Sunday 24 February 2013

Of tattoos, Pinkie Pie and weighted blankets




The picture above is the tattoo I got on July 21st 2012. The day after my 21st birthday. each birthday for me was another year I had succeeded in keeping myself going, of not ending it all, another year of being a warrior, another year of fighting my insides. And it is a fight.
It's funny my mother following seeing said tattoo said this:

"What madness have you survived?"

I laughed. I literally sat down on the floor and started laughing. Because to me it was so obvious it wasn't even funny.

It was at that moment I understood that in less you live with mental illness and cognitive differences you do understand. Living in my brain without going mad is a task and a half and it made me understand that I needed to find a way to make others and her understand.

That also is a hard under taking in itself because of lack of ability to transport you directly inside of my brain.

My tattoo is also a reminder that I am strong and I am made stronger by my experiences and my willingness to share


This week like any other has been exceptionally busy and I try very hard to keep up with this blog but you will have bare with me.

This week has been a long one. Or it feels like a long one.


To describe it would be something a long the lines of this:

First I want you to imagine a quiet humming in your head sort of like a bee, now it's quiet but always there. You learn to live with it and try to manage the humming in your head because you have no choice. (Normal people also have this humming but they have the ability to put it on mute pretend you don't have that ability).

 Now imagine there is a track list inside your head it shuffles according to how you feel (fairly smoothly for those who have a normal brain) NOW you have the humming in the background and the track list going imagine that track list is changing from one song to the next the humming is getting louder and all you can do is cry. YOU CANNOT STOP IT or control how fast the songs are changing or how loud the humming is.

 You spend all day focusing very hard on everything around you and trying to put out the right response and complete given tasks.

Now imagine your skin crawling with ants.

That was a description of what is like to live in my mind.
A few things that provide relief are deep pressure recently I was lucky enough to be given the gift of a weighted blanket.

Here I am chilling out underneath it looking rather tired out because I was. What is a weighted blanket? A weighted blanket is a blanket that has pockets in it which weights (usually rice or poly-fil) are evenly placed throughout it. IT SHOULD Be noted you should research/consult a Occupational therapy because it should only be 10% of your body weight which isn't much. Basically it's like a GIANT hug all over your body. It sucks all the tension out caused by all that mind babbling I described early.

I have had a rough week in terms of I am currently cycling through a anxiety/depression phase ( I vary in degree and severity). I had my first ever anxiety attack at work and had to cover it up due to the nature of my job keeping clients calm is supposed to be my number one priority. This is not my usual norm and then on the way home I had to pull over because I had yet another one. I came home and crawled under my weighted blanket and put on my Pinkie Pie hat.

Let me explain the pinkie pie hat, I rarely deny myself things that make me happy and feel good inside because my moments of happiness usually are moments I don't usually have a consistent stretch of happy. If anything it has taught me the small things in life are the best things in life and that includes moments.

While the pinkie pie hat has raised some rather unwanted comments from adults which I could care less about.

The truth is people with disabilities often experience other medical issues and I worry with age my brain function may deteriorate which may or may not be a reality, but I choose to live my life like each day is gift. So why would I waste whatever time I am given to live weather it be to 100 or not worrying about other people think of something that makes me happy.

While this has been a rather random and general blog it's at least something!

Jess The Brave,

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