The Crazy Chronicles

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Welcome to The Crazy Chronicles

Maybe Writing and Sharing Will Keep Me (and you) Sane

“When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.”
— Franklin D. Roosevelt

No one likes feeling alone.

I’m not talking about the people who choose a life of solitude and love themselves as their best friends. That’s great. Keep on keeping on.

But no one enjoys feeling like they’re the only person suffering. Misery loves company is how the saying goes, correct? I’m not sure misery seeks out others so much as we all crave empathy. Understanding. Validation.

We don’t want to feel crazy.

Which is why I started this blog — The Crazy Chronicles. Yes, it’s a poke at the title given to any of us beginning to suffer mental illness here in America. CRAZY.

But I want to laugh at it, and joke about it, and be serious about it. I want to share in my journey as I begin therapy to heal, and invite you to share your journey too.

Because we’re all a little crazy, and none of us should feel alone.

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Today is a Better Day

“For me, I think one of the biggest battles is mentally. You have good days, and you have bad days.”
Jimmy Graham

I don’t say today is a “good” day, because it’s not. It hasn’t been “good” in quite some time. I remember “good” days, and this does not fit the definition.

But today is a “better” day. I’m not feeling warped with anxiety, drowned by anguish, constantly attacked by intrusive thoughts. I’ve cried twice, but in between, I don’t feel desperate grief. I feel OK. I can concentrate on work; I can relax in windows of normalcy within my mind.

I’ve learned to be grateful for these windows. I do miss my old self: who I was back in college and early adulthood. I miss the carefree excitement I used to feel for life, how starry-eyed and hopeful I was for the future.

I wish I could feel that same excitement today, but any time I begin to experience a hint of it, something inside reminds me I don’t deserve it. I can’t have fun.

I don’t know why I feel this way. I suppose this confusion, this mystery, is why I began therapy. I’m sure I will learn the answer in time.

But until I reach that point, I’m grateful for the better days like today. They offer a sense of relief and allow me to breathe. Right now, I just need to breathe.

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This Brain Scan Could Change My Life

“Let your hopes, not your hurts, shape your future.”
Robert H. Schuller

My partner sent me a Ted Talk YouTube video today that gave me a lot of hope.

It’s a 15-minute video about the most important lesson learned after scanning 83,000 brains over the course of 22 years. Brains were scanned of criminals, anxiety disorders, depression, PTSD, dementia, TBI … the list goes on.

But most importantly, after watching it, I felt not just hopeful my life could improve, but inspired to make it happen. I believe in science, and the science showed me something incredible today.

I’ve embedded the video below. I encourage you to watch it. Because if you’ve suffered like me, wondered if you’re sentenced to a life of endless exhaustion and anguish, then this video will offer something new, something promising.

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The Lure of Isolation (but I know I shouldn’t)

“We’re all islands shouting lies to each other across seas of misunderstanding.”
Rudyard Kipling, The Light That Failed

Today, I almost broke off contact with my life partner and one of my parents.

And I feel ashamed.

I’m ashamed because I love them both, but I also grew scared–scared that I cannot trust my own judgement, that I was somehow harming myself, that to heal, I needed to be alone.

I decided against it. Thank God.

I never spoke to my parent about it. My partner, on the other hand, I did. We almost broke up because I was so confused. Life felt overwhelming and wrong. I didn’t understand where these intense desires to isolate came from.

After reading some articles from reputable sources like Healthline and Psychology Today, I realized the need to isolate is a symptom of trauma. One might even grow confused about his or her life.

My therapist also told me the inability to trust one’s own judgement is common with trauma-induced mental illness.

Right now, I’m feeling calmer again, and I’m grateful for the moment, because I know it won’t last. The waves must be crazy-making for others. Even my coworkers asked if I was OK.

In these moments where I feel more sane, I remind myself that I’m just beginning the journey of therapy. I found a fantastic counselor. Now, I need to allow time and science to do their magic.

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When Will it End?

“Waiting is painful. Forgetting is painful. But not knowing which to do is the worse kind of suffering.”
Paulo Coelho

I woke up this morning feeling exhausted again.

Like I didn’t sleep (even though I slept). Like a fog has overtaken my mind.

The anxiety is ever present in the womb of my gut, in the crevices of my mind. The fear of leaving the bedroom, the house, the car, haunts me. The world seems too large to handle right now.

The familiar knot rises in my throat, threatening tears, but I’m too tired to cry again. I feel like I’m grieving, but I don’t know what (or who) died.

Maybe an idea? A vision I had of my past that now is becoming too clear, too real?

I cannot keep going like this. The constant mental anguish is no way to live life. I want to be free of my mind’s cage.

I hate the slow moving sludge of therapy. I know it’s necessary, but when will it end? When will the nagging pain cease? I want to live again.

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My First Therapy Session: ‘It’s Trauma’

“I knew nothing but shadows and I thought them to be real.”
-Oscar Wilde, The Picture of Dorian Gray

I always thought it was anxiety. Intense anxiety.

Yesterday, I learned the symptoms come from somewhere far deeper: trauma.

I had my first therapy session. Finding a good therapist is like finding the perfect slice of chocolate cake; you try numerous pieces but always find them too dry, or too sweet, or too moist.

Until one day, you taste the perfect bite. And your taste buds scream in both delight and gratitude. You can finally breathe.

My therapist didn’t judge. She didn’t roll her eyes or make snide remarks about my partner or my parents.

Instead, she reassured me that I wasn’t developing a mood disorder, that my random crying spells and paralyzing waves of fear where I couldn’t leave bed had an explanation.

I have post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

“But what about all the veterans who fought in Iraq and Afghanistan?” I asked her. “Or surviviors of war-ravaged countries? I didn’t go through anything like that.”

My therapist smiled. “We have two levels of trauma,” she told me. “Combat veterans or war survivors have the capital T. But then, some of us who’ve gone through abusive childhoods, where the stress was constant and ongoing, have the little ‘t.'”

So, my childhood caused my trauma?

Even though the emotional, verbal, and psychological abuse was sometimes unbearable as a child, I still have a relationship with my family today. I still love them fiercely. They still love me.

So accepting that my childhood and my family caused my trauma was hard to grasp.

I mean, I used to wish my mom and dad would get divorced so I could live with the calm, nurturing parent. But I also remember family vacations where we’d laugh.

I suppose I felt relieved to learn I wasn’t losing my mind, that my symptoms have a perfectly rational explanation. But on the other hand …

I woke up in a fit of tears this morning, heaving over in bed as though I was grieving. Anger, homesickness, and guilt attacked me simultaneously, like a swarm of bees.

I climbed out of bed, completely naked, and pulled myself into the bathroom. I forced myself to look into the mirror, at my puffy cheeks and tearful, swollen eyes, and I realized this is the face of healing. I’m about to embark upon a journey from which there is no return.

Morpheus just asked me which pill I want to take, and I chose the red.

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