It's my job to worry.

I was trying to remember where I had heard a quote something like my title when, for no particular reason, I remembered one of the quotes I had to memorize for Mr. Lavelle's notoriously difficult AP English final in high school. In 1990. (Looking back, I realize now that the final was actually really easy. A gift to us, the students he had made think all year long, but we all liked the mythology behind "the hardest final ever" which never changed a single freakin' question from year to year.) Mr. Lavelle was my favorite teacher ever, so in his honor:

Not tho' the soldier knew
Someone had blunder'd:
Their's not to make reply,
Their's not to reason why,
Their's but to do and die:
[Alfred, Lord Tennyson's "The Charge of the Light Brigade"; Googled only for correct punctuation]

Anywho, that totally has nothing to do with this post, but it's weird what you can suddenly remember 20 years and some months later when you honestly can't recall what you ate today.

So, "Forward, the Light Brigade! Charge for the guns!"

It suddenly occurred to me today that when I have my larproscopy on January 12th, it's possible that rather than finding nothing and leaving me to wonder what to do with this pain and other "stuff," or finding endometriosis and/or adhesions which may cause me to lose my uterus, that a third possibility is that I might lose it all. Or most of it. It honestly hasn't popped into my thoughts the whole time I've been agonizing over whether or not to have my uterus removed if they find nothing when they open me up. (The doctor said that sometimes some people find relief from pelvic pain of unknown etiology by having a hysterectomy. I won't be doing that as there are too many other things that might go wrong: cystocele, hernia, worsening of my IBS, greater surgery aggravating my autoimmune illness/inflammatory response, vaginal, vaginal vault, urethral, small intestine or rectal prolapse and, ironically, pelvic pain.)

This lead to a rather intense anxiety attack with much sobbing. The thought of taking hormones for the rest of my life, when I am not yet 40 and my family has a life expectancy of around 80 or 90 years, usually, terrifies me. I like the way I look, flaws and all, but I do not want to gain more weight, I don't need any drier or pimplier skin and I am not fond of synthetic hormones to begin with. (But the nearest bio-identical doctor is near Philly. Too far for me to travel for a doctor's appointment; I grumble over traveling to Hershey, for crap's sake!)

All of this on top of the mystical proclamation that recovery will take four to seven days to four to six weeks depending on what they have to do, leading me to wonder how employed people plan for this shit.

So, I worry, but that is nothing new. It's my job to worry.

I share a nose with a dead woman.

I just re-lit the pilot light on the 60-some year old stove which my great-grandmother installed in her kitchen when she remodeled her then 20-some year old kitchen. The kitchen in the house of which she oversaw every single detail as it was being built. The house I now own and love, warts and all. (The house was not kept sparkly new in the latter years of my great-grandparents lives, mostly because they lived very long lives and 98-year-olds don't always have the wherewithal for plastering, painting and remodeling. Go figure... The good part, for a house geek like me, is that almost my entire house is original.)
I knew the pilot light had gone out because I could smell the gas which should be burning but was not. I smelled it from two rooms away, but I am the only person I know who can smell when our pilot light goes out. And I smell it almost immediately. The tiny amount of gas leaking in a not-airtight house isn't really dangerous, especially when you notice it within a few minutes of the pilot having gone out. Apparently my Nana had this weird unlit-pilot light ESP, too.
My Nana and I have a lot in common in many ways, both physically and personally, and sometimes I weirdly feel like I was destined to take over her beloved household in which I spent home-sick-from-school afternoons as a child. So it didn't surprise me when I was told that Nana always knew when the pilot light went out.

I have an afghan which was Nana and Grandpa's and it hangs in the back of my couch just as it hung over the back of theirs for my childhood. Not a day goes by that I don't look at the afghan as I sit down on my couch and feel a connection to the woman whose home--and nose--I share.

Paris Daydreams

A Facebook friend of mine (the incomparable Muffy Bolding) is looking for a sublet and a friend of hers suggested a site in which he invested start-up money, airbnb.
I decided to check it out because I have quite liked the idea of home stays rather than hotels for a while now.
Of course, for the destination I entered the one place I will always choose to go if it's totally up to me: Paris. BIG mistake. I'm about to take the joint AmEx and run away for a week or two or five.
The windows, the balconies, the tucked-in-the-eaves garrets with exposed rough-hewn beams and tiny kitchens tucked in corners and handheld showers in teeny tiny tubs and the artist's flare for decorating that many people who sublet because they travel a lot seem to have, especially when they travel with their ballet or theater company or antiquing journeys across Europe for their boutiques as many of the subletters seem to mention. The Nutella and croissant and baguette and cheeses displayed in many of the artfully arranged kitchen pictures. The views of Parisian rooftops and La Tour Eiffel and canals and La Seine and Notre Dame de Paris. The little cobbled lanes one must travel to reach the flats.
MUST. Go. Back.
SOON!

An Addendum

As a child we did have some family dinners at my Grandma and Grandpa Taylor's house and, usually, it was spaghetti if it wasn't a picnic or a holiday.

There was always a bag of sliced bread (often Vim), a tub of margarine (Parkay, maybe?), the crock full of spaghetti sauce and a Fire King Tulip motif mixing bowl full of San Giorgio spaghetti.

When I was older and living on my own--maybe even after I had my own children--I asked my grandma for her spaghetti sauce recipe, because I remembered how much I loved those meals.

It was then I learned that frying up some burger, tossing it in some Ragu, doctoring it with several "salts"--you know: celery, garlic and onion--and letting it simmer for a while, maybe even in a crockpot was a simple thing that could make your grandchildren think you were a real Italian chef.

Simple Things

I am a great lover of good food. From a hunk of cheese with a hunk of bread and some wine to an elaborate multi-course tasting menu, I love good food.
But sometimes, for me, good food is not always snob-worthy. Some of my favorite comfort meals in the world:

• American cheese grilled on potato bread with a can of Campbell's tomato soup
• Fried up burger in jarred red sauce over boxed spaghetti with Kraft grated Parmesan and a slice of packaged bread with--wait for it--Country Crock spread on it (I'm sure this is due to the overwhelming presence of margarine in my childhood. I find non-butter "butter" comforting.)
• Reallyreally rich mashed potatoes with heaping helpings of sauerkraut on top of them
• Harvard beets forked right from the jar
• large curd, full fat cottage cheese on Triscuits with Fresca or TaB or ginger ale

Other than the beets, these are all, in one way or another, a remnant of my childhood. I don't have any particularly fond or poor memories of these foods; I simply remember these simple things. And I enjoy them shamelessly.

Cucumbers smell good, but not as good as madeleines, apparently.

I forgot to sleep again.

I have been keeping vampire hours, but I have also been getting a solid eight hours most "nights." Last night, however, I just never got sleepy. So, once again, I am going to power through the day and hope for an early bedtime. No more than a two hour nap, no later than noon. Last time I tried this I still ended up staying awake until well past midnight and had mild hallucinations, but hey, it's worth another shot. The hallucinations, I mean. I have a TaB, a bunch of lit ginger/citrus candles, all of the downstairs lights on (it's rather gloomy out there today), loud '80s music and the promise of a hyyyyyooooooooge mug of coffee once I hit "Publish Post," so I think I will be good until about 10, when I will definitely require that nap.

I was still trying to read all of the Internet when Nate's alarm went off. I told him I'm halfway done as he made his way to the kitchen to make dinner in one of our myriad Crockpots. (I am the world's worst unemployed wife. I don't ask him to cook, though, he just does, so I guess I shouldn't feel quite so guilty.) He had pureed some mangoes this weekend unbeknownst to me and had taken chicken out of the freezer last night, so this morning he chopped up a few cucumbers and added some other ingredients and we will be having Caribbean chicken with rice for supper tonight.

My whole house now smells beautifully of cucumbers. There have always been cucumbers in my life; it's one of the few vegetables my mother's family seems to like fresh. So I was hoping the smell would bring to mind some writerly musings on my life. Alas, my brain is collapsing in on itself due to its vast emptiness.

I did want to write a short post about a few things I miss from my childhood, but said post will be neither profound nor literary, so I'll save that for later.

And now, WE DRINK. (Coffee...)

Word Geek Sadness

I have heard that the new edition of the Oxford English Dictionary may be published only online for paid members.
Only a few of my readers will understand the sadness this brings me, but I will try to explain it.
When I was little my Ma and The Sperm Donor owned the Unabridged OED. (I believe it might have been the student edition, which is less well-made and cheaper to buy.) It was a thing of great beauty to behold. Even before I could actually read I loved opening the little drawer at the top, removing the magnifying glass, slipping one of the great, black volumes from it's case and poring over the pages.
Since that time it has been my Book Hoarder's Number One Goal in life to own such a wonderful, mystical, magical book. It's been on my Amazon wish list for years, but, of course, if it were bought as a gift for me it would be the only gift I would receive and my friends and family know I like lots of little gifts much more than one big gift. But I may have to bite the bullet and beg for the volumes before they become rare collector's items for geeks all over the world.
There is this ridiculously expensive version which would make me so proud to see as I walk past my bookcases, but I am drawn instead to this one, a reminder of the awe I felt the first time I encountered a truly magical book.

Something as simple as a shower.

This afternoon when taking a shower I watched the sun dappled leaves rustling in the wind. A cherry tree, a walnut, a locust, a sycamore and several maples. The smell of the lilac soap, a gift from my best friend, tricking me into wondering if it was really spring and not fall's approach I was seeing... Beauty in the mundane. I must always remind myself to pause when I find it and record it to my memory.

When it rains it pours and other clichés I hate but use anyway.

Nate’s trip to Vegas for work this year coincided with a “crunch time” at my job, so I had to beg off of going to one of my favorite places with one of my favorite people, yet again. And, BOY HOWDY! Am I glad I stayed here, because not less than 48 hours after he left I became effectively, indefinitely unemployed. I am fairly sure I am still on the hirable list from how it was explained to me, but there are no studies coming up for which I am able to work. Paying off remaining debt plus loneliness plus having no spending money plus nowhere to go plus nothing to do equals… well, my heads explodes at that kind of math.
The same night my job was finished, my iPhone decided to crash. I know if you don’t have an iPhone or other PDA or smart phone on which you entirely rely for all of your notes, lists, appointments, et cetera, that this sounds like a privileged woman complaining about not being able to buy new shoes or something. For me, though, my whole life is run by that cute little device. My memory is poor enough and my appointments are great enough in number that I pretty much can’t get anything done without the ping of the alert or alarm reminding where I need to be. And the notes and lists help me remember what I am supposed to do when I get there. Well, apparently, some of my data was not backed up properly and I am spending the first half of this day calling everyone in hell’s tarnation and saying, “Um, hi. This is Kayly Newcomer. Am I supposed to see you at some point in the future? And if so: when?” I loooove sounding like a mentally challenged weirdo to people with access to my medical records.
Taking a step back, though: before I was able to get the phone to work again, I stayed up until 5:30 a.m. Thursday trying to follow Apple’s convoluted instructions on how to fix my problem. The instructions boiled down to, basically, “If you can’t do ‘a,’ then do ‘a’ to be able to do ‘a.’” Uuummmmm. Hm. So, yes, I basically bashed my head against the wall for a few hours until I had to sleep. I slept twenty minutes and then woke Holden for school; I slept another hour and woke to get Ethan to school; then I slept two hours before I woke to haul my dirty haired, sweaty, rumpled clothed ass to the AT&T Technical Support office on Jonestown Road. He put the phone in something he called “DFU mode” and told me not to touch anything on the phone, but to take it straight home, plug it in and restore factory software and my settings. Even he didn’t know what DFU stood for, but I’m convinced it stands for Don’t Fuck Up. In the end it’s all going to be okay. (I keep taking long, deep breaths and telling myself that, anyway…) The purely annoying (not really important) aspect of this whole thing is that I have over 80 gig of music on my hard drive, but only about 14 gig of space on my iPhone iPod, so I obviously don’t just sync iTunes to the phone; I pick and choose what I want to hear when I’m tooling around and drag it onto the device. There is no simple, time-saving way to back that list up and it has taken me almost the whole year I’ve had the phone to get it just right and weed out the duplicates, clunkers and so on just taking up space. So that process begins again, sigh. But, like my loving hubby said, “Hey, at least you have free time to do that since you’re not working anymore.” Ah, love!
The last of what I hope are the “everything bad happens in threes”-three is just the icing on the big, annoying shit cake I’ve been served this week. On the way home from the tech center I stopped at the library to pick up some books I had on hold. On the way out of the parking lot a woman in a big, ugly truck backed right into my driver’s side rear quarter panel. The first thing she said when she hopped down from the driver’s seat was, “I didn’t see you at all!!” The last thing she said after we exchanged information and were leaving was, “It didn’t even leave a mark on my truck!!” Lady, I know where you live, please don’t tempt me to violence. I don’t need that much of an excuse at this point.
I’ve been in touch with the lady’s insurance company and they said she is accepting responsibility for the accident, so now there is just the pain in the butt of getting it all done—the estimate, the bodywork, the not having a car for a day or two or whatever.
Total non-sequitur: It has been in the 90s for days now, yet today I had to turn on the heat again. It’s 63° in here! What…is the DEAL…with that?
Also, in case you are wondering: yes, I am just pretending I’ve been blogging all along. I have to just jump in and do it and stop being so self-conscious about the quality of my writing. I had a second round of ECT (five treatments) in February and my memory is still revving up to normal, as is my attention span for words on paper—mine or others’. Hopefully, this was readable enough for all six of you!

Random list: Things I've learned this year

These are a few things I have learned this past year:

• No matter how long the darkness is, there IS light again at the end.
• My boys are soon adults. (!!!!!!!)
• My boys are more funny, intelligent and independent than I ever realized, and I like to think I have almost everything to do with that.
• Keith Olbermann is the most entertaining and wonderful newsman on TV. Who knew I'd love someone from ESPN so much??
• The face--the literal face--of politics is changing. A woman and a man of mixed race running for POTUS is amazing!!
• The figurative face of politics can change--witness Obama's campaign full of dignity, truth and actual hope. It's not just a slogan.
• When one is cruising through all of the CSI episodes ever made on Spike TV and CBS and has almost run out, ECT will make them all new and fresh to watch again. Not that I recommend this method of re-loving your shows.
• Surprises can come in small and large packages, sometimes at the exact same time.
• Life can throw crap at you for a few years and seemingly devestate your world, but it is more than likely not a lifetime of bad luck and life will bless you again at some point.
• I am ready to try to keep houseplants alive again. (Wish me and my black thumb luck!)
• Costco's filet mignon is about the best thing ever meat-wise.
• Frank's Red Hot--a longtime favorite--can fix more foods than previously thought.
• Good coffee and red wine (long consumed, but never before fully appreciated) are indispensible little bits of heaven in my everyday routine.
• All that loud music as a kid really does effect your hearing. Sigh... (As a connected "thing I've learned": Closed Captioning is a wonderful invention.)
• You can grow older and grow more liberal contrary to popular belief. (Right, my socialist little hubby? MWAH!)
• You can absolutely retain "cool-ness" as you grow older. Sometimes you can even increase it.

Maybe more later.

My word in edgewise. Hell, my word full-frontal!!

GROUP SUCKS DIRTY, SMELLY MONKEY BALLS!
I cannot stand listening to people whine about how horrible their life is when they are clearly unwilling to change it at at all. I am sick of listening to people describing a breakup (not even of a marriage) of ten years ago as what is causing them to be "depressed" today. I am totally over the concept of "I can't find a mate" as some sort of synonym for "depressed." You wanna know depressed? I'll show you depressed, then I'll turn it sideways and shove it up your lazy, whiny ass. I am exhausted with trying to give my opinion or insight (as we are supposed to) only to be cut off by yet another manic bipolar person. I am exhausted, period, from listening to the manics in the crowd.
In other news, I like my counsellor and psychiatrists quite well, thank you. I even heard a phrase I never remembered hearing from a counsellor of mine before which had an impact on me. I need to validate all of the "invalidated emotions" from my childhood and young adulthood. Now, it is such an elementary phrase and concept, but it was honestly not familiar to me. Maybe it is one of the things I "lost in the fire." (Hmmmm... This is my terminology for the memories I lost in ECT, but it just struck me that I have never used it in this forum before.)
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy was described to me YET AGAIN in one "educational seminar" today. I get it! I get it! But the last step has had me stuck for about fifteen years now. HELP ME WITH THAT!!! AAAAARGH!
I forgot to wash my travel mug so I had to throw out my paper SBUX cup which made me feel guilty. Yes, I have gotten to the point where I feel guilty over one paper coffee cup and sleeve. I didn't have time to pack my lunch for some reason (which was a nice rounded healthy meal) so I ate at KFC and felt guilty about the factory farmed chickens and the paper I was wasting and the crap I was putting into my body and the underpaid workers and...and... Yes, somebody please stop me. This is not right. I think I am getting, goddess forgive me for even thinking it, too eco-concious. But then Nate mailed me this article, and I realized, "Maybe somebody should "worry about the birds." Maybe 'too' isn't so bad when some people are 'not enough.'" I just wish I wasn't so quick to judge myself for little "misses" when I have so many "hits." (Oh, but if I could figure out that last step of cognitive behavioral therapy, I'd be able to forgive and forget the "misses," right?)
I got abso-fucking-lutely NO errands done today, although I still have to take my youngest to his soccer practice at 6:30. So...library and Humane Society tomorrow maybe?

Going Out with Friends Long Not Seen

Tonight will be the first night I will see a few old friends since the ECT. I'm nervous. It's like a coming out party or something, and I feel worried that I will not fulfill expectations. Can I show them I'm "happy enough?" Will I piss anyone off with my still occasionally poor memory? Will I get drunk and embarrass myself? (We're going to a brewpub, and lately beer--and just beer, not liquor or wine--gets me pretty high after one or two.) Maybe I'll stick to their home brewed root beer and water.

Some of them I've seen once or twice in the past year because of the "holing up" which took place as the depression deepened. I feel as if I will be on display or something tonight. None of these people know anyone else who has had ECT most likely. I'm the specimen for their collection. These friends are all about the warmest most non-judgemental people you can imagine, but I still worry.

I still regret not seeing some good friends who moved back to Wisconsin while I was "all about Kayly." I feel deep sadness about losing such good and decent friends. I know we can still exchange emails, cards, etc., but it's not the same as New Year's Eve parties, drop-bys, and other various invitations.

My nervousness is extending to what clothes and shoes to wear and how to do my hair and whether or not to put makeup on. These are not concerns I usually have when I see my friends. I've even come up with conversation topics, in case conversation is awkard and lags. Here is the list so far:

• Obama
• Obama
• the PA primary
• Obama

Yeah, I'm a little one-track-minded lately. Nervous about 4/22, too.

Laugh Riot

My sons had Odyssey of the Mind Tournament today. They did really well and were so funny onstage; I was very proud of them. But a funny thing happened offstage today, too. I had told the boys they couldn't do OM again, because every year they sign up and then complain about having to go to half of the practices. So Nate was asking Holden if they had a team at SciTech would he sign up and he said he didn't think so, but that Ethan wasn't allowed to sign up. Nate and Ethan asked why not, and Holden said, "Because Mommy said we weren't allowed." Ethan said, "Maybe she forgot." And Holden said--in a boisterous speaking voice in a crowd of people, "Was that before or AFTER SHE HAD ECT???" I think Nate was a BIT embarrassed, sniggersniggersnortsnort.

One of the keys to happiness is a bad memory.--Rita Mae Brown

It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick
society.--Krishnamurti

There's a fine line between genius and insanity. I have erased this
line.--Oscar Levant [a Capricorn like me--we're always witty geniuses!!]

There is no great genius without some touch of madness.--Seneca

Have YOU donated to Obama yet?

I'm OLD!!!!!

Based on phone calls and information I've received today, I believe Holden is getting into the SciTech magnet school we've been been hoping for. Which is great; YAY! But it made me realize my little boy--who stands about my height, wears his dad's size shoes, has just started listening to the "classic rock" sounds of Nirvana ("Mommy, did you know Kurt Cobain of Nirvana [like I have to have it explained to me, lol!] killed himself five days before I was born?" [Yes, infact I found out on the way to the hospital, and it freaked me out, but that is another story.]) and dresses more stylishly than most rock stars, right down to his beautiful long hair and, by now, trademark fedoras--is NOT a little boy anymore. What with multiple girlfriend wannabes and his playing the field and the fact that his first day of high school will occur in less than six months and all of the other stuff that goes with being almost 14, he is now definetly NOT a "little boy" anymore. WAAAAAAAHHHHH!!!!!

Here he is at six months after he was baptized at Nate and my wedding.

And here he is at about 3½ years old being a goof.

And when he was about 5½.

His first day of kindergarten.

In Japan lighting incense at a Shinto shrine shortly before his 13th birthday.

And with some Japanese cherry blossoms.

And in the Badlands listening to his MP3 player in August '07.

And then, as I finish writing this, my best friend, who has an evil sixth sense timing-wise, sent me this article. Uh, thanks, Vick. By the way, I emailed it to both of my sons, told them to consider it homework, quizzed them on it, and poured myself a LARGE glass of red wine.

So things progress as such:

I ended up doing five ECT treatments. Two inpatient and three out. My psychiatrist--Dr. Tan--was a great man. Funny, warm, respectful. Everything you could want from the dude about to put you into a minute-long seizure. He actually seemed to like me and let me go home on the Friday after I checked in, rather than the next Monday as originally planned. Which was just what I had hoped for, as nothing freaks me out more than being locked in somewhere, especially with a bunch of nut jobs!

So here is how the treatment goes:

1. You don't eat or drink after midnight the night before.
2. You pee when you wake up.
3. You have an i.v. put in--easy for some, tough for those with no veins, like me.
4. You put on a hospital gown and booties and no undies. Yes, you may piss yourself.
5. They wheel you into the o.r.
6. The put the oxygen monitor on your finger, the b.p. cuff on your arm and another b.p. cuff on your ankle. (This cuff will be tightened during the whole procedure to prevent the paralyzing anesthetic from reaching your toes so they will twitch to prove to the docs that you are, indeed, convulsing.)
7. The put electrical leads (EEG?? I think...) on various parts of your body to make sure your heart works well during the whole thing.
8. They put the "zapper" electrical leads on your head. I vaguely recall that these went on your forehead and behind your ear. On this I could be mistaken; my memory is hazy on some things... I do know I ended up going with bilateral ECT rather than unilateral after a thorough discussion with Dr. Tan whose opinion I thoroughly respected and trusted. We talked about "titrated" doses, which I said was the only way I would do bilateral, and he understood.
9. They put the oxygen/sleeping gas mask over your face and inject the paralyzing anesthetic into your i.v. The gas smelled annoying to me and the injection burned me somewhat. I think I fell asleep all five times going, "Oh, it burns, it burns.... it.... buuuuurrrrrr...... uuuuuhhhhhhhh......."
10. Presumably I was then paralyzed and "zapped." The convulsion lasts somewhere around a half a minute or so. I think it's 15-60 seconds.
11. I wake up in the recovery room with very sweet nurses monitoring my vitals. For some reason I displayed a fever after every treatment, which is not a normal aftereffect. My guess is that it has something to do with my inflammatory illness.
12. They let me get dressed and go home.
13. I was not allowed to drive on treatment days.

So did it work?

Well, I feel what I can only keep calling "normal." I am still having some depression and some anxiety. But I feel like these are acceptable and manageable levels of these problems and somewhat situational.

"Normal" for me: The other day I awoke before 9 a.m. (rather than 3 p.m.), took a shower, exfoliated, moisturized, did a full face cleaning routine, did my hair, got dressed in "real" clothes (not sweats or PJ's), put on jewelry (!!!) and lipstick (!!!!) and went out to do about a half a dozen errands. The whole time I kept thinking, "This is weird. This is really weird." But I later realized that, no, it was actually really really normal. Which, for me, was weird.

I have been have some cognitive and memory problems, but they are fading steadily, although they still bother me immensely. More, I am quite sure, than they might bother the average person. If you know me, then you know that my high intelligence and scarily impeccable memory are very important traits of which I am proud and which I depend upon.

The cognitive problems are things like not being able to think of a word or phrase, not being able to think of what the next thing I should do would be while following my daily routine--which I guess are actually memory problems as well. My other memory problems are more straightforward: I don't remember some stuff that happened in the weeks and months leading up to ECT and in the period afterwards. When--if--it comes back to me I become very frustrated in the realization that I forgot it to begin with.

I think I'll end here for now. More will follow as I know many of my friends and family want to know more about the whole shebang.

"About suffering they were never wrong, The Old Masters: how well they understood Its human position; how well it takes place While someone else is eating or opening a window or just walking dully along;"

BRAIN FRIED!! YAY!!

So, I've been back for a bit now. I'm having memory problems, but ultimately do feel a bit happier. I'm not very chatty yet, either in real life or in blog world, but wanted to let everyone know I am alive and doing well.

Response from friends?

So far I have had one friend respond to me privately regarding my last post. They were supportive beyond what I could hope for at this point, and even said, regarding memory loss, "...and to be perfectly frank, you're memory is already hyper-accentuated for some ungodly reason to almost superhuman levels." Why, thank you! That combined with the reading I've done that suggests the higher the intelligence of a person, the easier it is for them to adapt to memory loss, makes me hopeful. But still nervous. I'm wondering if the lack of response is because of fear of what to say to me, or fear of what may become of me, or disapproval, or just that people haven't got around to reading it yet.
Some suggested reading if you have the time:
Undercurrents by Martha Manning (Her depression was much like mine is and her description of it is the closest to what I would write if I could express myself better. It's also a cheap, easy and short read.)
Shock by Kitty Dukakis and Larry Tye (An easily read and bargain priced book which gives a thorough, obejective and up-to-date history alongside a personal account of depression and receiving the treatment.)
I highly recommend avoiding googling ECT as you will receive mostly the horror story, anti-ECT tirade websites that aren't always honest, up-to-date or realistic.
My mention of the "Church of Scientology" failed to explain that the reason they are likely so anti-psychiatry is that they sell a competing service under the guise of religion. It's all about the money trail, people.