Month: July 2016

The Rehab Diaries Redux – Week 3

Mac the Disordered rehab diaries , , , , , ,

I’m home now so this will be an account of my final week in hospital.

My regular doctor came back and was not impressed with the medication change imposed by the other one. She removed the diazepam and changed the fluoxetine to 15 mg instead of 20.  This means I need to split the tablet into quarters as it only comes in 20s, which I have been trying to do on my own with not much success.  I need to find one of those pill cutter things.

I feel like my mood resolved a bit but my activity hit a low. All I did from when I got up at 3am (yes that’s still happening) to dinner time is watch Dragonball Z.  Anyone familiar with Dragonball Z knows there’s enough of it to sustain my inactivity marathon for weeks.  I find myself getting frustrated with it though – it’s so drawn out.  I can watch the same fight go on for about ten episodes and still not have closure.

Maybe next admission I’ll get into Bleach, ha. You won’t see me for months.

The dietician I’ve been seeing outpatient also works for this hospital so I had an appointment with him this week to get a free one in. He tried to encourage me to exercise – I’ve still been playing sport but in hospital they have a gym which I could be using but I’m not.  Would rather be watching Dragonball Z.

We also talked about something that has been concerning me, maintaining a healthy diet when I move in with my boyfriend. Our eating habits go to shit when we’re together – we hardly ever cook, we snack together watching tv and tend to influence each other’s drinking habits.  The solution, we agreed was to start cooking more.  He promised to bring me some print outs of healthy recipes for our next session.

I only went to two group therapy sessions this week. One was a dietician’s group in which I encountered more judgement from other patients but this time I wasn’t keeping quiet.  It happened during this exchange, where this girl who was about my age asked the dietician if walking was good exercise to lose weight:

Dietician: Well, all physical activity is good, but to lose weight you need to do something that gets your heart rate up.

Girl: Well I can’t go to the gym, they’re too intimidating. And who plays team sports at my age?

Me: Excuse me, I do.

*cue crickets*

Dietician: Yeah and Mac plays a very interesting team sport, don’t you Mac?

I told her what it was (a contact sport) and still she had nothing to say. The other patients took over with the usual comments I get for disclosing that I play that sport “wow you must be so tough!” etc.  But I didn’t hear from that girl for the rest of the group.

The other group I went to was another addictions group. I was hoping that the people who were in it the week before would be there so I could tell them what a bunch of dickheads they were but didn’t go.  Instead it seemed to be a bunch of patients who were just there for something to do.  I got sick of them asking too many self serving, irrelevant questions and walked out.

Well I’ve been willing to give my therapist a chance even though we have bad chemistry but in our final session of the admission she convinced me that I never want to work with her again. The session lasted 15 minutes and she spent it telling me how difficult I have been to work with and that I should seriously reconsider trying to get a job in admin because I’m too socially inept for it.  I challenged her to give me an example of a job that didn’t have face to face contact and she couldn’t.  I don’t know what she expects me to do, just sit at home watching Dragonball Z all day for the rest of my life?

I understand that, as someone on the spectrum, my personal presentation can sometimes leave a bit to be desired. But I would have thought that a psychology professional would have the knowledge to be accommodating of that.  I’ve worked with many therapists over my several admissions at that hospital and we’ve made great progress despite my being ‘difficult.’  Unfortunately she pulled this one after my last session with my doctor so I won’t be able to complain about it for a long time.

My discharge went smoothly. They gave me my papers over breakfast and I had them signed and handed back immediately.  The hard part is waiting around for my medication and scripts, which can take hours, but only took half an hour that day.  Then my boyfriend took me home and I arrived ready to face life sober.

Until I get admitted again (so ages away hopefully)

 

Mac

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The Rehab Diaries Redux – Week 2

Mac the Disordered rehab diaries , , , , , , ,

We’ve reached the end of week two. The original plan was for me to go home after two weeks but considering I’m still fantasising about nailing myself with vodka as soon as I go home I decided to stay on for another week at least.

I have still been feeling low and unmotivated. I am supposed to be looking for work but I haven’t been motivated to do that.  I have a recruitment company looking for work for me and they got me a job interview that I had to go on leave for.  Obviously if I got the job I would have to discharge myself, but I didn’t.  They couldn’t give me any feedback except to say that I interviewed well but they needed to cull some applicants.  The whole thing sapped my mood even more.

The AWS assessments seem to have stopped. I was told at the beginning that I would be breathalysed after going on leave but that hasn’t happened yet.  I haven’t got any of the withdrawal symptoms mentioned in the assessment but I’m told feeling low can be one.

My regular doctor went away and I have been seeing the same one I saw when she went away during my last admission. Previously I’ve been frustrated with him because he has a conservative approach to treatment and is hesitant to make any changes but this time he put my antidepressant up when I told him I’d been feeling low and prescribe 2mg of diazepam to combat any agitation that might cause.

He also pointed out that this is a regular private mental health facility; there is no alcohol specific programs. We discussed whether my aim is to cut down or stop completely and I said I wanted to cut down if I could; I wasn’t ready to cut it out.  He said that most alcohol programs are abstinence focussed, and I need to look at controlled drinking programs.

I continue to fight with myself to eat properly. The food is heavy and often unappetising and so far I have gained 2kg in here despite sometimes only eating a bread roll for dinner.  The 5pm dinner time is still throwing me off.  I’m lucky that my boyfriend is here most nights to take me out for dinner.  Come to think of it, that could be responsible for the weight gain.

Sleeping has been surprisingly easy; I usually take two hours to fall asleep after taking my night meds but here I have been falling asleep after only one, despite having a room across from the dining room where most of the patients hang out at night and make the most noise. Only problem is, I have been waking up early.  Like, really early.  I wait until 6 to eat then take my meds with food, as advised, and fall asleep at 7.  When I do this at home I will wake up at 5 or 6am but here I have been waking up at 3am.  All I can do is get out my headphones and watch the tv shows my bf downloaded onto the computer for me.

I have been making myself go to group therapy to fill in time because left to my own devices I would just watch my shows all day.  Trouble is I have heard most of them before and end up sitting there bored out of my mind and getting annoyed with the other patients oversharing or interrupting with their ‘hilarious’ comments.

There was an addiction specific group and I thought I’d go along to that, but I left feeling more annoyed than ever. The other group members were very judgemental – one guy was a former smoker and said that all smokers are losers.  That’s right.  He came to an addiction group and called people with addictions losers.  Are.  You.  Fucking.  Kidding.  Me.  I wish I had said something but I was to appalled at the time.

Another girl who was there because she was worried she had an addictive personality but no actual addictions (I wanted to shake her and tell her to get a grip) said that she didn’t want to associate with her friends because they drink and do drugs and she thinks they will ruin her reputation. Well how am I, a problem drinker, supposed to feel comfortable sharing after that?

I went over the session with my inpatient therapist who happened to be the same therapist running the group. She helped me realised that the underlying emotion to that annoyance was shame, and the comments from the other patients triggered that and made me shut down.

I’m still not sure about my connection with this therapist who I have never seen before this admission but apparently she is good for tackling addictive behaviours. I have had three sessions with her so far and I feel that I am opening up more but I still don’t have the same chemistry with her that I have had with others.

I will be seeing my regular doctor again next week and if all goes to plan I will be writing week three’s edition from home.

 

Mac

The Rehab Diaries Redux – Week 1

Mac the Disordered rehab diaries , , , , , ,

So I’ve been here a week and not much has happened. As I posted earlier we got off to a shit start when the admitting CMO fucked up my medication chart and it took an emergency phone call to my doctor to get me my regular meds.  She had to come in to the hospital the following day to change my chart to what it was supposed to be.  Next time I get admitted I will bring a list detailing exactly what I take morning and night in what strengths.

The changes to my chart must have rattled the staff too because for the next three days I was getting the wrong meds and sending them back. The other thing the CMO did to piss me off was to chart a new pill without telling me – a thiamine supplement.  This is apparently given to alcoholics to reduce the chance of brain damage leading to things like Korsakoff’s psychosis.  Not that I’m not happy to take it, I just don’t think it’s unreasonable to want to be informed of changes to my medication routine.

The staff have been doing the alcohol withdrawal quizzes with me but so far I haven’t experienced any of those insidious withdrawal symptoms. I was drinking a lot – think blacking out regularly a lot – but I guess I haven’t been doing it for long enough.

I was getting cravings though, and for very specific things. Like one morning at 6 am I was craving a long island iced tea of all things.  I’m not sure if I would have succumbed to that craving at home given the time of day, but that’s a dangerous thing to want.  I’m embarrassed to say that on my benders I would make myself two of those and go from there.

The other thing I want is vodka. I was getting that craving watching cartoons in the evening, when I would normally be drinking.  It was so strong I could half taste it.  I told my doctor about these cravings and she put me on naltrexone.  It’s a drug that won’t make me sick it I actually drink so it’s good for cutting down rather than cutting out.  She was worried it would make me sick but so far I’ve had no side effects, and no more cravings.

Even though the cravings are gone I still miss drinking. I told my doctor that I still have the attitude of “if I wasn’t here I could be drinking” and she told me that probably means I need to stay here for a few more weeks.  I’m not sure I can last here that long but we’ll see how we go.

I’m struggling a bit because of boredom. At home I was bored too because I’m unemployed at the moment but I have more limits on me here.  At home when boredom was getting to me I could get in my car and go to the shops or the beach.  Here I’m stuck unless someone takes me out.  My BF has tried to help by bringing a hard drive full of my favourite tv shows but you can only watch so much tv in a day.

I think the main reason I’m struggling is that I’m not really unwell. My mood is a little low, maybe from coming off alcohol, maybe from boredom but I’m not feeling distressed all the time like I have been on my previous admissions.  On all of them I have been starting new medication regimes and most of my time was spent sleeping off the side effects.  Now the only two new drugs I have don’t seem to have any side effects and I’m wide awake all day.

As per usual there are several group therapy programs a day going on here and I have been going to a few to fill in time but they’re a bit different to last time I was here; they are more discussion based and less skill based. I find them socially exhausting and I get uncomfortable when other patients overshare.

I’m trying to get used to the meal times here, particularly dinner which is at 5pm when I’ve barely digested my lunch. The food is very heavy so I try to go on leave for meals where I can.  My meds need to be taken soon after food; normally they give the night meds out at 8pm but I’ve been asking for mine at 6pm.  That means I go to bed at 8pm, which I don’t mind, but I’ve been waking up at 3 am when I would normally wake up at 6am at home when taking meds at the same time.

Not sure if it was my anxiety or my mania but I was a cantankerous bitch last time and literally everyone in the hospital annoyed me. Now that I’m not really unwell – except for the drinking thing – I find I’m more tolerant of the other patients.  There are a few that grate on me – like the one who’s singing loudly underneath my window right now – but not enough to waste my time thinking about.

My doctor has gone on leave starting yesterday so have to see a different one for the next ten days – although truthfully I don’t think I’ll last that long – the same one as I saw on my last admission when she went away. I’m apprehensive about what he will make of this new issue of mine as I found his approach a bit conservative last time.

And so I’ve made it one week without climbing the walls. I’ll be back next week detailing my experiences with this new doctor and group therapy.

 

Mac