Rave on this crazy feeling

Turns out that the party drug ecstasy (we called it X when I was a kid and it first hit college campuses, and nowadays they call it E, but technically it's known as MDMA) may have efficacy in treating post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) -- and by extension I'm assuming panic disorder, too.

Don't believe me? There's no reason you should. But maybe you'll believe The Economist magazine, where an article called "Agony and ecstasy" recently was published. From the article:

Dr Mithoefer’s Phase II research, which used MDMA from the only legal source—a chemist at Purdue University licensed by the DEA to distribute controlled quantities from a supply synthesised in 1985—is directly descended from the first generation of LSD psychotherapy. Subjects were given MDMA while attended by Dr Mithoefer and his wife, a psychiatric nurse. They rested on a futon, listened to music and were encouraged to revisit their trauma.

“I remember feeling incredibly safe and very motivated,” says Ms Westerfield of her first session....

The patients who received MDMA showed statistically significant improvement of their PTSD symptoms compared with those who received the same day-long therapy sessions with an inactive placebo. “All the major approaches involve revisiting the trauma in therapy”, says Dr Mithoefer, “but patients may be overwhelmed and retraumatised.” He believes the fear and defensiveness that characterise PTSD are obstacles to treatment, and that it is MDMA’s attenuation of these emotions that permits concurrent psychotherapy to be effective. He will publish the study shortly.

Sounds like MDMA may help those who panic process situations that trigger their attacks -- e.g., it might facilitate more effective cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) treatment. Maybe someone will do similar studies about MDMA's potential in treating panic and agoraphobia. Until then, though, rave on.

But keep it clean -- self-treatment with unprescribed medications is a risky game.

On panic attacks and Iron Man 3

In the most recent installment of the Iron Man movie franchise, Tony Stark experiences what are clearly panic attacks. You can check one out here.

Reaction has been significant on the internet.

Twitter lit up with conversation about Tony Stark's anxiety.

More than one psychologist has considered Iron Man's possible DSM diagnosis.

A social work advocate looked at potential policy implications.

Me? I wish I'd had one of those Iron Man suits back when I first started having panic attacks. "No sign of cardiac anomaly or unusual brain activity," the suit tells Tony Stark. "My diagnosis is that you've experienced a severe anxiety attack." That would have been a whole lot easier than stumbling around blind for years before finally learning what a panic attack was and why I was having them.

Waiting to get on the bus

So im on the bus now. Paid my £1.80 :) slightly anxious but im feeling good! Bring it on kind of mood. Its set off. Comforting it goes as fast as a car. Nice big space not claustraphobic at all. Bus driver also seemed really nice. Looking out of windows. Not many people on it either. Feeling fine. Breathing steadily in threw nose&out threw mouth. And there I am nearly at the stop I said Id meet my dad at :) better than i thought amd defonitely not what i expected. Negative thoughts really arnt reality. Completed my homework woohoo!!xxxx

The Versatile Blogger Award Now Tattooed on My First Born Son!

I didn't know WHAT to do with this shiny new award I just got from the delightful Cherie over at Ready. Write. Go. (Honored I am, indeed!)

At first I thought this might be some kind of master Ponzi scheme. If I give five people awards, and they give five people awards, and so on, and so on, we'll end up with really thick and lustrous hair, or maybe in prison! I wouldn't like prison. Unless I had really shiny, nice hair, which I could sell for contraband so that my fellow inmates could make knock-off Barbie dolls and sell them, to others who would then re-sell them to still other people...oh, I digress.

So I thought the best thing to do with this nice award was to display it to my neighbors, in case they forget to read my blog. So I took my kid to a tattoo artist and had this done. He was upset, but I was proud and pleased.

Relax, everyone, this is not really my kid! He doesn't even look like me, man. No, I never saw that kid, I swear. I got this photo off Flickr. He has only TWO teeth and I have lots. Where are you taking me?

Without further adieu, the rules of this blogger award are:

1. Thank and link to the person who nominated me.
2. Share seven random facts about myself.
3. Pass the award along to 5 new-found blogging buddies.
4. Contact those buddies to congratulate them.

SEVEN FACTS

1. I have never tattooed a child. I am Caucasian with a wee bit of Native American tossed in the pot, and that kid is not mine.
2. I was once painted green, and I have updated my profile photo to share that, in honor of my new green award! Green is my favorite color, too. Especially when featured on a Lilly Pulitzer outfit.
3. I lived in Athens, Greece for a year at age 13.
4. I can play guitar but...
5. My singing is frightful. (I'm working on it, though.)
6. I have a costume trunk in the attic that contains wig, fake animal noses, and all manner of marvelous tag sale finds.
7. In elementary school I decided I wanted to be called "Pony," hence the true origin of this blog's name.

And the award-ees! I'm betting that a couple of these peeps have this award already (I searched but could not find it), but if I am first to hand it over, GO ME! (By the way, I feel sort of shy and goofy giving this award. Shucks. I like these people!)

1. Anita Howard
2. Angela, aka The Starving Novelist
3. Bethany, aka Rookie Riter
4. Mary Frame, aka Marewolf
5. Holly VanDyne

Stop relying on those struggling to speak first

(CW: talk of suicide.)

I’m a bit irritated. 

I used to blog a lot when I was irritated. I loved having fierce emotions and strong opinions but when my mental health started going up the spout, my fierce emotions became a misdirected mess and I had no opinions on anything because what’s the fucking point, am I right. 

But I’m irritated and tired at a particular part of the mental health conversation so I’m here and ready to bang my gavel.

It’s a repeated and basic point, but social media is both a blessing and a curse, especially when it comes to mental health. It allows a space for all to explore and be open, and it allows for trolls and bullies and thoughts and opinions from all angles. It’s liberating, but it’s exhausting. It’s progressive, but it’s dangerous. Ad infinitum. 

Thanks to social media, we also now know pretty quickly when someone - more often a celebrity/someone well known - takes their own life. There’s likely no warning. We refresh and suddenly know about the actions they took often no longer than 24 hours previously. Sometimes we don’t know them, sometimes we know of them, and sometimes we know them and like them and love them. It’s a hard thing to stomach. 

I try and stay out of the aftermath when this happens. I find it hard to read stories on suicide, especially when they’re so raw, and I know I can’t contribute to the conversation. I feel anything I say will be futile and so I step away, but not before I get probably irrationally angry at tweets and Facebook statuses and Instagram posts ordering those struggling with their mental health to talk. 

“Please tell someone if you’re feeling suicidal!!!”

“Don’t suffer in silence. Talk to someone. Say something.”

“I’m always here if you need a chat. xxx”

“I can’t believe someone could feel so lost that they’d commit suicide?!!” 

It’s not ‘commit suicide’, because suicide is no longer a crime. Say they took their own life, ‘completed’ suicide, or killed themselves. Do not say ‘commit’. Ok? Ok.

If I end up grating my teeth so hard just writing this post that I get sore and can’t eat dinner later then I’m gonna be so fucking angry. And I’m really trying to not be angry, and blunt, and sarcastic, because that’s not too healthy when talking about mental health, and especially suicide. I’m trying.

But, believe it or not, people who are struggling with their mental health likely know that they should talk. They know that there are people out there who would listen, whether it be their family, friends, teachers, colleagues, GP, a stranger on a helpline, strangers on social media. They know. They know that the biggest step can be admitting you’re struggling, starting that conversation.

They know. 

They don’t need an old school friend, who they’ve only still got on Facebook because they like keeping up with the dramatic oversharing, saying that their inbox is always open if you need to talk xoxoxoxoxox. They don’t need another thread on Twitter with thousands of numbers telling them to talk if they think suicide is their only option. They don’t need a whimsy Instagram quote on a beautiful background with an unncessary amount of hashtags telling them that they’re important and life is beautiful. 

It’s not enough. They know. People who struggle with their mental health may have irrational thoughts, but they still know they’re not ok, most of the time. They know about the importance of talking. They know who they can talk to. But they need more. They need:

1) The tools and skills to help them talk about how they’re feeling, and

2) Others to start the conversation for them

And 2) is what I’m encouraging here. That’s what I’m highlighting, what I’m shoving on a billboard, what I’m sticking up in neon lights with fireworks.

S T A R T T H E C O N V E R S A T I O N F O R T H E M.

Disclaimer: No, it’s not your responsibility to care for someone’s mental health. It’s not your responsibility to fix anything and provide answers. It’s not your responsibility to be responsible. But the art of conversation and learning and practising the skills to talk about mental health - your own and others’ - is important and underrated.

Please don’t get me wrong. I encourage the encouragement to get those struggling to speak up and not be afraid to talk about their mental health. Hell, I ran a fucking marathon (here she is, banging on about the marathon again) for Heads Together, whose message was just that. I encourage conversations and taking those first steps and going to see your GP. That’s great. It’s important. It’s not futile and pointless and basic. But it cannot stop there. You cannot rely on that. Everyone is different, their situations are different, and making it obvious that you can talk about your struggles is not enough.

A lot of people don’t know HOW to talk about their mental health, their thoughts, their emotions. We’re not taught it. Someone might WANT to speak up, but they don’t know where to bloody start. That’s something for another post. 

A lot of people are obviously unwell. They’re down or anxious. Their behaviours have changed. They’re erratic. They’re emotional. It’s noticeable. But those around them don’t know how to broach it. They feel embarrassed or like it’s not their place, so they wait for the person to admit it themselves. That’s also something for another post. Another another post.

A lot of people are secretly unwell. They’re good actors, they have coping mechanisms. They’re charmers. They’re jokers. They’re good at excuses, they’re extroverts. They’re high-functioning and they’re different people when they’re alone again. 

You’re not meant to be mind-readers, so what do you do then? 

The lesson here, to me, is to always be talking about mental health. You don’t have to struggle to talk about it. You don’t have to use technical language. You don’t need a psychology degree. You don’t have to talk about feeling bad, you can talk about feeling good. That’s still mental health. You can explore why you’re feeling certain ways with someone, and you can ask how that someone is too. 

You can drop them a text.

You can meet up for lunch.

You can go for a walk. 

You can ask them how things are going and how they’re doing. You can check in. You can talk about your own feelings to make it obvious you’re open. You can be invested in those around you, always. The more comfortable you make your relationships, the more likely someone will reach out should they need to. 

It shouldn’t take someone taking their own life for you to insist that you’re always there and your inbox is open. Mental health shouldn’t be a topic solely focused on when tragedy strikes. It’s not seasonal, it’s not topical at all. It should be an ongoing conversation, just part of your life, however you and your loved ones are doing and feeling. Always check in.
 

So when you feel compelled to tell people you’re always there for a chat or to urge those struggling to speak out, start talking yourself. Start talking now, go on. Send a text. Send a Snapchat with a rabbit filter, whatever. You’re not a mind reader and you can’t stop anyone from feeling mentally unwell, but maybe you’ll encourage someone to reach out. Maybe you’ll give them an opportunity instead of near-shaming them for not taking the step blindly themselves.

Don’t rely on those struggling to open up. Open up for them. Be aware. Be mindful. Be kind. That’s all.

Dr Allen Discusses Borderline Personality Disorder The Earth Needs Rebels Show on Orion Talk Radio

Dr. Allen discussed his ideas about borderline personality disorder in detail (this time it's just him and the host) on The Earth Needs Rebels Show broadcast on Orion Talk Radio http://oriontalkradio.com from Tonawanda, New York, 1650am and global on the internet, with additional feeds like Tunein Radio (http://tunein.com for more information on tunein radio and free software).

Here is the link to the downloaded broadcast: http://oriontalkradio.com/archives.htm.  Click on "down" and not on "listen."  The date and times posted for the broadcast: Tuesday, August 13, at 1:05 and 2:05 PM.

Parts 2 will be on live September 10 from 12-2 PM U.S. Central Time.

On fear of flying

Bill McGee of USA Today recently wrote a very thorough article all about the fear of flying, from what causes it...

...the "fear" of flying may in fact be comprised of separate and distinct fears, including fear of heights, fear of loss of control, fear of losing one's balance, and fear of death itself, in addition to claustrophobia, panic disorders and social phobias. Many travelers suffer from two or more of these conditions at once, so an effective diagnosis is critical.

...to a variety of ways it can be coped with:

Some nervous fliers simply choose to medicate, though counselors say this may not always be effective. For those concerned about side effects, some travelers prefer homeopathic products, which offer a non-addictive alternative to many prescription sedatives and other medications. Homeopathic remedies for fear of flying symptoms are offered through a variety of health stores and online.

Counselors I spoke to question the effectiveness of hypnosis, but those who are receptive to such procedures may find comfort in this option. In-person visitation is the preferred method, but patients who don't have the time and/or money and/or access can purchase a variety of audio tools. Also, synchronized breathing might help some find relief and calm their nerves. Ancient exercises—such as Qi Gong—are proven stress relievers, but may not work for all nervous fliers, particularly once they're airborne. However, under certain conditions such practices could provide a low-cost and natural remedy.

One of the simplest of all solutions may prove effective for some fearful fliers: Listening to soothing music on an iPod or other electronic device can ease the stress and anxiety of flying. In addition, some recordings can be overdubbed with subliminal therapeutic advice.

Of course, psychological counseling is always an option as well.

The piece also links to fear-of-flying clinics and seminars across the country and around the world.

On Boundaries and Burnout

Before I say anything else, I need to point you toward my WIDGET. No, that is not a euphemism. My friend Brigid Kemmerer made me this handy little SANCTUM countdown widget, and now I have it to stare at and watch the seconds fly by. If you would also like to stare at it, feel free to grab and post.

NOW ... as you probably know, writing is not my only job. I still psychologize (though on fewer days than before my writing career began to gobble up everything else). In fact, I direct something called the Center for Community Based Services at my agency, and that means I supervise staff and do all sorts of other training/consulting/meeting type things.

I have the best staff in the world. They are simply the most dedicated, thoughtful, vibrant bunch of people I've ever worked with. Their jobs are difficult--we provide intensive home- and community-based behavioral health services to families with kids who are at high risk for psychiatric hospitalization or for incarceration. It's a job that entails a definite element of physical risk--some staff members have been assaulted by clients who were having a particularly hard time. But the job also comes with emotional risk, and last week we all met to discuss that a bit.

In our weekly staff meeting, we talked about burnout, and what causes it. Staff listed a lot of things that could lead to burnout--not taking good care of themselves, dealing with uncertainty, not seeking or accepting help and support from colleagues and supervisors ... but they also came up with this: not having healthy boundaries.

Not having healthy boundaries can lead to burnout.

And as I thought about it, I realized that is true for many professions, not just for those in the mental health field. It's also true for writers. Here are some ways unhealthy boundaries can manifest:

No feeling able to say NO. To a request for a beta-read or critique. To a guest blog post. To a co-authored project. To a promotional or other group project.

Always being ON. The demands of social media are 24/7. Content content content. Interaction interaction interaction. Now now now. It's difficult to unplug, but what are the consequences for being ... plugged? All the time?

Too much self-disclosure. Really, it's easy to live life online. You can tell others your deepest, darkest secrets and feelings with a series of keystrokes, never having to look them in the eye. And sometimes, disclosure is pure and honest and brave and therapeutic. But sometimes, when the potential risks are not thought through, it leaves a person quite vulnerable and can lead to regret and ongoing feelings of anxiety and victimization. Despite this risk, there's a significant amount of pressure to get personal, I think. It often feels good in the moment, and it's often reinforced by others, which leads to more, and more personal, disclosure. I think the amount of disclosure that's "right" totally depends on the individual and how he/she handles it, but when the balance is off, burnout is a risk.


On Monday, I'll talk about how I manage this personally (and imperfectly) as I get ready for the publication of my first novel.

For now, I think I'll take a breath and ask YOU to weigh in! How do you think about boundaries? How do you maintain them? Are here other ways unhealthy boundaries can manifest?

On nervous breakdowns

Chances are, if you've been agoraphobic, depressed, or anxious for any significant portion of your life, you've experienced something approximating the classic nervous breakdown -- a feeling of being overwhelmed by life and a capitulation to and admission that you are helpless to overcome the pain it brings.

On the Verge of 'Vital Exhaustion?' is a New York Times piece from Sunday, May 31. It traces the history of the concept of the nervous breakdown:

This is the latest umbrella term for the kind of emotional collapses that have plagued humanity for ages, stemming at times from severe mental difficulties and more often from mild ones. There have been plenty of others. In the early decades of the 20th century, many people simply referred to a crackup, including “The Crack-Up,” F. Scott Fitzgerald’s 1936 collection of essays describing his own. And before that there was neurasthenia, a widely diagnosed and undefined nerve affliction causing just about any symptom people cared to add.

Yet medical historians say that, for versatility and descriptive power, it may be hard to improve upon the “nervous breakdown.” Coined around 1900, the phrase peaked in usage during the middle of the 20th century and echoes still.

It also looks at evolving attitudes towards sufferers of nervous breakdowns:

A nervous breakdown was no small thing in the 1950s or ’60s, at least by the time a person arrived at a doctor’s office. Psychiatrists today say that, most often, it was code for an episode of severe depression — or psychosis, the delusions that often signal schizophrenia.

“I don’t remember people who got that label ever using it as their own complaint — it was very much stigmatized,” said Dr. Nada L. Stotland, a former president of the American Psychiatric Association and a professor at Rush Medical College in Chicago, who began practicing in the 1960s. “Whether it was ‘nervous exhaustion’ or ‘nervous breakdown,’ anything that sounded psychiatric was stigmatized at that time. It was shameful, humiliating.”

Famous people who've had nervous breakdowns include Beach Boy Brian Wilson (upon hearing the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band), comedian Richard Pryor (onstage in Las Vegas in 1969), Enron CEO Jeffrey Skilling (as evidence of his company's greed, arrogance, and disregard for the law came to public light), writer Joan Didion (who wrote about hers in The White Album) ... the list goes on.

Special bonus (!): an autobiographical depiction of a nervous breakdown (at least, I think that's what it was)....

Whoosh. The automatic door closed behind me, and I stood there in front of the Walgreens. In my chest I sensed the emotion beginning to gallop, a dark, unsettled feeling; if I didn’t seize the reins, I knew, that feeling would only grow. In my mind I saw the Asian man at the pharmacy counter, handing me my bank card and saying, “Sorry, insufficient funds.” 

Around me, the neighborhood went about its midday business. A pretty Latina mom walked by pushing a stroller and talking on a cellphone. A couple of teenaged boys in baggy jeans and oversized white t-shirts; a lady cop, strolling her beat. All of them walking right past me, inches away, without even noticing me. I might as well have been a ghost.

It had been 16 years since my first panic attack. I’d had thousands more since then. Without my pills, I knew, I faced the danger of yet another debilitating cycle of panic. Because of panic, I was 40 years old but unable to keep a steady job. Because of panic, I was almost $60,000 in debt. Each night when I brushed my teeth my gums bled, but I couldn’t afford to visit a dentist. I couldn’t afford health insurance, either, and even if I had been able to, my pre-existing condition made me an unacceptable risk to insurers. And because of panic, I’d lost every woman I’d ever loved, and more than a few important friendships.

I really, really didn’t want to start having panic attacks again. I’d long since stopped believing panic signaled imminent death, yet the attacks remained searing, unbearable; each and every time, they left me feeling like I’d been the victim of physical violence. I was tired of fighting them off, of trying to soften my shoulders and breathe slowly and evenly into the depths of my belly, of telling myself this will pass, this is only temporary. I was tired of the knowledge that even as I endured one panic attack, there was always another waiting to strike.

Twenty years earlier, if you’d told me this was where I’d end up, I’d have laughed right in your face. I was popular. I'd gone to an Ivy League school. I had a fancy job on Wall Street. I was good in front of an audience. Girls liked me. The future seemed bright.

Too often since then, though, I’d been seized by sudden, inexplicable terror. In banks, department stores, supermarkets, bodegas, fast food restaurants, airports, subway stations, elevators, taxicabs, movie theaters, night clubs, art museums, auto dealerships, jury-selection waiting rooms, Las Vegas casinos, and multi-level parking structures; on ski lifts, commuter railroads, crosstown buses, suspension bridges, fishing boats, downtown sidewalks, and alpine hiking trails. And that’s just the short list.

I’d been transformed in the process.

The January sun shone down on Mission Street, penetrating and merciless. Something had to change, I knew; if it didn't, I'd end up killing myself or caked in dirt and living under a highway overpass, all my worldly possessions stored in a shopping cart. I'd missed so much, lost so much, failed in so many ways.

The weight of memory pressed down on me, and right there on Mission Street, all 6'5" and 250 pounds of me, I began to weep.

The Manny Diaries Chapter Fourteen Someone Whacked Me on the Head and Stole My Pants

The Manny has had a spate of bad luck lately, but I want to reassure all his fans that he is absolutely fine, despite the rather ominous tone of this post's title. If I were more verbose, the title of this post would have been "Someone whacked me on the head and stole my pants, shoes, and underwear, and then some ladies found me lying stone cold naked from the waist down in a bush," which is decidedly worse. Because who steals underwear?! And why leave the shirt and take the skivvies?

This is so much more acrobatic than it must have really looked, and my Photoshop is poo, but how long do YOU want to Google terms like "Hairy male legs protruding from bush" before you have to permanently clear your browsing history and take a scalding shower? 

But let's back up. A while back, we got a phone call from Manny, who had suffered a stroke/seizure sort of thing and was slurring and hiccuping uncontrollably. Luckily, the stroke/seizure sort of thing had occurred while his kind landlord, Rudolfo, was on hand unstopping the toilet.

"Apparently, you're not supposed to put TP in the toilet in Mexico," says Manny. "Because I got it all clogged up. Why do they call it toilet paper, anyway? If it doesn't go in the toilet what kind of paper IS it?"

Manny suddenly keeled over and whacked his head on the floor and commenced bleeding and writhing. He related the story as such:

"I fell flat on my head. I almost died! I was bleeding out on the floor! Rudolfo, he sticks his wallet in my mouth so I won't bite myself. But it's too late. I already swallowed some of my tongue! I mean, a big chunk of my tongue! I think I swallowed it!"

"So anyway, Dora, my landlady, calls the Red Cross. She says to me, you're not going to die today, and especially not in my apartment. Meanwhile, my skull is cracked open. It was too much! Did you know that a quarter-inch of my tongue is missing because of the crazy-ass seizure I had?"

"The Red Cross tell me I have brain enamelies. I was fledge-e-ling around all over the floor. My arms were in the air! I bit my tongue off! My mind is crazy! The Red Cross told me that my tongue will fix itself."

He seemed okay, though, and fairly jolly despite what had happened. The Red Cross didn't charge him a penny. He hiccuped and blamed it on the "brain enamelies." He didn't drink anymore, of course!

He went on, sharing more details of his life in Mexico:

"So then, the lady with the scorpion tattoo calls me. I met her at the Learning Library—all the gringos go there. She tells me about the guy who put scorpions in the Mezcal. He cuts their stingers off. Charges $250 a bottle. Hey, my eyes are doing weird shit. There is a guy here who is trying to sell me an AK-47. I've gotten old, and OLD! One day this crazy German chick shows up at my door. She wants to sleep with me!"

"Did you sleep with her?" one of us asked.

"You know I'm a private guy! I don't like to talk about that stuff! How dare you ask me! Yeah, I did.

See, I'm glaringly honest about everything now. I'm like a retarded child! And I'm not drinking a drop."

Then he started talking about how awesome Mexico was and how we all had to come down and live there because it's so beautiful and so safe and marvelous. He planned to rent a beach house. He hoped that we would serve as his "memory," because his brain was doing weird tricks and couldn't remember things properly anymore. 

It might have had a little bit to do with the night, a few weeks later, when someone whacked his skull with a crowbar and took all the clothing off his nethers. He was lost, walking around dazed in some neighborhood, when someone gave him a whack and left him slumped in the weeds, free of pants and shoeless.

"They even took my underwear," he said. "The Red Cross made me some paper towel underwear. I still have a big dent in my head. Like a HOLE in my head, Miss Jennifer. It was awful."

Disposable undies. Not the finest.

During the incident, the poor man bit his tongue again. Maybe a wee little chunk went down the gullet?

But he's still in fighting form, despite the fact that on top of all this, he had a heart attack not too long ago. The Red Cross told him he probably had the heart attack because he stopped drinking so suddenly that it shocked his system. "Remember that day you picked me up on the side of the road?" he said. "That wasn't alcohol. It was my HEART."

But, mind you, he is not drinking now. Ahem. His landlords are the kindest people possible—much unlike his previous landlords, who kicked him out for giving the Mexican workers free beans and rice. The Mexicans shouldn't "get used to the idea that they get anything for free."

"You don't do that to people, that isn't right," he said. "He told me, you will either be shot or arrested. So I left."

He's a good person. He delivers meat to some of the local men, whose wives reportedly hate him because all they serve is beans and rice, and he shows up with steak and mushrooms.

"My life right now is the best thing that's ever happened to me. I pay $235/month to live here. And they feed me three meals a day," he said. "Oh, and I'm about to get married to their niece. She's only 25, and she likes me. Her name? What? No, I didn't forget her name, I just don't remember it. She likes me a lot! We're going to move into a bigger place. She wants to take care of me!"

Manny had just been to a 9-year-old's birthday party, where he had been offered alcohol, and he vociferously refused. Purportedly.

"I'm so much healthier. Listen to how I'm talking. This is not crazy! I feel so much better. I am healthy! I am not worried about drinking too much. I love it so much here. They knock on my bedroom window at 11 at night and bring me tostadas. This is a good world. This is a good place."

On failure and not being afraid of it

I feel pretty confident saying that a lot of people who have panic attacks have issues with failure. Not that we all don't. But that there's often a dysfunctional relationship with failure -- some kind of fundamental inability to deal with failure without hurting ourselves or others -- lurking behind panic.

Which might make this New York Times piece, about the importance of failure from a philosophical perspective, pretty interesting. A snippet:

Failure is the sudden irruption of nothingness into the midst of existence. To experience failure is to start seeing the cracks in the fabric of being, and that’s precisely the moment when, properly digested, failure turns out to be a blessing in disguise. For it is this lurking, constant threat that should make us aware of the extraordinariness of our being: the miracle that we exist at all when there is no reason that we should. Knowing that gives us some dignity. 

In this role, failure also possesses a distinct therapeutic function. Most of us (the most self-aware or enlightened excepted) suffer chronically from a poor adjustment to existence; we compulsively fancy ourselves much more important than we are and behave as though the world exists only for our sake; in our worst moments, we place ourselves like infants at the center of everything and expect the rest of the universe to be always at our service. We insatiably devour other species, denude the planet of life and fill it with trash. Failure could be a medicine against such arrogance and hubris, as it often brings humility.

We shouldn't try to avoid failure. We should embrace it. It's our truest opportunity to learn.

Previously on PANIC!: "Perfectionism and anxiety."

The April Fools Day Prank I Pulled on My Mom

My mom has a habit of collecting newspaper clippings about awful tragedies and worrisome things that her children need to know about, putting them in envelopes, and mailing them off to us. 

Over the years I have gotten clippings that pretty much tell me I am going to DIE at any moment because the world is full of dangers. And clippings about bed bugs. My mom may have a specific fear of bed bugs. (One time, in fact, one of her bed bug clippings randomly wound up in a box of clothing that we were trying to sell at a tag sale in our yard. Most unfortunate! Nothing sold, and we could not understand why.)

Anyway, when it came to April Fool's Day I realized that the best person to prank was my own mother. (There will be more blog entries about the pranks I have pulled on my mother, because this is rich fodder indeed.) I decided to prank her with an email, even though she doesn't read email (my dad does, and he prints them out and hands them to her). So I thought, how about a [blank] of-the-month club? What would really give my mother a good laugh, once she figured out the prank? Ideas included:

Bag of Organic Matter and Compost of-the-Month Club
Something Dug Up at an Archaeological Site of-the-Month Club
Things That End in "Ork" of-the-Month Club (January: A Spork! February: Pork!)
Exotic Meat Nugget of-the-Month Club

But my brilliant sister came up with the perfect scheme. Bad News of-the-Month Club! (aka Clippings-of-the-Month Club, for more sneakiness). 

NEWS FLASH: I just got an email signed from my mother stating that she "does not wish to receive this service. Please remove me from your list." Maybe the Bag of Organic Matter of-the-Month Club would have been more favorably received?

Here it is:

Dear ______,

All sorts of need-to-know news is generated every single day, and some of it can be quite alarming: Articles about foreign bug infestations, infectious diseases, political plots, malfunctioning children's toys, cars that suddenly accelerate without warning, and so much more. But it's impossible to keep up with all the absolutely crucial stories that YOU really can't miss.

That's why we created Clippings-of-the-Month Club! Our dedicated team of editors works tirelessly each month to comb media sources, local and worldwide, to bring you the stories that you need. We inform. We educate. We help keep you safe and alert to what's going on in YOUR world.

And thanks to a special gift from Anonymous, you've been signed up for a full year of Clippings-of-the-Month Club absolutely free!

Each month, you'll receive a fresh bag of newspaper clippings delivered right to your door. You'll find stories that amaze, educate, and startle you. We guarantee that you'll want to share these headlines with everyone you know, especially your loved ones. It's truly "can't-miss" news. Here are just a few examples of the kind of news you're going to get every single month:

Please tell a friend about Clippings-of-the-Month Club. We hope you enjoy your year of astounding, amazing, and hair-raising news stories.

Best,

Juniper Crane

Clippings-of-the-Month Club Co-Founder