Let me tell you about my best friend...
Today in history the first private mental health hospital opened in 1817. It was founded by Quakers and was named Asylum for the Relief of Persons Deprived of the Use of Their Reason and is still in Philadelphia today under the name of Friends Hospital. The mission statement for the hospital: "To provide for the suitable accommodation of persons who are or may be deprived of the use of their reason, and the maintenance of an asylum for their reception, which is intended to furnish, besides requisite medical aid, such tender, sympathetic attention as may soothe their agitated minds, and under the Divine Blessing, facilitate their recovery.” –treatmentadvocacycenter.org
Now you may be wondering ‘out of many choices of what happened on this day, why pick this specific one?’ and to be honest, I fought it at first but this was the only one that jumped out at me and had some relevance to my life. Let me tell you a little background to help you understand the struggles I have today.
Parasites
Back in 2011 I went to Corpus Christi for a camp counselor retreat for a sports camp I was going to coach at for the summer. The last 2 days of the trip I ended up getting really sick and had some very unpleasant stomach issues… thinking I just ate something funny I didn’t think much of it. I got back home and for the next 2 weeks I was still very sick, and had to tell the camp I was unable to be a coach for them that summer… well this turned into having to stop school and work for the next year and a half.
I went to many doctors telling them I believed I had parasites but since I hadn’t left the country they didn’t believe that to be the case but took stool samples and I even had to endure a colonoscopy (worst part was the day before the procedure). No medication they gave me worked and so I did what I could, which was lay around at home being too weak to do much else. My boyfriend (now husband) was very accommodating and we did many a nights sitting on the couch watching movies. I would go out but it was tough and terrifying to make sure a bathroom was in close proximity to wherever I was, just in case, as I had now been used to food passing right through me… I had gotten down to 89 pounds. Many a people saying “I wish I could get a parasite so I could lose some weight” which still brings tears to my eyes because this was the most miserable time of my life. I was so active with having 2 jobs and going to school full time and now I was just there… doing nothing.
Anyways, I am not sure who recommended this doctor to me or how I found her but I will forever be grateful to Dr. Kay Spears who is a Nutritionist and she worked with a scientist who made up concoctions based on what parasites you have and after taking this for a couple of weeks I was cured!!! Praise the Lord!!! AHHHH man that was such an amazing feeling!
So, how does this have anything to do with mental health? For a year and a half I did not have control over my body, I couldn’t trust my stomach and that is terrifying. After I was cured, I was still getting sick when I made a commitment to leave the house, I was worried maybe I still had parasites but seeing as I could eat again and had no side effects I knew it was something different. Every time I planned to leave the house I would have anxiety and was just horrified at the thought of traveling. I dealt with this for a while until I had a best friend who asked me to be a bridesmaid and her wedding was coming up, but the wedding was 4 to 5 hours away, I was sick for the entire month leading up to the wedding. Made an appointment with a doctor and he gave me Clonazepam to help calm me down for the trip. The week before the trip I was stuck to my house scared to leave and ended up having to call my friend and tell her I was unable to go and be apart of her wedding… I lost a great friendship that day, my heart hurts thinking I let her down but also that the friendship was lost because of this. It sucks.
Life went on and I had my meds that I would take when an attack came on and life was going well until the day Robin Williams committed suicide… I was hard of breathing after reading through people on social media calling him so selfish for doing this (no do not read into this, I am not saying suicide is okay at all) but hearing people say these things brought on an anxiety attack where I couldn’t breath and was on my knees crying out to God to please help me to calm down. My Husband and I were down to one car that week as one was in the shop so I was stuck with nowhere to go, but my family jumped in right away to help. My dad called the doctor (couldn’t get into the one I had before but was able to see another one, so thankful for this change!) and then he picked me up for the appointment, he then had to go to work so my sister, Lauren, came and sat with me in the waiting room and then my husband showed up. This support meant and still means the world to me. Went in to see the new doctor, Dr. Wendy Nguyen, and after I told her my story about the parasites and everything else she looked at me and talked to me about how she believed I had PTSD from the experience I went through and she put me on a new medication, Sertraline. She said I needed to get my brain chemistry back on track and even though she still prescribed me the Clonazepam she said it was basically just a band-aid. When I first went to see her I was taking 2 or 3 of the Clonazepam pills a day, now over 4 years after I only take one pill every couple of weeks, even if that! I do still take Sertraline everyday as me and my doctor discussed I am still not ready to go off them yet.
So, I suffer from extreme anxiety and although I have gotten better I still struggle. I am now able to travel 45-1 hour away from my house! Which may not seem a lot but this goes along way from the 15 minutes I was able to do before I got on Sertraline. Now, don’t get me wrong I don’t think medication is the answer for everyone and it definitely needs to be regulated so that you don’t have to keep upping the dose. Finding a good doctor is key, don’t just allow them to give you a band-aid, get what is needed to help you to get better and to hopefully get off the medication at some point. And before you say anything, I did go to counseling for my anxiety before I went on medication… didn’t work, medication is what was needed for me, and that is okay! I can now live my life and leave my house without fear, Praise the Lord!! Anxiety is my best friend because she is always around… always in the back of my mind she is my frenemy. One day we will part ways but as long as she is with me I will not hide from my truth and that I struggle with anxiety.
