I Have Hope Once More

Something you may not know about me is my daily struggle with mental illness.   I am diagnosed with schizoaffective disorder which is like being bipolar and schizophrenic at the same time.  You can read a bit more about my personal experience with it here on my associated content profile.  (Coming soon, waiting to be published). 

What it boils down to is this:  I've been very depressed (or the opposite, way too happy) and hearing voices, experiencing paranoia and bizarre thinking for many, many years.  Over thirty years, actually, and it's getting worse.  I am to the point where I feel there is no hope to get better and now that I'm going through menopause, it seems useless (to me, anyway).  I can't even help my kids through their troubles because I don't know how to get out of my own.  Daily suicidal ideations are not uncommon for me. 

Tonight, on PBS (Public Broadcasting) I saw a Dr Daniel Amen who wrote a book called "Change Your Brain" and "The Magnificent Mind".  Listening to this doctor has given me hope that I could find no where else.  My regular doctors have told me a gate has been opened that may never be closed, referring to my psychiatric symptoms.  In other words, all the medication in the world isn't going to make the voices go away or make me feel better.  Medication does help somewhat but the symptoms are bad enough that my quality of life is at an all time low.  Going into the hospital for intensive treatment used to help but no longer gives me the rest and help I need to feel better for a while.  Going to the hospital used to make me feel better but as soon as I was released and back into my home environment, everything would get bad again.  All the symptoms would resurface and before I knew it I was ready to check myself into the psych unit again for relief. 

Dr. Amen says there are things I can do to improve the functioning of my brain and one of the things that hit me was retraining (refurbishing) my basal ganglia which affects fear and anxiety in people.  Years ago I had a stroke and guess where it was?  My basal ganglia!  I try to remember if I had the fear and anxiety I have now, before my stroke but I can't remember.  (My memory is one of the things the stroke affected badly).

If I can retrain my brain and do things to help my brain be more healthy, maybe my symptoms will get better.  I don't expect them to go away completely but I can give it a good shot. 

Dr. Amen's website is here
You can find his books on Amazon, he's written many, all of them are not listed here.  If you want to see all the books this wonderful Doctor wrote, do a search in the Amazon search box (located on this page) and type in Dr. Daniel Amen.
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