Monthly Archives: June 2016

Dentist Disaster

Posted on by Gertie

You go for a rather complex dental procedure and the dentist

has put you under general anesthesia.

But when you wake up, you are no longer at the dentist office.

You are on a train with a briefcase handcuffed to your wrist.

Just as you are registering your new surroundings,

a man walks up with a gun and points it at you.

What happens next?

I start to panic as I am realizing that I am staring down a barrel of a gun. As I slowly realize I have a gun pointed at my face, I started laughing. Laughing at the fact that I wasn’t really staring down the barrel of a gun, I was staring at the foot (end) of a flute. People on the train thought I wasn’t taking it as seriously as they thought I should. It was just a flute in my face. Considering the “briefcase” I was handcuffed to was actually an empty flute case, I am going to assume the man wants me to put the flute into the case.

As I slowly come to, I realize that my assumption was completely wrong. I was just under the influence of laughing gas from the dentist. I informed my dentist about the flute dream and she began to laugh. She laughed because it wasn’t the first time someone in her dentist chair had this particular laughing gas dream. This made me wonder if I should go see another dentist as I walked out of the office after she was done. Nah, if this was the worst thing that can happen at the dentist then I will stick with her.

Weekly Check-In

Posted on by Gertie

Good Morning!!! It is that time of week to do my weekly check-in. It has been quite a week.

My week started out with me needing to go to the Emergency Room (ER) because I had flu like symptoms. I vomited and had diarrhea multiple times within a two hour time period. Since I am prone to dehydration I went to the E.R. The doctors told me that it wasn’t a food born illness nor the flu but “flu-like illness.” Whatever the hell “flu-like illness” means.  I unfortunately, had to miss work on Monday.

My work week went about as “normal” as it can be working in the mental health field. We did have a flood at work due to a broken pipe which was kind of funny for a multitude of reasons. I wish I could tell you more about the flood and why it was so funny but I cannot because it would violate HIPPA laws and I want to protect my clients privacy.

I took a planned day off on yesterday (Friday) so I could be able to see my therapist. My session with Diana didn’t go to well. I pretty much yelled at her most of the time due to the fact of the lack of communication on her part and how I wasn’t feeling supported by her. I know yelling at your therapist isn’t the wisest of choices. I guess, I was and am frustrated that my therapist isn’t doing what I think she should be doing to help me. Plus, I felt like she wasn’t picking up on the fact that I was wanting to discuss my grief and loss with the miscarriages. I also know that it doesn’t help that she works part time and I work full time. Which is why I wish she would try to check-in with me a little be more. It is something I have emailed her about and am hoping she follows through. Diana has helped me a great deal. If it wasn’t for her help over that last seven and a half years, I wouldn’t be working as a Peer Specialist. So, I do owe Diana a lot since she has helped me a lot.

Thank you for reading. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. Peace Out!!!

Wabbit Hunting

Posted on by Gertie

You wake up one morning and find yourself inside a “Looney Tunes” cartoon 

 with a burning desire to hunt down a certain mischievous bunny, no matter the cost. 

What happens next?

I wake up thinking I’ve lost my mind once again so I wake up Junior and ask him if I am loosing my mind. Junior nods his no as he says “I think we both lost our minds.” At that moment it time the phone rings it’s my brother, Jay who asked “What the hell is going on? I’m in a “Looney Tunes” cartoon.” I then told him that both Junior and myself are in a  “Looney Tunes” cartoon as well.  I invite my brother over so we can discuss the situation of waking in a cartoon.

My brother arrives at my place quite quickly in a panic speaking gibberish. When we were finally able to understand what Jay was saying we realize that the entire world became amerced in a “Looney Tunes” cartoon. The good news of this is that it appears that everyone is loosing their minds. The bad news is that you may not be in the same “Looney Tunes” cartoon as someone who is close to you even if you live with the person.

As Junior, Jay and myself were discussing about how the world was loosing their minds due to being in a “Looney Tunes” cartoon we all realized we wanted to go hunt down a certain bunny. We all came to the consensus that since we wouldn’t think about murdering somebody when the world wasn’t in a cartoon, we wouldn’t do it now since we weren’t a hundred percent positive the mischievous bunny wasn’t really a person in the non cartoon world.

Now on to bigger problems, how do we help ourselves and the rest of the world get out of being in a cartoon. It might be fun for a few days however realistically we all would need to get back to reality. The reality of being human and not a cartoon.

The world was complete chaos for the obvious reason of everyone being in a “Looney Tunes” cartoon. Now it was time to attempt to get everyone in the same episode so maybe just maybe things can get back to whatever the hell normal is and being human again and not a cartoon.

Junior, Jay, myself as well as our friends and family all decided to  share our ideas with local first responders and Politian’s. Surprisingly enough everyone was on board about brining everyone back to reality and out of a cartoon. Fortunately, after two weeks with the world being a “Looney Tunes” cartoon everyone became human again. Only this time there was world peace. Yes, I did say world peace.

Tomorrow Starts…

Posted on by Gertie

Well, I am not sure if you remember me telling you this a few weeks ago that, I bought some magazines. A couple of those magazines happen to be focused specifically on writing. One of the writing magazines has 52 prompts. Fifty-two prompts to do for an entire year. One prompt every week for a year.

I got to thinking about the weekly writing prompts and how it reminded me of the Daily Prompts that WordPress does. It got me to thinking that to keep you my reader and follower engaged with my blog that I would do the weekly writing prompt from this particular writing magazine. Part of the reason why I am doing the writing prompt is because I want to engage you in a way that I haven’t engage you before you. The weekly prompts will be fiction. Well, most of them will be fiction. I am sure some of them won’t be fiction. Another reason why I am doing the writing prompts is that I can write them ahead of time and schedule them so if I get busy with life or my mental illness rears its ugly head, I then have something being posted every week. Plus, if my mental illness does rear it’s ugly head, I then can do a weekly prompt to help me get out of my head even if it is a prompt that is two months way.  So, the weekly prompts start tomorrow.

Well, besides the weekly prompts starting tomorrow, I will be going to work with my new butterfly tattoo and my hair being highlighted purple. I am looking forward to seeing what my colleagues and clients think of my hair and showing off my new tattoo.

I hope to be able to tell you later this week what others think of my hair and tattoo. Have a wonderful week. Peace Out!!

 

Tattoo of Hope

Posted on by Gertie

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Good Morning!! I hope everyone is having a good weekend. If you regularly read my blog you know that I got a new tattoo yesterday. In fact the tattoo I got yesterday evening is pictured above.

I have wanted to get a butterfly tattoo for several years now for several reasons. The main reason is that a butterfly is a sign of hope. Hope that all the struggles one goes through that beauty is on the other side. Think of the caterpillar and the darkness it goes through when it is in a cocoon and out from the cocoon the beauty of the butterfly emerges.

This is how I view recovery. Not just my recovery but other’s recovery. Knowing that the beauty of recovery looks differently  to each person and each person is in recovery from different issues.

For me my recovery is from a mental illness and cutting as well as eating disorders. Granted I have been in recovery from the eating disorders longer than my mental health issues but it is still recovery. I also am in recovery from cutting.

As you can see in the picture, I have scars from the cutting and that the butterfly covers up some of those scars. Scars that may look fresh but are not.  I purposely had the butterfly placed where it is because I wanted to show the beauty of what recovery looks like despite the scars I have, both visible and invisible to the eye.

Thank you for reading. I appreciate each and everyone of you and hope that what I blog about has meaning to someone just like my both my tattoos have meaning to me. Have a great weekend and peace out.

Weekly Check-In

Posted on by Gertie

Good Evening or should I say Happy Friday!!! It is finally the end of a long and stressful work week. Don’t get me wrong I love my job it just was a long week at work.

As you may know that this week was suppose to be a “short” week because of the three day weekend but I went into work on Memorial Day to clean up a messy office that I acquired from my predecessors as well as catching up on the all so lovely paper work that is nesasary as peer specialist. Not to mention that the lovely paper work is required by the state and federal government as well as the lovely insurance companies that pay for clients to seek services. Well, back on topic of work and the stress that goes with being a peer specialist. Besides paper work, myself and my colleagues were informed of three client deaths. I of course can’t say anymore about the client deaths due to HIPPA. It is not easy to hear about a clients death especially multiple in a week.

Hearing about the clients deaths brought up my own grief and loss issues. Not just over loosing clients but that of the miscarriages I have dealt with. It is still quite difficult dealing with the miscarriage loss’s. Loosing a child(ren) is the toughest thing a person can deal with. So tough at times that at the moment I rather change the subject.

So let go on to the subject of earlier this evening. After work I went and got my second tattoo. I got a butterfly tattoo. I hope to blog more about it tomorrow with a picture or two. Getting the tattoo was quite relaxing and am grateful that I got it. So far the people who have seen the tattoo like it.

I hope to blog more about my tattoo tomorrow (Saturday) morning. Have a great weekend everyone. Peace out!!

Looking Forward To Tomorrow

Posted on by Gertie

It’s been a long day and continues get longer. I, of coursed worked today and now I am waiting to start a Warm Line shift. I decided that I would fill in for someone who needed to take the day off from their shift. Others have done it for me so I will do it for others. I know I’m going to be tired by the end of my volunteer shift since I worked today as well but I am looking forward to tomorrow.

I am looking forward to tomorrow because at this time tomorrow I will be getting my second tattoo. I am going to be getting a butterfly on my right shoulder. I emailed an idea of the butterfly tattoo I desire to my tattoo artist informing him that the image I sent him was an idea of how I want the butterfly and would like his artistic style to the butterfly as well. From my understanding he is grateful for the idea and is “thrilled” to be able add his own style to the butterfly tattoo I emailed him. It was and is just an idea of how I would like the idea.

The placement of my tattoo will be covering up some scars on my shoulder. Scars that people always assume that are “fresh” when they are not. They just happened to be keloid scars. If you regularly read my blog you know that I have had issues with cutting myself in the height of my mental illness.

It seems that all the tattoo’s I plan on getting including the one I have and the butterfly I am getting tomorrow all have some meaning to me in regards to my mental illness. Most if not all I am going to get will be recovery related. Two or three will help bring awareness to mental illness like the semi-colon tattoo I already have. The butterfly has meaning to me as well and yes it involves my recovery dealing with mental illness. I will share with you the meaning behind it, tomorrow evening or Saturday morning when I do my weekly check in. Hell, I might just do an entire post on just my new tattoo after I get it. Yes, I will put up a picture of it on my blog.

I need to get going. My Warm Line shift is about to start. Have a wonderful evening. I hope to do another post tomorrow evening, weather it’s my weekly check in or about my butterfly tattoo. Peace Out!!!

Introduction: Mama Bear

Posted on by mamabearraine

Hello! Let me introduce myself. I am who Gertie refers to as Mama Bear. As you know, Gertie has asked me to be a contributor to her blog. I will be sharing my personal experience on what it is like to be a support system to someone who struggles  with a mental illness.

I have been asked to also share my experience on what it is like to be a parent of two children who are diagnosed with a mental illness. I may consider Gertie like a daughter, I have four other children. Two of which I had biologically and two of which I adopted. It is my adopted children that have a diagnosed mental illness. Not only will I be sharing my experience of what its like to be the support system of someone who struggles with a mental illness and being the parent of two children with a mental illness, I will be discussing what it is like to be a first responder who deals with the mentally ill.

I have known Gertie for nearly 16 years and have seen her grow. Grow in ways that many of us didn’t think could happen. We didn’t think it could happen because Gertie was so close to death due to multiple suicide attempts that we didn’t think should would make it. Gertie’s will and determination to start recovery and to remain in recovery is what has helped to get to the place she is in now. She is doing awesome. She is following her dreams of being in a romantic relationship with my colleague, Junior as well as working as a Peer Specialist to help show others recovery is possible.

I thank you for reading. I hope to post as often as I am able with being a working mother to four children and a motherly figure Gertie needs.

Mama Bear