Friday, December 28, 2012

Just a Couple of Things



Firstly, I have 4 words to say about the Newton shootings: Mental Health Care Access.

There is something very wrong with a society where guns are so easy to get and mental health care is so hard.

If you want to fight for better access but don’t have the time or energy (or functionality), your easiest option is probably to join NAMI (Nationally Alliance for the Mentally Ill). They have got lots of members who are normies, some of them real powerhouses, and they DO have the energy to work on these issues. The dues are moderate (there is a deep discount for mental health care consumers), and they pay, among other things, for legislative battles to protect and help people like us. NAMI also has lots of free programs that you or maybe your family could use. Go to www.nami.org and look up your nearest branch.

Secondly, I have been hearing from mentally ill friends that they’d like to meditate but just can’t seem to do it. They can’t calm their thoughts or detach from them. I totally get that! But I’ve gotten a lot of relief this past year out of meditating; so here, if you want them, are my best tips.

Don’t try to ‘empty your mind.’ That is like trying NOT to think of pink elephants. Don’t try to separate from your thoughts and let them float on by, either. That is an advanced technique - and frankly, if we could do that, we  wouldn’t have a psychiatric condition.

All meditation requires is that you try to focus on ONE thing, to the exclusion of all else. So pick a really simple thing. It could be counting up to 10: 1 on the inhale, 2 on the exhale, and so forth. Start over when you get to 10. If you are highly visual, it could be staring at an interesting but basic object, like a seashell. Or if you’re tactile, you can lie down and put your hands on your belly and feel your breath rise and fall. Or feel your breath come into and out of your nostrils. These are just examples.

Set an alarm for 5 minutes, or whatever amount of time you’ve picked. You don’t want to be interrupting your meditation by checking the clock to see if your time is up yet.

Now. Once you start, concentrate ONLY on the simple focus you have chosen. Don’t change your mind and switch to something else, or get up to answer the door, or interrupt yourself in any other way. Try to have your whole mind, every bit of it, invested ONLY in your focal point. Try to have that be your complete existence till the alarm goes off. Whatever other thoughts come (and they will, by the hundreds), just say to yourself, “That’s not important right now. The ONLY thing that’s important is my counting” (my breathing, my seashell). Just go back to that over and over, no matter how many times you get sidetracked and no matter how urgent the thought is. You can get back to it later.

You see, your mind is not ‘empty,’ and it is not ‘detached.’ It is merely concentrated on one thing.

What this does is give you a wonderful break from all that yammering and worry in your head. Even if you only manage it for 30 seconds out of 10 minutes, it is a desperately needed rest. Even if that is all you ever get out of it, it’s a step toward mental health. And you did it all by yourself, without drugs.

I am a volatile bipolar gal who never does anything the same way twice, but I’ve kept this up nearly every day, over and over, for a year now. That bit of mental rest is sometimes the only sanity I get all day. For that reason alone, it’s worth it.

And there is always hope that one day my mind will learn to do this by itself.




Deborah is a public speaker and author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness, available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker, and sings on his latest CD, "The Colors of Sound." Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Monday, December 10, 2012

And Now for Something Completely Different...


I’ve just had a unique experience that I doubt science is equipped to explain. If you’re comfortable with spiritual ideas, it might sit better. Or maybe not...we'll see.

I went to Sedona, Arizona over Thanksgiving week. Heard of Sedona? It’s about a two hour drive south of the Grand Canyon, and nearly as awesome to look at. There are huge, shapely, gorgeous sedimentary rock bluffs that rise everywhere over the landscape, in a rich eye catching red color due to their high iron oxide content. Among New Agers and other spiritual seekers, Sedona is considered mystically significant. This is partly due to the energy anomalies that exist there, each one known as a “Vortex” (for some reason, maybe to distinguish them, they use the plural ‘Vortexes,’ not vortices). People pay sometimes hefty fees for vortex tours, or healing and meditative pilgrimages to them.

The first two times we went to Sedona, I thought this was a very woo-woo idea and did not bother going. But I have opened my mind to all kinds of things since my marriage seven years ago, and this time I gave them a try. I didn’t know if there was anything to the hype - or whether I would feel it, even if there were.

So here’s what happened. We got a vortex map from a local spiritual center. Then we hiked up the side of Bell Rock, the vortex closest to where we were staying. We looked for juniper trees with especially twisted branches, which the vortex energy is said to cause. My husband and I went about halfway up the rock, sat down in the scanty shade of one of these short trees, and sat quietly, taking in the spectacular view.

Did anything happen? Oh, yeah.

All the discord drained out of my head, all the noise, all the inner criticism and second guessing - really everything that makes it uncomfortable in there. I fell utterly silent inside, peaceful and positive and sure. I was not mentally ill. It went away, completely. It was an amazing sensation. But - just a peak moment, right? Nice vacation, great view, my love at my side, who wouldn’t feel good?

Here’s the kicker: it lasted for two weeks.

No inner voices, no symptoms, no negative thoughts, no nothing. Absolute remission for half a month. Even on the marathon drive back to California, in a big awkward van that usually frightens me to death, I was calm and happy and relaxed. I drove for hours longer than I am usually able to and felt no strain. The interesting thing is that this state of consciousness involved no effort and no thought. In fact, I did remarkably little thinking. I was perfectly aware and alert, I played with concepts, I had conversations. But I did not often have words in my head. Eckhart Tolle claims that thinking is not usually necessary. You know what? He may be right. I didn’t need thought very often, and I still got plenty of things done. Life was so frigging easy!

My peace and sanity lasted until the first time I listened to someone complain at length about a bad Thanksgiving experience. It was as if their unhappy, uneasy voice had waked up my own. It started to mutter. And after that, despite everything I could do, that voice grew and grew. A week later I realized my beautiful peace was all gone, and I sobbed. I was unstable again, and life was hard. Just like always.

So is that the end of that? Not exactly. It’s a little like the first time I took medications that cleared my thinking. Now I know what it FEELS like to be sane. If you know what you’re shooting for, you have some chance of getting there. Until you have a target, you can’t even aim. And now I know I am capable of absolute inner peace.

What else can I do that I don’t even think is possible?

I don’t know what’s going on at those spots in Sedona. I don’t have to know. All I need to know is that sanity is possible. Even for me. For now, that’s enough to go on with.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness, available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Sunday, November 18, 2012

As Winter Approaches



Just a few thoughts at the darkening of the year. This is a hard time for many of us. First and foremost, days are shortening. In America, we have exited Daylight Savings Time, so instead of the long slow dusk we’ve been used to all summer, it’s pitch black before we even get our dinner. The warmth is leaving, and the holiday season is coming with its heavy expectations. Those who have family or community that they feel good about can snuggle up to them right now, but many of us feel the lack of close ties or gifts or abundance; so the whole season registers as a reproach, a scenario we “should” be living up to but aren’t.

This is the time to pull out your whole wardrobe of anti-depression strategies, because you’re going to need them. There’s exercise, number one - which you actually need more of to balance all that comfort food and indoor hunkering. There’s finding access to light, whether you sit by a window or invest in full spectrum bulbs or just put Christmas twinklers on your mailbox. There’s music - not necessarily Christmas music (I think it’s too early, anyway), but something to stir the blood a little. And there’s color. Don’t retreat into a brown and grey world just  because Winter’s coming. Bring out sweaters or quilts or pillows in your favorite bright colors to spice up the days. Wear them, sleep in them, sprinkle them around your home. It doesn’t cost any more to buy a bright color than a dull color, and it gives an immediate lift to the spirits. Nature herself approves of this: She brings out the brilliant reds and golds the minute Fall hits. Your environment doesn’t have to be drab just because the weather is.

This is a good time to cultivate beauty of all kinds. Walk through a gallery or museum or a pet shop full of brilliant exotic fish or birds. Attend that movie that’s billed as sheer eye candy. Drift through a lot full of sleek shiny sports cars. Now is the time to find the indoor beauties we have perhaps been neglecting.

It’s time to cuddle up with a good book or audiobook, or your cat or dog, or your knitting or whittling or DVDs.Take up meditation or mosaics. It’s time to shift focus. That’s not bad. It’s just an effort.

And speaking of shifting focus, I had an experience today that I’d like to share. I hope I can do it without sounding like Pollyanna Purebread. Today was a bad day for me mentally until about 2 in the afternoon. I was angry, irritable, grim, emotionally in the bottom of the ashtray. There was no reason why (which suggests to me that it was purely symptomatic). At some point, driving my car, I said to myself, “I don’t want to feel this way. What can I do to feel different?” I had taken my pills. I had gone for a two mile walk. I had treated myself to tea at Peet’s. I didn’t know what else to do for myself.

Suddenly it occurred to me that my brain (and emotions) were insisting on telling me everything that WASN’T ideal, when actually there was a lot that was good about the day. I remembered an old 12-Step tool and started listing, out loud, the things I was grateful for, starting with the fact that I was in a car instead of on public transit. And you know, once I started listing things, I just couldn’t stop. There were so many things, tiny things and big things, that could have been worse. By the time I arrived at my destination, I felt great. It completely changed my outlook - so far, for the remainder of the day.

Now, I am the first person to roll my eyes when people urge me to “think positive.” There are times when life is not positive, there is nothing positive to think about, and I’m not going to force myself into an emotional lie. But I see that shifting my focus from things that are wrong to things that are right is a completely free and easy way to improve my state of consciousness. And as those of us with diagnoses know, state of consciousness is everything.

I make no promises, but this sounds like a method I want to add to my toolbox. I offer it to you, for what it is worth.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness, available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Monday, October 29, 2012

For Gals Only



I know I promised a further exploration of Anosognosia, but I’m taking time out for a medical heads-up. Ladies, menopause may be dangerous to your mental health, and going hormone-free might not be one of your viable options.

I noticed a couple of years ago that I was destabilizing rapidly and had no idea why. In a few months, it felt like I had been dropped back into hell - I was in total misery, as vulnerable to symptoms as if I were taking no medications at all. When I started feeling suicidal, my husband and I talked it over. We determined that the only physical change in the last few months had been the cessation of my periods. This meant a massive drop in hormone levels, which might reasonably be responsible for what I was experiencing. So I started on a small dose of hormone replacement therapy, and Bingo! Within two weeks my symptoms receded to previous levels.

Here’s the kicker: it looks like I may not be able to get off them. Just recently my new GP reminded me of the possible link between certain cancers and HRT, and asked me to cut my dose in half to see if I could tolerate it. Within days, I began to feel depressed and experience anhedonia. In less than a month, I was suicidal once more. So much for that experiment.

I know there are a lot of women who just don’t want HRT, or only for a short while at most. They may be justly worried about long term effects, or they may simply want to go the natural route. This may be a choice you will have to face: which do you want to preserve, your mind or your body? It is a very personal dilemma.

For myself, I would rather have cancer temporarily, at the end of my life, even if it shortens my life, than the torture of psychiatric symptoms in a healthy body for years on end. I would rather be in a medical hospital at the end of my life than in a mental hospital for large portions of my golden years. You may feel differently. That’s fine. But I am already accustomed to a permanent regime of pills that may be harmful to various parts of my body. I find that one more risk is acceptable to me. I made my choice long ago: I would rather be sane. No matter what.

I’m not trying to influence anybody in this decision. Just be aware that if you are female, and you live long enough, this choice may be coming your way. Hormones can have a profound effect on our mental condition. One way or another, expect some rocks in the road.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Her books are available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Thursday, October 11, 2012

“I’m NOT sick!”



I’ve been out of town, which made this blog very late - but when I came home and checked my mail, I learned something very interesting. My monthly NAMI newsletter had an article on a mental health condition I did not know existed.

Whenever I speak in public, I am sure to meet at least one audience member who tells me a variation of this sad story: My son/sister/brother has been schizophrenic/bipolar for 20 years. He/she won’t take medicine or go to the doctor, no matter what we do. How can we get through to him or her? We’ve tried everything!

I’ve never had a good answer. I still don’t. But at least now I can tell them what’s going on. It’s a neurological syndrome called anosognosia. The name means “to not know an illness” and it is often nicknamed “lack of insight.” People with anosognosia have actual physical damage to one or more structures in their brains which prevent them from being able to understand that anything is wrong with them.  It is not denial, stubbornness, or fear of stigma. It is anatomical damage to one or more parts of the brain and/or the connections between them - specifically, the part that allows you to think about or observe yourself. And it is NOT caused by medications: it is caused by the disease itself.

Anosognosia is also a problem with other brain dysfunctions, such as stroke, Alzheimer’s, Huntington’s or certain brain tumors. A stroke patient with anosognosia will literally swear that nothing is wrong with him even though the entire left side of his body is paralyzed! This is not a new problem or a new finding; the only new element is acknowledging that it happens to the mentally ill, as a result of the many studies that have taken place since the late 1990’s.

The damage seems to be connected to the experience of psychosis. Current figures show that it affects 50% of schizophrenics and 40% of bipolar patients with psychotic features. That is a whopping percentage! And it explains a whole lot.

Think about it. All of these people are UNABLE to comprehend that they are ill, therefore they are UNABLE to consent to or carry out treatment. According to recent surveys, this condition is the number one reason for medication noncompliance, number two being substance abuse - not side effects or lack of access, which lurk somewhere around fourth or fifth on the list.

Naturally this has profound implications for mental health policy and practices, which I intend to take up in a later blog. It is enough to point out now that when patients are given mandatory medication, they are sometimes able to regain some ability to understand their illness. Stop treatment, and that benefit goes away. So where does that leave the debate on the unfairness of mandating treatment for people who don’t want it? What does that mean for the opponents of Laura’s Law?

I’ll leave you with a great website for more information, and add it to my links:
www.treatmentadvocacycenter.org/problem/anosognosia

Please check out this very enlightening series of pages.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two novels. Her books are available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors; or you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Thursday, September 13, 2012

Letter to the Editor

In the town where I live, on September 4, 2012, a Highway Patrolman, Kenyon Headstrom, was shot by a man named Chris Lacy. Headstrom later died of his wounds. Lacy died at the scene. It has since come out that Lacy was Bipolar, and local papers have treated this story as if  Bipolar Disorder made Lacy automatically violent; as if the shooting were inevitable because of his condition. This is my letter to the editor about the stigma engendered by that terrible event.

I am one of the mentally ill of Contra Costa county, and I am saddened by reporting that seems to assume that Chris Lacy killed that brave officer because Lacy was bipolar.  Yes, he killed. Yes, he was Bipolar. But the two descriptives aren’t automatically connected. People only hear about us when we kill somebody. This is the image the public has of mental illness, and it scares everybody without helping a thing. It adds terror and stigma to a tragedy that is surely bad enough already!

I have been bipolar for forty years; I own a gun for self-defense; I even have the bad temper that goes with my red hair. But I have never slapped or hit or shot anybody.  I write books that help others with their mental health. I sometimes speak in public for the National Alliance for the Mentally Ill, in their anti-stigma program, “In Our Own Voice.” This is how I contribute to society.

 Here’s what most people don’t know: the average percentage of violence among the mentally ill is lower than the average percentage of violence among the total population. For years I supported myself by reading to the blind; I read that statistic in the standard study guides that my mentor, Dr David Kallinger (clinical psychologist) used for oral exams he took before obtaining his PhD. This is not obscure information: it is available to every clinician getting ready to obtain his license. Dangerous criminals among the abnormal are the exception rather than the rule (Corrigan & Watson, 2005). Most of us turn our violence against ourselves, not against others.

But it doesn’t fit the public paradigms. If a person does something that awful, they MUST be crazy, right? Crazy is the only explanation, isn’t it? The frightening truth is that most violent crime is committed by individuals who have no mental illness. They are reasoning, ‘sane’ individuals who think this course of action makes sense.

That statistic wouldn’t sell any papers, though. So you won’t hear about it. As a psychology teacher of mine used to say, “Mental Patient Lives Quietly, Dies Peacefully” just doesn’t work as a headline.

It is true that some mentally ill individuals commit terrible crimes. We have seen two examples just recently. I cannot say how sad they make me. But there are terrible, violent, tragic crimes EVERY day, and most of them are committed by “normal” individuals. It is not sensible to think that anyone with a mental illness is automatically dangerous, and it simply is not borne out by experience or statistics.

When we think like this, we are assuming the worst of human nature. We are assuming that when  brain wiring goes wrong, its first order of business is to attack others. And that is just incorrect. Most of us are just trying to get through another day, and get the care we need from a reluctant mental health system. What society can do to stop crimes like this is stop being afraid and concentrate instead on making sure health systems are responsive, giving thorough and prompt help, instead of abandoning people to stew in their own juices, locked in the prison of their minds with no way out.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two novels. Her books are available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors; or you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Monday, August 27, 2012

In Search of Silence



I am looking for silence. I have been looking everywhere for a long time.

Not the silence that falls between two people in the middle of a fight. That is fraught with unspoken words, prickly ones in the air like allergens, irritating all the psychic senses. It is a relief when someone finally snatches at the subtext and speaks.

And not the silence of Nature, though a quiet forest is a great relief. But that is a silence filled with living. That is beetles and boughs and rodents going about their business with no regard to the mute observer.

And not the silence of cities, the void that yawns beneath traffic noises and jackhammers, beneath change machines and coffee cups clinking, beneath jukeboxes and beer bottles - the sterile emptiness where no communication is going on, no one is really connecting.

I mean the deeper inner silence of the soul, something that could speak but chooses not to. I mean the silence of a peaceful mind. It is something the mentally ill seldom experience. I haven’t seen it since childhood, myself.

I remember watching dust motes as they danced peacefully in a window embrasure. I must have done it for minutes on end. Just looking, fulfilled and timeless, my mind suspended and turning slowly, like they were doing. Nothing else existed at that moment.

I remember sinking backwards beneath the bath water, eyes open to the wavering fairy light, ears reverberating with the amplified tap of my fingers on the tub wall.

I was not thinking then. I did not have to. Those were good days. But they ended with the advent of hormones, for me. I became bipolar at puberty.

The mystics say that the true center of every soul is a vast and spacious stillness, laced with stars and smelling of forever. I have lain in meditation time after time and tried to reach it, following my breath, counting inhale and exhale, shut off from everything else in the world. There comes a moment when that silence sidles up to me, nudges me softly and whispers, “Stop counting.”

Maybe, for an instant, I do.

Immediately the brain starts screaming in terror. “My God!” it says, “We’ll explode out of our body and disappear! Don’t do it!” And then the yammering starts again, the ceaseless yammering on any subject and none - the aimless, hopeless, pointless gossip of the mind that drove me to meditation in the first place.

I have looked for silence in anti-psychotics, but the moment I seem to grasp it, savor its  texture, I fall asleep. So I search for it in sleep, but I dream and snore. I have listened for it under great music, and sometimes heard it between two beats.

And I wonder if the brain is right, if I really would pull up anchor from my body and sail away if I found that still center. Leaving the chattering brain behind, all by itself in a jar, spinning wave after wave of spurious story, believing itself an ocean.

(Thanks to the women in my creative writing group, who nominated this piece for my blog)

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two novels. Her books are available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors; or you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

www.islandjourneycd.com

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

My Diagnosis

My astrology chart shows Neptune in the 6th House at the time of my birth. In other words, I was born to have a mysterious illness that would be difficult to diagnose. I was 26 when at last someone told me I was manic depressive.

My response was, “Finally! Something that makes sense!” Because I had known for a long time that the world I saw and reacted to was not the same as the one everyone else did.

Insanity, if one dares to use the word, is hard to pin down, hard to tell someone, and usually hard for them to hear, my experience not withstanding. Some people will be told over and over for the rest of their lives without ever believing that it’s true. Hardest of all, even if they do believe, is to get them to start treatment.

Why is this? Why do we find it so hard to believe that the world inside one person’s mind is not the same as that of everybody they are standing with?

I remember long summer gabfests between college semesters. We were always batting ideas back and forth languidly, like a ping pong game where nobody was keeping score. The only point was to stay out in the garage away from the ‘old’ people. Time and again the conversation turned on existence and perception: how do we know that anything outside us exists? How do we know that we exist? How do we know that two people who say “blue” are actually seeing the same color? Maybe their blue is my green, or puce for that matter. All we know is that we are giving it the same name, that we both perceive something.

I never found it much of a stretch to believe that my head was different. After all, I’d been told over and over again that I was too sensitive - that I was uptight - that I was too serious - that I was way too dramatic - no matter what the stimulus, someone somewhere would say my response was too big, too little, or flat out wrong. Yet I was only reacting naturally to what I saw and heard. Obviously they were seeing, hearing, feeling something different. Theirs was a blander, less upsetting world, without tricky double meanings and barbs in every casual glance.

With time, with medicine, I learned to react less, to pretend to be less upset and in pain. Within a few decades, I was able to convince the most exacting critics that I was no longer scary and abnormal. And now, with 40 years practice, I have come to understand that everybody’s universe is different, that no one lives on the same planet, that our entire lives are a holodeck geared to the needs of just one person. The miracle is that any of us see anything remotely the same. And language, a shaky tool at best, is often the only thing that allows us to think we have so much in common.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two novels. Her books are available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBookstore, and other major vendors; or you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Info for the Bipolar



This week I just want to tell you about a resource, International Bipolar Foundation. They’ve been around since 2006, but they’re new to me. The website address is exactly what you would expect it to be: www.internationalbipolarfoundation.org. They are involved in supporting bipolar education and research, and enhancing various support services such as housing. Such enhancement includes support groups per se, if you happen to live near San Diego, California. They also list some interesting sounding online communities to check out.

I am impressed by their monthly newsletter, which is full of ideas, tips, news about bipolar people in the public eye, and updates on the latest research in the field (see my previous blog for a sample topic). You can subscribe at: http://conta.cc/eyK0ra.

They also have a book, Healthy Living with Bipolar Disorder, which you can get FREE as a pdf for the asking. It’s also available on kindle for $1.99 - there’s a long URL but if you type the title in Amazon’s book search box it comes up right at the top.You can also get a hard copy, but for that you need to pay shipping, which comes to $12 U.S. and $25 international. I’ve downloaded this book, and I have to say what I’ve read is quite factual. There is a good section on the drugs commonly used, how they operate, what their drawbacks are, and even how they work in the body if that is known. They don’t stint on including side effects, either. If what you want is solid information on standard treatment, this is a good place to start. And what can you lose when it’s free, right? (If what you want is more practical, how-do-I- LIVE-with-this advice, though, you’d be better off reading Is There Room for Me, Too? Just saying).

Here’s their snail address, and I’ll add their link to my list on the right:

International Bipolar Foundation
8895 Towne Centre Drive, Suite 105-360
San Diego, CA  92122

 They host lectures and post them on the website the following week, hold webinars, have a buddy program, speakers bureau and outreach and referral program, anti-stigma campaigns, and more. Seems to me with this much activity, they must have something you could use... if bipolar is your thing, check them out.


Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two novels. Her books are available at Amazon.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Sunday, July 15, 2012

Punishment


A new study out of Canada, published in Pediatrics, shows that people who are physically punished in childhood are more likely to develop mood and personality disorders. They are also more likely to abuse alcohol and other substances. “Approximately two to seven percent of mental disorders in the study were tied to physical punishment,” reports the International Bipolar Foundation newsletter dated July 8, 2012.

Well, duh. I could have told them that, though I didn’t know the numbers. I’ve met very few psychiatric patients who can boast a happy childhood.

Something happens to a child when their parent or guardian hits them. The world turns upside down. This is the person who is supposed to protect you. They are your safety. They probably also claim to love you, and you love them back. But there they are, hurting you on purpose. Chances are they are claiming it is GOOD FOR YOU. Maybe even, “I only do it because I love you.” Love equals pain.

That is enough to screw up anyone’s head. At any age. So what does it do to someone just learning how to think?

I remember well how that kind of punishment worked. First there were the accusations, building to fury; then slapping or spanking, usually in front of the other kids and mom; and then the deadly Lecture. Looking back, The Lecture might have been the most poisonous part. Because, while I stood there, in pain and probably crying, they told me that this was all my fault. If I only wouldn’t [fib, yell, break something], it would never happen (See? All you have to do is be perfect.) But my parents LOVED me. They only did it because they LOVED me. Now, come give Daddy a hug and say you’re sorry, and try harder to be good. So then I had to hug the person who had just hit me, and tell him I loved him.

Am I the only one to whom this looks sick and twisted? Is it any wonder our minds get bent?

I cannot tell you how many victims of horrific physical punishments have told me as adults, “I deserved it.” Beaten wives sometimes think that, too. That doesn’t make it so.

Later in that same article, a psychologist who shall remain nameless was quoted as saying, “For younger children, spanking may be suitable as long as the child views spanking as a motivational tool, for their behavior and overall good.” As we used to say in Monopoly: ‘Go to Jail. Go directly to Jail. Do not pass Go. Do not collect $200.’ He has completely missed the point! A child’s love does not know from “motivational tools.” What a child understands, at a very visceral level, is that pain is not love. Once you’ve convinced him that pain IS love, you have set him up for a lifetime of rotten relationships and confusion of all kinds. Now we know that includes mental disorders.

What the researchers found was that in a sample of 35,000, 16% of un-hit persons over 20 experienced depression, but 20% of physically punished persons did. And 30% who had not been hit abused substances, versus a whopping 43% of people who had been physically punished. This is AFTER omitting serious abuse from the figures, and correcting for things such as race, income, and level of education.

What can I tell you? Hit a kid, warp a mind. The numbers bear me out.


Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two novels. Her books are available at Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker. Check out sound samples at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

The Uses of Anger

I recently had a remarkable experience, one that is still going on, and one that I can’t say I entirely understand. But it shows me the remarkable power of anger. I have always had plenty of anger; it is one of my worst symptoms, in fact, which I work hard to keep within rational limits. I seem to have centuries of it, and it boils and swells without reason. It has ruined many a good relationship. I never knew before that it could have any good uses.

Background for this story: I appear to have a pinched nerve in my hip. It happened very suddenly, I have no idea why, and I have never had any trouble of this kind before. So I left it untreated until more than a week had gone by and it was obvious even to me that it was not going away by itself. The urgent care doctor gave me a Motrin prescription. That worked beautifully for exactly one day.

Unfortunately, my husband and I had to drive out of state the next day, and by the time we arrived two days later, I was in so much pain I had to be helped to a bed, where I stayed for three days straight. I could not so much as walk to the bathroom, five steps away from the end of the bed; I had to crawl and sometimes I screamed. I tried for two days to get my home doctor to call a prescription in to my local Walgreen’s, some sort of pain killer so I could sit up long enough to sit in a wheelchair and get to a local medico. Long story short, they refused.

And that’s when I came apart. At first, I cried in despair at the prospect of more and more pain without hope of reprieve. But after a while, it turned into a tantrum against whatever powers may be. “I hate you!” I yelled over and over. “You have no right to do this to me! There is no excuse!” This went on for quite a while. I need not elaborate, I suppose. We have all been angry at “Them” one time or another. And then I sort of turned a mental corner. I found myself shouting, “I don’t accept this. You don’t have the right to do this to me. I take away that right. You no longer have my permission to do this to me! I forbid it!”

And I sat up. And I stood up. And I walked.

Now, I am not saying I “got well.” I still have a pinched nerve and it can be damned painful. But I have never been as completely helpless again since that moment. It is as if the anger burned the terror of pain out of me: the worst of the muscle spasms that were torturing me ceased. I can walk small distances with a cane, and I can sit up awhile though I am not terribly comfortable and eventually have to lie down again. But I am not bedridden.

My husband did not find this remarkable: he merely said, “You took your power back.”
Yes, that is exactly what happened. But who knew my ‘power’ included the function of my nerves and muscles? And who knew that the anger I’ve feared and restrained all my life could ever do positive work?

I have decided that unbottling my anger is very effective for my health, and intend to do it regularly from now on. I can’t work it out at the gym right now, but I can beat on my husband’s drums, yell and shout when nobody is here, hit a pillow and all that jazz. Keeping it in didn’t help; let’s see what letting it out will do.

I am open to all comments and conjectures about this odd episode.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two romantic comedies. They are available at Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or  you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has also narrated a guided meditation CD with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker; check it out at www.islandjourneyCD.com.

Saturday, June 2, 2012

It's A Pity



When I was first diagnosed, I asked my therapist what my greatest risk would be. I expected some spectacular answer, like, 'don't eat beef or you'll run over a cliff'...instead she looked me straight in the face and said, "Self-pity".
Busted.
Even if I didn't try to make others sorry for me, I often waddled in neck-deep pity for my poor little damaged self.
No one can blame us for sometimes feeling pretty sorry about this mess we didn't ask for. Sometimes. But beyond that, it's like poking an infected tooth. Why do it? Do you like pain?
For instance, sometimes I get very boo-hooey over the American Dream as portrayed on TV. I'll never meet that standard - I can't work enough to earn that salary. And it's not my fault! And it's not fair! Why can't I have fashionable clothing and a huge bank account and unlimited credit? Why can't I have a car that reminds one of a panther and streaks along curvy shore roads?
I have special trouble with this whenever I hit a decade birthday. I think, ‘I should have this by now. Ordinary people do. Ordinary people can work 40 hours a week. They can learn new skills and switch careers if they want to. Ordinary people finish school by the time they're 30 and find a partner without worrying about when to betray their Dark Secret.’
Well, OK, all these things may be true (notice I said may be). I may have spent 30 years learning to live with my disease while other people were using that time in other ways. And occasionally this does make me sad.
But is it true that I am deprived?
First of all, I have never hankered after the forty-hour week and settled career. I have always wanted to be a writer. So the chances are I would not have spent those years climbing the corporate ladder even were I free to do so.
Secondly - and you already know this - the advertising machinery of this country is not a trustworthy measure of what we 'should' be, or by what age we 'should' be there. Advertising is to make people want the product, buy the product, make the company some profit, and keep the good old economy going. That is its purpose. Not your purpose. Not necessarily in your best interests at all.
Thirdly, what is the good of thinking this way? Why moan about what I've missed? If I must look back, why not look at what I've achieved? As of this writing, I am in my 22nd year of recovery. I am no longer afraid to go out in public, or afraid that if I don't watch out I'll do something awful to the ones I love. I have a job that I can believe in. I have people in my life whom I respect and love, and they respect and love me in return. Would I really trade that in for a Lexus? And in the end - long after anybody normal would have thrown in the towel - I actually found that great husband and nice house in the suburbs - at 45. So you never know. Is it really time to give up yet?
Fourthly, and most importantly, this self-pity is based on a false premise. It assumes that everyone without my disease is happy and normal. Or at most, they have only minor problems that don't stack up against mine.
It's just an illusion. The longer I live, the more I find that everyone has some burden. Some of those burdens are incredibly awful. Just because you can't see the crack doesn't mean somebody’s not broken. We have not been specially picked out for grief and suffering. The human race is a sort of Special Olympics, and everyone gets a suitable handicap. This is ours.
We all get in this funk sometimes. It’s natural. But the best way out is to start counting what we do have. It adds up fast. Start with being able to read, and having access to a computer. That puts you ahead of much of the world, and that’s just the start. Go ahead, try it, count your blessings: 1,2,3...


Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two romantic comedies. All three books are available at Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or  you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has narrated a guided meditation CD, “Island Journey,” produced with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker; available on iTunes, Amazon, CD Baby, and many other venues.

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Taking it Slow



I’ve been trying to think of what to write about next, with little success - which is why you haven’t heard from me. After all, I’ve been writing this blog for 3 years now, and how much good advice does any one person have?

So here’s a thought: how about if you suggest some topics? I did get one suggestion already: to write about panic attacks. The problem is, I’ve never had one, and have no tips to offer. So if any of you are good at dealing with this symptom, please leave a comment below or email me at lastlaughpro@gmail.com. Perhaps we can have a guest blogger on the topic.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I want to make a pitch for living life a little more slowly. This has been one of the more important life tactics I have adopted since my diagnosis. I can stay pretty level-headed if the pressure is low - if I am not rushing, multi-tasking, or trying to do too many things in a day. I am less insane if I do not live at the insane pace of modern life.

Granted, there are times when a lot needs to get done. But even so, it is best to do one thing at a time. I honestly think multi-tasking is a crock. Instead of doing one thing well, then going on to the next thing, we end up doing several things badly because we are not paying full attention to any of them. As often as not, we just waste more time fixing the mistakes we made because we were distracted. Calm down, already. Life comes to us one moment at a time. Our minds are less fevered when our activities do, too.

I have found that if I make more than two appointments for any given day, it is a mistake (the number for you might be different, but it’s worth finding out what your limit is). Perhaps it’s my Anxiety Disorder, but just knowing that all those demands are stacked up ahead of me like fences to jump makes me feel squeezed and unhappy and nervous. When will there be time for me? When will I breathe, or make any spontaneous choices?

I understand that some people are constituted differently. They want structure, activities lined up like dominoes, never a dull moment. If that is your makeup, do what suits you best, of course.

But otherwise, if you are disabled and cannot work full time, what’s the big hurry? The one glorious thing our condition may give us is TIME. This is a priceless gift. It cannot be bought, bargained for, or restored. It is irreplaceable. Take a deep breath and enjoy yours.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two romantic comedies. All three books are available at Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or  you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has narrated a guided meditation CD, “Island Journey,” produced with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker; available on iTunes, Amazon, CD Baby, and many other venues.

Saturday, April 7, 2012

The Dividing Line


After a lifetime spent with various sorts of people, I find myself thrown in these days with a rather New-Age-ish crowd. Which is fine. I am a long-time believer in the old adage, “live and let live.” I even agree with them on many issues. But more and more, I am having a problem with parts of their outlook, as they are recommended over and over again to me. There are two major sticking points (and I hope you will make allowance for my imperfect understanding). I feel pushed to “let go of my limitations” and to adopt an updated version of positive thinking.

Now, there are some very good points in favor of both attitudes. It is quite true that, as conditioned members of society, we tend to hem ourselves into strict little comfort zones and stay there, when we are capable of more. Ask any psychologist (or any teenager), and I suspect they will tell you that risk is necessary sometimes. Everyone needs to stretch themselves once in a while. Life lived in a box is not healthy or humane.

There is also much to be said for positive thinking. There always has been. I am aware that I have spent much of my lifetime in struggles for survival, and this has led to a problem-focused, ‘downside’ habit of mind that really isn’t helpful. Once we thoroughly understand and a problem (and we must to think about it to do that), it behooves us to concentrate on the solution. The results are better, and the relief to the nervous system is enormous.

Further, I will even concede to those who claim that looking on the bright side improves life itself. To an extent it does. As I say, it feels better, and more than that it sharpens your alertness to any helpful circumstance or fresh opportunity; the kind that can drift by unnoticed if you’ve got your head in a dark cloud. As we with altered states know better than anyone, perception, or state of consciousness, is everything.

But there are philosophies, such as that in The Secret, which seem to propound that the way you think will actually change events - that the Universe will in fact respond to you and give way to your desires. This is just one baby step away from magical thinking. And it is a step too far for me.

Now mind you, I’m not saying they’re wrong. It might be true. I don’t know. I try never to judge others’ belief systems. BUT - and it’s a big ‘but’ - as a mentally ill person I cannot afford to think this way. It is profoundly dangerous to my shaky grip on reality. It smacks of delusion. The Secret - which I’m only picking on as an example, I actually like the book - encourages its audience to speak, act and believe that things which they want, but which haven’t happened yet, are actually true now.

It is just one small step to telling people that your Pumpkin carriage is waiting for you out in the parking lot, with the Prince inside. People get locked up for stuff like that.

The mentally ill cannot afford to play patty-cake with physical reality. We need a concrete grasp to stay sane. We need to look our circumstances in the eye and say, “this is what it is.” After that, we can work to make things better. At our own pace.

If our world also becomes blessed with synchronicity, if the Universe hands us gifts, that’s wonderful. Be joyful.

The same thing goes for “letting go of our limits.” As individuals with a medical condition, we have very specific things we cannot do. I have learned over the years which behaviors and events produce meltdown and which sustain serenity. It is not “negative” to respect these limits, any more than it is “negative” for a diabetic to turn down cake and pie and ice cream at a party.

I have seen this played out time and time again. Someone will try to convince me that I can do X or Y if I would only stretch myself; that it’s “not really hard,” that it’s “for my best interest.” And those people suffer with me when they are treated to my screaming, shouting breakdown. They thought it was OK. But they were WRONG. They don’t have my condition, and so they don’t know, no matter how well they THINK they understand it. My therapist made the remark about cake and diabetes, and she ended by saying, “What do you have to do to convince them? Go into a coma?”

Remember, when it comes to your mental condition, YOU are the only expert. Don’t be pushed around.








Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She is currently recording it as an audiobook and CD set.  Deborah has also published two romantic comedies. All three books are available on Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or  you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. She has narrated a guided meditation CD, “Island Journey,” produced with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker; available on iTunes, Amazon, CD Baby, and many other venues.

Tuesday, March 13, 2012

Your Suggestions

The results are in...though I didn't see any posts, I got several personal and Facebook responses to my "grounding techniques" blog. The following have been suggested to me. It is no surprise that every one of them has to do with linking back to your physical body, which is as grounding as earth itself.

aromatherapy
swimming (also showers and baths: water on the skin is very effective)
running (goes with "exercise" from last week)
Tai Chi
massage
putting on scent, such as aftershave or cologne (goes with "aromatherapy", above)


It is also said that certain stones and crystals are grounding. For instance, I have a large piece of tourmaline that seems to steady me when I remember to hold it and breathe deeply.

That's all the feedback I have noted so far...next question for your input: when does "positive thinking" or New Age "Manifestation technique" go too far and become simply delusional? What's your take on this? I'd like to address that question. Things are a little hectic in my life right now, but I'll tackle this subject soon. Stay tuned.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She has also published two romantic comedies. All three books are available on Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or  you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. Her newest project is a guided meditation CD, “Island Journey,” produced with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker; available on iTunes, Amazon, and many other venues

Monday, February 20, 2012

Down to Earth


Lately, I’ve had trouble sticking to the real world. I spend a lot of time doing cerebral things - writing, sitting at the computer, reading, listening to people - and then there is the issue of those other, extra dimensions I go to that normal people tend not to visit...I sort of lose myself, though I don’t often go all the way to delusions.

And it occurred to me, maybe we could all use some advice on how to keep from floating away in the ozone. Altered states are easy for some of us. The trick is how to get back.

So I started a list for myself of my top ten grounding techniques. It’s not a very long list yet. What I’m hoping is that you, my readers, will contribute and help me and all of us find good ways to come back down to earth when we’ve been floating away. Here’s the beginning list:

1. Eat something. It’s a direct connection to the physical and literally weighs you down. Comfort food is good, especially meat if you’re not vegetarian.

2. Take a walk. The rhythmic motion of your body helps, and so does seeing some nature, if there’s any you can get to. Actually, any exercise will help.

3. Clean something. The dirtier the better. Scrubbing the sink, sweeping the porch, shaking out the welcome mat, all of it counts. Plus, you get a clean rug (or whatever) at the end of it.

4. Personal hygiene. Getting your hair wet or cutting your toenails is real three-dimensional stuff. Putting on makeup does NOT count - that takes you off into the area of fantasy, who you wish you were, how you’d like to look.

5. Gardening. Start by pulling weeds. The original down-to-earth.

6. Do something with your pet. Stroke it, walk it, play with it, help it turn its hamster wheel. Direct interaction with animals is an energy transformer, and being responsible is a good tie to life.

7. Dispose of clutter. It could be paper, or it could be the knick knacks on the shelves or your three hundred pair of shoes. Deciding what you can and can’t live without brings you right to the here and now. This sort of goes with ‘clean something.’

8. Get manual. Build a shelf, sew on a button, chop vegetables. Microwaving and using the sewing machine do not count.

9. Meditate. I recommend yoga especially, because it’s physical.

10. This one may sound odd, but it works for me: activate your root chakra with your voice. You do this by saying or singing the syllable “UH” for as long as you can, on as deep a note as you can. Supposedly a good number of times to do this is seven, but choose for yourself. This gets a vibration going right at your base, which is good for you in all sorts of ways and appeals to the primitive part of you. Think of it as caveman therapy, if you like.

What else can you suggest to me? I’d love to hear what works for you so I can try it myself.

Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She has also published two romantic comedies. All three books are available on Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or  you can order them from your local bookstore. Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net. Her newest project is a guided meditation CD, “Island Journey,” produced with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker; available on iTunes, Amazon, and many other venues

Tuesday, January 24, 2012

On the Move



I’ve been thinking this month about resolutions and why we make them. Depending on the year, I can fall on either side of the argument about whether to make New Year’s Resolutions or not. But it’s really not about “I’m going to lose 10 pounds.” It’s really about hope, and that’s something we all need.

Life with mental illness can often be devoid of the markers other people use to gauge their progress. If you can’t work, for instance, there is none of the built-in feeling of “I’m finished” at the end of the day, no projects you’ve completed, no deadlines met, and no raises or promotions. Sometimes bare survival can get very hard indeed, and we feel that is all we can expect out of life.

But survival for survival’s sake is not enough for human beings. Resolutions speak to the human need to say, “I’ve decided I want things to change, and I’m going to MAKE them change.”  When you are prone to altered states, it can seem that everything is out of your control. It is especially important for people in our position to have reachable goals and possible dreams. As day by day goes by in your funky supported housing and nothing gets better or changes, it is easy to stop dreaming. This way lies apathy and death. Not having a dream is a most pernicious form of suicide. I read somewhere that when you are killing time, you die a little yourself in the process. We need hope.  As Abraham Cowley once wrote, “Hope! of all ills that men endure, the only cheap and universal cure.”

It may be useless and discouraging to wish for A Cure. It may even be too much, at any given time, to say, “I’m going to lose the 60 pounds my medicine put on me.” But you could start with a broader dream, such as, “I’m going to have better health,” and then think up little reachable steps, such as taking a multivitamin every morning. Then you can proceed through other small steps, such as eating a salad twice a week, or taking a regular walk, and as you achieve these things you gain confidence. One day, eventually, you will be consulting your doctor about just how few calories you need to keep the pounds off, and designing a diet for yourself.

By the way, if your dream is eventually supporting yourself again, I recommend you look up the International Clubhouse (www.iccd.org). If there is a Clubhouse within reach, this is an excellent place to take part in a work-ordered day, train for supported positions in the community, and eventually re-enter the work force. Their statistics on the numbers of members who have succeeded in this process are impressive and encouraging.

The important thing is that we each have a dream that is meaningful to us, and not outside the bounds of possibility. Perhaps your dream will be a variation of your original life goal before receiving your diagnosis. And then be sure to support that dream, at whatever speed works for you, with little bitty steps in the direction you want. They can be tiny and infrequent steps, and it is not abnormal to fall backwards sometimes and have to start over. As long as we feel we are moving. I would personally recommend 2 or 3 goals, so that when one is not panning out you can at least look to some other goal for your satisfaction. For example, I haven’t written even one chapter of a novel this year, but I did lose a bunch of weight. So when my inner critic starts carping at me, I have something to shut it up.

Of course, manic people like me may actually make too many resolutions (or too big), and suffer collapse and burn out. When I realized this year that my projected resolutions numbered FIFTEEN, I decided to call it off.  You don't always have to have a specific resolution. You just have to want to go somewhere, take one step, and believe that the next step is possible.


Deborah is a public speaker and the author of Is There Room for Me, Too? 12 Steps & 12 Strategies for Coping with Mental Illness. She has also published two romantic comedies. All three books are available on Amazon.com, Barnes and Noble.com, Kindle Editions, iBooks, and other major vendors; or  you can order them from your local bookstore. Her newest project is a guided meditation CD, “Island Journey,” produced with her husband, musician Robert Hamaker; available on iTunes, Amazon, and many other venues.Visit her web page at www.lafruche.net, or see her catalog at www.lastlaughproductions.net.