I had a normal life & had myself a very together person. I was a rebel for my time.....but I was always strong minded & wouldn't let people pressure me into doing anything I felt was wrong for me. When I got married, that strong mindedness probably caused many of the problems that existed, & sadly, I didn't listen to that little voice inside of me that told me not to get married.....but there was nothing strong minded that was really telling me not to....it was a just sorta kinda.

I would always dive into everything I was doing completely.....I would spend so much time that when I would finish, I would be exhausted & take a few days break to recover....that was how I worked in college, & during my career as an aerospace communications firmware engineer. It wasn't until I moved into my last house when I found out what burn out was all about. We had to move into an apartment because our house wasn't completed when our other house sold.....so some stuff was in storage & living out of boxes for 6 months. Then came the move & I had knee problems that I needed to have my knee reconstructed....major surgery....1 month of cast, 3 months of crutches & no weight on the leg.....6 months of physical therapy 3 days a week & since I was pushing myself (like usual) so I could be back doing down hill skiing within that 6 months for my vacation, I was working the other 4 days on doing my own physical therapy for several hours a day. The day we moved into our new house July 4, my husbands brother was killed in a motorcycle accident. I was trying to handle all this & work 70 hours a week. Then that air force contract was cancelled & I was laid off. That was the first time I realized that I was capable of feeling burn out because when I got a job offer, I actually turned it down because I was just too exhausted & knew I wouldn't do well on a new job feeling the way I was feeling.....& there is always a new job....which there was after I gave myself a longer break.

I got my career back on track within a few months.....with a few struggles, but it was going well & back to the 70 hour weeks & pushing (why would I ever learn from my mistakes when I didn't think they were a mistake???). So....everything went well for about 5 years until my career finally fell apart. The project was over that I was working on & there wasn't anything in the company that I felt ok about doing.....the only thing that showed up, looked like it might be a different path...it turned out being nothing but a glorified secretarial position....& for a techincal person......that was really a come down for me. I gave it 6 months & hated every minute of the job. But like my normal self, I did the job so well, they wouldn't let me go back to technical when one came up. One of the things we had to do was put together a presentation for the national convention that was being held. I took all the buzz words in the area I was working in & threw all the BS I could come up with together & I couldn't believe it.....my presentation was accepted. All I was doing was sitting in my office & crying all day...coming out & doing the job I had to do & going back to the privacy of my office to fall apart when I realized how trapped I was (sadly, my experience had become outdated in other companies, so just changing companies wasn't an option either). This was around Thanksgiving & I was struggling to get by until Christmas break, praying that I could get through my burnout. Well, the first of the year came & the burnout didn't go away, so I kept calling in sick. Then the 1994 earthquake hit in Northridge California. That collapsed the freeway I used to take to work. I lived 1 1/2 hours from work in the first place & that just made it take 6 hours. I off & on ride shared with my neighbor who worked at the same company. We were on the road sometims 12 hours a day. They forced me to come into work & take a lunch hour on top of that. That added up to 21 hours our of 24 hours....3 hours to sleep, so I continued to call in sick as much as possible....until I finally went to my GP & she put me on medical leave of absense with horrible anxiety attacks that I just couldn't deal with.

Who would have ever thought that within a year, I would become suicidal for years & would be in & out of mental hospitals & then the migraines hit which took over 24/7. The suicide attempts lasted for about 4 years & the pain & neck fusion continued after that until around 2003 when I found a pain specialist who was willing to prescripe a level of meds that controlled the pain. During that time, they wanted me to get into doing things that I wanted in my life....so I got back into doing my dressage riging & got my first horse & then I also got into my american eskimo dogs & showing & breeding them. Even with all of these wonderful things, I couldn't seem to find the real meaning of my life. My marriage that was since 1975 was horrible & I left after 1 hospitalization....came back to my own part of the house.

It wasn't until 2003 that I finally started getting bits of my life together & decided to go back to school & take some classes I enjoyed. My husband had lost his job at that time but that didn't make being with him any easier. Then my Mother ended up with cancer & everything else fell apart...but it was finally at that time even when I was then dealing with anorexia & PTSD from that, that I finally started getting my life together & with the move to Kentucky & leaving my husband has really helped with all my symptoms. I still get anxiety attacks, but can usually sleep them off....sometimes it takes a few days, but they go away without having to take meds now. I am using a high dose of Omega 3 for depression, but I wasn't having depression issues anyway, so figure it's just good for my health. I have dr appointments & my blood pressure is right on.....considering the anger & have been going through with my husband, it sound have been high, not normal.

I have run the circle of emotions & symotoms since 1994. I have experiences feelings & situations I never would have dreamed could have ever happened in my life. It seems that my symptoms & mental health issues much have been situational & seem to continue showing up with situations since they never existed in my life before the situation & now that I am getting my life together & finding that coming back to my Christianity has made the complete difference in my feelings. I finally have a free feeling compaired to the prison I was in for those years.

Debbie