Can you teach compassion??

There is much going on here in the Jungle. Most importantly, my animals (and family) are fine and doing well.
I did an 'In Our Own Voice' presentation for a large psychology student crowd (90 people) yesterday. I have mixed feelings about it.
One: I know we did a good job and we presented well. We answered questions to the best of our ability. And I am proud of myself and my co-presenter. And that is what matters most.
Two: There was some compassion in the crowd and some kind and sincere comments/questions.
But, Three: some of the questions/comments showed a bit scary ignorance among a population that you would hope would know more. I know that was the reason that the professor asked us to come and speak and he was thrilled with the presentation and said that it was better than any lecture he could have ever given. Which does hearten the 'Tart as well.
As my wonderful boss and friend said to me, this was the first time we gave a presentation in front people that are not truly in the mental health field, they were not 'Our people.'
The professor wants us to do the presentation once a semester for his classes.
:)

So the other shoe drops.

I am stressed, irritable, cranky. All of it. Even though I have read in my Patty Duke 'A Brilliant Madness' book that your bipolar is likely to strike you during your PMS time, it doesn't help one bit - know what I am saying?

I know that being irritable with people is a sign of my bipolar (as told to me by my last therapist). Does it help to make me feel less irritable? No.

I actually feel a little relieved that I am finally experiencing the crank. Like that is the real purpose of my life, which I have steadfastly been denying all this time, but why not just give into it.

I'm so incredibly stressed about money. I could never make enough to cover all the expenses. It is SO depressing when you do all that you CAN and it is still not enough.

American Idol sux. + possible triggering stuff

Oh I am really 'full of it' tonight.

First of all, I am pissed about American Idol. Adam Lambert can sing better than Kris Kringle. Period. Why didn't he win? I am wondering if it is because he is gay. What the?

I can't wait for him to make a CD. I haven't bought music in a loong time, but I will buy that. I am also considering boycotting Idol in the future. What a joke it is.

Additionally, on an entirely different topic, I am pissed and feeling very low in general. Certain things from the baking thing bother me. Long story not getting into right now.

As in I thought about (pOSSIBLE TRIGGER) offing myself. But instead I ate some chocolate, took a clonapin (not in that order) and am now typing.

I will regret all of it (the typing) except that I will breathe for another day tomarraw. For those of you not aware, I do know how to spell - I was speaking of the day after tonight known as to-mor-row.

I went to my baking thing and was all alone with the founder who I greatly admire in heneral (that's Spanish for in general). If this is creativity, shoot me.

We talked of many things. But I ended up feeling sad today as I thought of it. I felt very left out of her schizophrenic world, one in which she finds there are so many others having the same symptoms as she.

I don't feel like I know a kinship of bipolars, or get to talk with anyone hardly except my emotionally verklempt husband for 10 minutes while we snarf down dinner and then he goes comatose on the couch, never to be heard from again. Not to mention he's the only human being I see all day. It's very weird. I might as well live in a burkha.

I married someone who doesn't laugh, doesn't speak much, but is real sweet. He's not mean to me, he is kind and says that he loves me (I'm about being truthful, not skewering the guy) but except for the emergencies he's not getting involved, know what I'm sayin'? Even then I would have to be holding a weapon in my hand or worse, shake him from deep sleep telling him I believe it's Armageddon again (That's worse than having a weapon only because that would be waking him up). You get the picture.

Anyhoo, said founder of bakery thing, who is also quite sweet (and naive, really, but that is another thing) and is a go-getter, I've said so in the past, works really hard, has a husband and child, goes to school, and apparently to her chagrin, takes medicine.

Probably not realizing how much this medicine makes it possible for all of the above to occur. Just an observation.

Then founder says she would like to be off medicine someday.

What is with people being afraid to take medicine? I am getting too tired tonight to write the scathing pissed off feelings that I feel about it.

I've paid a price a large exhorbitant price to learn that I've got to be on the stuff in order to be in this reality. Period. Six months in a state hospital NOT being a criminal but merely a mortal with an illness gives me the right to state this. I've been in remission for 15 years and I am still brought to tears if I talk about what happened then. And when I say remission, I mean psychotic episodes not the rest of the illness which is blunted greatly by tons of medication but STILL raises its ugly head enough to not let me live a normal life.

The anger courses through me. I have no one to talk to about it. So I send it out on the internet winds.

Why am I angry? Because so many times I have pulled myself up by my bootstraps, come back stronger from a 'fall' or at least survived the unfathomable and have no one to talk to about it. So now I pathetically write it on my blog.

I had another dream about smoking last night. It was a choice between a long lovely menthol or a long regular cigarette. In the dream, I chose the regular because I was concerned about ripping my lungs with the menthol (I smoked mostly menthols for 10 years in real life). Amazing. Worried about my health in a dream like that.

Plenty of real nightmares lately too. Won't go into it. Doesn't make you much want to sleep does it? Well, the 'dream cigarettes' make it nicer.

I wake up at 4 a.m. after a particularly messed up dream and can't sleep. It doesn't help that the next door neighbor's dog bays, howls, barks at 5:30 a.m on. Then my Emma dog starts in and then you are no longer compatible with the nice person that everyone thinks (I) am. You just want to yell.

But husband is sleeping. And its not Armageddon yet.

Who's Crazy Now?!!! (a Rant.)

So the whole looking-for-a-new-psychiatrist thing has taken a turn for the worse.

Having to speak to the most inane, insensitive, STUPID secretaries that seem to enjoy dangling your life in their hands is enough to make anyone either quit the search or have to don armor just to pick up the phone and try to make a simple appointment.

It SHOULD be simple. Make an appointment. Go to appointment. Have yer heart ripped out.

I had gotten the list from my insurance, I had consulted my primary care physician and I have abided by all the rules, crossed my t's and obeyed the q's.

Only to have conversations that include statements like "We don't deal with psychotic people (I mentioned I was Bipolar I and tried to briefly explain what that meant and tried to explain that my last psychosis was 15 years ago (which seems like a KEY POINT). I suspect They deal with psychotic people all the time and I even asked her what they do with them when they run across them, because her responses MADE ME FEEL PUNCHY).

It's a counseling center located inSIDE the local mental hospital, which frankly already makes me nervous. Some part of me is not trusting, not convinced that they are not laying in wait to get me in there on a more permanent basis. I know, I know, that sounds silly and unreasonable but few have ever accused me of being otherwise.

So I asked to make an appointment with one of the doctors and Secretary says no he is not taking patients. Not to be daunted, I had a second name, for the same counseling center (I only had two 'approved' names from my doctor out of a list of 20 or so, and I wasn't about to be hornswaggled into accepting just any old psychiatrist. No, I want the best as I think highly of my primary care physician who went to the trouble of recommending them and if I'm going to leave the County after 15 years I d*mn well want good care!!!!)

Anyway, secretary says she can make an appointment with this second person but it will be a couple of months out (which I don't mind whatsoever, what's a few more months of being bled dry by the County as it will take them a while to copy my ENOURmous chart and get it there anyway, I know the b*st*rds.) and wouldn't I prefer a pdoc that I can get a sooner appointment with. Like it's some kind of switch a roo, like wouldn't you want someone you've never heard of, have your life in their hands type of thing all because I, Secretary, don't want to schedule you out 2 months even though you've expressed it's not a problem.

No I don't want the first available. I want someone good. As Suze Orman says, do what is Right, not what is Easy. I am upset that I am being 'handed' (more like fighting for) a psych like Sears sells power tools (and everthing else, I know I worked in the Men's Department!) with bait-and-switch tactics and no care for the effect on the consumer. I am so angry.

Oh, she tried hard. She said ALL their psychs could deal with Bipolar, and this particular psych was their only woman, and they liked to reserve her for the under-30 set. Which I would have understood (I'm really not unreasonable, and for the record I AM IN REALITY, d*mn it!), but Secretary did not put her foot down and say I could not have an appointment with her, only that again normally they 'reserved her' (whose They, and that's weird) for adolescents and she, Secretary, wanted to make me a SOONER appointment.

Which is so odd, because after the conversation she took ALL my information, asked HORRIBLY INVASIVE questions for a person that I don't know and would never want to - COMBATTED me and cut me off on those questions before I could even explain, not caring anyway what I was saying (which really was the most galling part of it) and was incredibly ignorant of mental health issues yet portended such importance and knowledge (making her triply ignorant, even Husband said so) and then said "We will look up your hospitalizations and GET BACK TO YOU. (!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

That's fine if that's how they treat everybody else. But I am thinking that she is afraid that I am psychotic and will kill her only precious female psych and must evaluate me and my history. That's the impression that I get. I will be pleasantly (??) surprised if she does call back. Really.

I am thinking that she will not call back, until I call next week and ask to speak to the manager, or get Husband to call (which I think I should do all along, as I have become incapable of dealing with these people anymore), or ask my primary care physician's wonderful, NOT-STUPID, gifted, lovely assistant to call and ask them what the deal-e-o if they actually don't call back.

I'm not enlarging the situation, mountains really are mountains (no molehills) and I'm thinking of going to a nearby county or an unauthorized person (on the list but not loved by my doctor) across the street from said mental hospital because this place is a Mickey-Mouse Operation.

On another note it's only Saturday, so it may not be a big deal but it's 4:36a.m. and I haven't gone to bed yet. Yeah. The puppy will be up at 5:30 for pee-peeing. What's the use of going to bed. I'm so wired.

Other than that, I know I'm lucky. I've got insurance and so many don't and I know that I am blessed incredibly to have it.

The County has made it clear that I have to 'move out' of the program, and they made so many promises that they can no longer keep I have to (read: forced) to go through this process and you think, ok, I will make phone calls today, I will make contact with these people and they are awful to you.

I can't imagine what they see, and I am fortunate because I understand that They don't know me, They are just performing a job. But this is my job too, taking care of myself. This is what I do. And apparently I'm a little ineffective at it at the moment.

Proud to be an American woman.

I'm glad that I live in a country that values freedom, and in a culture that encourages me as a woman to learn and be educated. And lets me budget my own money. Whether I am married or not.

I found this today in the New York Times concerning the large amount of Iraqi women who are now widows and how the government wants to deal with the problem.

"If we give the money to the widows, they will spend it unwisely because they are uneducated and they don’t know about budgeting. But if we find her a husband, there will be a person in charge of her and her children for the rest of their lives."MAZIN al-SHIHAN, director of a city agency in Baghdad, on his plan to pay men to marry Iraqi war widows.

That makes me sick. Be proud ladies that you are in charge of your own money and that your government lets you be responsible for your own life. Who knew it was a luxury?

Facebook & telling the truth as a bipolar

So it turns out on Facebook that people can ping you anytime they want to, because you are online. Just like so many things on that site, I don't know how to work it, maybe you can tell it you are off-line while you are on there. Anyone know?

Anyway, I've been stymied as to what to say to all the high school people who knew me who ask 'Whatcha up to?' or the the worst came yesterday, 'What do you do?'

So being in a mood, and I'm still not sorry for it, I was truthful. Asked what do I do, I said I don't work outside the home (so unneccessary and kind of untrue) I'm on disability for bipolar and help a non-profit with proposals and grants using my English degree. The person stopped typing for a full 15 minutes (it was a guy too).

So in the future I'll cut out all the personal stuff and just say I help a non-profit. Live and learn.

It's not my fault that all that is true. And I'm not sorry for being me. And at least I have a degree, I used to do things, I used to have dreams that included the real world, I thought I was going to have a career and wear sensible high heeled shoes til I was 40 (and then have kids and have the energy for that too - what pipedreams).

Nope, not meant to be. I mean, I'm 'only' 37, but clearly I'm not following the life plan that seems to play out for so many. (The 'simple' stuff like working and having kids).God has/d other plans for me. And that's as poetic as I allow myself to be. (Cause it rhymes, you see.)

But I am still rotten angry about how life has turned out. I do other things, I write, I plan my much smaller life (literally I have forgotten how to travel outside a tiny comfort zone) and have such a long way to go to enter into reality without, for instance, even shaking around other messed up people.

It's not easy if you're high-functioning either, it doesn't seem to matter. I love my friends who are more accepting of themselves and I respect the anger and fight in the people who are coming to terms with themselves.

It's always so fun being truthful isn't it, NOT!:)

Have a great day, everybody. Seriously.

I'm having lunch with Husband today and if I still don't feel like doing anything, I will watch a movie (see below - I'm thinking 'The Hours'), which is like putting myself in a holding pattern, being on life-support or oxygen, waiting for a big awakening into times when I can DO again.

Lucky gal.

As I write this I am in a cranked out mood. Cranky. Trying to get over it, but that's life.

I have been working on fixing a jacket for someone at the Drop-in Center. He will pay me a little to fix it and it is frustrating me this morning, as it is suede and the needle I am using is large and I am having difficulty getting it through. Arggg!

The thing also smells because the jacket owner is a smoker and I sometimes must take breaks from it to get away from the stench.

Long-time readers may remember that the Tart use to smoke, for about 10 years, but I quit a few years ago, and yes it often now smells bad to me to be in the extreme vicinity of it. Not always, but I don't like being blanketed in it with the thing on my lap. Who knew?

I am also obsessively recovering from having my feelings hurt at the Drop-in Center yesterday. It only takes one comment sometimes to send me hurting and upset and then - mad, then upset again. I won't grace it with discussion except to say it was fairly small, and I need to get over it. Yes, Tart sensitive. Must stop it.

So to take a break, I got on the computer and started looking up favorite things to cheer me up.

Of course, the ultimate cheer-up is knowing I'm picking up my precious girl (my new fawn Pug puppy) on Saturday!! Yes, I found a precious girl and she will be ready to go home on Friday, but Saturday's the day we will pick her up.

We have taken two pictures of her and when I was going off and being so obsessive about my feelings being hurt last night, Husband brought up her beautiful face on the laptop and reminded me what was important in life.

I am so lucky that I have a good homelife and my pets to keep me company during the day. Sometimes I want to be around people and of course, now I feel 'burned' about going to Drop-in and want to just say well the heck with you, I'm going to have my puppy to love up and take care of.

I can't seem to do that quite yet, because I promised, or said that I would, go to the Executive Director's birthday party on Friday at the Center. I don't want to let her down but I don't really want to go there anymore, at least not the way I'm feeling right now.

I have done good work with them - a fundraiser, proofing a grant, sending out three letters of inquiry for food grants - I have given when all that some others have done is taken, and of course it's a 'taker' that makes a jealous comment about me because there is a genuine friendship between the Executive Director and I.

No wonder I am friends with the Executive Director, we are friends, we do get along so well, and no wonder that some people are just jealous beyotches and truth be told I hate jealousy because I just don't know what to say - I almost feel sorry for the other person but I get mad because they are attacking me. It's just so uncomfortable and unfair.

And then I spend time thinking of what I should have said. Yeah, like I need this.

And I said I wouldn't talk about it.

But, on the upswing, I'm getting a puppy and I know I'm a lucky gal for that.

Thank you all for your comments on the previous couple of posts. I really do appreciate them.

Tracy's site, Spiritual Brush Strokes, is experiencing technical difficulties on Explorer

If you use Internet Explorer to open and view Tracy's website (Spiritual Brush Strokes ) you will find that there is a little 'glitch' in it, as of this evening any way, where you can't open it (on Explorer, it works fine on Mozilla:).

I'm letting anyone know this who comes here, that she is waiting to see if Blogger will get over their 'little problems' and let her publish for everyone very soon.:)

I was in contact with her and she just wanted her Blogger Land friends to know that she was feeling a little grounded (especially because her ability to comment wasn't working for a bit but Now They Are!:) but that she expects this to work out soon. Let's hope so!!

I am going fishing A-gain in the morning, so I best be off to beddy-bye. Wish me luck!! I'll report back soon.
Love,
Tart

Listening to the inner voice.:) (Revised 7-4-08)

Apples (& cores), Webshots

I received one of the very nicest, most heart felt and loving emails today. It came from a wonderful blogger friend.:) It brought me such joy and tears that I printed it to keep it near me.:)

She reminded me of what I said from the beginning of this blog - that I hope that I can help even one person with this blog, reaching to who knows where.

I hope I can help people feel not so alone, as many of us travail in the dark half the time. I try to do this just by being me, I still tell you all my 'slob' stories, in other words express my humanity. Just be me. That's how I try to help. Sometimes, I probably give self-righteous sounding 'advice' that doesn't quite hit the mark. But I try to stay positive, which I believe in very much.:)

This friend made me remember that I do have something to say. You see, I suffer from a real chronic illness, and some people have very little sympathy for it. But I know I have it, and a lot of us have it or wonder if they have it, and would feel comforted to read the daily travails of a bipolar. As least, I think so.

I don't need sympathy exactly, but I too, like to know that I'm not alone. And I am supported by friends and family and when the sad times come, and they do (of course, and I hate sad times that I can't figure out a 'reason' for, and then I simply have to say, "Oh, that's the illness, Duh on me!"), I work through them. Sometimes, just continuing to breathe makes me a winner.

I keep to myself most of the time in the real-world, mostly because I'm just plain comfortable that way, and because sometimes when I doooo go out, like last night, it feels like I (hopefully only temporarily) lose faith in people. My computer is so much kinder. So is the telephone.

I want to give a shout out to all the Mom's out there who are dealing with this illness with their children. The mother bears who fight for their cubs, against a cruel world.

You see, I have a Mom like that, and I had a Dad like that too. Long story, and neither of my parents were perfect, but they turned out to be perfect for me, and were there (and still are) when I needed them most, like a beacon in a storm.

I don't have children and the best example I have known of a Mom handling bipolar in a child is what I've seen of my Mom. My Mom didn't want me to get involved with the 'system' she wanted to keep me safe at home, but eventually I was too sick for it to work out that way. She fought for me. When I was sick in my 20's my Dad was a huge comfort to me, like angel, and I won't forget it.

If you are searching for what to do for your child, you can talk to doctors, you can take or allow the system to take your child to facilities (and don't be afraid to do it, if its needed) you can read books at some point when its not all crisis and you have time, you can be lucky to talk to someone who's been through this, but I really believe most of all - That you must follow your heart, your insides, and do what you think is right. You must LISTEN to that voice within and try to throw away fears to not follow it, ask questions sure, but you make the decisions that you can live with. And I for one, encourage you to follow that voice within.

Inside, you KNOW what the right things might be, you need help to make the right decisions, but in the end it's the voice within that rules! Some people call it God. I do.

Trust your instincts. You should be given massive props for doing so, because it's an unimaginably difficult job. :)

I received 'props' from my Mom today for going to that 'party,' and I received it from you guys here on the blog too (thank you so much for that!:) It means so much to be supported by people, to feel love, when I somehow feel like a weird outcast around some people at that 'party', people who PRETEND to be loving, understanding people.

Or more truthfully, some people THINK they are loving or nice, but are so stunted in their growth as human beings, instead, that I can barely stand being judged by THAT!

It takes a lot of patience and boredom on my part to put up with it. And certain persons have called me names, like 'Oh, you are weird!" as though that were acceptable to say. Would "Oh, you ARE a prissy princess!" be acceptable? Why not?

In the end its just too much anger to hold onto. I've got to let it go. If the other person can't let it go, then it's their problem. But I am trying.

So, as usual, I digress, because you let me.:) I hope dear reader, that I Can be of some help to you, it's what I hope to do.:)

Alright, blogger land, let's have a good week! I wish it for all of you!

Love,

Tart

I survived a social outing! (that I was dreading.)

It's such a long story as to why it's so painful for me but suffice to say, I went to a birthday party (sans present, because I was told two days ago, and didn't KNOW this was a birthday party!) where a person that I pretty much have bad feelings about also attended. I have good reason to not like this person but I will not go into it now. And I noticed that this person avoided me like the plague as well, even though I walked in cheerful and talkative and trying to be engaged in the conversation.

You know when you go to one of those stuffy joints, with stuffy people and just feel uncomfortable the whole time? That's how I felt. I could barely eat, even though the food was good, but, whatever. I hated the fact that I shook while eating, but whatever. (I shake because of meds, but I notice it and feel embarrassed. So that's uncomfortable. My husband ignores it, but I don't know how much it freaks other people out.)

BUT, I went out. I went over there. I DID engage in some conversations, and listened and did not butt in on many of them! In other words, dear friends, I tried to act normal. If normal is being quiet (and acting shy) when you're not necessarily. It's like you don't want to speak because I'll be embarrassing myself, even though people talked about plenty of inappropriate-you'd-think-it-would- be- party-killers-things. It about killed me, but I was as normal as I could be. And it was brave for me. I knew I was afraid to go, I had been avoiding it all weekend and I went anyway.

We have Ticks!

I'm talking the real deal. I just found tick number 7 or so crawling up my leg in my office as I blogged (the dogs come in here). I immediately flushed it down the toilet, then called Husband to report and get upset to.

Ticks are disgusting.

I have a photo of one that we caught about a month ago and were saving for the vet. We like to do that even though most of them are the same - with the white spot on the back. I've searched my hard drive, I can't find that very hard to see tick in a plastic bag photo. Sorry!

I've had them crawling on me, I had one trying to attach to my tummy - GROSS! We've found one on my little black pug, and I think another attached to her and now this crawling on me. So maybe that's Only five, but it feels like Waaaaaay toooo many!

I just put Frontline Plus on them both yesterday so this may be a sign that it's working! I don't want them to have ticks, but I hate them on me too. The little black pug, Mia, is ALLERGIC to flea bites (she does not Have fleas, she just is in distress when she gets one little bite) so the vet suggested deet on her tail and ears only (not face of course, precious beast). Oh the travails of summer!

(I may have to take a Clonapin, search myself again for ticks, and take a rest. This is revving me up waaay to much.)

That didn't get past Me.

I know that there has been a lot of brouhaha of late about Oprah and her spirituality and whatnot.

I’m not going to address that, except to say that I haven’t been feeling like watching Oprah of late and I’m not in the slightest interested in her ‘New Age’ fascination with eckard toll or whatever.

I did however catch today’s interview with Barbara Walter’s as sitting duck, I mean interviewee. And I noticed the joy that Oprah had at making Baba nearly cry talking about her retarded sister and her death.

AND I caught, at the end of the interview, Baba’s very telling remark that she was “too old to interview anymore, because she had become too kind.” And she didn’t blink or apologize for it.

Ouch. Take that, you Strong Woman. Make Baba cry, but she’ll put your fat ass in your place.

Out.

WHAT!!? Not everyone considers furbabies as fur-children!!??!

I guess I can see the neighbor's problem. My small, adorable black pug only barks like a crazed doggie when she see's their kid, a small girl. My pug, has issues with the small variety of human. They are strange, a source of concern, or perhaps she's playing with them, I don't know. But she is consistent.

We have other pugs here, my other fawn, and my Mom's fawn, for a total of 2 other pugs that came to check out the fuss. So I had told my Mom to call me if my little one barked or carried on.

The thing is, she won't do it unless the loud (I can hear her) child comes to the fence and babbles and goads the dog into a frenzy. I mean that, the dog is fine without neighbors child or mowing next to the fence, the two things I've seen get her going.

The short of it, is the Dad of child drags her away from the fence muttering something about 'Not right to have 3 dogs..'

Ouch. Not only did he not accept my apology for my puggie, which I don't think she started anyway, it's clear that they don't understand the love we have for our dogs. It was not a frenzy with the 3 of them, the other two were just THERE.

So, I would be surprised if I ever have a human child, being pumped full of drugs and already owning a ripe hormonal system. However, I'm doing well with the fur-children and I will just have to accept that human parents don't see it the same way.

I'm lucky I'm allowed to speak to people with children, after all I'm such a FREAK, as a 36-year old woman who has not reproduced. Can we take into account that during the years of prime reproduction I had three scorching cases of psychoses? I mean, we should be impressed with that and the fact that lately I've been hiding my tarkinesia as I can. Could a Mom be more superhuman?

Ah well, its a good thing that people like me are so tolerant of the rest. But I'm not impressed with the squealing and outright ruckuses in restaurants, and if I was saddled with it - the constant responsibility, the incredible possibility to screw up and the kid turns out 'bad,'and I'm not interested in my local PTA, because I've taught children and they were a delight, their parents were the nightmare - so why rock the boat on having what is already populating Earth too much anyway.

My illness is not my fault, but my ability to use reproductive shields successfully is apparently something to further be amazed with. I'm grateful for my consolation prizes and I'll try not impinge on parental territory any more than they should cut on what I consider my joy. I think I deserve some.

Next post: PMS, the scorge I can't rid myself of, besides Bipolar. What frkn frustration.

Ready to Rumble

I get so mad about the Xyprexa, Eli Lily Lies because I was on the stuff for a brief while, feeding on carbs (how dare I, as that was the only disclaimer I was given out of the mental ward – DON’T EAT PIES! I am dead serious.) getting fatter by the moment and lucking out in not growing the pathos of diabetes.

Others: not so lucky. For years of lying and covering up the truth instead of spending the billions to make sure the damn drug was safe, Lily must pay, and pay well.

Every payout needs to take a serious bite out of da bizniss. It might was as well be the Mafia, what a setup and a ream the Drug Companies truly are.

I am a youngling, that means old to some of you, and it was in my prime when the Exxon Valdez oil disaster occurred. I know some tasteless jokes on that matter, but the best is when the Exxon boat driver realizes he ‘messed up’ Alaska. Yeah, messed up something, Boat Driver.

Well, Eli Lily has been forced thru court of law, to see that they ‘messed up’ schizophrenics and bipolars in the fine state of Alaska to the tune of $15 million dolla’s. Which is so paltry, considering the billions to settle just 30,000 individual claims.

Read it: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/26/business/26cnd-zyprexa.html?_r=1&8au=&oref=slogin&emc=au&pagewanted=print

Read about the pure greed, the cover up of playing down the drug’s risks (Diabetes and cholesterol problems) to doctors, all to make sure they sold the drug.

The thing is there’s such a thing as R&D, Research & Development, for every drug. This company clearly cut corners with finishing their job. Their deceitfulness gave a life debilitating illness to so many. Diabetes kills, especially on top of the confusion of Bipolar. My God, if I got it I’d contemplate suicide with sincerity.

I’ll never know what my Dad REALLY died of, but they say it has to do with the diabetes, never mentioning his possibility to tox out, like I almost did. He took his meds religiously. We all trust massively when we pop our medications in our mouth: the doctors, their knowledge, hospitals even.

To have to wonder if the drug companies are waiting for the pennies on our eyeballs is utterly reprehensible. Eli Lily, I barf on you. And all your little (always dressed in black) VULTURE DRUG REPS, too.

Make my Lithium right you little bitches, or you will just wish you had never been born. God, don't piss off a 'Tart.

I had to lau-ah-augh....

It snowed today in certain parts of the area. My area. I come outside to get in my car to go see Husband to do lunch and it's starting to snow.

But I got into car anyway, had lunch and returned just fine.

Around 5 I'm asleep with two Pugs on me :) and wake up to the news.

There was a 25 car pile up in the opposite direction of the road I took. A semi jack-knifed. All sorts of hullabloo with no extreme injuries or death.

And, like John Lennon, all I can do is laugh.

They said it, "Came out of nowhere!!!!!!!" and they didn't know 'what to to do!'

Didn't know how to drive in what turned out to be less than 1.5 inches of snow. How did they get a driver's license? Seriously?

And THAT is how I know people are stupid.
:)

Good Story Found - Man fall 47 Stories and Miraculously Survives!

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/04/nyregion/04fall.html?_r=1&th&emc=th&oref=slogin

Why can't we have stories where people plant pansies and they flourish into a beautiful garden? This is what bothers me about 'good stories.'

It takes something terrible to turn into something good.

How bipolar.

It Boggles the Imagination

So I’m checking out my counter for the blog, as I’m often want to do and I find some jack ass, pardon the Franche, who typed into Google “Can Abilify get you high?”

Honey, you are on the wrong blog. I’m bipolar. Everything gets ME high.

It would never occur to me to type in, or go LOOKING for items that bring upon highness, because you should talk to my Husband – we don’t want no more of that.

So this is a clear case of normies, with no life, let’s be specific because plenty have lives, bless them, coming to my blog wondering if this shit is crushable and can be inhaled. Or whatever you do to get high off a mood stabilizing drug – YOU IDIOTS!!!

You have nothing better to do than type that in? Were your 15-year-old friends snickering in the background, telling you how cool you are? (Can’t ya just tell that to yourself (I AM COOL!!) and save us all a lot of tax payer money for your rahab/jail stay in the, probable, not so distant future???)

Oh, I know, you’re a mother of seven, and somehow thinking of ripping off a pharmacy for some aBILify and wanted to check first before taking the wrong things. It’s just to help the overwhelming tiredness, the fact that NO one must understand (snarf), and the frigidness.

Why don’t the two of you hug each other and stop taking drugs that don’t belong to you. And get your sorry ass off my page.

Next.

Nicole Richie, Joel Madden Shower 100 Moms with Baby Gifts (story via People.com)

http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20164093,00.html

As some of you remember, I have been accused of being (sometimes very) harsh about Nicole Richie. I'm proud to say that pregnancy, impending motherhood, a much talked about impending entrance into married life, and a desire to set things straight with family and the world(?) seem to have matured Ms. Richie greatly and I admit, in nice ways, in the last few months.

I feel somehow proud and good, myself, that Nicole and baby daddy Joel Madden showered 100 Los Angeles Health Clinic moms with $200,000 of gifts this weekend. These shocked moms received the same things that Nicole will be using for her soon-to-be newborn, which has probably got to be special if you're a Nicole fan. Let alone that this was truly a gesture in giving to the poor and needy.

Yes, this could all be a publicity stunt, meant to get all of us to forget some of Nicole's problems (the same previous unniceties that I've mentioned before), but it was such a nice stunt, backed up with perhaps one or two previous things that the couple mention on their new joint website.

Joel & Nicole seem to be a very nice united front, and say that their families are very close to each other (I assume that means emotionally, as well as living 'near' to each other) and that they helped with this endeavor.

The two have established the richiemaddenfoundation.com, which, in a way, is dedicated to their baby that is yet waiting to be born in January. Nice.

They say they have been putting this together, or thinking about it, since learning of the pregnancy. Sweet.

I've looked at their site and their companion site www.babycenter.com and I'm pretty impressed. Not only as a consistent lover of baby education, myself, I am now a considerer of the lifestyle for me, myself & Husband, and found the information alone on http://www.babycenter.com/ to be very interesting. Oh! And you can buy baby stuff there too!

The two lovebirds seem to perform their acts of kindness coinciding with what is going on in their own life, meaning I don't know if they'll still be handing out toys when Nicole's in a totally different stage with her own tyke, but they really seem sincere.

And that's a profoundly different thought than the ones I had earlier this year about Nicole and I'm not afraid to report a change in my feelings, especially when she's done something to 'wow' me. Nice job Nicole & Joel! Thank you for making Christmas more real for one bipolar blogger, giving me a celebrity turn-around moment. I wonder if I should have put this on my 'Good Stuff' page? Maybe if you keep it up.:)

Not complain unduly, but has anybody else noticed what a beast it's become to format on the Blogger page these days? This and a couple of my last posts have had horrible formatting problems, especially in spacing between paragraphs. It's a 'whut the' moment./Discuss

'A Chastened Imus Returns to Radio'

Here's the link from a NYT's article.
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/03/business/media/03cnd-imus.html?_r=1&8au&emc=au&oref=slogin

Now that he's adding two black comedians, promising to chat about race relations while 'never saying anything to compromise the promise made to the Rutger's 'young ladies,' (a definite difference next to the description of them that got him trouble last time!!) he's got the all clear.

Excuse me, while I clear my delicate palate after those retching sounds just exuded that I had to turn the mic off for.

What IS it that I hate about I-mus so much? He is a hypocrite, plain and simple. I'm sure he explained to the money-makers that made him and themselves so much off his 'humor' that he didn't mean to piss the black people off so bad and They know that he just pushes the envelope everday because teenage boys getting ready for high school need a friend so They can sell crap to them. EIGHT MONTHS and he's reinstated.

Do you know what my most favorite movie of all time is? I had the joy of watching it again this weekend with Husband. I love it so much that it's impossible to control my parroting factoring, my repeat before they say it of what's said. Ready, kids??

Gooooood Morning, Vietnam!

This role was Robin Williams true calling. That was HIM, and he is utterly hilarious and true as Adrienne Cronoaur (sp) brought from Crete to do a radio show in Vietnam 1965.

Yes, he gets kicked off the radio at one point, for telling the truth! in a 'conflict' where the censors must be listened to.

You rent the movie. You do the research on Imus. Somebody's a dirty, media-owned slut and someone's got morals. One is funny, the other wouldn't know funny if a (wacka-wacka) horn wuz shoved up his butt. You be the judge.

Horrible People and the Lives destroyed

I'm taking some time out of my day here to discuss the one unbelievably, sad, and as the parents put it 'vile' (always a favorite word for me, glad they used it) story today.

Unless you're living under a rock, I'm referring to the 'parent' that created a Myspace account of a fake boy in the pretense to monitor and 'find out' what other - what people, KIDS? (actually specially one young lady) - were saying about her 'child.'

At some point, the fake boy created by this bitch (are you following that she is an adult and 'mother?') stopped being kind and being the smallest semblance of a self-esteem lifter for the young girl - whom the account was specifically created to fk with, but started that ever-popular present-day cyber-smackdown high school experience for way too many bullied kids - the, evil, listing over and over of aggregious lies that are like an atomic bomb to the innards of a barely hanging on kid. Words like that are meant to kill, and this girl is not the first to fall in its crossfire. She killed herself.

Do I have THIS right? I think I said it better than any flat story you'll read about it, and it's all over MSN, if you need details.

First of all, this is proof positive - Do not kill yourself, not for any reason

Not for what you think is the most 'obvious' reason in the world (you are worthless, what am I, an amateur??) caused by what anyone SAYS, or even by what anything inside you says - believe it or not, there are legions of us that can feel suicidal WITHOUT some son of bitch listing, and listing, and listing, and listing, and sending, and sending, and sending, sending a bunch of CRAP that basically boils down to Sa tan ic lies. When a kid is a kid, they're impressionable, and can really buy into the idea - THIS is the whole world. Everyone/old friends/a significant other hates me, they must be right and this is the end of the world.

Oh, tip #2 - THEY are almost never right! When you survive all this and get as old as I am, you truly won't even care what they think - if only youth had this magic gift. Note to self: when I have a kid someday I will try to instill these things in that person from the time communicatory skills are established.

I MEAN THIS WITH THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART - NEVER KILL YOURSELF FOR ANY REASON. If nothing else, don't EVER give anyone the satisfaction.

I know some people need to hear this. I bring it up because that is not only one the biggest travesties of this entire situation, it saddens me greatly that there is no one out there giving basic facts.

We all, maybe the young even more, need to hear hear that we are loved, that we matter, that life IS tough but we are strong enough to soldier through, even if that means an occasional fetal position and an inability to get out of bed for several months. No one deserves to die. No one deserves to be a teenager, with a whole life to live, and kill themselves. And may I say this kid sounded like she would have grown up through all her awkward stages and been a terrific person. My God, it pisses me off.

The parents of the victim are so overwrought that they are divorcing. They were told by the FBI not to say anything to the press as they tried to figure out what happened. This young lady died October of 2006. I think they've been hit, blindsided, and sound like they are still deciding what to do and have been quiet for long enough. Apparently they have to shop in the same town as these pathetic sacks of shit, and the lady who perpetrated this thing (why do they call it a hoax, she committed a criminal act!) 'asked the mother to stop talking to the press.'

Additionally, the perps have offered no apology. It seems like a simple, civil thing to do but the perp family utterly refuses. All I can say is, the moment the Mom-perp started the bombing, the cruelties, that is precisely the point that the woman became an animal and apologizing should be the least of her fears. If everyone is shielding the perp-daughter, they need to stop. It's time that bullies, whether they be the mom, shocker?, or the kid, pay for the damages and heartache (in civil suits, that comes in the form of money) for what they did wrong. With a law on the books, someday, prison time.

The girl's parents act like grieving parents. Their lives have been irreparably destroyed by this. They monitored the heck out of their daughter's internet use and this still happened. What amazes me is that they are just now talking about a civil suit.

Just because lawmakers and law enforcement are typically still back in the early 1900's regarding anything internet is No Reason why things should not be taken care of properly. And just because this awful woman is not forced, told, or held by the hand to apologize to the dead girl's family doesn't mean that a person with ANY morals or sense for the unconscionable damage she's done to these people's lives should not in fact BE FULLY EXPECTED!! Barring that:

I recommend suing them for every penny they've ever owned. And stop hiding their names, they have done nothing to deserve any kindness from you. We all think they're beasts anyway - it's just a matter of time before they really get it.
:)

Update, 11-22-07: Here are some links to read about this story online:

ABC News: Mom: Daughter's Suicide Preceded By Cruel Web Hoax

Mom: Girl killed herself over online hoax - Internet - MSNBC.com