THE POETRY OF PAIN

Poetry deals in the language of emotion and I have written a lot of poems when in the grips of a depression.  The following poems that I have written talk about emotional pain and feelings of suicide. This is not to suggest that I am recommending suicide, I am only expressing the way I feel sometimes, so that others can feel that they are not alone. If you feel suicidal please go to your mental health provider or your priest.

When Feelings Howl

By Katherine Tapley-Milton

On this useless night

of continual soul aching,

I wonder why life turns brutal.

My feelings in daylight hours

stay locked in safety deposit boxes,

But when when the sparkling sun

dips down on the blood-red horizon

my emotions howl like a furious blizzard.

Fear, anger, love, guilt, rage

all whip my psyche to battered bits.

Scenes of the past

flash like a kaleidoscope

of Stephen King movies;

until I fall exhausted into a psychotropic sleep.

The Grim Reaper’s Charms

 By Katherine Tapley-Milton

Death, the seducer

Whispers softly

To my lust

For animation.

Offering

Mental peace, cessation of pain

The end of worry

And toil.

Her bony hand embraces mine

And offers me the ride

Down the dark tunnel

Towards the light,

And the sliding down

Before eternity.

Death the sorcerer,

Smooth and eloquent,

Tempting, tempting, me

Towards another dimension.

Wanting to hurtle me

Into immortality

Only half formed,

Prematurely born

Wrested from God’s operating table

And from this mortal coil.

Death takes advantage of my

Struggle with the dual demons

Of depression and despair

She whispers.

  

 Faking Normal

 By Katherine Tapley-Milton

Hide the madness,

Don’t let it splatter

All over the sidewalk

Where descent townsfolk might

Read it.

Hide the madness,

Tuck it in tight

Like your winter scarf.

Neurons misfiring,

Thought  processes tangled,

But don’t ever let on.

Your speech  should be flawless and fluent:

Make small talk and open doors for people

Fake it and hide the cerebral confusion

And the cacophony of  voices

That scream suicide and self injury

Make yourself into another Jane Doe

Whom nothing extraordinary happens to.

COMPANION

By Katherine Tapley-Milton

An understanding

between man and beast,

We cuddle together

on interminable wet Sundays

or frigid winter nights.

While I read, he purrs

in contented feline bliss.

Head on my sneaker

 and body curled close.

Some inexplicable bonds

keeping the different two species

in a quiet, gentle intimacy.

                                    

William Cowper was a popular hymn writer and poet .  He lived from 1731-1800.  Cowper had numerous attacks of mental illness and tried to commit suicide, using various methods.  His poem, "The Castaway" speaks of a shipwrecked individual who drowned in the cold, stormy ocean while his friends tried to rescue him in vain.  Cowper says, "But I beneath a rougher sea, and whelmed in deeper gulfs than he." This refers to his struggle with mental illness and an obsessive fear of eternal damnation.

The Castaway

BY WILLIAM COWPER

Obscurest night involv'd the sky,

         Th' Atlantic billows roar'd,

When such a destin'd wretch as I,

         Wash'd headlong from on board,

Of friends, of hope, of all bereft,

His floating home for ever left.

No braver chief could Albion boast

         Than he with whom he went,

Nor ever ship left Albion's coast,

         With warmer wishes sent.

He lov'd them both, but both in vain,

Nor him beheld, nor her again.

Not long beneath the whelming brine,

         Expert to swim, he lay;

Nor soon he felt his strength decline,

         Or courage die away;

But wag'd with death a lasting strife,

Supported by despair of life.

He shouted: nor his friends had fail'd

         To check the vessel's course,

But so the furious blast prevail'd,

         That, pitiless perforce,

They left their outcast mate behind,

And scudded still before the wind.

Some succour yet they could afford;

         And, such as storms allow,

The cask, the coop, the floated cord,

         Delay'd not to bestow.

But he (they knew) nor ship, nor shore,

Whate'er they gave, should visit more.

Nor, cruel as it seem'd, could he

         Their haste himself condemn,

Aware that flight, in such a sea,

         Alone could rescue them;

Yet bitter felt it still to die

Deserted, and his friends so nigh.

He long survives, who lives an hour

         In ocean, self-upheld;

And so long he, with unspent pow'r,

         His destiny repell'd;

And ever, as the minutes flew,

Entreated help, or cried—Adieu!

At length, his transient respite past,

         His comrades, who before

Had heard his voice in ev'ry blast,

         Could catch the sound no more.

For then, by toil subdued, he drank

The stifling wave, and then he sank.

No poet wept him: but the page

         Of narrative sincere;

That tells his name, his worth, his age,

         Is wet with Anson's tear.

And tears by bards or heroes shed

Alike immortalize the dead.

I therefore purpose not, or dream,

         Descanting on his fate,

To give the melancholy theme

         A more enduring date:

But misery still delights to trace

   Its semblance in another's case.

No voice divine the storm allay'd,

         No light propitious shone;

When, snatch'd from all effectual aid,

         We perish'd, each alone:

But I beneath a rougher sea,

And whelm'd in deeper gulfs than he.

The following poem by  Ella Wheeler Wilcox (November 5, 1850 – October 30, 1919 is sad but true.  For those who suffer clinical depression, the world is hard on them, while those who have a sunny disposition fare better.  All, however, suffer pain.

Solitude

Laugh, and the world laughs with you:
Weep, and you weep alone;
For the sad old earth
Must borrow its mirth,
It has trouble enough of its own.

Sing, and the hills will answer;
Sigh, it is lost on the air;
The echoes bound
To a joyful sound,
But shrink from voicing care.

Rejoice, and men will seek you;
Grieve, and they turn and go;
They want full measure
Of all your pleasure,
But they do not want your woe.

Be glad, and your friends are many;
Be sad, and you lose them all;
There are none to decline
Your nectared wine,
But alone you must drink life's gall.

Feast, and your halls are crowded;
Fast, and the world goes by;
Succeed and give,
And it helps you live,
But it cannot help you die.

There is room in the halls of pleasure
For a long and lordly train;
But one by one
We must all file on
Through the narrow aisles of pain.

TRANSCRANIAL MAGNETIC STIMULATION: ALTERNATIVE TO SHOCK

                                                        

                                                by Katherine Tapley-Milton

     Shock therapy is back in vogue among psychiatrists, a fact which is very disturbing.    While the doctors 

claim it helps the deep depression of bipolar mood disorder and is safe, in reality shock therapy can have the

 side effect of long term or short term memory damage that in a lot of cases can be permanent. An alternative 

therapy, TMS or “Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation” seems to be a less barbaric treatment which does not 

cause brain damage.  General anesthetic is not required with TMS and specific areas of the brain can be 

targeted without causing a convulsion.

     According to the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression, TMS “ ... has been 

successful in helping people who are severely depressed.”  TMS uses an external magnet to stimulate the left 

prefrontal cortex, an area of the brain that is found to be functioning abnormally in depressed individuals.  Dr. 

Mark George comments, “This new tool allows us for the first time in the history of mankind to non-

invasively stimulate the brain while the person is awake and alert.” In a study of 30 depressed, suicidal 

patients who had not been helped by medication, 20 had TMS for 20 minutes five days a week for a 

fortnight.  Ten patients had the magnetic device placed on their heads but didn’t receive the treatment.  None 

of the patients knew if they received the real treatment or not.  The patients who received the TMS therapy 

showed a marked improvement in their depression, while the controls showed no improvement at all.  

Apparently, the only side effect of TMS is that a third of the patients reported a mild headache, which was

 easily relieved with common over the counter remedies like ibuprophen.

      The biological mechanisms that trigger depression are still not well known, however, research done using 

MRI machines has detected abnormalities in the prefrontal cortex of depressed patients.  This reason lead 

scientists to consider TMS as tool to target that area.  Before TMS becomes a standard treatment for 

depression at your local Mental Health Clinic, more studies have to be done to determine why it works, what

 intensity of magnetic power to use, and how frequent the treatment should be.  However, Dr. George feels 

that further MRI research will reveal more of the brains secrets.   Also, there is controversy over whether a 

treatment which does not cause a convulsion is as effective as electroshock which does cause a convulsion. 

   Traditional electroshock requires anesthesia and this can produce over sedation and vomiting afterwards, 

while TMS does not have these discomforts.

        There are a significant number of depressed patients who are not helped by antidepressants or 

experience too unpleasant side effects to tolerate them.  While there is still experimentation going on with

 TMS it has been around for ten years and looks like a humane and viable alternative to shock therapy.  

    

    

    

The Psychiatric Hospital that Had a Dungeon

by Katherine Tapley-Milton

     Twenty-nine years ago I was a prisoner in one of Canada’s oldest, and most terrible psychiatric hospitals called Centrecare.  Today, that institution has been demolished, but my memories of the abuse I received there have not been. At the time I was having a nervous breakdown and needed love and support, however Centrecare made me angry and bitter.  The psychiatrist I had did the foolish thing of taking all my medication away at once, without even tapering any if it off.

       I had been on huge doses of antidepressants, anxiety medication, and antipsychotics that a psychiatrist had me on to try and control my schizophrenia.  Soon, I started shaking and vomiting as a response to sudden drug withdrawal. The staff accused me of making myself sick.  After three months of being violently ill I was almost dead. However, when I couldn’t sit up straight in a chair, the staff slapped me around.  One day as I lay on the bed my roommate commented, “ I think that you are going to die.” I replied, “Yes, I think you’re right.”  The psychologist was a nice guy, but he didn’t understand my condition.  He kept yelling at me, “Katherine, stop you’re shaking!”

     I never got any sleep at Centrecare and yet they wouldn’t give me any sleeping medication or even let me have the light on to read.  Also, when the psychiatrist overdosed me with 30 mgs. of Haldol my neck arched back and my eyes rolled up in my head.  I spent two days staring into a light bulb and could not move from that position.  It was pure, unadulterated agony.  Even though I pleaded with the staff, they would not give me the antidote drug , Cogentin.  Another outrage was the fact that the psychologist did days and days of psychological testing while I was grossly over drugged and falling asleep on Haldol.  I kept telling him over and over that I was too stoned to do the tests, however, he did not believe me.  He tried to get me to retell stories, put together puzzles, remember words and numbers, etc. and in the end told the psychiatrist that I was probably brain damaged. 

     Embedded in my memory forever are all the horrible sounds of Centrecare – the moaning, crying, screaming, and shouting that was always going on.  There was danger too.  One might get a punch in the head if you were not careful. I remember that Centrecare was always permeated with a sickening sulphur smell that came from the pulp mill across the Reversing Falls.  I felt that as if I had died and truly gone to hell.  One man I talked to, who was in jail, told me he was incarcerated in Centrecare’s forensic unit once.  He vehemently declared to me that he was never so damned glad to get back to jail in all his life. This ancient psychiatric institution held in its walls over 100 years of human misery and mistreatment.  It even had a dungeon; a testament to its barbarism.  All that is left of Centrecare is a grassy knoll now, but its victims are doomed to relive forever the horror being abused there.

THE IMPACT OF PSYCHOLOGICAL DISORDERS

Psalms 139:23 “ Search me, O God, and know my heart: try me, and know my thoughts:”

     On the official website for the New England Psychologist --- nePsy.com, the impact of mental illness as opposed to physical illness is discussed:

Approximately one-third of sick days are caused by psychological disorders, according to a survey sponsored by the National Institute of Mental Health.

The survey of more than 9,000 adults was based on the National Comorbidity Survey-Replication and measured sick days for chronic conditions. Adults with mental disorders - including depression and anxiety - miss 1.3 billion days of work, school or other activities every year, more than back and neck pain, which caused 1.2 billion days per year, according to the survey. Americans report 3.7 billion sick days a year because of chronic conditions such as cancer, vision loss and heart attacks.

The study was also unique because it took a comparative perspective of physical disorders and psychological disorders, he says. "It was a surprise to see how enormous (the number of sick days) was for mental health disorders." The fact that one out of every three days is because of a mental disorder is "extraordinary," he says … .

That number is particularly noteworthy if one analyzes another factor. "If I look at how much money is given on research to cancer or heart disease or diabetes, obviously the allocation of resources to tackle these problems are way out of kilter with the magnitude of these problems," Kessler says. "Mental health disorder is not getting the attention it deserves."

That is not only true for research, but also true for treatment. "When we look at some other work we've done on patterns of treatment for mental and physical disorders, we find that, in general, people are more likely to get treatment for a physical than a mental health problem for comparable severity," he says.

"There are two reasons," Kessler continues. "One is that people don't very often code emotional distress as an illness." He notes that one of the lowest rates of treatment is for social phobia or anxiety. "People say, 'I'm shy … it's not an illness.'" Public perception is a factor. "People say, you 'have' a heart attack, but you 'are' mentally ill," Kessler adds… .  Of the 1.3 billion sick days for mental health disorders, depression topped the list with 387 million. Social phobia accounted for 214 million; posttraumatic stress disorder, 113 million; generalized anxiety disorder, 110 million; and bipolar disorder and panic disorders were each just over 100 million. Other issues included substance abuse, agoraphobia and separation anxiety disorder.

Physical conditions that resulted in sick days included arthritis (375 million), stroke (221 million), heart attack (204 million) and cancer (71.5 million).

Public awareness of mental health conditions is rising, Kessler says, but still, there is a misallocation of attention and funds in medicine in general. "It's not just mental disorders. If you look at the amount of research money available for childhood cancer, it's staggering in relation to the number of kids who have cancer," he says. "The reason is, it's just a compelling thing."

Physical conditions that resulted in sick days included arthritis (375 million), stroke (221 million), heart attack (204 million) and cancer (71.5 million).

Public awareness of mental health conditions is rising, Kessler says, but still, there is a misallocation of attention and funds in medicine in general. "It's not just mental disorders. If you look at the amount of research money available for childhood cancer, it's staggering in relation to the number of kids who have cancer," he says. "The reason is, it's just a compelling thing…"

" I know there are an awful lot of people with mental disorders who are suffering and are not in treatment compared to people with less severe physical disorders who are getting treatment." The allocation needs to be changed, "to make society as a whole function better," he says.”  http://www.masspsy.com/leading/0801_ne_disorders.html Job talks about mental anguish in Job 15:24 --“Trouble and anguish shall make him afraid; they shall prevail against him, as a king ready to the battle.”  We need to lobby for better treatment for the mentally ill.  Do you know someone who is struggling with depression or mental illness?  Extend a hand of friendship to them.

PRACTICAL SELF-HELP FOR MENTAL HEALTH CONSUMERS

By

Katherine Tapley-Milton

THE 18 STEPS

     In 2007, Mike Santoro and Daniel Gervais collaborated to create,
”The 80/20 Project”, which is a DVD about mental illness and the benefits of self-help.  This film has already won two prestigious awards – The Accolade Competition Festival in La Jolla, California and honourable mention at the Inspirational Film Festival in Houston, Texas. Mike proposes in his film that psychiatric medication comprises only 20% of recovery and that 80% of rehabilitation is in the mental health consumer’s own hands. In this DVD Mike gives 18 tips on how one can improve their mental health, which are all things that he discovered in his own recovery process. The tips are as follows:

• Keep track of patterns in your illness and mark them on the calendar.  Is there a predictable pattern to your symptoms?
• Build trust with other people and your support network
• Your life is not your illness.  Do not discuss your illness all the time.
• Accept your illness and deal with it.
• Find the right medication
• Learn from your relapses
• Find a doctor that you can feel comfortable with
• Stick to a budget because debt equals stress. Financial stability brings peace of mind.
• Do not indulge in alcohol or street drugs as these can destabilize you.
• Use the “OHIO” method.  This means “Only handle it once.”  If you are working on a project finish it or it will add to the clutter of your mind.
• Talk to your partner about your mental illness and be transparent about it.
• Control your symptoms and get educated about your mental illness.
• Be honest. Nothing is better than the truth.
• Tell your employer about your illness.
• Know your limits and stay within them.
• Show appreciation to those who have helped you and respect everyone.  Treat others as you would like to be treated.
• Keep your appointments.
• Be active and exercise.  Never give up.

I found this DVD to have a surprisingly professional video quality and the actors were very competent as well.  Mike’s purpose for doing this project is, “The 80/20 Project is my vision of how I manage and life my life even though I suffer from a severe mental illness … It has to do with a lot of effort, discipline, perseverance, and taking responsibility.  This gives me the opportunity to learn from my mistakes and focuses on prevention instead of the cure. Reducing anxiety is a key element in the 80/20 Project. “  Mike tells of how for years he would take his medication and he still got sick, but now that he has implemented the twenty-one steps to maintaining wellness it is working for him.  Mike hopes that he can be a role model for other mental health consumers and it looks like he is.

MIKE SANTRO IS HONORED

     This year Mike is featured as a mental health consumer role model during Mental Illness Awareness Week by the Canadian Alliance of Mental Illness and Mental Health.  They say the following about him, “ He is the loving father of a five year old daughter, a dedicated husband, and an administrative assistant at a non-profit organization in Montreal. He loves spending time with his family, barbequing, bowling, and catching up with his many friends over coffee. Mike also lives with a severe and persistent mental illness called schizoaffective disorder. With the support of family, friends and community organizations, and by knowing what triggers his illness and taking appropriate steps when those triggers occur, Mike has learned to live a full, balanced, and rewarding life. Mike is sharing his story to fulfill his dream of helping others face mental illness by letting them know that mental illness can be treated and recovery is possible…”

 

EXTRA SELF-HELP TIPS TO ADD TO MIKE’S

     Michael John Lake on www.WhyHope.com adds ideas that can be added to Mike

 Santro’s self-help steps. These self-help suggestions are all complimentary to the ones

 found in “The 80/20 Project”.  Lake comments:

 Self Help:  Curing your Mental illness or other issues -- Here are my rules to fix what is wrong in your life:

1. Verify the truth. - False information can make you like society, confused and dangerous.
2. There is no universal cure. - Every person is different and needs to find their own solution.
3. Find out what helps. - It can take trial and error.  Remember rule #1 above.
4. Don't be afraid to ask for help. - Doctors and other people can help.  Remember rule #1.
5. If it is not broke, don't fix it! - Changing things which help can cause more harm than good.
6. When things get better, consider why they did. - See #1, are you sure of the reasons?
7. If you succeed, then fail, don't give up.  Remember rule #3.
8. Take it one step at a time. - You can not know what works if you confuse the issues.
9. Do not eliminate bad thoughts, instead replace them. - It is hard to forget, so find better!  It takes time for people to change, including yourself!  Do not give up or accept blame for weakness.  (This information was taken from http://www.whyhope.com/why/living.htm#cure.)  Think about it -- maybe your problem is not your pill or your psychiatrist; it is just your need for diligent self-help.  The fact that 80% of our wellness may be in our hands is very empowering.