Ratprincess' psychotic model 2013 and Happy New Year!

I have been talking about this book I have been working on.  Unfortunately, not too many a person has seen the ghost of it, not to mention IT, while in my imaginary world, too many a person has reviewed it along the way since before the beginning of the model where there was only less than one page of texts.

In the beginning, there is the psychotic model.

The model is destined to be imperfect, an exact mirror image of the existence of me's, myselves and I's.  Imperfect as well is the language, which I had to use to get the model constructed, with the nature of the language yet to be defined.

I would have loved to give you a cleaner copy of the model and have it proofread for many more an iteration except I have a deadline: I promised my head to have Ratprincess' psychotic model 2013 out by the end of 2013.

Here it is... where Ratprincess' psychotic model 2013 resides, still undergoing renovation, the second section of "Ratprincess' 11-Copy Book" (only need to sell 11 copies of it to break my own record, the sales of my dissertation 8-O lol).

Let me reiterate it yet again... it's a drafty draft of some non-academic writing.  Would have loved to incorporate this happy rat in the watermark.  Unfortunately, yours truly has nothing artistic in her.  Would have to leave it to you to combine the image of this happy creature and the word "Draft" in your episodic buffer manually.

Happy New Year wherever you are!!!

An ode to Comma

After all these years of mindless use of the English language, one thing I came to realize this year is that, above and beyond everything else, I really don't no jack about comma and I think I might have contributed greatly to the plight of comma as depicted in the following illustration. 8-O lol 8-X

Poor comma, my bad.

http://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/21/the-most-comma-mistakes/?_r=0

Proofreaders needed for Down with Meds

My head finally authorizes me to move to the phase of getting the texts of "Down with Meds" proofread.

Knowing how popular and well-read my blogs like Ratology Reloaded are (oops... 8-X lol), I decided to post the link to my odesk job post here... in case anyone who religiously read this blog wants to take on a part-time job in proofreading my incurably Bad English. 8-X

The following is the job description and the link to the job post:
"I have a substantial amount of writing to be proofread. Since the writing is equivalent to qualitative data, there only thing I want from the proof reader is to have the grammatical and syntax errors corrected so as to retain the integrity of the data. The texts to be edited were part of the documentation of a psychotic patient. Please contact me if you are interested."

https://www.odesk.com/jobs/~~0cfe3db0541a1726

12/22/2013 Update: The positions are filled for this job.

A tale of Mental Illness--Elyn Saks

A great talk to share with you...



At some point into her talk when she was speaking of her struggles to get off meds, been there, done that, and today I only wish to be down with meds except the side effects have a bad habit of getting in the way.

Ratology lingo

(1/8/2014 Update: Please see http://neologyratology.blogspot.com/2014/01/ratology-lingo-update.html for the updated Ratology Lingo list)

My writing in the Ratology domain is mostly nothing too close to standard English.  I know it along the way but since I have been using language this way so long, many of the usages have become the standardized Ratology usage.  (Of course, some part of my strange English is simply due to either mindless mistakes or my not-knowing-English-too-well kind of error. 8-O lol)

After I went through the notes and edits of proofreaders who went through the model I developed on my psychosis, I got to better identify how Ratology lingo deviates from standard English. One thing I have to stress is that I have no way to tell whether these preferred usages are a manifestation of the pathology or not--could be and could be not. Following is a list of Ratology language usage (still a work in process) with some of the points actually already mentioned in the Neologism in Ratology blog.

1. Me’s, myselves, and Is.  Nothing grand and no mistakes... given my split-headed existence and as an attempt to acknowledge all the voices etc in me... there came... "mes, myselves, and Is."
2. I like to put words together to create a new word.
3. I like to build sentences this way: aberrant my brain structure or limited my words as opposed to my aberrant brain structure or my limited words
4. I like to build sentences this way: verb+not as in turn right not
5. I use emoticons to express feelings :-O :-X :-D lol
6. I like the sound of what it be like as opposed to what would it be like
7. I like to use da, them, la, etc as opposed to the standardized the
8. I like to use double negatives: should there be no nothing
9. I like the word: Donno
10. I like the word: Ain’t
11. I use the notion of “self” a lot because being psychotic is all about all things relating to me’s, myselves, and I’s.  Therefore, terminologies like self-related.
12. I like to use vernacular language
13. I use the term “the normal” to refer to “the non-psychotic”
14. Sometimes psychotic is used as a noun to represent a person with psychosis
15. In terms of comma, I really don’t know my commas too well.  However, sometimes that comma I put in does mean a pause partially because I do think slowly and there are pauses between my thoughts
16. The Apocalypses and the notion of being killed a million and a time I speak of refer to the scenarios at the height of my second full-blown psychotic episode.
17. Bend and snap: As per Elle in Legally Blond, "In my experience, it has a 98% success rate of getting a man's attention and when used appropriately -- it has an 83% rate of return on a dinner invitation. It's called the 'bend and snap.'" As per yours truly, I might have to swap "a man's attention" to "my symptoms' attention" and "a dinner invitation" to "an increase in medications." 8-O lol
18. I use the word “la” at the end of the sentence at times. Since 2-3 years ago and after I went back to Taiwan, I picked up this usage of "la" because I simply like it la! Them "la's" you see in my writing, it's the pinyin of the Chinese character "啦":  a final particle of assertion.

(This writing is cross-posted in Neologism in Ratology.)

Frankl and I Broke My Neck But That Didn't Break Me

A clip I found with Viktor Frankl in it with a gentleman whose neck was broken but it didn't break him.  Think it's really... powerful...

Something to share with you... (unfortunately the site doesn't allow me to embed the clip here so please click on the link.)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1_lmMl4P7cQ

A historical first time experience: got a cell number

The last time I had the most traumatic experience in my life... I lost my beloved 212 phone number... still could feel that pain... (you know how hard it is to get a 212 number!) 8-O

Today is the sequel... I don't wanna do it but I have to do it... I had to get myself a cell number and lose that identity as one of the last surviving Luddite without a cell...

Anyways, however traumatic that identity loss might be, I, for the first time in my life, got a cell number of my own.

If you wonder, why don't I want to use a cell phone and carry it with me on the road?  Is it because I am a paranoid delusional fearing that people might track me etc?

Albeit the 99.9% principle, I am 100% sure that it's not the reason (for once in my life).

Let me put it this way, in my imaginary world, people monitor and record everything I say and do 24/7 even when I did not have a cellphone.  Using a cellphone absolutely would not add more to that 24/7 grade of monitoring and recording.  Ain't like... well... now they now can monitor and record everything 25/8? lol

Why do I refuse to have a cellphone?  Just don't like it and I don't like to talk on the phone anyways.  8-O lol  

Loose cannon in NYC

I really am insane.

So there is the feeling that my naive model of my psychosis is finally in shape and time to get back to NYC.

And, in NYC tonight while having no idea at all where that proof reader/editor of mine is still.

Insane in my own eyes... don't know what it be like in yours.

Good old writings

Getting old... forgetting what I memorized as an even springer chicken and finding myself skipping things left and right when trying to recite them good old poems... like the following...

What mastery with words!  Wow!

念奴嬌 赤壁懷古　　蘇軾

大江東去，浪淘盡，千古風流人物。
故壘西邊，人道是，三國周郎赤壁。
亂石崩雲，驚濤裂岸，捲起千堆雪；江山如畫，一時多少豪傑。
遙想公瑾當年，小喬初嫁了，雄姿英發，羽扇綸巾，談笑間，強虜灰飛煙滅。
故國神遊，多情應笑我，早生華髪。
人生如夢，一尊還酹江月。

宣州謝朓樓餞別校書叔雲 李白

棄我去者，昨日之日不可留；
亂我心者，今日之日多煩憂。
長風萬里送秋雁，對此可以酣高樓。
蓬萊文章建安骨，中間小謝又清發。
俱懷逸興壯思飛，欲上青天攬明月。
抽刀斷水水更流，舉杯銷愁愁更愁。
人生在世不稱意，明朝散發弄扁舟。

將進酒 李白

君不見黃河之水天上來，
奔流到海不復回？
君不見高堂明鏡悲白髮，
朝如青絲暮成雪？

人生得意須盡歡，
莫使金樽空對月。
天生我才必有用，
千金散盡還復來。
烹羊宰牛且為樂，
會須一飲三百杯。

岑夫子，丹丘生，
將進酒，杯莫停。
與君歌一曲，
請君為我傾耳聽：
鍾鼓饌玉不足貴，
但願長醉不願醒。
古來聖賢皆寂寞，
唯有飲者留其名。
陳王昔時宴平樂，
斗酒十千恣讙謔。
主人為何言少錢？
徑須沽取對君酌。

五花馬、千金裘。
呼兒將出換美酒，
與爾同銷萬古愁。

First time experience: Just Got Paid! 8-O

Since my blogs are so "well-read," I have given up on seeing the day to come when I get a check from google Adsense and use it more or less as an alternative means to cross-check the stats gathered through google stats.

(To show you an example of how well-read my blogs are... there were 31 hits on Ratology Reloaded yesterday and it includes visits from browsers who might have browsed through but didn't stop, or bots accessing my blog to entice me to go to some sites, etc... 8-O lol)

Then, somehow I checked the gmail account I hardly check today and found this strange email, which I automatically classified as a spam mail...

Since I just wrote something down a day or two ago about how it might take me another 1-2 decades to get enough hits to get a check from google Adsense, out of curiosity, I clicked on this email and found the following content...

I checked all parts of the email and tried to figure out how this might be a phishing email... though... all parts seemed quite legit.

So I logged in to my adsense account and found that it really said that an amount of 100 dollars something was transferred to my account.

How could a check that is to come in 1-2 decades have arrived like 3 days ago?  Can't be right?!

So I logged in to my bank account and... OMG... just got paid by Google Adsense for the first time!

Also for the first time in my life, I got paid for the dungeon I built for myself with limited my words... from Down with Meds to Ratology Reloaded... Wow... That is grand!  Ain't no nothing grander than that! A historic moment in Ratology! Something worth me to shed a tear or two albeit the fact that TNT is for drama...

P.S., Now what's going on in the head of your paranoid delusional with grandiosity is... Oh... Lord... now my eternal love and IRS is watching me closely... I can envision myself under investigation and state... "My name is Ratprincess Ratology and I take the Fifth." 8-O lol

First time experience: Started a fire!

Today is the Mid Autumn festival and we decided to do a BBQ at home on a night when da typhoon rabbit gave us a break so that I got to see the full moon hanging high in the skies..

We didn't start the fire but...



I proudly did... for the first time in my life!



BBQ meat, vegi and fish...

魚下巴

while the song I sang to the first fire I started was...



So it concludes the post on "Started a fire for the first time."

La recherche... Du Temps perdu

When cleaning up all them papers piling up, I couldn't find Nelson and Naren's article.  So I went on searching and searching till, haphazardly, I found on my desk journals I took when I went into the psychiatric ward for the first time... while I still didn't know (or believe) I was psychotic.

An especially interesting paragraph to come across drafted on June 17th, 2001... possibly the 9th day behind the gated doors.

"I only wish everything could just stop here. Just leave me alone. I wish the taping process, doesn't matter by whom, could come to an end. I want everything to stop. It, somehow, has turned to be a soap opera of some sort. It does not deserve... I don't deserve people's attention and energy. I am just a simple person and I am but an workaholic. That's all."

Same words still applicable for yours paranoid delusional with grandiosity to use today and many days before and after today.

Except today, so I also say to myself...

"Cut that drama part already... you want drama, go watch TNT.  How is it your business someone wiretapping you or not?  Ain't like you are endowed in the wealth, fame, or power kinda department.  Get the shxt done so that one day you can bring a penny or two in and I can spare a bit of money to do work in an AC condition.  Shut the front door, get done with your work, and go make the body feel more comfortable!" (Developmental outcome? 8-O lol sigh)

Taiwanese singer... 陳雷

Someone came to visit this post... Down with Meds -- A revelation of Ratology (Recovered): 歡喜就好

5-6 years after the rise of Ratology Reloaded, his songs remain... 讚啦！

Without interuptions, let me present to you the Taiwanese songs by the singer...  陳雷.

1 and 1/2 of 25 mg +-

The night I made the post on dosage adjustment... I realized that I actually took 1 and 1/4 of 25 mg Seroquel by mistake since there was still 3/4 of the 25 mg pill left in the pill cutter.  Since going down from 50 mg (2 25 mg pills) is almost like going down by 50 percent, ain't no way of doing dosage adjustment.  Why didn't I suffer more from the dosage adjustment and the withdrawal?  Guess, having been exceptionally overdosed for all these months, still quite a bit of residuals of Seroquel in the body.

That night, I took the 1 and 3/4 of the 25 mg pills to be on the safe side.  Forget about the fish on the cutting board when trying to fall asleep, I spent the next day feeling the entire body all tight... uncomfortable.

It was then did I decide... what about 1 and 1/2 instead?  Taking the middle value?  From then on to date, still dosage adjustment though at the amount of 1 and 1/2 of 25 mg +-... still the "unmentioned."

This is why... crying out loud... "Where is my cure?"  A cure that free me of the symptoms, the side effects of the medication, and the never-ending dosage adjustment!



Ratology Reloaded: 1 and 3/4 of 25 mg +-: So, after a prolonged wait (months), in the face of the ever intensifying fish on the cutting board and the fear for esophageal spasm , dos...

Where is my cure?

10 years ago, it was estimated that a cure can be found for Schizophrenia as Possible in 10 Years.  Alright... it's 2013... if schizophrenia can be cured, they gotta be able to cure me of my mental department!

We are here; we are waiting!

(Please view the clip from 57 second if it doesn't start from 57 second into the clip as I had it set up.)

From my first skype interview to the legal thing...

Had my first Skype interview just now... when discussing the potential of doing translation work, I told the interviewer that there are things beyond my bandwidth... no quantum mechanics and no nothing in legal, for instance.

After the interview, so I pondered to myself, no quantum mechanics... I can fully comprehend... but that thing I feel about legal documents... is it grounded in anything?

So I decided to look up a case online... such as RICARDO MARRERO, PETITIONER v. UNITED STATES... and...

The thing I feel about legal documents... there surely is a reason for it.  In no way will I be able to tasks alike.  Case closed.

1 and 3/4 of 25 mg +-

So, after a prolonged wait (months), in the face of the ever intensifying fish on the cutting board and the fear for esophageal spasm, dosage change again... decreasing from 50 mg to 1 and 3/4 of 25 mg +- (since there is no way to cut a 25 mg pill in equal quars).

The adjustment... live it like how I have to live it before... just the reloading of the same old scenario... unmentioned cuz no need to mention no more. 8-X lol sigh



Ratology Reloaded: My biggest struggle--again: I really don't wanna have no nothing to do with this struggle again... why... all these months... just let it be 2 whole pills... as lo...

My biggest struggle--again

I really don't wanna have no nothing to do with this struggle again... why... all these months... just let it be 2 whole pills... as long as enough cognitive capacity to do some work now and then.

With the intensified fish on the cutting board... might have to jump back to the sea of suffering... pill cutter here I come!

Really 苦海無涯 (there is no end to the sea of suffering)... just kept on getting sucked back to da aqua... (Geez... I really have low tolerance for suffering... This also accounts for suffering? But do it yourself and you shall know... 8-O lol)



Ratology Reloaded: My biggest struggle: This past two months or so, every night, I have to fight this biggest struggle in my life... cutting pills (8-O lol) The task of cutting a...

A cup of coffee--a benchmark

Finally took a trip outside of Taiwan again... just thought... since there is an opportunity, might as well go and do my walking somewhere else...

I actually had no set plan on where to go and what to see... just going with the flow... perhaps, making it to find the City God Temple 城隍廟  in Shanghai--a temple I had thought might exist, was told to exist not, and finally found out that it really exists after I came back to Taiwan 3 years ago.

There was one thing I wanted to do at the beginning of the journey... My friends' family were flying to Taiwan on the same day although we were not taking the same flight and going to the same airport.  Knowing that their flight will take off 2-3 hours earlier than mine, I had in my mind this big plan... sort of... to go into town and have a sip of coffee at a coffee shop.

Possibly due to the fact that they know how not too useful my body is, they were worried and wanted me to have a cup of coffee at the airport instead. lol

Yet, I bid them farewell when they were getting on to the airport bus and ventured on to my final destination... an unknown coffee shop... where I'd be sipping my cup of coffee... people watching.

I knew what was to come... the empire of my body strikes back albeit my rehab efforts.  The weight of the luggage, however minimal I packed, still would do damage.  I was prepared and I was prepared to find all means to minimize the damage.

I found myself a coffee shop and sat down to leisurely have my cup of coffee... not the first one, not the second one... I made my efforts to search for a coffee shop and, en route, walked a bit more around the Shatin Mall.  Which one to choose?  As per the order of my body...  the Pacific Coffee.

On August 16th, 2013, thousands of people might have visited the Mall, many more a person got a cup of coffee from this shop, quite a few of them sat on one of the seats while I was there or not... The same day when that cup of coffee that I drank and the whole 9 yards it entailed happens to be yet another benchmark I made this year.  Surely, there was setback in my bodily condition... yet with minimized repercussions... which could be "repaired" within a few days.

I, like what other travellers do, I walked with luggages hanging at the Mall.  I sat down at a coffee shop, drank my cup of coffee, watched the people around, and did some work.

So it is... a cup of coffee... a benchmark. (Man... I surely am ambitious... ain't I? 8-O lol)

Screw

While working on my translation job, I saw this sentence... "one screw having problem... community of the same destiny."

I saw the word screw... I thought of the chair from which I fell from... all because one screw having problem...  I surely was screwed by the screw and never came to appreciate the power of a screw till today (though the accident took place over 6 years ago).  8-O lol sigh

Yet, the screw did screw the whole system... with the chair collapsed onto the group in one piece... the community of the same destiny... How is it my business to get screwed by the screwed screwed? An alternative version of my can't mind my own business disorder?  8-O lol

Regardless, first time to really understand the importance of a screw... sort of like... over 6 years too late? I surely am a slow learner... 8-O lol

At the same time, the funny thing is that... I had never seen that screw... whether it was broken or got loose...  since what happened was someone used a stable to replace that broken screw.  Reminding me of the notion of the entanglement between particles that never existed at the same time...

And, the reality is that, without that screw, that'd be no Ratology Reloaded and neither this book I am working on... which sort of make this book... the story of a screw. 8-O

Learned helplessness

The last three papers I took notes on all talked about the phenomena of learned helplessness.

One thing I have to say about being psychotic is that I am 100% sure that I am doomed to falter in the face of the mental God since delusions can never be fully caught.  Such inevitability surely can lead to the unfolding and manifestation of learned helplessness... Yet, as a not-so-physically-capable psychotic starting the mental career as a depressive, knowing the certainty that I am doomed to fail, all the plausible theories about how learned helplessness is developed, and thinking that failing less is good enough, what can I do to escape the entrapment of learned helplessness?  And, what could others in the same shoes do?

Interesting question... 

Thought broadcasting

Something new to share with you on my cuckoo head concerning thought broadcasting...

In 2005, I started my blogging career because I was sick and tired of the thought broadcasting symptoms... like... I might as well broadcast thoughts myself if I am gonna be so delusional as to think that my thoughts are being broadcast (let along the everyday belief that people are recording my verbalized speech and words typed out).

This blogging version of thought broadcasting is more conservative though since I retain a faceless presence (though, if one really want to find my face, they surely can find it something associated to this google account... just donno why anyone would wanna work so hard).

Just occurred to me earlier that, in the past year or two or three, there has been some strange change in MO.

I do think-aloud... I think therefore I talk...  at large or not... beyond my control... of course... (unless simply some serious disruption in the function of the subvocal rehearsal mechanism.  period.)

Come to think about it... ain't that taking thought-broadcasting to a totally different level?  With the presence of the face, body, and everything else.

So what kind of implication does it have?  Given that it's real that the thought is broadcast with the presence of the mouth on the face running these thoughts etc, which partials the uncertainty effect out, what's to be handled is the core of the issues.  It's because when the core is addressed, the thought broadcasting symptom, my though broadcasting through my blog or durch my mouth... ain't no nothing gonna matter.

Am I sure?  Consider it as 賈雨村言 Jiǎ yǔ cūn yán la!

(Though, this self-talk thing reminds me of some thing I observed once every so often... When smoking at large, I see and hear every so often that kids or young adults would run their mouth out loud with comments... as if I were not there.  This remind me of what this pal had me said once about a similar scenario, something like... "How the parents teach their kids today... they'd better make sure they are not in the wrong side of the town.")



Ratology Reloaded: Delusional: How do I know that I am still delusional? This is a question I have to answer myself time and again... On a scale of 1 to 10, I score a 3 ...

Is that Venus on 6/24/2013?

Saw this big bright object after sun down around NWN tonight... albeit the constraints of my shaking hands (side effects of the med) and the aging grandpa Canon, I managed to find ways to capture this object...

Thought it was too bright to be a star (my bias) and almost too bright to be a planet...

Then, after all due diligence in my googling efforts, I found out in various sources that the unidentified flying object (UFO) to me could be Venus since Venus could be spotted after sundown in the NWN sky...

From Is that Venus on 6/24/2013

One thing that got me bewildered is... when blowing some pix up... I found out my intelligent technology called my grandpa Canon was seeing things I don't see... the purple circle in the center of the possibly known as Venus?

In the eyes of my grandpa Canon, it seemed to see the purple thing consistently.  One thing I wonder is... since all these pictures were taken using digital zooming, could it have something to do with the zooming... like my grandpa Canon is rubbing off on me and is starting to see things (Though I am down with hearing things only... 8-O lol 8-X)   Since these sort of reminds me of jelly donuts and the camera was starting to do the "change battery" thing. It's possible that the camera might be really hungry and started to see images of potential sources of energy.... unless... simply old age and need to get the eyes checked?


Or, this is what the possibly known as Venus should look like when blown up?

Tried to google this up but I don't have enough background knowledge to figure out what keywords to use.  At the same time, gotta say that I am really liking my grandpa Canon that's almost as old as my age as a physically-not-so-able.
 

Time traveling

There are so many movies about time traveling... like Source Code, MIB III...

I also found a new way to travel back in time... literature review (if not reading in general).

Almost like the stars observable by the Hubble as depicted in the following film... what you see are how things were at all different points points in time... with many occurring billions of light years ago.

Take the model of working memory of Baddeley and Hitch first proposed in 1974 for instance, if you start from reading Baddeley and Hitch's (1974) and keep on reading all the way to 2013, you will see the following (with the episodic buffer added at around 2000)...

From Baddeley, Allen, & Hitch (2011) Binding in visual working memory: The role of the episodic buffer

You can choose whatever sequence you like to read up the theory and the related research... Chronologically... you see how things get built up in time... the process of becoming. Even better, you can randomly chose the time you want to go back to... not being constrained by the forward direction of the time dimension!

Come to think about it... perhaps, everything could be used as a means to travel in time... music, pictures, films, rocks... everything that can take you above and beyond the restricted notion of how things should be?! Reminding me of the time when I went into a phase of constructions... from my castle to time distortion.

Living with psychosis: Agent J vs. Boris The Animal

Watched Man in Black III yesterday and thought this is sort of like (hopefully) what it's like to live with psychotic symptoms... though it took J only one time to get it...



No wonder J is J, and Is am/are only mes.  All that J needed was to reload the scenario once while... 8-X

(Dear symptoms, don't be mad at me... just an analogy... the learning of how to dodge your mighty power)

From Altemetrics--impact of research

What it be like, one day, on your CV... you will list how many people visited your blog, tweeted it, FB it in addition to all other good old elements?

A notion addressed in the Chronicle of Higher Ed: Rise of 'Altmetrics' Revives Questions About How to Measure Impact of Research.

This world surely is evolving where I am... sort of like... sleeping (since my body and head take the liking of putting me to the sleep mode whenever possible. 8-O lol)

Regardless, instinctively, I know... albeit the rise of the "Altmetrics"... it ain't gonna do nothing to the pitiful not-to-many-ingredient state of my CV post my terminal degree...

Forget about the issue of bots, time on page, etc that might need to get resolved first... (the equivalent of valid data)...

Adding all hits I have gotten from the following 6 active public blogs (though far less actively in Ratology Reloaded and Technologies in Ratology since 2010 or so)... the total hits on these 6  blogs are 67,418 between May 2007 and 6/6/2013... although some blogs got started later and do not have as many posts etc.

What this tells me is that... even if the "altemetrics" turns to be a common measure for everyone's work and contribution to the society (not restricted to the measurement of research impact), 6 years for this many hits on all blogs combined?  Shit out of luck. Think I'd better hide the stats.  8-X lol

Metacognition

Was doing some literature review on metacognition...  and I came across the book titled... "Early Detection and Cognitive Therapy for People at High Risk of Developing Psychosis : A Treatment Approach."

Though I don't have the time yet to read through it, the notion itself... is one I would strongly endorse... though who gives a rat's ass about my endorsement... especially like... the psychotic chick with faulty metacognition endorsing the notion of metacognition in action? 8-X lol

I don't know how the detection could be done prior to the psychotic onset... Yet, since existing research has found metacognition to be beneficial for learning in general, at an early stage, teach them to think metacognitively and give them the tools to learn to think metacognitively... everyone... 

Surely, today, I have come to embrace the notion of how I am metacognitively wrong.  Yet, it's also my current "belief" that metacognition could be a tool to help us live psychotically... to monitor and control/regulate our disordered thinking... albeit with the reality that it is defective and some days it works better than others... to allow us to think less disorderly, if not simply to prevent us from thinking more disorderly each every day.

Why emphasizing the notion of "the tools to learn to think metacognitively"?  It's because psychotics have to be the one to derive metacognitive knowledge and skills from our own the metacognitive experiences in order to come up with the best strategies to intervene the outcome of our disordered-thoughts and out-of-whack metacognition. Although I have only the limited amount of conversation with other psychotic patients in more stabilized state about our psychotic experiences, I have heard people spoken of metacognitive experiences... like... "it's so funny that your think the people on TV are talking about you,"  which points to the knowledge that "what my reality is not the so-to-speak reality shared by the others.

This is something most of us (if not all of us) already do although we might not always get it done as well as we would like to, and we (at least mes myselves) just need to get better at it... the antipsychotic department of metacognition... as time goes on... as we keep on kicking...

Of course, the reason why I speak of metacognition is because it happens to be a word in my dictionary and part of my educational background.  For someone else, it could be called anything else relevant to their background... such as... my doing the "hells kitchen" thing.

It is my belief.  Yes.

My two cents before going nite nite.

Google stats and metacognition

I check google stats on a daily basis...  It is sort of fun to check out the postings people visited because, all too often, I would be lol by what came out of my mouth.

It is training though... the stats to check... because I have a tendency to generate theories and, many a time, the posts visited actually coincide with thing happened or outta my mouth earlier on in the day.

I check out the demographic info of the users... but... just for the fun of it cuz God knows where visits really came from though... God knows why I am endowed with this propensity to even entertain this notion.  8-O lol

I check the page view... seeing the fact... the limited number of page views on a daily basis... also taking into consideration that some people might simply browsed through the site without stopping or some might have been accessed by bots to entice me to visit their website.  I am surely aware that the contents can also get accessed through RSS feeds... but I have to refrain myself from continuing with that line of thinking since... what good does it do for me.

So, I have been reading up them articles about metacognition because in the writing I have been doing, I also talked about the metacognition kind of stuffs since I think it is something that has helped me to live psychotically.

There are times when I wondered though... why spending all the energy trying to learn to intervene from the metacognitive level?  Wouldn't it be but impose extra amount of stress?

Then, I realized that I was not thinking straight... the psychotic kind of straight...

Without the metacognitive intervention, the stats for my blogs--let along everything happens everywhere else in my everyday life--already provide more than abundant contents for the disordered processing at the cognitive level, which can lead to the fortification of my almighty delusional system.

In a sense, the act of checking out google stats itself is a daily training activity.  How do I do it?  I look at the stats and I have the metacognitive experience that... oopsy... I am thinking delusionally... and find a way to neutralize if not negate the way of thinking.  This is something I do on a daily basis and sometimes more than once a day since the release of google stats for blogger...  Is there a practice effect and do I get better at it after drilling myself on this same task for years? 8-O lol

I would say... yes... I think there is a practice effect... and the reality is that... I could feel that there is this part of my head that is about to fire up to participate in the collaborative activity of information processing... with its specialization in the department of delusion generation... except, at this point, this dosage, and this mental state, I can somehow block it if not stop it from joining in... at least at the conscious level.  Although, of course, I am far from 100% sure.  lol

Can what I learned be transfer to other context especially when knowledge transfer usually do not occur automatically?  Can't quite tell you either... whether my handling with other events in my everyday life is the result of transferring what I learned from the google stats training, independent learning, what I do with google stats is the outcome of transferring what I have learned from other scenario, etc.

Well, regardless, since the unrest mind doesn't feel like to rest any, guess... try to assign it to do something else if possible? 8-O

Trotzdem Ja Zum Leben Sagen

Was chatting with this friend the other day... someone I might have seen last on commencement day in 2005... a point, though mental, I was almost certain that, with hard work, I would be able to make myself someone of some kind though, to date, I remain to be in the lowest rung of the socioeconomic ladder. (So said the experts, the feel of knowing might be reliable but might not have predictive validity. 8-X lol)

Somewhere along our conversation, I told her that what I do everyday could be simply put as "walking" or "stop walking."

Though, in between and within the states of walking and stop walking... with the minor inconveniences in life as the inevitable background noise... carrying my private inferno on my back or not... trotzdem... das leben... for Ratology at walk affords me Handicapped at large (while simply incapable, you, all to tell).

Since nothing's new under the sun, your own Ratology at move shall also afford you your own version of at large... n'est pas?


P.S., I don't have the audacity to use Frankl's "Trotzdem Ja Zum Leben Sagen" since I ain't got no clue what it be like to do the Ja sagen in the concentration camp.  Therefore... Trotzdem, das Leben.

Tactics: Defects and workarounds

In working with that DWM and beyond book of mine, I came up with "tactics" to offer Princessa Ratonssita at all points on the time dimension (mes, myselves, and Is).  These tactics fall either under the "It's physical" or "In your head" categories.

The tactics are composed of the defect and the workaround components.  The defects are not equivalent to symptoms; rather, the defects are the unbearable weakness manifested in our symptoms.  The workarounds are the ways that I have identified to live with the disordered thoughts so as to minimize their impacts.  For you who live beyond June 19^th of 2007, you have to attend more to the defects at both the physical and mental level as well as their interactions.  So they say, know thy enemy and, admit it, we are our own worst enemy.  What is to be presented are just some examples of our defects and the means to work around them—just it would take too many more words to cover them all.  lol 8-X

 An example of the tactics under the "In your head" category is...

Defect: Visions of the future | Workaround: Flight 1549: What you see might not be the end result.

Visions of mishaps are one of the most annoying and intrusive symptoms.   They come into your mind either unannounced or get triggered by certain topics or sights of objects.
For a long time, I had this vision and delusion of air crash.  The heavy traffic over the Manhattan sky didn’t help.  Still remember vividly how it felt, one day, when this acquaintance told me, “I have joined the air force!”  The first thing came to my mind—crash.  While it makes me feel scared to “foresee” bad things, it also makes me feel bad because it is as if I were wishing bad things to happen to people.  Then, there came this day when that gentleman landed US Airways Flight 1549 on the Hudson, sort of next door, while all on board miraculously walked on water safe and sound.

From then on, when visions and delusions of horrors alike occur, I thought of Flight 1549.

For all these years, I still could not break the associations between the accidents and the whole flight chapter in my life—regardless the dosage of Seroquel I was/am on, and my mental state.  Yet, Flight 1549 offered me an alternative way to work with symptoms alike.  Essentially, well, even if I cannot defy the impact of them visions and delusions, I can always think of Flight 1549 and say to myself, “Even you really have some strange capability to see what lies beyond, look at Flight 1549, it’s not until after the event will you know the actual outcome.”

Sort of like... "there is more to them than meets the eyes..." So said the huge truck of my dream... my octopus prime (possibly your Uptimus prime).

 

Ratology Reloaded: Does it have to do with your hospitalization?

Someone came to this post... and I had one more of my lol moments revisiting my dad's question.

For sure I don't see myself suing my eternal love on the ground of the disability act...

Yet, surely, ain't like I have been faking my paranoid delusions for all these years and claiming the crown for conspiracy theory for no reason!  lol

Come to think about it... yin yin mei dai zi, let me serenade my eternal love yet again...



xoxoxoxoxo

(I didn't know that Barney is actually a boy till today... 8-O)

Ratology Reloaded: Does it have to do with your hospitalization?: An interesting question asked by my dad last night... "Why do you have so much problem with staying in the US?  Does it have anything...

First time experience: Replace the Water Heater Battery

For the first time in my life... today... I figured out how to replace the Water Heater battery and got it done successfully!

What happened was... I have a very peculiar body... and, in recent years, it just became even more peculiar... such as... when my body gets wet,even feet only,  pain etc would emerge immediate and like bend-and-snap it never fails!

Then, today, when taking a shower earlier in the morning, the hot water turned cold... Then, after it got heated, it turned cold again. Immediately, my body was in pain and discomfort and I got a cold. Earlier this evening, I found out that it might have something to do with the problem of "battery low."

Ain't no nothing is to get between me and my good hot shower... Enmaddened (and ain't nobody wanna get me mad), I decided to get it fixed like... yesterday. And I did... and, for the first time in my life, I changed the water heater battery (since the building in New York has a boiler)


Technologies in Ratology: How to replace Water Heater Battery? 更換熱水器電池: First time in my life to know that Water Heater (熱水器) is actually powered by electricity through a 1.5 V battery and got the battery replac...

Measurement of reality

Find an interesting measure for the distance between the "reality" and me....

Think I am redshift 20+ away from reality...

Like farther away then before them branes haphazardly collided...

How did my reality run so far and fast?  Interesting question.

An ode to my cognition--Superwoman

As I am plowing away with my psychotic model of my cuckoo head, so I thought... such must have my cognitive capacity had me serenade all the way into Valentine's Day 2008... I'm no superwoman... 8-O

An ode to my cognition... from my body and me...

DWM and bend and snap

Totally gonna stick to two and a half pills of 25 mg Seroquel until the last minute since them higher level cognitive processing that is required for yours sadomasochist to work on this psychotic model of my cuckoo head is a real...@#$%& (meaning I am not gonna go down on dosage until the fish on the cutting board thing gets too unbearable and, of course, before esophageal spasm strikes however sedated I might be the entire day as long as I have sufficient cognitive capacity to do 1-2 hours of da work to ensure Seroquel can shut the head down afterwards sucessfully...)

Higher level up, thought racing propensity up, grandiosity up and delusions also up... like bend and snap it never fails! 8-O 8-X lol

As per Elle in Legally Blond, "In my experience, it has a 98% success rate of getting a man's attention and when used appropriately -- it has an 83% rate of return on a dinner invitation. It's called the 'bend and snap.'"

As per yours truly, I might have to swap "a man's attention" to "my symptoms''" attention and "a dinner invitation" to "an increase in medications." 8-O lol 

 (The sole reason why I am making this post public is to show you the famous "bend and snap" that never fails! 8-O lol)

(This is cross-posted in Neologism in Ratology.)

Even though I didn't go all the way... I lived through a miracle today...

Even though I didn't go all the way... today... I walked down and up the 清水斷崖 Chingshui Cliff... though having many people passed me by on their way all the way down to the water and on their way  back up.  The same day when someone came to visit my regain.

It doesn't matter... today, I walked down and up the 清水斷崖 Chingshui Cliff without a cane and I am damn proud of it!

An accomplishment and miracle recognized only by mes, myselves and Is.  lol sigh (Mes, myselves, and Is?  Enough of recognition... COME ON! lol)

It ain't like miracles gets recognized by me everyday... I surely cherish my miracle!

Maybe, that day might come when, one day, I could say... today I went up and down 清水斷崖 (Chingshui Cliff)  and touched the pacific ocean... (though still... one day at a time and one step at a time since I have lived my share for the day!)

Ratology- Handicapped at Large: 清水斷崖 Chingshui Cliff: I walked down 清水斷崖 (Chingshui Cliff) today... sort of... although I did not get to go all the way down... I did managed to go down and back...

When would I like my onset to be served?

Never thought this would be a question until just now...

So, I was looking for some literature about late onset of psychosis and came across statistics like the following from this 2001 article by Steven D. Targum titled "Treating Psychotic Symptoms in Elderly Patients":

1. 10% of first-episode cases of schizophrenia do occur in patients who are older than 45 years.^1,7 
2. Delusional disorders appear in men between the ages of 40 and 49 years, and in women, between the ages of 60 and 69 years.^1,24,25 

This got me thinking... though I prefer to live through my life without onset... I think I will be settled for the late onset in the late 20s rather than one in the 40s.

Can't imagine myself having to live through the past decade and more starting at this age or later... and coming to understand a bit more a day what Ratology is talking about...

If it is destined to happen, good thing that it happened way back. Consider it as God's blessing, I guess. 8-O

Ratology Reloaded: I am still in love

Someone came to visit this post... synchronously, it was a few days ago when I was thinking to myself... "Haven't serenade my love for a while..."

Oh... my love... my darling...

Ratology Reloaded: I am still in love: As I was going through some old writing, it came to my attention that... oops... it seems like... I have not spoke of DHS for a while... ...

Am I creative?

I had a dinner with an artist, a composer and a artistic psychologist today.

Since I am nothing artistic, I told them frankly so when they were brainstorming about how an exhibition could be laid out in an art gallery.

At some point, my friend the psychologist asked me something like... "How are you creative?"

Took me an extreme amount of tangential thinking to get to the answer that... (within context of another discussion topic people at the table were engaging in: the trade-off between diversification and specialization in their professional development)

Sure, I am not like artists who can create art and musicians who can compose nice music...

One thing I had was diverse training, if not backgrounds. Although now I have scaled it all back into one single dot (DWM) and leave all other diverse background slacking around, I can still draw references from them departments of "hanging there doing nothing" when needed.  That ability to draw references from the departments of "hanging there doing nothing"... shall there be anything creative about me... maybe that's how I can be considered as creative? 8-O

So... in a nutshell, what I see as an indicator of my creativity is the ability to retrieve prior knowledge stored in long-term memory?  (A revelation unfolded ours after the end of my tangential thinking... 8-O lol)

Psychosomatization buster

I was in the PHD (pile high and deep) grade of a piece of crap state yesterday...  the head on the dark side of the moon and the body in extreme discomfort... all tensed... could barely move... drastically different from the day before... when I happily got back to my walking routine after recuperating from them miserable days with da sinusitis and associated upper respiratory problem.

What happened?

That mother of mine who just had an operation to remove Cataract Friday afternoon won't stop trying to bend down and lift things... including taking the garbage out which involves opening that heavy metal door... while I was sleeping or while I went out for 2-3 hours for physical therapy.  I kept on telling her to stop but she kept on insisting on doing things her own way...

Finally I blew up big...

I don't get mad usually... partially because when I really get really upset, both my body and mind suffer... and really suffer.  My folks are my Achilles' heel, 99.9% of the times, shall there be sudden change in my bodily condition, no doubt... it would have something to do with my parents... and chances are... something to do with their well-being.

So I blew up and go REALLY mad... 氣死, 氣死, 氣死啦!!!

Then, it feels as if my body was blowing up like a balloon with Qi building up without any release... from head to toe... bloated, bloated, and bloated... as if I were to explode.  While in extreme discomfort, I also couldn't keep myself awake... So I took a short nap... only to find out after I woke up that my entire left side spasmed so bad that the body was bending towards the left side... and... the entire left side was semi-paralyzed (unless my mom got me so upset that I had a stroke, sounds familiar... left side semi-paralyzed)... I couldn't lift my left hand and leg.   When trying to get to do my physical therapy, I had to take many a stop because I got tired and out of breath so easily.  And... the way I walked... it was more like I was constantly swinging the left side of my body forward... though I did get my therapy done and got myself home.
To wash hands, I had to use my right hand to lift my left hand.  To get into the bathtub, of course, I had to use my right hand to lift my left leg...  Yet, so I thought... as long as one side of my body works...  at least I could still take my clothes off, take a shower and manage to put the clothes on...

So I went to bed early... by 10 o'clock... only to wake up 4 hours later... wide awake... not able to fall back to sleep and in pain... with severe nerve pain literally from head to toe...  I decided to get up, put some body cream with Lavender essential oil on, and, later, took an Alleve.

Waking up this morning, the left side was still weak but far better than how it was yesterday... Then, after some of my swinging thing (which I couldn't do at all yesterday), I took my less-crappy sory body to see my rehabilitation doctor.

I told him what happened and I couldn't get the Qi in my body to flow because it was too stalled.  The doctor took a look at me and was in agreement with me...

After I laid on my stomach, he did something on my left hip and right hip like what the bakers did in the Japanese anime 烘焙王 (Yakitate!! Japan)... kneading the dough... 8-O lol

After I got up, I felt... much relaxed and Qi flowing down...  I walked in to the clinic with a flavor of a limp, I walked out... less limping and, as I kept on walking on, trying to relax more, I walked better and better...

What I have described so far... after getting all upset, the body became immobile and suffered excruciating nerve pain... you can't get a better psychosomatic example than this... no doubt... psycho (upset) leads to soma...

Since what happened to me is, no doubt, the manifestation of psychosomatization and it took my doctor 2 minutes to get it resolved, so I thought on my way home... observing that the weakness on the left side gone and my getting back to, not limp, walk,...  that should make my doctor the psychosomatization buster... whether you buy in the concept of Qi or not... or you consider it a manifestation of self-fulfilling prophecy or not... (and, of course, the effects might not last too long if I continue with my  "氣死, 氣死, 氣死啦!!!" routine... In a sense, sustainability is dependent on the patient la!)

Pain perception and Psychosomatization

When doing my physical therapy, I chatted with this neighbor who was, apparently, very much in pain and is leaving for the US tomorrow.  Somewhere along our chit-chatting... the notion of relaxing and ignoring pain came up.  Since she had to go, I didn't have the chance to clarify fully with her what I had wished to convey, and since the thoughts have already emerged, I might as well share it with you... some notions I might have spoke of... buried in the scarily huge amount of limited my words... 8-X

When she revealed that she was advised to try to relax, I also suggested to her that when the pain is manageable, it would be good for her to try to learn to focus on anything other than pain (though I have no idea whether things outta my mouth were interpreted in accordance to what I intended to express during our chit-chatting).  

Since somewhere out there and someone else might be going through the issue of coping with pain and discomfort, I decide to come back to the topic again.

Regardless, somewhere during the chit-chatting, the notion of in your head arise... which, inevitably, reminds me of the notion of psychosomatization.

Let me speak of pain first... it is my believe that among the multidimensionalities of pain, there should be one dimension labeled as "manageability."  Some pain is more manageable than others-- I know it because the aches and pains I have to endure today is far more manageable than what I had to live with years back when the body was in ground zero... after the accident in 2007 and after the chiropractor's manipulation in 2010.  For most people suffering from excruciating pain that takes out the full control of cognitive processing, with proper treatments and therapeutic interventions, the day shall come when unmanageable pain becomes more manageable... at some point.

Personally, after the pain becomes more manageable, it becomes much easier to focus on something to distract myself from bodily comfort, and to practice the art of ignoring pain. (Sounds almost like the notion of ignoring my psychotic symptoms... so it is... the story of my ain't-no-nothing-new-ever-happen life. 8-O lol)  When the time comes for the pain to be manageable, you will know.

I always remember, one day, how my disability coordinator at worker's com said... something like... "You might just have to live with the pain" since that's what many others do.  I was absolutely upset by the notion of "well, just live with that pain" while I can't stop asking myself... "Could it be true that it is me too lame to live with the pain that no one else have problem living with?"   It was not until the pain finally became manageable did I understand that it is possible to live with the pain... except for... it was not until when the pain became manageable to me did I realize that... yes... I might have to live with that pain and I think I can live with it.

So, how does relaxing have anything to do with anything?

When people are stressed, they feel tensed... psychologically and physically.  Think about it... if my nerves are already impinged, what good would it do for the surrounding tissues already two-tents?  Make it three tents, I guess?  Unless enough tents to build a village?  This is why the experts recommend again and again--telling us to relax.  At the same time, though I am no big proponent for pain killers--since I have surely had my share of quota and suffered from it-- when I sense the conditions are to go beyond the level of manageability, I would pop my pill of Alleve to prevent things from escalating.  Yet, relaxing is an art... an art I yet have to learn to master and I don't know whether there would come one day when I will learn to truly relax.  Yet, since it is my own body and my own suffering, who else is to work on it... I guess?

Next in line... it's all in your head... Of course, it really is all in your head since it is your head that performs pain perception.  In addition, them neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine all have been found to work for the department of pain modulation.  Also, organic changes in brain structure been found in people suffering chronic pain.  The only thing I can say about it's all in your head is that... accept it!  It surely is all in your head! 8-O lol

What about that good old notion of psychosomatization?  Psycho and soma are, beyond a doubt, interlinked... sort of like... the serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine in the pain modulation department are the same serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine contributing to, for instance, my private mental department.  Thus, there is no doubt that psycho affects soma and vice versa. (Gotta say though... whether my mental model of psychosomatization is the same as others' mental model of psychosomatization...)

Sounds like more bad news than good news I have been sharing so far...

OK... now I have run through my facts... Yet,  facts are all good but insufficient because what is most important is to say, given the facts, so what can can be done to live when all possible organic changes have incurred or there is nothing organic and when all is but psychosomattic?

For me, personally, it took me years of living with what I have and what I have to live through to come to the following way of thinking... regardless the cause... all psychosomatic, all organic or the combination of both psychosomatic and organic...  Take the extreme scenario for instance... like what my friend Jan had me told when this neurologist speculated the diagnosis of "conversion disorder"... "So you have conversion disorder but what can they do about it?"

Unterwegs zur recovery... face the reality that if you are in pain and in unbearable pain, you are tensed and it surely is mighty difficult for you to relax!  Quit lying to yourself that you are already all relaxed!  Also, accept all possible causes as it is (like... already got done with it many a blue moon before yesterday) so that you can stop worrying whether it is all in your head and it is all psychosomatic with the purpose of accepting it all being--getting rid of the impact of such notion so that you have less to worry about and be more relaxed (rather than accepting it all and continue to worry about its implication).  Thereafter, dedicate your  focus on what you can do to help yourself get better, feel better, and be more relaxed--do the right things you can do one day at a time.  Like what Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. said...

At the same time, having pain not corresponding to anatomical evidence? Check out... Beyond size and sensation... lol

PS. I know, I know... I have discussed the same notion too many a time... almost like a broken record already... 

In Proust's eyes--Françoise and her headless chicken

For years, I spoke of Françoise and her headless chicken de Proust--sheer memory sur la recherche du temps perdu.

So I decided to find out whether it was true that Françoise put off a fight with her headless chicken... (the only one thing I recall from the limited amount of Proust I have managed to read so far in my life) and so I found...

When I went in, I saw her in the back-kitchen which opened on to the courtyard, in process of killing a chicken; by its desperate and quite natural resistance, which Françoise, beside herself with rage as she attempted to slit its throat beneath the ear, accompanied with shrill cries of "Filthy creature! Filthy creature!" it made the saintly kindness and unction of our servant rather less prominent than it would do, next day at dinner, when it made its appearance in a skin gold-embroidered like a chasuble, and its precious juice was poured out drop by drop as from a pyx. When it was dead Françoise mopped up its streaming blood, in which, however, she did not let her rancour drown, for she gave vent to another burst of rage, and, gazing down at the carcass of her enemy, uttered a final "Filthy creature!"

Proust, M. (1966). Remembrance Of Things Past. Vol. I. Swann's Way  http://www.gutenberg.org/: Project Gutenberg.  Retrieved from http://www.gutenberg.org/files/7178/7178-h/7178-h.htm 

Quand je fus en bas, elle était en train, dans l'arrière-cuisine qui donnait sur la basse-cour, de tuer un poulet qui, par sa résistance désespérée et bien naturelle, mais accompagnée par Françoise hors d'elle, tandis qu'elle cherchait à lui fendre le cou sous l'oreille, des cris de "sale bête ! sale bête ! ", mettait la sainte douceur et l'onction de notre servante un peu moins en lumière qu'il n'eût fait, au dîner du lendemain, par sa peau brodée d'or comme une chasuble et son jus précieux égoutté d'un ciboire. Quand il fut mort, Françoise recueillit le sang qui coulait sans noyer sa rancune, eut encore un sursaut de colère, et regardant le cadavre de son ennemi, dit une dernière fois : "sale bête ! " 

Proust, M. (1966). A la recherche du temps perdu. Du côté de chez Swann  http://www.gutenberg.org/: Project Gutenberg.  Retrieved from http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2650/2650-h/2650-h.htm