What's the point?

My therapist told me about some new study that says that if you spend a lot of time in front of a computer do it in a well lit room. Doing it with only the back lighting of the screen was shown to cause depression or make it worse. Tv too. I used to do a lot of online gaming in a dark room. For some reason now I like to have lights on. I dunno why, this was before I heard about the study.

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I don't know much about political organizing but it sounds exciting! What does a staging location director do?

Oh, I didn't mean to suggest to just leave the meds and go lifestyle alone. It was more along the lines if maybe you got better, they could maybe reduce dosages then? (Long term, veery long-term)
That sucks about having so restricted food, what do you eat? I know it's possible, can't be fun though...
And also about holistic options being currently not available.

Hm, have you thought about a non-computer related hobby? Origami? Playing an instrument? Songwriting? Drawing? (If you like the Sims )

Basically, we set up a number of staging locations across the state. This is particularly important in my region, which is large and mostly rural. In areas around Boston, it's not as big a deal because the regions are geographically smaller and the populations are much more complicated. We launch phone banks, canvasses, and poll watchers from each staging location to the surrounding area. The staging location director coordinates all of that and relays relevant information back to campaign headquarters. We have interns leading our canvasses, but I have to make sure they have maps, canvass packets, literature, etc., and I sometimes have to train new volunteers if the interns aren't comfortable doing the training. We're also doing most of our canvasses with a smartphone app, so I have to teach people how to use that. For canvassers who don't have smartphones, we have paper walk lists, and then someone (generally me) has to manually enter in all that data later. Ditto with phone banks--mostly done online, but sometimes we have callers without computers who use paper lists. After each shift, I have to tally data (number of volunteers, number of no-shows, number of calls made, number of doors knocked, number of contacts, and contact rate) and send that to my direct supervisors and the folks at HQ. I make sure that the volunteers scheduled for shifts the next day are still planning to show up. I'm around to answer questions anyone may have, which can range from "How do I get to East Street from here?" to "I need a breakdown of how much we spent on TV ads each month" to "Can someone from HQ tell this lady politely that, no, our candidate is not going to come have brunch with her?" Basically, I'm there to make sure everything goes smoothly. And when there's downtime, I make calls myself. If I'm not interrupted, I can make 150 calls in a four-hour shift.

If I got better, yeah, it's possible that they could reduce some of the meds. It's all a balancing act, though, and you can never tell what might set off a flare. We do know I absolutely can't go off the steroids or get any lower than the dose I'm currently on, even if I'm doing well. Every time we've tried that, I've ended up in the hospital. My doctor actually did just bump down the dose of one of my immunosuppressants last week, as he thinks (as do I) that it's significantly contributing to the fatigue and weakness. Unfortunately, at this point we can't lower it any further without risking a major flare, since it's the only drug that's gotten my GI symptoms under any kind of control.

I knit obsessively, but I almost always have a DVD going while I work. I don't do well with silence most of the time. It gives my brain too much space to start thinking crazy, downward-spiral type things. But I think the knitting class I teach seasonally is going to start back up again soon, so that'll get me away from the computer for a while every week. I enjoy teaching people, too. It's kind of rewarding. You take a piece of string and two sticks, and eventually something beautiful and useable emerges.

WOW, it sounds fairly complicated, and you do a lot!
Any organization/political figure/etc can consider themselves happy to have you on their side!

You're lucky you can knit! I think my back wouldn't like it. I've crocheted a bit and it wasn't exactly pain-free last time I tried... And you can even teach others!
Good that a class will give you some people time!
You really have a cool and unique way of writing too...

It's really not as complicated as it sounds on paper. It's a lot of balls to juggle, but once you get the hang of it, it's not really difficult. One of the things I like about political organizing is that it encompasses so many different tasks and skills. I get bored easily and don't do well with rote work. With organizing, there's always something new to learn. I'd particularly like to get involved in more policy work. I haven't had a chance to do that yet--all my work has been field.

My neck is sometimes unhappy with my knitting, probably because I'm bent over my work. But a good support pillow for my back and taking breaks to roll my head around helps. I actually have more problems with my hands. On small needles, I can work for hours at a time, but on thicker needles, my knuckles start to hurt. The bigger the needles, the less time I can spend knitting with them. Apparently that's the reverse of basically everyone else on the planet, who prefer big needles because tiny ones make their hands cramp.

Interesting.

My Grandma used to knit a lot when she was younger, she made beautiful things, I just tried a tiny bit and then gave up as it wasn't that 'trendy' when I was growing up as it is now.

You're very intelligent, so I was thinking something to 'occupy' the mind would be good too - learning a language immerses you into a whole new world and can be done with a book and notebook too, for at least some of the time. Any languages you might be interested in and that could help you in your work - Spanish maybe? Or just 'for the soul'...?

Singing and playing an instrument at the same time also immerses both the brain and the body into something, and leaves no room for unwanted thoughts (okay, unless you sing very depressing songs or such, but even that sometimes helps.)

It's interesting you want to get involved with policy work (me too haha, partly). Is there a system in place for that within the political party you belong to, or how would you go about it? Mental health/health/poverty legislation or other areas too?

Oh, and do you know of an organization or website that is inspiring and is for people with both health and mental health problems? I was wondering if something like that exists...? (There are organizations for physically disabled and unwell people, and separately mental health organizations, but for people dealing with both problems like you have been...? There are specific challenges that may not be addressed elsewhere..)

I have major cognitive deficits (the lasting legacy of ECT) that make learning a new language all but impossible. I used to be good with languages (I've taken Spanish, Latin, and Chinese before), but now nothing seems to stick. I tried teaching myself Welsh and got nowhere with it.

I've never been much of a singer, either. I have moderate hearing loss, which probably factors in--I cannot match pitch to save my life. I remember my elementary school music teacher telling me, before an assembly where we were supposed to sing for the rest of the school, to just stand there and mouth the words. I did play clarinet and bass clarinet in middle school, but I don't have an instrument anymore.

I'm honestly not sure how one makes the jump from field work to policy. I think I'd probably need to get at least my bachelor's first, in political science, public policy, or a related field. Most of the policy folks I've known have had a Master's or higher, and interns and volunteers don't usually get to do policy stuff because there's too much that could go wrong if you screw something up.

I don't know of any groups that work specifically around issues of both physical and psychological disabilities. Most disability rights groups say they include people with psych disabilities, but it's generally in a secondary, tacked-on way, in my experience. And I differ philosophically with the big mental health advocacy groups, primarily because I believe mainstream psychiatric treatment is traumatizing, often abusive, and does consumers a great disservice by taking away their power and control of their lives. So I would not work with organizations that ally themselves with that kind of treatment.

Sorry to hear about the cognitive deficits - and Wow for taking Spanish, Latin and Chinese! - not many English speakers are into languages. I love languages too, and have taken some of these too
When I was on computer A LOT I found that it also made me a bit 'ADD' and caused me to not remember stuff etc. So this (+worries) can be a factor too...(+meds, at least mine) Welsh seems a particularly difficult language to me, maybe others would be easier?
I've sort of given up on Japanese for now, because I don't seem to have a good textbook too. It really can make a difference. (Plus I was forgetting a lot too yikes.) But I still love languages.
Do you still know any Spanish, Latin and Chinese, or did you forget those too?

I know that sometimes NGOs can contribute to policies too, not sure how it is in your country. Here, you'd have to find the right NGOs and the right people... I googled 'ngos policy making usa' and some links seem interesting, it's too late here to fully research them though. Maybe you can read some of that yourself?

BA and MA seem valid long-term goals... Are there any free options or grants for what you'd need to study to get into policy work? (Law? Or what?) Any free courses online to prep yourself for them?

I agree with you about mainstream psychiatry, add that it seems largely ineffective too, with numbers of people on neuroleptic meds rising? Of course you need to stay true to your beliefs. I'm more into holistic or 'alternative' approaches like Open Dialogue Finland or such myself too.
Mad in America seem vocal about these approaches, not sure if they're into policymaking also? (just googled ' "mad in america" policy making usa' and they seem at least interested in policy. Do you know mentalillnesspolicy.org/ ? Are they pro-mainstream or...? I don't like what they seem to say about schizophrenia though, hm, totally pro-med only - too bad)
Well, maybe there are other groups, or existing groups like Icarus could go into policy making field too - or do they already do that? Don't know... Things to explore maybe?

I've lost a lot of the vocabulary I used to know, but my memory of grammatical structures and rules is intact. I've always been good at that kind of stuff, even in English.

I think Welsh would actually be less complicated to learn than Chinese if I could focus enough. Structurally/grammatically, it's not terribly different than English or Latin--they're all part of the Indo-European language family. Actually, of the languages I've studied, I think Latin has the most complicated grammatical rules. But it's very orderly and logical, whereas English just steals its rules from every other language and is therefore completely inconsistent.

I haven't really had a chance to look into grants and such yet. Right now, I live in an area with five colleges, but I don't have a way to get to any of them--it's a crazy, messed up situation with inadequate/inaccessible public transportation. I know two of the private women's colleges have very good scholarship programs for nontraditional students. However, to qualify, you have to have half of the credits for a degree, and I don't think I would have enough credits yet. So I'd probably need to do several semesters at the state university or one of the community colleges. I'm not sure what kind of scholarship programs and financial aid would be available, and I'd also have to look into what kind of disability accommodations they'd be willing to offer.

NGO's do policy work here, too, and I've been involved with some between election cycles, though just in a field organizer capacity, not policy. I imagine the criteria for getting involved with policy stuff for NGO's would be much the same as it would be for political campaigns.

MIA and TIP, as far as I know, don't do a lot of policy stuff, although I know both have done some work on opposing the Murphy bill recently. I actually just applied for a national organizer job for TIP, though I don't know how likely I am to get that job. I think it's something I'd be good at it, and it would also give me a chance to travel, which I think I'd enjoy.

I wasn't familiar with mentalillnesspolicy.org until you mentioned it, but I gave it a cursory glance. It looks like they've got some pro-commitment stuff, which I don't support. But I'll give it a more thorough look later--right now I'm making a bunch of phone calls and writing emails for my campaigns.

Yeah, Latin has a lot of grammar rules! I've forgotten a lot of it, it does make learning/understanding languages like Spanish or French that stem from Latin easier.
Chinese is probably quite difficult, so even if Welsh is easier, it still doesn't mean a lot lol. Good to know you kept grammar and such! How long have you studied the languages?

Well, you can research grants and other things after the elections...
Sorry to hear about inadequate/inaccessible public transportation again, rural areas can suck with public transportation - if I remember it right, you wrote you live in a more rural area? (I live in a rural area too) Maybe you can win the lottery and get a personal chauffer?

Can you drive? Are there car-sharing options? (Where you rent a car for cheap from another ordinary human, this kind of thing is coming to our country, it was in the media. Or where someone posts where they're going, from which street even, and can take you with for a small amount of money for gas. There are sites, fb apps and fb groups for this too.)

Yeah, I was wondering if you applied for TIP job! I think you'd be good at it too! (I'd apply myself if it was for an international position! )

mentalillnesspolicy.org does seem a bit fishy, alas - it's weird though, I'd expect more from a member of Amnesty International?? (if I remember it right, something on that site was written by one. I wonder if they could be lobbied?)

I briefly googled up Murphy's bill and can understand why MIA and TIP were opposing it.

Chinese is really not as difficult as people seem to think it is. It's a tonal language, so you have to teach yourself to hear that, and there are some sounds you have to learn that don't have an equivalent in English. But grammatically it's much less complicated than most Romance and Germanic languages. There are no articles to have to deal with, and there are no gendered nouns, so you don't have to learn declension charts and so forth. Verb conjugation is a whole lot simpler, too. The biggest difficulty in learning Chinese is that they don't have a phonetic alphabet, so you have to memorize what the characters mean. But there's a system called Pinyin that was developed for western learners. It basically uses the Roman alphabet--with some diacritical marks added to indicate tone--to provide a phonetic translation of the characters.

I studied Spanish and Latin in high school, so 10+ years ago. Chinese and Latin in college, so about 8 years ago. And as a small child (<10 years old), I spoke--or at least understood--some Welsh. My great-grandmother spoke it to me, but no one else in the family spoke it. It was one of those situations where they only taught their children English because they wanted them to integrate, but as she got older I think she regretted not passing on her language. But after she passed away, since no one else in the family spoke it, I lost what I remembered.

I can drive, but I don't currently have a driver's license simply because I didn't have a car to take the test when I moved to Massachusetts. I'm sure I could pass a road test if I had access to a car, but AFAIK there aren't any car shares out here where I live, although I know some of the cities have them.

I ran into my city councilor at a political event last night, and he did say he was trying to get some answers about my public transit situation. (I emailed him about it a few weeks back.) He also called me the only normal person there and then called me a unicorn five minutes later. :-) Politics can generate some odd conversations. But I'm hopeful that he can get some answers. It's ridiculous, but sometimes people in positions of authority can get things done when normal people can't. Not how the system should work, but such is life.

Yeah, I'm not sure how good my chances are of actually getting the TIP position. It's based in NYC, although the posting did say other locations were possible since a lot of the organizing can be done remotely. And once I had some money, I wouldn't mind relocating, either. It would probably give me access to much better resources. And I think my experience with political organizing combined with my lived experience of extreme states and mental health services would make me a good match for what they're looking for. So we'll see. It bugs me that their job posting didn't say when people could expect to hear from them or have a contact person. But I think the deadline for applications was today, so I'm hoping I'll hear something in the next week or two.

The Murphy bill scares the crap out of me. It's already absurdly easy to commit someone involuntarily--when it happened to me, literally all that happened was the judge asked the psychiatrist, "Is this person seriously mentally ill and in need of treatment?" I think he gave my lawyer a token chance to "defend" me, but since my lawyer was about 12 years old and had only been allowed to talk to me 5 minutes before the hearing, that was pretty much a joke. So I don't know why on earth Murphy thinks it needs to be easier to institutionalize people. And he's not engineering programs that offer more comprehensive inpatient treatment, either. Most places still won't offer any therapy, so all you do is stare at the walls for 18 hours a day. I'd say parts of his bill violate the Supreme Court's decision in Olmsted, even. And his bill (unlike the Democratic alternative to it) doesn't eliminate the Medicare lifetime limit on services, so basically it still allows the most seriously ill people (those of us who are on disability) to be denied treatment, while private insurers are forced to cover treatment under recent parity laws. I could go on at great length about the evils of the Murphy bill.