:

“It’s late at night, and I’ve taken all my regular medication, yet I’m finding it hard to fall asleep. My recent hookup didn’t go well, I guess. It’s with someone I know from the past, and we’re not dating or anything. But I did expect him to call or text me, which, of course, he didn’t, even after being intimate twice last week. He himself told me he’s not the kind of guy who stays—he leaves jobs, men, and women. So what should I expect from him? He got his dopamine or oxytocin fix, and now it’s over. He may pop up again in a few years. Intimacy is one way to get high, but it’s only temporary. After this high comes the emptiness, the sadness, the grief. I’m forty and single, unemployed, and rather isolated. I have very few friends.

“My doctor told me that I’m in the process of getting esketamine, a novel treatment for drug-resistant major depression. They may use it for people who have already tried two types of antidepressants and failed.

“So I may have something to look forward to, something to give me hope. I also saw my nephew today, and he was very sweet. He makes me very happy.

“I’ve been keeping a series of notes lately, almost like journal entries, to elaborate on some thoughts for later. Maybe it’ll turn into a book, or perhaps even an academic paper.

“Who knows what insights might emerge from these reflections? Only time will tell,” says ChatGPT. Time doesn’t play in my favor. I’m getting old. I have experienced a severe deterioration in my mental health. Statistics don’t play in my favor—for people with schizoaffective disorder, at my age, there is no good prognosis. What didn’t happen for me until now probably never will. That could be my depression talking, but I find ChatGPT’s revisions shallow and simplistic. My posts are not being generated by ChatGPT; rather, they are being written with ChatGPT. I don’t seek approval or validation. I am in search of meaning, for making sense of my shattered life, my broken self.

It is important to set realistic expectations. Surely in my dreams, my writing will secure me a grant to get my master’s degree in digital culture. I will be recognized as a novel writer, a visionary, and an established thinker. I’ll get my book published. I will connect with a soulmate who will find my writing inspirational. If there is any realistic expectation, it is just that I’ll enjoy writing and find a hobby to keep busy rather than spending hours sleeping or staring at the walls. Maybe I can understand something about myself. Perhaps something will eventually make sense, something to share with my therapist to get some insight.

My friend commented that sometimes the writing in my blog is in the second person—that is because I copied a response from ChatGPT. I’m not trying to hide that I’m writing with ChatGPT, that this is some form of dialogue or assisted technology, that I myself am somewhat damaged. For now, it is the depression that is making it difficult to focus on anything but my personal pain, grief, and thought loops of rumination.

There is a lot of grief in post-psychotic depression. I have come to realize that I’m never going to be the same person that I used to be and that the high expectations I had in life are not going to happen. That notion of grief and experience of loss after psychosis is not something that I learned from academic articles. It’s something that I heard on YouTube from the “Schizophrenia influencers” Lauren Kennedy West and Carolyn Ponzoha. I found their stories rather relatable and compelling. I was inspired by them. Yet, both of them tend to speak from a very personal point of view while I am wishing to place my psychotic experience within the context of historical and societal circumstances. I believe that the personal is the political and that living in a conflict zone deeply affects my mental health and well-being.

I’m writing this while sitting in the yard of a kibbutz in the Galil, north of Israel. I keep hearing booms and muffled explosions, but there are no sirens, so it’s most likely that what I’m hearing is the IDF bombing Hezbollah. I’m not in any immediate danger; the war is always out there, and for a person who is hardly a “Zionist,” that leaves me in a rather isolated position. Also, I never forget that I am a middle-aged woman living with severe mental illness. I struggle most with forming significant connections to other people, not with anxiety regarding my physical safety.

My brother-in-law, who is a very established intellectual and editor, told me that I should give up from the very beginning on keeping up a linear plot and differentiating between personal and theoretical writing. I gladly take his advice, but I don’t know if I’ll ever be good enough with personal writing. Most of the things about my personal life—I’m not very proud of. I was rejected and abandoned too many times, for such long periods. I was never able to live a stable, healthy life. I was a stoner, an anarchist, living on disability benefits, got into debt, had an abortion, ran away from home, spent years in therapy that didn’t work, and I am currently struggling with major depression, which of course doesn’t make me a pleasant speaker. Rather than dwelling on low self-esteem, my guilt, shame, and tiredness, I feel that my recent hookups were degrading. I hope ChatGPT won’t ban me just for mentioning hookups and talking about sex. I don’t know if that aligns with the guidelines.

Should I omit the parts about degrading sex in a rented car with a junkie or the porn video chats with the psychiatrist from Tinder? None of them kept in touch after all, but at least they both found me attractive. That is far from true love. I know what true love feels like from my ex-husband and my deceased best friend. These men might find me attractive, but I’m not sure if they even like me.

I was sober from weed for one year, and then I relapsed. I had some puffs with that junkie in his rented car, then I bought some on Telegram. Weed is risky for me; it might trigger another manic episode from which I’ll probably won’t recover. It feels as if I could only have a puff, it would ease my pain. And sex without love is just temporary relief. I got my Clonex pills and coffee, and in a couple of days, I’m supposed to start treatment with Eskatmin.

Eskatamin and weed do not mix well, so I’m obliged to take urine tests. I must remain sober. I gave up all the weed I had—one to a kid under the building, the other to my friend so she can make weed butter for her mother who has Parkinson’s. Is this the kind of gritty, spicy material that readers would find interesting?

Whatever I’m writing about now feels like writing on the sand—I can always edit, revise, and omit the parts that are just depressive ruminations. Waiting for my friend’s mother to wake up so I can make espresso from the machine and get focused enough to delve into Deleuze and Guattari, Jean Baudrillard, social engineering, and AI—the stuff that I find distracting and interesting. I should probably not take a Clonex right now. I’m just a bit restless, not panicking, just a bit sad. That’s not a good enough reason to use benzodiazepines.

Dealing with the contents of my paranoid delusions by reflecting upon them is part of my path toward recovery, I believe. I attempt to find meaning and make sense of my psychotic experiences. Some people who experience paranoid delusions might avoid any recollection of their delusions because it can re-trigger the psychosis. They choose to seal off the experience rather than discuss it in public. I enjoy writing and sharing my story, but there is always a risk of slipping back into the psychotic state.

In this episode of my major depression, I think I actually prefer the manic psychotic state of myself. For so long, I only had repetitive thoughts and suicidal ideation. I was full of pain and grief. I haven’t recovered yet from my middle-age crisis. I might relapse tomorrow into a mode where I don’t get out of bed. The memories of my psychosis keep me company. They are better than the horrible pain of being single, childless, and disabled. They are better than anhedonia, avolition, and social withdrawal.

I hope I did well today, but I didn’t write everything I could. I keep things in the theoretical framework. Finally, I can feel something else that isn’t the grief of post-psychosis. I take my medication and attend daycare groups. I talk to my therapists. I don’t know what the future might hold for me. I may never be able to live independently or form meaningful connections. Growing old can be so cruel.

I felt dead inside for so long, as if only my physical body existed, but my soul was dead. Last year was incredibly traumatic for me, perhaps the worst year of my life. I loved someone deeply, but he didn’t return my affection. He was true love for me, and I’m afraid I’ll never be able to fall in love again. Nobody can compare to him, the brilliant scholar. Nobody will be as bright as he is.

I lost my best friends. The first one I lost was my beloved Efi, who committed the unthinkable when she was only 21. The other was my best friend, a love greater than life. My time at the closed ward changed me, and not for the better. The staff didn’t treat us as if we were human. There was no one to talk to. The place was filthy, and the showers were disgusting. I was heavily sedated. Some of the girls were violent. I discharged myself while I was only in partial remission because I was afraid of the violent ones. It was such a sad place. The heavy dosage of antipsychotics took a toll on me. I lost all sense of self, my own identity. I was restless, couldn’t stop talking, couldn’t sit in one place for a moment. I was unable to think. I lived in hell.

He left me, of course. My great love. He ditched me the second I became manic. I was left so alone. But maybe it was better than being fully aware in my country—the looming threat of civil war, the violent protests, the violence and hate. My country was falling apart. Most people “just” had depression and anxiety. I became fully psychotic. But perhaps this psychosis was protecting me from seeing how my country was falling apart, piece by piece—the place I fought for all my life. All this hate and fear. Maybe I was hiding and seeking refuge at the asylum because I couldn’t deal with reality.

A Tough Weekend and Unexpected News

A Weekend in Hiding This weekend was not good for me. I slept for two whole days, so deeply that I didn’t even hear the sirens and explosions outside. When I finally got up, we went to a restaurant—my friend’s parents, my friend, and I. The food was good, but I went back to bed at 19:00 because I had an important meeting to attend.

Confusion About Moving Plans Everyone seems to assume that I’m going to move to Haifa soon to live in a supportive community. However, I’m actually looking for an apartment with roommates in Jerusalem. This assumption adds to the stress and confusion.

Supportive community

In recent years, the “supportive community” model has been developed, which enables persons with mental health disorders to live in an apartment in the community while receiving intensive assistance available 24 hours a day, similarly to a hostel. Approximately 60 persons live in each community, with apartments distributed within a radius of 1 km from a central home, which also serves as a meeting place.

This model contributes to reduction of the stigma towards persons with mental health disorders, and creates an improved bond of the person undergoing rehabilitation with the community, while making sure to provide them with close assistance and enabling their needs to be met. source https://www.health.gov.il/English/Topics/Mental_Health/rehabilitation/rehab_sub/housing/Pages/default.aspx

Loss of Interest and Deep Pain This weekend was scary. I lost all interest in reading, writing, or making plans to return to grad school. I was in deep pain and just wanted to sedate myself to wait for this wave of distress to pass.

A Glimmer of Hope and Family Concerns On Sunday, I received some good news: I got approval for ketamine treatment. However, my mother had another cardiological operation, so I went to visit her, feeling debilitated and depressed. This left me with no energy or time to review my post.

The last few days have not been good at all. I feel like I’m fading away, like a candle. Nothing seems interesting or desirable. Most of my mental health team has already decided that I should move to a supportive community in Haifa. Everyone seems to think this is the best solution for me given my current situation. I think the idea of moving to a supportive community in Haifa could be more appealing if I knew I was applying for a master’s degree at Haifa University next year. However, I currently lack the funds for that. I’m afraid of being forced to live with people who suffer from serious cognitive decline. I would not do well in such an environment. I wish I could do the unthinkable and just give up.

The words of Elliott Smith from the song “King’s Crossing” echo in my head: “I can’t prepare for death anymore than I already have…so give me one good reason not to do it.”

I usually sleep through the days when I’m deeply depressed. It frustrates me immensely that no one seems to understand how difficult this move is for me. Being distant from my family and relocating to another city at 40 years of age is incredibly challenging.

the best source that I have for getting support is Sal Shikum (israel)