Dismissiveness - the scars of living amonst the Ns

[James]

GS,

I want to share a few of my observations on mental mechanisms and how this might apply to your current situation. First, repressed childhod feelings especially from infancy are extremely intense and our defences are those ways we avoid their confrontation in the present. Depending on the person, awareness of the unconscious defense and what it protects us from is difficult to understand. Keep, in mind many if not most people have strong defences to one degree or another. For example.....your fathers Drs might avoid their own feelings of helplessness. They might ignore reality and do something "stupid" that doesnt make sense to avoid their deepest emotions. In this way they keep those feelings down and are in control again. Can become crazy making for others involved. When people deny their unconscious reality they can force others around them to feel their own helplessness which they are not necessarily aware of. In this way other people are triggered and may be forced to pay the price  when ownership is denied. May apply in your case or not......just food for thought in making sense of what might really be going on (altered states of consciousness) Hope this helps and makes sense. I';ve found this undestanding comes in very handy.

[seastorm]

Thanks Gaining Strength for sharing so much of what is going on and bringing up the feelings of being dismissed.

It doesn't matter if people mean well if you feel you have been dismissed, especially when you need to be heard. This kind of well meaning dismissiveness, justifying the insensitivity of the dismisser, leaves one feeling that they should be able to cope better or have better self talk and not react to someone being dismissive.

It took a lot of courage to share your feelings and you explained them very clearly. You are right. There is a lot of dismissiveness that goes on. It does not matter if the people doing it don't realize what they are doing. It still hurts a lot.
I have thought about this too. I say," Oh well, you can't expect people to care and maybe my post is not compelling enough or I sound like I am feeling sorry for myself". My own voice has dwindled down to a trickle here.
Not everyone realizes that if someone posts then the posts requires that people actually respond to the post and don't start making it self referential. I mean that other people don't make it all about themselves. Or rationalize your feelings away and advise one to suck it up or feel something else.

It is tricky. There may be a powerful, heartfelt post and 194 people view it and 1 person responds. You cant see that person and the words count very heavily. There is a real down side to this posting business.

You have broken through the veil of denial here and it so needed to be done. I think that most people, including myself, feel a lot of pain and we need to be brought back to our feelings and sharing them as honestly as we can. I needed so much for you to say the things you said. I haven't even read all your posts on this subject. I wanted to respond to your first statements. I care how you feel and I hope I don't minimize your feelings or advise you to feel something else.

As for being caught up in the relentless gears of the medical and mental health bureaucracy ...... There is nothing worse. I am so sorry that this is happening to you. I can imagine you trying to make sense of this insane system and hitting a very hard brick wall. It is disgusting that the police are the ones left who are dealing with seriously mentally ill people and having to handle complex medical /mental health issues. I said that in a very sanitized way. Sorry. Your story paints the tragedy of your dad in a very heartbreaking and vivid way. Please keep posting. Get support. You sure got my attention and I hope I can listen and not minimize. Please let me know if I am. I want to be there for you through this. If I miss the mark and do something unconscious and thoughtless, like minimize what you are saying or feeling, or offer irrelevant and annoying advice, let me know.

Many blessings to you Gaining Strength

Sea storm

[seastorm]

Dear Gaining strength

You are caught up in something so huge and beyond your ability to fix. You can do what you can but take very good care of yourself. You are witnessing something really horrendous, unfair and dangerous to your father's health. This must feel overwhelming and painful. In these systems most people gave up listening long ago. They could never cope with the numbers of people and the extreme needs. If there is any way on earth that you can detach and not take their insanity personally I hope you can do it.

What you are going through sounds nearly impossibly difficult and painful. PLease keep posting.

Sea storm

[debkor]

Hi GS,

Well you certainly must be very tired.  You have many things on your plate.  And then more...and then more....And you are handling it.  Sometimes you don't want to.
Your a single parent and you don't have that *choice not to* ...Not your choice.  Wasn't mine either but it does take it's toll on you.  Raising a child, supporting a child,
being mom and dad, things that are going to go wrong (do go wrong).  And trust me .....that is a biggie....I know it.  Your worried about this and that and raising your child in the very best way you can...with money problems, things breaking, trying to keep it as normal as possible and things just (cutting it short)..like no heat, no money for heat, and a very scary time .....but you will get through it.  Promise.  Just *hell unleased* all at the same time\ including your own childhood healing...and awareness of being raise by (mentally ill parent/or parents) Now elderely mental ill parent.  And it's just too much!!!  It's overwhelming!!!  And depressing.  And you want to cry!!

And I want to cry for you because it hit's close to home for me.  I know how you may be feeling.  So I won't dismiss you.  I can't help you other then knowing (how your in a rock and a hard place) and how deep it goes.

It will change...Swear...Honest Engine....It just can't come fast enough...but it will come.

And all you or I should say (I) wanted to scream is ....I'm Tired!!!!   It's too much!!!   Do you understand me??????   Without saying it.....and one time my sister turned to me and said....I don't think I could have done what you have done with what you have been through...You did good kid.

No discussion, no suggestions, out of the blue......

So from me to you...with no suggestions (because I really have none) just maybe understand how you feel a bit....

Your done good Kid.

Love to you....
Deb   

[Hopalong]

GS--

How is it going in the crisis?

Are you nurturing and loving yourself in the middle of it all, as best you can?

(No more advice, I promise. Just want to know how you're doing.)

Love to you,

Hops

[Gaining Strength]

This may be the most comforting and healing dialogue I have experienced on this board.  Thanks to all.  Time is short - school almost out.  Lost my computer for a few days.  Have comments to share maybe later today.

Thanks again.  Feel heard, supported and rarer still - understood. Am truly appreciative.

[Gaining Strength]

There is no end to the misery and the "system" is contributing about 85%.  It is NEXT to impossible to see the Dr.  The staff refuses to sedate my father which is the only way to administer medication because he refuses it - spits it out, throws water on the attendant, screams profanities and on and on and on.

Unless he receives medication there will be no end to the cycle and at this point the medical team is unwilling or incapable of administering it.  That will leave him out on the street for sure because no facility will have him regardless of how much he is willing to pay.

I have just learned that yesterday's MRI conclusively demonstrated that he has recently (last few weeks) had a stroke.  But the doctor has only given the findings to him and he is in and out of lucidity.  They do not allow visitors until 10am but the doctors have finished their rounds by then and left the floor.  I have called the morning and asked for an appointment.  Hope they call me back before she leaves again. 

I am getting angrier and angrier at the insanity.  Always know my rage is fueled by impotence.

[Hopalong]

GS--
No need to answer any of these but this is what comes to mind:

I'm guessing your father would never have been so sensible...
but does he have: a Power of Attorney, and/or a Durable Medical Power of Attorney?

Sorry it's hard to get a doctor to talk with you...have you tried making an
appointment with a patient advocate at the hospital?

What is your greatest concern in all of it, if you had to boil it down? Is it that
your father may be discharged to an unsafe environment? Is it that you fear YOU
would have to step into the caregiving role if he were? How would you do or avoid
doing that, what form would it take?

Is your brother helping?
What's reasonably possible for aftercare for your father?
Is there an Alzheimer's unit somewhere, that he'd fit?

How can you protect yourself?

hang in there,

Hops

[Gaining Strength]

Hello Hops - my father does not have Alzheimers so that is not an issue.  The problem is purely this - the psychiatrist does not understand that he must be given some kind of a sedative in order to administer the psychotropic drugs so that te cycles of bipolar can be calmed and so that he can receive some relief from the profound anxiety that is driving his extraordinary OCD.  Both of these issues are exacerbating his refusal to take medicine for his medical issues.  Itis very complicated. 

The psychiatrist simply believed that she could develop a relationship with him so that he would agree to take his medicine.  She, like everyone else, is so certain that they know more than those of us who have lived it.  Yet another example of dismissiveness. 

[Gaining Strength]

James - your post goes to such profound issues.  I am reading only sentences at a time, processing on several levels very slowly.  You have written a tome in your brief paragraph.  I hear you and recognize mmense wisdom with much to plumb - so much that little can be said in response.  Only hope I have the courage and ability to consider such a point of view.  Not sure I am quite that courageous too look at my own actions in perspecttive of coming out of my own wounding.  Not yet able to read your brief post fully and thoughtfullly. Points to those shadow selves that I have worked so hard to hide, even from myself, no, especially from myself.

[Gaining Strength]

Sea and Debkor - still processing your sharings of yourselves.  Want to respond thoughtfully and with heartfelt words.  Just a little patience please.

[sKePTiKal]

oh.... Strength....

why IS IT, that medical folk want to always start from ground-zero collecting information, assessing it, for themselves - and not accept what is in the records (what their colleagues have already diagnosed) - or what you've told them??? I so understand your frustration... but one explanation - for what it's worth - is that they want to confirm what someone else has decided about your dad... and eliminate the possibility that something was diagnosed or prescribed in error.

This is how Twiggy felt about not being believed... and my avoidance of the medical professionals out there... who never heard a word I had to say... and only what my mother told them about me.

I would be at the phase of frustration, by now, that I call "jumping up & down on someone's desk"... to make them HEAR me, if I were you. But then, I'm always willing to throw my dignity out the window - if I can finally get someone to hear me. (That isn't something I recommend; it has unpleasant consequences and I always feel like a jerk afterwards... but every once in while it works.)

[Hopalong]

I can imagine your frustration, GS...

So many doctors react so self-protectively to thinking they're being "told what to do" by a non-MD.

And what so often gets lost in the mist is common sense.

I hope they will hear you soon.

xo
Hops

[sKePTiKal]

'morning... I was just re-reading your latest posts again... I missed something REALLY important, in the midst of my own (unimportant) reaction and sympathy for you, about dealing with the medical profession...

You said they confirmed your dad had a stroke. Here are some questions to ask the neuro doctor, or anyone qualified to discuss his condition with you - assuming they've recognized that a.) you are his family and b.) you are also legally "qualified" to make healthcare decisions for him. Because you're family - the visitation rules should NOT apply to you in the hospital; might be different in the psych-care unit... and even without a POA they should be telling you what they know. They just may not know much yet...

How big a stroke was it? Was it a hemorrage or embolic stroke (embolism is a blood clot)...? (they'll know this much from a CT or MRI)

What area of the brain was it located in? Is it an area that can have an impact on his historical mental illness? (and then here you can fill in what kind of mental illness it's been...) (they'll know this from the tests, too... maybe not the total impact on the mental illness... or with any certainty...)

The neurologist needs to work WITH the psychiatrist... they need to tag-team your dad's condition... because of the possibility that the stroke was big enough and in an area of the brain related to his symptoms of mental illness... to be altering that mental illness or even causing new kinds of symptoms. It's because of the stroke... and needing more info about it... that's the reason they aren't giving him his other drugs, I believe. They need to do a post-stroke assessment of his brain function, before they start up his drugs again.

Could be it was just a small stroke - I watched my MIL recover almost completely from a pretty big one. My dad was another story. He did pretty well for awhile... then a bunch of emotional things snowballed with him... and he stopped trying; he gave up. Depression, rage, anger... and irrationality can all be post-stroke symptoms... and of course, it's complicated with your dad's pre-existing mental illness. One thing I didn't know about until it was too late, for MIL - was that certain kinds of strokes can predispose the patient - make them more vulnerable - to a silent type of seizure (no spasms)... which in turn, can increase the probablility of another, usually greater stroke. I SURE wish I'd known this sooner; not even her GP made the connection between the "spells" she had and seizures.

Still, I realize that knowing that might not have made any difference for her... except in being prescribed even MORE drugs... sigh. One of her problems near the end was, I'm convinced but can't prove, too many drugs... and too many people prescribing more drugs... until I know she felt like she was a chemistry experiment - a beaker full of all these substances affecting her body in sometimes conflicting ways. Doctors don't always know all the interactions that are possible between drugs.

There's way more I could tell you, based on my experience with my dad & MIL... but I don't want to overwhelm you with info right now. I know that getting him his drugs is one of your biggest frustrations right now with the "system"... and it dawned on me, that this might help - a real, rational reason for why they're not giving him drugs, just yet. The med folks take strokes extremely seriously - as they should. And I've come to learn that they really do know what they're doing... but...

SIGH... the one thing they don't do is communicate well. And what I've guessed is the reason for that, is that they don't want to be "wrong"... tell you something that with further testing, recovery, etc... turns out not to be the case. They absolutely will not speculate; they won't talk until they "know". It drives the concerned family members absolutely bonkers to just sit and wait... (and with histories like ours, pushes all those old buttons, too...).

Is your dad showing any physical effects of the stroke? Weakness or paralysis on one side of the body? his face? How's his speech? If he's not showing any real obvious physical symptoms, then it's possible that the stroke was very small; in a small, defined area of his brain.

Poor GS... you must be about worn out!! If there seems to be no change, maybe you could risk a "day off" to take care of yourself and spend time with your son? Maybe you can make an appointment to talk to his docs, together? And rest up a little before meeting with them?

[Gaining Strength]

Insanity in this world only seems to be increasing - just in general - this world seems crazier and crazier by the day.

I am now in a vigil as my father lies dying.  How long will it be?  An hour?  A day? Maybe even months.  Hard to know.  He is calm now.  Talking frequently without venom.  Some memories and comprehension remarkable clear.  Next moment - confusion.  No remorse.  I cannot remember if I posted this here and too tired to review recent postings but the doctor told me on Friday that my father told her that he has used abusive methods to intimidate people around him to get his way his entire life.  She did not say anything about who those people were but one of those people was a 3 year old girl, an 8 year old girl, a 13 year old girl and on and on.  A girl who would have done anything to please, unaware that she was being abused, intimidated - at all - much less by a man who was supposed to care for, care about, provide for and train, teach, direct about life to come.

It has taken so long to get clear in my head what it means to have parents who want to make sure I fail at everything - career, socially, financially - all so that they will not look bad in comparison.

I have come to see that my mother has no interest in having empathy.  She is utterly oblivious to what it is.  I am understanding why her behavior makes me so angry - it is because being in her presence is synonymous with being fodder for N supply.  All that I have known about Narcissism and N-supply has not penetrated my understanding until now.

One of the most fascinating is that my mother knows that my father has been in the hospital or on his way for two weeks.  She has claimed her "undieing love" for him for years and years.  She claims to love me.  She claims to love my child.  And yet - it has not even occurred to to ask how my father is - not a single time when I have dropped my son off while I go to the hospital, not when I pick my son up.  Not when I arranged to get an alimony check for several months back alimony the other day. (Which she also did not bother acknowledging nor thanking me for - until I asked her if she had saw it on her front hall table and yes she did know I was making such arrangements because I called her to ask the amount so that my father's wife could write it - but not surprisingly she simply takes that all in N order.