All God’s Creatures and Creations

       This is a photo of a poor neglected critter not too far from where I live.  There are scores of these poor guys in Edmonton.  I have heard that rabbits like these are often not wild rabbits, they are rabbits that were adopted as pets for Easter and people decided they didn’t have the resources to take care of them and set them loose.  Australia had a very serious problem with rabbit overpopulation (hey-they breed like rabbits!)  They actually had to release a disease that killed them off by the thousands to cull the population.  Sometimes I wonder, even though it does seem a bit inhumane, why they don’t capture these rabbits and use them for food or even simply their pelts.  As far as food, apparently you don’t want to eat any rabbit that lives within 50 miles of a city, they are full of rancid polluted water and waste.  As for the pelts I don’t know.  I had a friend who worked in leathers and he was able to make gloves and such from rabbit, but that may be different kinds of rabbits than the ones we see around Edmonton.

Well, I don’t really think I have a terrible lot to say today.  There is something I want to address, up until recently I had a problem with two things that made my whole life very difficult.  One was that I had a very hard time getting up and getting going for things I had to do, and the other is that I never seemed to be able to stick to a schedule.  Lately I have gotten a lot better about these things (thankfully-I had a strong feeling that this would doom me to unemployment and even extremely poor health-imagine never being able to keep Doctor’s appointments and such).  One of my problems though was time management and it has been incredibly changed by me buying an iPhone.  I have a friend with one and he is constantly checking it for appointments and adding or removing things.  The iPhone makes things so easy, you just scroll through a few options, type in what you need to do and where and you can even set alerts for a day ahead or an hour ahead, and also a second alert.  I thought just having a phone was a huge difference in my life, but now I am feeling a lot more confident about being able to stay on track, take on different things.  I was never able to keep a  day timer before, but now I took the leap and it is kind of exciting.

So, as many of you may know, I try to keep to a kind of ‘life skills’ theme, focused on people who either have or treat or have family members with mental illness.  I think a lot of what I have to say applies to many types of people though.  What I wanted to address today is pets.  Pets can be so amazing for people, just the other day I met an incredible dog that changed my mind about dogs forever.  I also like cats a lot, but now I see how much fun a dog could be.  I have only had a few pets in my life, a couple of gerbils and a hamster, and it was amazing how much they changed me.  My first pet, a gerbil I named Leo was so much fun.  I would let him out of his cage and he would climb into my hand, run up my arm and either sit on my head if I lowered it, or he would shimmy down and go into my shirt pocket.  It was an amazing experience to have another creature to care for, and having him helped me through one of the most difficult times of my life.  I will never forget watching a documentary about a senior’s home where a cat they had in common among all the residents would actually know when a person was going to pass away and would go and just sit with them until they were gone.  Dozens of studies have proved that a pet lowers blood pressure and heart rate and other important health indicators.

I can’t remember if I had talked about him before in this blog, but I had a pet once who was pretty incredible.  His name was Lilleven, which was Danish for little friend and he was so loving to each of the five members of our family.  When he died I thought I would never have another pet.  I have had pets since him, but I still like to honor his memory by getting others to name their pets after him and to talk and write about him.  I won’t get too far into that here, I just want to stress that anyone who is dealing with a mental health issue should consider even something small like a gerbil or guinea pig, they can add new meaning to one’s life.  I remember a story I heard when I was a teenager about a woman who was in a serious state of depression and would have tried to kill herself but stopped because she realized that no one would take care of her cat if she were gone.  That is a pretty powerful reason to have a pet, it can actually save your life!

I will lay that topic to rest for now.  Today is my departed cousin’s birthday.  His name was Frank Hansen and he was a very kind and friendly man.  I don’t know for sure if I met him when we were kids and I was in Denmark, but we connected for a time on Facebook and I had made plans to one day go and visit him and his family.  His sons today posted to Facebook a picture of them laying flowers on his grave and it made me feel very sad.  It has been three years since he passed away and they are still having a hard time coping.  I totally understand what they are going through, some years back my mom passed away and not a day, not and hour goes by without me thinking of her.  Every time something good happens, every time I feel like I need to talk to someone who cares no matter what I think of my mom.  What I was told that my grieving process may never end, and that is fine with me.  Over time I have learned to cope with my feelings but I don’t get them out as much as I would like.  Shortly after my mom passed, my Psychiatrist told me with the utmost of compassion that losing your parents is something that happens to all of us.  In a way I thought my mom and I had a special relationship because we both had a mental illness and both knew the state of hopeless desperation, but in reality, a mom is a pretty special person to probably 998 out of a thousand people.  Nothing in the world is more important than being a mother, there would be no people if it weren’t for mothers and there would be a lot more carnage in this world if mothers didn’t teach their kids just about everything about life.  To get in a good word for Catholics, I should mention that Mary, mother of Jesus was the first Saint and is held high above all humans because she was holy enough to carry the son of God in her womb.

Anyhow, I hope people out there have been enjoying this blog.  As I always I welcome your comments, I want to thank the people who have been commenting, though I feel you are all being a little too kind!  🙂  As always, I want to stress that I am writing this blog in the hopes of helping people and reducing the stigma surrounding mental illness, so feel free to contact me any time at my person email, viking3082000@yahoo.com

This is Pyramid Lake, where my family goes each year around this time.  The small island is where we scattered my mother’s remains a few years ago. 

 

Peter Hemingway (Coronation)

 

It was hot today and I was waiting in the sun for another downtown run

I squinted in the bright sunlight admiring pigeon-angels taking flight

They soar in search of usable waste, then glide gracefully down to take a taste

If I had some fries I would share, these are such beautiful creations and I care

I wish I could feed the world and these scavenging birds but all I have is words

In my heart I feel such strong emotion, a feeling not unlike devotion

The animals and trees and grass and sky, they all give me some new kind of high

I wait just long enough then from far off I see my bus

I board the number five and marvel at how in the summer this city is alive

Rabbits, magpies, gulls geese and blue jays, oh God in heaven bless these warm days

The bus takes me along to where I see the river, our provider, our forgiver

A million green and glorious trees swaying gently in a cool north country breeze

But as the route continues all goes dead no more trees just financial towers instead

Soon though I pass downtown and once more trees grass and parks abound

I ring the bell to sound the call I am disembarking at the mall

As I leave the bus the perfume perfection of lilac trees surrounds and enraptures me

What a time in life to walk through a park then write poems until dark

I want to paint for you a picture all in words of these things I’ve seen and heard

How I walked to the swimming pool and dove into water deep, blue and cool

And then I sweated all my cares away in the hot tub to cap off the day

Now I feel as though I were newly born, just a little time left for TV and popcorn

Colder days haven’t escaped all thought, but hey-these summer days were bought

I also have so many awesome friends; cold weather doesn’t mean the fun must end

Edmonton is truly dear to me, here my heart soars like an eagle, strong and free

 

Leif Gregersen

June 8, 2015

Taking Things Day By Day

Today the Canadian Military Was On Exercise In  An Edmonton Park

One of the things about having a mental illness is that you often end up with a lot of time on your hands and very little to do with it all.  I can recall periods where literally for years I would do very little if anything that was at all meaningful.  At the time this can feel comforting, but I want to warn people that time can pass by quickly and with it a lot of opportunities.  One thing that I feel kind of strongly about is that a person who has Bipolar and is properly managing their condition, really should have a volunteer job or a regular job, even if just part-time to fill up their days.  This can make such a huge difference in life, starting with the extra few bucks it brings in to simply getting out and meeting people and interacting with them.  One of the reasons I feel so strongly about this is because there were periods in my life when for long stretches I stayed at home, watching TV, smoking cigarettes, and when you couple the isolation with depression, you get so bad off sometimes you actually want to be back in a hospital.

I can think back to many occasions when I thought I desperately needed someone or something to ‘fix’ me when in fact I was being non-compliant with meds or treatment suggestions.  I had a pretty good Doctor at one point and he had set things up so I could get into a group home and take some life skills classes, he had even set me up with a Psychologist, but perhaps partially out of fear and partially out of laziness, I didn’t take these opportunities and he made the decision that he would no longer see me.  This felt hurtful, and I was very bitter about this but I didn’t take the bitterness and try to make things better, I took it and decided to hurt myself because of it.  One of the main things I did was stop seeing any Psychiatrist, which didn’t seem to hurt at first, but over time my condition eroded to the point where I was very sick, very delusional.

These days, things are a lot different I like to think.  One of the big things of course is I have my writing, including this blog, to give me something to do, give me a bit of purpose and meaning in my life.  The other thing is that I have decided that the side effects of my medications are not bad enough that I will face getting sick again and go off them.  The third thing is that I am now in a group home where I get a little bit of structure and interaction with others.  There is also my Dad, who is getting on in years, but is still a great source of inspiration.  Now my days are filled with things to do and places to go.

The way that I know I need to keep myself active, see my Doctor and live in a group home is simply by how my dreams go for me.  I often have these vivid nightmares where I imagine I am in my teen years again but in the dream I come to the realization that I am 43 and have barely accomplished what a lot of 30 year old people have done.  This really scares me sometimes because though I know getting older can’t be helped, I have for some reason always feared wasting my life away.  Going back all the way to my elementary school and junior high days, I think of how much time I spent watching Television that was 95% a waste of time and not even exercising or reading or anything.  I could never tell what might have come about especially since my younger years were severely disrupted by my illness, but I know that if I had found a sport I could enjoy or read books of a higher level than comics, I would have been far ahead of those I grew up with, while now having not done those things nearly as much as I could, I haven’t even finished high school and likely never will.

It isn’t  a total loss of course, but a good example is my writing.  For years I wrote and didn’t know anything about getting books published.   For years I published books without knowing how to market them, and if I had worked a little harder and focused on what I wanted to do in a more realistic fashion at a more realistic age, I would have been so much further ahead.

I am hoping that these words can somehow shed some light on the importance of filling up your days, of trying to sit down and take a clear look at what you want to accomplish.  Setting goals is extremely important.  If one doesn’t set goals, you simply wander aimlessly until hopefully at some unspecified point you somehow, possibly get somewhere.  A goal makes you aim and fire and hit a target rather than just shooting blindly.  Set your goals, and work towards them.  And as time passes, re-evaluate your goals and check to see how you are doing with them.  It really can save your life.  All the best, dear readers!

Isolation and the Psychiatric Patient

Here is a nice picture of my dear old Dad, who is building me a bookshelf.  I could write volumes about what an incredible Dad he has been for me.

     Well, I felt a little bit inspired to talk a bit today about something that I certainly notice in myself.  It is a phenomena where I have social anxiety disorder (which is part of the reason why Prozac/Fluoxetine works well for me) especially after I have isolated myself for some time.  There are times of course when this can’t be avoided, like the other week when I was sick for a few days.  I seriously could tell I hadn’t had any decent human interaction in some time when I first started getting out of the house again.  Fortunately these days it isn’t as bad as it was when I was younger.  I have a very gripping memory of being 14 and being in the Psychiatric Ward of Edmonton’s General Hospital and every moment I could isolate myself I would.  I was afraid of the other patients, one time I started a conversation with an older man and he started drooling, something very common with psychiatric medications at the time and still to this day, which upset so greatly that I pleaded with my Dad to get me out of there, that I didn’t deserve to be there.  My Dad had a great deal of experience with mental illness at the time though, he had cared for my mom who had an illness for many years and he told me that these people were not to be feared or misunderstood.  Still, it was very difficult and I wouldn’t participate in groups or go to the hospital school, I would mostly sit in my room and read a History book that had nothing to do with any class I was taking (I recall it was a fascinating book though about the war in the desert during World War Two) and I would even hide when I heard the nurses coming around for their half hourly checks.

The end result of all that isolating was that when I went to Air Cadets on Thursday of one of those two weeks, I had to get up in front of everyone in my public speaking class and I was literally terrified.  I shook, I stammered, I messed up what I wanted to say, I thought about my acne which was quite bad at the time and I even had a great deal of trouble looking anyone in the eye.  Not long after this, after I returned to school and went about my normal activities, I actually ended up doing fairly well in that public speaking class and greatly enjoying it.  But the question remains:  how does one adjust from being in a hospital/institutional setting and get back to interacting with people in the outside world?

That is basically the question I wanted to answer in today’s blog.  I remember, though it has now been 15 plus years since I was hospitalized, that it is a big adjustment going into the hospital but it can be just as big an adjustment when you get out.  I met a man today who actually had been a Psychiatric Nurse on one of the wards I was on 25 years ago and he was telling me that often he would encourage people who were in there and in what they felt was a dire situation that everyone eventually does get discharged.  I personally have seen people on the inside who were very much gone, thinking only of their next cigarette and their next meal who are out walking around in public stabilized on medications and doing well.  It does take a great deal of support, but it is always possible.  With some of the more serious cases, and mine was very serious a number of times, there is need for frequent visits to nurses and doctors, possibly injections of medications to help with ease of taking medications and higher levels of compliance.  Not to mention something I don’t know much about in the US, but I do know here in Alberta is the situation where a person needs to receive some kind of financial benefits.  (In my case most of my benefits go directly to the group home I live in), but the thing to remember is that one day no matter how bad you think things have gotten, you will be back in a place you are comfortable with, with a degree of freedom you won’t have in the hospital and no one to answer to outside of your loved ones.

But how do you get to that point?  Inside the hospital it is a matter of accepting you need help and doing everything you can to find a Doctor who you can be honest with and one who will help adjust and change your medications to an optimal level.  Inside the hospital your medications will likely be higher than when you feel better and are discharged, but still it is possible to work with something you can handle.  It is important when you are in the hospital to work with the staff members to have as full a life as you can.  I can recall going bowling for free in Edmonton close to the hospital I was in, working at recycling parking meters part-time for a small amount of money and then there was events such as dances or therapy sessions which I would participate in, and if you are lucky, you will make a few friends.  At this point I think it is important to note that meeting a significant other or life partner or boyfriend or girlfriend is almost always a bad thing when you are in the hospital.  I can’t tell you why this is, but I can tell you that this is something I learned from experience and was also told by a number of staff members.  Perhaps it has to do with how people in a hospital setting can be very different people when they get home and they will be under a great deal of stress at this time.  I have had two such relationships and both were serious disasters.

So, when you get out probably one of the best things you can do is to start walking.  15 years ago when I got out of the mental institution after 5 months on the inside, my Dad was kind enough to come and pick me up and drive me to the park and we would walk different routes in any time of year through Edmonton’s beautiful river valley.  When I noticed my concentration and patience was returning, I started getting interested in reading Steinbeck and not long after I once again took up my old hobby of writing.  By sheer chance a friend handed me a stack of papers in a plastic bag one day and here was the manuscript that is now (available on this website to order) “Through The Withering Storm”.  Writing brought new meaning and purpose to my life, and from those small steps at first, I started turning back into a fully active, working and traveling and even writing person.  More on that tomorrow, I side-tracked a fair bit in this blog and I don’t want to put too much into just one post or I will run out of ideas and my readers will run out of patience.  As always, I am just an email away, viking3082000@yahoo.com

This is a photo of my good friend Dr.Gary Garrison, who has just released an incredible book that takes a look inside Canada’s Federal prison system called “Human on the Inside”