Homework

Beth took this of me on our walk today. See the flowers?
See the guy having a nervous breakdown?

1.  It's kind of like having two personalities: Walking with Beth today I felt totally normal. My stutter ebbed and flowed but I felt really great in her company. Then she left and BOOM! Back to high alert.

2.  My numbers are HUGE. A lot of people have suddenly started reading my blog. I guess an inside view of a nervous breakdown is interesting. Well it isn't going to last long. I'm making huge strides with my anxiety. I have a long way to go with my voice though.

3.  I am an optimist. For me, the glass is half-full, so I am enjoying a hell of a lot in my current state. I am drunk on insight, thrilled a nervous breakdown doesn't hurt and enjoying the incredible new sense of clarity with which I see myself and others.

4. I am prepared for my next appointment with Dr. Shoja, my fabulous shrink.

Questions:

• What is your objective in working with me?

• Why are so many anxiety attacks in my bed?

• I’m practically/mildly agoraphobic. Does it hasten or hinder my recovery to go out? Does going out create the pressure that produces anxiety attacks?

• I would value an accurate way to describe my situation. Knowing the proper term(s) makes me feel good and allows me to tell friends the truth so I wrote this: "I have an anxiety disorder; it manifests as a bad stutter and an overwhelming sense of over-stimulation that happens outside my home.” What name would you put to an overwhelming sense of over-stimulation that happens outside my home? Would you use the term agoraphobia?

 Revelations:

• All that I am, I have always been. It’s just way, way more extreme now.

• All this started with a bath. I got in and a zillion “repressed” memories came back.

• It wasn’t his beatings that caused this; nor her lies. It was the invisibility messaging they were both so good at that killed me inside.

• I hear this new sound in my voice; it is love.

• I feel like this condition is making me self-obsessive. I want to “see my friends” and share their interests and not talk about myself but I am obsessed with my condition.

• I’ve been "self-medicating" with marijuana for decades. It has always made me feel like I can handle everything. It has given me “distance” from life and I have known that. I can’t handle being alone very well but neither can I handle people.