Isolation @ MindSay

The days pass by like a cold molasses river - but it travels further and faster than you can imagine from the watching.

 

It is a different world out here, so many hundreds of miles from big cities, hundred miles from the closest large town.... The season still shift, but the sense of time is distorted... I am younger than I was when I moved here. I forget to remember what day it is... When someone asks directions, the answer is always "Go that way for a couple of minutes".

 

Dusty, my mind is dusty... I put down my brushes and my pen and forgot to create because, I suppose, I got lost in the magic of no time.. The magic of the shifting seasonal light on the mountains seems to make creating paintings a moot point... there is ever so much more beauty in the blow by blow visual feast that is the desert mountain landscape than I could ever capture.... And words, those are useless, my friends... I hardly talk to many people anymore.. the inane bar conversation went from being a time filler or time killer to even worse... depressingly repetitive...

 

I have these magic moments with me and my boy, and I've tried to translate here and there in the throes of passionate longing, but they don't work... Friday night after the guest had gone, stumbling mildly buzzed in the shower in the bus, kissing and touching and just falling into the intense beauty of skin on skin and mouth to mouth and giggles and laughter and hands in wet hair.... I don't know how to translate that, it seems to cheapen it to try to hard... But worse, I fear forgetting if I don't take these verbal snapshots of it, weakened and diluted by time as they may be...

 

I still get depressed...Last night I just wanted to curl up and die... Perhaps I still do... but even more, I want his touch and his quirky smile and his delight in the simple....

 

And the night sky, and the screaming of the stars plummeting to earth, and the moaning of the arthritic fog enclosing our senses to teach us what it means to be close to death....

 

 

PTSD

(Posttraumatic Stress Disorder)

Jim Heitmeyer

14 November 2007

Common Reactions After Trauma

   Following a traumatic event, people typically describe feeling things like relief to be alive, followed by stress, fear, and anger. They also often find they are unable to stop thinking about what happened. Having stress reactions is what happens to most people and has nothing to do with personal weakness. Many will also exhibit high levels of arousal. For most, if the following symptoms occur, they will slowly decrease over time. Some people have a very difficult time living with their illness, pain and suffering, but today’s medicines have helped some people cope better while living their life.

Remember that most trauma survivors (including veterans, children, disaster rescue or relief workers) experience common stress reactions. Understanding what is happening when you or someone you know reacts to a traumatic event will help you be less fearful and better able to handle things. These reactions may last for several days or even a few weeks and may include:

Some reactions may include the following:

• Anxiety attacks
• Having trouble concentrating, indecisiveness
• Isolation from others
• Easily forgetting things, people or events
• Feeling hopeless about the future and detached or unconcerned about others
• Hearing loud explosions in the mind
• Startle easily at a sudden noise
• On guard and constantly alert
• Having disturbing dreams, memories or flashbacks
• Work or school problems

You may experience more physical reactions such as:

• Pounding heart, rapid breathing, edginess
• Stomach upset, cramps, and trouble eating
• Restlessness while trying to sleep and exhaustion
• Certain weather conditions may set off a bad memory
• Severe headache if thinking of the event, sweating
• Failure to engage in exercise, diet, safe sex, regular health care
• Worsening of chronic medical problems
• Excess smoking, alcohol, drugs, food
•  

Or have more emotional troubles such as:

• Feeling shock, numb, unable to experience love or joy
• Feeling nervous, helpless, fearful, sad
• Avoiding people, places, and things related to the event
• Becoming easily upset or agitated
• Self-blame or negative views of oneself or the world
• Distrust of others, conflict, being over controlling
• Withdrawal, feeling rejected or abandoned
• Loss of intimacy or feeling detached
• Being irritable or outbursts of anger

   Use your family and friends, for an affective support system when you are ready to talk. Recovery is an ongoing gradual process. It doesn't happen through suddenly being "cured" and it doesn't mean that you will forget what happened. For most, fear, anxiety, remembering, efforts to avoid reminders, and arousal symptoms, if present, will gradually decrease over time. Most people will recover from trauma naturally. Remember, having PTSD does not mean that you are crazy. PTSD and Mental Illness are similar in some ways and that a specialist can diagnosis your problem accurately. If your emotional reactions are getting in the way of your relationships, work, or other important activities you may want to talk to a certified counselor or doctor who specializes in PTSD. Good treatments are available.

Problems that can occur

   Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD, is a condition that can develop after someone has experienced a life-threatening situation. People with PTSD often can't stop thinking about what happened to them. They may try to avoid people and places that remind them of the trauma and may work hard to push thoughts of the event out of their head. Feeling numb is another common reaction. Finally, people find that they have trouble relaxing. They startle easily and are often on guard. If left untreated, PTSD symptoms generally become worse.

Depression: Involves feeling down or sad more days than not, and losing interest in activities that used to be enjoyable or fun. You may feel low in energy and be overly tired. People may feel hopelessness or despair, or feeling that things will never get better. Depression may be especially likely when a person experiences losses such as the death of close friends. This sometimes leads a depressed person to think about hurting or killing him or herself. Because of this, it is important to get help.

   Self-blame, guilt and shame: Sometimes in trying to make sense of a traumatic event, people take too much responsibility for bad things that happened, for what they did or did not do, or for surviving when others didn't. Remember, we all tend to be our own worst critics and that guilt, shame and self-blame are usually unjustified.

   Suicidal thoughts: Trauma and personal loss, can lead a depressed person to think about hurting or killing themselves. If you think someone you know may be feeling suicidal, you should directly ask them. You will NOT put the idea in their head. If they have a plan to hurt themselves and the means to do it, and cannot make a contract with you to stay safe, try to get them to a counselor or call 911 immediately.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline http://www.suicidepreventionlifeline.org

1-800-273-TALK (8255)

Department of Veterans Affairs (PTSD Treatment)

   Anger or aggressive behavior: Trauma can be connected with anger in many ways. After a trauma people often feel that the situation was unfair or unjust. They can't comprehend why the event has happened and why it has happened to them. These thoughts can result in intense anger. Although anger is a natural and healthy emotion, intense feelings of anger and aggressive behavior can cause relationship and job problems, and loss of friendships. If people become violent when angry, this can just make the situation worse as people can become injured and there may be legal consequences.

   Alcohol/Drug abuse: Drinking or "self-medicating" with drugs is a common way many cope with upsetting events to numb themselves and to try to deal with the difficult thoughts, feelings, and memories related to the trauma. While this may offer a quick solution, it can actually lead to more problems. If someone close begins to lose control of drinking or drug use, it is important to assist them in getting appropriate care.

 Recovery

   Immediately following a trauma, almost everyone will find themselves unable to stop thinking about what happened. Many will also exhibit high levels of arousal. For most, fear, anxiety, remembering, efforts to avoid reminders, and arousal symptoms, if present, will gradually decrease over time. Use your personal support systems, family and friends, when you are ready to talk. Recovery is an ongoing gradual process. It doesn't happen overnight and it doesn't mean that you will forget what happened. But, most people will recover from trauma naturally over time, others will need special care for the remainder of their lives.

   If your emotional reactions are getting in the way of your relationships, work, or other important activities you may want to talk to a certified counselor or a doctor who specializes in PTSD. Early signs of detecting PTSD symptoms will often prevent the problem from becoming worse. More severe PTSD cases are treated with therapy and special medications that can help a person cope. If you or someone you know show signs of the symptoms I have written here, seek help immediately. You owe it to yourself and to your loved ones. Remember that good treatments are available.

hey whats up people. i guess i am hanging around  this world for a lil more. anyway i havent been on in ten or so days (sorry for your loss folx). well i am trying to do the best i can with finding a job so i can have some money while school starts up again very soon. i guess i am looking forward to it, only because i do nothing with my time, all dam day. i lock myself in a room and watch the teli, no freinds, or social contact exept for a very special, dear person, but otherwise i am as apathetic, imobile, and slow as a turtle. whatever thats what depression is...a attenuation of our true mode of experssion. does anybody want to be buddies with an aloof, stoic, negative creep like me? i think i will post some of my thoughts and poetic sentiments in a few days or so, but untill then...keep in touch.

This article, which was on azcentral.com, was shocking.  I cannot believe the treatment this man is receiving; it is too harsh.  

 

I understand the importance of containment and isolation, for the safety of the general population.  Imagine if someone with this strain of TB decided to get on an airplane; how many people would contract the TB, and then, unknowingly, take it back home and spread it throughout their community?  The next influenza pandemic will most likely be spread by infected individuals travelling by airplane.  (For a Hollywood reference, rent the movie Outbreak with Dustin Hoffman and a young Dr. McDreamy).

 

Even though this man has a deadly, drug-resistant strain of TB, the fact that he is not allowed any contact with the outside world could constitute 'cruel and unusual' punishment.  I don't understand the reasoning behind the fact that he is not allowed at least a phone, television or a shower.  I'm not sure how watching televison would put anyone at risk for contracting TB.

 

While reading this keep in mind that he is an American (he has dual citizenhip) and has a wife and daughter in Russia, whom, according to this article, he can't communicate with because he isn't allowed a phone (I'm not sure if he can make calls, the article doesn't address that). 

 

Please let me know your thoughts...

 

Quarantine breach leaves TB patient locked in isolation

Man may serve life in hospital

Dennis Wagner
The Arizona Republic
Mar. 1, 2007 12:00 AM

 

He has been isolated here for eight months and is expected to remain much longer, perhaps until he dies.

But Robert Daniels is not charged with any crime. He has tuberculosis. And he is under court-ordered confinement because he violated the rules of voluntary quarantine, exposing others to a potentially deadly illness.

Daniels is afflicted with a TB strain so dangerous that he has never met his appointed lawyer, Robert Blecher, who describes the situation as "extremely unusual."

"Mr. Daniels' problems occurred - and he understands this - because of his own actions," Blecher said. "It does come down to a health issue for the entire community. He did go out in the public. He was exposing people."

Blecher acknowledged that his client's living conditions are unusual: Daniels is housed in Station 41, a room where air flows only in, not out. He is on a hospital floor supervised by the Sheriff's Office. There is no other facility in the Valley for medical lockdown.

Jack McIntyre, a sheriff's spokesman, said sympathetic nurses gave Daniels a computer, a phone and other items for a time, but those were confiscated for security reasons. "While he's there, we treat him as an incarcerated individual," McIntyre said. "It's a jail ward."

Daniels contracted TB while living in Russia, according to Superior Court filings. In July 2006, he was admitted to Scottsdale Healthcare Osborn hospital for respiratory illness. Lab tests revealed that he suffered from "extreme multi-drug-resistant tuberculosis," records show.

The disease is spread by airborne contact: If a patient coughs in public, others are endangered.

Robert England, Maricopa County tuberculosis control officer, said in court filings that Daniels was transferred from the hospital in July to Monroe House, an outpatient facility for indigent TB patients near downtown Phoenix. He was instructed to continue treatment and wear a mask whenever going out in public. England alleged that Daniels stopped taking his medication and went unprotected to a Jack in the Box, a Circle K and other stores. Daniels understood the rules, England said in his affidavit, but "merely refuses to follow them."

Based on that, the Maricopa County Department of Public Health obtained a court order for "compulsory detention," a legal tool used only about once a year in Arizona and usually only for a short time.

Daniels is a Russian-born 27-year-old with dual U.S. citizenship. During a hurried and rare phone conversation Tuesday, he admitted making a mistake eight months ago but said he did not understand the gravity of his disease at the time.

"I don't want to confuse people if I wear a mask," Daniels said, describing his thoughts. "What if they think I'm a robber? What if I get shot?

"Nobody talked to me about this thing. Nobody lectured me."

Daniels said face covers are not worn by tuberculosis patients in his homeland, which ranks 12th on the World Health Organization's list of most infected nations.

"In Moscow," he said, "when I went to clinics, even the doctors did not wear masks."

Russia, with 26,000 TB deaths annually, has more than 80 cases per 100,000 population, compared with five per 100,000 in Arizona.

Daniels said he has become depressed to the point of weeping.

"They're making a criminal out of me," he added. "I've been crying almost every day. . . . I'm all alone. No showers. No sunlight. It's the silence that's pushing down on me. . . . It's the worst you can get, even if you murdered somebody."

Daniels, who has an American father and lived in the United States during the 1990s, was diagnosed with TB two years ago in Moscow. He was told drugs were difficult to obtain and too expensive for a poor laborer. Daniels said he came to Arizona in January 2006 looking for work and hoping to get treatment.

His wife, Alla, who is in Russia with their 5-year-old son, said in a phone interview that the imprisonment seems inhumane.

"I know he has a very dangerous form of the disease," she said. "But he was not arrested. His rights are being violated."

Daniels said hospital workers became so upset with his plight recently that a series of county Superior Court hearings were conducted. Last week, Commissioner Randy Ellexson ordered that the patient be moved to new quarters. He then reversed that decision during an emergency session, which Daniels said he was not allowed to monitor by phone.

Daniels said he has been a model patient at Station 41 and would not violate quarantine again. He claimed recent tests of sputum from his lungs were negative for TB.

But prospects for freedom remain unclear. A medical assessment submitted to the court in August indicated the disease was still mutating in Daniels and may require treatment for years.

"There is certainly a high likelihood that the patient has developed additional drug resistant (sic) that may make cure impossible," the assessment said. "If this is the case, the patient must be detained in isolation until death or patient's own immune system contains it (50% chance of either possibility)."

A Feb. 20 entry in the file added that Daniels needs eight weeks of clear tests before he can be deemed non-infectious. Court records do not contain an updated prognosis, and medical authorities declined to comment.

 

Inspired by the annual question at the Edge, "what are you optimistic about for the future?", and a post on Stranger Fruit at Scienceblogs by someone who seems enraged by liberal/atheistic/scientific (they seem to be one group for him) bloggers very existence on the internets, I have decided to think optimistically for today. I want to apologize for not announcing my recent blogging break, but I did not intend to avoid blogging for such a long period. But this is a new year, and I want to start off early and hope to achieve some sort of consistency despite it being against my very nature.

It seems I recall a time called high school when many of the smartest kids were considered outcasts and despite differences in interests and opinions, often engaged socially with one another simply because their perspectives, ways of thinking and communicative tendencies often led to confusion and miscommunication when engaged with more typical patterns of thinking found in the general population. Whether due to inadequate vocabulary or an inability to conceptually grasp the discussions of the gifted, some of those lacking in such abilities would fear and despise the intellectual subset of high school students and through exclusion or occasionally use threat of violence to help supplement a hidden ego-weakness characterized by the ideas that "if I don't know what they are talking about then a) they may be better than me in some way and b) they may be talking about me."

Then came the internet and those smart people could gather together, discuss their issues, and they could not be threatened into keeping their discussions in carefully guarded privacy. It was the realization of the worst fear of many who either through choice or limitations do not participate in nor acknowledge the benefits of the academic or intellectual lifestyle. And you know, sometimes the smart kids were talking about them. So they try to counter with the one true weapon in the age of cyberspace- with words of their own. Unfortunately, they still don't know what those bright kids were talking about, so their arguments fall flat. Meanwhile, those kids- so often excluded, so often misunderstood, and so often demonized for their talents, have been sharpening their skills at debate and honing their linguistic talents to razor sharp precision.

You can almost hear them type: it's our time now.