Coming Out Crazy

I have a mental illness.

I have struggled with depression since I was 15 years old. That's more than half my life. I take medication for my illness, and I have a self-care regimen that plays an important role in keeping me healthy.

Over the course of my life, I have had a number of depressive episodes. I have been hospitalized for depression. I have self-harmed. I have taken sick leave from work. I have sought and received professional help. I have done really, really stupid things when the crazy has come to call. But I have fought through the dark and come into the light.

These days, I am happier far more often than I am sad. I struggle in the winter, and always will. I will always take medication - I have tried going off it, with poor results. But I am safe, I am happy, and I know how to take care of myself.

Despite it all, I wouldn't change my past. The crazy, as much as it has been terrifying, debilitating, overwhelming and, well, crazy, has made me so much stronger. By getting help, I wasn't just helping myself deal with a specific depressive episode, but I was building a toolbox of coping skills and techniques that have helped me to get through struggles that would have otherwise crippled me. I have come out of it all a better, stronger person.

Mental illness is more common than you may think. And it's nothing to be ashamed of. The Royal Ottawa's mental illness awareness campaign is called You Know Who I Am. And you do. But the best part of my journey is that now I can say that I know who I am. I know who I am, and I love who I am.

To anyone who is in the thick of it: you are not alone. Keep persevering, keep seeking and getting help, keep pushing through the dark. Because the light on the other side will eventually show you how incredible you are.

The Kanawana Crazies

I could write a book about my relationship with Kamp Kanawana, much less an blog entry. In my head, it's become so much more than it ever was, but I should begin with what it is.

It's a YMCA summer camp located near St. Sauveur in the Laurentians. I spent seven summers there as a camper (sorry, a kamper), from the time I was eight to the time I was fifteen years old. Members of my family were involved with Kanawana for years. My father was a camper and a ranger there. My aunt and uncle were the camp doctor and nurse in the 1960s. Many of my cousins began as campers, and moved on to become staff. My sister did the same, with her final year as CIT director in 1993.

Kanawana played a huge role in who I used to be. It still plays a role in who I am. I have some fantastic memories from my summers there. It's a place I felt at home. It's a place I always looked forward to going - it often got me through the school year - and a place I was always devastated to leave. It's where I learned to love nature. It was where I had my first kiss. It was where I learned to sing like nobody was listening. It was where I formed some really special friendships.

Unfortunately for me, the last summer I was there, The Crazy had come crashing down on me during the previous school year. And I brought it with me to kamp. I didn't just pack it along and take it with me - I waved that sucker around for all to see. It was fairly typical 15-year-old angst (I write dark poetry! I dress in black! I cut myself! LOOK! I take PROZAC!) but it didn't belong in the forest of my childhood, and that was likely a big part of the reason I didn't get hired on as a counselor in training the following summer. That was a devastating blow for me, as I didn't get to say goodbye to Kanawana on my own terms. I felt like I'd been exiled, and it was pretty heartbreaking.

Over the last 15 years or so, I have often had dreams about Kanawana. Sometimes, I'm my current age, they won't hire me on as a counselor, but I've somehow been allowed to be a camper again for one more summer. All my friends are staff members, looking curiously at the 33-year-old trying to hide among the 15-year-old girls. Sometimes, I dream that I have come back for visiting day, but the whole place has drastically changed. Nothing is the same, and I feel lost and confused. Other times, I dream perfectly normal dreams that just happen to take place at Kanawana.

But my favourite dreams are the ones where it's a gorgeous sunny day, I jump off the dock into the lake, and I swim underwater for what feels like forever. I can see the sun streaming into the lake above me, I feel energized and refreshed, and I come up for air laughing.

Kanawana and I have recently come to terms with each other. It feels nice. Because, after all, wherever you go and whatever you do, you'll always be a Kanawanian.

(Originally posted here.) 

Oh, crazy. There you are.

In the past week or so, the crazy showed up. Of course, I didn't realize it was the crazy - I just thought everyone was judging me, that people were purposely pissing me off, and that I just wasn't good enough for anyone. 

Then, yesterday, while I was steaming about something Bundy had done several days ago to piss me off, I suddenly asked myself, "Yumi, why aren't you able to let this GO?" And it dawned on me that perhaps, just maybe, the crazy was here. 

Well, considering that on December 24, I was royally pissed off at Mark and Janine for having the temerity to go out of town for Christmas to visit their families, it is in fact possible that the crazy had showed up. 

I was *so* angry all the time. If I wasn't angry, I was filled with anxiety. Christmas Day was, I'm sorry to say, not fantastic for me. It was great to see Moe enjoying his first Christmas, but I spent a lot of time feeling judged and just not good enough. 

Shortly after asking myself what the hell my damage was, it occurred to me that maybe I was dealing with some hormonal changes related to weaning. So I asked Google. 

And Google answered. 

Let me be clear - I didn't enter into weaning without doing my research. I read about the best ways to wean, the physical risks associated with weaning, signs and symptoms of mastitis, etc. NOWHERE did it mention that weaning could bring the crazy, and especially the crazy in someone with a history of depression. Some of the reading I did mentioned that I might feel kind of sad about losing this connection. Nobody said anything about turning into a freaking nutcase. 

But it makes sense. I often feel best in the morning, when my breasts are fullest. I still nurse him first thing in the morning, and once during the day. I am happiest after these feedings. This morning, around 11am, I felt the crazy spiraling. What on earth was wrong with me? I'm lackin' prolactin. 

If I had known the risks, I'd have gone about the process much, much more slowly. And right now, I'm not taking any further steps to eliminate those last two feedings. I just have to make sure I have a back-up bottle for the one during the day - I often don't have enough.

I have been so unhappy about weaning that it crossed my mind several times in the past week or so to just stop, to go back to pumping to increase my milk supply again, and to just keep nursing for a while longer. Sure, maybe I could even pump at work and keep this up once my leave is over. But you know what? I have to wean him sometime. And I've begun. And it isn't fair to change the rules on him now. Besides, it won't be any easier the next time. 

In the meantime, it's nice to know a) the crazy is here and the world isn't out to get me, b) *why* the crazy is suddenly here, and c) that my husband and family support me in my quest to beat the crazy down. 

I was telling Bundy and my mom that I figured out that the crazy was here, and they were both staring at me as if to say, as politely as possible, "DUH." Yeah, THEY knew something was wrong. I didn't - I just thought everyone was suddenly being an asshole. 

It hasn't been this bad since I was on Clomid. I didn't have the crazy when I was pregnant. I was a bit more emotional, but I know how to deal with that. I did have it in those first three days postpartum, but I knew it was coming and was able to accept that yep, this was what I'd been warned about. 

So, yeah. The crazy is here. But I know it will get better.