Torture scenes in public

Our society has lost its moral direction. This can be seen in many different ways. But here's one small thing that happened to me recently, that made me think about moral direction, right and wrong, and society as a whole.

I went into an electronics store the other day.  I won't name the store's name, but it was a chain store. They sell cell phones, radios, and TVs.  They had their TVs playing a movie.  I was looking around, and so, of course, I look at the TV.  The movie is in the middle of a torture scene, involving someone's private parts....

I look away, go somewhere else in the store, and don't look back.  I don't watch movies with scenes like that at home, and I certainly don't want to there.

What if a kid was in that store?

I can handle it, but I shouldn't have to.  Sure, I'm more sensitive than most... But it's just so disappointing that they thought it would be OK to play that movie.

It's not OK.

Maybe this example isn't about morality. Maybe it is just about insensitivity, thoughtlessness, immaturity...

But looking back over the past 50 years, and talking to people older than myself, it's clear that times were different. It wasn't always this way.  I'm not suggesting we should go back to when the word "pregnant" wasn't supposed to be said, or when two people couldn't be in the same bed on TV.... but torture scenes playing on TVs in public stores?  It seems that we need some boundaries.

Toxic Mom

I don't get along with my Mother.  She is a controlling, judgmental, narcissistic person. 

I don't know that I even love her. Yet, for some reason, I've been still wanting her approval.  I've been working on the relationship, wanting it to get better. 

Well, no more of wanting approval from her. I'm trying to get over that.

She changed our relationship yet again last week.

She doesn't like my husband, and wants me to break up with him.  I already knew this, but last week she brought up the topic in an email. Her email was manipulative, and while trying to pull on my heart-strings, she says lies about my husband.

I long ago stopped mentioning my husband's name to her at all, which of course means not telling her lots of stuff, but that's fine.  I can live with a superficial relationship.

However, I can't live with opening up emails that put me into an emotional turmoil and cause my day to be filled with anxiety. 

I don't know why her words have such a strong effect on me. They are untrue, but yet it causes my bipolar to flare. My ability to be stable me, to have good concentration, and smooth emotions, goes downhill.  My whole body gets riddled with stress.

Well, I just can't be riddled with stress all of the time.  So now I am filtering her emails, which means that I don't read them.  Do I delete them? I probably should - I deleted the last one without reading it - but I'm a bit of a wimp. 

There is a long history here. In the past she has not liked other things about me and also written me long horrific emails.  I didn't talk to her for a long time, and stupidly I promised her that I wouldn't not talk to her again. Because of course it hurt her so much, and it is supposedly my fault for everything.

I might have to reneg on my promise.. She breaks her promises all of the time. Of course that doesn't mean that I want to also break mine. But I need my sanity. 


P.S.  If I referred to my Mom in a positive light before this, it might have been in reference to my Mother-in-law. I have adopted her as my Mom because she is one of the nicest people in the world.  She says all of the kind words to me that my biological Mom doesn't say. I am thankful for her.

Sundown..... Symptoms increase around sunset...

I (almost) always feel strange between 4pm-8pm.....

Right now it is 6:30 and the strangeness has set in.  It's not too bad today.

Mostly this strangeness is an increase in my symptoms.  Often it is a depressed feeling, but today it seems to be a glowiness.  Sometimes it presents itself as anxiety.  It's not always the same feeling, but it's always a wrong feeling.  Many of the days, recently, I have a sadness during this time period, that's not here during the rest of the day/night.

Once the sun has set, I usually go back to feeling fine.. I haven't figured out what the reason is behind this.  I thought it might be the change in light, but even on overcast days I seem to have a peak in symptoms during this time.  I thought it might be blood sugar changes, but even when I eat early, I still get the symptoms.

So mostly I just write this incase this experience is more common that I've found online (my searching hasn't found anything much).

Mostly I treat this evening mood disturbance how I try to treat any other mood change.  If I can, I keep doing what I normally do, and just tell myself that I'm experiencing bipolar symptoms.  If I need to, I do one of the things that tends to calm me - take a nap, listen to music, take a walk, etc.   If I can sleep, that's just about the best solution, but I'm not always tired - just symptomatic!

Thinking back on my life, I've had changes associated with this time of day for a long time.  Perhaps many people do experience a change during the early evening time, and all that I'm experiencing is an exaggeration of the change that everyone else gets. Of course, being tired in the early evening is normal.  Coffee with dinner is popular.  Energy drinks are just about made for this time of day.  (Not for me, though. I can't tolerate too much caffeine.)

P.S.  I am familiar with the term sundowning. It refers to symptoms in people with Alzheimer's disease or dementia.  They often have an increase in confusion and other Alzheimer's symptoms. I haven't heard of it associated with any other form of mental illness.

Virus HERV-W could be the cause of Schizophrenia, Bipolar Disorder, and MS...

I just finished reading an article entitled The Insanity Virus by Douglas Fox (Discover Magazine, June 2010) about the connection between a virus and mental illness.  The virus HERV-W is a retrovirus that could trigger diseases like schizophrenia, bipolar disorder, and MS.  The virus lives in a person's DNA and the proposal is that if a person has a weakened immune system shortly after birth, this virus isn't contained well.  Subsequent infections later in life cause the HERV-W to unleash itself and do damage....

Apparently, it is thought that infection by toxoplasmosis or influenza, can wake up the HERV-W virus.  Moreso, basically anything that causes inflammation - like an infection, cigarette smoke, pollutants in drinking water - can cause retroviruses to be awakened...

Beyond the science of the article (which is quite intriguing!), I'm interested in the practical implications of what this could mean, and one statement from this article about schizophrenia says: "It explains why the disease waxes and wanes like a chronic infection.  And it could explain why some schizophrenics suffer their first psychosis after a mysterious, monolike illness."

Current reasoning for the waxing and waning of mental illness has to do with things like: changes in levels of stress, changes in medication, ability to cope, lifelong progression of the illness, etc.  What if it also has to do with the immune system?

I, personally, often feel that my mood is effected by physical sickness. I started taking zinc to treat a cold and then found that it helps my depression.

If a person is under more stress, they are more likely to get physically sick, as well as have increased psychiatric symptoms.

Should treating our immune system be part of treating bipolar disorder?  The article has this solution:  Faith Dickerson at Sheppard Pratt Health System, "is running a clinical trial to examine whether adding an anti-infective agent called artemisinin to the drugs that patients are already taking can lessen the symptoms of schizophrenia. The drug would hit HERV-W indirectly by tamping down the infections that awaken it."

Lithium Flatness (loss of creativity, not liking lithium)

A lot of people seem to not like being on lithium (or some other mood stabilizer).  They say that it ruins their creativity, makes them feel flat or emotionless.


I don't have this problem.  And I propose that there are two reasons for this, which need to work together -

1. Take the lowest dose of lithium or other mood stabilizer that is effective.

2. Make lifestyle changes.

If you think of mania or hypomania as being similar to alcoholism, except that the addiction is to "excessive involvement in pleasurable activities that have a high potential for painful consequences," whether it be sex or shopping or drugs or whatever your activity of choice is - then you can see how taking a mood stabilizer alone isn't the whole solution.

You have to change your lifestyle.  That is, your activities. If you are an alcoholic and love going to the bar but then start taking a medicine that makes you not able to drink, then you're not going to like that medicine because when you go to the bar you won't experience the same enjoyment as you used to.  The key of course, is to stop going to the bar.

I propose that you can have creativity and lots of emotions and be taking a mood stabilizer, IF you refocus your life on activities that aren't excessive and that don't have painful consequences.

If you can successfully change your lifestyle, then you may even be able to reduce the mood stabilizer.  Ideally, you want to be taking the mood stabilizer at the lowest amount so that you can still feel a wide dynamic of emotions.

Changing your lifestyle is not easy, and could involve major changes like changing a romantic relationship, changing your friends, changing where you live, changing careers, etc.  This is all stressful stuff that by itself could cause your moods to become worse, which is why you might need to see a therapist and a psychiatrist regularly so you can keep your meds adjusted as you go through these changes.

Also, some of your experiences might be rooted in not just brain chemicals gone awry, but they might be the result of environmental problems like trauma, lack of self confidence, difficult relationships, etc. Things that need to be worked through over time, perhaps in therapy.

So the mood stabilizer is just one part of the equation.  It's a big part, but if you aren't committed to making changes, then the mood stabilizer alone might not work.  The good news is that usually a mood stabilizer changes your thoughts enough that it makes it easier for you to slow down and do some self-examining to see what you want your life to look like.  You just have to embrace the opportunity to ask yourself big questions.

I'll leave it to you to come up with the questions that need to be asked.

--

Footnotes:

1. I'm not a doctor, but from personal experience, I would suggest that you might need a higher dose of lithium or mood stabilizer at first, but that after you have made lifestyle changes and/or sought other treatment like therapy, then the mood stabilizer might be adjusted downward.  However, you have to always be watchful of a dangerous hypomania/mania episode coming on... Best to catch these episodes by watching your THOUGHTS and catching them before your actions take a turn for the worse.

2. Omitted from above, is this:

Going to the bar doesn't have painful consequences for everyone, but it does for alcoholics.

Similarly, whatever activity you became addicted to while hypomanic, you should try to avoid.

This statement might be a bit radical, but avoiding something at first might be a good idea. For example, don't go to the mall if you have trouble with spending too much money.

Hypomania and Jumping

My Dad built a deck onto my house, and for awhile, he had the steps all done, but not the railing.  One afternoon, after coming home from high school, I decided that a fun activity would be to see how far I could jump. I started on a lower step and worked my way to almost the very top of the deck.  I jumped until I got a little bit scared....

I was probably manic or hypomanic, as I suspect I was a lot during my teenage years. Looking back on it, mania explains a lot of my decisions...  Check out the following criteria for hypomania. I would say this jumping activity falls straight into #7.

Criteria for Hypomanic Episode  (from the DSM-IV TR)

A. A distinct period of persistently elevated, expansive, or irritable mood, lasting throughout at least 4 days, that is clearly different from the usual nondepressed mood.

B. During the period of mood disturbance, three (or more) of the following symptoms have persisted (four if the mood is only irritable) and have been present to a significant degree:

   1. inflated self-esteem or grandiosity
   2. decreased need for sleep (e.g., feels rested after only 3 hours of sleep)
   3. more talkative than usual or pressure to keep talking
   4. flight of ideas, or subjective experience that thoughts are racing
   5. distractibility (i.e., attention too easily drawn to unimportant or irrelevant external stimuli)
   6. increase in goal-directed activity (either socially, at work or school, or sexually) or psychomotor agitation
   7. excessive involvement in pleasurable activities that have a high potential for painful consequences (e.g., engaging in unrestrained buying sprees, sexual indiscretions, or foolish business investments)

C. The episode is associated with an unequivocal change in functioning that is uncharacteristic of the person when not symptomatic.

D. The disturbance in mood and the change in functioning are observable by others.

E. The episode is not severe enough to cause marked impairment in social or occupational functioning, or to necessitate hospitalization, and there are no psychotic features.

F. The symptoms are not due to the direct physiological effects of a substance (e.g., a drug of abuse, a medication, or other treatment) or a general medical condition (e.g., hyperthyroidism).

Giving up too easily?

Most often, the difference between success and no success, seems to be persistence.  Sure, chance plays a part, as does a slew of other things that you don't have much control over, but persistence is something you actually do have control over.

While playing chess a couple of weeks ago, I realized that I often give up too early in the game.  When I do play the game out, a disadvantageous situation often turns around, and some of the time I still win.  But, when the going gets tough, I was giving up too easily.  The most often excuse I gave myself is that I felt tired. But was I really tired of playing, or, was I just doubting myself?  Why do I quit when the going gets tough?

Translating chess psychology and strategy into real life is something I like to do, and so I thought about what I've given up on in the past, and the reason why.

About twelve years ago, back in high school, I gave up programming. Before I gave it up, I really liked it. I had a book that I was following, and I just got to one point and I got stuck. I couldn't go further.  So instead of seeking out a solution, I quit.  Today I can think of many solutions. Get a different book. Find a teacher or mentor. Try a different programming language. It could have just been a mistake in the book, or a gap in my knowledge. 

So now I am back, programming.  A little bit. I find it enjoyable once again.  I'd love to make a million dollars from something I program some day, but for now, I'm just picking up the path where I left it... Except for now I have twelve more years of maturity, wisdom, and confidence under my belt. It might just make the difference.  Plus, perhaps even more important: my moods are controlled. I'm no longer living in a prolonged stretch of irrational hypomania in a stressed out environment.

What have you quit, and why?  Is it time to revisit?

Seagull Takeoff Near Cannon Beach, Oregon

Picture taken by me :)