Greedy

As I am trying to climb back on the wagon of smoking cessation, I am back to a state of using food as a means to deal with da oral fixation, which used to get fulfilled through the act of smoking.

So, before I got off work, I took a piece of cookies....

This friend of mine looked at me and commented...

"You must be very greedy."

Followed by something like...

"You eat so much."

I replied.

"I just want to eat." 8-O lol

This reminds me of this old scenario that took place when I was in high school.

I love spicy food and inhuman grade of spicy food.

One day, a group of us went to get some noodle soup...

I added hot chilly pepper and added even more....

Finally, this guy I hardly knew looked at me and said...

"You must be really greedy."

I stared at him and said, "What?"

"The hot chilly pepper is the most expensive spice and you added so much."

The confusion of interpretations.... and amazing how people could come up with these creative thinking--- almost competitive to my potential for tangential thinking.... 8-O lol

Maybe I am greedy... though, honest to God, I have no idea how the first thoughts coming to their minds would be the concept of greed....

For me, I simply see a pig that loves food especially when it is spicy.... 8-O lol

On a second thought, they are right... pigs eat.... 8-O lol

Two dreams

Most of the dreams I woke up from are immediately forgotten...

There were two really strange dreams that I still remember so very vividly although it has been days if not weeks since I had these dreams...

So, one night, I had a dream that I was trying to use Oprah's coupon to get the grilled chicken meal from KFC. At some point, I realised that they had given me two wings and I tried to exchange one of the wings for a leg instead.... That was when I woke up from da KFC dream...

I think it was the day after...

I had another dream that stuck in my head...

Someone was walking his dog... The doggie pooped and the owner was going to simply walked away leaving the doggie doo behind. I don't think I really wanted to tell the guy to clean up after his dog... Yet, I stopped him from walking away. At the end of the dream, the guy picked the doggie doo up.... And... I woke up...

People say that the content of dreams are often the manifestation of thoughts we did not get to processed in the day time.......

So I thought about these two dreams of mine...

Some pretty deep contents I gotta say.... food and shit... the deepest concern in my mind?! 8-O lol

On a second thought... so goes this wise Chinese saying... Life is but eat, drink, poop and pee only..... 8-O lol

dream

Last night after I went to bed, I laid there waiting for the arrival of a good night sleep... or, simply sleep...

Then, this strange thing happened again.... something happened before...

It was as if I jumped right into REM state of sleep... without even falling asleep...

It was as I was going into dreams after dreams... shall it be the right naming...

In between, there resides the moments when I could consciously think to myself...

"I am still awake... yet, dreaming..."

What I vaguely recall.... them moments when I thought my torso was moving.... though, in the ensuing moments of awakening, I found myself have moved not...

How long did it last.... might have been hours....

What did I dream of? No recollection....

Could it be what they call as NREM parasomnia? God knows...

The only thing I knew....

The alarm clock went off and I knew that, although the sleep had been cut short, I did wake up in the morning....

Nicotine, Serotonin and Dopamine

I don't know about you. However, this question just occurred to me a bit earlier that....

OK... it sounds like a pretty good theory that the reduced level of nicotine resulted in the lowered level of dopamine in the reward pathway....

This has something to do with my being depressed.... no nothing ain't so rewarding no more...

Yet, it suddenly occurred to me that while psychosis is commonly linked to L-Dopa and depression associated with low serotonin level....

How on earth does nicotine, Serotonin and Dopamine, together, creative in me the existential vacuous state of being?

Out of curiosity, I did a bit of search on relevant literature and found the following article....

"Depression and self-medication with nicotine: the modifying influence of the dopamine D4 receptor gene." Link

Based on my understanding-- dopamine D4 receptor, depressive people and smoking

1. The rewarding properties of nicotine are largely mediated by its effects on dopamine transmission
2. The dopamine D4 receptors are highly loaded in the reward center
3. Depressive people with certain variant of the dopamine D4 receptor gene might have the propensity to use smoking to stimulate themselves and to reduce negative affect

So what is the role of serotonin?

I haven't found any specific journal article yet daueber... therefore it doesn't mean such knowledge doesn't exist...

I assume-- conventional wisdom says... there is a linkage between low Serotonin level and depression....

Then, the next question I have is that... so how do all these interrelationships have anything to do with my psychotic symptoms?

Based on what I gathered from some other articles I encountered... them experts are not quite sure which variant of Dopamine D4 receptor gene (DRD4) might be related to schizophrenia shall such a variant really exist...

One thing I think they are much more sure is da relationship between L-Dopa and things like schizophrenia...

Interesting to ponder about all them things related with the naming called Dopamine, be them receptors or neurotransmitters... It is sort of like, I guess, all Asian are Asian except for Taiwanese are not Japanese or Korean.... 8-O lol

Just some schizoaffective layperson's mumble jumble... lol

Existential vacuum: antidote

Last night I entertained the nicotine theory of my depressive symptoms....

Essentially, Nicotine acts by binding to the nicotinic acetylcholine receptors, nicotine increase the "volume" of neurotransmitters such as dopamines in the reward circuit in the brain... The decrease of nicotine in the blood stream, thus, could be translated into the decrease level of dopamines in the reward circuit.... Thus, no nothing seems to be so very rewarding in life.... 8-O

Tonight, the concept of existential vacuum came to my mind... once again...

What it be like if I am simply in a state of existential vacuum and flooded by the unbearable meaninglessness in life... except for please do not ask me what exactly the flooding part of the sentence means...

Then, funny enough, I came across this following quote of Frankl about the implications of love ...

"The salvation of man is through love and in love."

This reminds me of a comment someone made the other day...

"You know you are surrounded by people who love you."

Without hesitation, I replied...

"Yes, I know."

So, I, again, brought myself back to facing them loving people who me love and who I love...

And, so I ponder...

What it be like to fill da vacuous mind and soul with them loving intentions and how do I make it work?

And, how could loving intention mobilise the activities in the reward pathway through the modulation of them tiny little neurotransmitters shall it be plausible that love is the antidote.... 8-O lol

Potion

I used to use the handle Dame YC in my days of hunting down Diablo...

The role I took up was a sorcerer... magical power was my gift...

So, after I finally completed my mission, defeated Diablo after many a potion of mana and life, I lost my right wrist to repeated stress syndrome....

Ya, not because of my dissertation, because of diablo... 8-O lol

Today is another day when the cognitive side of me tries its best to figure out what to do to bring myself out of depression...

There is a potion ready... I know... them pills... da zoloft...

Yet, some part of me wishes that, somehow, I could find a way to climb back out of this dungeon of depressive symptoms... the immobility of da reward center....

I cling to whatever structure I could hang on to in life... including the swinging activities and walking exercise... though walking is not gonna be the same as them 45 minute long of highest-strength arm-ecliptic...

However, it doesn't seem to be working as well as I wish it could...

Having slacking on them Vitamins.... and them vitamin B seem to have served as them uppers...

Perhaps, vitamin B might be what I have to get back to...

Could it be the alternative answer for the portion of mana or life for Ratprincess, an alternative handle? 8-O 8-X

On a second thought, who is my Diablo this round? How do I defeated in me, Diablo?

We mentals and them smokes

Went to see my counselor today about my smoking cessation...

An interesting topic came up concerning the plausible benefits of nicotine in my system and the possibility that the decrease level of nicotine in my system could be one of the contributing factors for my recent trip into the hit-by-a-truck grade of depression...

Interesting idea that I have never entertained before....

So I did some simple Google search and came across a report with the following as the introduction paragraph paired with a figure showing the prevalence of Tobacco use in individuals with psychiatric disorder...

"While the prevalence of smoking in the total U.S. population is about 25 to 30 percent, the prevalence among people with schizophrenia is approximately three times as high - or almost 90%, and approximately 60% to 70% for people who have bipolar disorder."

http://www.schizophrenia.com/smokereport.htm


Granted, the sample size might be a bit on the small end and there might be a need for future research to include more subjects in the studies.

Yet, for me, since I am 100% sure that I can be classified as part of the schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and major depression groups, and, I might also have panic attacks, shall the theses of the related research be valid.... No wonder I am such a smoking gun...

Blame me not for my lack of stamina to just say no....

Blame me on them mental conditions of mine to make me more predisposed, genetic or not, to the use of tobacco as a means of, so they say, self-medication.... (some good excuse, I would say.... 8-O lol 8-X )

At some point in the report, it was mentioned that...

"the average person who has schizophrenia smokes approximately 24 cigarettes per day"....

So I thought.... finally I find evidence that I have actually been part of the norm, whatever the norm is.... and God... give me the strength to be the abnormal of the abnormal... 8-O lol

In another article, based on literature review, the authors stated that...

"In patients with a history of major depression, smoking cessation may lead to re-emergence of major depressive symptoms (Covey et al., 1997; Glassman et al., 1990), although a recent study has questioned this phenomenon (Tsoh et al., 2000)."

Regardless whether whether the evidence is conclusive or not, interestingly, I did go into depression and I am still trying to climb my way out of it... although other factors such as them minor inconviniences in life might also have their share of contributions....

At the same time, this reminds me of how my attempt to quit cold turkey back in late 1997 and early 1998 shuffled me right into major depression and got me stuck with this tension headache that would not go away.... Gotta be something sort of true about this line of research, I guess....

In addition, some authors have also attempted to link the presence of nicotine with negative symptoms...

"nicotine has been shown to increase the release of dopamine in the nucleus acumbens and the prefrontal cortex (5,6,7). Glassman (8) suggested that the apathy and lack of motivation characteristic of negative symptoms is what one would expect with diminishing activity of the brain's reward system."

Interesting way of explaining my amotivated state of being...

What it be like if the lower level of nicotine in my system is actually the culprit which resulted in the decreased drive for me to maintain 4 smokes a day schedule? 8-O

In another article, the authors found that...

"nicotine levels of smokers with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder were 1.3 times higher than control smokers despite smoking a similar number of cigarettes per day."

In other words, people like me really get our money's worth since the we actually could retain more nicotine out of the same number of smokes we go through when comparing to them normal people. 8-O 8-$

And, of course, if one ever wonder why I went off the wagon on them cigarettes when trying to finish the class I was taking this past few weeks while trying to pull myself out of da depressed state of being... Other than smoking is a means of calming myself down, it also help me think better.... sort of like what they said...

"Nicotine helps schizophrenics with attention and memory."

Essentially, a means to counteract the side effects of the antipsychotic medication we are on.... because as the antipsychotic medications stalls our thinking, nicotine sort of helps us think....

A good example would be, my head was sort of going through the withdrawl and I was staring at the previous sentence not knowing what else to say.... Then, I put this piece of nicotine lozenge into my mouth.... Immediately, I felt the thoughts flowing and, in no time, this last paragraph formed.... regardless whether there is any substance in it or not... 8-O lol

And, the scariest thing that could happen is for me to experience what they have said in the literature as well....

"some smokers with schizophrenia experiencean acute increase in symptoms during attempts to quit smoking."

8-X

For those of you who would like to learn more about the relationship between smoking and mental health disorders, please visit the following site for more information...

http://www.schizophrenia.com/smoke/schizophrenia.smoking.res.htm

Or, use google scholar to look for some more academic grade kinda articles...

(By the way, of course, I won't really suggest the non-mentals to be calling us mentals mentals... because, coming out of your normal mouth, it is called discrimination; coming out of my mouth, it is but a term of endearment... 8-O lol)

Say a little prayer for you...

A nice little song... even though I don't use make up... 8-O lol

I especially like the ending when the elegant ladies looked at Julia Roberts running across the field...

"She is from New York..." 8-O lol



You

Say a little prayer for you
Me a-go say a little prayer for you

From the moment me wake up
Before me put on me make up
Me say a little prayer for you
Me combing me hair now
Me a-wonder which dress fe wear now
Me say a little prayer for you

(Forever and ever)
You stay in my heart
And I'll love you
(Forever and ever)
We never will part
And I'll love you
(Together, together)
That's how it should be
Without you
Would only be heartbreak for me

Me run fe the bus, love
Me a-ride and me a-think 'bout us, love
Me say a little prayer for you
(Say a little prayer for you)
At work I just take time
And all through my coffee break time
Me say a little prayer for you
Oh

Forever and ever
You stay in my heart
And I'll love you
Forever and ever
We never will part
And I'll love you
Together, together
That's how it should be
Without you
Would only be heartbreak for me

Say a little prayer for you
Me a-go say a little prayer for you

Me darling, believe me
For me there is no one but you
Say you love me too
Oh

(Forever and ever)
You stay in my heart
And I'll love you
(Forever)
And ever
We never will part
And I'll love you
Together, together
That's how it should be
Without you
Forever and ever
You stay in my heart
And I love you
(Forever and ever)
We never will part
And I love you
(Together, together)
That's how it should be
Without you
Would only be heartbreak for me
Yeah, nobody
Heartbreak

Forever and ever
You stay in my heart
And I'll love you
Forever and ever
We never will part
And I'll love you
(Together, together)
That's how it should be
And I love you
(Forever and ever)
Will stay in my heart
Forever and ever

(Forever and ever)
Together, together
That's how it should be
Without you
Would only be heartbreak
(For me)
Only be heartbreak for me
Yeah

(Forever and ever)
Oh
(You stay in my heart)
And I'll love you
(Forever and ever
We never will part
And)
I'll love you
(Together)
Together
(Together)
Together
(That's how it should be
And I'll love you
Forever and ever).

Doube-rainbow over NYC

I came across this beautiful double-ranbow over the sky of NYC on May 12th...

IMAP

The other night, I saw this guy that I haven't seen for the longest time...

While struggling to remember his name, I kept on thought of "IMAP"....

A term I haven't came across for the longest time... so long that I have even forgotten whose abbreviation it is....

Apparently, it stands for Internal Message Access Protocol, also know as Internet Mail Access Protocol-- a protocol used for users to retrieve email messages from the mail servers....

The second day, someone called at work asking how he could download all of his emails for backup purposes...

Ended up, the specification of IMAP on the client serves the purpose...

So I thought... interesting coincidences in life...

Who am I?

A question that has been bothering this past few weeks is that...

Who am I?

Or...

What am I?

The answer I got for myself today was that....

I am simply what I am.... nothing more... nothing less....

Whatever it is.... 8-O lol

Love

I love people.... condition by the theta parameter... their ability to not get on my nerve.... 8-O lol

So... life's circumstances must have brought forth higher degree of anxiety and I must have this propensity to internalize my anxiety, which gets manifested as depression...

In other words, I saw myself gradually went into depression, hit the bottom and found myself eventually moving myself out of it one step at a time.... this past few weeks...

Then, there was this day.... when I thought to myself...

I don't know what it is that I am carrying with me or whether there is anything that I am carrying on my shoulder... even if it is only the air pressure...

One thing I knew was it was too heavy for me to carry on...

The unbearable heaviness of da lightness in life, I guess...

So I thought to myself... at some point, I might just need to give up....

The matter of the fact is that all that I wanted to do was just to give it all up... whatever it might be or whether it ever exists...

Then, this voice said to me... (ya, my auditory hallucination)... something like...

"You can give up everything but you could not give up on people."

Point taken.

For all else I have not.... I have people who me care and who me love.... I should never give up on them who I love....

So, if you ask me how I have eventually and gradually pulled myself away from the dungeon of depressive symptoms mixed with anxiety... manifested in amotivation...

Chances are... it is love....

And, perhaps, it was not me who had carried me through all these time... it is them loving people who me carried...

And, how nice... I could love...

So I sent an email to this very last jackass from hell 4-5 years apart from me...

So I thought to myself... cease the fire, stop the anger and let go of the grudge...

For... I don't particularly like the dark side and all I need is love to... I guess... show me the light... (and, of course, a full time job, good pay so that I can take my mama and daddy for trips everywhere... 8-O lol)

Full time job

At times I ponder to myself.... when is it so hard for me to find a full time job...

Then, I thought of all the things I have learned so far through my "clinical and empirical experiences"...

Some empirical experiences not necessary for ordinary people.... so put this good friend of mine... 8-O lol sigh

And, I realise...

I don't know how well the others would fair with them... for me, somehow it is as if it is a full time job on them unnecessary nuances to live through and to cope... although this job doesn't pay at all... 8-O lol

So I said to God...

Do me a favor please... another full time job that pays better than da... should it be possible for me to get rid of this full time job that pays nothing at all... 8-O lol

Lesson learned: Spasm

Last night I laid in bed, trying to fall asleep while dealing with them ordinary uncontrollable images that came into my head.... (short of auditory hallucination, though, I think...)

At a certain point, I found myself having difficulties swallowing...

If was as if the bottom of my tongue was a piece of some foreign object in my mouth that would not respond to my command at all...

There after, I came to the realization... it appeared that the area right below the bottom of my tongue is also neglecting any request I made concerning this swallowing activity...

So I got up, but the condition did not change....

In my mind, I knew.... esophageal spasm... so it is...

I decided to take one of the Naproxen... to ease the spasm...

I picked up one pill and carefully tried to swallow it down the throat with water....

Yet, this amazing phenomenon happened....

That huge pill did not go too far...

It felt as if it move 1 or 2 centimeters down, if not shorter distance, and got stuck there perhaps at the very top of my esophagus.

I waited a bit and tried to swallow a bit more water... while curiously monitored what was going on with the pill...

A bit later, the pill moved a little bit lower... and it felt as if the areas above was becoming a bit more flex and not so tense...

So, I sat there a bit more... observing that pill behaving as if it is the gate keeper... soothing the esophagus one segment at a time until finally the pill went down as low as in my chest area...

Thereafter, I went back laying in my bed, trying to fall asleep again...

Shortly, I knew the pill was working because the internal organs seemed to be feeling much more relaxing.... 8-O (of course, this could simply be my imagination...)

And, I realise that... I was attacked again by this thing called dry mouth... something that hasn't happened for awhile...

On my way home today, I thought of this incidence, and, I had this insight...

I have been bad with smoking these past few days when I am trying to finish up the homework and paper....

Possibly, it is the body reacting to them smokes....

And, I thought how funny it is... even when in the scariest moments of upper esophageal spasm... when the spasm was so bad that I could not swallow the pill....

In addition to the uncontrollable concern about whether this spasm thing is gonna turn me eternally adios or not...

What was in my mind, the cognitive part of my mind, was the thought...

"Damn esophageal spasm again..."

And... again... just when I thought I knew what it means to have spasm... I know that I don't know jack about spasm...

And, of course, speaking of the multiple manifestations of the same principle... 8-Olol

House Gone Psychotic

Although I did not watch the full episode of House today, I did catch the ending....

Just when House thought everything was under control and he could live with hallucinations without any intervention, the end of the episode proved him wrong....

It is more than sad for me to be watching the end of the episode and looking at House shipped himself into the psychiatric ward...

The kind of fear he, although a fiction figure, might have to endure...

Let alone that fear about losing or the knowledge of the partial lost of what he prides himself of most... cognition...

Watching him walking into the hospital at his own will, with the intentions of committing himself...

That brought me back to the day when I took myself to the ER of St. Luke's hospital...

The fear...

The scare...

About what the reality of being psychotic could bring forth.... not realizing that I had already been entrapped by the web of delusions and hallucinations....

Then, this thought occurred to me as I was getting ready for my shower....

The symptoms might take its toll and it might take time and work for one to grow out of the onset....

Eventually, we will be forced to accept it and to realize the power of the symptoms as well as how different our worldview could be from what it really is...

The events that took place which had never taken place... to begin with...

Yet, the greatest danger we psychotics has to face might actually come after the process of recovery or when symptoms go into full remission....

That danger I am speaking of is the mindset one might develop about... now I have gone through it, now I have grown out of it, now I have learned my lessons about all identifiable patterns associated with psychotic symptoms, and, now I won't become institutionalizable grade of psychotic again...

The matter of the fact is that... like what I have been told by my auditory hallucination... you could never catch it.... regardless how much you reflect on your own condition and how well you could eventually become in identifying your symptoms....

There, perhaps, simply are no fail-save proof to the unidentifiable equation....

So, I thought of this posting I made to my private blog last week after watch the last episode of House...

Funny enough... as a viewer and based on my observation, I had come to the conclusion that House was doing fine, only to realize in today's episode that his condition is actually at some institutionalizable kinda grade...

The matter of the fact is that... the above seems to do an excellent job in representing the actual process it took for my symptoms to grow into the grade-- institutionalizable... (and, if you don't quite understand what I am trying to convey here, that's OK... for... I am not quite sure either what exactly it is I am trying to convey and how to put it into words as well...)

Monday, May 4, 2009
House Goes Cuckoo

Sometime after I started with the previous posting, I watched on TV the episode of House titled under your skin.... in this episode, House experienced psychotic symptoms including visual and auditory hallucination represented by the presence of Amber, the dead girlfriend of his doctor pal... Yet, never a point did he have doubts that them symptoms were symptoms....

Of course, dramas have to be dramas and this is the reason why, after all the hallucinations, there did not really seem to be any sign of Dr. House starting to develop some sort of delusional beliefs. In addition, as a fledgling psychotic, he was able to will them symptoms out with his meta-cognitive skills.... (something I have been trying to learn through out all these years and could still not perfect the given skills otherwise I would not have gone back to the cuckoo's nest again early last year... 8-O)

There was only one part of the show that didn't quite make sense. At some point, it was apparent that the processing of hallucinations (internal stimuli) took precedence over that of the speech of real people in the room... House was distracted by the hallucinations and was having some difficulties handling external stimuli in the presence of them hallucinations. Yet, he made a comment about how he felt no fear....

Well, regardless whether his limbic system was giving up and regardless how cognitive or rational he might be, someone who pride himself so much about his cognitive capacity, I really doubt that he really would have no fear... unless he was simply in shock...

One thing I like about this episode is that... just because one experiences positive symptoms does not mean that one no longer has the ability to perform ordinary daily task such as brain-storming about differential diagnoses....

Although the performance outcome might be discounted given that a chunk of cognitive processing is now, without a choice, dedicated to all processes relating to positive symptoms such as hallucinations.

The utilities of everyday things

Thank da hallucinations of mine for pushing me back to finish all them proofs...

Regardless I have prove them things right or not...

One thing I could say is that...

The utilities of everyday things...

The scary dasein moments that made me finish my homework...

Who would have figured.... 8-O lol

Do your homework

After my last posting, this head of my sort of was on its way to wonder off.... from my homework etc...

Then, this voice came back... still faintly... emotionless...

"Now go back to do your homework..." 8-O lol

Da hallucination

Just when I am studiously working on solving how 2 PL models are actually a special case of polytomous IRT models...

This faint voice whispered in the back of my head... something like...

"Good that you are working so hard on your homework. When you are done, be done. Don't forget to take care of business...."

Then the presence disappeared...

So I sent an email to my advisor... the only thing I could do, to be honest, to see whether I could get a bit more time to finish the course work...

Then I thought of what I asked God when dropping by St. Patrick this afternoon...

"Show me the sign... what I am supposed to do..."

Oops... don't tell my that the sign is manifested as my hallucinations... 8-O lol 8-X

Quality

Just finished watching the movie "The Weatherman" while I was doing my daily swinging exercise...



Some depressed film to go with my moody blues in a day-- partly sunny, partly cloudy, partly rainy...

One thing I got from this movie is the monologue at the end of the film...

Something like the following in my own words...

When I was much younger, I dreamed myself of many a fine quality... as time goes by, these qualities become reduced and reduced till there is nothing more than one left... me... be it good and/or bad... and everything else in between... though that still doesn't quite tell me what exactly it is that I am..

Car wash

Just watched Shark Tale while doing my swinging exercise...

The take home lesson today would be...

Small fish, big fish and whatever kind of fish you might be...
Be open to the all kinds of fishes you might meet

Never forget, though,

who you have been
where you come from
and, especially, all these times, who has been there for thee...




Car wash

Y'all small tuna fish, I'm one big catch
(This is a Shark Tale exclusive)
Y'all small tuna fish, I'm one big catch
(Here we go again) (2004)
Y'all small tuna fish, I'm one big catch
(Say what, say what) (phenomenal hit)
Y'all small tuna fish, I'm one big catch
(Yeah)

Ooh, do do do do do do do
Car wash, car wash
Ooh, do do do do do do do
Car wash, car wash

(Yeah, let's drop it on 'em like this)

Ooh, do do do do do do, na na na ah, ooh
Ooh, do do do do do do, na na na ah, ooh

You might not ever get rich, ha
Let me tell you it's better than digging a ditch
There ain't no telling who you might meet
A movie star or maybe a common thief

Working at the car wash (oh oh, yeah yeah)
At the car wash, yeah (ooh, yeah yeah)
At the car wash (sing it with me now)
Working at the car wash, yeah

(Oh, oh)

Come summer the work gets kind of hard
This ain't no place to be if you're planning on being a star
Let me tell you it's always cool
And the boss don't mind sometimes if you're acting like a fool

Working at the car wash (oh oh, yeah yeah)
At the car wash, yeah (ooh ooh ooh)
At the car wash (ow said, now come and work it with me now, yeah)
Working at the car wash, yeah

Said, said, said, sing

(Work and work)
Well those cars never stop coming
(Work and work)
Keep those rags and machines humming
(Work and work)
My fingers to the bone
(Work and work)
Keep on and can't wait till it's time to go home

(Ooh ooh ooh)
Hey, get your car washed today
(Ooh ooh ooh)
Fill up and you don't have to pay
(Ooh ooh ooh)
Hey, get your car washed today
Give it up, right away

Missy Elliott:
Work at the, car wash
Sharks in the water make they jaws lock
When I swim through the grim, I'm too hot
Y'all can make y'all bets
Y'all small tuna fish, I'm one big catch
Shark slayer, bow down playa
'Cause this right here will be your worst nightmare (nightmare)
Work that, work that, pop back, hurt that
Turn this up and bang it all up in the surface

(Work and work)
9 to 5 I gotta keep that fat stack coming
(Work and work) (work it)
No matter how big the shark is, the right keep running
(Work and work)
Washing cars ain't no place to be a superstar man
(Work and work)
That's why I work, and work

Working at the car wash (ohhh, yeah)
At the car wash, yeah (come on work it, baby work it, say now)
At the car wash (ahh)
Working at the car wash, yeah

So come on, come on, come on, come on, come on

Ooh, do do do do do do, na na na ah, ooh
(Now keep it coming)
Ooh, do do do do do do (woo, so), na na na ah, ooh
(You may not ever get rich, but hey)

(Ooh ooh ooh)
Hey, get your car washed today (hey)
(Ooh ooh ooh)
Hey, get your car washed today
(Ooh ooh ooh)
Hey, get your car washed today (phenomenal hit)

Dream a little dream

Once in a while, wouldn't it be so nice to dream a little dream... like da dream that makes up le Fabuleux Destin D'Amelie Poulain...

Belle du jour

Belle du jour... a classic featuring the all time ice maiden Catherine Deneuve...

Le Fabuleux Destin

Le Fabuleux Destin D'Amelie Poulain --- a nice little movie.... about nice...

You learn

This thought came up to my head again....

The concept of letting go...

Yet, the question I have would be...

How do I let go of god knows what without going into pieces and ending up losing myselves?

I might be a slow learner.... I do, mostly of the times, eventually learn..... I guess... 8-O lol 8-X




"You Learn"

I recommend getting your heart trampled on to anyone
I recommend walking around naked in your living room
Swallow it down (what a jagged little pill)
It feels so good (swimming in your stomach)
Wait until the dust settles

You live you learn
You love you learn
You cry you learn
You lose you learn
You bleed you learn
You scream you learn

I recommend biting off more then you can chew to anyone
I certainly do
I recommend sticking your foot in your mouth at any time
Feel free
Throw it down (the caution blocks you from the wind)
Hold it up (to the rays)
You wait and see when the smoke clears

You live you learn
You love you learn
You cry you learn
You lose you learn
You bleed you learn
You scream you learn

Wear it out (the way a three-year-old would do)
Melt it down (you're gonna have to eventually anyway)
The fire trucks are coming up around the bend

You live you learn
You love you learn
You cry you learn
You lose you learn
You bleed you learn
You scream you learn

You grieve you learn
You choke you learn
You laugh you learn
You choose you learn
You pray you learn
You ask you learn
You live you learn

Support

(This writing is cross-posted in my other blog Disability in Ratology.)

Since I am still catching up with my literature review about disability and so on, I yet have to write up my notes for some of them articles I have read...

In the meanwhile, I think I am to post the following two links...

I came across this discussion topic on the website of spark people titled "All in you head."

Interesting enough, it does give me such a sense of relief to be reading through my own experiences in someone else's words. It is because it does give you the feeling that I am not along in this reiterative process of pondering whether all the pains and difficulties in mobility are but psychogenetic and root in nothing more then the tofu in my airhead.... 8-O lol

The process of sharing helps the reloading or reflection on myself.

The reactions from the others give me a sense of hope-- the wishful thinking that, even though I am struggling to find meaning about the same-old-same-old minor inconvineinces I have encounted so far, perhaps, the words could somhow be useful for someone else....

http://www.sparkpeople.com/myspark/team_messageboard_thread.asp?board=0x41x24933009

Another link I recently discovered was the invisible disability advocate, with the main purpose to educate people about the paradox of how people could look good but not feel so hot.

http://www.invisibledisabilities.org/theylook.htm

The irony I see in my recent engagement with online support group is that... when I first started with my graduate education, I was doing research with this professor in the counseling department. Among all them projects I was involved in, one eventually was finally published last year--- almost 1 decade later, with the topic being the use of online discussion forum as a means of providing social support.....

Fail safe

A fine old movie Fail Safe (1964) that I found on youtube....

Good take home lesson.... no mechanism of fail safe could be instated without a touch of human factors...

Free Met Opera for the weekend...

Just found this.... Opera programs from the Metropolitan Opera for free for the whole weekend...

http://www.metoperafamily.org/met_player/

The heart has its reason.... 8-O

Last night, after I went to bed, I experienced again them poundings of the heart, which is extremely annoying.

Surely, while there might be really change in the heartbeat rate, the lack of other stimuli present when trying to fall asleep might make it especially easy for me to have heightened sensitivity towards perceptions concerning my bodily function. In addition, due to the more frequent occurrences of such experiences, it is plausible for me to start behaving like Pavlov's dog to whom the ring of the bell could actually result in the increase of secretion of saliva... 8-O lol

Yet, tachycardia or rapid heart rate is one of the documented side effect of Seroquel and I have been experiencing them on and off through out the years... In addition, although rarely do I take Clonazepam, I have also experienced pounding heartbeat after taking this medication...

In other words, to be honest, there is no telling, you see, whether them pounding heartbeat at crazy rates is simply due to the side effect of the meds or the psychosomatization of heightened anxiety level.

One insight I gained as I was feeling them heartbeats pounding up a storm last night is that...

Whatever the causes might be, I gotta find a way to help myself engage in biofeedback kinda exercise....

Such as.... staring at a goose fixing its feather or another one dosing off under the summer heat by the pond... (wow, never occurred to me that geese could dose off, too... 8-O lol)



By the way, it was very funny when, at times, while me staring at the goose and the goose stared at me. Is it me staring at the goose or the goose staring at me? Pretty zen... isn't it? 8-O lol

And, I think, the goose must be thinking to itself... "What on earth is this strange thing doing staring at me?" lol

What the f have you done lately?

"What the f have you done lately?" was the sentence ending tonight's entertainment at Ratology.... the off-season movie "Wanted: Weapon of Fate."



One thing I would say is... definitely, this is not a movie suitable for my young nephews.

At the beginning, I thought it might have been a good alternative to view my recent encounter with the plausible panic or anxiety attacks.

At the end, as I ejected the DVD from the player... I thanked God for gracefully granting nothing more than them ordinary panics and anxieties. 8-O lol

I won't say more about the script so that I won't ruin your fun shall you have not watched this movie. Yet, I gotta say, though, this movie actually exceeded my expectations....

And, it does brings me to ponder this question...

"What the f have I done lately?"

The first problem I encounter is... how should "lately" be defined?

Measured by hours? Days? Weeks? Months? Years? Or decades?

A tough question.

Then, there comes the second dilemma... What should be included if there is ever anything substantial to be included?

Did a bit of studies?

Got a few of them degrees?

Did a bit of working?

Got in and out of a few relationships?

Gone through a few of them depressive stages?

Experienced some phases of high anxiety with various range of duration and had a few of them episodes starting with the word panic?

Turned psychotic and live through some times with up and downs in symptom severity?

Turned disabled by them chronic pain and discounted degree of mobility?

Type out a few mumble-jumbles while I am not quite sure yet what them run-on sentences could mean...

The above should summarize what I might have done recently.... I guess... to a certain degree... appropriate for time measures of different length of duration... 8-O

Then, there comes to this third issue... How do I make the evaluations?

Given I have neither wealth nor fame, it makes it sort of a difficult task to identify them criteria for the evaluation phase because a bit more of them generative processes might be needed to explore alternative criteria that could be included... 8-O lol

Regardless, since my I-20 is expiring again in about two weeks and I am coming face to face again with the reality concerning the entire immigration thing, it does seem perfectly reasonable for me to be in a state higher in anxiety, decorated by sparkles of panics.... 8-O lol

So, the other day, as I was meeting with my doctor, I popped this question...

Them nights of pounding heart and breathing problems, what is the likelihood that those were moments of anxiety or panic attacks and what might be the preventative interventions?

Interestingly, both my doctor and I agreed that... since it is reasonable for me to be in a state higher on anxiety, given life's circumstances, there doesn't seem to be anything really I could do to prevent them annoying moments other than telling myself to not go even higher on anxiety level when sensing something like an attack might be in the process of formation....

Then, tonight, I saw the movie.

And, I thought....

Dear God, let my panicking be simply them dasein moments in panic... Let there be no higher reason and let there be no grander scheme... Thank you for letting it be it although I don't really need it. 8-O lol

Real

Replaying the first clip, it is really touching to hear she said, "When you are young, you don't know what is real, what is not real."

When do we eventually grow to be able to tell and what would it take?

Gia

Some clips I found yesterday....

To me, these clips seem to represent a story about a young girl's struggle to make sense... of life...

Meaning

I asked this question the other day again in addition to some other more times...

What is the meaning of life? Or, what is the meaning of my life?

You see, strip me of all things--- which I don't really have all that much anyway.... what would be left of me? And, why?

Then, during the conversation, this thought occurred to me...

Perhaps, the only reason why I can't shake this habit of asking this same question again and again is that....

I am a spoilt brat and got too much spare time at hand...

When people are busy fulfilling their duties to their families, they don't have the American time (a Taiwanese expression which means having too much spare time) to be worrying about the whole meaning or meaninglessness kinda young Wether's sorrow.... (this sounds like theta)

8-O oops....

Although, that doesn't really answer the question either.... (where is the estimation for alpha, beta and c 8-O lol)

To have it all

I happened to be watching this HBO film titled "Gia" earlier this morning....



It is really sad that...

Someone so young, beautiful and seemed to have it all shall end her life so soon....

Speaking of the choices that we have been granted in life.... how do we know which way it shall flow?

So ponder da old hen-- a professional lost soul in limbo.... 8-O

Integration

I used to be, and, perhaps still am, a gigantic integration freak...

For instance, with my dissertation, I was trying really hard to integrate all that I have learned through out all these years... psychology, methodology, statistics, technology, ratology 8-O etc... although nobody ever told me that a dissertation has to be a work to integrate my entire life so far... (and it was and is all in my head... 8-O lol)

To this date, I still believe that I had not reached a state of integration through the work I did with my dissertation.

In any case, after one of them recent nights of sleeplessness with the following experiences:

1. I was having physical symptoms with them dry mouth etc.
2. I was sensing elevated level of anxiety and so on which could be classified as anxiety or panic attacks.
3. Worst of all, one night, I actually had this feeling that them memories of scary delusional stories were lurking around and were about to come out to play. Again, although those are the memories of the past, the dasein moments remained to be dasein moments.

And, I came up with this interesting thought...

That seems to be some fairly integrated kind of experience....

So they say.... Body and Mind? 8-O lol

Neurosis vs psychosis: A comparision

You see, one thing I have to admit is that, for the longest time, I had this grandious belief that it is worse to be psychotic than to be neurotic alone. Yet, after my recent revisit to depressive and anxiety-related symptoms, I eventually come up with the conclusion that when it comes to how bad the conditions could make me feel-- both psychotic and neurotic kinda dasein moments could be really annoying and make me feel really bad... just in different format.

For instance, both the symptoms of psychosis and neurosis could make you feel like you were about to die and, honestly, at points, unfortunately, make you feel that death might be the only solution. Yet, fortunately, I have been able to remind myself time and again that I have worked too hard through out my life to survive and giving it up is not an option....

Take neurosis kinda condition such as anxiety attack or panic attack for instance, which might have happened quite a few times in recent weeks-- following that night when it felt as if the esophagus spasm could have gotten me suffocated.... Although the experience of esophagus spasm did not happen again, for nights after nights, my mouth would turn so dry that it would feel as if the wall of the esophagus was sticking together and there was no saliva at all present.

During this phase, the anxiety level would rise up, the heart would start pounding. The extreme of both psychological and physical discomfort would make me feel so bad to the extent that I would start fearing for my life, and, it would feel as if I were to go into the state of a full-blown anxiety attack--- for a reason... (unconditioned response... sort of...)

After a few days, I started to find myself gradually developing this sense of fear about going to bed... This is because I was started to associate the concept or the act of going to bed with the torment mentioned above. In other words, going to bed is now associated with all the minor inconveniences and could now serve, on its own, as the trigger for the dasein moments which were very much like anxiety attacks. The experience was so annoying that, at point, I would find me thinking to myself.... This is no way to live.... This is no way to live... How could people live this way and I can't live this way?

Thank, God, I eventually live out of that phase and, believe or not, I do thank God for allowing me to fall asleep without da fear no more....

With psychosis, the delusions and hallucinations do amazing work in building delusional stories to scare myself. For instance, on the night before I shipped myself back to the psychiatric ward, I had this delusional belief in my mind that some patient in the psychiatric ward escaped and he is on his way to me-- on the mission to make me go adios....

Although some might believe that delusions are simply delusions and there might not be any meaning to them delusional beliefs. I do find some interesting questions related to the above delusional kinda story.....

Who could that patient be? Who was this cuckoo at large that intended to do me harm? And, regarding the danger I sensed.... what exactly does that sense of danger mean in reality?

Could that sense of danger have something to do the deteriorating mental state I was in? Could it have something to do with the fear of having to go back to the cuckoo's nest? Or, could it have something to do with the plausible guilt I sensed about not having upping the dosage of my meds earlier enough due to my foolish pride about wanting to take control of my mental states without having to use meds as the dominant means and wanting to test my own limits?

In any case, what I am trying to convey with the above scenarios is that... both neurotic and psychotic symptoms could cause high degree of annoyances even though the experiences might be substantially different.... In other words, having psychotic symptoms make you suffer neither more nor less than having symptoms associated with neurotic kinda condition.

Getting back to the topic of honesty.....

Ya, honest to God, for the longest time, I was... psychotic-centered (?). It was not until my recent encounter with the hit-by-a-truck grade of depression and them experiences like anxiety or panic attack did my memories about neurosis get refreshed. And, thereafter, I finally can come up with the, hopefully more impartial, conclusion that, when it comes to the dasein moments both psychotic and neurotic symptoms could afford, all symptoms are equally bad although their nature might be substantially different. 8-O

Honesty

Today I have been somehow overcame with thoughts.

Some many thoughts that I have to start wondering whether I am becoming more on the manic side or not as opposed to be depressed.

Then, after my last posting and as I was walking back home, this word came up to my mind... chances are, it might have something to do with them thoughts I have been pondering about the multiple manifestation of Scheiße or Kaka....

That word being either liar or lies.... I don't quite remember now and it doesn't really matter anyway....

Following my propensity for tangential thinking....

What it be like when all that I have thought of, done, and said are nothing more than lies to myself all these years--- with them lies so very well packaged that I actually could fool myself to believe in them....

And, what would it take for me to be true to myself? Like what my doctor in Taiwan had me told before....

"Don't lie to yourself because your 元神 knows whether you are being honest or not and it will not be happy if you are not Honest to yourself."

This brings me back to this question that I tried to answer many a day last summer when I was pondering day and night how I might have been not honest and how I might be telling myself lies...

Then, somewhere along the time, I felt this part of me revealing this thought...

Be honest, it hurts thinking about I have to leave if nothing else comes up.

Is this simply because I have fear for change?

Or, what it be like if it is simply because-- I love staying here in New York?

What is the truth and how do I know?

Essentially, instead of doing more useful thing such as looking for a job, I spent the entire day coming up with useless thoughts involving processes such as typing, deleting, copying and pasting) is while wherever my head has been seems to be very irrelevant to what I could do to handle the minor issues in my life....

What is the truth and how do I know?

And, if you want to drive yourself crazy over some esoteric thought... ponder how you might have been dishonest to yourself.... 8-O lol

Scheiße or Kaka?- to speak or not to speak

Hardly would you hear me talking about other people--- in my much younger and more vulnerable years. 8-O lol

Strangely, through out the past few mouths, the propensity for me to just say what happens to be in my mind just kept on getting stronger and stronger. To the extent that I might consider myself as starting to develop some kinda OCD for I just can’t help that the hell simply comes out of my mouth in the format of verbal diarrhea…

The funny thing is that…. now that I have gone through both the phases of to tell and not to tell…. It gives me an interesting perspective about the MO of to tell and not to tell as well…. 8-O lol

To be honest, I no longer remember why I used to talk about the others not.

Could it have something to do with my being so 清高 in my younger years that I used to be able to speak of no one? If my not speaking of the others represents my being above it all, could my starting to talk about the others be the benchmark of my finally coming down to earth? 8-O lol

Or, perhaps, it might have something to do with my not feeling it as a good thing to talk about people. In addition, consciously or not, I might have the belief that people who talk about people worth less then those who do not.

In reflection, there is a high chance that my not talking about the others might simply an act to make me become more likes them “good” people.... No longer do I believe that I had kept my mouth shut simply because I was above it.... Rather, I, be it intentionally or unintentionally, was acting in a way that would make me be considered and judged as "good."

So, that was the time when this good friend of mine and I would get together. Out of boredom or whatever else, we would attempt to gossip about the others--- such as this other girl and her propensity to gossip about the others… 8-O lol Yet, other than that, our thoughts were dry and it was fairly difficult for us to generate gossips about anyone else…

For quite a long time, we thought we were the good people since we hardly talk anything about the others. Yet, at some point, it occurred to both of us that, perhaps, the main reasons we didn’t talk about the others much was that we simply didn't know too many people and we also didn’t know too much about them limited number of people who we knew. 8-O lol

The, in the past few months, something inside has been driving me to spit whatever is there out whichever enters my mind... This is a drastic difference from how I actually had been for the longest time, especially during the times when my paranoid delusions were worse or worst.

And, today, I found myself turning into someone I would never dream that I could become of….

Essentially--- I am now one of them really bad people who speaks of the others…. OMG…. 8-O lol

Although, it would be preferable for me to think that I am no longer that someone who dare not engage in the act of speaking about the others simply because such act is socially considered as bad and I do not wanting to be considered bad?

To date, I have been someone who spent the majority of my life trying to be good due to the mandates set by my delusions which states “See no evil, think no evil, and do no evil.”

I have also, somehow, turned into almost a compulsive speaker of all things that approach my mind, including observations, perceptions, observations, etc… while, of course, such new found propensity could simply be the manifestation of the over-compensation for the past….

Yes, I had been someone who keeps all things inside until it gets so jammed packed that I finally exploded, and, many a time. I have also been someone who has the slightest idea why on earth things just come out of my mouth the way they do.

And, if you ask me which type of MO is better….

My guess would be…

"Welche klingt besser? Scheiße or Kaka?"

For... it all eventually comes out anyway.... 8-O lol

Scheiße or Kaka? on Personality

In the clip below, Karyn Buxman spoke of 3 types of persionality, people with Type A, Type B and Type E personality. In this version of personality typology, people with Type A personality dies for their intrinsic need for structure. People with type B personality could live happily and forever due to their laissez-faire attitude towards life. Those with type C personality, on the other hand, are people who eventually become passive aggressiveness due to chronic stress?




As was indicated in the above video, people are people and intrinsic to each of us is our personality, which is often operationalized as our peculiar modus operandi.

When Type A people are being Type A people, Type B as Type B, and, Type E as Type ---- up to Type n as Type n, people are who they are. However, when conflicts arise and if we listen closely to what exactly was coming out from our mouths, we might be surprised to find that, very so often, what we see as so very wrong in the others are simply the way people are--- except for they are different from us….

So far as I am concerned, to say whether one type of personality is better over the other, it is equivalent to Grandma’s questions….

"Welche klingt besser? Scheiße or Kaka?"
8-O lol

Scheiße or Kaka?

When I was hanging out with my friends the other nights, the mama of my friend told me a story about grandma, a proper and classic lady who never uses profanity and things alike...

One day, either on the beach or by the park, Grandma was reading her nice little book. All of a sudden, grandma looked up and asked, with all due sincerity, this question:

"Welche klingt besser? Scheiße or Kaka?"

Or, in plain English:

"Which one sounds better? Shit or pooh-pooh?"

This story gave us all a good laugh.... and a good laugh...

Part of the reason why I find it so funny might have something to do with the fact that.... although not all of us might be as proper as Grandma who uses profanity not, in some way, we all make judgments about whether it is more appropriate to say "Scheiße" or "Kaka"... Consequentially, those of us who decided to go along with the word "Kaka" would see wrong in those saying "Scheiße" and vice versa while the two are actually and literally two of a kind…. 8-O lol

It would be nice

Last night, I somehow thought of what this friend said to me the other day....

"Why don't you write a book?"

This thought, then, came to my mind...

Ya, it actually was my childhood dream to be a writer.....

Shall I be able to find something to write about and come up with a book with some sort.... it would be nice....

Interpretations and assumptions

Once ever so often, the concept of interpretations comes to my head....

The confusions of interpretations...

So, today, I somehow got myself into this cat fight (Thank God that I am imperfect and perfectly capable of getting into cat fights 8-O lol).

For me, all that I do and I can not refrain myself from doing these past few months through my verbal diarrhea is speaking of my observations while, at times, generating further interpretation by referencing to my past experiences through accessing information in my long term memories. Yet, the other cat see it different.

I will use the experiences I went through on my way home to clarify again what it takes for us to come up with interpretations based on my understanding of how the mind is supposed to work....

Scenario:

My neurotransmitters must got all excited during some useless cat fight although there must be a bigger reason for the cat fight to take place and since Rome was not built in one day. So as I walked down the street towards the downtown direction, I saw a huge number of people walking uptown towards me. They all have just heard about cat fight and they are debating on the side to take. They were looking or wanted to look at me while not dare to look directly towards my direction. I looked down to the street to avoid facing them because I am not perfect and I get into conflicts. Then, I realized that what I was avoiding was my delusions which just have their level of severity going sky-rocketed.

Attention: I attended to things in the environment. This is what precedes the observations I make consequently.

Perceiving: The process of perceiving results in observations that could be both internal and external.

1. So as I walked down the street towards the downtown direction, I saw a huge number of people walking uptown towards me.
2. People look.
3. I looked down.
4. my delusions which just have their level of severity going sky-rocketed. (This is a psychosis-related observation which might not be too useful to normal people)

Interpretation: The interpretations could be both delusional and non-delusional. Regardless, they are the artifacts of what is already in place in my head or in me. In addition, the generation of interpretations involves the recent observations and interpretations as well as the access to information in long term memories.

1. They all have just heard about the cat fight and they are debating on the side to take. (The classic way of interpreting things delusionally. Without any basis, the assumption was made in my head that, first, people knew who I am and, second, care about what I do. It is this biased assumption that led me to make the interpretation. This belief, of course, provides a perfect example for ego-centrism.)
2. They were looking or wanted to look at me while not dare to look directly towards my direction. (It is but an interpretation driven by my self-centered delusional propensity. Again, the embedded assumptions are that people know me and know what I do while nobody gives a rat's ass about me.)
3. I looked down to the street to avoid facing them because I am not perfect and I get into conflicts. (Over here, I was both reacting and making inferences about the interpretations I have come up with, which are absolutely in lack of basis.)
4. I realized that what I was avoiding was my delusions which just have their level of severity going sky-rocketed. (In addition to what I have mentioned above. Here goes the interpretations following the tradition of psychoanalysis... 8-O lol)

An interesting observation I made when coming up with the above meaningless analysis is that the word assumption has appeared in many locations. To the extent that it is as if the assumptions we hold could emerge absolutely out of any context and independent of any supporting evidence.

At the same time, the assumptions I hold did not arrive in a vacuum. It is the cumulative artifacts of the present context involving both the perceptions and the interpretation as well as the information stored in our long term memories. Guess this is why, in statistics, my professors could not stop repeating or emphasizing the importance of "check your assumptions."

So?

I guess the take home lesson for me is that....

My interpretations are mine. The reason why it is mine is because the interpretations are generated based on the values, beliefs and worldviews that have been stored in my long-term memories in the form of schema, script, mental models, etc. In addition, what precedes the derivision of values, beliefs and worldviews are the experiences or the interactions I have with the external environment.

It is the idiosyncratic nature of the information that have been derived by the peculiar me that makes my interpretations about whatever I encounter.

This is the same reason why other people's interpretations are theirs and theirs only.

In places where the two do not match. Figure out the assumptions and check the assumptions.

Limitations: Of course, I can't really generalized how a delusional think to that of them normal.

Lazy and/or invisibly disabled

It is very funny that, last night, as I was going to bed, I posted this simple sentence in my private blog...

"One thing I could tell myself is... Thoughts have gone dry...."

It seems as if there was just nothing more worthwhile for me to speak of in Ratology anymore....

Then, today, as I came out from some of my everyday experiences, I came to understand that it was not because there exists nothing more in this pitifully boring state of my life... Rather, I have not been able to reload them raw thoughts....

So after some drama that occurred at work, I came face-to-face with my disabled state of being and its consequences.

You see, before I became disabled, one day, I got in the mail this letter speaking about how people with disabilities are often being thoughts as lazy. It was a foreign concept and I must have thought then.... "How on earth did they get my address?"

Then, the concept of disability was operationalized. For the longest time, forget about the thought of achieving anything... deal, first, with learning to walk and see whether I could move past 30 steps or 40 steps before I have to stop for spasm to pass... And, up to less than an year from now, I was still not sure whether there would come one day when I could simply walk without spasm and, maybe, one day, without walking aids...

It has been about two years after I became disabled and, to date, I am still trying to recover. Yet, once every so often, situations occur and the notion resurrects--- disability is considered by an act of laziness...

There are many things I have become unable to do. For instance, since the gym is no longer an option for me... this leaves walking and my swinging the only exercise I have been spared and I could afford.

I also remain to have difficulties with lifting weights.... What I have learned so far through life's lesson is... if I do too much of moving things around, the pains resurges and the inability to walk comes back for the body to take its toll.

Today, again, I came face-to-face with the everyday scenarios surrounding the issue of moving and lifting weights.

It, finally, came to my realization that my lost ability to lift weights could actually be perceived as an act of laziness simply because "you look so good".... How could you be disabled? Why does anyone else have to be the one to be doing lifting while all you do is mingling around with some accessories such as cables? In other words, you are either lazy or malignant and I don't believe you could be disabled.

Of course, no one ever put things out the way I have spitted it out as above. In other words, these are things coming out of my mouth-- a representation of my worldview and mental model.
One thing I thought nobody could understand, I might have never spoken of, and, possibly, I have never realized is that...

Disability is not a past state of being. My inability to perform the tasks I used to be able to perform did not go away with the disappearance of the cane or walker as the walking aids.

Rather, the cane is gone but the disabilities remain.

Rather, disability is a way of life.

Life is never the way it was and I have no idea how close to the way it was it could get.

Although I would like to keep staring at the full part of the glass, I finally am at a point when I have to face the empty part of the glass--- staring into the void filled with them activities I can no longer engage in and I can no longer perform.

So I thought I knew what it meant to be disabled. And, of course, again, I am slapped in the face by my own absolute ignorance.

Then, as I pondered about why I look good to everyone, including myself, but can't do them things I used to be able to perform, and, I wondered whether it is simply laziness or I am really disabled (which is something I am still having trouble accepting, I guess...)

It was not until then did I perform a search online and come across some writings about people who are not only disabled but also "invisibly disabled."

And, I came across quotes such as the following:

From: But They LOOK So Good!

1. While the person with the illness/pain is mourning their loss of ability and freedom, others often accuse them of just being lazy or malingering.
2. Frankly, it is impossible for us to be compassionate, until we have acknowledged there is a situation for which to be compassionate!
3. I do not believe you are sick, because you don’t look sick?
4. Ironically, those with chronic conditions would like nothing more than to gain complete control of their lives and not have to adjust to any limitations at all! Nonetheless, their bodies do not always cooperate with their desires, no matter how much they want it to.

From: Invisible disability

1. Invisible Disabilities are disabilities that are not immediately apparent.
2. Those with joint problems or chronic pain may not use mobility aids on good days, or at all.
3. About 10% of Americans have a medical condition which could be considered an invisible disability.

And, it was then did I realize that....
However lazy people might consciously or unconsciously think I am....
Some people might think I am lazy simply because they do not believe with their eyes that I could have any physical constraints....
In addition, I could come to think that some people might see me nothing more than being lazy because they don't believe I am disabled in any capacity...
Whatever it is, ignorant as I am, I finally come to learn that there is a term for it....
"Invisibly disabled."
Apparently, I am not alone and it is just normal.
In any case, whether I am purely lazy or not, anyone is welcome to judge and, for me, I will let it God to run its credit check...
And, if you ask me that, if God exists and does do his credit check on our every move, why on earth would I be in a state of invisibly disabled--- like the remaining 10% or so of my American cohorts?
For me, the answer is simple. Other than the possibility that I am simply a bad person and that's why I have to be punished for God knows what I have done in my life so far...
Chances are, without living through them experiences unnecessary to them normal people, I wouldn't have understood what it means to be totally disabled and the process it take to come to face my existence as an invisibly disabled. I also wouldn't have come up with this question--- would there come a day when I can be declassified as an invisibly disabled?
Where else could I find life-long and tuition-free immersion education based on constructivist principles as such that eventially grants me, the above, useless thoughts (even though I have no idea why I shall come up through my life's experiences them meaningless thoughts)? 8-O lol
As for anyone else... you are entitled to make whatever interpretation you want to make as long as you remember the interpretations are yours. 8-O lol

念奴嬌 赤壁懷古

Once in a while, I think of this poem.... or 詞... rather...

What a dasein.... especially when you think of ....
大江東去,浪淘盡,千古風流人物...
and
雄姿英發,羽扇綸巾,談笑間,強虜灰飛煙滅.

What else are we fussing about in life?
Let's just.... 人生如夢,一尊還酹江月


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.
亂石穿空, 驚濤拍岸,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,早生華髮.
人生如夢,一尊還酹江月.

Interesting perspective about 瑜亮情結...............

From esophagus spasm to dry mouth only

Following is a posting I made this Wednesday for my private blog... It sort of documented my recent encounter with esophagus spasm and dry mouth....

Like what I always say.... I have no idea why I have to go through the things I have to go through in life.... Yet, in retrospective, I do see how my own action have an impact on the outcomes.... 8-O lol

In addition, after I tossed and turned for a few hours in bed, I eventually got up to take a Clonazepam.... unfortunately, it took this pill much longer a time to put me to sleep then usually....

Go to sleep
drafted on Wednesday, April 8, 2009

I have never known how difficult it could be to fall asleep....

Yes, it is true...

I have lived through nights of sleeplessness....

I have lived through them nights of sleeplessness.... so many a night... and... within which I were haunted by the ghosts of my own delusions.... and the associated delusions concerning death...

Yet, what has been happening to me nowadays is something different....

What I have been experiencing in recent days are the extreme of physical discomfort.... the inability for me to swallow--- even my own saliva, the dry mouth.... so dry that it feels as if my mouth produces no saliva at all, the ensuing sense of anxiety.... especially the tension resulting from the bodily discomfort and the inability to fall a sleep....

I had the worst symptoms last Thursday night....

What I ate for dinner was one of the cup a noodle with some mushrooms....

Thereafter I had a beer and a strawberry Margarita along with 4 pints of hot water while hanging out...

After I got home and before I went night night, I put the dissolvable tooth whitening strips of Listerine.... In other words, I went to bed with them Listerine whitening strips still in my mouth waiting to be dissolved and broken down by my saliva...

Then, the next thing I realized was that..... it was 2 o'clock in the morning and, after I got up, I found myself lost the ability to swallow even my own saliva.... Worst of all, I was having trouble breathing through my mouth... It was then did this thought occurred to me... OMG... I could die in suffocation here along in my room and no one would even know about it...

I struggled and finally swallowed down one of my Naproxen.... The pill immediate relaxed my neck area and I finally could swallow again... although still having to deal with the increased heart beat rate as well as the unbearable dryness in my mouth...

Regardless, I went back to bed since there seems to be two options only I saw... I go to bed and wake up the morning after or I wake up not....

Apparently, in retrospective, I did fall asleep and I did wake up....

Following are a few of the options that I entertained:

1. The chemical in the whitening strips might have built up in my mouth and caused irritation
2. I have become allergic to something (e.g., alcohol, shrimp, wheat)
3. I drank too much liquid and the water built up in my cells such as those in my throat... or water intoxication
4. I might have experienced an anxiety attack or panic attack
5. Or, the combinations of more than one of the above

Friday night was a good night since I had no trouble at all falling asleep...

Saturday night... I think I had some problems falling asleep again but not so bad... some sensation of dry mouth, maybe...

Sunday night... maybe a bit of dry mouth kind of problem....

On Monday, I went to see my doctor... and we came to the conclusion that it might have been the Listerine strips that got my throat totally irritated... Yet, that after noon, against her advise, yours nothing in the head decided to get another kind of extra powerful tooth whitening strips...

Then, Monday night, again... I had great discomfort and difficulties falling asleep... First, it felt as if I was having difficulties swallowing and there seems to be something stuck in my throat... After I got up and moved around a bit, I went back to lie in bed... only to find myself being attacked by dry mouth... and dry throat.... So dry that I felt the lining of my throat was touching each other and rubbing against each other.

I got up again and again only to find myself still being attacked by da dry throat and mouth...

And, the same thing happened again last night...

I wanted so bad to take either one of the Clonazepam or Naproxen...

Yet, I decided to not take additional pills instead....

Eventually, I fell asleep and woke up this morning... spending the entire day feeling still sleepy...

In retrospective, I think what happened since Monday night might have something to do with the Crest Advanced Seal whitening strips... It is because I was able to feel their after effects all the way into the later part of the day on Tuesday even though I applied the strips later in the evening...

Given that I have also been feeling gas coming up through my esophagus, I decided tonight that.... Maybe what I am experiencing have something to do with this thing called acid reflux...

I was going to hold it though the night to see whether I am going to experience the same thing tonight without any further intervention...

Yet, I decided to take two of the Tumbs.... for... it ain't making sense for me to kill myself over some stupid and methodologically unsound experiments... 8-O lol

Let's hope and pray to God that I could finally fall asleep.... once for a change.....

Last note... perhaps... something else in the equation... da prune juice might also be part of the equation since I am trying to use it to help me with da constipation department.... (8-O lol oops... did I say it? lol)

And, God... let me fall asleep for once... tonight... shall you exist and shall you be listening... in addition to letting me find a husband soon... 8-O lol sigh... (Think this is quite funny for me to be still thinking about finding a husband while under-going the given condition.... 8-O lol)

Phobia-- dry mouth and can't sleep

Speaking of phobia... though out the past few days... I think that I was about to develop some kind about phobia about going to sleep..... at least up till last night... when I finally fall asleep...

This had been happening....

Every night... falling asleep has turned into a more drastic battle than I would like it to be...

More nights than I would like it to be... I would be lying in bed, tossing and turning-- tormented by xerostomia or this dryness in my mouth....

I got this sinus that came from no where... and I need to use my mouth to breathe...

Yet, or maybe as a result, the mouth would go dry and so dry... so dry that it felt as if there is no saliva at all....

For over an hour or two.... I lie there waiting.... for the time to come.... for me to wake up to a new day... a new beginning....

As days go by, I started to have this fear that the same thing is to happen again as I go night night.... As a result, the anxiety level might have been heightened, which doesn't really help the condition either...

If you ask me why I don't have a glass of water by my bed side to quench my thirst and to compensate for the dryness....

I do.

Throughout the night, I would get up again and again.... drinking more water and some more... only to be overcome by this sense of dryness again shortly....

If you want me to compare between them nights of delusional terrors and them nights of never-ending dryness...

If you want me to choose which one would be the worst....

Honestly, neither prefer I....

So, before I went to see my physician yesterday morning and as I was pondering whether there are any other people who suffer from similar kind of minor inconveniences, I did a google search with the key words "dry mouth can't sleep".... only to realize that there are so many other people out there sharing the same experiences and struggling to find a means for a sense of relief...

Luckily, after I took my physician's advise and ate some "pears" before bed, once for a change...

Last night, I was able to fall asleep without having to be tormented for hours by da "dry-mouth-ness"....

Then, I thought of those people who have to live with this condition for years.... God bless and have mercy.....

And, for those who can't understand what I mean by being tormented by dry mouth and being kept awake as a result of it... Lucky you.... and may you keep your bless...

And... hope that... tonight... dry mouth won't come back to keep me away from falling asleep....

Commitment phobia

I know that I have spoken time after time about them ghost of jackasses from hell for all these times.

Then, last night, this friend of mine brought up this topic of commitment phobia...

Yes, a topic so very outrageous...

Commitment phobia...

And, like what someone else pointed out last week or the week before... most of the time, it takes what we see in the others to help us see what is in ourselves....

So, as I was sort of cleaning up the kitchen, I thought of this comment about the correlations of someone else's MO in choosing the target of affection and the person's phobia concerning commitment...

It was during this process did I realize that...

Perhaps, that someone else is far closer to me than I might have been willing to acknowledge...

That someone is me...

Perhaps, I have chosen that last jackass of my all the way in Arizona simply because....

He is far away and so far away from me.

Even if we might have gotten married...

The concept of him and I to be not even in the same state....

It might have been a bit easier for a vow as such to be exchanged....

What it be like...

Despite of my wish now to... no... not have a boy friend... to simply get married....

What it be like...

I am again, simply, trying to test whether I am commitment phobic.... ?

Who else out there.... might be... commitment phobic?

Whatever out there could help us figuring out whether it is actually we ourselves that really are commitment phobic?

And, what might be the indicators telling us that... we eventually could migrate away from being commitment phobic?

What it be like... being no longer... commitment phobic?

Texas - Multiple Sclerosis - Tim Timmons

The story of Tim, a patient of MS and a medical marijuana user...



And, some hypotheses about MS..



As well as some faces of MS...



And... what about one of the last comment....

"Oh, my God... what does it mean for our children?"

(This writing is cross-posted in my disability blog.)

Pain, disability and pain killer

So far, I have posted in the blog the academic journal articles that I came across so far... and not much yet about another disabling factor called pain and chronic pain...

Today, be it due to the pouring rain or my poor posture, my upper back pains made their comeback...

This reminds of the topic of medical Marijuana I came across briefly on TV while channel surfing...

This reminded to be some story I came across on TV by chance.... until I had my accident and went into temporary total disability due to pains and immobility...

A brand new world and eye-opening experiences, I guess, about the impacts of the disabling pain and the consequential pondering about how others with worse pains deal with it....

Since I could not locate the program I saw within which they interviewed a gentleman who became wheel-chair-bounded and in chronic pain after an accident in his deep-sea diving venture.... Following is a brief program I found from 60 minutes....



Since I am not quite sure where exactly this posting below... I have cross posted this in my disability blog...