Knee surgery Update:

almost a month after surgery

 I'm doing better, I can do standing exercises and some bending ones, had a set back this last week when they bent my leg to far and I couldn't get the pain to go away for about 4 days. I'm cooking as long as i don't stand to long, I can sit at my computer desk and play WoW for about a 1/2 hour. I can do crafts as long as I take breaks and rest.

Dress and hat for granddaughter's doll.

 

 I made a crochet gift for my granddaughter's bday this month. and I've been working on the sunflowers

sunflowers.

 I'm hoping to get back to the Good Girl story soon since I might be having my other eye surgery next month.

I hope you have a blessed week. Love and Huggs your family.

Huggs,

Cleary (Cie) 

Knee Surgery recovery.....

 

Day 1

The things that I have learned about myself in the last week since my knee surgery is amazing.  That my body can go through that and come out the other-side and forget the pain. Which is a lot more than I thought it was going to be even with pain meds. But also at the same time not as bad as I feared it would be. That I would get up and walk even before I went home from the surgery clinic. That my first PT appt would go so well even though I lost my breathe from the pain of them moving my knee. To be able to cook, maybe not eat well but cook. I'm having a hard time with eating because I think my jaw is flaring a bit from the surgery and RA. I'm not quite ready to do crafts yet because I'm so sleepy right now. But I can sit up long enough to write this but not play WOW

I'm realizing that your body knows what it needs even if you think otherwise so it is easier to listen to it, but at the same time do the PT so I heal.

Anyways I hope you all have a great week tell your love ones that you love them oftem.

Huggs,

Cleary (Cie) 

When you are raised a "Good Girl" On Hold

 I'm getting ready for knee surgery next week so I'm putting this on hold until after it.

I feel that I need to put all my energy into mentally getting ready for this and healing afterwards. 

Thank you for reading this so far.

Huggs,

Cleary (Cie) 

 

When you are raised a "Good Girl" Part 7: This might trigger some:

 

I left off yesterday with my going down to the locked unit. It was an eye opener completely different from the open co-ed unit. Here there was no windows, a couple of private rooms and a large common bedroom that held 10 girls, and the TV area.The dinning room was in another part of the place, you had to go through the tunnels to get to it. 

    The biggest difference was there was no privacy. I was watch 24/7 by a MHW (mental health worker). I had to ask to go to the bathroom or go to another part of the unit. They keep trying to get you to talk about anything and report everything you say or do. I mostly could ignore her and do my crafts I had a latch hook kit I was working on. Or I wrote in my journal -we were encouraged to keep one. After about a week I started asking how long she was going to keep following me and wasn't she bored? I asked when she was going to tell my doctor I no longer needed this as I was never going to hurt myself in the first place. I wanted to go back to the other unit. The girls here were extremely not well and I was scared for my health from a couple of them. Bu,t she said it wasn't up to her. I asked who it was up to and she said the Unit Nurse. So I asked to talk to her and she told me that she was busy but would let her know.

    During that week there was one girl that was really out of it, all she did was watch TV all day. and she watch even when it had nothing on it but the white noise screen. Well after about 3 days she finally noticed I was on the unit, she took one look at me and started screaming that I was the devil and a witch. I looked at my worker because I wasn't sure what to do and she told me to ignore her and not to look at her. Well while I was trying to do that a heavy set girl came in the room and walked up to her and slapped her across the face which got her to calm down. No one said a word about the fact that she hit her, but it worked so I guess it was okay. Then she walked over to me and said hi, told me her name and said that if I had anymore trouble with the girl to let her know and welcome to the unit. I didn't know how to respond to that so just said I would thank you.

    I asked her what was wrong with the other girl and if there was anything I could do so she wouldn't freak out around me. She said just be calm and speak slowly, maybe make her a gift to show her your a friend. So I made her a bracelet at our next craft time. When I went up to her to give it to her she froze and I talked softly and told her I wasn't going to hurt her just wanted to be friends and I made something for her.  Her eyes got really big and she took it put it on, then hugged me like she had never been hugged before. I ended up with another friend. We made sure she ate and got to bed on time and I also gave her one of my stuff animals to sleep with. It turned out her family put her in here and then just never came to visit or find out how she was.

    I was still trying to get off being followed around it had been almost a week and 1/2 that I finally talked to the head nurse and she said it was up to my doctor but she was gone for the weekend. That pissed me off. Now, I do have a temper, it is slow but when it hits I see red, so I did something stupid, I walk up to my worker and told her I was going to my room and she didn't need to come with me. I would prefer it if she would just leave me alone. Then I marched into my room and slammed the room closed and move the chair up against the door so it couldn't be open and sat on my bed to calm down. 

Trigger Warning -slight violence in this next part. Mental health places didn't have to many laws back then.

    Well, that might have worked at home but being in a place like I was it wasn't the smartest thing to do. The next thing I knew there was banging on my door, which I told them to go away I was calming myself down. Then I heard a bell go off and the next thing I knew there was 3 really big muscle men in my room picking me up and carrying me to another room.  There was a table in the room and the put me on it and held me down and they started taking my clothes off (all of my clothes). Then they started wrapping me in cold wet sheets to where I couldn't move. It is called being wet packed. I'm sure there is a clinical name for it but that is what they called it. After I was wrapped the men left and a female worker stayed with me, They monitor you BP and Pulse during it, because it shocks your body into calming down. I actually fell asleep and felt really calm when I woke up before dinner. So I realized I was in there for at least 4 hours. 

    It changed my whole thought process of being in that place. I now knew that they could and would over power me whenever they wanted to.  I had the bruises to prove it.That's when I realized it wasn't really like a boarding school which was what the open unit was mostly. This place could really hurt you if your not careful and no one would stop them. They could drug you, wrap you in wet sheets for hours, etc. I was only 16 and being there reinforced the being a good girl and follow the rules. I just wanted out, I wanted to go home. 

More later.

Love and Huggs your family often.

Huggs,

Cleary (Cie) 

When you are raised a "Good Girl" Part 6: This might trigger some:

 

When I left off last post I had been at IOL for a couple of weeks. I stayed there for 4 months. The first couple of months were really good. We had craft classes we could go to, swimming twice a week. Movies and dances on the weekend. You could go outside and play baseball or just watch it. Inside on the unit you could play spades or pool, there were board games or just read in a corner on your favorite chair. Now there were things you had to be careful of because everyone was in for mental reason so everyone was mostly polite to everyone else.  I don't remember there being any fights on the unit or anything like that. A couple of regular boyfriend- girlfriend fights but noting major. That happens on a co-ed unit.

    I mostly hung out with my friend and a couple of others. But mostly my friend -I'm going to call him Tom but that's not his real name, he was my lifeline to dealing with being so far away from family and everything I knew. We did everything together but our counseling. 

    I had been there 3 months when I woke up one morning feeling off, like something had changed but I didn't know what it was. I got dressed and headed to the dinning room for breakfast, got breakfast was eating it waiting for Tom to show up but he didn't. When I left the dinning room I headed to his room to see if he was okay and got stopped by a counselor.  She told my doctor was here to see me and it was important. That I had to go talk to her. So, I went to the head doctor room (that's what we called the counseling rooms) My doctor had me sit down and asked me if I was alright did I want to talk about it. I was like talk about what? She just looked at me and then said "oh great you don't know yet." I said know what? I know something is wrong I just don't know what I can feel it. So what it is? I watched her take a deep breath and told me to stay calm but Tom my friend tried to kill himself last night and was taken to the regular hospital. I didn't move I felt my whole body shut down. I just asked if he was going to be alright and when he was coming back. She said he would be but he would have to go to a different unit when he came back. So I won't see him again. I told her that wasn't fair. I asked how he was supposed to get better if he didn't have his friends around him. And she told me he would have help I said it wasn't the same and asked her if she was done so I could go to my room now. She asked if I wanted to talk about it I said not right now. She told me that I had to stay on the unit for the next couple of days. I asked why, she said she thought it would be better because she thought I was a flight risk. I was like where would I go? I don't know this state, then I walked out and to my room.

    I had a sweat jacket that I always wore when I was upset, I would zip it up with my stuffy inside it and feel better from it. I went to my room and put it on, then went and sat on our favorite couch and just cried. I stopped eating again.  I asked to go outside to watch the baseball game and they said no I couldn't yet. I screamed at them that I wasn't going to go anywhere I just need to do normal things. The floor counselor came in my room and asked me if I wanted to talk. I said I felt like I was being punished for something i didn't do just because he was my friend. I told her I felt so angry at them and him and scared. That I just want to hit something. That he was the only friend I had there and no I have no one. Well that's the wrong thing to say. Because they told my doctor and she decided I need to be on suicide watch 24/7 which meant that I would be moved to a lower closed unit, have a counselor with me 24/7.  So I was moved by the tunnels again to a different unit and they moved all my stuff later. This lower unit was a lock down one you couldn't see outside and the doors were locked. The only good thing is I had my own room.  I was very scared on this unit as it felt unsafe. and it was an all female only unit. There were about 25 girls on it. That first day I was mostly in shock because things had changed so fast and none of it was because of anything I had originally done. It was all done to me because I was friends with Tom. 

I'm stopping here I will get into what happened on that unit next time.

 tell your family you love them and give them huggs .

Huggs,

Cleary (Cie) 

July 4 musings...

 This is me today. I love the Holidays and decorating for them and making a big deal out of them. But this one not so much anymore, this was the last holiday that Hubby and I spent together. We had such a good day and even went out to see fireworks which we hadn't done in years. In my mind I somehow made this day the beginning of the end of things. Because the next day shit started and everything went down hill from there. I'm not sure if what happened had anything to do with him taking his life but I know it didn't help. I also know now that what I saw him doing the next 2 weeks was getting ready to take his life. Cleaning up the yard, paying off debts. I also know now that he was mentally battling with himself. But at the same time he was silently saying goodbye to everyone. I know I can't change any of it, you can't go back in time. But this is why I like being alone today, I know I could be with family and friends. but I would rather be by myself and remembering the last good time I had with him. Eight years has made a lot of difference as I can do this now with smiles and not tears or rage.

I hope you have a blessed day, hugs your loved ones 

Huggs,

Cleary (Cie) 

When you are raised a "Good Girl" Part 5: This might trigger some:

 

 

 

    I left off on my first night in IOL. I spent 4 months there until my insurance ran out and stopped paying for me to be there. I've been debating with myself if I want to write about what happened there because the laws were different then and mental health care didn't really care about your age. You got treated the same as an adult or maybe a bit worse. But, then I'm know there are others who also went through the same things. 

    So I will write about what I remember the most about those 4 months. Being on the open unit I was placed on it was co-ed, meaning there were boys and girls on the same unit all under 18 and over 12. The first week I had to have classes because I was under 16 so still had to have school. That took up most of my morning and afternoon. I was still not talking to anyone else on the unit and still not really eating. I had drinks and smoked a lot. Oh yeah they encouraged our parents to put money in our banks for cigarettes and to by shampoo etc. We were encourage to smoke to help keep us calmer.  

    I was doing okay until my Birthday, right before dinner I got a phone call from my parents telling me Happy Birthday and that the nurses will give me my present after dinner.  I did good until I hung up and the dinner bell rang. I actually went to try and eat something, got to the door of the dinning room and broke out in tears. I couldn't stop crying. The boy in front of me in line grabbed my hand and pulled me to my favorite couch by the window and just held my hand and sat with me until I could talk. He told me his name and said he had been watching me all week just waiting for this to happen. I giggled at him and asked if he was psychic? He said no that he went through almost the same thing when he first got here. I laugh and said good because I thought I was going crazy, not being able to talk to anyone or being able to eat. He told me it was shock of being ripped away from everything I know and felt safe with. He honestly should have worked there and not been a patient.

He became my lifeline in there. I slowly started eating again. Went to classes, started going outside to watch him play baseball. Went to the gym. I got permission to go to the pool and swim which was good as it gave me something semi normal to do. This place had amazing food, we had a  movie theater and weekend dances.. You had to earn point to be able to go to these things and not be a high risk. But they helped to keep things kind of normal. You still had to talk to the floor counselors everyday and doctors every week. Plus take your meds, things that made you realize you were still in a mental hospital. So the first couple of months I was doing well and getting adjusted to being there. I had friends now and things to look forward to. 

I'm going to stop here because the next part I need to think about how to put it. But this gives you an idea of what life was like on an open unit.

Huggs your love ones and tell them you love them.

Huggs,

Cleary (Cie)