Explore mental illness, its common symptoms, causes, and treatment options. Learn how to support mental health and seek help when needed.
“There is no greater agony than bearing an untold story inside you”, Maya Angelou A very interesting interview a while ago on CBC Radio with Michael Enright as host. Dr. Suzanne Koven, who is a Massachusetts General Hospital Writer-in-Residence and a primary care doctor, writes, teaches, and speaks about the healing power of story writing. She was Enright’s guest. It has allowed me to ponder upon my own need to write about fibromyalgia and in turn for others to comment…
“My own brain is to me the most unaccountable of machinery-always buzzing, humming, soaring roaring diving, and then buried in mud”, Virginia Woolf To live a life in a state of high anxiety, boarding on panic is common among those of us with fibromyalgia. We anticipate pain, fatigue, muddled thoughts, and a myriad of other symptoms almost every waking (and sleeping!) hour. It has become a habit that often seems unable to be broken and…
“When anxious people anticipate something bad about to happen- such as being confronted with creepy pictures of snakes or spiders- their right frontal insulas go into overdrive”, Blakeslee and Blakeslee Many of us with fibromyalgia can remember childhood as the beginning of a lifetime of fear, and anxiety. Since there might have been a significant childhood episode that triggered this dis-ease called fibromyalgia, it stayed with us while other troublesome events in our lives piled…
“There’s someone in my head, but it’s not me”, Pink Floyd Just as I thought that I had nothing new to write about I have discovered that the weird ‘brain’ sensations I have, which only last for moments, are common among those of us with this frustrating condition of fibromyalgia! I have had these peculiar short-lived experiences that are followed by dizziness for several years now. The episodes are almost like a small temporary memory loss, almost feeling…
” People who are prone to anxiety are nearly always people-pleasers who fear conflict and negative feelings like anger”, David D. Burns Everyone worries, it falls under the umbrella of anxiety. It is not about living in the moment but rather it is about looking back in the past where it all began and into a future that is pure fantasy. Those of us with excessive anxiety are prone to catastrophic thinking, our thoughts go…
” The mind is the most capricious of insects-flitting, fluttering”, Virginia Woolf Sit quietly for a minute and imagine this stream with leaves quietly floating by in the water. Now think of the many thoughts, that are like a barrel full of monkeys, aggravating your mind, flitting around uncontrollably. With each thought (or monkey) that arises, a place that thought on a leaf and imagines it floating away. The thoughts will come non-stop, but in…
“We must cultivate the courage to look deeply, with clarity and courage, into our own suffering”, Peter A. Levine Dr. Levine is the world’s leading expert on the study of stress physiology. I began reading his works years ago when my physiotherapist suggested Waking the Tiger and I have not looked back since. His theories resonate with me. It was in 1969 when he began his work on the mind/body healing approach which developed when…
“Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear”, Mark Twain I have watched all episodes of the documentary Afflicted on Netflix. My mind is reeling and disturbed. I am hoping that by writing this blog I can begin to piece together my thoughts which to this point are rambling and disjointed. I have heard from one reader who has said there is a group who is writing to ask Netflix to…
” PTSD is similar to Panic Attacks in that once turned on, the anxiety is fed into a vicious cycle”, David Yeung Anxiety, depression, and panic attacks are triplets. They live together and feed on one another. The sources of these three demons are usually childhood experience, past trauma, and family history. While panic attacks are extreme episodes of anxiety and are relatively common in the general population, their frequency of them is noteworthy in those of…
” Trust one who has gone through it”, Virgil Writing those words is psychosomatic, in fact, even thinking about the title makes me feel uncomfortable! Who wants to be labeled as one whose pain is thought to be “JUST in your head” implying it is not real? But, before we go off into a tailspin about that specific demeaning-sounding word, I should begin by saying what I now believe psychosomatic to mean. It certainly does not suggest that those…