Grade Seven

The blood of my brothers was spilled

On the far away Afghanistan shore

Now their corpses are silent and still

And their names are not used anymore

So careful to not let any skin show

Women there once again have to dress

Covered from head to toe

And female education has quickly regressed

Today I sat writing on a park bench

Happily immersed in midsummer delight

I saw a sight that made my teeth clench

A girl whose situation just didn’t seem right

She had to be close to nineteen

Had a baby boy close to a year

In that loveliness of shimmering green

She looked so lovely as she drew near

All but her face was covered

She was radiant, but so out of place

So young to make babies and mother

Like she wasn’t a full part of the human race

I often am too quick to judge

And different people have their own ways

I could see that her young child was loved

And a sweet smile was upon her face

But since the Afghanistan mission pulled out

Females there no longer go past the sixth grade

I want to protest, go to rallies and shout

The country lost the precious freedoms we gave

Did You Ever Trip Over Your Tongue So Bad You Got a Nosebleed?

https://www.patreon.com/leifg

 

Hello Dear Readers!

I have decided that some of my followers like to read a little about what I have to say, while others want to see videos, so I am going to try and alternate between the two or at least break up the order a little with a written blog now and then and a video blog when I feel up to it. I have been kind of having a struggle the past little while feeling like someone I worked with is stepping on my territory. I’m sure a lot of people who do creative work will feel this way now and then. As many of you know, due to a medication change that was supposed to greatly improve my situation but actually made me extremely sick to the point where I needed to spend a month in the hospital, I had to take some time off work. During that time, I seemed to miss out on a lot of opportunities, the biggest of which was something I really enjoyed, giving presentations to the Police Recruit class here in Edmonton. Thankfully few people seem to be able to do the work I do, and this past fall I was able to go back to speak at the Recruit Centre. For a while though, one of my co-workers had seemed to steal all my thunder, making videos where I was making written blogs (some of which I even wrote from my hospital bed). I tried to contact this person but received no response and then due to my personal social ineptitude, matters only got worse. I can’t remember why, but I had my employer give her a copy of my two memoirs in hopes that she could help get the word out about them, but in reality I am finding more and more that most people are unwilling to do anything that doesn’t directly benefit themselves. I even got a bit angry and asked that my books be returned and heard nothing back, $40 out the window on that one. I really can’t blame this person though, ,most of my feelings can be chalked up to jealousy. Not to mention that I felt extremely hurt that I missed out on so much when I was in the hospital and dealing with horrifying circumstances. Later this year, the person in question actually had her own hospital admission and from that point on I tried to look more at what I had done wrong. I saw how I was being angry and bitter about something that was no one’s fault. Even my doctor could not have predicted that I would have the reaction I did to the medications I took. Hoping to make the best of a bad situation, some time back I decided not to launch a lawsuit and instead went to work on a book about the experience. The book is now done and I have sent it for consideration to a few publishers. Also, I have been trying to find new ways to improve my blog and delivery of my message of more awareness of mental illness and less stigma. The person in question that has videos is really just trying to do the same thing. I have a feeling though that in reality she is much younger and less experienced than me and not someone I should worry about. I should actually be very happy that others are working to improve the situation of people with a mental illness, and simply do the best I can without comparing myself or my work to that of others. A couple of weeks ago there was a staff Christmas party, and as per usual, I was asked to do the photography for it. The video blogger and her boyfriend were there which for whatever reason gave me extreme anxiety which I can’t blame them for, I can only try and recognize my triggers and try to avoid situations like that in the future. Wanting to do the job I was paid for, I took a picture of them and later wished the blogger a Merry Christmas which was returned. When I look back though, it is an interesting rollercoaster of ideas and emotions I went through. First I had heard about this young woman who seemed very kind, nice, and well-dressed. Then some time later after meeting her at a staff meeting she emailed about having me in one of her videos. That was the point where I am uncertain if it was obvious that I was becoming ill, I had my medication change around that time but didn’t enter the hospital until the end of January. I was in a terrible state of paranoia in the hospital and don’t remember if I contacted her. I think this is a good time to pause and mention something: if someone you know has become ill and has been admitted to a hospital, one should always remember how difficult and upsetting it can be. If you have the ability, do your best to visit them just for a short while, as much as once per week, it can make such a huge difference to a person’s recovery.

So anyhow, after leaving the hospital I felt that my status as a mental health advocate had dropped a few hundred points and then I kept hearing about this new blogger. I have to commend her, she has made a lot of great videos though the information in them is pretty simplistic (as they should be–those who need the videos the most have problems processing and remembering things), but she has also managed to stay in school despite schizoaffective disorder and even a hospitalization of her own. These are really qualities I should never be jealous of. Also, I have decided to learn what I can from this new blog format and try and deliver to you, my readers, what you want and need in more efficient ways. I have now started a Patreon page and it would be such a blessing if those who are able can pledge $5-$8 for which I will work with skill and patience on crafting a short story and/or two poems for each month that only supporters will see. Now, I always like to give some advice or at least try and sum up what I say each time I write a blog, but I guess all I can really do is ask that, especially around this time of year we need to be forgiving and inclusive of others, especially if they have an impairment such as mental illness. When I was 18, I was kicked out of the house on Christmas Eve and it took a very long time for me to forgive my dad for it. Now, years later I cherish every moment I can have with my dad (my mom passed ten years ago) and I can see what a selfish teenage jerk I was 30 years ago as a teen. Not only that, but I had two wonderful Christmas dinners this year, one with a friend and his family, and one with my dad and my brother. I really couldn’t ask for any more. Thanks once again for reading and Merry Christmas to one and all!

Tall Trees Sown From Seeds of Love and Hate

Please see below today’s photo for a poem and a blog entry

All the fearful years of tears and trials

Wreak havoc upon my thoughts

It seems a test, a trial, a quiz

To even focus upon what I have sought

 

In life we have so little time

As our hours slip into days

I remember holding her like she was mine

then her telling me I was just a phase

 

In death and living there are no words

to slow the march of time

I only long to be understood and heard

to tell them all I have found the perfect crime

 

I do what I can for those I see

show compassion for those in troubled times

and somehow I fool myself that the world cares for me

when they all seem to only want what now is mine

 

I gave away my heart too soon

in a lover’s sweet embrace

now as I work and push a mop and broom

my thoughts occupy a sad, unholy place

 

I no longer dream of God our father

Though he seemed to have done right by me

When my day is done and I close the door

he lets my romantic heart soar free

 

I found a loveliness, a happiness

among the stillness and the peace

and whisper out a tiny prayer

that soon my soul will be released

 

Well, not the most cheerful poem I ever wrote, but I think I am making progress with my writing. I guess I can spill the beans now since the project is almost finished. I am writing a book about my most recent stay in the hospital. I went through a couple of very difficult times, one was the delusional voices I heard, which were extremely convincing, and the other was that I was very paranoid. I had really thought I wasn’t going to have to experience all this again as long as I got rest and took my medications, but there is no insurance policy that covers everything. I still don’t understand why I got so incredibly ill just because of switching from one medication to the next, supposedly newer one. Not a lot was explained. I did have my diagnosis changed once again, this time neglecting to mention my anxiety and adding in my diabetes. I think the Doctor put down schizoaffective disorder bipolar subtype. It’s all pretty confusing. I really want to put this book out to help people to understand more about hospital admissions and how horrible they can be.

What bugs me the most is I like to try and make each of these blogs worthwhile for my readers, but there seems to be no easy answers. I met a man last year who was incredibly kind and diligent about getting help for his son who eventually died by suicide. I have tried to show people how they can get work like I do for the schizophrenia society and feel better about themselves and have some recovery in their lives, but there are many heartbreaking cases I have known, even among people who have worked hard all their lives. I guess I am fairly good at taking care of myself, with the exception of getting into debt too easily. But what do you say to someone who comes up to you and says they have a friend with schizophrenia or they themselves have bipolar and don’t know what to do. All I can really do is keep going to schools and Universities and doing my level best to get a few key points across. Number one, there is no cure, there are only treatments, but they are getting better all the time. Number two, don’t use drugs or alcohol or ski or play football or do anything fun where you might hit your head and get a brain injury. I used to love sports like boxing and football and skiing. I will never forget the first time I went into the hospital and they were doing everything they could for me, hooking me up to million dollar machines and putting me through all kinds of tests to see if my erratic behaviour had to do with a bad fall I had taken on a ski hill in town or not. It seemed once I was deemed mentally ill they sent me to a psychiatric facility to let me rot and I lost all of my opportunities, I wasn’t even allowed to try and finish high school by my parents or the school administrators.

But even in that situation there were good times. There was this moment I was hitch-hiking through the rockies trying to get home to Edmonton in the winter and I was in Hope, British Columbia (it’s where they filmed the first Rambo movie) and the air and the sky and the mountains were all shining silently, singing a chorus of light and beauty that took my breath away. Or this time when I was just entering BC for the first time and I saw a massive Moose and her child running in circles in a flowing field of grass with mountains and cumulonimbus clouds in the background. Those images stayed in my heart. I hate to think what it did to my parents for me, off my medications, with no money or means of earning a living to be wandering all over North America. I lived for the five minute phone call I placed to my parents every night from downtown Vancouver. But when I got back there was no love left for me. No place to stay, no one to do things with. It drove me nuts because I would try and call my sister to talk and each time it was a one-sided lecture to me about how busy she was with school.

But the amazing part of things really is that with time, everything got better. I learned to cook, I found out how to eat healthy and how to lose the weight my medication packed onto me. I even learned to make friends and have some pretty incredible people in my life. It is really kind of funny because in just two years of living on the coast it was like my body had lost its ability to heat itself. The Edmonton winters were just too much. It took a long time, maybe ten years but I adjusted to it and I kept pushing myself to make friends, to read, to write. And somehow the world changed around me and I have an incredibly enviable life now. I think a lot of it just came down to becoming a part of a community and caring for and watching out for the people in my life. That’s about it for today folks, thanks for stopping in.

LG

Mental Illness Doesn’t Take a Holiday On Christmas Day

Scroll down past my special Christmas Poem for my Christmas Day Blog.

Christmas Poem December 25, 2018

By: Leif Gregersen

 

Christmas dinner for all is such a fantastic time

No matter your sins, your faults or your crimes

 

Mountains of turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes and yams

No one sees the stress and the effort only mothers understand

 

Even on our most precious holiday, we orbit the sun as we turn on our axis in place

Each split second, a smile for good or devious origins comes to another child’s face

 

In a country of opportunity, freedom, equal rights and democracy

To bullying children all that matters is the cash value under the tree

 

But the love that kids share with the family members who congregate

Can often be just enough to turn the tides of their fate

 

Show a child that by hard work and effort they will prosper and grow

That precious Christmas vacation will bless them more than you ever could know

 

My favourite Christmas happened somewhat like that

My Uncle Glen was alive and so was our Lilleven our wonderful cat

 

We feasted and laughed, even had a taste of rum and some wine

Uncle Glen got a bottle of liquor and it seemed the whole world was mine

 

I stayed up to watch Jimmy Stewart’s best character give all of himself

All his effort and hard work for others to end up being put on a shelf

 

The message that movie carried deep into my fifteen-year-old heart

Made me tear up, made me vow to make a new start

 

Care for your loved ones, show those struggling there is a much better way

What better time to start on the savior’s most magical day

 

No one will look back when you’re gone and think of your self-serving deeds

The best way to become immortal is to give toil and tears to those truly in need

END

 

Good day people of all faiths and nations. The clock has turned and as I write, (in Mountain Standard Time anyway) it is now Christmas Day. Yesterday I received an injection of Abilify, which comes to the clinic in powder form and then the nurse mixes it up and injects it into one of my shoulders. It is intended to replace a medication I was on earlier which had to be administered twice a month and was considered not as good as the new one. It is going to be difficult, but I want to try and stay with this new injection but there are some reasons why I am beginning to have my doubts. The biggest one is that I am starting to move into the borderline of hallucinating. I don’t see people or things that aren’t there, but, along with making me pretty tired, and often only out of the far range of my peripheral vision, things that can’t move (table, cutting board) seem to move all on their own. I have also been getting flashes of thinking people are behind me or in the room. Worst of all is that I have been getting pretty paranoid, though that situation is improving. One of the things I have been trying to do is ride the bus less, which can be pretty difficult when it is minus 12 to minus 15 Celsius outside and you have to get across the city by walking. Regardless, I have been doing it.

When I do get on the bus, I find myself deathly afraid that I am going to be mistaken for some kind of predator. A couple of times, there has been a female on the bus who goes out of their way to stand near the bus driver, ask for a special stop, then run as fast as possible when the bus stops. This I am sure isn’t always because of me, but once or twice I have been pretty certain. It doesn’t help that there is so much stigma out there regarding people with schizophrenia, and that a couple of years back I was given the gears by an ass of a police detective who got my name from my boss and seemed to suspect that because I was an (un-uniformed) security guard, I fit a description of a uniformed security guard in the area who had assaulted a woman.

The really good thing is that I found out that my new nurse (Best Wishes on your retirement Willie!) not only has a Registered Psychiatric Nursing Diploma/Degree, but also a degree in Psychology. The other cool thing is that she knows her comic books, so I think she may be a huge help to me as time unravels.

I didn’t want to stop the blog today before talking a bit about Christmas. It is the time of year when beds in psychiatric wards and hospitals fill to overflowing. Often this is from suicide attempts from people who are in a terrible state and the Christmas holiday reminds them of lost loved ones, estranged loved ones, and perhaps also their own isolation. These people need our time, our patience and our understanding, not our judgement. Sadly, as many do say, the worst thing you can do is give them money. It will go to addictions a lot of the time. If it doesn’t, say you try to do the right thing and buy them groceries, it is likely they will take their allotted grocery money to use on drugs or alcohol. I personally think the best thing a person can do to help people who have mental health, addiction or homelessness problems (often some have all three) it is best to try and put in some time at a social services agency (Edmonton: Mustard Seed, Bissell Centre, Hope Mission) another thing that can be done is to donate non-perishable food to these places, or even go to a local dollar store if you live in a cold climate and buy a bunch of gloves and hats for people. Giving donations directly to the charities can sound like the ideal thing, but I have been very wary of some charities. I gave more than I thought I could afford more than once to charities that spend upwards of 80 to 90 percent of their donations on raising more donations. This made me sick to my stomach. I would say if a person wanted to donate to a charity, especially a local homeless charity, go down and volunteer and find out what your money will be spent on. Just a suggestion. Merry Christmas Everyone!!!

Leif Gregersen

viking3082000@yahoo.com

Poetry, Creative Writing, Wellness, and Mental Health Awareness Presenter and Facilitator.

 

A Whole Bunch of Mental Health Recovery Philosophy and Self Care Wisdom

Well, this is downtown Edmonton again. In days long gone there was an old woman who was known far and wide as the “got a quarter” lady who was once immortalized in an oil painting. This woman was the very definition of a downtown icon. There was also a man who was a street corner preacher who could often be upsetting and somewhat hostile. Now, more and more the downtown core is either steel and glass office towers or another added condominium complex. My big question as I see old buildings get torn down and expensive new ones opening up is, where do all the homeless, the jobless, the hungry, and especially the mentally ill go? The hospitals haven’t gotten any bigger, actually one of them, the famous “Charles Camsell” hospital was shut down and is now being redone as apartments. Despite all these new buildings, affordable housing is at a premium and the agencies that offer housing and care are fewer and farther between. I am so fortunate to live in subsidized and supported housing, but I often wonder where I could go if I ever had to leave here.

Regardless, there are more important things to discuss. I am happy to report that my transition from my once every two weeks’ injection has been successfully changed to invega, which only needs to be administered every four weeks. I am also getting used to my diabetes medication, Metformin which at first made me weak and dizzy. I feel that anyone who has a hard time taking medications really should try them for at least 3 or even 6 months. It is amazing what kind of changes can go on in that amount of time, our bodies can be extremely adaptable.

As far as my insomnia has been going, it has improved. I was sleeping on my new futon and had no idea that my back just wasn’t prepared for a firm mattress. I have gone back to sleeping on my good old Salvation Army $500 pillow top mattress and I have been getting such a great sleep. I was a little worried for a while because I had been using some mild sedatives to get me to sleep for a while, but now that I have gone back to my own bed things have normalized.

I don’t know how many writers there are out there who read my blog, but I do think that anyone who has mental health issues, and also for that matter, anyone period, should keep a journal of their thoughts, ideas, and general progress towards their goals in life. For example, something I have learned by keeping a journal is that taking my medications at the same time each day, as in 5:00am and 9:00pm is much more beneficial than taking them when I wake up or when I go to sleep. One of the reasons this is so much better and has afforded me a much improved quality of life is that when I get up at 5:00am I can have some time to myself, do some reading or some writing, and then go for a walk to a swimming pool or something like that and then have an entire day ahead of me. Getting into synch with the world outside my apartment has given me the ability to work part-time on a regular basis, make connections and make friends I never would have met, and literally publish 11 books in a short amount of time. I am also pretty positive that my medications work a lot better on my symptoms when I take them like this.

The other thing I wanted to discuss can be something hard to do, but it can be incredibly beneficial to a person with a diagnosis of a mental health issue, be it OCD or bipolar or schizoaffective disorder. It is all about having a friend. For some, especially those who are ‘shut in’ their homes, a pet can be the only friend they have. This is great, and I don’t knock this at all, but having a person you can do things with, go places, watch out for each other is something I consider almost an essential survival tool. Where do you meet people to be friends with these days? I used to meet a lot of people at 12-step meetings, but I think this can be an extremely bad idea. Not to knock the meetings, they do incredible good for a lot of people who couldn’t find any other way to get it, but in my own experience these people can be very controlling, aggressive, and often abusive. I don’t want to discuss any identities, but I will say I had two close friends I met in meetings that I should have ran away from screaming if I knew what they would do to me eventually.

I think one of the best first steps to finding friends is to get involved in a local schizophrenia society or mental health organization. This can be really difficult if you live in a smaller community, but if you are reading this it means you have access to a computer, which means you can access online resources. You can go to Youtube and learn about your illness, cognitive behavioural therapy, and look up your medications. Having knowledge of these things will help you in dealing with your own illness, and it will also give you a chance to one day give back to others who could easily be unknowingly suffering from a mental illness. I do know also that all of the resources that the Schizophrenia Society branch I work for are online as well, including podcasts, support groups, and more. Lastly, if you can afford it or if you can find a practitioner who works on a sliding scale, you can actually get counselling over the computer. As a last side note, there are many 12-step meetings online as well. Anyone who would like to access resources like these, please feel free to comment on this post or email me at viking3082000@yahoo.com and I will do my best to inform you of resources in your area.

Well, dear readers. Once again I am leaving you without a poem to think about. I would love to write more poetry and put them in these blog postings, but I have felt the writer’s block for the past couple of weeks. If anyone out there writes their own poetry, and doesn’t mind others seeing it, I would be more than happy to put a poem I choose with my next blog, but don’t worry too much, I think I am at heart a poet and will have more for those who enjoy them soon. For now, think about some of the things I have been discussing with regards to being mindful of your surroundings (for example by taking a walk and noticing things like what the wind feels like, what the temperature is, what birds can see you, what kind of people live in the neighbourhood) and also think about what I said about using medication times to ‘synch’ yourself with the outside world. Isolation can be poisonous to those of us who suffer, keep it to a minimum and remember you can always reach me at viking3082000@yahoo.com