I was actually depressed a couple of months ago, for the first time in nearly two-and-a-half years. Spent a few weeks thinking about suicide all the time and so on. My doctor increased my dosage of Zoloft to 100 mg, up from 50 mg, because I told her I thought I might need my meds adjusted.

It worked, damnit. The depression just went away. Don’t get me wrong; I’m glad that I’m not depressed. But it doesn’t make any sense to me that the drugs are helping. The chemical imbalance theory of mental illness is crap. Antidepressants haven’t been proven to be any more effective than placebo for most patients, and I am a cynical bitch who always expects the worst, so placebo effects don’t tend to affect me, not for the better, anyway.

I was also really annoyed because spring is not a typical depression time for me. I tend to spend February through May hypomanic and/or manic and/or rapid cycling, and constant depression is more of a September through January thing for me. I found it unsettling to be depressed in the spring, and I also had this self-righteous, whiny sense that it was not fair. If I had to be crazy in the spring, I at least wanted to be hypomanic, to feel that everything in the whole universe was connected, spend too much money, drink too much, to be loud and obnoxious, flirt inappropriately with people, stay awake all night, feel driven to write and write and not be able to stop writing, to see the funny side of everything, to have ideas zoom through my brain in rapid succession, to love the world so much that it hurt. That was a more typical spring experience for me, and I felt cheated out of it by having depression ungraciously plunk itself down in April.

I want to cut my dosage back down to 50 mg as soon as I can do so without getting depressed again. I’ve only been on the higher dosage for about six weeks, so it’ll be a while yet, though. I don’t want to wind up gradually increasing my meds to the maximum dosages until they stop working altogether.

The chiropractor has suggested that I cut down on my time at the computer for the next little while, and I am actually listening to him. My back is feeling a bit better, so it is possible that my time away from the keyboard is helping me.

An online friend of mine died recently, and since she was not someone I knew from the mental health blogosphere, any time that I have been spending online has been elsewhere, as those of us who knew her deal with the emotional fallout and try to organize things to do in her memory.

I didn’t know her extremely well, but she was a lovely person who always had a kind word to say and never got caught up in petty Internet drama. And she was so young. I am heartbroken about this, and I feel so bad for her family.

I’ve had an Internet friend die from suicide before, and now I’m discovering that it isn’t any better or any worse to have one die from natural causes. It’s just different. And it sucks every bit as much.

Despite my complete absence from the blogosphere lately, I’m still alive.

Eight years since my most serious suicide attempt, and I’m still alive.

I haven’t been getting much sleep lately, but I’m not doing too badly apart from that.

I’m totally at a loss for words when I try to discuss this article, Critics: Don’t tie driver’s licence renewal to psychiatric history. Oh, there’s nothing wrong with the article itself. The topic, however, horrifies me. There is something really, really wrong with the Registry of Motor Vehicles in Nova Scotia.

Service Nova Scotia now requires people renewing their licences to indicate on an application form if they’ve had a “psychiatric or psychological condition.”

People who indicate yes — even if it was something such as a bout of depression — are asked to provide more specific details and then must have a doctor complete a medical, sharing what’s usually confidential information with the government.

“The contents of the medical report will be reviewed by department staff and may be referred to a committee of medical specialists who make recommendations on clients’ medical fitness to safely drive,” the province has advised affected people in writing.

The application form also asks those renewing their licences if they have had lung, heart, eye or neurological diseases, a stroke or dementia.

Doctors sometimes charge a fee for the medical and failure to comply with the request could result in drivers losing their licences.

Why, why, why would anyone ever think this is a good idea?

Paul Arsenault, the provincial registrar of motor vehicles, defended the practice, saying that his department needs to know that information for the sake of public safety.

“If somebody’s severely depressed, they probably shouldn’t be on the road,” he said.

Hiya. Manic-depressive here. Severe depression, mania, psychosis, the whole works. I’ve never had a car accident. I’m not saying that nobody ever caused an accident because they were manic and driving too fast, or that no asshole has ever committed suicide by crashing their car, but that’s got nothing to do with me. My psychiatric condition isn’t any of the provincial government’s business, and I certainly don’t see why anybody who needs to get their license renewed should have to tell the government if they’ve had a brief bout of anxiety or depression in the past.

Carol Tooton, executive director of the Nova Scotia division of the Canadian Mental Health Association… wondered why the province would require such sensitive medical information that has little to do with somebody’s ability to operate a vehicle.

“I’ve never heard of this before. It certainly doesn’t help to eliminate the stigma around someone who may have a mental illness.”

See, I’m not the only person who thinks this is screwed up.

Stephen Ayers, the executive director of the Schizophrenia Society of Nova Scotia, said he was uneasy about the requirement and found it intrusive.

“This is concerning, obviously. It’s required by law for a physician or psychiatrist to notify (the Registry of) Motor Vehicles of a medical condition a person has that would impair their ability to drive.”

David Simpson, with the Mental Health Police Records Check Coalition, an Ontario rights advocacy organization, said the practice smacks of discrimination.

“What you always have to be worried about in situations like this is if there is some sort of systemic bias in place or covert discrimination, that they believe because you have a mental illness you’re going to use your vehicle as a weapon to injure people or injure yourself.”

I would definitely not indicate yes on this form and then pay $50 to get a doctor to complete a medical.

Since that article is a week old, how about you also check out one from today’s issue of the same paper? I mentioned Howard Hyde’s death last year, and here’s the latest news:

The Nova Scotia government will appoint a fatality inquiry into the death of Howard Hyde, who died after being Tasered by Halifax police in November.

Justice Minister Cecil Clarke announced the inquiry today on the heels of a report from the province’s chief medical examiner that found that Mr. Hyde died of excited delirium, not of being zapped with a Taser.

Yeah, because you hear about so many people dying of excited delirium while they’re not in police custody, right?

When I was a bit younger, I used to have really bad PMS. It was probably bad enough to be diagnosed as PMDD, but if anybody ever did diagnose me as such, they didn’t tell me. Every time I attempted suicide, I think it was just before or during my period. The worst thing about it was that my period was also extremely irregular, so I never even knew when the PMS was coming. Although there was a good side to that, too — I’d suddenly become intensely suicidal, but when my period would come, I’d be so relieved to know that there was a concrete reason for my mood, I wasn’t “going crazy” again, and I’d be feeling better in a few days. That’s an amazing sense of relief to have.

This was a major issue for me until I started taking the birth control pill. I wanted to start taking it a few years before I actually did, but I couldn’t find a doctor who would prescribe it for me. The reason? I was on Topamax, and Topamax can sometimes make oral contraceptives less effective. This only holds true if you’re on 200 mg or more daily, and I think I was on 100 mg at the time, but who’s counting?

How did I eventually get prescribed oral contraceptives? Well, one day I went to a clinic to get the morning after pill (yes, we’d been using protection, but we had a condom breakage issue) and when the doctor was asking me some questions, I told her that this was the third or fourth occasion that I’d taken emergency contraceptives (over a span of three years).

She said, “Polly, Polly, Polly, what are we going to do with you?”

She had never seen me before in her life.

I said, “Well, for starters, somebody could prescribe me the birth control pill!”

And so she did. Yes, she knew that I was taking Topamax and that it could make the Pill less effective. I should point out that the other doctors I’d asked about birth control had all been male.

I never took the morning after pill again. I have never been pregnant. A couple years later, I stopped taking Topamax.

I know that oral contraceptives cause really bad mood swings in some women, but they actually help prevent them for me. It’s also nice having my menstrual cycle regulated, so that I know when a possible time of PMS is coming up. On the other hand, since I now only rarely get depressed and irritable before I get my period, there’s still that element of surprise. If I’ve gone for many months without PMS, I’m not expecting it to happen.

Which is why last week, I spent a couple of days feeling like I wanted to go lie down in traffic, but was cheered up when I realized that I only felt that was because of PMS. Then I got a little too cheered up, because I had an insomnia thing going on, and I got hypomanic. I was so jumpy and hyper that I was seriously afraid that I was going to have to call in sick to work one day because of it. I had a cup of coffee the day before, like an idiot — I try not to drink coffee at all normally, and when I’m hypomanic, coffee is an incredibly bad idea. IT MAKES MY BRAIN FEEL LIKE IT IS JUMPING UP AND DOWN. AND IT MAKES ME FEEL LIKE EVERY NERVE IN MY BODY IS JUMPING UP AND DOWN INSIDE MY SKIN, TOO. And that’s actually a lot of fun, even if my pitiful, inaccurate attempts to describe it make it sound uncomfortable. The uncomfortable part comes because I. Can’t. Keep. Still. and any situation that would require me to stay still is horrible for me. If I’ve got free rein to climb on stuff and do whatever I want, then it’s tons of fun.

You see why this might be a problem when I’m at work, though.

I guess caffeine does this to a lot of people, but if you are not manic-depressive, I don’t think that ONE CUP OF COFFEE can make you feel like this for TWELVE HOURS STRAIGHT before you start to come down a little.

Anyway, I somehow started feeling a lot more subdued, and I was able to go to work, and it was all good.

Um, I have no idea where I was going with this. I’m still a wee bit on the hypomanic side, but not in a bad way. Oh, yeah. I wanted to mention that although I don’t eat as well as I should, for a long time now I’ve been doing really well at trying to make sure my sleep schedule is as regular as possible, because I know how important it is for me to sleep properly if I want to stay well.

Ha ha ha, I’m standing up at the computer again because I’m still not so awesome with the sitting still. Sit down, you.

Anyway, my sleep being messed up through no fault of my own and the subsequent consequences provided me with additional proof that I should definitely stick to a regular sleeping schedule. I’m so much more stable when I do. I know, duh, right? Although the insomnia wasn’t brought on by anything I did, for a few days I didn’t try hard enough to get my schedule back on track, and that only served to remind me that it is dumb not to try to get enough sleep. It is also dumb for me to oversleep, or to sleep at weird times, especially since I have a more-or-less nine-to-five kind of job.

I’m trying harder now, though. For really.

Hey, student nurse. Yes, you, the girl who recently did a rotation on a psychiatric ward. I don’t think that while you are riding on the bus, you are supposed to be telling detailed stories to your friend about the patients in the hospital. You know everybody else around you on the bus can hear you, too, right? But you don’t care at all, do you? Of course not. Most mental health workers I’ve seen don’t give a damn about patient confidentiality, so why should you be any different, student nurse? I bet you think that since you didn’t mention any names, everything is cool, right? Well, guess what. It’s not. By the way, those were human beings you were poking fun at. I understand that dark humour has a place among health care workers, to help them cope with the things they have to deal with in their work. That place is not on the bus, however.

Hey, guy from the bus a month or two ago. I overheard you when you were saying, “It seems like everybody I grew up with is dying. One guy died of a drug overdose. Another friend of mine killed herself in jail in Ontario.”

I wanted to say, “You were friends with Ashley Smith? Man, I’m so sorry about what happened to her.”

But, of course, I didn’t say anything.

It was a shock to hear the other day that Heath Ledger had died, seemingly due to an accidental or intentional overdose of pills. He was a talented actor, appeared to be a genuinely nice person, according to what his friends and neighbours said about him, and he had a two-year-old daughter he loved very much. I am also crass enough to mention that he was hot, although his death wouldn’t have been any less upsetting if he hadn’t been attractive.

It’s strange that when someone dies and nobody knows whether it’s suicide or an accident, most people’s immediate response is, I sure hope it wasn’t suicide. I’m not sure it’s any less sad if someone who definitely doesn’t want to die suddenly winds up dead. It’s easy enough to think of reasons behind this knee-jerk reaction, though, and here are a few:

• Suicide is considered a major taboo.
• It’s very uncomfortable to think of someone who is suffering and unhappy before they die, and more pleasant to think of them as having had a pleasant and rosy life up until their death.
• People feel that it’s something someone should have seen coming and been able to stop, unlike a freak accident that might have been less easy to predict.
• In a case like this, where it’s somebody who Had It All, you know that this guy had talent, money, fame, good looks, and a child he cared about, and still might have been depressed enough to purposely end his life, and you wonder what the hell kind of chance any of the rest of us have of being okay.

Anyway, suicide or accident, it’s still a tragedy.

Here’s another one for the “What the Hell Is WRONG With People?” file. I’m not sure there’s much point in linking to this entire article, since it’s from the Saint John Telegraph-Journal, and Canadaeast.com doesn’t seem to keep archived newspaper articles online for a very long time, but here you go. It’s about a New Brunswick teenager who committed suicide in an Ontario prison.

Mentally ill Moncton teenager Ashley Smith, whose death in a segregation cell in an Ontario prison a month ago has sparked several investigations, was often kept in restraints with her cuffed hands chained to a body belt that was attached by another chain to her shackled ankles, Canadaeast News Service has learned.

“We are well aware that these restraints were quite often used in the staff interventions with Ashley Smith,” said Kim Pate, a specialist in prison law and advocate for female offenders.

The restraints may have violated Smith’s human rights and raise questions about why she was in a prison at all, said Pate, national director of the Canadian Association of Elizabeth Fry Societies.

“I can’t imagine a scenario where it wouldn’t violate her human rights, and even if the correctional service perceived it as lawful in order to protect her from self-harm, if they felt the need to use it in segregation, she should have been sent for a full psychiatric assessment,” said Pate, who knew Smith and last saw her alive less than a month before her apparent suicide Oct. 19 in the Grand Valley Institution for Women in Kitchener, Ont.

Ashley Smith committed suicide by asphyxiation in her cell. Several prison staff members are facing charges of criminal negligence causing death, others are being suspended without pay, a new warden has been appointed, and a number of official investigations are being conducted, but it’s all too late for Ashley.

Smith’s odyssey through the prison system began when she went to the Miramichi Youth Detention Centre as a 15-year-old who had thrown apples at a postal worker. The offences that led to an accumulated six-year, one-month sentence were nearly all committed while she was incarcerated, says Pate, who is speaking publicly on behalf of Smith’s parents. Smith’s convictions were for assaulting a peace officer, falsely reporting a fire, uttering threats, theft and assault.

Yes, you read that right. This kid first went to jail for throwing apples at someone. And then it seems that she just didn’t get out. Almost all of her offences were committed while she was in jail, and her sentence just got longer. I can’t say that nobody tried to rehabilitate her, but I can say that it obviously didn’t work. They must have given up on the rehabilitation idea eventually, though, since soon Ashley Smith was spending up to 23 hours a day in segregation.

From an article in the Globe and Mail:

At the time of her death, Ms. Smith was on suicide watch, which called for her to be under constant surveillance, both by prison guards and by a set of video cameras. Her psychological breakdown was not a surprise: For nearly two years, Ms. Smith had been confined to segregation cells, where she lived alone, in conditions that appalled the few outsiders who knew about them.

“Her human rights and her Charter rights were violated,” said Kim Pate… “She was being treated in ways that were inhumane.”

Ms. Smith spent time in several institutions. One of them was in Saskatchewan; a male guard there was later charged with assaulting her. Ms. Pate visited Ms. Smith several times, and complained to prison officials, apparently to no avail. The last visit was on Sept. 24, when Ms. Pate saw Ms. Smith in a bare concrete cell at Grand Valley. Ms. Smith had no shoes, and her only clothing was a security gown, a prison garment that looked like a horse blanket. Ms. Smith’s mattress had been taken away, forcing her to sleep on a concrete slab. There was no blanket.

In Ms. Pate’s view, Ms. Smith was spiralling downward, trapped in a cycle of self-defeating rage against the institution, which reacted with punishments and deprivations.

“She was cold, and she was quite distressed,” Ms. Pate said. “She had been that way for several days when I saw her. Anyone being treated in that way, if they did not have mental-health issues, certainly would have developed them.”

After a suicide in the prison in 2004, an inquest was conducted and recommendations were made to prevent further suicides from occurring. A couple of these recommendations were followed. Others weren’t. A team of British prison inspectors also advised the prison to stop shackling women in leg irons, and this recommendation wasn’t followed, either.

From the Telegraph-Journal article:

CTV News, citing unnamed sources, reported last week that guards had watched her place a ligature around her neck but did not intervene immediately, believing she was not seriously harming herself.

“Rather than receiving treatment, this mentally unstable teenager spent most of her sentence in segregation,” [Kitchener-area Liberal MP Karen] Redman said in question period. “Segregation cannot be confused with treatment.

“The government has ignored several reports calling for a mental health strategy in our prisons. When will the government take action and implement a mental health strategy in Canadian prisons?”

Not that I’ve got a mental health strategy for Canadian prisons up my sleeve, but I think it’s pretty obvious that forcing a suicidal girl, prisoner or no, to sleep on a concrete slab in solitary confinement isn’t going to turn her into a productive member of society.

Speaking of productive members of society, I am working normal hours again and will finally have time to regularly update this blog.

Seven years ago today, I almost died. It was my most serious suicide attempt, and it was almost successful. Assuming you’re using the ludicrous terminology that equates being dead as being a success at something.

Today, I am employed in my chosen career field. I have two university degrees, a long-term boyfriend, and friends. I get along with my family most of the time. I have hobbies I enjoy. I am stable on low dosages of medication with no noticeable side effects. I no longer cut myself, hear voices, or spend all day sleeping. I am happy.

So there. I win.

I’m going to assume without even checking that everyone in various mental health blog circles has read this story already. The original article was published five days ago, which in Internet time is the equivalent of about eight thousand years. I link to things I find interesting more so that I can find them again if I want to than to point them out to other people. I don’t actually want to think about this ever again because it makes me feel sick, but unfortunately it’s not the kind of thing that anybody can afford to ignore. I have way too many things to do right now to take the time to make any kind of thoughtful commentary, and really, I’m glad about that, because I suspect that words would fail me if I tried to say anything about this unfathomable cruelty.

Oh, and if you want to know the name of the vile excuse for a human being who emotionally tortured Megan Meier, you can find it in the comments on this post. Her address and phone number are there, too… that is, if she hasn’t changed her number already.

Never thought I’d see the day that I’d consider myself lucky that when I was thirteen, the ex-friend who bullied me told me to my face that I should kill myself. But I got through stuff like that much better than I think I would have if her mother had also been fucking with my mind, too.