Year: 2016

Remembering My Father in this Election Year 2016

gail louise Parenting, People, Mentors, and Allies , ,

Picture this, a big table in our farm kitchen covered with red and while checked oil cloth and dozens of clean clear glass jars, standing alert and ready to receive the recently made homemade jam of the month. Perhaps it was my favorite, raspberry jam. Raspberry jam was the perfect complement to my mother’s homemade bread. (It was heavenly in our kitchen when Mom baked bread. The aroma of the baking bread was divine.  She would find a way week after week to fit all 7 loaves of bread/dinner rolls into the oven simultaneously. If we timed it just right, the younger children, would arrive home from school just as the bread finished baking. The big question always was: Which of us would get the crusts?

This past weekend I have been enjoying making fresh applesauce and tasty apple butter. As I write, this it is Thanksgiving week and I hope everyone who will share our holiday feast will enjoy some warm fragrant apple butter with my daughter’s fresh baked dinner rolls. The apple butter is (mostly) made from dark red McIntosh apples which yielded a rich bright pink naturally sweet sauce. The sauce looked good to eat, and it was as delicious as it looked!

I smiled as I remembered these things. For you see, I am thankful that my mother had passed food preserving skills and interest in them to me when I was as young as 9 years old.  I realize that I’ve passed these baking and cooking skills to my daughter and son, who are more gifted with food creation than both my mother and I.

And then I felt sad. Other than my lovely singing voice, what gifts did my father pass on to me?  I thought for awhile and then realized I had let the fact that he had a mental illness blur my sight and my insight. My father gave me something I’m sure to need for today and for these next four years.  He taught me the importance of attending to daily news, especially state and national news, and politics. Dad was attentive to the news, to politics, and to our government. And I was proud of his interest and ability to discuss and debate current affairs.

I’ve never forgotten the image of my Dad reading the daily paper:  The afternoon paper, which was the liberal paper – and in contrast to his in-laws, who always read the morning, conservative, Republican paper. The prime location for reading the daily paper was the kitchen table. He’d sit down in his overalls and cap with a cup of coffee in his rugged hands.  Perhaps the hardworking hands were chapped or sunburned. The paper would be spread out to cover most of the table. We children dare not monkey with the paper until Dad had read the news—you know, the front page and section. We children also did not talk with Dad or fool around in the kitchen when he was reading.

Mom as well read the paper every day. (As a farm wife, she deserved a break every day before we all returned home. It was always reading the paper, sitting at the kitchen table, with a refreshing drink, right when the clock struck three pm.) But Mom read quietly, and kept her views of the news private.

During the 1950’s when times were good for our family, Mother and Dad took me, then 13-years old, and my two teenage brothers on a trip to see our nation’s capital. Two younger sisters both then in grade school were left in the care of a neighboring farm family.  The care and feeding of a dairy herd is a very personal skill, and a task that cannot cease even for a single day.  I don’t know if this expresses how unusual and how risky it was for a farm family to take leave of their farm for a vacation that meant traveling across a considerable area of the United States. We did stop at historic sites too, including Gettysburg.

Why did my father choose Washington, DC? He felt we three older children were at the right age to learn the importance of and to visit our national capitol and the famous monuments, and to hear again the story of our grandparents who had immigrated earlier during the 1900’s from Norway. Both became citizens.  But the biggest push was to meet the congressmen representing Wisconsin.  Fortunately, the elected officials with their busy schedules were available. They were able to spend a brief 5 to 10 minutes each with us. Three future new voters were very impressed with Mom and Dad’s vacation gift and its lessons of people, history …. and responsibility. And we, to the best of my knowledge, have always exercised our responsibility and privilege as citizens of this great land my father took us across.

Even this year.

The Depressed Voice Doesn’t Sing

gail louise Beyond Recovery to Healing , ,

My Dad had a beautiful voice (as did his father, my grandfather), but he never sang in a choir. He loved song. We heard the love of song come flowing out at times, though that was unusual except during Sunday church services. I believe the love of singing and a voice to sing with was there in him.  That love and that voice was passed on to his children, three of whom sing in choirs regularly. I’m crying now, for his children get so much joy from singing.  My father with reoccurring major depression missed a world that brings so many rewards to his children and to me.  A world of joy, beauty and companionship.

As a child, I asked Dad,” How about joining the church choir?” His response was to look grave, shake his head no and say “No, I can’t read music”. It seemed as if I had asked him a really distant question. Singing in the choir seemed to be for those who deserved to sing, who were good enough (as persons) and who had friends in the choir. There was no possibility in his mind for him to join choir.

But he would have been welcome.

You see, despite the potential great reward, the risk may have been too high for my father to have sung in a choir. Risk? Singing in a choir? Yes, for Dad had high anxiety often, which is common with major depression.  The necessity of performing in front of an assembled congregation may have led to some real anxiety issues on Sundays. And something else, perhaps more subtle but more dangerous: Riding the waves of emotional highs and lows that are necessary to express when one sings the lyrics with meaning may have been too uncomfortable for my father. For there is no lack of opportunity to travel from the depths of despair to the heights of all grandeur and sublime to sweet simple unadorned joy when one sings good music. He may have been moved to tears when singing; even been unable to sing. When depression is near the surface, surging emotions are not safe.

And something else got in the way. Depression often blocks out the bearers knowledge that they have the talent to do something. “I’m not good enough” is a frequent negative thought and self-talk holding people back.

And yet singing brings great joy to many people and that passion for singing can lead to other benefits as well. Our singing brain is bathed in dopamine which brings feelings of pleasure and alertness as well as serotonin, another neurotransmitter associated with feelings of euphoria and contentment. I remember feeling that going to choir rehearsal at the end of the working day was a trying task, requiring a lot of physical and creative energy. But so agreed with a friend and choirmate who often remarked that he was dead tired and didn’t think he make it until the end of rehearsals. “But then,” he said, “something magic happens and I revive….it happens almost every time.”

Singing, I believe, can bring healing.

 My father missed this world:

The first track on Chanticleer’s “Out Of This World” CD (1994) is titled I Have Had Singing, and it touches me every time I hear it sung with such beauty for I know its meaning well. Here is the story of the song:

A book by Ronald Blythes Akenfield, Portrait of an English Village, recounts the difficult lives of the inhabitants of a tiny East Anglian village in Suffolk, England. In one interview, Fred Mitchell, an 85-year old ploughman, recalls his difficult childhood. When asked what they did for fun, he took a pause, then replied:

“I never did any playing in all my life. There was nothing in my childhood, only work. I never had pleasure. One day a year I went to Felixstowe along with the chapel women and children, and this was my pleasure.

But I have forgotten one thing —the singing.

(Here I insert the lyrics used in the composition)

“Singing, singing, oh the singing!
There was so much singing then!
We all sang, and this was my pleasure too.
The boys in the fields,
The chapels were full of singing, always full of singing.
I have had pleasure enough,
I have had singing.”

 

 

The Unseen Disruptions of Living with a Mental Illness

gail louise Giving and Receiving Support

It’s early April as I write this – the evening of April 3rd, 2016, to be exact. Now the temperature has fallen back to around 42 degrees F. But it was a balmy 65 degrees when we were out walking the Aldo Leopold Wetland Management Area in Columbia Co. We were stretching our legs and taking in big healthy breaths of good Wisconsin fresh air. Relaxing, being contemplative, and Intent on the low key beauty of the marsh.

The many varieties of ducks we saw were not surprising and neither were the geese, but the eagle! The eagle was a special gift and unexpected. It soared far above us in the clear air and we delighted in its flight. Then returning it descended quite close so that I had a good view of the raptor‘s majesty. It was wondrous.

A little while later, outwardly unrelated to this day’s explorations, a feeling of impending doom cast its spell on me. I was experiencing my first panic attack in recent years. Once again it was as if an octopus had released its fluid, so dark and inky and totally encompassing was the sense of foreboding ruin. Danger lurked everywhere; there was no safe niche for me or for us. Not If I believed my false mind. Not being able to depend on one’s own mind, to know its emotions are reliable, is one of the most difficult aspects of having a mental illness. Certainly there was no danger. I was even in touch with my husband – holding his hand – yet I was struck by a chilling miasma.

 

Luckily, I have experience now. I recognized and knew this episode was a panic attack (please note *) . That meant my feelings weren’t accurate and I had to hold on to myself firmly enough to wait it out. Wait out the fear and wait out the panic. A cool 20 minutes, while awash in waves of alarm and high alert.  Today’s attack was pretty smooth because there was just Jim and I walking in this vicinity. When I was a younger woman, our children would have been outdoors with us, exploring for the first signs of spring. Things were awkward then for all of us.

Panic attacks can happen any time or anywhere. From my NAMI Family to Family Education Program curriculum (2013): “You might be shopping, sleeping, or in the middle of a meeting. Suddenly, your heart begins to race, your face flushes and you have trouble breathing. You feel dizzy, nauseated, out-of-control —- maybe even like you’re going to die.”

What to do?

What did I do? I kept on walking……walking at the same steady pace. Today I do not run; I do not desperately seek to hide, to retreat. And we did not begin bright cherry talk in an attempt to break free of the imploding fear. Instead, I informed Jim as to what was going on. I asked for and received a quiet squeeze and we pursued our goal, a simple late afternoon walk.

As I have found from my experience, and as psychiatric treatment and research has shown, learning about and accepting a panic attack for what it is can help lessen its effect. A panic attack is often a reaction to fear, and some of the strange physical reactions experienced during an attack are the result of the body reacting to this fear. One may become mentally anxious over a past, traumatic event and the body responds as if it will happen right away. Or a person may not only picture themselves experiencing a traumatic event, but perhaps also fear losing control and not being able to handle the current situation.  Your body goes on alert and automatic bodily reactions ensue. Your mind remains stuck on fearful thoughts.

Giving this array of physical feelings and scary thoughts a name, i.e., panic attack, cuts the phenomenon back to a human scale. I have found that the more I understand my fears, the better I am able to control them. Here are some practices I have found helpful:

  • Simple breathing and relaxation techniques.
  • Walking and light aerobic exercise.
  • Confronting your fears.
    Try writing in a journal about your panic attacks. Read the description when you’re feeling better. This technique is helpful for two reasons: you’ll learn what to expect and two, you can look for patterns to find similarities between attacks. From this practice one gains some mastery which can help counter the overwhelming flood of helplessness that fear and doom brings.

It was also helpful for me to remember that panic attacks were relatively brief and not real in the sense that the doom wasn’t real.

For those whose loved one experiences panic attacks, my husband passes on this message:

“…..Simply and gently ask the person experiencing a panic attack what would make them more comfortable. In years past we tried to help by focusing on a bright sunny sky, for example, but Gail’s panic worsened and she felt rejected. Best was a calm acceptance and a safe presence while panic flooded her person. Try reminders to do deep breathing. Again, give gentle reassurance that the frightening experience will pass. Allow some time afterwards for a breather for everyone to recover before you attempt to get back to things as they were.”

 

(*) I’m speaking here of the experience typically termed a “panic attack.” They may be infrequent or never occur again, but if you have recurrent, unexpected panic attacks and spent long periods in constant fear of another attack, you may have a condition called panic disorder.  Please seek help.
(Return to your reading)

On Forgiveness, part two

gail louise Learning to Hope, Real Life; Real Challenges , , ,

A lot has happened since I last posted. Joyous holidays, the battle with a depressive episode—- still lingering and touched mightily by recent family affairs, progress with workouts under direction of my personal trainer, and the severe illness and death January 31st of my beloved younger sister, Ellie. She was the first in our family of six brothers and sisters to pass. I miss her greatly.

I have been studying forgiveness and the power of forgiveness in one’s life for some time now. Indeed, I have an essay On Forgiveness on this website already devoted to the topic.   In that essay, I wrote that “forgiveness does not mean forgetting. And yet it is more than tolerating. I was startled to read that forgiveness is beyond letting go of negatives, such as anger; it is also the inclusion of positive gift-like qualities such as compassion, generosity, and even love.”

This posting is part two of my growth in understanding of this most powerful act of human reconciliation.

*   *    *    *    *    *    *

I’ve now made a little dent into the literature of forgiveness, and have learned two major facts: One, there is research to show that physical and mental health benefits come from forgiving and Two, that forgiving, learning forgiveness, is hard work. I’ll write about those benefits in this posting. The hard work of forgiveness will be addressed in future posts.

“NOT Forgiving — nursing a grudge—is so caustic”, reports Fred Luskin, PhD, a health psychologist at Stanford University and author of Forgive for Good: A Proven Prescription for Health and Happiness. “It raises your blood pressure, depletes immune function, makes you more depressed and causes enormous physical stress to the whole body.”  In this book, citing research and teaching by vivid example, Mr. Luskin shows that people who are forgiving tend to have not only less stress but also better relationships, fewer general health problems and lower incidences of the most serious illnesses like depression, heart disease, stroke and cancer.

So how does one forgive? Is it a process one can learn, something each of us might do, or a work for the saints among us only?

Forgiveness can be hard work. Robert Enright, PhD, the author of Eight Keys to Forgiveness, says: “….in its essence forgiveness is not something we do to just help ourselves. It is not something about you or done for you. It is something you extend toward another person, because you recognize, over time, that it is the best response to the situation.”  And then, Professor Enright continues:  “Working on forgiveness can help us increase our self-esteem and give us a sense of inner strength and safety. It can reverse the lies that we often tell ourselves when someone has hurt us deeply—lies like, I am defeated or I’m not worthy. Forgiveness can heal us and allow us to move on in life with meaning and purpose. Forgiveness matters and we will be its primary beneficiary.”

I’ll end this post with a brief outline of forgiveness’ process.

First, accept that something happened in opposition to your wishes and you can’t change it. What can you do to suffer less?  Then, look at your involvement with this person—simplify it.

Second, try to move past the hurt and go on. Perhaps the steps suggested below will help you progress.

  • Acknowledge that you have been hurt. Talk to a few close friends to explore your feelings and obtain a sense of perspective.
  • Make a commitment to forgiveness.
  • Start with small things. Start by trying to forgive modest slights by people who have done you harm in life.
  • Recognize your “grievance stories” and gradually deemphasize and replace them by thinking of your own positive goals.
  • Focus on facts rather than emotions. Attempt to understand what led the person to the hurtful behavior. Bless you.
  • Try not to take things personally. Many offenses were not deliberately targeted to hurt you personally, but were byproducts of other people’s own selfish goals.
  • Forgive those you love. The most important people to forgive are those close to us.

( Find these steps in Terrie Heinrich Rizzo’s posting The Healing Power of Forgiveness, 2006 )