World mental health day / Nat’l coming out day 2017

These days occur consecutively every year – October 10th and 11th.  It’s a good chance to kind of look back and take stock.  And to see where I was at; here’s what I wrote last year:
World mental health day / Nat’l coming out day 2016

Before talking about this year, I just want to note that last year I said,  “I’d say within the next 6 months I’ll be out at work and everywhere else.  I look forward to the day that my driver’s license, signature, little plastic rectangle on the custodial office, Facebook page, the words out of teachers’ and co-workers’ mouths, and everything else, all say the same thing!”  I’ve reached that point!!!  Well, everything except that little plastic rectangle, but that is in-process (see below)!

This past year in my mental health landscape:  I thought I was stable in a way that couldn’t be rocked, but actually I ended up back in the hospital again with another manic / psychotic episode.  I know my loved ones went through a lot of stress and strife, but, in comparison to past episodes, this felt like a breeze, and it even felt healing in many ways.  I do want to try to write about this, but I’m not quite there yet.  Hopefully soon.  I spent two months out of work, I got raised to triple my prior dose of Seroquel (a drug I continue to like a lot – a first for me), and now I’m down to double my prior dose.  I’m off of any antidepressants right now.  I’m worried I will lapse into another depression, but so far, so good.  I’m starting to finally address the issues I’m having with oversleeping.  But, to be honest, if oversleeping is the worst thing to come out of being in a really good place mentally otherwise, then so be it, I guess…  For now at least.

In terms of National Coming Out Day, coming out is happening all the time, and I’m glad to be in a place where I’m neither invisible nor fearful of having to come out again and again and again.  I love every opportunity.  Take yesterday for example:  I didn’t realize it was National Coming Out Day until that night when I went on facebook after work.  And during that day, I had two instances of coming out.  While I was working in the cafeteria during lunch, a kid asked me, “Are you a boy?”  I replied, “I’m neither.  I’m a little bit of both.”  He replied, “Really?!”  And I said, “Yeah!”  I had a big smile on my face.  Then later in the afternoon, I realized that my new boss(?) got his plastic rectangle with his name “engraved” and it was now on the custodial door, and I’ve been waiting for mine since January, when I changed my name.  So instead of getting worked up about that, I just wrote down on a piece of paper what I wanted (so there’d be no confusion) and explained to the administrative assistant that Mr. [last name] has his on the door and I’ve been waiting for mine.  She apologized for forgetting to include mine in the order, and said she would go ahead and order mine.  I gave her the paper:  It said, “Mx. [last name].”  She verbalized that back to me to make sure it was right, and I said, “Yep.”  I should have that up hopefully within a couple of weeks, finally.  This feels like such a victory!

There’s one other thing I want to mention regarding mental health:  I started listening exclusively to a new-to-me podcast.  By this, I mean, I listen to podcasts every day while at work.  And previously, that would be somewhere between 5-8 different ones at any given time.  Right now, for whatever reason, I’m just listening to one, all day every day.  I’m sure I’ll get tired of it and get back to some of my other ones, but for now, it’s pretty mesmerizing.  If you’re interested in checking it out, it’s called the Mental Illness Happy Hour.  It is definitely not for the faint of heart.  The host jokes that he does not give advanced notice for triggers because he would have to stop every couple of minutes to announce another Trigger Warning.  And it is absolutely true.  There is a lot of stuff about abuse of all kinds, dark secrets and shame, both sexual in nature and just like, the kinds of stuff that randomly pops in your head and you hate yourself for thinking it.  The host lightens things up by being in turns uplifting and darkly humorous.  Each show is somewhere between 2-3 hours (!?!), and he’d read people’s surveys they’ve sent in anonymously, and he will also interview one person per show.  He’s doing all this seemingly on his own, and he’s making a living off of it.  I’m kinda obsessed right now.