[Junerain]

I have begun to throw the big R word around, among close friends, the word Recovery....

Friends say, I just needed self esteem, assertiveness, my niche....I have found these things in nursing school..it became apparent that nurses HAD to be assertive, that I needed that not only as a nurse but as a young woman, as a friend, as a leader of the Depression Bipolar Support Alliance..so I reached deep down inside and found myself ever so slowly asserting myself, stating the things I have never been or never were. People tended to pick on me, and now, when they did, I point out, but, my step-sisters igonre me and I do not them. I ask them about their lives and they do not ask about mine. Or, when people say, you were fired from a lot of jobs, I say, all 58 of the times I was fired were all different, subjective reasons, I never did anything outwardly wrong, they seemed to sense there was something inwardly wrong, hence firing me..

...............................................I do nothing outwardly wrong now..my brother says, I have changed the way I present myself, the way I line up my personality......the transformation is smooth and complete..

I am acheiving good grades in nursing school, performing well on the labs, even leading the student nurse association...

Yes I am haunted by the emptiness of my past, my hollow old personality, and write and journal about this past a great deal..

Yet I do feel my past is my past yet what I have now is a beautiful, vivid, present moment, which is leading as we speak into a beautiful and even brighter future....

Maybe recovery will never be fully mine, maybe it is the journey, not the destination...

And oh what a beautiful journey it is..

[seeker1950]

Junerain! What a beautiful statement! I think you are well-deserving to think of this as recovery. I am feeling much the same as you, though I suspect it has taken me a much longer time. I know, I KNOW, you will be a wonderful nurse!
Love,
patty

[silentandscared]

Wow what a beautiful piece of writing so inspirational.......you give me hope that the past can become just that the past even though there are feelings about that they remain in the past giving you the present and allowing to even dream about a future.......THANK YOU so much for sharing this ......it seems so very far away and on some days not even a hope or wish.....just a get through today feeling.
I wish you well on your journey to recovery and yes l think your jorney will always have new things to add as you continue to heal and grow...............Well done..............enjoy, relax and live again and leave the past where it belongs in the past............continue with your daily growth in strength, love and peace within



take the world in your hands and feel the peace, love and happines within

Mandyxx

[(JD)]

I think one has "recovered" when the past is no longer negatively affecting their present life, and is accepted as having been. It's when one realizes that life "is" all those things that happen along the journey's path... it "is."

When one has to stop and think "if" the recovery process is complete (or nearly so) then it truly is, imo.

To add to the idea... perhaps one is fully "recovered" when they don't feel the need to differentiate from when they needed recovery to the present... and no longer think about "being" recovered.

[Junerain]

My past does _not_ negatively affect my life....it is in me, yet I _use_ it when I let people cry on my shoulder at the Depression Bipolar Support Alliance, and say, I have been there, with you, and empathetically feel for you, truly feel for you. I _use_ my past to pose questions at nursing school, as we are studying Maslow's hierarchy of needs, question, the exact defintion of self actualization, get called on by my professor to explain my defintion of it, to the class, as mine is clearer than that of my professors. I _use_ it when I go to church and sign sign language to my friend's wife to include her more in our conversation. I _use_ it when I write good things in my autobiography about the depth of my friendships I have maintained since high school, since social work school, even friends from my time in the hospital. I _use_ it when I open my daily planner, pencil in my appointments, homework, then work church, karaoke, and dinner with friends around the less fun things. I _use_ it when I shop for a whole new wardrobe, get my hair done in a more natural way, and buy a watch so I can keep my patient's pulse and respirations. I _use_ it when I meet my brother at the local indoor gardens, and focus on him and his life and not expect him to give _me_ too much focus, that is expected and accepted. I _use_ it when I have breakfast with my father, walk the dog for him, then proceed to ask him more about why he became a doctor, compare my desire to go into the medical field to his, and of course, explain I went into for my sight of the good in all people and my wanting to find that good, to reach out a little. My Dad states he became a doctor in order to see people's skin conditions improve because of him, and I smile at him, and hug him.

I simply wanted to explore the issue of recovery, to put it out there, throw the word around a little, why not, there are words and ideas and attitudes, good and noble ones, then there are words that simply do no good. Take 'differentiation' yes, now that I read that, yes, I do that, probably always will, and to be honest, probably never will _fully_ recover, have no shame in saying that.

These words are just that, words on a screen...like the past....it is just that....the past......yet there are sometimes deeper things behind the words, behind the past. I like to probe into these deep things beneath the surface, not write things that do not question, push the envelope. Yes _Sky, you did in fact question, yet I differentiate like I stated in my first post, it is the journey, the _use_ of the past, the process, the path, and there is differentiation in all walks of life, all phases of recovery, all human beings, all hopes and dreams, dreams of recovery, even.

[Rhapsody]

It is always a thrill to hear another say they are doing so well that they are now standing on the foundation of RECOVERY - I am PROUD for and with YOU.

[nowheretorun]

(((June))) you have the ability to make smiles out of frowns with your energy! its better than good to hear about your progress and milestones! it takes some time to get many that we can actually identify but rising to higher planes of understanding is felt to the core when it happens... you share with us your knowing about the struggle and the way to become what we dream and strive for.. not giving up has taken you there

[Sannah]

I think that recovery occurs when you are functional whereever you might find yourself, when you can handle whatever comes your way (you are still sad when appropriate, angry, etc., but you can handle these things and function without it bringing you down). All along my journey to recovery I always took stock in what I had accomplished along the way and felt really good about it. I also believe that you will know when you are recovered when you have unloaded all the old baggage and you live each day with only the concerns of today, when your mind is clear of all the recirculating past.

Junerain it sounds like you have done a lot of good work!

(junerain))))))))))))))))))) you have worked so hard.
Its a good word to throw around the R one
you are so right it is a journey.
FInding your assertiveness is a good thing
You have set your boundrys for you

I really like this (((Yet I do feel my past is my past ))))
that makes me smile
Your right your future is beautiful and even brighter .........
muffy

[Junerain]

Let's throw this into this thread...let's take a different focus...we all feel, at times, silent, as that happens, and we feel scared..for me for so long I had a scare of reality, it was so cold, and empty. So let's take that, at our starting point, for those of us that are diagnosed with a mental health issue, that is how we feel, act, and emulate...we are...silent and scared...

And that is a visual, that we feel, when we are silent and scared, that we have the idea of needing and/or wanting help....help...help...

The words, silent and scared.....if one examines this thread...they will find someone with the screen name, Silentandscared

So this goes out to all of us, you most of all Silentandscared, for the things you wrote, and I extend, an invitation for everyone reading this who has ever felt silent and scared, to join in this coffee table discussion, here in a cyberspace coffee shop, let's examine what silentandscared wrote, she wrote about the thought of recovery being far away, that she just gets through each day, and in her signature, there is a fairy, a quotation about taking the world in your hands, and the statement about never telling a child their dreams are outlandish....

Silentandscared offered great insight to me, and I am obviously still struggling, struggling a great deal, and silentandscared helped me realize, things will be ADDED to my past in the form of the present, my past is a tragic tale, period. End of story- no adding. That is how I feel. I have been asking less mentally ill friends, looking into their eyes, stating, do you, Jodi, think, you could go, be a nurse, if _you_ had been through, and I mean through, in the ugliness form of the word through, what I have been _through_...all the while looking my friend Jodi, deep into her hazel eyes, until she pulls a back a little, from the sheer pain in my brown eyes....

I want to end the tragic tale, period. Adding? Cannot comprehend the act of adding to the tragic tale..when I showed a previous thread I had written about discarding my old self, my friend Denise, looked at me, stated you have discarded your old self...she is gone.....forever...no longer living......

But there is adding..tragic tales get sequels made sometimes with more quality than the original..sometimes the silent, the scared, meet you in cyberspace...and add on, to the tale, only to find Junerain is just as silent and scared, crying on the inside, not knowing what exactly to add, where to put the addition, where, in her heart of all hearts, is there room, to add anything, do tragic tales have happy endings, or, by defintion, are they tragic, sad, and thus illustrating the tragedy as just that, a tragedy..

The nursing school social worker approached me...the first two weeks of class....saying I had just ceased to participate in class discussions, that my professors expected _more_ of me....

I told them I had trouble sitting still...that I could for a period of time...then it became hard....

I was encouraged to move to the back of the classroom, in a classmate's desk who had left the program, that they were sensing things from, where I was sitting at the front, that made it hard to teach...

So I moved to the back...took on a new outlook..

Then, the social worker said..we understand, from what you told your teacher, you are bipolar...

( They had been questioning what had been going on at home, at home, at home until I felt I had to mutter something, anything..)

The social worker asked all kinds of questions about where I lived, who I lived with, informed me "because we have people who live in their cars.."

I do not live in my car, Theresa...

She then asked if I could afford new shoes..mine were old ones I had thrown on because I left pair at my boyfriend's....

Yes, i can afford new shoes, Theresa..

This time, this most recent time..I called HER out her being the social worker named Theresa..I stated, ASSERTIVELY..

Theresa I have had and will have to live with stigma my whole lifespan...I do not expect it from a social worker, not someone who studied stigma in their studies to become a social worker...

Next I informed her I wanted to steer clear of the hospital where I was in the psychiatric wing, not be a nurse _there_................._there_ I was nursed myself, a role reversal would feel weird and inappropriate..

Next I told her that she, like all the employers who fired me, was focusing on the physical...that there was something different about me, and very different about me, yet, this difference was an emotional one..

No one can quite put a finger on what exactly is different about me, just that I am.....

I am and I think it is something in a category other than illness- people have strange reactions to me, this have to come to expect...

The social worker admitted she had stigma, a touch of it..

_I_ am silent and scared, more scared then even silent...scared that i will not and cannot be a nurse with a tragic tale that needs adding on, but seems to be ending in a period. Jodi this is my tragic tale PERIOD then Jodi what would you do if you had been through what i had been THROUGH.

I am terrified of donning my scrubs, showing up at the hospital more of a drive away than the one I had inhabited..

Terrified of the respect required, the trust, for at times, _I_ have not trusted myself.......

I look at the pink fairy that is Silentandscared's signature...it is beautiful yet mysterious and unique...it is doing just what silentandscared stated, taking the world by your hands..

The meek shall inherit the Earth...according to the Bible...I have been meek so long...now I am a force to be reckoned with...

As silent andscared writes.....recovery...the R word....seems so far away, so very far away..

Yet I must not be silent with my patients, whether they be psychiatric patients, opthamology patients, dermatology patients...

I must create a less sensitive shell......to deal....with patients of all kinds..

I have my pink highlighter in my hand, ready to get back to my drug cards due tomorrow, it is late, and nursing school awaits..

It has come to me the title of my autobiography, without a doubt, the cover will have a picture of me, in my scrubs, with the statement, "This Nurse Has a Story"....

My pink highlighter is fading..into..the kind of pink..that is in silentandscared's signature, the color of the fairy...

Pink slowly fades to purple..........

[silentandscared]

Originally Posted by Junerain

Let's throw this into this thread...let's take a different focus...we all feel, at times, silent, as that happens, and we feel scared..for me for so long I had a scare of reality, it was so cold, and empty. So let's take that, at our starting point, for those of us that are diagnosed with a mental health issue, that is how we feel, act, and emulate...we are...silent and scared...

And that is a visual, that we feel, when we are silent and scared, that we have the idea of needing and/or wanting help....help...help...

The words, silent and scared.....if one examines this thread...they will find someone with the screen name, Silentandscared

So this goes out to all of us, you most of all Silentandscared, for the things you wrote, and I extend, an invitation for everyone reading this who has ever felt silent and scared, to join in this coffee table discussion, here in a cyberspace coffee shop, let's examine what silentandscared wrote, she wrote about the thought of recovery being far away, that she just gets through each day, and in her signature, there is a fairy, a quotation about taking the world in your hands, and the statement about never telling a child their dreams are outlandish....

Silentandscared offered great insight to me, and I am obviously still struggling, struggling a great deal, and silentandscared helped me realize, things will be ADDED to my past in the form of the present, my past is a tragic tale, period. End of story- no adding. That is how I feel. I have been asking less mentally ill friends, looking into their eyes, stating, do you, Jodi, think, you could go, be a nurse, if _you_ had been through, and I mean through, in the ugliness form of the word through, what I have been _through_...all the while looking my friend Jodi, deep into her hazel eyes, until she pulls a back a little, from the sheer pain in my brown eyes....

I want to end the tragic tale, period. Adding? Cannot comprehend the act of adding to the tragic tale..when I showed a previous thread I had written about discarding my old self, my friend Denise, looked at me, stated you have discarded your old self...she is gone.....forever...no longer living......

But there is adding..tragic tales get sequels made sometimes with more quality than the original..sometimes the silent, the scared, meet you in cyberspace...and add on, to the tale, only to find Junerain is just as silent and scared, crying on the inside, not knowing what exactly to add, where to put the addition, where, in her heart of all hearts, is there room, to add anything, do tragic tales have happy endings, or, by defintion, are they tragic, sad, and thus illustrating the tragedy as just that, a tragedy..

The nursing school social worker approached me...the first two weeks of class....saying I had just ceased to participate in class discussions, that my professors expected _more_ of me....

I told them I had trouble sitting still...that I could for a period of time...then it became hard....

I was encouraged to move to the back of the classroom, in a classmate's desk who had left the program, that they were sensing things from, where I was sitting at the front, that made it hard to teach...

So I moved to the back...took on a new outlook..

Then, the social worker said..we understand, from what you told your teacher, you are bipolar...

( They had been questioning what had been going on at home, at home, at home until I felt I had to mutter something, anything..)

The social worker asked all kinds of questions about where I lived, who I lived with, informed me "because we have people who live in their cars.."

I do not live in my car, Theresa...

She then asked if I could afford new shoes..mine were old ones I had thrown on because I left pair at my boyfriend's....

Yes, i can afford new shoes, Theresa..

This time, this most recent time..I called HER out her being the social worker named Theresa..I stated, ASSERTIVELY..

Theresa I have had and will have to live with stigma my whole lifespan...I do not expect it from a social worker, not someone who studied stigma in their studies to become a social worker...

Next I informed her I wanted to steer clear of the hospital where I was in the psychiatric wing, not be a nurse _there_................._there_ I was nursed myself, a role reversal would feel weird and inappropriate..

Next I told her that she, like all the employers who fired me, was focusing on the physical...that there was something different about me, and very different about me, yet, this difference was an emotional one..

No one can quite put a finger on what exactly is different about me, just that I am.....

I am and I think it is something in a category other than illness- people have strange reactions to me, this have to come to expect...

The social worker admitted she had stigma, a touch of it..

_I_ am silent and scared, more scared then even silent...scared that i will not and cannot be a nurse with a tragic tale that needs adding on, but seems to be ending in a period. Jodi this is my tragic tale PERIOD then Jodi what would you do if you had been through what i had been THROUGH.

I am terrified of donning my scrubs, showing up at the hospital more of a drive away than the one I had inhabited..

Terrified of the respect required, the trust, for at times, _I_ have not trusted myself.......

I look at the pink fairy that is Silentandscared's signature...it is beautiful yet mysterious and unique...it is doing just what silentandscared stated, taking the world by your hands..

The meek shall inherit the Earth...according to the Bible...I have been meek so long...now I am a force to be reckoned with...

As silent andscared writes.....recovery...the R word....seems so far away, so very far away..

Yet I must not be silent with my patients, whether they be psychiatric patients, opthamology patients, dermatology patients...

I must create a less sensitive shell......to deal....with patients of all kinds..

I have my pink highlighter in my hand, ready to get back to my drug cards due tomorrow, it is late, and nursing school awaits..

It has come to me the title of my autobiography, without a doubt, the cover will have a picture of me, in my scrubs, with the statement, "This Nurse Has a Story"....

My pink highlighter is fading..into..the kind of pink..that is in silentandscared's signature, the color of the fairy...

Pink slowly fades to purple..........

Thank you so much for this.......THIS NURSE ALSO HAS A HISTORY.....that history will make you the one who listens, the one who cares , the one who really hears what her patients are saying to you...and do you know why.....because of that history......always you will remember what is feels like to be SILENT..AND..SCARED... hopefully the pains will disappear until new and wonderful experiences will replace the horrors of the past.....there will be bad times but you will surpass them once again

AND in my mind I KNOW YOU will be one of those nurses WHO cares and maybe like me you will be told YOU CARE TOO MUCH.....but l believe that we can not care to much about others......let us reach out our hands share the love...... remove the suffering when we can
l sense another Florence Nightingale in the making.......do not worry or fret about tat first day as the nurse it will be the new beginning , the walk along the path, the light that guides you......
You will be one of the best nurses ever and never let stigma or discrimination stand in your way........your past happened to you, you did not want or choose it dont let it dictate your life with the stigma of it all

In my thoughts and prayers
Good luck in your profession
I hope it brings you many hours of joy and pleasure
It is a true vocation
Mandyxx

ANOTHER LADY WITH THE LAMP
Mandyxx

[Junerain]

They are all after me.. all my professors..for strange reasons about not feeling comfortable with the hands on.everyone, everyone says i cannot and will not be a nurse//i think i can...yet the odds are daunting, i have a history of illness that is daunting...............................................