suicidal depression

February 28 2017

alive

susangayhart Poetry agoraphobia, alone, antidepressants, anxiety, clinical depression, depressed, depression, depression signals, emotions, hospitalizations, lonely, Major Depressive Disorder, mental health, mental illness, myketaminestory, observing, sadness, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, treatment resistant depression

My body is solid, I’m alive or so they say
my mind is in a whirl that keeps spinning round
I put in my favorite tape and press play
I hold the sharp razor to my right wrist

I close my eyes and think only of harmony
the peace I am seeking, imagine serenity
ponder the feeling of being free, out of this misery
I cut deep and close my eyes tighter as I cut deeper

I think of the freedom I am seeking
it races through my mind continuously
I was now concentrating on the razor
I change the cold steel to the other wrist

I take hundreds of pills to ensure my death
as I feel the blood so slick and sticky
oh so much blood, I still have my eyes glued shut
as I feel the blood soaking my clothing I think

It will all be over soon, the blood feels so warm
the heat makes me comfortable within
the best I’ve felt in such a long time
I laugh inside as a smile races across my face

Just then I hear the telephone rings then once again
my eyes open with no intention of answering it
it rings again, I glance down at my wrist
panic arose inside puzzled and so very much alive

I don’t understand, no words to explain
the telephone rings again I pull the line
I should be dying, inside my soul weeps
as I have to face yet another day
SEG

*Most of the poetry posted on my website was written during my teens and twenties. There are a few exceptions but typically I find myself wanting to journal regularly and write poetry if inspired. Poetry has been my therapist during many trying times. I have decided to post these poems because it reflects my history with suicidal depression and the struggles I encountered trying to cope with life and depression.

February 26 2017

can’t walk it off

susangayhart Poetry alone, anxiety, autumn, clinical depression, colors, depressed, depression signals, foliage, fresh air, help, insight, insomnia, longing, Major Depressive Disorder, meditation, mental illness, myketaminestory, observing, panic attacks, running, sadness, self aware, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, walking, winter

Whenever I’m depressed or anxious
I’ll sometimes take a long walk
which allows me to contemplate my life

Walking in the autumn is I find especially nice
looking at all the different colored leaves
but discovering no comfort for winter will soon arrive

I try breathing in the fresh air
attempting to live for the moment
I could walk forever wishing I could quiet my mind

I long to stroll without a care in the world
but as I roam down the street the issues
race through my head obsessively

I don’t possess the ability to turn off my mind
It’s such a dilemma to me, not being aware
how to solve my problems and deal with my past

Yearning desperately that I could merely
walk it off, but realistically I recognize
the depression, my illness will still be there

There are times when I figure a way to cope
a strategy or solution may occur to me
but never can I just walk it off or disappear
SEG

February 24 2017

death

susangayhart Poetry alone, angry, answers, antidepressants, anxiety, clinical depression, complex puzzle, death, depressed, depression signals, doubts, freedom, friendships, god, help, Major Depressive Disorder, panic attacks, pleas, sadness, self aware, suicidal depression, suicide prevention, suidical depression, treatment resistant depression, wonder

Death, it lives inside me
it makes it hard for me to breathe
it causes me to have a difficult time concentrating
to see things straight and clear

My interior mind is jumbled
similar to a complex puzzle
I’m finding that none of the pieces fit
I often wonder why I got this puzzle

I look to the sky to locate the answers
thought “God” might know the reason why
but He leaves me hanging and guessing
I beg him and plead with him please

I believe God holds the strings to my life
as time goes on I start to doubt myself and God
I mean how could a “God” that loves, allow such pain
as life continues and I start to wonder if there is a God

I wonder sometimes why I must stay in a place
where I wish not to be, I have become angry at the Lord
for allowing my heartache or anyone’s to linger so long
why won’t he accept me into his world, cut the strings and let me be free?
SEG

February 23 2017

deception

susangayhart Poetry affairs, alone, anxiety, clinical depression, deception, desire, emotional affair, insight, lies, lonely, longing, loving, Major Depressive Disorder, meditation, mental health, mental illness, myketaminestory, panic attacks, relationships, sadness, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, support, symptoms, treatment resistant depression

I hurt the one that I love immensely
I am ashamed of, and very angry too
could it be that my illness caused it?
I did so many actions that I can undo
carried out too many unforgivable things

Can he or I ever forgive myself for my conduct?
the reasons for my deception hurts inside
I devoted myself to man in marriage
why did I break that commitment to him?
was it because I thought he didn’t care?

I believed that he didn’t understand my mental illness
that the love we once shared so deeply
was no longer in existence, plainly dead
did I destroy a relationship I treasured?
morally I let go of what was meaningful to me

I went looking for others for the support and love
how can he ever pardon the affair when I know
that his heart is breaking from half a world away
will our marriage withstand all that I have done
or will it end in a wicked and ugly divorce?
SEG

February 21 2017

insightful

susangayhart Poetry anxiety, clinical depression, conversations, depressed, depression signals, ECT, fault, guilt, hate, help, hurt, longing, lost, love, Major Depressive Disorder, mental health, mental illness, observing, panic attacks, remembering, sadness, self aware, side effects, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, treatment resistant depression, treatments

When I first met you, I was extremely ill
but you looked into my blue eyes,
eyes that I figure hide everything
all my pain, all my anger, my entire life
yet you could see that I had no childhood

You were correct, I was robbed of the laughter,
the enjoyment all the things a child should have
I grew up resentful, alone and feeling awful
I thought that every dreadful episode was my fault and guilt
accompanied every event in my life, even before I was able to fight back

I really don’t know how you knew these things
when I was an expert at disguising what lie inside
you could see my inner soul when others couldn’t
tears came because of my broken heart, you said
I must have felt safe with you to be so open

I would love to know, to remember
all the conversations we have had
I pray daily for my memory to return
I practice every chance I get not to be so upset
at the devastating fact that I can’t recall any of them

I do thank you for having the recollections that you do
I listen closely for words, stories, incidents
that may trigger my mind into the past months
so far nothing has been restored to me
but with your caring and sharing, maybe one day
SEG

February 19 2017

memories

susangayhart Poetry agoraphobia, alone, antidepressants, anxiety, choices, doctors, ECT, hate, longing, Major Depressive Disorder, mental health, mental illness, misinformed, myketaminestory, observing, OCD, painful, panic attacks, sadness, self aware, stolen, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, terror, treatment resistant depression, treatments

The panic I feel when things don’t go as planned
I can’t breathe, think or know how to react
my memory it does not help or ease the fright
and that sense of anger overwhelms me
due to my choice to have electro convulsive therapy

I want to recall with all my might to be able
to reminiscence and have the knowledge I lost
it upsets me to no end all that’s gone
when others say that it is alright in time it will return
what they don’t realize is it didn’t happen to them

It’s not fine what I have forfeited because of my choice
the doctors, everyone I talk to tell me that eventually
someday I’ll recollect all that was stolen from me
until that day or moment when it’s supposed to occur
how do I handle all the anxiety and depression I feel

I want back what I perceive I can’t have
nevertheless I deserve to possess each and every event
that has been seized from me, I can’t stop obsessing about it
even though I agreed to under go shock treatment
It’s causing me such distress, it’s eating me alive
SEG

February 17 2017

questions

susangayhart Poetry afraid, alone, anxiety, clinical depression, death, discover, dreams, heartache, insight, loneliness, Major Depressive Disorder, outdoors, panic attacks, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, thoughts, treatment resistant depression

People tell me in my heart
I really don’t want to die
but in my mind I hear otherwise
I can’t stop the thoughts in my head
no matter how hard I try

Even if I think of the outdoors
of nature, the sun, the stars
I can dream of the mountains and trees
the summer hikes on my favorite trails
that’s all disappeared, no longer there

What I discover now
Is only loneliness and heartache
deadly thoughts of death and suicide
I want to hide from it all
to turn it off my thoughts as if they were a television

But I can’t switch off the voices in my head
I am afraid to be alone
yet at the same time
I want no one around
why doesn’t any of it make sense to me?
SEG

February 16 2017

the dream

susangayhart Poetry agoraphobia, alone, anxiety, clinical depression, depression signals, devil, distress, dream. gifts, exhausted, god, happiness, hell, lord, Major Depressive Disorder, mask, mental health, mental illness, pain, peace, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, symptoms, tired, tragic war, treatment resistant depression

The dream, that’s what it would be
the dream to have just one day of peace
this depression, it’s killing me
if for some time I could be happy
I’d continue to live and struggle
just to be rid of this disease

If I could find the joys of the world
and not to feel so damn miserable
I’d search and seek to locate that place
the area that knows nothing of such horrible pain
the time where I wouldn’t have to wear a mask
to pretend to be what everyone imagines me to be

I’m tired, tired of trying to fight
and very few people I know understand,
truly comprehend the war I’m in
a tragic war, that I can only dream of winning
I often wonder why that is, why they can’t
Why do they think I can just “snap out of it”?

The hell that I exist in, is pure distress
an area where demons have hold of me
I desperately want to destroy the devil inside
so that he can never affect me again
the dream I pray to the Lord every day
I want to have that one day of peace and happiness
SEG

February 14 2017

gone crazy

susangayhart Poetry acceptance, alone, antidepressants, clinical depression, dying, fear, friendships, gone crazy, grief, haunts, laughing, lonely, longing, mental health, mental illness, myketaminestory, observing, panic attacks, sadness, self aware, suicidal depression, suicide, suicide prevention, suidical depression, treatment resistant depression, unhappy, voices

My heart is dying inside
what does all this mean?
nothing really just reassuring me
no one could truly love me
I’m not worthy of unconditional love

Because you see those that have tried
leave so unhappily most of the time
I often wonder why that is
why can’t people accept who I am?
oh! it must be my personality

no need to cry the tears will never
wash away the pain that’s locked up inside
will it all end in suicide?
are the images I see, are they really laughing at me?
the whispers I hear, they frighten me so

The voices that haunt me
they won’t stop, so I obsess
about what I hear, have I gone crazy?
I’m scared and feel so empty
why do I turned everyone away?
SEG

February 13 2017

follow me upwards

susangayhart Blog antidepressants, anxiety, clinical depression, depressed, depression signals, Dr. Charles Moseley, Dr. Steven Levine, effects without ketamine, hospitalizations, insomnia, ketamine, Ketamine Advocacy Network, ketamine effects, ketamine infusions, ketamine shots, Major Depressive Disorder, myketaminestory, suicidal depression, suicide prevention, treatment resistant depression, www.ketamineadvocacynetwork.org

Hello again. I have been adding a few more things to the website and I am taking a much needed break to blog. I was thinking about my website and what else it needs in order to help. I decided to head over to a website that helped my family during the month leading up to and after my Ketamine Infusions. I pray the site Ketamine Advocacy Network continues to attract attention and more people become aware of the huge benefits that Ketamine offers for treatment resistant depression. I was visiting the site today and decided to finally register and post. I have been reluctant to in the past because I can get pretty overwhelmed by others emotions and experiences. I admit that even today it was upsetting. However, I did remind myself that tomorrow is Ketamine day and that I have been ready for my treatment 10 days now. It is not shocking that I would cry and hurt when reading about others’ histories and pain. It is a very fresh feeling for me. What I mean by that is I am too close to the depression. I feel some days it is too raw and painful. I know that after 9:30am tomorrow I will feel substantially better. I won’t falter. I feel broken today. I have much to accomplish and no, absolutely no drive to do. I want to accept and embrace where I am today but I admit I am angry. I am human. I am a little irritable, okay extremely so. I am definitely struggling with my depression lately. I am very uncomfortable. I am fighting for breath. My disability to center myself is compounded by the constriction the depression causes in my chest and stomach. I am feeling immensely negated. I feel I could disappear and nothing would shift or change. It will be as though I never was; nothing loss. My head is heavy and I believe I am close to auditioning for Sesame Street as the letter C because when I looked up and saw my reflection in the window that was what came to mind. I am curling into myself. It is physically more difficult to move and function mentally when the depression has latched its rotten teeth into me. I want that shot. I need that shot.

I have been using Ketamine therapy since March 2015. I have learned so much. I am in touch with my mental illness. I recognize the shifts and difference in myself. I feel blessed that I can distinguish a rotten day from Clinical Depression. However, I have hours upon hours of research left ahead of me. I need and want to research Ketamine. It is a massive part of my life. You know that part that decides whether it continues. I try not to freak out about the possibilities of not be able to afford or get my Ketamine therapy. It would be lovely if changes could occur to insurance companies so that Ketamine can be made available to everyone under their insurance coverage. I also would like and want to change stigmas. This is a tough one for me because I hide my illness at every turn. If I couldn’t camouflage my depression I wasn’t leaving the house. I spent many, too many, days in bed. I want and must inform doctors. I am shocked at how few doctors know or are willing to believe in Ketamine and its effects. I realize that prescribing Ketamine involves a little more hands on time for safety but in exchange for days of pure relief it is a no brainer to me. I feel the doctors should want to take the time if they are truly about healing the body. I have millions of pieces to glue together to make Susan completely whole again. I love knowing that Ketamine will give me a kick start. I will be floating up the stairs instead of crawling.

I was posting on the KAN sites’ forum about how I started with 6 Ketamine infusions and now I get a shot every two weeks and it brought back memories. I was investigating on the Ketamine Advocacy Network website and it got me thinking. I am documenting my journey by creating a place to go and I hope to see activity to my site too in an effort to help others. I know for a fact that the Ketamine Advocacy Network website helped my husband when I was barely hanging on to life. I feel Ketamine needs a voice. It needs all the voices it can find. It is so sad that this amazing drug has to go through so many hoops in order to help possibly millions. I would be dead today if not for Ketamine. That might sound dramatic but it is no lie. It changed my life. It continues to change me. I can not say it enough. I believe with everything in me that Ketamine could help thousands and thousands of individuals with Treatment Resistant Depression and Anxiety.

I also found after reading a few posts and comments on their forums section that I need to take some time to write about my Infusions and the treatment experiences I originally had and the ways that has changed over time. I want to be informative. I will.

The major obstacle, besides the health and insurance industry, is those of us suffering don’t know anything about Ketamine therapy and neither do our doctors!! Education is needed. I want more people talking openly about Ketamine and depression. I started my website as a beginning. There is so much I want to say. I want to shout it. Ketamine was my last chance. I had my suicide planned out fully in my head if I returned from NJ and the Ketamine didn’t turn out to be this wonder drug my husband was reading about. If it was unsuccessful which I figured it would be I had the escape plan. And that is exactly how I saw the direction of my life. I didn’t honestly have any hope that this treatment would be any different than any other antidepressants or cocktails from hell I have been prescribed over the last three decades. I had nothing left to give. I stuck around to try this last treatment only for my husband and son. The incredible part is we haven’t looked back since. I am working diligently on healing and Ketamine gives me the ability to do the work. I am super fortunate to have discovered Ketamine. This drug could help so many like me but it isn’t being used or talked about nearly enough! I am on a mission…. ?

I never believed my outlook on life could feel so completely opposite to the beliefs I have had in the past but they are. It hasn’t been reflected in the last couple post (excluding the poetry. I am posting many that were written in my teens and twenties. A history of mental illness in stance if you will.) and I know I still have several unanswered questions. Oh, that reminds me Dr. Steven Levine emailed me back Friday and agreed to discuss my case with my local doctor today. I am going to close for now and give Dr. Charles Moseley a call and check the status on what they decided regarding Ketamine and possible issues with my menopause results. It could be an explanation as to why the Ketamine wasn’t as effective as it typically is. Until next time. Keep moving upwards even if you have to crawl because at the top is Ketamine. I am crawling. I know what I will find. It is worth the bruises.