Suicide is a disease

What Doesn't Kill You?

Suicide seems to run rampant in my family. Spreading itself around like a transmittable disease. I keep hoping to "Cure" my family of it, but it appears to have dug its roots deep.



My Sister and I 1981

I remember when my grandfather came into the room where I was sleeping to tell me my mother had died. I had gone to bed early. It was around 9pm and I remember him say "Tachia, Tachia" by the second time he'd said my name I was just beginning to wake up and said "what?" he replied "you're mother is dead". I said "okay" and rolled back over to sleep.
I was 14 years old. I remember still trying to sleep and thinking I couldn't have heard him correctly. As I layed there I heard him on the telephone (one of the old rotary dial phones) making calls and talking to people. As I was still half asleep, I could heard him crying. I thought he was laughing. I remember thinking; why is he telling everyone my mother is dead?...
Read more here...

~ Natachia Barlow Ramsey's Story; Surviving Postpartum Psychosis ~ Suicide is a disease ~

Dirty Little Secrets

Forced Sterilization or Self Imposed

Compulsary Sterilization in a Civilized World



I was 19 and my daughter (Shey)
was about 6 months old

I am not sure of the exact moment in time when I realized I would have to get sterilized in order for the powers that be to start supporting my release. I just remember being in the court room listening to basically the same testimony as I heard before with the "only real risk factors" being if I were to get pregnant again. It was the same verbage used at a previous hearing and I realized as long as I could have children I was going to be stuck there and the sooner I wanted to get out the quicker I had better make it so I couldn't have any more kids.
 

So, I asked the hospital to schedule an appointment for a tubal ligation and within a couple months it was done. The very next time I went to court, it was brought up that I had 'voluntarily' undergone a tubal and therefore I could not have any more children. You see, they could not come right out and say compulsory sterilization because the law had changed. They couldn't even suggest I be "fixed". It just had to be hinted at enough and hoped I got it. If I didn't? I would stay there until my ovaries were like prunes. Or like another woman I knew; had to end up having..
Read more here...
 

~ Natachia Barlow Ramsey's Story; Surviving Postpartum Psychosis ~ Dirty Little Secrets ~

Walking the line

I Walk the Line

I have walked the line between living for one child or dying for another. There's never a good, right or perfect answer. I just have to live with knowing that I have walked the line and probably always will.

 



My daughter and I on her 9th birthday in 2002

When I was sick with PostPartum Psychosis in 1999, and I wanted to commit suicide, my son's (Hunter's) father didn't believe that Hunter was his; I thought in those terribly dysfunctional moments that the only one who wanted Hunter was me. That in order for him to be 'safe' I had to take him with me.

I know, I know; it doesn't make any sense now. How could I possibly be keeping him "Safe" by wanting to take his life and mine? I cannot rationalize my thinking that day. I can only say in those moments, in those minutes, on that day it made sense to me.

Asking someone who is losing their mind to explain why they were thinking a particular way and expecting it to make sense is like... well, asking a schizophrenic person who doesn't know they're schizophrenic if the voices they hear are real. They can't distinguish the difference.

I have yearned to find someone who had gone through a similar experience. Not because I wanted them to feel this kind of anguish, but because it feels so very lonely when..
Read more here...
 

~ Natachia Barlow Ramsey's Story; Surviving Postpartum Psychosis ~ I walk the line ~

Nightmare Alley

What Dreams May Come

For a decade I had the same recurring nightmare; that I would walk into the Augusta Mental Health Institute for some kind of meeting, the doors would close behind me and I couldn't get out. The dreams always started off with me having to go there for something innocuous. Once inside they inform me I cannot leave. I check all the doors, I am crying, I plead with them. No matter what I say, no matter what I do I have to stay there. Locked inside.

Although I do not remember exactly when I had the first nightmare, I do recall it was sometime after I was released the first time in September of 1999 into a group home on personal recognizance bail so I could be in therapy.

I would wake up in a cold sweat and have that same feeling everytime. This weighted down, surreal and out of sorts feeling. Empty space. I don't think I've ever been afraid of a place or afraid of anything really as I was afraid of that place. Just being there the five months I was there when I was sick with Postpartum Psychosis was incredibly scary.

One of the worst things about being there is that people mess with you, staff included, and even when you try to tell someone, you are often not believed because "you" are the crazy one. You're the one who is in the hospital for being sick. There are some real assholes working in mental health hospitals, people who really like being in control, who shouldn't be allowed to work with people who have a mental illness. Now that's not to say that everyone is bad. They're certainly not and if

Read the rest here:

..Natachia Barlow Ramsey's Story; Surviving Postpartum Psychosis ~ Nightmare Alley ~

What is Home Really?...

There's No Place Like Home

I think a lot of people think of 'home' as a particular place. Maybe for some that's true. For me, home is with the people I love and care about. As long as they're there; that's home.

I have just moved into a cottage near the ocean until next June. It's furnished, almost complete with kitchen-ware. So while I am bringing in my personal things along with a few small furniture pieces, I'll be borrowing someone else's housewares for the next 9-10 months and I'll call this home.

I haven't been online blogging in a while since I had a 'series of unfortunate events' occur that included my phone breaking and thus my internet went along with my communication.

This summer has taken almost all of my resources and drained them. I am just beginning to feel a resurgence of energy reserves slowly starting to build. I think the quiet of the Village (yes I said Village. This IS Maine and this is the second time in 8 years I have rented a cottage near the water in a Village. The last time being in Liberty, Maine on Lake St. George, one of my favorite places to be) will be just what I need. Mostly I want the people I love..

Read more here..
 

~ Natachia Barlow Ramsey's Story; Surviving Postpartum Psychosis ~ What is Home Really? ~