Thursday, July 22 - pre-menstrual pain so bad that I spent the last half of the last day of Cultural teacher training class sobbing. Friday and Saturday, I felt a little better, go figure. The cramps were moderate on those two days.
Sunday, July 25 to Wednesday, July 28 - spent four days in a hard wooden chair, because for some reason, my body was in too much pain being on the soft couch or bed. Lots of Tylenol 3 and Advil for the endometriosis pain, which stayed constantly at about a 7 on the scale. Heavy bleeding. Tried cannabis edibles which gave me long, unwanted mind trips and did very little for the pain.
Thursday, July 29 - Was about to head to my pain management appointment at UCSF when I checked the joint bank account and found it EMPTY, with several bills waiting to roll through. Panic ensued. Woke husband, who said he had no money to spare. Argument ensued as to how he thought he was supposed to take care of of me financially this summer for school and pay all my bills when obviously there was a giant error in calculation. More panic ensued. Immediate dangerous depression, as money issues are a huge trigger for me, emotionally.
Friday, July 30 - Slept 11 hours. Tired all day. Blamed post-menstrual body detox from spending a week on Tylenol 3. Also very depressed - dangerously depressed, due to the financial situation. Did not leave the house.
Saturday, July 31 - What can only be described as a psychotic break. Did not leave the house for my own protection. Spent the day alternating between crying, babbling, rearranging the house, and finding all the old cat piss that I hadn’t found previously - my male cat has been targeting my stuff to pee on since last November.
Sunday, August 1 - Continued “mixed episode” - bipolar with psychotic features. Did not leave the house. Cat resumed peeing on my stuff because I’d moved furniture around.
Monday, August 2 - Spent the day crying and trying to get homework done. Did not leave the house for my own protection.
Tuesday, August 3 - Did not leave the house. Did homework for much of the day. In the late evening, songs triggered memories of old friends, caused me sorrow and fully distracted me from getting further homework done.
Wednesday, August 4 - Forced myself out of the house - I went to an art store in Berkeley. After buying fresh coloured pencils for my homework, I was witness to a parking lot collision. This set off triggers of a near death accident in 1994, and when I got home, I sobbed for much of the rest of the day.
Thursday, August 5 - Went to local doctor for anxiety/depression. I got 1mg Ativan prescription and promised to see a psychologist. I did another thyroid blood draw, hoping something would come up to explain this terrifying depression. Did not leave the house for the rest of the day.
Friday, August 6 - Mid-cycle pain for much of the day. Game night that night with friends. Promised everyone I would not get drunk, and proceeded to get MOTHERFUCKING drunk. The night ended in puke and tears. Guilt over that drove me further into depression.
Saturday, August 7 - Spent the day hungover, in an Ativan haze, and sobbing for part of the day. Decided to pick my personality apart and kick out the Bad Ztepf. Found out B’s dad had also spent the night puking, and was in the hospital with complications due to a bad virus and his diabetes throwing his blood sugar up near 500. Spent the day waiting for each next call from dad’s wife.
Sunday, August 8 - Visited B’s dad in the hospital. Ate fast food and watched TV with B. I fell asleep on the couch, then woke up after midnight with a real, actual hot flash. I tore off my blanket, socks and hoodie and ran around on the cool bare wood floor for a few minutes, then dove into the cool sheets of the bed and fell back to sleep.
Monday, August 9 - Was awakened before 9am from a company called Magellan, who told me I cannot see the psychologist my local doctor wants me to see, because he’s not in-network. I said he’s listed on the Aetna website. Magellan had to explain to me that my husband’s company has Aetna for health care, and Magellan for mental health care. I replied that I have access to all the mental health stuff on the Aetna website, which is confusing. I expressed distrust for these Magellan people. They told me not only could I not see the dude I was referred to, but the UCSF pain management psychologist I’ve seen twice and have paid co-payments to is ALSO not on the Magellan network, and so I OWE money to Magellan and/or UCSF.
This was first thing in the morning. This was hitting my financial panic trigger. I broke down in tears immediately and spent the rest of the morning curled up on the floor at the end of the bed, sobbing and becoming suicidal.
B was working from home that day, and did not want to leave me alone, so gently insisted that I come with him to visit B’s dad in the hospital again. We went around 1pm I think.
After that, I sobbed for most of the day - part of it was worry for B’s dad, most of it was continued WTF IS WRONG WITH MY BRAIN crying. Took a total of 3mg Ativan. Suicidal ideation turned into mania and I moved more furniture and stuff around in the house. Then I started updating my will, which didn’t last long and turned into making a list to give everything away so I could run away and start over, which turned to kicking out Bad Ztepf and crying over her departure. Wow, what a headspace….
And today…
Tuesday, August 10 - I woke to find that my male cat had once again shown his displeasure with me moving HIS stuff around in HIS house. He scooted his poopy butt all over the computer room floor, leaving two shit kibbles on the floor, and then he’d hopped up on top of my desk and left a big shit kibble on my desk.
Despite my goddamned cat, I was feeling a little better - I had gotten up early to go to the psychologist appointment that Magellan did not want me to go to, but that B insisted I go to. The dude called last minute and said he’d double-booked, could I show up at 3pm instead? Sure. I needed to clean up after the damned cat, anyway.
I was just about to leave the house to run some errands, when Magellan called again.
Magellan told me again not to see this psychologist, that he’s not covered, that I will owe money, etc and so forth. They also said they checked, and for sure I owe money to them and to UCSF for daring having seen a pain management psychologist such as is listed on the Aetna website.
I yelled obscenities and broke down in tears immediately. I told them to where to go, how to go there, and said all sorts of things. I told them they were ruining my life. The woman reacted by threatening to send a squad car over and lock me up on 5150. I told her my husband was home and taking care of me, and that yesterday he’d lodged a complaint against Magellan.
I dictated to this woman that Magellan, the company B works for, and Aetna needs to get their collective asses together and communicate effectively to their employees and patients, because this is UNACCEPTABLE.
I spent the rest of the morning sobbing uncontrollably.
I went to the banned psychologist at 3pm - I went on my own despite B offering to go with me. I wanted to assert some form of independence and stability in all of this. I made it to the appointment on time, met the guy, and …
Turns out he’s a spaz, and drops the F-bomb a lot, and swears in general (mental patient swearing okay, mental health professional swearing - NOT OKAY - just so we’re clear). At several points he got the gist of my mental state WRONG. At one point he tried summing up the mess I’ve gotten my brain into, and said, and I quote, “WOW, YOU’RE FUCKED!”
And lastly, while I was encouraged to talk about my family and was describing my relationship with my parents and sibling, the shrink interrupted out of the blue to panic about how he will be paid for this session, since he’s not in-network, and wow, with all these triggers and emotional fucked-upness, I will likely be REALLY mad at HIM and will hold shit against HIM, THE SHRINK, if he charges me the full amount, but he HAS to be paid you see….etc etc.
I broke down in tears to explain to him that I thought he was on my side, he was referred by someone I trust and like - that being my local doctor. And therefore I trust HIM and therefore I won’t be upset with HIM and I KNOW he has to be paid. I promised him my husband would call him tomorrow and suss out the payment. I left confused, because the shrink had said repeatedly before the appointment not to worry about payment on the first visit, that he could bill me, and we’d work out out with the insurance company.
I got home, cried a bit more, told my husband all the gory details about this shrink, and we agreed HE’S fucked in the head, and that I won’t be seeing him again. But now guess what, we owe $130 for that visit, which we have to file a form with Magellan for, to hopefully be reimbursed at 70%. So, more money woes.
My husband went off to band practice tonight, which was BAD (i’ll let him tell you about it), and when he got home, his dad’s wife called to say that Kaiser caused his father to have a heart attack by giving him potassium in his IV, and now his heart is damaged, and they don’t know how badly.
I had just stressed on Sunday over them fucking up his heart, because they wanted to give him a CT scan with contrast (dye), which carries serious risk to damaging the heart in sick and at risk patients. It wasn’t the CT scan that did it, though. They were giving him his dialysis and decided he should for some reason have potassium added in, when he wasn’t supposed to.
KAISER ALMOST KILLED MY FATHER-IN-LAW.
Thankfully his wife has been keeping copious notes, and will be filing a complaint, if not a lawsuit.
Motherfuckers.
In closing, I’d like to say I have only had 1mg Ativan today. I’m taking one more right now before I go to bed.
My husband is worse for the wear, now. He’s been hitting the bottle(s). I am letting him. He’s also taking a mental health day from work tomorrow, or at the very least, working from home again.
I pray to [insert deity here] that I am emotionally stable tomorrow. I haven’t done homework in what, four days? And my husband is the one who needs me to be emotionally sound, right now.