Depression and learned behavior

I’m part of a big discussion etc group on GoodReads (I love GoodReads it is my fave). We were talking about Gone Girl and the nature of abusive relationships. The part of the conversation that I was involved in focused on mother-child relationships.

From my own experience, a behavior that you learned – your mother abusing you – makes it more likely that you, as a mother, will abuse your own child. A couple of people vociferously argued against this point. I agree with them, and I disagree with them.

I consider that a lot of my mother’s behavior towards me was abusive. I feel angry that she acted this way towards me. I feel angry that she didn’t care enough about her children – this is my emotional perception – to be more kind, to get help and treatment, to change her behavior, to get herself under control. So, yes,it doesn’t matter what kind of parenting you experienced as a child, you should make every change possible and CHOOSE to be a different person, not to abuse your own children.

But then I think about my relationship with my husband (bear with me; I agree he is not my child). The primary example of marriage that I have is my parents’ marriage, which, while I was growing up, did not seem very happy. I remember a lot of sniping and fight-picking on my mother’s side; I remember feeling sad that no matter what my father did or said, no matter how kind and loving he was, it was not enough for my mother and made her even more angry at him. Tried to load the dishwasher after dinner – yelled at for not doing it correctly. That kind of thing.

And, again, I see my relationship with my husband, and I act the same way that my mother does. I do not want to do it. I want to show love. I want to be a person who loves. But the only model that I have for “how to wife” is not a good one. And I nitpick, and I start arguments about loading the dishwasher.

I know I am mean, I know this is bad behavior. Oh, I know. I acknowledge and apologize and ask forgiveness. But in the moment, I literally do not understand how to act differently. I do not understand what it means to CHOOSE to act differently. I do not understand how to recognize that there IS any other way to act. This is why I am in therapy, and have been for some time.

So I think learned behavior has more of a place in abuse than that discussion partner understands. In those heated moments, you run on instinct, your emotions completely eat your brain, and you ACT. It happens. The words fly out of your mouth at incredible speeds. It is so hard to stop them, and I fail more than I succeed. This is also why I do not want to be a mother. I do not want to submit a child to the awful behavior I know I would exhibit, even if only for a short period of time. I think that what I learned then is too strong, and experimenting on that hypothetical child would be too cruel.

Struggles

I love running. I love being in a race and being faster than other people, beating them, passing them. I love that feeling I get about a mile in when the run suddenly starts to feel great (anaerobic metabolism finally switching over to aerobic metabolism = running feels easier). I love thinking of myself as A Runner.

But sometimes it is almost impossible for me to get out the door. Not just because of snow and cold – I have the clothing and gear to conquer that. My depression can sometimes make sitting in bed and not moving seem like the best possible option for the day, whether I have to study for the NCLEX or go for a training run or get some errands done. On these days I forget that running actually makes my depression feel better, helps me feel more energized and less likely to sleep the day away.

I’ve been going back and forth in 1.5-2 week bursts: I’m on schedule with my running, and then I take five days to sit on the couch all day. Rinse and repeat. Signing up for two long races (halfathon and a Ragnar) has certainly helped with this, but I don’t have it figured out yet.

I felt extra upset at my depression diagnosis on Monday. For my new job as an RN (whee!) I had to supply my future employers – no contract signed yet – with a document from the nurse practitioner who oversees my meds and therapy. This document had to give her opinion on my ability to handle stress. In other words, because I have mental problems, will the stress of being a nurse make me crack and kill a patient?

I got the letter, brought it into the office, and asked to see someone who could explain why I had to do this. I did not get a good answer. It was a whole lot of “This will protect your license.” Okay, how? What is the mechanism by which YOU having this piece of paper protects MY nursing license? “Well, it protects your license.” Round and round in circles we went, my lips getting more and more pursed.

I was so humiliated by this request. Humiliated and frustrated. They didn’t need this letter in order to make disability accommodations – I don’t need any. I don’t have diabetes mellitus, where my coworkers would need to know where the orange juice is kept in case of a hypoglycemic episode. I have Major Depressive Disorder, and now my employer wants – and I quote – “to be involved in [my] ongoing care.” None of your business. Please get your nose out of it. I do not need your help with this.

The most amazing thing I have ever seen

I was picking up food from a LynLake restaurant (I work for a food delivery service that picks up from restaurants w/o delivery and brings it to your house – perfect for the polar voteces). I was standing next to the expo line, waiting for my two orders. At a table near me, an older hippie couple was sitting with their two children and the children’s partners/spouses/gfs/bfs.

One daughter (looked exactly like Old Hippie Man, so I am assuming it was his daughter) had a boyfriend/partner/WHATEVER with a long blond ponytail. This couple, Daughter and Blondie, looked like typical Minneapolis Young Hippies. Not hipsters, but hippies who wear pure hemp sandals and dumpster dive for food unless their parents take them out to a fancy restaurant and refuse to wash their hair until they have accidental dreads. You know the type.

Daughter reaches behind Blondie’s head and pulls at his long ponytail. “How nice, she’s playing with his hair – at the dinner table. Okay.”

Daughter pulls on the end of his ponytail, pulling out several strands of shed hair. “What.”

Daughter inspects these strands of hair shed from the head of Blondie, removed forcibly from his long ponytail. “What is she looking for?”

Daughter selects a very long strand of this unwashed blond hair, wraps it around her two index fingers, AND FLOSSES HER TEETH WITH IT.

All of her teeth. The front ones. The molars. Tops and bottom. At the dinner table. In a restaurant. SHE PULLED OUT A PIECE OF HER BOYFRIEND’S HAIR AND FLOSSED HER TEETH WITH IT. IN PUBLIC.

My mind was blown. I was struck dumb. My mouth – covered by my scarf to protect me from the vortex – dropped open and nearly touched my chest. I stared at her the entire time she flossed. I could not – would not – look away.

Insurance

It only took eight hours on hold, but I finally got through to a real person at MNSure in order to figure out my health insurance stuff.

I am hopeful that, by the time Feb 1 comes around, I will be gainfully employed with employer-provided insurance and will not need this, but better safe than sorry.

I had another interview at St Cloud Hospital. The first one, back in December, went wonderfully, but “internal staff movement” meant they couldn’t hire me. My fingers are crossed for this second interview that I had yesterday – it’s for the telemetry unit, which is where I want to be.

Things Minneapolis residents hate

Visible house numbers.

I currently work for a business that delivers food to people. (Quit the restaurant job, love this one, don’t have to talk to hardly anyone.) I have a smartphone that helps me find houses, but you know what else would help? If each house had its number somewhere near the front door, that was illuminated, and visible from the road. So helpful!

A crazy thought, but perhaps worth thinking about.

So close

I am writing now because I do not want to work on my stupid capstone project.

“But if you get it done, you can do something else!” Or, I can do something else right now and then go to bed immediately after finishing the slideshow.

Graduation is in seventeen days. It is hard for be to believe that. I talk sometimes with the first-year master’s students and think that I still feel the same as they do, terrified and excited. And then I remember that I can actually interpret lab results and titrate meds accordingly and oh yeah am about to take my boards and become a nurse.

This stupid capstone is standing in the way of that.

Instead of doing a project and then presenting it via slideshow/VoiceThread, I think I should be graded on doing a complete physical exam, or on drawing blood for an arterial blood gas test, or on speaking with a difficult patient who doesn’t want their finger stuck for another glucose test.

I did receive my cap, gown, and hood in the mail for the graduation ceremony. I suppose I should finish this assignment, so that I can actually use them in two weeks.

Best feeling

I did something so fun today that felt so great: I helped get a guy arrested!

I was working at the restaurant, which is right next to the Metrodome, during a home game. Vikings versus Packers. HUGE rowdy drunk crowd. We were expecting stupid assholes, so we had four cops inside the restaurant, at the doors with us hosts, working on crowd control.

I’m right outside one of the doors, grabbing some empty beer bottles. I feel a hand graze my ass and then rest on one of my butt cheeks, squeezing. I turn around to find out who in the red hell is doing that. “Oh, I’m shorry, I didn’t mean to do that,” slurred the drunk groping douchebag, as his hand reached for my crotch. Also, his girlfriend is right there.

I grabbed the front of his shirt and started dragging  him back inside the restaurant. I’m yelling as loud as I can: “OFFICER, OFFICER! SEXUAL ASSAULT!” The cop – with whom I’ve been speaking for about three hours now and is very friendly with me – grabs the guys, takes him outside. Drunk Douchebag is drunk and thinks that the cop…is a rent-a-cop? and shouts at him and shoves him. Oops. Now you’re not just getting charged with assault, now it’s assaulting a cop, too!

It was amazing. Best that that’s happened to me all week.

A semester of insanity

Clinicals alternate between 0700-1530 and 2300-0730. Switching over to night-owling is fine; the switch back to regular hours is the worst.

This coming week I have eight hours of daylight where I can be home. Total. Period. Pretty much every other hour is accounted for by some task or responsibility.

72 days until graduation.

Final semester

I just got in contact with my nurse preceptor. I’ll be working in an ICU, which is AWESOME and exactly what I wanted. My preceptor works day/night swings, which means that every two weeks or so she switches between day shifts and night shifts, sometime within the same week.

This semester is going to suck – 12 hour night shift a few days a week, daytime classes two days a week, evening work at the restaurant on the weekends. I kind of have no idea how I’m going to make it work, but hope springs eternal.

The funniest part of this is the s-c-r-e-a-m-i-n-g that my nursing school classmates are engaging in because…they might have to work nights.

Guys, we’re in nursing school. This is what nurses do. You asked for a hospital clinical setting, you’re going to work nights occasionally. If you didn’t want to work nights, should’ve asked for an outpatient setting. “But those are all low-acuity!” Yes, yes they are. And you’re not required to work nights. So pick one.

I know that it’s been over a month since my last post. What can I say, I had an amazing month off.

I went to the house in Marble, Colorado, which was surprisingly very hard. It was my first time up there since my grandfather died last summer – the house belonged to him and my grandmother. The first day there I basically just moved from room to room and cried. Everything about the house means “JoJo and GorGor” to me. Everything – the smell of the sheets, the kitchen, the deck, the hummingbirds, the mailbox with their names on it, hiking on the trails I’ve known since I was a baby.

Tomorrow is the first day of class, the first day of my last semester. I cannot believe it. So close to the end, and so not ready to be there.

Orange is the New Black

I’m watching the Netflix show “Orange is the New Black”, which is based on the experiences of Piper Kerman. Kerman spent 15 months in prison for running drug money for a girlfriend. The show is entertaining.

The recurring thought I have about the show, Kerman’s bestselling memoir of the same name, and the TED talks Kerman has been invited to give is that no one would give a shit if Kerman was not white. Black woman goes to jail for running drug money, Latina woman spends 15 months in prison and learns about herself – no one cares.

The amount of privilege is kind of fascinating. I wish that Kerman were using her media platform for more than just memoir-selling.