A Splintered Mind

Friday - Entry 29: Where to begin? It is Day93 . My energy levels seem to be returning, though the deep cough lingers. My lungs still burn as if I had just come down with bronchitis. I am still physically inactive, which is difficult as March goes out like a lamb with warm breezes and sunny days. I hope to go to church this Sunday and brave exposure to friendly, smiling people. If only I wasn't also suffering from a really bad haircut. I must admit. It was a truly bad haircut. Each day I struggle with it to look halfway decent, but it seems to have been cut to enhance all of my cowlicks in the most unflattering ways possible. The hairs stick out here and there as if i had been trimmed by a blind gardner with a weed wacker. My vanity is deeply wounded… …but not as deeply wounded as my beloved minivan. On Wensday the 20th, the same day my blog passed the 300,000 unique visitor mark, my minivan was on its way to Unique Auto Body. I had been driving out of my building comp...

I wanted to share with you a blog that I have been aware of for years. It is called Beyond Blue and is written by author Therese Borchard . I find Therese's exploration of the intersection of faith and depression very interesting even if I don't share the same faith as her. I used to comment there years ago, but found myself drawn into fights with her readers, some of who branded me as "the Secret guy"—named after that once popular book The Secret by Rhonda Byrne —because of my belief that depression can be overcome with positive thinking and recognizing your triggers. Since I am still  hypersensitive to psychotropic meds, this is the philosophy that has helped me survive depression. I don't believe in a sentient Universe awaiting my every wish like some genie in a bottle as The Secret suggests. I believe that positive thinking puts us in the proper mindset to fight depression and win. And truthfully, I feel that my approach to fighting depression was insp...

If you follow my blog, then you know I've been working on writing a book for quite some time. Actually, I've finished quite a few of them. I've got a handful of picture book manuscripts finished, as well as a middle grade novel. They weren't very good so I put them aside. I also began working on an ADHD book last year as well as a Depression book. I started a new middle grade novel, too. Of course, there's this blog, and soon I will blog on an additional website as well as a SciFi entertainment review site, both paid gigs. And I write in a journal. Two of them. There's also the freelance web content work I do. I also dump my mind into Path on a daily basis, as well as other social networks. I write. A lot. However, there was only so much time in any given day, so when something had to give in my schedule it was usually my personal book projects. It should have been Twitter, but Twitter was easy and writing books was not. So I decided to focus on one book instea...

I was contacted recently by a group taking research data on Depression and turning it into an app. The research was by Harvard scientist, Diego Pizzagalli. Using MRIs and EEGs, he noticed certain parts of the brain light up in response to antidepressants and psychotherapy. If those parts of the brain weren't lighting up, then the treatment wasn't working. So he asked himself, "Is there another way to light up those parts of the brain?" He and a group of app developers formed BrainTracer and created MoodTune, an app that, if played for 15 minutes a day, will replace medical treatments for some people. You can read more about it over at Popular Science . It sounds promising, but I'd have to see it at work before getting too excited. Also, their payment scheme is pricey and puts the app out of reach for my budget, though you might find it acceptable if you were already paying for medication. Users basically subscribe to the app. There is a kickstarter project ...

Visitor Map from a Small Slice of a March Day I just wanted to take a moment to mark this event. Today my blog crossed over the 300,000 unique visitor line. Three Hundred Thousand Unique Visitors! I don't count page loads because many of you find my blog then dig through the archives for a while. I'm counting unique individuals from all over the world who have come by to read what I have to say. It's humbling. When I crossed 50,000 in 2007 , I thought that was a big deal. When I crossed 100,000 in 2008  I thought that was a big deal, too. Now I don't know what to think. 300,000. Wow. I want to thank all of you for hanging in there with me. For reading. For commenting. And for sharing. Thank you. (This blog was written on Thursday, March 28, 2013 4:44:44 PM)

Never mind that I already went out for a 2 mile walk tonight. My nervous system feels positively oppressed. I need to feel the wind on my face and the ground moving under my feet. The stars fight to be seen above the city lights, but I just tonight found a place to lie down and watch the stars in private. I remember how cool the grass was on my hot skin after my brisk walk, and I look forward to getting worked up like that again. Then I can rest in my new spot, let my eyes adjust to the semi-darkness, and see the stars pop out one by one from the gray sky. But not for long. Soon I'll need to leave stargazing behind and walk, walk, walk. If I still had nervous energy built up after that, I could work out or dance or climb stairs. Or write. Or clean. Anything but give in to the boredom. Sleep? I can't do that. I'm too restless. Hallowell & Ratey list this quality as one of the hallmarks of Adult ADHD . 16. Restlessness One usually does not see in an adult the fu...

Tuesday - Entry 28: The sudden sound of a freight train with rusty wheels filled my living room. I put down my edits and ran to the balcony to see what was making such a loud racket at 3am. I live by a lumberyard complete with train tracks, but have never seen any trains use them in the year and a half I've been here. I assumed they were long abandoned for flatbed trucks—along with the rusted grain silo and weather worn buildings. But there it was backing into the lumberyard. A train! I ran outside to get a better look. Like a little boy I was thrilled to see the train so close to my apartment complex—right on the other side of the wall. I arrived just after it quickly picked up its load. As the train pulled away I followed it to the corner of my parking lot and watched it head off into the night. Then I walked around my complex typing on my iPhone the last edits for my blog post. There was a slight drizzle, and the faint but certain scent of Spring was in the air. For t...

Today I wanted to share with you an excellent list of blogs that cover Depression and Bipolar Disorder. It was put together by the folks over at the Depression Treatment Center . Somehow, I ended up on the list. I think it's a mistake. But they assured me I belonged there. I guess you'll have to be the judge. The list has some of the same blogs I've seen on lists like these before, like Beyond Blue by my old blogging friend Terese Borchard, but there are some new ones in there I was excited to learn about. Fighting the Darkness looked interesting, as did Beyond Meds & The Secret Life of a Manic Depressive . This is by no means the best of them. They're all excellent from what I could see from a cursory glance. I invite you to visit the Best Depression Blogs of 2013 and see for yourself. ~Dˢ

(I am listening to “ All This Time ” by Sara Watkins and other melancholy tunes as I process my thoughts about yesterday.) Thursday - Entry 27: After a full day of parent-teacher meetings, a church meeting, and an emergency school meeting with family at my old home, I was pretty pooped for the day. It was Day70. I still struggled with a bronchial cough and limited energy. A test on Monday had ruled out allergies as my problem. I still had left a CT scan and a blood test for weak immunities to complete. The day had been a beautiful one, and I had been in high spirits. I had received a check from some freelance writing I had done. I had a contract for a new paid blogging gig awaiting my attention. My children loved me. I had positive experiences with my daughters' teachers. And nobody had tried to kill me while I drove around—a rare event. Yet those high spirits had set with the sun. As midnight encroached, a darker mood came along with it. Despite the drizzle, I decide...

This week I'd like to point you in the direction of Bryan Hutchinson's vibrant community over at ADDer World . The forums are very active, especially the Adult ADHD forum with posts daily. If you are looking to connect with others who share AD/HD in common, this is a great place to start. What I really enjoy about Bryan's site is his collection of free ebooks on dealing with ADHD and self-esteem. Whereas other folks like me blog about ADHD, and even more take to Twitter and microblog about it, Bryan publishes. He has easily a dozen ebooks and PDFs for you to load into your iPad or eReader. Not only that, but he has his own memoir for sale: One Boy's Struggle: A Memoir: Surviving Life with Undiagnosed ADD I've taken a look at a few of his free ebooks and they are professionally laid out and full of upbeat information. If you are into ebooks, I'd definitely drop by his site to check them out. You may even find kindred spirits in the forums. If you don't take ...