Visceral | Karalee Dearden
I am on the verge of tears this morning. Last night, my roomate had a nervous breakdown. She has bipolar disorder, and recently told me that she hadn't been taking her medicine. Since Monday this week, I have noticed that things were bad, and have been trying to get her to take them. She wouldn't talk, she wanted to quit her job because she was scared to go. But last night, things reached a peak. We went out to dinner with a friend, and she kept getting worse as the night went on. She was either refusing to talk, or talking so fast you couldn't understand her. We were at Wal-Mart when things hit rock bottom. She was shaking all over because she had anxiety. She didn't know what she was scared of, or why she was freaking out, and she almost cried when she was paying for the movie she bought. So I made her call my dad. He told me to do what I had already been trying to, "Get her to take her meds." When we got off the phone, she refused to go back to our apartment and take her medicine. She shut down after that, and wouldn't say a word. It was torture trying to get her to nod or shake her head. After an hour, we talked her into going to the emergency room. Even then, she kept coming up with excuses not to go. " I have a test in the morning.", " My mom and stepdad will be mad." And when we finally got her there, she kept trying to edge her way away from the checkin desk. The whole experience was scary. I didn't know what to do. I mostly stood back and watched while her friend took control of things. But I couldn't leave her alone. I couldn't stop watching her. Because at the same time, everything was interesting. If I had been a stranger watching from afar, I don't think I would have been able to look away.
posted by Karalee | 8:48 AM
3 Comments:
Wow can I relate to you. My junior year in high school I had a friend live with me that had some major depression problems. I'm not sure it was Bipolar but it was definitely something. While living with me she tried to end her life multiple times. It was hard on all of us. Finally she was put in an institution. That was probably the hardest 6 months of my life. I had problems with depression as well and was going through some of the exact things she was. Luckily I could control myself. The story does end happily, she is now married and hasn't had too many problems since. Karalee, all I can say is the best of luck and I hope everything works out for your roomate as it did for mine.
You are very couragous. I know that if I had seen somthing like that I wouldn't have been able to look away. How strange that this all happened in walmart.
I have to add a little something to this now. The weekend was a nightmare. We were going to go home for LDS General Conference, but because of the anxiety attacks, we decided it would be safer to stay. Friday night, she locked herself out in the car. She started tearing things up, and handed me a pair of scissors to take away from her. I was really freaked out, so I called my dad. Then I called our bishop. He came over and they had a long talk. She took her medicine, willingly this time, and calmed down. I think she was kind of mad at me for that one. Saturday morning brought new problems. She woke up with horrible pain on the right side of her stomach. My first thought on hearing this was apendicitis. So I called my dad and asked him if he could look up the symptoms. She had most, if not all, of them. So I took her to the ER again. She was not happy with me, but we got her there, they gave her pain medication and something for the nausea. All the tests they took came back normal. But they told us to come back the next morning. So we did. Spent four hours in the ER, and we still don't know what's wrong. The pain and nasea are still there. It's frusterating to not know what's going on.
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