Medical Networking....Because Being Sick Is Not Enough

Starting over in a new city can be hard when it comes to friends, a routine, feeling like you have a home..... but the hardest way to start over is medically.

To be bluntly honest, The easiest way is going through the ER.  I have so many different conditions, that no single doctor is qualified to attend to all of my various health needs.  So rather than finding a doctor to refer me to the other doctors, checking insurance coverage, coordinating appointments for at least four different docs, usually months in advance, and having to get to and keep track of all of these appointments when I'm already weakened from pain.... the ER has them all available and in network, and they all come to my side when I need them.

I'm need another nerve block.
Fortunately/unfortunately I've done the ER routine in New York City a few years ago, so I still have my Crohn's doctor.  Unfortunately, however, he knows no one who performs nerve blocks and doesn't know anything about the condition my LA pain management doctor identified and was treating....

So here I am, proactive enough to know what I need and when....and here are all the steps it took to maybe possible have a lead:

1.  Called old doctor (if I didn't have him, I'd have to find a primary care to refer me to him, putting me here about two weeks later, if we were moving efficiently)
2. He knows an anesthesiologist.
3. Googled that doctors name.
4. Called the wrong medical practice and got another number that might work for him.
5. Called the right one and gave them insurance information.
6. They checked my benefits and called me back. We scheduled an appointment.
7. And so now I'll be seeing him, in hopes that he performs nerve blocks and if not can link me to someone who does.

He is also out of network, which for now is covered, but come January 1st, I won't be able to see him until I've payed the copay equivalent of $5,000 for his services to then be at least partially covered. Otherwise he'll own every I have.

Years.
Years of self research to know my body this well, but what's taken even longer is knowing how to work the system. Not work it even, just survive in it. I'd be dead if I hadn't. Homeless, in pain, unable to get the care I need, in debt, and eventually dying from lack of medication.

I am so thankful to be working through this when I'm at least somewhat stronger physically than I was even a few months ago.

I also have to call three different medical offices to get copies of records sent to these new doctors. You know, because having the conditions aren't bad enough....but I need to have other doctors to prove that I have them, otherwise I'll be treated as a junky and not given even a milligram of help or respect.

This is why it's easier waiting until my body starts ripping itself into pieces and going to the ER.
Somehow that is easier than this.

I really hope this doesn't start to consume my life again.....I just started feeling like a person.

Coping With PTSD

Sometimes our inner animal shows.
Obviously I'm more prey than predator. I'd definitely eat berries and grass and be very fast and gentle.

Other people are vicious, meaning deliberately cruel or violent. The kind that would play with their food before they killed it, enjoying their fear.

Someone gestured at me like they were going to strangle me. They weren't actually going to, they may not have even been physically capable of it, but they reminded me vaguely of my abuser and the violence is what put me past the point of control.

I traded places with someone else, or as the person phrased it "I ran away."
That is the eyes of a predator searching for their pray.

Some people going through this world tackling and conquering to get their ways; not realizing that kindness will take them as far if not rather, not to mention it feels better emotionally and physically as well.

But what irks me is when they see self preservation as fleeting. In animal terms, I was protecting myself from a creature that wanted to eat me.  And they saw it as feeing shamefully. They did not say this, but that is the connotation associated with running away.

Personally I hate when people view the world as theirs to control. Who stomp on everyone and consider those they hurt to be weak.
I do not know if this person had such a view, for I am triggered currently, causing the preciously associated the flavors of my trauma to mix with this reminiscent being.  Like how Earl Grey smells like fruit loops so it reminds you of their taste as well.

So here I am, in a dark corner shaking. Listening to music and hiding. Like I had to do for most of my adolescence if I wanted to escape and feel safe. Hidden. Protected by the object forest surrounding me.
I haven't been in danger for almost seven years now, and yet one angered gesture brings me back to this place.

It's like an emotional Tardis, bringing me right back to where I was so many moons ago.

Two years ago, I would've gone home. Today I'll be fine. I have learned the tricks to teach my brain that I am safe. I have a cup of water. An ice pack. Stones and music. I'm not near anyone else, because even a hand on my shoulder would make me jump.
I am grateful to be able to find a spot in this busy city where I'm not surrounded by hundreds of others.
I am writing. I am breathing.

I am terrified, though I know I am in no real danger. It's only my demons haunting me now.
I am safe.

This just needs to get out of my system, like the flu.
I just wish people understood mental health they way they do physical.
That said I will get through this. I'll count to ten like Kimmie Schmidt (who very notably also has PTSD) and eventually feel like me again.

I see where I am, I am aware of the stress, and I will not let it keep me here.

The Most Important Post I'll Write for Awhile

I feel alone in this city, which is ironic as this is the most received I’ve ever felt.  People here don’t compare my passions to their own, feeling as if me loving something unusual to them somehow threatens their own passions.  Instead they very easily accept that what matters to me….matters to me, and more than that, they’re happy someone’s loving it. 

For instance, although hermit crabs are more common as pets on the east coast, fewer people here question how I could love Spencer as much as I do.  

In turn, this also makes change less terrifying.   Last week, for example, I started drawing with our store's iPad Pro, and suddenly coworkers and strangers asked if I was a visual artist; quickly I realized I was the only one laughing at the idea of that being true.

I had changed myself overnight and it was accepted effortlessly.  Back in college, you couldn't change your hair color without worrying about how it would be seen.  So it's odd to me, how in an environment so willing to see you as anything you so choose, that I still feel unhappy.

Perhaps it signals the end of me discovering myself: I found what I wanted and that’s who I am. And if having those choices validated doesn’t satisfy my craving for more, then I’m already onto the next item on the agenda.

When I was a kid I knew the type of person I wanted to be, and it seems I’ve finally grown into the shoes.

So that just leaves walking somewhere.

When  I visited Philly in April, almost a year after being away, I started crying when one of my friends/mentors noted how much I had grown; as much as I wanted that to be true, it was hard to believe. 

Life is monotonous here.  Every day looks the same, feels the same, so it’s only logical to feel like you’re the same, too.

But consider a rock at the edge of the sea, longing to be pulled into the magnificent chaos.  Every waves makes a promise as they come towards it, and every wave breaks its heart when they leave it behind.  It’s tortured in the monotony, with each little splash teasing it with the salty taste of adventure. 

And yet.

Each wave that brushes against it helps it glisten in the sun, tugging away at its imperfections, subtly chiseling it towards is truest form, where it’ll only bear the weight of what defines it the most.  And eventually the day will come when the final wave convinces the rock to let go of the final burden rooting it, and the rock will be carried back with the wave, towards adventure it longs for no longer.

So that’s my final business here.  I have to let go of the final piece keeping me here, so that I can move on to greater things.

And I know what it is, too.

I met a dog in our store the other day, and when I kneeled to pet him, he climbed onto my knees, lifted his front legs and hugged  me.  His owner commented that he likes me and that he’s such a loving dog; and how shocking it is that when she found him, he had been stabbed.

The pup had been recently groomed and when he walked away I could see the scars from his wounds.  And yet if his owner hadn’t told me, I never would’ve known.  That dog was more loving and more forgiving than most people.

A few days ago I tried to find a book I hadn’t finished.  My room is still in the pandemonium of moving five times in a year and no longer owning a bookcase, and so I couldn’t find the book.  But I found another I hadn’t finished and I tossed it into my bag instead.  I take so long to read that I continued where I had left off rather than restarting the book.  The book as a whole takes common children’s stories and breaks down what the symbolism means in adult psycology.  This particular chapter was about “the mistaken zygote,” a.k.a. The Ugly Duckling a.k.a. the trauma we face when we are abused as children and have to grow up too fast in the face of not receiving the unconditional love and care that we need in our developmental years.

I also have been watching The West Wing, and there was an episode where a character works with a psychologist who diagnoses him with PTSD.  The worst the doctor says to him are such: “What we need to get you to do is be able to remember the [traumatic event] without reliving it, and you have been reliving it.”

The book, Women Who Run with the Wolves, phrases it incredibly as well: 

“There is another issue to be dealt with.  Mistaken Zygotes learn to be survivors.  It is touch to spend years among those who cannot help you flourish.  Being able to say one is a survivor is an accomplishment…And yet there comes a time in the individuation process where the threat or trauma has significantly past.  Then is the time to go onto the next stage of survivorship, to healing and thriving.”

Now I’d be too nervous to say the threat has past, but I met a customer who understood quite a lot of this and confidently told me  I didn’t need a restraining order.      I’ve been here for a year and was only stalked once.  It triggers me, I’m still coping with the trauma, but I am safe.  Definitely safer than I was then.

The book continues: “One can take so much pride in being a survivor that it becomes a hazard to further creative development.”  For me, I think it’s that I went so many years on my own, people not knowing how hard my life was, before and after the abuse, that saying I survived validated the struggle I still felt I needed to prove.  

But,  “at some point, allying with it exclusively begins to inhibit new development…Liken it to a tough little plant that managed — without water, sunlight, nutrients — to sen out a brave and ornery leave anyway.  In spite of it all.  But thriving means, now that the bad times are behind, to put ourselves into occasions of the lush, the nutritive, the light, and there to flourish.”

That’s greater than “making survivorship the centerpiece of one’s life.”

That dog did it.  He is a creature made entirely of love, and still he was betrayed and almost killed by those he had chosen.  Miraculously he survived, but he didn’t remain in his abused state, bowing his head to those he feared would hurt him again.  He forgave and trusted and let go of the burdens rooting him to the shore — and now is as happy as he could be.

That’s my next step.  I didn’t just accidentally bump into all of these themes in the span of a week.  They’re the waves that have chosen to come towards me, highlighting that which I’m gripping to tightly, which in turn is gripping tightly onto me.  They splash me with the importance and safety of letting it go.  Ultimately, I’d rather say I’m happy than say I’m a survivor.  So if I can change myself overnight, tomorrow I will wake up in the direction of health, moving  a step closer towards being a thriving individual.

Hitting the Road Again...

So I think I am cursed.

I thought the other day was a great day.  My new neighborhood is safer and because of that I can finally explore again.  There are great things in a ten minute walk in any direction.  I also love that I am basically neighbors with the studios that house my dream job; if I can see it from my window, them maybe I can actually end up there.  I’m also closer to work, my doctors, and my friends; which all equates to a healthier life.

So this was how I started my Tuesday.

And yet it ended by wondering if I am too broken of an individual to not cut everyone I touch with my jagged edges…  In under a day, my new roommate decided that I’m not worth getting to know and that she would rather break our lease than work together to create a peaceful living environment.

I hate having to acknowledge this, (as I don’t think it’s a constraint worthy of how this situation has unfolded,) but my PTSD was triggered by her that night, but like any physical injury, it just requires a little bit of time to heal.  For instance, if you twisted your ankle, you need to sit down for moment to let it rest, and then it’s better.

I just needed to sleep on it and then I knew I’d feel better the next morning.

Instead I woke up to a message that had escalated the situation beyond something that could be resolved.

I’m still trying to remedy the situation, like I have been doing constantly for the last four months….but my circumstances seem to only get more and more impossible.

And now I’m sitting here worrying that there’s something wrong with me for having yet another ailment that I didn’t choose, that’s now altering my chance at happiness.

So I am looking for another place to live, again….and in doing so I think I have burned the bridges that I have left and I don’t know where to turn for help.  I didn’t choose this.  I didn’t want this to happen.  I thought by hiding in my room I would be avoiding any chance of this happening.

I’ve lost so much since all of this started.  I’m tired of everything being this hard.  If I knew how to give up, I would.  

I’ve just faced so much physical and emotional pain.  I don’t know how to heal back into something that can be fixed.

A New Day...And I'm Feelin' Good

An Insight Into the Realm of PTSD

The 11th CC

Relaxation and Revelation