Tag Archives: changes

Plans For Spring

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Looking at my calendar I see that there’s less than one month until the start of Spring.  Looking out my window, I see that almost all the snow we had three weeks ago is gone and the trees are showing buds.  I also heard several flocks of Canadian Geese overhead during the last few days.  We’ve had nicer than usual weather the last several days, giving us a teaser for the spring.  Even preseason baseball practice has started.  I’m thinking it’s going to be another long year for my Colorado Rockies but since the Kansas City Royals put together some excellent teams the last couple years, it has me thinking it’s possible.  But hope springs with all the possibilities of the upcoming Spring.

Now that I’ve stabilized after the problems of the fall and the holiday season, I think that getting out of the apartment complex more is in order.  There is a cool museum in one of the nearby towns that I haven’t been to for a few years.  It’s called Pioneer Village.  Pretty cool place with a lot of antique cars, toys, nick nacks, and a full scale 1880s frontier town in the complex.  I think almost every school kid in Nebraska has made a field trip to this place.  Pioneer Village is definitely a must for any visitor to Nebraska.

Another must is the bird migrations that go on in late February and March.  Every spring thousands of Canadian Geese, Sandhills Cranes, and other migrating birds come.  The fields along the Platte River, particularly along Interstate 80, are so covered with birds the fields are white with them.  They are especially thick the first two weeks of March.  Some places along the Platte River offer guided tours that draw bird watchers from all over the country.  I probably won’t be paying for any tours. I’ll just go a few miles outside of town and check out any field near the river.  Last year I was lucky enough to see several large flocks of geese take off.  Mornings are usually best for viewing the migrating birds, but evenings are pretty good too.

I’m also planning on being at the family acreage this spring.  I haven’t been there since late October.  From what I heard the place wintered well.  A mother cat had several kittens they made it through the winter.  Dad is talking about building solar panels for the cabin.  Since I’ve helped him build a couple cabins and renovate his rental house over the last several years, I’ll help him on this project.  I got pretty decent at using power tools, saws, and wood working.  But I never got very good with electrical work.  This may be a chance to pick that skill up.

I’m going to exercise outdoors as the weather warms.  I’ve been limited to walking indoors and arm weights three times a week since late November. Haven’t gained any weight in the last month, so I’ve stopped the weight gain.  Now the weather is going to warm soon I’ll start losing again.  I should have known that losing weight last winter wasn’t normal unless you have good exercise equipment at home.  Yesterday was the first time I exercised outdoors for any real length in a month.  That large blizzard we had at the beginning of the month is mostly melted.  I’m looking forward to the start of spring.  I won’t be sorry when the winter ends.

 

 

Reflections On Being a Recovering Doom Junkie

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As I’ve been laid up for the last few days with a sore foot that is only now starting to clear up, I have been allowed the opportunity to reflect back on all the changes that have happened over the last several years in my lines of thinking.

I turned 35 years old this summer.  Even after being a college graduate, working for several years, and being on my own for a dozen years, I’m still not as smart as I thought I was at age 18.  But, I enjoy being an adult.  I also have enough years of experience that I’ve survived several supposed “end of the world and collapse” type scenarios that I chuckle every time I see such drivel. After seeing the ’88 Reasons for the Return of Jesus in 1988′, the Branch Davidians, the Hale Bop Comet cult, Y2k, 9/11, the tech bubble, the stock market bust of 2008 and subsequent Great Recession, the Mayan apocalypse of 2012, listening to my grandparents’ stories of the Great Depression, Dust Bowl, and World War II, and seeing ‘evidence’ that every U.S. president since at least JFK was supposed to be the Anti-Christ, I’ve developed the attitude of “Meh, let it come.”

I suppose this is an advanced line of thinking, especially since I am prone to unhealthy paranoia.  But the older and wiser I get, the less time I have for doom and gloom nonsense.  I spent a couple years researching some of that doom nonsense myself and even thought some of it possible.  But then, I used to think that Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, magical elves, pixie dust, and Disney fairy tales were possible too.  When I was a child I thought and acted as a child.  Now that I am a man I put foolish and childish things aside.  Wise words, St. Paul.

As I’ve experienced changes over the course of my 35 years I’ve come to the conclusion that change is the only constant.  I’ve come to embrace it and actually hope for even more. I’ve also accepted that there are always going to be hustlers and well meaning fools that are convinced that the ends of civilization and humanity are just around the next corner.  If I live long enough I’m probably going to see blogs and youtube videos, or the successors to blogs and youtube, about how the manned missions to Mars are hoaxes, how greedy elites are hoarding the proceeds from asteroid mining for their evil purposes, how we’re all going to die from nanotech and anti-matter experiments gone bad, etc.  I’ve seen enough of this before.  Nothing new.  Since our ancestors survived several ice ages and bubonic plagues I know at least some people will be able to whatever comes our way in the future.  One could make a fortune not betting against humanity.

Return to Normal With Mental Illness, Part 2

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Fall is just a few days away after a long and eventful summer.  I saw my best friend get married and we buried the last of my grandparents.  Partly because of these developments I became lackadaisical about my exercise routine.  I was taking so much time dealing with externals that I neglected to take care of myself and gained some weight.  Fortunately I made it through the summer with only one relapse into schizophrenia and even that lasted only an afternoon.  This time two years ago I had just gotten out of a mental health hospital after a voluntary commitment.  Two years in a row now I’ve made it through the roughest parts of the year without a major problem.  I’m feeling pretty good about that.

The leaves are starting to turn, the weather isn’t as hot now, and the corn harvest will be going really hard and fast within a few weeks.  I have always enjoyed this time of year, almost as much as spring.  My mental health always improves in the fall and I seem to get a lot done in these times.  Recently I sign up for khanacademy.org and am working though a few of their free online courses, namely chemistry and world history.  This will be one of my fall projects.  My winter project will be to get an General License in ham radio.  I already have a Technician License that I studied for last winter.  With the increased exercise I have my projects for fall and winter already lined up.

Exercise Pain, Spring’s Renaissance, and Gradual Improvements

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I enjoy the spring season more than any other.  The weather is turning warm, the trees are blooming, the grass is turning lush green, and everything is brimming over with new life and new possibility.  I even enjoy the rain and occasional storms.  Spring is the annual rebirth of nature.

I live in a small town with several parks and lots of hiking trails.  I have visited a few of these parks on almost a daily basis for the last month.  The trees, bushes, flowers, lakes, and wildlife in these parks offer the added benefit of being able to relax and enjoy a little of the natural world while exercising.

Speaking of exercise, I’ve been doing that for longer times on an almost daily basis.  Walked in the light rain and humidity this morning for twenty minutes.  I was unhappy at first that I had to stop after a short time before the aches and pains came on.  What I didn’t take into account was I had been walking forty to sixty minutes four days a week for the last six weeks.  On the other days I was still doing at least twenty to thirty minutes a day.  I track all my exercise and eating on webmd.com in addition to keeping written logs.  When I reviewed these logs, I didn’t realize just how few days off I had.  I think I’ve had only two or three days of no exercise since April 1st.  Last year I made it a point to take at least one day off per week.  My aches and pains are no doubt from pushing myself harder and taking fewer breaks.

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Fortunately my mental health hasn’t suffered.  I probably should go back to the take one day off per week to stay fresh.  When I started exercising and losing weight, I wanted the project to be sustainable weight loss and small changes enacted every so often as my physical well being increased.  I never intended for this to be temporary or drudge work.  Last spring I started tracking everything I ate.  Last summer, I started keeping tabs on how much I exercised.  Other changes I made included decreasing my carbs intake.  I rarely buy or eat bread anymore because I feel sluggish after eating more than a couple slices. I love things like bread, rice with Chinese food, and spaghetti.  So this was a large transition.  It got easier because I felt better mentally and physically on days I kept the carbs low.

A big change I made starting on New Year’s was light weight lifting.  I did this for three times a week for four months.  I gradually increased the weight involved as well as the repetitions.  Gone easy for the last week as I was beginning to over do it.  My muscles let me know I was going too hard.  But it really helped me keep exercising and eating right during the winter.  Some days the weights would be my only exercise.  In spite of the decreased activity of winter, I still lost an average of one pound a week.

Been going pretty hard on the exercise since the first warm up in early March. I haven’t had many days off from exercise. I’m starting to feel it physically.  A couple days off from the grind are in order.  Need to reset and take a little time to reflect on how much has already been accomplished during the previous year.

Looking Forward To Spring’s Rebirth

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Spring will officially begin in a few days.  In my part of the USA, we’ve had unbelievably nice weather for the last week.  Got to do some outdoor activities like watching the migrating cranes and geese a few miles from my hometown.  My part of the country has literally thousands of birds like Sandhills Cranes and Canadian Geese flying through this time of year.  The lakes, rivers, and fields will be covered with them.  It’s a sight to see for anyone remotely interested in bird watching.

I’m now exercising more outside as I’ve already done two walks in the park already.  I managed to lose 12 pounds in the winter months, even with less activity.  I was concerned how well I would do health wise with the forced inactivity.  Looks like I survived the first winter of this lifestyle overhaul quite well.  I’m down 70 pounds overall in the last year.

Been to a couple cookouts already.  Since I live in a complex with sixty other people, it’s pretty easy to get those organized with almost no advanced planning.  There were ten of us at the one tonight.  All you had to do was bring something to share with everyone else.  And it wasn’t one of those things organized by the manager of the complex.  The tenants did this entirely on our own.  We’re pretty good about organizing get togethers with no notice.  It’s almost like my freshman dorm over fifteen years ago, minus the loud music at 2 am.

One thing I have neglected during the winter months was my social life.  I didn’t go out much nor did I chat with friends as much this winter.  While we didn’t get hammered with as much snow as our East Coast friends, we still had a pretty cold winter.  Yet using the cold as a reason not to socialize was a poor excuse.  It is easy to socialize in spring and summer.  But when it’s cold, not much is going on, the nights are long, and some people are more depressed in the darker days, that when socializing with living and breathing people is needed.  There are only so many computer games and podcasts I can do before I just have to get out of the apartment.  Anyone with a job and a family knows there is more to life than just going to work everyday, spending a paycheck before it’s collected, and counting off the days and years until retirement.  I often get so rapped up in the day to day living that I forget to have a life.  Or even worse, get so wrapped up in day to day struggles that I forget how much we’ve accomplished or how much fun we’ve had with friends already.

In line with being lost in the day to day struggles, I have to keep reminding myself how far I’ve come just in the last twelve months.  Losing 70 pounds, writing a few dozen blog entries, getting outdoors some everyday, staying in contact with old friends while making a few new ones in the process, simplifying my life and decluttering my apartment, etc. are not small accomplishments.  This was all in the last 365 days.  I can only imagine what the rebirth of spring and the next twelve months will bring.

Finding A New Therapist and Trust Issues

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Today I’m going to write about one of the aspects of mental illness that happens to most of us with mental illness diagnosis at least once in the course of our lives.  This is the subject of changing therapists.  For me, it was a bit daunting to change from a therapist that had developed a trusted relationship with me.  Trust is a big, big issue for mental health patients.  I don’t trust anyone right away under any circumstances.  My default mode has been, traditionally, not to trust someone I just met until I can figure them out well enough to tell if they are trustworthy.  The trust of a mentally ill person does not come as fast or easy as it would with a chronically normal person.  But that trust, once broken for any reason, will never be regained.  It rarely matters how small or insignificant such breeches may seem to a normal. Once a mentally ill person has any reason to doubt your sincerity, that friendship/relationship/etc. is as good as dead.

I write all of this to simply state that we who have mental health problems have problems with trusting people right away.  This is perhaps due to some of us being more sensitive to verbal cues from others.  Some, like me, may not easily trust because we have been betrayed too many times as young people because we had difficulty reading who can and cannot be trusted.  Others, also like myself, may have never learned, or were born knowing, the proper rules of social etiquette.  Either you normals were born knowing social cues or that subject was covered during one of the dozen or so days of school I missed between kindergarten and 12th grade.  I really don’t know how to socialize properly.  I really don’t know what is the appropriate time and proof needed before I can properly show trust.  Many of us mentally ill simply do not know these unspoken rules of social etiquette.

After two sessions with this new therapist, I still don’t know if the trust can be made.  Yes, he seems to be competent.  He seems to care about me, at least in a professional sense.  But, trust is a big deal.  Not only is it a problem to know if I can trust someone, it is also a problem for me to know I have someone’s support, appreciation, friendship, etc. Even after two hours with this new therapist, I still don’t know if this is someone I can trust.

I have had too many instances when I thought I had someone’s trust (again with people I should have never opened up to at all, like coworkers and bosses), that I found out that my trust was violated.  I have had too many instances when a coworker, boss, former friend, etc. told me we were on good terms at first, then go silent for a long time.  Then, I’d get that call into private conference where I’d be ambushed with a laundry list of things I was doing wrong and people I was irritating.  It is my experience that no one, and I mean absolutely no one, in any kind of authority wants to see me unless I am already in serious trouble.  Many mentally ill people are like this as well.  I have been told I have problems with authority and no respect for rules.  My problem is I don’t believe in superficially trusting someone who could stab me in the back at any moment for crimes I had no idea I was committing.  I also cannot understand why rules that make no sense or are obsolete should be followed.  I have never been able to hold that level of cognitive dissonance between my actions and my thoughts.  Most mentally ill people are like me in this regard.

I have trust issues.  I don’t trust people I just meet.  It’s not because I am an arrogant and aloof jerk.  It is simply because I cannot read the social and nonverbal cues that say whether or not I can trust an individual.

Not Holding ‘Traditional’ Employment, Losing Weight, and Changes

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It’s been at least two and half years since I last held a traditional job of any kind.  No doubt some would argue that since I have a good amount of intelligence, I have no reason not to be doing some kind of job.  I’m sure that some look upon me with disdain because I’m on Disability Insurance for a condition that they don’t understand, let alone acknowledge it’s existence.  At this point in my life and development I don’t hold this against anyone.  I’ve come to accept, without any degree of resentment, that some aren’t going to grasp why I decided to opt out of traditional employment.

I absolutely intend to go back into the workforce at some point in the future.  But, at this point and time in my life, I believe it far more important for myself to lose weight and get back into good health before I rejoin the workforce. As of this writing, I have lost at least 60 pounds since the middle of March 2014.  I still have a long way to go before I hit my final health and weight goal.  With my body build being what it is (short legs, short arms, large body, very thick bones, and more muscled than average) I doubt I’ll be able to finish a marathon even when I make final goal.  But I can certainly be healthy even with the natural framework I have.  I think that anyone can if they make the efforts to be more conscious about what they eat, what they do for exercise, and know themselves well enough to plan around their strengths and weaknesses.

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Sadly, when I worked I wasn’t able to lose weight.  This was even with doing jobs like janitorial and factory work where I had to keep moving at all times.  Whatever I burned off from these jobs I consumed back from the course of not tracking what I ate.  I wasn’t conscious about what I ate.  Since I usually came hold tired and worn out, as a result of carrying so much weight and working physical jobs, I made no efforts to exercise when I wasn’t at my place of employment.  And thus a vicious cycle of unhealthiness, fatigue from work, and depression plus anxiety from being out of shape enough I couldn’t do what I wanted in my hours away from the job was going on during the years I held even part time employment.  Serious changes were needed to break this cycle.

After I left my last paying job, I set out to attempt to get healthier.  I read many books on dieting, exercise, nutrition, motivation, and mental health.  I also decided to take a very long and completely honest assessment of my strengths, weaknesses, and tendencies.  I liked much of what I was able to uncover (my intelligence, my ability for keeping accurate records, attention to details, ability to adapt quickly, ability to learn quickly, etc.).  I also didn’t like much of what I found about my drawbacks (tend to be discouraged in the day to day work, often not keeping attention on the larger picture, tendencies to distraction, tendencies to attempt too many projects at once, tendency to get discouraged when not able to see progress, etc.).  I decided rather than trying to improve my deficits, I would instead develop my natural strengths enough to negate my weaknesses.

I decided I wanted to lose weight in the summer of 2013.  I didn’t seriously start losing weight and getting healthier until April 2014.  That is when I started tracking everything I ate.  Just as vital, I tracked all exercises I did.  I wanted to not only know what was going in my body,  I was also interested in what I was doing too.  Over a period of a few weeks, I noticed my activity was increasing while my consumption was decreasing.  Stretch that over several months, my consumption is still decreasing and my activity is not only increasing, but is getting easier to do.  I’m embarrassed to admit this, but on the day I decided without a doubt I was going to get to a set goal weight, in my case 225 pounds, on or before a set date in time, this date was March 17, 2019.  I picked March 17, 2019 only because it was exactly five years from the date when I decided I was ready to set out on the long journey to good health.

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By March 2014, I had done an inventory of my strengths, weaknesses, and motivations.  I also had a working knowledge of several different types of diet programs (such as Weight Watchers, South Beach, Paleo-Diets, Glycemic Index Diets, etc.).  I had stated, and written down, my intentions of losing weight and getting healthy by stating an exact weight I wanted to be at and gave myself a set time period to do this work.  I knew I enjoyed walking, whether it’s in a park or in the old downtown of my hometown.  So walking became a major element in my exercise program.  I also decided I would track what I ate and what exercises I did every day.  If this sounds like a lot of work, it is a lot of work.  It took almost fifteen years to get as unhealthy as I was.  I wasn’t going to get back to good health rushing into a program without doing some planning.  No one builds anything that lasts, it doesn’t matter if it’s a dog house or the new World Trade Center building in New York, without sitting down and making some plans.  Taking the time to evaluate what you have to work with and making plans accordingly is the key to any undertaking, not just getting into good health.

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Things You Can Do On Your Own For Your Mental Health

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This post is going to be about things you can do on your own to help alleviate stress, depression, and anxiety that goes along with mental health problems. There are times that, in spite of all the counseling, therapy,and medications involved, we still have problems. This is when we with mental health issues have to resort to our own resourcefulness. This post is going to be what you can do when you are primarily alone or in a private setting. The issue of avoiding problems in public will be the subject of another post later on.

For myself, there are at least three activities that I have found that help ward off stress, anxiety, and depression. One of these is writing out my frustrations. I have entire notebooks full of the writings I have done in efforts to alleviate stress, anxiety, and depression. I write in these even when I’m feeling well as a sort of preventative maintenance. I look back over these on occasion just to see if I notice patterns developing, especially over a period of weeks and months. From these writings alone I’ve noticed that my individual illness has a seasonal pattern to it, were I tend to do worse in late summer and around Christmas/end of year holidays than I normally do. My times I do best are in spring, early summer, most of autumn, and surprisingly late winter. I probably wouldn’t have figured out these patterns as soon as I did without my writing about what I was going through. An important factor in my journaling is that I do not censor what I write. I am honest with myself, even sometimes brutally. Of course I’m the only one who sees these writings. I also usually shred my writings after about two to three years as kind of a way to let the past go.

The second activity I do to alleviate stress is listen to music. I absolutely love almost all genres of music and the type I listen to varies even within a given day. Even though I have no musical talent myself, I appreciate those who can play instruments or sing and are not afraid to. To the end of listening to music I have an iPod, a subscription to Pandora internet radio service, and even look up music and music videos on youtube. A good session of listening to music can relax me even when I feel like telling someone off.

Finally, the third activity I do that helps to relax me is just silent time/meditation/prayer. While I’m not going to delve into any religious theology discussions as there are plenty of other blogs that do that, I do know that meditation, prayer, and just taking a few steps back have all worked well for me. As far as these go, I found they become even more effective once I stopped worrying if I was doing these ‘right.’ Even though I grew up in a devout Christian family, we were never required to memorize prayers when I was growing up. We just spoke what was on our hearts and minds at the time. In short, the only advice I give on this type of relaxation is don’t worry about doing it a right or wrong way.

There are plenty of things/activities you can do on your own to help alleviate your mental illness issues. While I have yet to find an activity that will cure all my problems at all times, I have at least found a few that work well for me. I’m interested in hearing from others as to what helps them to relax, calm down, etc.

Struggles With Mental Illness in College, Part 2

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            In a previous blog entry, I wrote about my struggles during the first year and a half of college before I began treatment.  This entry will be about my struggles after my treatment began.  Just because I was under treatment didn’t mean my problems were over.

            During the last three years of my collegiate career, I never achieved the quality of grades I had during my first year of college.  I also changed over to a different major.  I originally started college as a pre-pharmacy student.  After a year and a half of struggling with my mental illness as well as my classes, my grades were bad enough that I wasn’t going to be getting into pharmacy school.  I needed a change.

            I switched to a business management major, which was a surprise to my family.  I had never taken any business classes in high school.  I didn’t have much of an aptitude for sales, and I was quite an introvert.  So to my family and friends the move didn’t make much sense.  But to me it made a great deal of sense.

            In my line of thinking at the time, I wanted to be able to be employable with a good job as soon as I graduated from college.  Even though I was really passionate about literature and history, I always figured I could read all the history books and classics of literature on my own time when I wasn’t studying for my business classes.  With my best friend being a history education student helping me out with history and classical literature books, which is exactly what I did.

            I admit with this “Dual Study Program” with my studying business classes officially by day and reading my classical literature and history books late at night and on the weekends, I didn’t have much time for outside socialization.  I had my small core group of friends, and I also made it a point to be friendly as possible to as many fellow students as possible.

            As the last three years of college went on I slowly picked up a few more friends and gradually went to more social activities.  There were a few music bands on campus that occasionally played weekend concerts that I went to.  They were pretty much cover bands that also played some of their own material.   I made a few friends with some of the band members through that.

            I also made a few friends through some of my business clubs like Students In Free Enterprise.  I also went to many of my college’s home baseball and basketball games.  I preferred the baseball games because of the more laid-back atmosphere of baseball and I had a few friends on the team.  I also made a few friends through games of softball, ultimate Frisbee, and flag football.  I wasn’t a fast runner but could be a vicious blocker.

            I bring all of this up to show that I was able to have the average college experience in spite of having a mental illness.  There were a few things I obviously couldn’t do, namely the drinking scene because of my medications.  But I wasn’t in college to drink and drug.  I was there to get a degree.

            I didn’t work during the school year because of the stress of going to school full time, having a mental illness, and having a job would have just been too much.  So I worked in the summers instead.  It also helped that I had a good academic scholarship based on my grades.  Even though I wasn’t getting straight A’s, I was still managing to do well.  And I was enjoying the college experience at the same time. 

            A strange thing happened during my last year of college, I became interested in writing.  I had been reading voraciously the previously two years, so I suppose that writing would only be the next logical step.

            All of the struggles, problems, victories, and defeats of five years of college came to a culmination on May 8, 2004.  That was the day I graduated from college.  Graduating from college meant that I had overcome the problems of mental illness and accomplished my life long goal of finishing college.

            While it’s been several years and I still haven’t found permanent employment in my major, I still won because I was able to finish college.  I thank God that I was able to finish in spite of my illness.  Finishing college by itself is hard enough.  Throwing a mental illness in the mix makes the degree of difficulty pretty steep.  I hope that by finishing college that perhaps someday I can encourage someone with a mental illness to reach for and achieve their dreams.

Coping With Limitations and New Expectations

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When I was first diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia I was clueless as to what exactly that entailed.  I knew that I would have to take anti-psychotic medications for a while and go to therapy.  Yet I had absolutely no idea how much my life was going to change.

As a result of my worsening mental illness, my ability to concentrate gradually became less and less.  I also had problems remembering details and paying attention.  It became bad enough that I had to give up on my original career dreams.  I started college as a Pre-Pharmacy student with the intention of becoming a research scientist for a pharmaceutical company.  Because of my worsening mental illness and deepening paranoid this dream became impossible to achieve. 

My grades were declining to where I wasn’t even sure I could stay in college, let alone go after my dream.  A change in course was in order.  Even though I knew very little about the subject I switched over Business courses.  My thinking at the time was I wanted to be employable immediately after college if I did get better.

As my college career progressed in my business classes I never achieved the level of academic success I once had.  This was due to my illness making it impossible to concentrate for long periods of time or pay attention to minute details.  I also had problems prioritizing projects so I often had to rush my college class projects.  As a result I didn’t get as good of grades as I could have had I not been mentally ill.

With all of the effort I was putting into just getting through my classes, I wasn’t even thinking about what jobs I would be good at once I finished college.  I really had no clue what I wanted to do once I was done with school.  I didn’t research potential careers very closely, at least not careers that someone with my particular illness could do.

I was in a really odd place, looking back in retrospect.  I was mentally ill but I had been able to maintain much of my original natural intelligence.  I had always been one of the most intelligent kids in my class in high school and even managed to do well in my classes in college in spite of my paranoid schizophrenia. 

My problem was I had serious stress and paranoia issues concerning other people.  Those issues, along with my problems with anger and depression, made, and still make, holding a regular forty-hour a week job for any length of time impossible.  It was, and still is, frustrating to be sitting on this intelligence but not able to use it, at least not in a job.

After I graduated from college I applied for every business related job I could find.  I didn’t get many responses to my inquiries.  I was sending over twenty resumes a week but was having absolutely no luck in landing an interview.  I was painfully finding out that the “apply for everything out there and hope something hits” tactic to job applications does not work.  It wasn’t until a few years later I learned that it’s far better to focus in what you want and be patient.

I thought that I wanted to work in banking or insurance.  I believed that these were stable industries that would be not too difficult to get into.  Yet I couldn’t get interviews for even these industries.  I was painfully finding out another truth: Job hunts immediately after college take a long time.  The person who finds a job before graduation is not the rule; he or she is the exception.

Finally after three months of living with my parents and futile searching, I changed my expectations.  I decided that I was taking the first thing that came along.   That job came in the form of a minimum wage job as a store clerk, and this was a part time job on top of that.

The first few months weren’t that bad.  The boss liked me and I worked well with the customers.  Yet I had a coworker that was constantly on my case and was very unpleasant to be around.  It finally became bad enough that after four months of this that I decided as soon as something different, not necessarily better, came along I was going to jump on it.  The biggest reason was to be done with this disagreeable coworker.  I couldn’t put my finger exactly on it, but I think this coworker found my quirks of being mentally ill frustrating.  I never said anything negative to this person though inside I was seething angry with this person.

One thing I couldn’t deal with very well in the past because of my illness is work place politics.  I have gotten better about it with age because of better coping methods and being able to better tell when I’m just being paranoid. In my younger years I could never understand work place politics, pecking orders, jockeying, etc.  My thinking as a younger man was we are on the same side and we ought to make an honest attempt to get along.  Now that I’m a few years older and have a few years of work experience, I have just accepted politics in the office as just part of human nature.  Just because they occur does not mean that I am expected to participate whole-heartedly in the gossiping or anything malicious.  But I am expected to do my job to the expectations of my bosses and coworkers, and that is what is ultimately important in keeping a job.

If you are an individual with mental illness and you do seek a job, know that there are personality differences among your coworkers and office politics.  Just know that these are rarely personal, they are just part of human nature that cannot be changed.  It took me a real long time to figure this out.  Until I did figure it out, my working life was often miserable simply because I had misguided expectations.

My expectations have changed so many times over the years since I was eighteen.  My expectations about working alone has gone from where I wanted to be a great research scientist to wanting to work in insurance to hating even part time work to fearing I would never work at all to now I work twenty hours a week as a custodian back to not working right at the moment.  I don’t think I would have become interested in writing had I never become mentally ill.  Maybe something positive has come out of all of this after all. 

I don’t know where this journey is going to end.  But I do know that right now that it is quite exciting and each day brings something different and new.  I wouldn’t have had this if I never become ill or had to change my expectations.