Out of the frying pan, into the fire

Welcome! This is the first post in this new blog which is a sequel to my previous blog, "ECT: A Journey out of Darkness" (http://www.mikeect.blogspot.com/). I had stopped writing in that blog because, in its beginnings, that blog was to keep track of the day to day life of a patient undergoing ECT treatments. Those ended 10 months ago. It seemed to me that my ECT journey had ended, and thus, so should the blog. Having picked up several regular readers along the way, I was reminded that the ECT journey hadn't ended, that there was very little data concerning the long-term effects of ECT, and that several people cared and were interested in how things were going on a continuing basis. Instead of continuing the previous blog, this blog will pick up where the other left off and deal with the road post-ECT.

SallyT, a friend I picked up while writing the previous blog, suggested that my ECT road hadn't ended, but that it will continue indefinitely as I continue to find out who the post-ECT me really is. And believe me, the post-ECT Mike is a completely different person from the pre-ECT Mike. ECT did wonders for the depression I suffered from. It also had some very devastating side effects which have changed who I am, what I can and can't do, and even my likes and dislikes. I don't know if I can say that ECT saved my life. It extended A life. But my life before depression and ECT ended some time ago and a new life began. I spend every day exploring what that new life is all about, who I am, where I can go from here (asked another way "Is this all there is left?"), and what I want for myself and my family going forward.

Its been a while since my lasts posts in the previous blog. In the meantime, my family has moved from one state to another, rented a house for a while, bought a house and moved again, and spent a lot of time adjusting to life in a new place with new people and a new way of life. I guess that move and the changes it brought have complicated my efforts at figuring out what life looks like after ECT.

I have, in past journals (which I try to keep up with, with varying degrees of success), I have tried to use mood rating scales, most often from 1 (terrible day) to 10 (better days than I've had in a long long time.) The problem with such rating scales is that, while appearing to be objective, they aren't. I have found that the scores are subject to my mood at the time I'm rating a day, and so they are unreliable. So, I will try, for purposes of this blog and for my own records, a simpler scale: "Great", "Good", "OK", and "Bad." We'll see how that works.

I like to write, sometimes about my mood and my illness, and sometimes about my off-the-wall philosophies and other things. Please feel free to comment, e-mail, or whatever. I love hearing from readers, both those that I know and those that find this blog by chance on the world wide web. If you have any links that might be helpful to others reading this blog, please send them to me or include them in a comment.