Last year, most of my focus was about life living with mental illness. This year, 2019, let’s make it the year of Mental Wealth working together and supporting each other. The one thing that I made it today thus far is … Continue reading
Tag Archives: Lets Talk
Write! Write! Write! – Talk! Talk! Talk!
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Talking and writing are great partners in celebrating life. It’s an antidote for depression. Just take a look at this recent discovery exchange of words between one depressed person to another: I talk to anybody on the street more than … Continue reading
Tetris, CareNotes and Prayer Beads
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He was willing to bare all if even one person could relate to any part of his story and find strength in their family and friends, but most importantly within themselves. – Repurpose a story.
Safe. I felt safe being there. Stay. The ward is a lock-down facility to keep me safe. Mind. I didn’t mind the least bit. I don’t know where to go; don’t know where to stay. When in doubt, do nothing. Minding what is safe, I stayed, for a while.
The ward is equipped with TV, funny magazines, pool table, jigsaw puzzles, coloring books; items to keep me amused or occupied but none of these interest me. So I sat on the floor at the end of the long corridor looking out through the glass door. Here alone I played Tetris, read CareNotes and rolled the prayer beads with my fingers.
Tetris, a gift from my sister Poteet. A game she took away from my nephews. As I recall, the new computer game was causing problems that the boys were glued to it and neglecting to go outside to play the real stuff. I don’t like any kind of computer programs. I was once a computer geek in my younger days writing programs, test programs and application. It drove me crazy trying to solve someone’s programming that has no logic. But Tetris became a real stuff for me inside the ward. It helped me focus. It helped me solve problems. It helped me shape and organized my mind objectively. It helped rewire, build blocks and expand the plasticity of my brain.
CareNotes is all I can find at the Chaplain’s office. The Chaplin’s office is always closed. Never saw him, never met him, and never talked to him. The notes hang outside his office. I know he came around when there are new CareNotes. I collected them all. Dealing With Suicidal Feelings, Climbing Up From Depression, Believing in Your Own Inner Goodness, Finding Strength to Survive a Crisis or Tragedy, Making Sense Out of Suffering, Bearing the Special Grief of Suicide, Easing the Burden of Stress, Encountering Midlife, Emerging Renewed, Finding God in Pain or Illness, Walking with God Through Grief and Loss, Letting Tears Bring Healing and Renewal. CareNotes is an endless resource giving meaning to my question “Why Me?” Now, these CareNotes are my bathroom companion, at home. Good reads not just for me but as well as anyone that uses the toilet.
Prayer Beads enclosed came in a card from my other sister and she wrote: April 5, 1992. Dearest Lady, A priest in Toronto who cares deeply is giving you his personal rosary. This has been blessed and carries with it his own prayers for your well-being and that you will find it in you to pray the rosary. Lady, believe in the power of the rosary and you will be fully alive again. Love and prayers, always. Thelma.
I did not pray the rosary. I do not know how to pray, then. I carried it with me, though. I clutch it when I go to bed, never let it go. Should I wake up in the middle of the night with no prayer beads on my hand, I panic. Searching for it in the darkroom, the beads glow in the dark and with a sigh of relief of finding it, I kissed the cross and went back to sleep. The rosary is now gone; I don’t know how I lost it. But I still go to bed with a rosary on my hand. Can’t sleep without it just like a child with a teddy bear to snuggle with to have a goodnight sleep.
My family reads my blog and provides me articles in relation to the topic that I write. My sister Carmen sent me a Report on Business at the Globe and Mail about ‘Irv’. Irv and I share a common ground: Mental Illness.
It has been a long week of Let’s Talk. Stay well and be well, Perpetua.
Shipwreck from fantasy to reality
A blank piece of paper is transformative. Look at it and you can repurpose it by splashing colors of broken lines to circles. White is an absence of color and black has too much pigmentation. There are only three basic colors: red, yellow and green. What do you see?
On a busy street of West 12th and Granville, I see cars with its tailpipe spewing exhaust gasses; he sees dragons breathing fire and brimstone. Is his mind broken? No. Or is my imagination eschewed? Yes.
Lots of things are invisible, but we don’t know how many because we can’t see them. What we see are the good and the bad, the rich and the poor, the saint and sinners. With him, he can only see the goodness of others as they march by.
For other people, his life has turned up-side down. With that thought in mind, he literally took the word, reinvented the meaning of it, applied it to his last name and no matter how you read it up or down, it will always read SIGLOS.
So, what is the purpose of life. There is no single purpose. We just have to keep repurposing our talent and be of service to all.
Prognosis: Bipolar
Hey – Did you hear? So, rumor has it that…
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If you are going to spread rumor, make it good that it will benefit others. You can quote me on that. This was the gist of my short talk about Occupational Health and Safety at our General Membership meeting . … Continue reading
Feeling Good
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I’ve never read the book Anne of Green Gable written by L. M. Montgomery, a Canadian writer. The book is supposed to be a classic literature. Curiosity took over me and I came across with Chapter 5: Anne’s History. “Well, … Continue reading
What moves me, moves others.
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“Let’s go for Vitamin N.” a teacher exclaimed to the students. The students’ disposition immediately changed to jubilation. Vitamin N stands for Nature. Nature is just across the school, a park. A walk in the park, running around the trees, … Continue reading
Talk. Text. Tweet
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Her athletic journey captured our hearts not just by winning in Olympics also by speaking about mental health. Behind this beautiful smile, she suffers from depression. One of the best way to rise above depression is by talking about it. … Continue reading