Triple Diagnosed
Because I really don’t know what I am about to write please bear with me.
I am diagnosed with (3) disorders: Bipolar, Borderline Personality and Post Traumatic Stress. I was diagnosed in 2002 however, I was not fully aware of how much I am different from the norm until 2012. Prior to my diagnoses I presumed everyone went through emotional changes and raging outburst. I didn’t know I was depressed or manic. I knew there was something “wrong” with me but I didn’t know that it had a name to it. When I was first told I was mentally ill I began to cry in my doctor’s office because I had been taught so many negatives about “retarded” people. I asked my doctor if I was retarded and he told me no, and began to explain the differences to me but of course that went in one ear and out the other because all I heard was that I was a “crazy person”. I looked up the word mental illness in my thesaurus and a synonym was lunatic so that gave me more dread and caused me more depression and fears. I didn’t know what would become of me since I was a “lunatic”.
In early 2001 at the age of 36 I began to cry uncontrollably all day every day. I didn’t know why I was crying most times, I just knew everything was going wrong. At the time I was going through marital problems and my children were becoming teenagers so they were no longer the little children who didn’t give me much trouble. I almost never slept and I was constantly in a state of confusion. Everything and everyone was a fear to me of some sort. I had always had nightmares when I went to bed at night since my very early childhood but the nightmares interrupted my daytime naps also. I was never able to sleep without having nightmares. (Until 2011 I didn’t know this was a part of the PTSD). Currently I still have nightmares at least once a night/day although I am on med for it. The nightmares are sometimes less severe when I’m on the meds.
For a while my husband at the time tried to just get me to stop from crying but we never talked about what was on my mind… for one reason, I didn’t know what was on my mind and didn’t know why I was crying. My PCP prescribed me a med that was to help me stop crying but it didn’t and I became worse. By June 2002 I attempted suicide for the first time. (I say first time because there were many times after that). I was hospitalized for a weekend without really being treated or diagnosed so at home I was yet in this terrible state and didn’t know why and even still didn’t think to wonder why. Within (3) months I attempted suicide again, and was hospitalized in a state mental hospital, for about a week. It was there that I got my first medicines and diagnoses of Bipolar and BPD. (No talk therapy, no explanation why I was in the state I was in, and I didn’t think to ask.) Upon going home I was so lost and confused and still crying and having nightmares I didn’t know what to do but keep thinking suicide was the answer. From 2002 until November 2013 I idealized suicide and attempted time and again only to fail even with my most extreme attempt which was always to take as many pills as I could find in my house. (Mostly sleeping pills). But I will have to say miraculously I never expired.
For my own intentions I began to attempt suicide by causing myself to die slowly. Since suicide attempts didn’t work I began living my life recklessly. I began doing illegal drugs. I didn’t do them to party. I mostly did them in hopes I would somehow over dose. Later I began to realize the street drugs quieted the racing thoughts and because they kept me awake for days I was not having as many nightmares. (It was later that I came to understand I was self-medicating.) During this time I didn’t realize I was actually harming myself because all I wanted was a quiet mind. With each in take of the drugs my head was as I describe it blank. I began to use the drugs just for the purpose of having a blank mind and in my thoughts that was all I needed. I didn’t think I needed anything other than a quiet mind. After a bit more than a few years the min quieting drugs became a habit out of control that I personally despised because I didn’t like the people such as the dealers and users so I tried to think of ways to get the drugs without the aid of anyone. Of course that was a futile effort. No such thing exist which began my decision to get off the drugs and just try to quiet the thoughts some other ways. None of my efforts worked so I went into the deepest of depression I’d ever been in and attempted suicide once again. This time my daughters who are young adults now had become tired of the whirlwind cycles of hospitals, institutions and jail. My youngest told me if I ever attempted suicide again she would never speak to me again. I’m not sure how long it took for me to realize I was not only hurting but my children were too and something had to be done but at some point I began to really seek professional help as well as learn what I could on my own about being bipolar an drug addictions as relative to mental illness. It has been only as I consider it; a short time since I’ve been on the road to recovery as well as including myself as a helper of myself to get better. I am more able to discuss somewhat freely to my psychologist about what I can remember and somewhat understand but all is not clear to me and every day seems to either be a breakthrough or a breakdown of sorts. The realization that I am mentally ill with triple diagnosis has been hard to accept or even understand however, I attempt to utilize all professional helps available to me. As my doctors have told me this is a life long illness , it scares me still to think that one day… any time soon or later on down the road I may have a sever episode of crisis that would possibly imprison me or cause my death. I am today living with that fear as well as still not fully able to grasp ahold to my memories in a pleasant manner. My memories taunt me and cripple my days and nights. This unfortunately is not in my wording a complete success story but a story yet in the making. I only hope it will have a happy ending when I am old and grey and able to live comfortably without sever episodes of any sort.
