Author: erinreeve

Day 13

(part two)

I’m definitely not adjusting to sleeping without my husband.  That has been the hardest thing to get used to – and obviously I haven’t.  

So since I can’t go to sleep and am thinking about it anyway, maybe it will help to get the thoughts into actual words and sentences.  

First: when I visited tonight, he said that his doctor had told him that the best case scenario for his release from the hospital is that the first three ECT treatments will go perfectly and he’ll see such a marked improvement by next Wednesday (that’s right, a week from today) that he’ll be able to discharge him.  Apparently the doctor suspects that it will take more like 6 treatments until he feels comfortable enough with my husband’s improvement to let him come home.  This means that we’ll most likely move into his unpaid leave at work, which in turn means that we’ll be responsible for paying his insurance premiums.

Second: We talked a little about the day that he tried to kill himself.  He told me that he’d been in the attic while I was home on my lunch break.  

He went up to the attic right before I should have come home for lunch, which he knew because he’d asked me what time I take lunch a few days before.  I wondered why he had asked, but never suspected anything like this.  Did not enter my mind at all.  It scares me now to realize that he’d been thinking about doing this for a few days.  

My husband has some severe depression.  I didn’t realize – never wanted to realize, probably – how severe it is until all this happened.  I can’t imagine depression that deep; I suppose I should count myself lucky.  I feel more ineffectual.  

Third: and I have to keep reminding myself of this, but he reiterated tonight that none of this is my fault or about me at all.  He said that I have been nothing but wonderful this whole time.  I know that, but it’s good to hear him say it again.  No matter how hard I try to control my illogical emotions, they’re always bound to pop up anyway.  When I think – as I always do – that I wish I could do more to help him…well, I need to remember that I’m doing all that I’m capable of doing.  I’m being the kind of person who I would want to be married to, and I don’t know what else anyone wants.  

ECT

It’s been almost 2 weeks now.  He’s scheduled to receive his first ECT treatment tomorrow at some point – I don’t know what time.  This has left me hopeful but somewhat nervous, though I’m trying to focus on the first and dismiss the latter.  No amount of nervousness on my part (or anyone else’s) is going to help – if anything, it could cause harm.  So I’m trying not to imagine the procedure or the worst case scenarios.  I know they exist, and I’m content to leave it at that for now.  If they happen, I’ll deal with things at that point.  

I’m feeling more normal since he is feeling better.  I’m even hopeful that he’ll be able to come home soon — maybe even by the weekend.  I suspect that it will be more like Monday or Wednesday, though.  He’ll have about 3 days of leave left at the beginning of next week, which is also making me nervous since not only would it mean that we’d have to get by on only  my paycheck, but also that we’d have to pay his insurance premium until he could go back to work.  I’m really hoping that it doesn’t come to that, but I also don’t want to pressure him into going back to work before he is ready.  Just another thing that we’ll have to see about.

Funny how you never appreciate being healthy until something happens.  

Day 9

Just woke up.  Feeling fairly depressed.  Mom and Dad came over yesterday to take me to breakfast and help clean up the house and everything looks great now.  I wish they were still here though.  It was comforting to be around them.  Not a whole lot of other stuff has been comforting.  One of my friends wants to hang out later today, but I don’t know – I feel too blah to be around other people (besides my husband, who I’ll obviously be visiting).

Yesterday he wasn’t feeling good at all.  When I got there, he was obviously not trying to pretend to be doing okay, and when I left he said that he was basically too depressed to have any visitors.  I hope that’s a little different today.  At least tomorrow is Monday and he’ll be able to consult with the doctor on the possibility of ECT treatments.

I want this week to be over already.  I wouldn’t be sorry if the month was over too.  I know that time passes quickly … but not quickly enough when you want it to.

Day 8

It’s been over a week now that he’s been in the hospital.  I feel so terrible for him – I know he hates being there about as much as I hate him being there.  Ultimately, I’m sure he hates it more.  I’m very proud of him though, for signing himself in voluntarily – apparently you have to go to court if you are in a hospital involuntarily.  To avoid that, he signed himself in.  

His doctor mentioned the possibility of doing ECT treatments.  ECT stands for Electroconvulsive Therapy (or something very close to that anyway), and can apparently be very effective in chronic depressive cases where the patient is unresponsive to medication.  As my husband is.  He and I are both open to trying this procedure (procedures), so far.  It can cause memory loss, which I didn’t get the chance to talk to him about tonight (I was not his only visitor), but I’ll ask him about it tomorrow.  He prides his intelligence and it’s one of the reasons that I love him (though all the other reasons put together overshadow it, of course), and I would hate to see him lose any of that functionality.  I’m curious to see what he’s thinking about it though.

Today’s visit was kind of impersonal; as I mentioned above, I was not his only visitor.  Two of our friends also came to see him tonight, to play a strategy game together.  I got about 30 seconds alone with him (probably more like 2 minutes, actually) and that wasn’t long enough to do much more than tell him how much I love him and kiss him a few times.  I should get to spend more time with him tomorrow, though.  I’m looking forward to it.

I miss him so, so, so……………………..(sigh)……………………….so much.  There’s no one else who I really want to spend time with right now other than him.  I think of things that I’d like to do… and he’s the one who I want to do them with – not other friends or family members.  This is why I married him – because I like him best and want to spend the rest of my life doing things and living life with him.  

I wish he could feel how much I love him.  It is immense.   

Day 6

I feel like I’m in the middle of a battle for …my life, basically.  And I’m completely unable to do anything about the outcome.

CAN’T SOMEBODY HELP?!?!?!  PLEASE!!!!!!!?  WE NEED HELP.

I’m so discouraged.

He says that he’s tried so hard all his life to make things better.  He’s tried everything they tell you to do – make friends, stay active, eat right, think positive – all that.  But nothing helps, he said.  Something in his brain is missing.  He’s not capable of getting better, he said.  He’s weak and stupid, he said.

Can’t somebody help?  What am I supposed to do??  I try to tell him that I think he’s strong and smart and capable of getting better, but he throws it in my face.

Please.  Somebody help.

the blorst of times

things aren’t going so great. most of you know what’s up, but I’m not going to go into it here anyway. suffice it to say that things aren’t so great. in fact, you might even say that they’re pretty bad.

but I’m hopeful, most of the time, and plan to be productive in the coming days. not sure that it will happen today. I guess that’s the thing with productivity, though – planning doesn’t do any good. just doing it is what gets it done. meh. the dishes haven’t gone anywhere so far. they’ll be dirty tomorrow too.

I need to water my orchids. and fold the clean laundry. and the rest of the clean laundry on my bed. and put it away. and do more laundry. and mow the lawn. and clean the house. and stop eating fast food. and put away the stuff I bought at Goodwill on Sunday. and get some exercise.

I’ll get it done. most of it. soonish.

Day 4, part 2

 

So I spoke with his social worker today during my lunch break. Two things that I gleaned from that conversation: 1) that he is still suicidal and they are concerned about him, and 2) that they know he’s still planning on killing himself after he’s discharged. The latter makes me more confident that he won’t be released within the week, like he said yesterday. At this point, they can keep him in as long as they need to – I do not want to go through another day like May 31 2012.

And so I continue to have mixed feelings about his whole situation. Mostly the feelings are of a bad nature (sad, hurt, worried, afraid, etc), but I am very glad that he’s not dead, and I’m glad that he’s addressing this problem instead of continuing to ignore it. I suppose I should say that I’m glad he’sgoing to be addressing this, since I’m sure that he’s still trying his hardest to ignore it. Why bother addressing your problems if you’re going to be dead soon?

Obviously I’m still very worried and hurt and lonely. I’m getting more accustomed to the probability that I’ll be living by myself for a while yet, though. I haven’t been crying as much (still some). I don’t feel hopelessly depressed, and I think I might be able to start cleaning the house and being productive without having to collapse under the sobs of missing him so much. Soon, anyway.

day 4

I’m not sure if this is a bad thing or not, but this is all that I can think about.

Yesterday I had to wait about 15 minutes after visiting hours started because he had gone for a swim and wasn’t back yet. When he got back, he acted normal enough – but when I asked him if it was still his plan to kill himself when he got out, he said that he wouldn’t tell me. And then when I accused him of meaning “yes,” he said “no” with a smile on his face.

Which obviously means that it’s still his plan – or at least that he wants me to think it is.

He also said that on Sunday, his doctor estimated that he would be released in about a week. That scares me. Even though people keep telling me that it’s hard for the patients to fool the doctors, I have a lot of confidence in my husband’s ability to act. A lot of confidence. And I am skeptical of them finding the perfect drug for him – especially within a week or ten days. I don’t know if they’re spending time talking to him, but I have doubts that their efforts will be fruitful. My husband is very stubborn and doesn’t like to feel helpless or out of control, and in those situations he will do whatever he can to get out of the situation.

I guess the ultimate act of control is killing yourself, isn’t it? Even though it’s also the ultimate surrender to your problems. How can it be both?

Post #1

 

My husband, the man who has been sharing my bed and home and life for the past five years, is in a psychiatric hospital after trying to kill himself four days ago.

I need an outlet for my thoughts and feelings – one that can handle more honesty than my in-laws or parents or friends can or should. Not that I necessarily want to even have to face all that honesty by myself, but I feel like I shouldn’t deny or ignore the realities of my thoughts and feelings.

I don’t feel like going over all the details of what happened on Thursday, and I don’t think all the details are important anyway.

I’m crying less. I guess that’s good, though it doesn’t mean that I feel any less sad, lonely, desperate, or depressed than before. It just means that sobbing so much gives me a headache and dehydrates me. And there’s no one around to rub my back and neck anymore when they hurt, so I might as well try to avoid things that make them ache more.

My biggest, biggest, biggest fear is that he’ll feel the same when he comes home, and try to kill himself again like he promised he would over and over on the day I drove him to the ER. I don’t think he’ll make his goal of 10 days since I doubt they’ll release him from the hospital before then, but I’m sure he can lengthen the deadline as needed. I’m afraid that I won’t be able to tell when he starts feeling this way again, since he’s so adept at pretending that he’s fine when he’s anything but. And I, in my utter foolishness, pretend that he actually is fine, since I don’t want to face the reality of the pain and horror that’s underneath his façade. But my oblivion doesn’t help anything. I keep telling myself that none of this is my fault………but a little voice in the back of my head also keeps whispering that maybe if I had been more dedicated to helping him stay focused on being healthy, maybe we wouldn’t be here right now.

I can’t imagine losing my husband. That’s a lie – I can imagine it, and it’s the most horrible thing I’ve ever imagined. So much worse than giving up my baby for adoption. At least she’s alive and happy and I can feel good about that decision. If I was to lose my husband…. How do people cope with that kind of loss??? I’m having a hard time motivating myself to do the mundane but necessary things in life as it is – how much worse would it be if I didn’t have the hope of getting my husband back???

Surprisingly, I’m doing a pretty good job of not taking his suicide attempt personally. I know that it’s the abuse that is making him hopelessly depressed, and the drugs his psychiatrist has been randomly prescribing haven’t helped. I know that it’s not me. But this also makes me feel helpless to help him at all. All I can do is go visit him every day, as much as he will let me, and let him know that I love him and will not abandon him (as he has expected me to do ever since we got together). I can prove him wrong. But I can’t make that help him feel better. I hope that it will…but I have no control over his brain chemistry.

I feel pretty useless overall right now. I don’t even know how to make myself feel better – let alone him. Everything that I do, everywhere that I go, something reminds me of him and makes my heart ache with missing him. I’ve been trying to avoid being home by myself, but I can’t get away from missing him.  

Happy Pi Day!

I love any excuse to make pies.  I try not to make them on a regular basis for obvious reasons, but after I realized that it’s 3.14, I figured I’d make Indian food for dinner tomorrow and whip up some pies for tonight.  And I took pictures to, you know, see how I am at blogging about cooking.

For dinner, we had salad and a tomato onion tart (pie…tart…same difference), and for dessert I made strawberry shortcake pie because they have strawberries for $0.69 at Aldi.  I used recipes for the pie crusts, but made up the rest of the pies as I went — and both were delicious!!

To make the strawberry pie, which I did first, I cut about a quart of strawberries and used a potato masher to mash them while I heated them on the stove.  To the strawberry puree I added balsamic vinegar, a little honey, cornstarch, and a pinch of salt.  I simmered it for a bit until I could tell that the cornstarch was in there, then took it off the heat and let it cool a bit.

Meanwhile, I baked the pie crust.  I used one of Martha’s recipes, obviously, because they’re the best.  I’d like to have a food processor for making pie crust, since everything is supposed to be as cold as possible, but since I don’t have one I just use my hands and cut the butter into small pieces.  Seems to work fine, though I haven’t ever made a pie crust using a food processor so I can’t really compare.

You can see the tart pan underneath the pie pan.  Multitasking!  Once the pie crust was finished, I put the strawberry filling in and let it cool for a while in the fridge.

While it was cooling, I put the tart together — sweet potato medallions on top of a layer of sliced onion.  I baked the sweet potato first, but didn’t cook the onions at all (which resulted in some extra crunch).  I sliced a ball of fresh mozzarella and put that on top of the sweet potatoes, and chopped up some fresh basil to sprinkle on top of the mozzarella.  (Lots of basil.)  Topped it off with sliced tomato, salt and pepper, olive oil, and a somewhat sprinkling of balsamic vinegar, and then baked it for about 10 minutes until the cheese melted.

It was SOOOO GOOOOOD.  I mean, it was really good.  The only thing was that the crust ended up being soggy because of the oil and vinegar, plus the mozzarella and tomatoes are very wet.  I dried them between some paper towels before putting them on the tart, but I guess that wasn’t enough.  HOWEVER, I ended up kind of liking the sogginess.  But when I make it again I’ll probably try to avoid that.

I whipped some cream after we finished the tart, and added honey and vanilla to it.  Here’s the finished pie!

Again, I know I said this before and probably shouldn’t again, but the only recipes I used were for the pie crusts.  🙂  Just saying.  It’s okay to brag on my own blog, right?  Especially since the only people who will see this I would brag to anyway.

I forgot to mention that I put a layer of lady fingers on top of the pie crust, and poured the strawberry compote (I guess that’s what it was, right?) over the lady fingers.  I wanted it to be more strawberry shortcake inspired than strawberry pie inspired.

And now it’s 8:00 and the kitchen is a mess, and I’m too full to clean up.  Meh, there’s always tomorrow!