Nostalgia

"We are often comparing our lives, our marriages, our families, and our communities to unattainable, media-driven visions of perfection, or we're holding up our reality against our own fictional account of how great someone else has it. Nostalgia is also a dangerous form of comparison. Think about how often we compare ourselves and our lives to a memory that nostalgia has so completely edited that it never really existed: 'Remember when...? Those were the days...'"
-Brene Brown, Daring Greatly

Hey guys! It's been quite a few days since I posted a blog. I apologize. It's because I honestly ran out of things to say. I didn't want to repeat myself and I kind of hit what they call a writer's block.

I just started reading Brene's book and I can NOT put it down. She makes so many great points about vulnerability. It is a very well-written book.

I chose this quote because for me, lately, nostalgia is hitting me hard. I am dealing with severe weight gain because of my medications, one in particular, Zyprexa. It is known to make people always hungry. I often think of a year ago, when I was down to 105 pounds and I miss that time. I miss being light as a feather in some ways. I was able to run 6 minute miles. I was able to run up stairs. I never got out of breath. I could run 5 miles straight in 15 minutes. I miss the freedom. I miss the wind whipping in my face.

To be truthfully honest, I miss my mania at times. But not enough to go off my meds. I just miss the photographic memory. I miss the running. I miss feeling invincible. I miss feeling like nothing can stop me.

Now I feel so... ordinary...

Anyways, I went to my psychiatrist yesterday for the first time since 2010 and updated her on the past few years. Without even saying anything, she said we would be lowering my Zyprexa, because she said I am on a very high dose. I'm hoping this will help some with my weight gain. But at the same time I don't want it to affect my paranoia/psychosis. I am scared to go down a bit. But I am also scared about the health effects of being overweight.

It feels like there is no winning.

I guess the winning is that I've been out of the hospital for 10 and a half months. That's a big step forward. No matter how much I miss my mania, it is not enough to make me go off the meds and go back to the hospital. I just want stability without weight gain and my psychiatrist told me yesterday that there are other options.

Just keep moving forward...

The Natural High

"Humility frees me from outside pressures and allows me to learn at any time from anyone or any experience."
-Courage to Be Me, p. 137

Being humble means that you know you don't know it all. You are able to learn from all the various experiences during your lifetime. You are able to grow through your experiences.

When I was manic this time last year, I thought I knew it all. I had the classic manic behavior, in which I thought I was on top of the world, nothing could hurt me, nothing could stop me. I was the be-all, do-all person. At one point, I signed up for a Half Marathon, because I had been running 6 minute miles. I even made a goal for myself to achieve my PhD by the age of 25. I was on a natural high, as they say.

And then the high came crashing down...

Four hospitalizations followed. I was taken out of the PhD program. I stopped running. And my life somewhat became boring... No more high...

But I found stability.

However, that is just what I needed. Because with the high came nasty paranoia and psychosis. I learned through those experiences that I needed to take my meds in order to become and remain stable. I had to take the meds in order to lead a normal life again.

Sometimes I do miss that high, but it is not enough to make me go off my meds...

Creativity Within

"Joy doesn't come merely from being entertained, but from a decision to appreciate each moment that you are given as a rare and precious gift from God."
-Joyce Meyer, Power Thoughts

 My brother told me yesterday that I can make any camera, no matter how simple, take beautiful photography. That was a huge compliment to me and I did not take it lightly. You see, one of my main goals in life is to find beauty in simplicity and to share it with others. I love finding the beauty in the ordinary and capturing it through my photography, even with a simple camera. All of my photography is taken with an iPhone 4 camera and is not modified or photoshopped.

Andrew's comment was a huge compliment to me as well because it made me realize that all of my creativity has not been taken away by my medications. There is still some mild mania inside of me. As someone who loves art and creativity, this is a huge blessing. There is just enough mania within to able to capture the beauty all around me.

My creativity means the world to me. It means I can "appreciate each moment." It means that I can be excited about the ordinary and find meaning where there may look like there is none. Creativity is what drives me. It drives me as an engineer, blogger and photographer. Enjoying each moment as a gift from God is what makes me want to live. Each of my photos is a glimpse of my time with God.

I wanted to share some of my recent photography at a lake near my home in NJ. Enjoy!

Tales from a Hospital

A few months ago, I was catatonic... I hadn't slept, eaten or talk for three days. I remember the entire ordeal, but from a confused state. A state of total chaos.

What could bring me, a 24 year old biomedical engineer, soon to be neural engineer, to do that? To act in such chaos?

It all lies in the mind and mental illness. 

To those who don't know, I struggle with schizoaffective (schizophrenia and bipolar), PTSD and Aspergers.

The mind and the brain are currently being rigorously studied and there is a current debate about how they work. At the same time that my brain was going haywire, I was studying the brain in the lab. It's almost as if I studied so hard that the wires in my brain went chaotic. Overdrive, I think.

The voices are something very interesting. When I heard voices in the hospital, they were voices of people I had talked to throughout different points in my life but their voices were clear as day, even if I hadn't talked to them in many years. The voices were the strongest when I was catatonic. They were tormenting me, calling me a liar and telling me nobody cared about me.

I thought for awhile that I was hearing the voices on an invisible earplug in my ear... I thought they were talking to me but were in another room. I kept looking in other rooms to see if they were there. I got in trouble a few times for going in other peoples' rooms.

When the medications started working, the voices slowly slipped away...

One of the most interesting aspects I can remember is that the reason I didn't eat for three days was that I thought the food was poisoned. All of the food they gave me looked like it was rotten. It actually looked that way; there were dark spots on everything and it looked disgusting.

Not only was I blessed with auditory hallucinations, but I also have visual hallucinations.

Plus paranoia.

A few months ago, I went to the police because I thought someone booby-trapped my apartment.

Paranoia and psychosis make you do interesting things.

What intrigues me as someone who has studied the brain and deals with such severe mental illness is how all of the different parts of the brain work together to cause such "organized chaos." The voices went along with the visual hallucinations and everything made sense to me. To an outsider, it makes no sense though.

The brain is very interesting...

The Good, The Bad and the Mania

“My mania, at least in their early and mild forms, were absolutely intoxicating states that gave rise to great personal pleasure, an incomparable flow of thoughts, and a ceaseless energy that allowed the translation of new ideas into papers and projects.”

-Kay Redfield Jamison, An Unquiet Mind

As I read these words, I was reminded of my travels just a few months ago. Last June, my mother, I and a few other people who knew me well became suspicious that I may have been misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder. I went through neuropsychological testing with a psychologist. The results of that testing revealed that I had Asperger’s syndrome and I became undiagnosed with bipolar disorder. The test results were “counterindicative of bipolar disorder.”

So I went off my bipolar medications…

Thus entered the journey of this year…

I slowly weaned myself off of lithium, Risperdal and Prazosin. Lithium is a mood stabilizer, Risperdal an antipsychotic and Prazosin a medication used to treat nightmares and flashbacks of my Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.

I started walking a lot and then began running. So much so that I signed up for my first half Marathon. I guess then some people may have had their suspicions that I was manic. In fact, some asked, but my reply always was that the testing was counterindicative of it- I couldn’t have it. Everything seemed so good. To everyone, it looked like being off the meds was helping me. I was energetic and very lively. Often I felt like things were too good to be true. I felt so great. I was losing the weight that I gained on the medications. I quickly dropped to 105 pounds in a few months. I dove into my new job, working sometimes 10 or 11 hours a day. Nobody questioned that. But maybe they were suspicious.

But then came the bad side of mania… The psychotic and paranoid side of mania. That part of the mania that I hated with a passion. That part which I was so scared of. That part which I didn't know existed but I may have felt twitches of it earlier on in my life. When I entered that part of the mania- the unspeakable side- I had no choice but to come to terms with the fact that I had been manic and indeed, being bipolar is another part of my life.

Due to two extremely serious psychotic episodes in which I lost all function and capacity to think clearly, I was diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder, bipolar type, and PTSD. The two of these disorders are mixed and together, become extremely serious. For those who are not familiar, schizoaffective disorder is a disorder in which one exhibits symptoms of both schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. I often wondered if I had a form of schizophrenia- always had my suspicions. Even one of the students I tutored told me that I write like a schizophrenic- don't really know what that means. Needless to say, schizoaffective disorder is a complex disorder and I often wonder why God would allow me to have even more struggles.

But I press on…

Always…

Never, never give up and always, always move forward…

I was placed back on lithium and a new antipsychotic. I am having similar side effects to the meds I was on before, but this time, my stability is more important to me. I have no choice but to take the meds.

You see, it’s very difficult to make friends when I am in and out of hospitals. People don't know how to respond to my psychotic ideas and delusions. When I was having symptoms of bipolar disorder, people didn’t know which Chelsea they were going to meet- the happy, go-lucky, on top of the world, overly productive and enthusiastic Chelsea or the depressed, this world stinks, I want to sleep all day and crawl up in a ball Chelsea. People didn’t know if I would be in the hospital today or the next day. And so until my medications have been smoothed out, I was often avoided. In a way, I understand.

As my therapist and I discussed earlier this week, stability is very important in this life. Relationships require stability. Jobs require stability. And as I move forward, stability is key for my success on this earth.

“I cannot imagine leading a normal life without both taking lithium and having had the benefits of psychotherapy. Lithium prevents my seductive but disastrous highs, diminishes my depressions, clears out the wool and webbing from my disordered thinking, slows me down, settles me out, keeps me from ruining my career and relationships, keeps me out of a hospital and makes psychotherapy possible.”

-Kay Redfield Jamison, An Unquiet Mind

Though I often miss the “high” of my manic episodes, the amazing memory that I had that is now gone due to the medications, only sleeping 4 or 5 hours to be overly productive, I am happy to say that I am stable and moving forward. I have to agree with Kay Redfield Jamison that taking lithium is key to living a productive life. I have no other choice. Since I have been on it once again, I have been able to manage putting the shattered pieces of my life together- the pieces that were torn and shattered by my mania, psychosis and paranoia.

Sometimes, I feel the need to look behind me as I walk down the street, a bit paranoid that I am being followed- only a bit of my mania peeking through in my head, but when I am on the medications, I am able to function and be a productive person in society, which is key in this life. I am able to stay out of a hospital and each day I can stay out of one is a huge blessing from God.