Terrifying few days...

Dealing with mental illness remains a double edged sword. I was open and confided to my therapist that I felt her absence of 4 weeks due to illness felt like abandonment. I reminded her I had called my daughter and told daughter I had a premonition that her boyfriend may try to kill her on a trip they had planned. Subsequently I didn't hear from my daughter for 2 months and when she came on Mother's Day, she reminded me that I called her hysterical to break the news her boyfriend was a killer. I had no recollection, at all. As she repeated the incidence some details sounded familiar but I honestly had almost no recall at all. I do know that at the time I called her my primary concern was saving her life so it felt imperative that I tell her what I knew.

That was not an isolated incident...I had experiences at work where for example I confided in my VP that our crumbling new building should be blessed because despite repeated repairs to get clearance to open the building for occupancy, things kept breaking down. She laughed and told me the university community was too evolved to lean on prayer to solve problems.

Last night I dreamed my oldest son had committed suicide or was killed by a car...it was unclear in the dream other than he was gone.

The response from my therapist was to request permission to call my psych who only prescribes meds, and I agreed assuming that some medicine adjustment would be the answer. He didn't call me directly, the therapist called me to say, "go to the emergency room and tell them you need blood work to test your sodium levels, hormone levels." I mentioned that there were no written orders and no one would do such tests on someone walking in asking for them. She replied, "just tell them what you told me, that you had some hallucinations and your doctor wants these tests done." I smelled a rat, as we say.

I called a friend and explained the inexplicable and she warned me that if I walk in and say I've been having hallucinations that immediately the situation would turn into a psych hold and no one would hear anything else. Well of course she was right. Since the problem has more or less ended--there are no more faces peering out of my paisley design curtains--I wasn't ready to be held over for any amount of time. My sole comfort are my cats who need me.

I called my shrink directly and spoke to him; he had suggested the medical tests saying he felt it was a metabolic imbalance but if the symptoms have abated, we could leave the tests for now and I should come to see him at my appointment end of the week.

It seemed to me therapist was on thin ice trying to get me into the hospital as if I was too stupid to understand how the system works...just tell them what you told me, you're having hallucinations...yeah right and I have a bridge in Brooklyn I want to sell you.