Starting over!

I've been reading a LOT about bipolar lately, though it's really been following severe mental illness in general (schizophrenia, paranoia, bipolar, borderline personality disorder...). I've joined the group Thrive with Bipolar Disorder on Facebook (Side note: it would be super nice if I could keep those comments from going to my friends newsfeeds. Not that I wouldn't share that much of myself anyway, but I feel like it can be off-putting for friends that aren't on that level of "there" yet with the illness...), I read blogs, and follow what books are coming out. I follow all kinds of information about mental illness; marriage, children, pregnancy, individual responsibility, legal proceedings, scientific breakthroughs...everything I can get my hands on. I've been keeping track of it in a strange way, as always, a combination of my memory, bookmarks on my computer, sharing with family and friends... Anyway, I feel that method isn't working anymore and now that I am 6 days away from my commencement ceremony and have no undergraduate work left my goal is to post all of that stuff on here to keep better track of it. Starting today! :)

I just read this article about the difficulty knowing the difference between pre-hypomania and exuberance. As always when I read anything I immediately apply it to my experience, and my life. This actually has been a life saver in my last few weeks of the semester since I've found Thrive on Facebook. I've been able to focus on things I do in relation to others questions. But I digress, returning to the article at hand I realized how lucky I am to have the family and friends that support me unconditionally and are able to be objective about my moods. I think the best part is they are objective in different ways, which lets me figure out who I am and how I feel about my moods.

In the last 4 years I have met and married the best husband on the face of the planet. Totally a biased opinion, but it's mine and this is my blog so that's what I'm sharing. Terry and I have worked together to create a "mood map" of sorts for my bipolar to help figure out when things need attention and when they don't. It's not perfect, and it will forever be a work in progress, but its allowed us lots of freedom in our relationship that I didn't experience when I was with the ex. That's been a really positive experience. Last weekend was really rough, Terry was at camp helping with cub scouts, and I was supposed to be studying. Instead, since there is so much happening in my life right now my brain went into overdrive and I didn't sleep at all. However, because of our "mood map" I knew that I was going to be ok. I could text & check in, there was no freaking out. I could vocalize that I'm stressed, scared, and too much is changing at once. He knew that before he left town so there was no worry about the huge impact my mood had on my Facebook updating. We came up with a plan together for how to handle it, I did some little things that mean a lot to me (haircut with shampoo, eyebrow wax, shopping), I spent time with my best friend who understands me better than I understand myself. We focused on conversation and each other and her beautiful baby.

In my experience pre-hypomania and exuberance can be the same thing. The end result depends immensely on how I treat the feelings when they happen. Because of the "mood map" and my exposure to people who love me and have been around for a long time, who have seen me develop through the bipolar, who have stood by me when I needed help the most, I can actually turn pre-hypomania into exuberance and prevent the whole thing in the first place. Currently I still have anxiety/panic bordering on heart attack all the time lately, I'm still losing feeling in my extremities and having trouble with circulation, but its stress. There's a lot of changes happening. My long term claim is under review again, I'm finishing a whole chapter of my academic career and preparing for something completely new and scary. Not only new and scary, but new and scary and with all new people. That's enough to make me have a panic attack all by itself. I just keep reminding myself how amazing everyone I encountered in my last bit of undergrad has been with my illness. It's been infinitely better than the way corporate America treated me. That makes the panic disappear a little. I'm still packing. I'll be living out of as many suitcases as I can fit in Terry's Ion come June 1st.

Terrifying...

Learning experiences.

This year has been so full of learning experiences. It seems to be coming out ok. I got into grad school! I was offered and accepted a teaching assistantship where I'll be teaching one or two gen chem sections of 24 undergrads. Honestly, I'm a little scared, but there's time to worry about that later. It doesn't start until next fall.

I'm currently working on my last semester as an undergrad, so excited to be graduating after 10 years! There's lots of chemistry information to learn for my inorganic class, lots of writing to do for my french lit, english, and ethics classes, photos to take for my photography class...my apartment is getting packed up very methodically and carefully. Things are getting taken to Goodwill, and thrown out to have less to move. The cats are starting to get worried. I'm helping my best friend plan her wedding for the beginning of June.

The school thing is the most time consuming right now, but I'm also transitioning from short term to long term disability. This has been a barrage of phone calls and its going to be a ton of paperwork for both me and my doctors. Every phone call has started with "when will you be able to return to work" and my responding "I could have returned in December, but they are unable to accommodate my restrictions". To which I've had to answer all kinds of questions about my hours and history at my job, tons of questions about the change in management and how I would have handled the whole situation differently if I knew then what I know now. The whole process is complicated and annoying because it could have been avoided by just letting me keep the hours I had for two years.

I'm actually kind of hoping the insurance company takes legal action against my company for the money they've lost over the last year. There have been a lot of judges siding with employees who have had issues with ADA violations. When I talked to the vocational counselor she asked if I had a lawyer. I do, but the disability proceedings went so smoothly I didn't need to use the lawyer. I'm not out for a huge settlement (though I'd be dumb to turn one down if it landed in my lap), I just want the accommodations that will allow me to do my job successfully. I told her that if there was a problem in the future I would not hesitate to use legal action. I also told her that in the future I hope to have my restrictions in writing before all of this happens so I can stay at work. I'm not disabled to the point where I can't work at all, I just need the freedom to do the work in a way that allows me to be successful.

Live and learn. I'm looking forward to many more stories of judges siding with the ADA laws rather than employers. It's necessary for people to know they have support legally as well as personally.

Four Months in hell for a little slice of heaven.

I write so infrequently I forget what I wrote about, so after a little review I realize the last thing I talked about was the upcoming changes in my life. My GRE went well, I was able to use earplugs and as exhausted  as I was by the end it was finished. Honestly, I probably could have done better if I'd requested different circumstances, but this wasn't a matter of life-or-death for me. My application for grad school went out with very few problems, but the rest of my life continued in shambles.

I continued to battle with my employer through the insurance company, and as a result my mental stability went out the window. I read MadamBipolar on a fairly regular basis, and I've also been following this series on bipolar in the workplace, in addition to this series on the same subject. This combined with my recent acquisition of Ken Steele's The Day The Voices Stopped I have had a resurgence of the weight my fight holds. In the grand scheme of the world my fight against my company isn't going to change the way America views bipolar, on the contrary I hear my coworkers are quite enjoying calling me an alcoholic, among other choice slander, but it does prove to me that I am worth this fight. Also, each fight like this that is waged and won for the mentally ill brings us closer to actual acceptance.

My employer finally offered me a return to work schedule when I was in Detroit (having run away during a particularly nasty bout of self-doubt), that did not meet my accommodations. I told them I could not accept their terms, and explained which terms needed to be met. The response? Talk to the insurance, they told us this was acceptable. So I did, and the insurance, in turn, told them exactly what I told them. I need a quiet work environment to be successful at detailed data entry work. Through all of this the insurance has been a lifesaver. Without the resources I've linked to above, a supportive unit of family and friends, and doctors & insurance that fought for me I would not have been able to wage this particular war. I went nearly a month without being paid at all.

My medical situation and requested restrictions were judged by medical professionals that have never met me. My company chose to be discriminatory and misinformed, in spite of the masters in psychology held by my immediate boss, and her boss disclosing to me that a close family member suffers from bipolar. When the experts approved my medically necessary restriction of a quiet work environment I was beyond elated. This meant that the cycle of discrimination would HAVE to end! They have to admit that I was right to have the freedoms I experienced with my former boss, and my former boss was progressive and a wonderful boss that understood his employees needs without being strong-armed  into non-discrimination. Wrong. They chose, instead, to claim they are unable to accommodate me through my previous work schedule. This is a schedule that I maintained for two years in their department under different management. This management is unable to let me complete my data entry job when I can be successful, they would rather I be less successful and work within their hours. Fortunately, again, the insurance came to my rescue. I still get paid, and will get paid for up to 4 years of disability because my request for a quiet work environment is 100% medically supported.

So the battle is done and the employer forfeits. I'm satisfied with this result, if only because I get to complete my last school semester in peace. There was an issue with payment for my last few semesters, but that was resolved quickly through a letter to the school. It appears my school doesn't want to lose a student with a 3.59 GPA in her last semester because an employer can't bother to follow ADA laws. I received enough grants to cover all of the remaining balance for tuition.

When I explain my situation every single person I've talked to sees the blatant discrimination. Every single person thinks that its awful. And yet, my coworkers still make derogatory comments about me because they don't understand my situation. They ask why I haven't returned. They make offhand comments like "if she's well enough to be an alcoholic, why isn't she well enough to return to work?" The fact of the matter is I am not an alcoholic. Two beers and I'm drunk. Four and it takes me days to recover from my hangover. They are being bigoted and rude. My employer does not correct these types of comments. If I was at work I would be told to alter my behavior to prevent these comments. I don't really care about these comments, but I will never again put up with working for an employer that behaves this way. Management and HR should not allow bigotry to happen. That self-regulation I thought was possible so few years ago is a myth.

In spite of all the mess, I don't have to return to that work environment. I get to stay home, work through my last semester at school, and attend an interview for graduate admission. The best part of the whole thing? By choosing to not be supportive and instead engage in behavior that borders on illegal, my company is paying me to stay home and accomplish my dreams. I get 60% of my former paycheck, plus I keep my insurance. In addition, their behavior and the reduced pay is the reason my education is paid. I know they feel like they've won because the strange girl with all the difficult requests is no longer there, and they didn't have to deal with a lawsuit from firing me, but I think I came out on top this time. Four months of hell is really a small price to pay when I count all the blessings their decision has brought upon me.

New Year, New Changes

I'm embarking on the beginning of a journey this year. Choices resulting in major changes have been occurring more quickly as this year begins. I take the GRE on Thursday afternoon. The results of that test could mean any number of outcomes for this year, which in turn will change my life in ways I have no way to see. This is true of every year, but this year I feel it more acutely this year. A year and a half ago I made a huge decision to choose education. I already have an associates in lab techniques for biotechnology applications, which will serve me well in my current location because I have references, good technical skills, and a phenomenal work ethic. But if I want to leave my location I needed something more. Something that would be recognized elsewhere, so I began the end of my undergraduate career. I finish that career in May with a double major in Biochemistry and French Language. A way to move to other places, and a huge step forward. A step that continues to be cemented day by day by the unfair treatment of my employer. I'm the type of person that finds it extremely difficult to leave a job once I've started there. I worked for a movie rental store for six months after they stopped paying me. It actually got so bad that I couldn't even cash my payroll checks at Wal-Mart. Ridiculous, right? If it weren't made so blatantly clear that my job doesn't want me I would probably try to go to grad school in Madison, while continuing to work there.

Instead, the next 12 months brings more college applications. A physical move more bold than I've made in a long time, and a whole new set of experiences. I feel more at peace with this than I probably should with the potential problems I face in the next 12 months as well. A potential job loss, loss of insurance (again), the uncertainty of job prospects for both me and my husband...any large change comes with a potential for great disaster. I don't know what the future brings, but I am excited to see what will happen. I've decided to not make any resolutions this year, in favor of making good choices to keep my health in line through any storms that show up through any of this years many changes.

The Power of Touch

With the last year being so ridiculously horrible in regards to work my mental health deteriorated steadily through the year as well. I started this year with extremely high hopes, and great grades to show for it. My company helped me pay for my education and as part of their "help" to get me where I wanted to be my life got turned upside-down more than it would have just through school. I took great risks with my medication, which has lead to more and more serious episodes of mania, depression, and paranoia. The worst of this was the paranoia that has continued, albeit less severe than when I was at work being tormented by ever changing rules.

Which leads me to the subject of this blog post. Many people believe in the power of touch, this is apparent with massage therapy, acupuncture, acupressure, and countless other therapies that have made a comeback in our medical profession. My preferred reading lately has been dystopian societies or books about sex. The interesting juxtaposition of these types of books really tells two things about touch. Humans crave touch the same way we need water or food. The first book of the Hunger Games shows Katniss reaching out to whoever she can for help, for contact, for comfort. The other side is shown in Jenna Jameson's memoir, where she tries so hard to be accepted that she ends up putting herself in a compromising position as a teen and touch does nothing but hurt.

Having experienced both sides of the spectrum I can say for sure that touch can both heal and hurt. The healing aspect of touch is way more effective than the way that touch can hurt. I spend my nights laying awake in bed, scared that someone is going to break into my apartment. Terrified that my job is going to find something they deem to justify their actions, and that a judge is going to agree. Horrified at the possibility of being murdered in my bed while I'm asleep. This paranoia doesn't subside ever, it's always present at low levels. Until last night. Last night as I fell asleep I was super uncomfortable and at the same time more at peace than I have been nearly all year. My head resting on his shoulder, the most comforting touch came from his hand on my shoulder. He was sleeping, and every time I needed comfort his hand squeezed my shoulder a little.

All it took was that little touch and I slept more soundly than I have in months. I hope 2012 brings more peaceful nights, and a more peaceful mind.

Grocery Shopping & Racism?

I went grocery shopping this morning to get basics for meals, and stuff for pirogi because Miss Crystal Freeman made me want to try making some. While I was there I witnessed one of the most atrocious instances of human behavior I've ever seen, recreation below:

Clerk standing next to the aisle: Excuse me. (as she moves out of the way)
Old Lady: *whispering* Fuck you!
Clerk: Excuse me? I'm just trying to get out of your way...
Manager: Is something wrong?
Clerk: I was just trying to get out of her way.
Old Lady: *all haughty* That is NOT what happened and you know it.

Another employee vouched for the young clerk and the woman just shook her head and walked away. I watched other people get in this woman's way; she behaved completely different when the person in her way was white than she did when they were black or Asian. I have never seen anyone treat people like that.

When I got home I wondered why I've never seen that before. I would imagine that it probably happens on a smaller scale pretty frequently because of our countries desire to just not talk about something instead of fixing the naivety that allows it to continue. I've come to the conclusion that the reason I don't see it is I don't treat people that way. In my world there is no reason why someone should be treated differently based on color, nationality, sexual orientation, gender...Not to say that I treat everyone equally. People are treated differently based on how I feel about them, or how I feel when I'm around them. I suppose some people may make those judgments based on external things. Either way I was completely appalled by the lady, and if it wouldn't have gotten me kicked out of the store I would have made her shopping even more hell than she made it herself.

A Healthy Dose of Paranoia Never Hurt Anyone

I've been on and off short term disability for roughly four months of this less than happy year. Not of my own accord, but because Corporate America does not believe in the employee. Which leads me to my conspiracy theory about this employers market that is currently happening in the good old U. S. of A.

My employer does engagement surveys to improve their employees experience in the workplace. I've filled out this engagement survey twice. Last years survey was very positive. I was more than satisfied with my job, I needed improvement but trusted my company to provide me with the opportunity and tools to improve. I trusted my boss, my bosses boss, my bosses bosses boss, and HR to provide me with fair treatment and a due process if anything happened to go awry. Unfortunately, everything went awry. My new boss had a degree that made me trust her with my very individual set of mental illness difficulties. I was presented with a series of "opportunities" packaged to make me feel good about the direction I was moving in the company. There were accusations made on my abilities as a scientist, and my ability to perform my job satisfactorily was systematically demolished by a boss that was unable to communicate with me. There was no help given to my boss, except to continue feeding them corporate double-speak that worked less every time we tried to make sense of each other. In the end my schedule was changed in a way that was impossible for me to accommodate with my medications and my illness. I was deprived of the ability to help my coworkers, the one thing that really brings me joy at work.

I love doing a great job, I love being phenomenal at what I do, being indispensable. Most of all, I love being helpful. Knowing enough about my job to step in where I'm needed, taking some of the blood, sweat and tears away from coworkers that don't have as much of a desire to throw their lives into their work. I want nothing more than to give my employer everything they want, and do a better job for them then they could ever dream. In return I ask for respect, the ability to have flexibility in my schedule to accommodate my insane need to fill my life with more than most would dare with school. I also ask for understanding for my strange schedule habits just in general. My particular breed of crazy sometimes doesn't let me do my job all at once if it's not necessary. Sometimes I need to take longer breaks than most, sometimes I work better in the middle of the night. If I'm needed for something there is a guarantee I will be there for the entire time I'm needed, but if I'm not I work better with an accommodation of extreme flexibility. I'm not alone. I read a memoir of a lawyer who used to sleep under her desk for that very reason. People like she and I don't fit into Corporate America's rules and regulations. If the company is willing to look the other way, or make special contracts to allow for our strange work habits we will be the best employee you will ever have.

America right now is an employer's market. They don't have to put up with such nonsense, and no one cares if employees are good as long as they don't cost very much. Unfortunately for people like the memoir writer and myself, we are very costly. Each of the first two years I worked for my company I was hospitalized for a week, and out for two more after that to determine the correct amount of medication. Six weeks of unworked time paid for by the short term insurance company. Six weeks the company had to hold my job for me without the ability to bring someone else in and fill the void. It was two terms of three weeks, nearly a year apart, but when it becomes an employers market they remember those things. In the year since I filled out that first employee engagement survey I have been pushed and pulled into stress that resulted in four months out in one year. Every time I make enough personal headway to return to work the rules change. Last time the rules were completely thrown out the window and I didn't even recognize the game that was being played.

It would be very easy to point at my company and say it's their fault. That's false. I'm not usually one for political statements, but what I've heard of the "We are the 99%" movement, it is the same principle at work. Our large businesses run exactly the way congress works. Everything is based on money. In an employees market, when companies are struggling to fill jobs I am worth the risk and the cost because I am an amazing employee. When employees are struggling to find work because the unemployment rate is so high I'm not worth the cost. Quality is sacrificed for the sake of the bottom line. Power and control lie with the company and when the power falls elsewhere the company uses any means necessary to get it back. It's lame and I've seen and heard many large companies doing this recently in the U.S. The 99% don't have money, therefore they don't have power. This means that the corporations, which behave like our government, are going to run our lives until there is an economic shift.

I don't know how to fix the underlying problem without an overhaul of the government, but I do know that we need to educate the public about their rights regarding illnesses and disorders. There are laws that require companies to behave a certain way when there is a legitimate medical reason for an accommodation. Students use this all the time in the form of test readers, note takers, extra time provided for tests, and quiet environments provided for tests, among other accommodations. These laws do extend to Corporate America and an adult life. It is unreasonable to expect someone that needs extra accommodations at school won't need them in their professional life. The ADA may be a good place to look for help, but there are two professions that are the most stable in these economic circumstances: law enforcement and lawyers. Many lawyers provide free consultations. They will be able to tell you if your employer is behaving in a legal manner. Not all unsavory behavior is illegal, in spite of being unethical. A lawyer can help sort that out for you.

One year ago I believed that large corporations would be able to self-regulate against unethical behavior. I now know better. I don't believe that unions are the answer to regulating unethical behavior, but employee knowledge of the line between unethical and illegal will be a huge step forward. Don't let an employer take advantage for as long as I did. Find answers, find help, learn the laws that pertain to your circumstances and don't be afraid to take a stand. The more people do this, the more companies will realize people value fair treatment and ethical employers. And please, don't forget being the 99% five, ten, twenty years from now when the market turns and yet again favors employees more than corporations. That is when we will have power and can make a real change in Corporate America.