The past few weeks, as well as the upcoming ones, hold a lot of painful memories for me. I am clearly not dealing well.

My soul’s unrest lies in overwhelming memories that are knocking me down at the same time that I am unarmed with my usual defenses.

So I went to the doctor with a lot of seemingly random symptoms, primarily cognitive issues, that I didn’t think I had any connection to one another but my doctor did. He wanted me to get an MRI of my brain as soon as possible and to see a neurologist.

So I did. As it turns out, they found 3 lesions in my brain. So then I had to wait for the neurologist’s appointment. When we met, he asked me to list off medications that I was taking and when I reached Lithium, he told me to stop, that he had figured it out. I had lithium toxicity. The symptoms are basically the same to what my primary care doctor had been thinking. No testing needed. I just needed to stop taking lithium. And he would see me back in eight weeks.

Needless to say, I did not agree. He had completely dismissed the lesions. He dismissed the fact that the lithium level in my blood was lower than the range. He dismissed that I had lithium toxicity before and it didn’t feel the way I was feeling now. His only response was “All I’m asking is for you to stop taking your lithium for eight weeks.”

All I want you to do is stop taking the resource that has been keeping you somewhat sane since 2008. And no, there is no safety net in place. That’s all. Easy peasy.

My psychiatrist was trying to catch up because not only did we have to ween me off of the lithium, but meanwhile try to figure out what to put me on for the bipolar, knowing that it takes a while to build up in the system. There was going to be a stretch where nothing was in my system.

Guess when that stretch was. Surely it couldn’t be when all of the overwhelming emotions from anniversaries were due to hit, right? The universe wouldn’t do that to me. I mean I’m a good person.

Why would it flood me with these overpowering memories and the memories of the events that unfolded afterward and then take away my primary resource PLUS add the symptoms we were testing for in the first place, the physical pain, the frustration from cognitive issues, and anxiety about the pending diagnosis? What have I done to deserve that? Not trying to play the victim card here but seriously, what the fluff?

I was going to list out the anniversaries but realized that is like jumping into a black hole. Needless to say, it was the beginning of literally the worst year of my life, and that’s even including the year after the stroke, and why I have been so – let’s be honest here – nuts the past few weeks.

I’m trying to reel it all in before I lose everything again. Plus I think my blogs are a little, well, un-me, if you will. I’m trying to grasp a hold of the me that is inside and is being tossed about by racing thoughts, off-the-charts anxiety, and suicidal ideation, the likes of which I haven’t experienced since I was an emo kid (back before there was a name for emo kids).

So today I read that an old friend is in the hospital again with respiratory issues. Well, I happen to know that friend likes a particular kind of candy so I reached out to her husband and asked if I should send it to the hospital or to their house. He actually said she had recently bought a tub of it so I asked if there was something else that would make her smile. His response was that a) Peanut M&Ms and b) that she was elated that I had inquired (sounds like tears, he said. I refrained from telling him that I usually have that effect on women, not the elation but rather the tears. It’s a gift.).

But I did share my belief – that smiles help heal.

Wait, did I see…is that…oh look, it’s a little bit of me poking my pinky finger out from the wreckage, the life razed from which my ex-wife and ex-boyfriend left me to disentomb myself.

Hi, me.

And a super huge shout out to my Beth for being a rock for me during all the madness.