Puzzle photo

You asked!

Doesn’t she look a little like the Flying Nun with those ears?

Casualty

I’ve been meaning to post this photo for a while.  When Puzzle and I were finally reunited after my trip, she was so overjoyed to see me that first she licked my face a kazillion times, and then, quite without warning, she swatted my face with her paw.  She has sharp nails, as you can see.

Have a nice day!

QB revisited

I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about QB lately, wanting to write about him and how the situation I was in with him related to my issues with mental illness.

QB

June 27, 2006
“Daddy, doggie, doggie!” A young child pointed to QB and ran toward us. Closer, closer. Panic. So close I could see a drop of saliva on her pointing finger.

“No!” I tightened my grip on QB’s leash. He lunged forward. I held on tight. It often surprised me just how much power a 28-pound Sheltie could have. I held out my hand to stop the little girl. Dear God, don’t let her get any closer. “This dog isn’t friendly. Please–” my hands shook uncontrollably– “don’t come near. Please.” I turned to the child’s father, whose hands were clasped in front of him as if he were offering condolences. I took a step back. “My dog isn’t used to kids.”

“But he looks like Lassie!” shouted the child. “Lassie!”

QB leapt up a foot into the air on his little Sheltie legs and came down, then leapt up again and again. His puppy kindergarten teacher had told me, quite some time ago, that his extensive jumping would injure his knees, which, considering his age, was the least of my worries. This jumping was one peculiarity that got me suspecting he had something wrong in his brain. My neighbors called QB “Jumping Jack,” or, “Jumping Fool,” and several had said to me, “I’ll bet you wouldn’t have gotten him, if you’d known he was a jumper, all hyper, the way he is.”

The child shouted again, “Lassie!”

“Is he a show dog? Why does he do that?” asked the father. Show dog. Holy shit. QB would tear the show apart.

The father–he lived nearby, I realized, and was named Livingston–moved his daughter away.

Four teenagers, two boys and two girls, passed on the opposite side of the street, one girl talking on a cell phone. QB barked and jumped.

“Hey, there’s that dog again,” said one girl, blowing out billows of smoke from her cigarette. “He jumps. Look.”

“You’re a bitch, Shelley,” said one of the boys. “C’mon.”

I said to Livingston, “I–I have to go. He has to pee.” I ushered QB along the sidewalk.

Many of the tricks I’d tried to improve QB’s behavior hadn’t worked. I had tried different kinds of collars and harnesses, bringing a spray bottle of water along with me on walks, using a sound device, and making him sit during walks. Yelling at him certainly did no good. Sometimes I grabbed him by the scruff of the neck and forced him to look me at me, and all I saw in his eyes was hostility and defiance.

We rounded a corner. At the end of the block several girls were playing with a basketball. Immediately, QB strained on the leash, snarling and barking in the direction of the girls, foaming at the mouth. I rushed him across the street. I knew he hated basketballs, for some reason. He hated balls of all sorts–baseballs, balloons, pumpkins, inflatable balls–these and many other stimuli would send him into curdles of aggression.

Coming back into my building, I said a quick “hello” to those of my neighbors that we saw in the lobby.

“How is it out there?” asked my neighbor June.

I held QB tightly to make sure he didn’t jump on her. “Nice, “ I replied. “Pleasant.”

“It’s okay if he jumps on me.”

“He’s got awfully muddy paws.” QB leapt up again.

June chuckled. “Look at that fool!”

“Yes, he’s a fool all right.” Luckily, no one else accompanied QB and me in the elevator on our way up to the fifth floor, but when the door opened, my neighbor Nicky entered. QB immediately pounced on him. “No!” I pulled QB back. “Sorry,” I said to Nicky. “I didn’t see you there.”

“That’s okay. It’s okay. Really. I don’t mind.” I could tell he was fibbing.

QB was as relieved as I was to be home. As I refilled his water dish, thoughts ran through my mind: Was I a bad dog owner? What had I done wrong? The Beings had been threatening since QB was a tiny puppy to take him away from me, was this their way of carrying out that threat? And–what was wrong with QB? Was he mentally ill? Some of his behaviors were normal results of poor training, but others….My dog was becoming a source of deep concern to me–and embarrassment.

And then I thought of my mother. Had she felt similarly when I became ill? Did she question her parenting? Was she embarrassed by me? Once, I overheard her say to my father–and yes, I knew she was talking about me–“Alan, she gives me the creeps.”

On my table, the Yellow Pages were open to the page I wanted. I knew I could no longer put it off. I picked up the phone, and called the veterinary behavior specialty center recommended by QB’s vet, and made an appointment.

Thorazine, Part 2

Thorazine 2

 

Thorazine has been a more faithful friend to me over the past 25 years than most humans have been.  Thorazine has never lied to me or used me, or stolen from me or abused me or deceived me.  Thorazine does not say bad things about me behind my back or borrow things from me without returning them.  What Thorazine does do is rather remarkable and no human friend can match its abilities.  My first dose had me convinced, because the drug silenced the roaring in my head.

And because of this sudden silence, I was able to speak again, and hear my own voice, and respond to others without a huge chaos of echoes in my head.  It was like being brought up from a deep well, having been drowning in it for so long, in a very narrow, soggy place, now out in the open, free, and able to move about–and speak!  I could ask for what I needed: a toothbrush, a pen, a spoon.

It is odd that I needed silence to speak, thereby producing noise, almost as odd as the expression my ADHD mother uses, “It’s so loud in here, I can’t hear myself think!”

Abilify Pioneer

I went to see Dr. P Friday, and we decided that I would increase my Abilify from 30 mgs every morning to 40 mgs.  I don’t know anyone who takes over 30 mgs, so I am an Abilify pioneer.

So far, I am experiencing one of the side effects that I experienced when I first started Abilify two years ago: agitation.  It’s not too bad because I’m aware that Abilify can do that to a person.  It’s like I want to tear my hair out but I’m aware that I want to tear my hair out, so I can laugh at myself.  Maybe I should buy a wig so that I can tear the hair out of the wig and my real hair won’t be damaged.

So lotsa little things are getting on my nerves: the whimpering puppy, the toilet overflowing, misplaced bills.  I ended up taking Thorazine to calm myself down yesterday, which is kind of defeating the purpose.  The increase in Abilify is supposed to help me reduce the amount of Thorazine I need and thereby reduce sleepiness–get it?  Today I split a Thorazine tablet in half and took it.  And in the end, the puppy fell asleep, the toilet got fixed, and, most unfortunately, I found the bill.

Shower, or tub bath? Paper or plastic?

Julie Greene

2/17/2007         THIS TAKES PLACE ON MY BIRTHDAY 1983

 

Morning.  Looking around, looking around at the white bed, white walls, the curtain between the beds, and bedside table.  A rubbery smell.  Tip-tap of people hurrying past in the hallway.  Then: stomp, stomp, stomp, stomp.  Heide.  Shit.  I rolled over and hid my face in my pillow.

“I expect you to take a shower today,” she said.  “You have your menses.” She tap-tapped over to the nurses’ station and barked, “Where are my charts?  Vickie, where are the charts?”

I had, indeed, started my period the afternoon before, but I hadn’t told anyone.  How could I?  I still hadn’t recovered the ability to speak.  I had a small supply of tampons in my pocketbook that wouldn’t have lasted long.  Yet in the evening someone had strategically slipped a package of obstetrical pads in my bathroom.

Sitting up, I was overwhelmed by dizziness.  I had heard through Carole months ago that some medications can cause dizziness upon sitting or standing, and that this was called postural hypotension.  I lay back down, and tried again.  No way.  Too dizzy.

Heide appeared in the doorway again, followed by her henchwomen, Vickie and Pat, both LPN’s.   The three of them drew closer.  “Shower, or tub bath, which will it be, Julie?”

Shower.  Tub bath.  Tub bath.  Shower.  No.  I shook my head. They towered over me.  My breath quickened. 

“Which will it be?”

I rocked forward and held my knees close for protection.

“Well, then, it has been decided.  Run the tub, Vickie.”  Both Pat and Vickie scampered off. 

“Now, Julie, we’re going to have a little talk.  And I get to do all the talking.  Have you heard the expression, ‘The silent waters are the deepest’?”  I shook my head.  “Well, you’d better start thinking about it.”  Heide stared at me.  Creases under her green-hazel eyes had filled with turquoise eye shadow; in fact she was heavily made-up around the eyes.  Perhaps she’d been freckled as a child and those freckles had faded.  I guessed her age at 45; I was nearly correct, it turned out.

I’d been on the unit for several days, and had quickly learned to listen for Heide’s stomping footsteps entering the unit every morning promptly at 7:30 for Report, and then at 8:00 when she came out of Report.  Heide wore square heels and walked in such a way as to have quite an effect on the listener; I knew this because other patients mentioned to me that they, too, listened for Heide’s footsteps heading for Report in the morning.  (Report, I learned, was what the nurses called the exchange of information during the half-hour overlap of shifts, during which they would discuss the patients and the goings-on of the unit in general.  If the microwave oven had caught fire, surely the incident would have been included in Report.)

“Have you had a shower or bath in the past week?”  Heide asked.  I hadn’t.  “In the past two, three weeks?”  Again, I shook my head.  “Why?”  I backed away from her.  “Why?  Neglecting personal hygiene–why?”

Frequently, hygiene is lacking among people with mental illnesses.  One year, I didn’t bathe for five months.  (I’ve since overcompensated for it.)  In fact, everyone I’ve spoken to who has had a mental illness has gone through periods where some aspect or many aspects of grooming and cleanliness have been ignored.  Sometimes, the neglect of a particular aspect of hygiene can become an obsession. 

The bath was ready, but I did not intend to use it.

“Go on.”

I didn’t budge.

“Go on.  We’ll be waiting right outside.”

            I refused.

            “Ms. Greene, proceed to the bath!  Now!”  After a minute, Heide said, “Okay, girls, I’m not wasting my time waiting for this patient.  Let’s get her into the tub.”

            Pat was a heavy woman, but Vickie was twice as big, and strong, too.  With one of them on each side there was little I could do, though I struggled at first.  Their arms locked into mine, they dragged me from the bed, white sheets trailing behind us, while I dug my bare heels into the floor, though doing so did little to stop the progression toward the bath.  I screamed.  Of course I screamed.  I screamed for all the children in the world that had ever been forced into the bath; I screamed for all the patients that had ever been forced to do anything against their will; I screamed for my fellow Jew, whose kipah fell off his head as he was escaping the Nazis, yet he turned to pick it up–he was shot dead–I screamed for myself, for my future, which would unlock and reveal time after time the act of force, the act of entrapment, the act of belittlement, the act of shaming–in the name of saving my life–I screamed, as Pat and Vickie, under orders from Heide, ripped my bedclothes off of me, stripped me completely, pushed me into the tub, and with white hospital washcloths, washed me, while my menstrual blood flowed into the bath and mixed with the splashing bathwater and tears and mucus and spittle, bodily fluids all splashing together, swirling in this great sea of force, they washed me, and I wept.

Rant

2/17/2007

 

THE TRADE-OFF (A RANT)

 

Like hell I’m supposed to just accept it.  Take your meds and you will feel better.  Take your meds and you will be so doped up that you won’t be able to think straight and you won’t be able to write at all, you’ll nod off in workshops, you’ll yawn your way through advising group meetings no matter how much sleep you got the night before, and for godsakes how am I supposed to stay awake at my advisor’s reading tonight?  I mean, folks, this is really important–my advisor is my advisor and it seems imperative that I familiarize myself with her work–shit, man, she’d better be the first reader or I’m gonna flip–readers, you’re not going to believe this:

 

I will have three weeks to read three books and write papers on them, start a draft of a 17 to 20 page critical paper, and come up with 15-20 pages of prose.

 

And I’m supposed to do all that on HOW MANY MILLIGRAMS OF THORAZINE???

 

It’s a trade-off, not a very nice one, I must say.  The alternative isn’t pretty.  Having Evil Beings shouting at me all the time while I’m trying to write is far worse, but try to convince me of this while I’m typing up a “process letter” to Paisley (my advisor) full of excuses as to why I didn’t get my work done, that I was too sleepy, the meds dope me up too much, stifle my creativity, make me stupid, take all the passion out of life…

 

WELL, GODDAMMIT, THEY DO!!!!

 

Segue to Dr. P’s office.  I see Goldie on the 22^nd, Dr. P on the 23^rd.  Goldie may actually be a pleasure because I might be able to bring Puzzle.  I see Goldie at 4:30.  Then Dr. P the next day. 

 

“Well.”  I can see her now.  She plucks her pen out of her appointment book and nibbles on the end of it.  “I guess we found out it wasn’t such a good idea to cut down on those PRN’s, huh.”

 

(PRN stands for something in Latin which means “as needed.”  I take extra Thorazine if I need it, whether spell-check accepts the word or not.)

 

I can see Dr. P tapping her pen on the notes she’s writing.  She takes lots of notes.  “Well.  I don’t know what we can do.  It’s a trade-off.”

 

At this point, I hurl her computer monitor out the window.

 

 

Here’s part of an assignment I’ve been working on

This may become part of my thesis.  On the other hand, maybe I’ll scrap it.

2/17/2007

 

We had an assignment.  Each of us was given a photograph to write about.  Mine was of a child blowing out a birthday cake with one candle on it.  I thought of my 25^th birthday, which I spent in the hospital.  Here’s another scene, possibly for my thesis:

 

TUB SCENE

 

Morning.  Looking around, looking around at the white bed, white walls, the curtain between the beds, and bedside table.  A rubbery smell.  Tip-tap of people hurrying past in the hallway.  Then: stomp, stomp, stomp, stomp.  Heide.  Shit.  I rolled over and hid my face in my pillow.

 

“I expect you to take a shower today,” she said.  “You have your menses.” She tap-tapped over to the nurses’ station and barked, “Where are my charts?  Vickie, where are the charts?”

 

I had, indeed, started my period the afternoon before, but I hadn’t told anyone.  How could I?  I still hadn’t recovered the ability to speak.  I had a small supply of tampons in my pocketbook that wouldn’t have lasted long.  Yet in the evening someone had strategically slipped a package of obstetrical pads in my bathroom.

 

Sitting up, I was overwhelmed by dizziness.  I had heard through Carole months ago that some medications can cause dizziness upon sitting or standing, and that this was called postural hypotension.  I lay back down, and tried again.  No way.  Too dizzy.

 

Heide appeared in the doorway again, followed by her henchwomen, Vickie and Pat, both LPN’s, both hopelessly stupid.   The three of them drew closer.  “Shower, or tub bath, which will it be, Julie?”

 

Shower.  Tub bath.  Tub bath.  Shower.  No.  I shook my head. They towered over me.  My breath quickened. 

 

“Which will it be?”

 

I rocked forward and held my knees close for protection.

 

“Well, then, it has been decided.  Run the tub, Vickie.”

 

That’s as far as I got this writing session, dear readers, but I’ll clue you in to what happened next.

 

I refused to take a bath, so they stripped me, threw me into the tub, and washed me.

 

The last line will say something about it being my 25^th birthday.

 

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I’ve begun my thesis!

This is just a scrap.  I wish I could have brought it to some kind of stopping point last night, but I was tired.

Julie Greene

2/15/2007

 

PART OF MY THESIS

 

The inability to speak does scary things to a person.  I couldn’t ask for help, and couldn’t refuse help.  I just took what hit me, and in this emergency room cubical, everything that hit me was hitting hard. The curly-haired nurse spoke at me gleefully.  I couldn’t understand the words; they bubbled and broke before I could grasp them.  I was trapped.  Double-crossed.  All I could feel were two beams from the two watchful eyes of my roommate.  She sat in a chair in the corner.  Footsteps moved outside the thin curtain that separated my cubical from the rest of the emergency department, and from the world.

 

An alcohol tainted breeze brushed across my face as the nurse exited the room, ruffling the curtain.  My roommate, Carole, said, “Julie, you have to talk.  Tell them about the bingeing.  Tell them about the anxiety and the insomnia and everything.  And the Martians.  Everything.  Tell them.”  She started to walk around the room, peeking in cabinets.  “Any good drugs, do you think?  Syringes?  Shit, there’s gotta be something.  Do they let people smoke here?”

 

When I first came to the hospital, simple questions–what is your name? where do you live? what insurance do you have?–not necessarily in that order, I was unable to answer, and when it was apparent to the nurses that something mental was wrong with me, they had hush-hushed me into the cubical, there with Carole pretending to be perplexed, and the stethescoped nurse.

 

It suddenly occurred to me that I would be 25 years old in three days.  I giggled quietly to myself, and felt my mouth turn up into a grin.

 

“What’s so funny, Julie–what’s the matter, anyway?” the nurse asked.  She blurred in and out of focus.  “Why won’t you talk?”

 

“Yeah, Julie.  Talk.”

 

I think most people, at some point in their lives, have been scared speechless.  The cat gets one’s tongue plenty of times in grammar school, especially when one hasn’t done one’s lessons.  But to be so frightened as to be unable to speak for a long period causes problems in and of itself.

*****************

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The Beings are still bothering me.  I woke up feeling fine but they tried to interfere while I was organizing my room (they are the antithesis of organization) and while I was working on my study plans just now.

I talked to my friend Joshua in Philly last night.  He said, basically, “Told ya so,” in regard to having lowered my meds right before this trip.  I could have told him the same thing about his buying a 20-year-old truck a while back.  It died a few days ago.  Kaput.  Told ya so.

More later.

Marine Science Center

I walked over to this place the other day.

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