icecreammeltsinc-blog

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No Call, No Show

I can't believe I'm saying this.

I'm boycotting therapy. Me. The biggest advocate of therapy and counseling and psychology in general. I can't do it. And I know it's only hurting me but let me tell you why....

So my dad has been sick for going on two years. He's a lymphoma patient at the Blood and Marrow Transplant Group (BMT) at Northside Hospital in Atlanta. This past May, he received a stem cell transplant. For some time following the transplant and subsequent treatment, he seemed to be doing fine so they released him to his Kaiser Permanente oncologist. One day, when he felt not so great he went to Kaiser and they immediately sent him to Northside. He was admitted back as a patient with BMT and is undergoing further treatment for his lymphoma there.

I have been sick for as long as I can remember. I was diagnosed with depression in 2006, and most recently with bipolar disorder in 2010. I was being seen weekly at Atlanta Comprehensive Neuropsychology in Marietta, Ga for about a year. I seemed to be progressing so my doctor thought it would be okay to reduce my visits to every other week. When life happened and my schedule got crazy, I began missing appointments and eventually stopped scheduling them.

One could say, okay..... you stopped making appointments so you can't blame anyone but yourself. And I get that. But time has shown that I turn away from my regular activities when my mental health takes a turn for the worst. If anyone, my therapist would know that. I never received a "hey we haven't seen you in a while" call. Or a "just checking on you." Or anything. Of course, my mental health is my responsibility but the point of me building this relationship is to have accountability, someone to decrease my visits when I'm well and increase them again when I'm suffering. But the honest truth is, with my history, I could be dead and the person I paid weekly to save me let me go without a fight.

I didn't realize how frustrated I was until it was time for my annual lady parts exam and I received a call reminding me. Then, at the time for my teeth cleaning I received a postcard. And, as my dad battles cancer and follow up appointments are set for 100 day checks and six month visits, I remember, mental illness is STILL not treated the same as any other illness. Even professionals in the mental health field are feeding the stigma that mental health is not as important as physical health.

Is there not someone at the practice who noticed my name go missing? Or my face? Or my time slot empty? Is it all about money and as soon as mine wasn't coming in, I wasn't a priority? Is there no scheduling department or personnel who keep up with patients? Did my own therapist, who I shared everything with, never think to reach out? Am I a lost cause because this is incurable?Does this seem wrong to anyone else? Or am I being "CRAZY?"

As someone who fights with and for mental health every day, I try to never compare two things. Two illnesses. Two injuries. Two people. Two events. So I'm not saying that having bipolar disorder is worse or better than cancer by any means. My only hope is to bring to light how mental illness is an illness. Psychologists are doctors. And I was a patient.

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Small Victories

Have you ever been in a neighborhood so nice that the fire station looks like a magazine- worthy, immaculate structure? Communities of endless gated homes, kids riding bikes, and parents running the neighborhood with dog in tow, is the American dream. You can feel the financial stability and top tier school system as you smell the fresh cut grass with checkerboard design (that in lower income neighborhoods is somehow not possible).

For the past three days, I’ve found myself having to drive through the upper echelon Atlanta neighborhoods for one reason or another. With these not being areas I frequent it caught my attention that my new routes were taking me out of my norm. I love the scenery and am always thankful for the smooth roads. But as I listened to my highly appropriate “A-List Pop” playlist I wondered, what brought me this way? My friends and errands and daily plans have not changed, yet my route has.

All I can chalk it up to is I attracted myself to these places. I’ve been working hard to manifest the things I really want into my life. I recite affirmations daily about my spiritual life, relationships, finances, mental health and general wellbeing. I mean I definitely haven’t attracted myself enough money to buy these homes but it sure is a small victory to change my surroundings for the afternoon.

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August. It's like the Sunday of Summer

Since my freshman year of college, I have been continuously enlightened as to why grade school is structured the way it is. 8am to 3pm is a good time to learn and focus before everything else in your day takes over. Extra curricular activities in the afternoon are added incentive to make it through the day, kinda like the more grown up “Happy Hour”. And after summer there is a reboot where everything begins again and you grow to see another grade and new challenges.

Today starts the annual August cleanse. It's quite strange how year after year it comes at the perfect time. Why August? Maybe because summer is over. Maybe because we still have time to make something of our year but we had better do it fast. It’s like New Years but less resolution-y and more remove the negative to welcome the positive.

It began as time for me and my roommate to buckle down and make some changes in our lives. More God, no social media, less drinking and partying, and more purpose driven activities. How ironic that this year as we begin, Atlanta Public Schools also welcomes students back on August 1st. Perfect time for me to buy a new planner and some new reading material.

Being in our third year, recently single and in the midst of reading Destiny by T.D. Jakes, I am more than ready to walk in my purpose and fall more in love with myself. As I sit listing my tasks in my new planner I am so hopeful that this August is a time to put on my back to school clothes, buy new notebooks, and become my best self!

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13 Reasons Why is Accurate And Its Criticisms Are Too

At work, I notice over a man’s shoulder that he is watching 13 Reasons Why on his iPad. Having just finished the last episode and associated special, I tapped him and asked what episode he is on. As I asked, I saw one of the graphic content warnings which let me know he was towards the end. He told me he’s been hooked. He was returning home from a trip to Mexico and had been binge watching since the flight down. I could relate.

This show captivated me. It is so relatable and heartbreaking and powerful. Being seven years post suicide attempt myself, I can watch it as a show; as a work of fiction. I think the series did justice to the way things seem to the suicidal person. The topics and interactions, although deep, are very true to today’s high school experience. But I can’t help but wonder if I were back in school or back in that dark place how the series would have effected me. Would I have felt that suicide was my only way out? Would I compare my life to Hannah’s? Or would I have noticed the pain it caused every other character and prevented my family and friends from experiencing that?

When I was released from Ridgeview Institute’s day program in 2010, souped up on meds and with a new diagnosis of bipolar disorder, I had the rest of the semester off from school with nothing to do except watch The Soap Network. I found myself hooked on One Tree Hill…. until the most pivotal episode in the series. (Long story short) A student holds his fellow classmates hostage, draws their attention to the bullying and loneliness he felt from those who were previously his friends, and shoots himself. From the day I saw this on, I had constant anxiety and nightmares. I would continue to watch One Tree Hill at 2 & 3pm and otherwise hide in my room until my mother returned from work. I was addicted to watching the pain and drama that was the aftermath of the suicide yet being recently treated for my own suicide attempt, it terrified me. It was a glimpse into what could have been my story.

One day, I had gotten myself so worked up thinking about guns and death and crime that I was convinced someone was out to get me. I called my best friends dad who was at home around the corner and asked him to come check things out at my house. I had developed so much anxiety and paranoia that I, at twenty years old, could not be home alone. I began going to work with my best friends mom everyday which made it impossible for me to continue the show and eventually I was back to normal.

I disagree with the notion that it glamorizes suicide. I think it does something else to haunt people who are already afraid of their own thoughts. When you are at war with your own mind you have to be cautious of what outside noise you are exposed to.

All of that to say, I can understand the criticism the series receives. Are adolescents who are sneaking to watch the series, due to parental warnings sent out by many school systems, going to now turn around and admit they have disobeyed their parents in an attempt to discuss what is bothering them?

Still, 13 Reasons Why is a catalyst to opening the much needed conversation surrounding suicide. For example, I never would have had any substantial conversation with this man on the plane, outside of “peanuts, pretzels, or cookies,” had it not been for this show.

[icecreammeltsinc-blog]

I'm a Barbie Girl, In A Scary World

Beyond scary almost.

For the past two years, my roommate and I take the month of August to cleanse ourselves of bad habits, destructive thinking, and social media. We add and subtract from our lives as needed to enhance our productivity, build our relationships with God and ourselves, and in doing so get closer to reaching our full potential.

Great idea right? Of course.

So August 1st, I bought a composition book and began to outline my month. I drew a calendar to keep up with regular life events and my work schedule. I wrote out all the personal goals of my cleanse: to pray every morning and evening, read my bible, workout three times a week, journal daily, meditate for ten minutes a day, network with two professionals in my field a week, brainstorm ideas for my nonprofit for an hour a day, talk to my brother more, no social media, no drinking before 8pm, no unnecessary spending, and write one blog a week. It was a great feeling to add some needed structure to my life (which as of lately has become a clusterfuck of emotional meltdowns and mindless decisions).

As the week got underway, I quickly realized that the only goal I had set that was causing me anxiety was my blog. I would write half a paragraph about a topic and then be over it. I could not get over this hump to write a piece worth something. No matter how much dialogue I can have on mental health, I could not put the words together when it came time to write.

So I had to look at myself and ask why can’t you do this? Why is this so hard? Why did you even want to write a blog a week?

Oh duh! It’s 2016. Nothing I do is validated without publishing it for the world to see. It’s funny that I do everything else on my list without the slightest desire to snapchat my run, or tweet a bible verse, or post a pic of me meeting with potential business partners. I have truly only been productive in focusing on what I’m actually doing and not what people will think of it. I have found a place that not many young adults can find in the current social environment; I do not care what anyone thinks of what I’m doing. Letting people in by writing this blog is the equivalent to breaking my meditation to swat a fly. An annoyance.

On the other hand I do want to use blogging as an outlet to express my thoughts and my experiences and my life; but must I do this at the expense of my new found clarity?

No. I can not. I will not. I won’t write for the sake of just writing. If I don’t write a blog a week, I was not moved to write a blog a week. I want people to see me in my blogs. I want people to learn something from my blogs. I want people to relate to my blogs. If I write about things that mean something to me, I will have no choice but to be an influential blogger. (Im feeling real Kanye about blogging.)

Basically….. I should have never committed to writing one blog a week lol! The pressure of knowing this would be the one thing that others would know if I accomplished took away the fulfillment of accomplishing it. Social media is where we go for validation, for likes, for comments, but I have to see it as a tool to get my message out. I have to change my thoughts about social media to make social media work for me.

So as I saved my writing drafts about mental illness in the media, perception versus reality, and therapy for those without mental illnesses, I realized the only topic for me to blog about was blogging itself.

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My August Cleanse. I will not neglect this page but for this month there is no @sea_haze I need to be more focused, more productive, more motivated, and more mindful of the person I intend to be! Join me and create your own cleanse or sit back and watch the growth that will come from this! Either way my life depends on me.... #ThinkAboutIt #AugustCleanse #LivingWithMentalIllness

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#MondayMeltdown Run Club was super successful. We talked resentment, relocation, balance, parenting, self-care, judgement... Sooo many topics and (I'll speak for myself) I left feeling so refreshed and clear! Next dates coming soon! Stay tuned! (at Piedmont Park)

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#BrandsBuildingBrands a remarkable experience! Growing with, uplifting, and spotlighting other businesses in Atlanta! Thank you @j_curtthepr for challenging me to speak up and promote my brand. And Thank you @color_my_story for this awesome event, the exposure and donation, but mostly for believing in a cause that's so important to me! (at Coze Event Space)

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World Bipolar Day project. March 30: The birthday of Vincent Van Gogh who was posthumously diagnosed with Bipolar Disorder. #copingskills #painting #travel #WorldBipolarDay #SuicidePrevention #MentalHealthAwareness

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2016 Resolution: Give Up Grudges ✔️ #MELTnegativity #GameChanger #Forgiveness #YouAreABadass #Mindfulness #BeInThePresent #ForgiveThePast #Done (at Minneapolis–Saint Paul International Airport)

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#SelfInjuryAwarenessDay #SelfHarm #SuicidePrevention #MentalHealth #IceCreamMELTs #PositiveAffirmations #MELTnegativity #Smile #FreshStart #March #SelfLove (at Indianapolis, Indiana)

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6th Life-iversary!!!! Yall. You learn so much from yourself. Your own growth. Your own circumstances. Your own relationships. Your own feelings... That in the end you can't help but be a greater you than yesterday! Here's to being the January 14, 2016 version of me!!!! #tbt (at Charleston Cruise Port)

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Just because you can't see the pain, doesn't mean it doesn't exist.

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Wine Down Wednesday #TheGivers at @erosolakadepartmentstore tmrw!!! @shellynicole is bringing together @iamrobowens of @pwapinc | @mrbmb of @hashtaglunchbagatlanta | and myself to talk about our nonprofits! Canned goods for free admission!!! Get in the giving spirit with #ShellyNicole

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I'll Fly Away

Working in close quarters, you often hear conversations that were not meant for your ears. I’m standing outside of the cockpit during boarding on a flight, when the copilot begins telling the first officer of a mothers suicide in his area. Supposedly, the woman, who had five children and a husband drove to a Georgia lake about 2 hours outside of Atlanta and shot herself. The copilot mentioned that it is unusual for a woman to shoot themselves, as more men are mentally capable of such. That was the last statement of the conversation that I was able to stomach.

He went on to explain that the family decided to not tell the children the truth about their mothers suicide but they made it seem like a tragic passing. They had a large funeral and everyone else in the room was made uncomfortable by the story they were insinuating for the children’s sake. The pilot chimes in that he would tell his children the truth and not have a big service and celebration of life. He asked how she could do that to her children.

I don’t have children and I can’t say what I would ever do in this situation BUT is her life not worth celebrating? Was her passing not tragic? What did she do to her children???

If anything she suffered and probably showed show much strength for so long only so her children wouldn’t feel her pain. I’m not implying that she did her children a favor by leaving them motherless or her husband a widower. Suicide is always selfish. She coped the best way she knew how but to those who don’t suffer that makes no sense. And it won’t.

I have the conversation often where people say “I’ve thought about killing myself but then I realize all I have to live for.” Imagine being in a place where you can’t realize those things. Imagine waking up and not thinking of one reason to live. I agree it’s selfish. But that’s the difference between mental illness and mental health. You’re not going to understand.

Respectfully Mr. Pilot and Copilot, I can’t say anything because I’m eavesdropping (lol) but keep us alive in the air and leave making sense of life on the ground to the professionals, and stick to flying planes.

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Sharing your story is breaking the silence and breaking the silence leads to healing , hope and change.

Be Brave and Get Help, but it begins by telling someone . (via asuperhumanlife)

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Go forth and take it on! I love you!