OK. Day 3 begins with some lyrics from a song by my favorite completely unknown singer/songwriter, Matt Nathanson. This is the beginning of a summation of Day 3.
==
I'm ready to embrace this, I am
I'm ready for repair
I've got so many layers left by amateur painters who covered
over what was there
I stuffed myself sick on your memory
and the beautiful mess that we'd made
But I'm so tired
of being inspired only when things
slip away

They told me time would strip it all free and leave me bone
dry
They told me time would strip it all free but I'm no better than
when I left here the first time

I'm ready to erase this, I am
I'm ready to begin
Spent myself trying to change all of the beauty we'd made
just to want it all back again
And with the clouds moving in, this hardly looks like the same
moon
And with the leaves all gone the trees that once stood strong
now look pinched and cruel

They told me time would strip it all free and leave me bone
dry
They told me time would strip it all free but I'm no better than
when I left here the first time
========
This is what I get out of this experience so far, having been through it once before.

Fortunately, it was gray and cold today, so I wasn't too pissed off about having to spend 7 hours in a psych hospital, in therapy. The "weekend crew" (aka, the ones who aren't good enough to be A-team) was in, so pretty much all new faces save 1.

As for the loonies, there were only 5 of us, group is usually 12-13. The horribly talkative manic guy wasn't there, just the really oh-god-feed-the-S.O.B.-some-lithium-PLEASE guy, so that helped. The illiterate guy who likes recipe hour in place of therapy wasn't there either. We actually got some things accomplished -- imagine that!

And that's actually the bad part. Therapist I hadn't seen before had "process group" (everybody else calls it group therapy) today. The f'ing bee-otch made me CRY. Not just a little tear rolling down my cheek, but big huge wracking sobs. IN FRONT OF EVERYBODY.

GOD I hate that.

Last time I was in, one of the therapists who is in during the week was on vacation, so they brought a guy over from inpatient for 90 minutes a day to run process group. S.O.B. made me cry every single day. How do they do it?!

They make us fill out these "check-in" sheets in the morning to rate our symptoms. I think they should make us fill them out at the end instead. If I have enough coffee in me by the time I get there, I'm not feeling too bad. By the time the day is over, I'm nearly suicidal and ready to slice off body parts with sharp objects. It just sucks.

So, no real weirdos today except for manic boy, who used his time in group therapy to talk about feeling homicidal, and nothing funny to comment on -- I'm wrung out. I'm going to go take an extra Risperdal to calm down because I am f'ing SICK of nurses stopping me on my way to the bathroom or something and saying "What are you doing to stay safe?" I have to swear to them I won't cut between 3:30 p.m. and 8 a.m. After they whip me up into a frenzy by the end of the day, they have to know what they're asking!

What can I say -- it all sucks. I'm going shopping. A little retail therapy, a little atypical antipsychotic -- life can indeed be good.

Candy