mental health break

asylum

aaaaaaaahhhhh !

Is Radioactivity Really Good for You? – NRC to be The Decider | NoNukesCA.net

YOU may be suffering from…

RADIOLOGICAL PHOBIA!

Is Radioactivity Really Good for You? – NRC to be The Decider | NoNukesCA.net

Mirror In The Bathroom

prison state

watch "prison state" on pbs

Gonzo

Hunter S. Thompson

by Ralph Steadman

Hunter Stockton Thompson (July 18, 1937 – February 20, 2005) was an American journalist and author who wrote Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas (1971) and Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail '72 (1973).

He is credited as the creator of Gonzo journalism, a style of reporting where reporters involve themselves in the action to such a degree that they become central figures of their stories. He is known also for his unrepentant lifelong use of alcohol, LSD, mescaline, and cocaine (among other substances); his love of firearms; his inveterate hatred of Richard Nixon; and his iconoclastic contempt for authoritarianism. While suffering a bout of health problems, he committed suicide in 2005, at the age of 67. (read more)

Hunter S. Thompson

Jib Jab

JibJab

blog.jibjab.com

grog

beer

and

rum

makes

grog

yo ho!

tell it like it is

six keys to happiness

...8 hours of uninterrupted sleep...

...7 hours work a day...

...20 minutes or less commute a day...

...5 home cooked meals a week...

...2 hours of play with your children a day...

...4 hours of play with your partner a day...

PTSD

The military is known for instilling leadership and teamwork ability ..skills that battle conditions can quickly take away. According to a Rand study, nearly one third of all returning troops suffer from some form of post-traumatic stress (PTSD) or traumatic brain injury. Some of them show up at student services where I see them. James was part of a tank crew. On a hot day in Iraq ..they left the hatch open. That’s when a grenade blast slammed his head against an iron plate. At home, he enrolled in college using his GI benefits. However, crowded classrooms make him feel trapped and panicky. When he tries to contain these feelings, he finds he can’t make sense out of what the instructors are saying. Answering a question is like trying to find the answer to a riddle. He mumbles and strains to put together a coherent sentence ..and hopes he’s somewhere in the ballpark. I referred him to the VA for therapy. A short time later he quit school and went looking for a job. He hoped the skills they taught him in the service would help. Unfortunately, many employers told him they couldn’t accommodate time off for therapy. When I talked to him about it, he said he didn’t think that was the real reason. “They hire the disabled all the time” he says “Guys that need just as much time off as I do. No, it’s more like they’re afraid I’ll go postal or something. Head-cases make them nervous.”

The Cube

It's called Earth

Antidepressants

I think I like this guy! He certainly makes a convincing argument. He's saying that medication for depression (SSRIs, MAOIs and Tricyclics) may actually be turning single/acute episodes of depression into chronic conditions. I wonder what this means for children who are medicated for, what may only turn out to be, a rough period of adolescence ..that they would eventually outgrow.

And Now To Something Completely Different

Say no more,

know what I mean,

nudge, nudge

wink, wink.

All You Need Is

We are born alone

live alone

die alone

What have we without love?

Self medication

I’ve learned through experience that delusions, brought on by capricious mental activity, are best left ignored. Like passing clouds, there’s not one worth hanging on to. There’s a practice I learned called ‘grounding’ that I find valuable. It helps me disengage from delusional thinking by anchoring to something in my immediate surroundings. The goal is to bring myself out of the grips of a delusion, or an intrusive memory, by way of the senses. Anytime symptoms come on, whatever form they may take ..it’s a good time to practice this exercise. I start by looking at five things nearby and begin naming them ..being specific and detailed. For example, I see my dog and say: “ ..shaggy brown hair and wet nose ..” or “..black computer speakers with silver lettering” and so on. Next, I name five things I hear, like the humming of a fan or the whoosh of passing cars, and so forth. Then I name five things I feel by sense of touch, like the jeans against my legs; the soles of my feet on the ground, and so on. I concentrate on sensing things the way they actually are ..careful not to replace them with the way I think they should be. I repeat the whole process a couple of times ..earning extra points if I become so wrapped up in my senses that I lose count. The idea is to make delusions disperse and fade into the background like the meaningless noise that they are.

Head case

A model for the fabric of the mind has been tentatively settled-on. It’s one that characterizes what’s inside my head as a 3-dimensional network of delicately connected instances of prior experience and feeling. Under ordinary circumstances, incoming sensory and verbal events produce ripples that spread out over this fabric, like stones on a pond, activating network-connections until a clear mental representation is formed. However, when something goes wrong, and there’s a disturbance in the fabric, activation may become amp’d, unfettered and diffuse ..compounding insubstantial phenomena until, what may have started out as a gentle hummingbird, for example .. becomes a ferocious beast. Sometimes I think it’s only a matter of degree between clarity and delusion ..especially when I consider how many times I mistook a perfectly innocent remark as hostility.