional wreck. My boss wanted me to stay, but Human Resources were looking for a way to get me out of there. They managed to fire another woman who also had suicidal tendencies – they used her attendance as an excuse.

And my attendance was shoddy too. With the Ambilify and Lexapro, I knew I was moving in the right direction, but something was still missing.

By the fall of 2006, my psychiatrist left and a new one took her place. He studied my records carefully and asked if I ever tried Depakote – a medication designed for bipolar disorder. I hadn’t, so he put me on it.

Could This Be the Answer?

I am still too amateur of a writer to come close to describing the difference it made me feel. I felt like I finally have woken up from a very long, dismal, and horribly bleak nightmare. My thoughts were neither sluggish nor rapid. The thought of suicide now seemed foreign to me.

Still, I lost my job due to absenteeism. But instead of planning my death, I began looking for a new one. I felt a sense of hope but one that is realistic. I could now organize my thoughts.

I felt “normal.”

But only for a while. The symptoms crept back into my life, and the emotional downward spiral came once again.

I felt defeated once again.

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