Ruminations on Progress in Recovery (or, How to Eat an Elephant)
During my many inpatient psychiatric hospitalizations for Depression and suicide (both ideation and attempts) after my car accident, I was suffering from not only a loss of social status (adjusting to living on SSD income) but a loss of physical and mental capacities (Depression really does a number on one's cognitive abilities). I've since overcome many of these feelings, and even some of the physical and mental debilitations (although not all of them, unfortunately). I've had to learn how to live with a "new me" if you will, and learn that I have new limitations, in addition to discovering what previous limitations I've always had. It wasn't the doctors who helped me with the profound sense of loss and feelings of inadequacy. They're just there for pharmacological stabilization--"let's get him stabilized on pharmaceuticals and shove him out the door" is the mantra of most psychiatrists these days. It certainly wasn't ...