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Review of The first Visit  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (1.5)
While I'll admit this is decently written (though you use too much white space, making it difficult to follow), I need to make comments about the subject matter.

As a combat veteran with PTSD, and associated mood disorder issues, with a family tradition of service that includes a grandfather who still contends with "shell shock" (what they used to call what we now call "PTSD"), who had volunteered to fly with the RAF before the US got officially involved with WWII, I've got to express both frustration and anger at the misconceptions, lack of understanding, and offensive use of some terms.

Someone with a MH issue is going to find "cracked up" highly offensive. It's as bad as calling him "a nutcase" to his face--or as offensive as calling someone in a wheelchair "a gimp", or someone with substandard IQ "a retard". It's folks using terms like that, exposing that lack of understanding, compassion, and respect for them as a person that is part of the cause of the common issue of resisting diagnosis, refusing treatment, or failure to admit there is a problem to seek treatment for, to begin with.
After all, we were soldiers, we were strong enough to volunteer to be at the very edge of a dangerous situation that nobody who has not been in can really understand (though cops and first responders have a fair idea of what it might be like since they face that same "front line danger" and "seeing horrendous damage to human beings", but to a different degree, and in a different way). So knowing that there are so few who can really understand, and so many holding the ideas you express, we are reluctant to admit to being "too weak", and having "broken" under the strain.

Next is the idea that "the gentlemen" and "the common men" react differently, on average...much less with the symptoms you describe.
If you'll look up the studies, you'll find PTSD, while it occurs in combat arms veterans, is FAR more common in "support services" specialties...as both a combat vet and a student of psychology, I believe the theory that this is related to anxiety conditions in a combat zone--anytime you're in a combat zone, you are fully aware that you may come under fire, or under active attack, at any given moment--but support specialties tend not to have that happen as often, if at all. This means they are under the constant anxiety, without ever having something happen that makes it a clearly rational sense of tension. Combat forces, on the other hand, have the same long term continuous anxiety, but they also come under fire--those few seconds, minutes, or hours of pure terror are "justification" for the anxiety, as well as a release from it--even if through replacement by something even worse, and more intense.

Catatonia and stutter are very uncommon reactions, post-trauma, and completely unrecognized as symptomatic of combat fatigue OR PTSD/Shell Shock. Catatonia, or psychosomatic muteness might occur while on the battlefield, and a stutter might manifest during the heat of the moment, where thought and fear battle for your attention, but AFTER--that's when you get symptoms like paranoia, anti-social behaviors, disassociative disorders of multiple kinds, panic attacks, constant low grade anxiety, and the other established symptoms of combat fatigue or PTSD--and those are the symptoms that stick with the sufferers. And it's those symptoms that might cause a reaction that would get one institutionalized, or might lead to violence.

I suggest that if you intend to turn this in as a paper for school that you grab some reading on combat fatigue and PTSD studies, both for realism, and for the sake of actually approaching the issues with compassion and at least some level of an attempt at understanding what is actually likely to be going on in a combat vet's mind, to cause a need for psychotherapy...especially inpatient type approaches.

Good luck with the paper, the writing is pretty strong. The layout complicates grasping of the story as a whole, though.
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (2.5)
It's not just a human trait. Monkeys don't "laugh", per se, but watch a monkey house, some time. For an extended period.

Laughter is a KIND reaction, compared to the rest of the animal kingdom, where weakness or misfortune is capitalized on by the killing of the one suffering it, most often. Apes and higher monkeys come closer to "human" in that they rarely kill, and usually simply ostracize or abuse.

So yes, we are programmed to be so "unkind", simply by evolution. We haven't evolved past it yet, though we are getting better, as can be demonstrated by societally acceptable behaviors as time progresses.
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Review of Mommy Mayhem  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: ASR | (5.0)
LOL.
Dad's perspective here, but my wife and I were working opposing shifts so the kids could have an aware and attentive parent at all times (ours were first one, then second one ten months and two weeks later, then third one 14 months almost to the day after that). I'd grown up with my sister being born 5 years younger than me (well, she was born five years after me, so it would have been odd if she was born a year younger than me, don't you think?), and my brother 8 and a half years younger, plus my mom started taking care of the children of several neighbors' children about the same ages, as soon as their mothers went back to work.

As such, I had some experience, both first-hand from being mom's extra hands (and occasional child-rescuer), and from having to do some of the baby duties directly, to help her.

A solution to the baby tub issue you might wish to pass on...I never bought one. It is more comfortable, and safer, for the baby if you climb in (wear a swim suit if you are more comfortable doing so), and cross your legs. Use them as the support. The baby feels held the whole time, and stays calmer. They do occasionally "let loose" in the tub, as babies do, but all that means is you pull the stopper, stand up with the baby in your arms, run the shower for a few, to clean yourself and the tub, then refill the tub, and finish bathing. Shield the baby from the shower with your body.

Pediacare/Pediasure also works to loosen up a constipated baby, but real fruit juice in it works much better for quick relief, and you can use a "booger sucker" with warm, soapy water for a quick enema if that doesn't work. I always kept a spare one around for that purpose.

For teething (if you haven't completely passed this point yet) a little sugar water (Pediacare works for this too) in a bottle, bottle turned upside down, then stuck in the freezer until it hardens works. As they gnaw, the liquid thaws...they just drink it. The liquid stays cold, and constantly re-fills the nipple (harder to explain...you want to freeze the liquid, then crush or grind it, like a snow cone, and spoon it into the bottle, so the nipple constantly refills itself, as the melted liquid is drained by baby).

The trickiest part for me (always) has been a diaper change on a table...you need at least three hands, it seems. One to remove the diaper, clean the tush, one to hold the baby, to avoid rolling off the table, and one to grab new stuff from the diaper bag or wherever the needfuls are stored. As often as possible, I used a blanket and the floor, at houses (you just can't do that in public restrooms--yecch!).

Child-proof locks never are, they just make life hard on adults. So you move EVERYTHING you don't want baby touching out of reach...until you discover baby has learned to climb the nearest piece of furniture to get to some of it. So you move the furniture, and move stuff near it higher. To discover baby has learned to push things over to climb up, and examine interesting things. So you remove everything you don't want slobbered on, eaten, or broken from the house.

And even then, they get you. Mine were put down for nap-time one day, a nice summer day, and their bedroom window was large, and not too high up from the flowerbed. I thought nothing of it being quiet--they were napping. Until a neighbor called and asked why they were out, without her seeing me with them. I went and investigated. Apparently, they had cooperated to quietly bust out the screen, hand the smallest out, support the middle one as she climbed out, then help the eldest down, as he climbed out, himself. And when I was asking them what they thought they were doing, the eldest (three at the time) said "it's sunny, and we wanted to catch gasspropers (grasshoppers)", while my daughter nodded and agreed, and the little guy looked solemn.

But apparently, we did OK. One's just off to college, 3.8 GPA in high school, advanced classes, some of which gave college credit, as well as high school, planning to join the Army when he graduates, use that to finance a Master's degree in accountancy (minoring in criminal justice) in hopes of either going career military, or joining the FBI, my daughter is graduating this year, planning to chase anthropology and archaeology, with hopes of getting into deep research in the areas, and a fall-back plan of trying to get into marketing, and the youngest has announced intentions to join the navy immediately after graduation, and go for on-the-job training that will give him specialized skills beyond what a college would, THEN chase a degree complimentary to those skills.
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 18+ | (3.5)
Interesting start for a "digital age romance" (which is, in itself, a genre-bender, I think). I'm really intrigued as to where this is going to go. I'm unclear as to whether Ru is male or female, at this point. Though I don't suppose it really matters, does it?

I'll be back to see where you take it.
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Review of Blood and pain  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Rather negative and pessimistic...not even cynical, as it doesn't make any commentary about the motivations of actions, simply the assigned moods/emotions assumed in others.

It's a decent piece for what it is laid out to be, but the tone behind it is self-defeating attitude of the author. Another author once gave a piece of advice that rang so true that I've tried to live by it, ever since. It might help you.

The gist of it is: Pessimist by practice, optimist by temperament. Prepare for the worst, hope for the best, and take either philosophically. There is no such thing as an "evil person", all men have a justification (in their own minds) for their actions. Try to find theirs. It will either allow you to reach compromise, or to "kill" him without a guilty conscience. Altruism doesn't exist, it is self-delusion. It is simply an act where money is not what changes hands, and they payment received is an intangible (possibly as intangible as simply having the feeling of fulfilling a duty to the human race, or of the good feelings one gets for helping another in the right circumstances). Examine any inclination to altruism, root out the self-deception, and if the price still seems worth the return, wallow greedily in paying it.
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Actually, I think, after comparing the two, that this one is quite a bit better, not just through expansion, but also in style and conveyance of mood/emotion.

To top it off, it's a nice little chiller. Not up to King or Koontz standards (yet), but has the potential of the earlier short stories either of them wrote...specifically, it reminds me of King's "Boogeyman" ("so nice, soooo niiice"), with a touch of a couple other "things that go bump in the night" tales of his.
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: ASR | (4.5)
Nicely laid out, well emoted. The two important things about free-verse.

But you seem to be saying, at the same time, that man's actions, though we can be expected to think, and rise above our "greed" are somehow not part of that nature.
Which is a ridiculous stance, if you actually examine it.

What does evolutionary theory, of any flavor, say about the survival of a species? It must overpopulate its current environment, spread, and either thrive, displacing whatever served in its place before, or fail, fall back to an overpopulated environment, suffer a catastrophic incident bringing the species back into balance with the environment, to wait for a species from elsewhere to succeed at what they failed--and displace them.
Sometimes this adaptation is partly or wholly able to be done by the ability to adapt the environment, not adapt to it. Cougars and bears with their dens, started out as natural formations, made more suitable for the animal by the animal, rabbits and gophers digging their holes. Beavers with dams that flood acres upon acres of land that used to serve thousands of more evolved mammals than it now supports water life, all to adapt the environment more perfectly for a family of 3-10 beavers.

Where, then, does this make MAN'S alterations of his environment any less natural? Or moral? Where a beaver may "ruin" a square mile for all land animals, a human subdivision developer will turn a square mile of land into an environment to best suit the needs of dozens of human families of 3 to 5 people each, plus their pets, plus not upsetting the environment enough to totally drive out raccoon, skunks, possum, squirrels, rabbits, even bears and coyotes, some places. Many even make a concentrated effort to preserve streams that support newts, crayfish, little brook fish.

Which of these is "superior", "more natural", or "more moral"?

Then you add to this that man is the only animal, ever to have made sacrifices, and maintained species that actually directly compete with them for some resources, offer them direct danger in other ways, are just plain annoying to our ongoing comfort, at times. We are the only species in history to not only permit such situations when we don't have to, but to actively and deliberately encourage the competing species, so long as "it's kept within reason".

Not a thing done when a beaver builds a dam, or hornets, a nest.

As for "our greed". Where do you not find greed, as a basic animal trait? Won't wolves kill something they can't POSSIBLY eat before it goes bad? Won't they gorge themselves to sickness, when such opportunities arrive? Won't beavers continue expanding their dams, and stripping forests around them, long after the adaptations they have already put their environment through are sufficient to their purposes? Won't bees produce honey in far greater amounts than they can every use? And bears eat much more of that honey than is necessary, given the opportunity?

Greed is an animal trait. The miracle is when you can get people to decide to act against that trait, not to condemn them when they follow it. They can't help following it, if not taught to do differently, on a level that tells them why they need to do it.


Just a few things to think about when you get to a state of "nature = forests and bunnies and Bambi, and is inherently better than Humans with Mockingbird Lane and Privet Drive, and malls full of stores"--such thinking is a form of self-hate, really, that the people using it have directed outwards onto their whole species. Self-awareness and love of your species comes when you recognize that we're neither more not less than other animals, doing what we do for OUR betterment...but that conscious acts can allow us to deliberately give some small bit of room to preserve species that we would be required by nature to drive extinct, if we were unable to perform feats of higher cognition. And with that, you run into the idea that suddenly, we have an active responsibility to fulfill the role of any animals we've driven from any area, or killed off, simply so we can keep the ecosystem in balance as much as we can, for as long as we can.


G'luck.
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Review of Finish Line  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (5.0)
LOL!
Saw the ending coming a mile away, and it was funny when arrived at, anyhow!
Which, of course, is the mark of good humor...telling one that your audience knows where it will end, and continues reading, or listening, anyhow.
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Review of One Missed call  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (3.0)
I ignored fate, too. Then some men in body armor showed up and said "We're from the government, we're here to help you."

Now I get to see all of them every other Tuesday.
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Review of Questions  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.0)
As a fellow vet, same playground, can I encourage you to stretch this kind of perception further? Find ways to reach those who aren't from our circumstances, and aren't familiar with the terms you used? I mean beyond some being inherently scary sounding, and others getting media attention that you and I both know explosively overbuilds and entirely undersells the items under discussion in one fell swoop (for example, the SCUDS? The private sector heard all about what big, mean, nasty weapons these are/were, but insist on conceptions of a big TV/movie type rocket that went "boom", while you and I know they were far more likely to go "HISSSSS" while still far overhead...and those were the ones worth being afraid of.)

The point of poetry (or any writing, really) is to communicate, to communicate, you have to make sure your audience is speaking the same language.
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Review of Red Guilt  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (3.0)
Just my opinion, but you kind of fail to deliver on the "promise" of the title.
While I agree that you've never been truly alive, until you've faced death, it is when you face your OWN death, especially for the first time, that you become "alive".
It isn't until this point that you realize just how precious each and every little thing around you really is.
Most people aren't capable of even holding on to THAT much for more than a day or so after the experience, which is, again, in my opinion, backed by experience, why "adrenalin junkies" put their lives at risk so often, and push it further and further.
Much like an opiate, that feeling of "I'm on the edge of an experience that might kill me" backs off with use of the same dose, over and over. When you grow confident in your capabilities as a skydiver, and in packing your equipment, so that there is still "a rush", but no longer a sense of "I'm very likely going to die, or at least ALMOST die" to it, dulling the edge. So you step up to group formation dives, or skydiving onto a snow face high above the "safe line" with skis or a snowboard on, knowing that unmarked trails are dangerous, with a high potential for lethal ends.

Taking another's life may make you feel powerful (often the case in repeat killers, as well as those prone to habitual assault), but it doesn't make you appreciate life more. Much less make you more aware of the edginess and value of your own.
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Review of My Wife's Escape  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
I hope she (Sally) a Mustang. Otherwise you need a different name.
Why is it that EVERYTHING you put on here is simply hilarious?
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.5)
Pretty good ramble (and some decent tunes...want some others worth a listen? Oomph! and Eisbrecher are also German industrial band, Oomph!'s "Labyrinth" off the album "Monster" is a particular favorite of mine...for a dark punk, Schoolyard Heroes (now defunct, but the girl has that Betty Boop type voice that I like so much, and the lyrics are dark as...well, they're just macabre).

As for "not being a "normal" Christian"...if you are trying to behave as Christ said is expected of you, in the Bible, instead of twisting it into support for hate, ignorance, and prejudice, you're already not being a "normal Christian"

And that's not a bad thing at all...if you actually pay attention to the Bible, these "conservative Christians" are anything BUT Christian, regardless of their claims...look at what He did...no fixed address, no fixed job, hung out with hookers, thieves, and tradesmen, with a few intelligentsia joining the group...probably (though not expressly said) because they overheard him talking to the rest, and liked what they heard, while they were doing what all "intelligentsia" have done through the ages...get together, drink wine, and tell each-other how smart and well educated they are.
He spent his preaching life telling people "Hey, bro...if you're done wrong to, forgive they guy. if you do wrong, ask his forgiveness and forgive yourself (sounds an awful lot like "getting right with yourself" that bona-fide hippies tell everyone they need to do, doesn't it?). If the guy next door to you is different than you, leave it be, get along with him. Ignore it if you're insulted. Help a person out, when you see one more in need than yourself."

If you read the Bible, HE never claims to be the "one and only son of God", calls everyone spoken to as His "brothers" and "sisters"...it was Michael that told the crowd "He is God's one true son" as part of a longish speech, and when the crowd asked "is what he says true?" His response was "it is as he says"...that's the closest to an actual claim by Him.

The Bible also says there are many paths to God...it just says accepting Christ, and that he died to have YOUR sins forgiven is the EASIEST path. And blatantly states "there are many things man has yet to learn about the workings of God"...which says (to me, anyhow) that we're being told NOT to hold to superstition that is put to paper by flawed men, no matter how intense their belief, but to look for new truths, too.

As for "sheep"...black sheep, white sheep...you're still identifying as A sheep. A step out from the rest of the flock, but part of it...not good, in my opinion. better a sheepdog, or best, a thinking human, not lead by pack mentality, but actually learning to do your own research, dig through books worth of biased information to mine out the actual facts and numbers carried therein, using solid, logical thinking (rather than emotional) to come to every decision that is not EXPRESSLY one of base opinion and emotion. You might not like what you find out, when you work with facts and numbers...but you know what is true, when you do...and what is more important, knowing truth, or holding onto ignorance by choice?

I quite enjoyed your piece, here...I hope you like my response as much.
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Review of Sunday Morning  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (5.0)
Well captured.
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Review of A letter  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (2.5)
Interesting, in a stream-of-consciousness kind of style that almost come across as an insecure teen faced with the furtive looks from someone they are interested in in class, whom they hope is showing interest in them.

But you fall prey to atrocious punctuation, a fault I have, as well, though mine is run-on sentences with overuse of commas.

"dint" I'm sure you meant "didn't", typical typo or slang, either way, n't is a contraction of "not" and ALWAYS gets an apostrophe when used as such. The other form of dint doesn't fit contextually.
I would place a comma between "I finally feel I must go on with it" and "otherwise this weight in my heart will never leave me" as a joining of two thoughts. A natural pause.
"Loose" is improperly used, in context. It should be "lose" as in "misplace" not "loose" "as in "the opposite of making something tighter". Common mistake, especially with younger writers.
"Every time you glanced at me, I turned" "teasing my heart, I smiled a bit each time""Your anxiety, my fear, it felt amusing. It felt great" separation of identifiers or ideas.
"Pinching the palms of my hand, I wondered" (two separate actions)
"Am I being too obvious" is a question...question mark, not period.
"Then suddenly, it was over. You were gone, forever changing me." Again, two separate ideas and sentences."Your silly laugh, and innocent words" (two different things)
"Your voice all jittery, I could read your pules" or "Your voice all jittery. I could read your post", either works, separates two statements/ideas.
"It has been 5 months now, and your voice is not as clear"--two statements, conjoined by the "and", needs comma.
"I wonder now, when was is it that I fell (comma or period. new idea separation, here) because now I feel like I am falling. I don(apostrophe--contraction of "do not")t know who you are. (statement, not question)
"But this illusion I like (comma, separation of statements/ideas) because it has made me someone I never knew."
"It has opened me up (comma, separate statements)but at the same time imprisons me. I ..I really dont (apostrophe "don't", contraction of "do not") know if I have more to say to you. "
"I cant say I miss you, (comma separates ideas) but I am waiting to get to know you. ("cant "needs an apostrophe...contraction of "can not"--other use of word cant, without contraction, not contextually proper)


Aside from other places that I would end up placing commas to fill in what I consider natural pauses, this piece is proper grammatically, to an extent. Proper entirely if the goal was to carry emotional insecurity and confusion. Not so much if it was meant to be a character study on definitive emotions.
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: ASR | (4.5)
Rather interesting tale, on the psychological portions.
Are you aware of the meanings, in dream symbolism, as currently accepted, of falling dreams, dreams of being in another body (and qualities of that body), and undefined, but somehow aggressive darkness?
If not, you lined up a pretty damned good set, and I'll let you in on my own understanding (as a mentally ill person who dove into studies of psychology and psychiatry after accepting diagnosis, because *I* wanted to know what was going on in my pea-brained skull).

Falling dreams are most common in teens, especially in early adolescence...they represent a feeling of loss of control, or of having no control. Flying dreams are usually "limited control"
Dreams of inhabiting another body usually mean an image of a body that is what you see in yourself (she's confident and thinks she's comfortable, though there's an underlying sense that something is missing, hence the "uncomfortable in the body" despite sensing great strength in herself in a sense other than physical...it's just depicted as physical strength in the dream...not uncommon)
Dreams of a darkness...especially one you can't help but be drawn to, and is aggressively dangerous usually represent what the dreamer fears in themselves or their environment that may sabotage them to the point of overcoming any perceived strengths.

These, together, make a strong mosaic that anyone with any study in the area could get a very good picture of the character's personality.
And then the twist, the dreams having some concrete reality...common twist, but almost required in storytelling of this sort.

Good work, and I hope all of this was intentional (or biographical)
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
As a bi-polar (induced by both long term stress--military in wartime), I can sympathize...but I also feel the need to point out that during depressive phases, we rarely, if ever, attempt suicide. During those phases we PLAN it, yes. But, like clinical depressives, we don't have the energy, or the "care" to bother. That's the period where we close off, don't want to leave our beds, or interact with people. It's the manic period where we destroy ourselves. The time when everything is "do, do, do, and damn the consequences!"

With the number of attempted suicides you reference..may I say you are VERY lucky to have been in stages where you may have thought you intended them to work, but were actually begging for help? The rest of us may try once or twice before "getting it right", usually with no note, no chance of being interrupted or saved. Simply a well thought out plan that began while in depressive state, knowing what would return, and the results that manic periods invariably have, that is carried out later, just before a manic phase peaks.

If you're continuing to struggle, it usually means your meds are off balance (assuming you're adhering to a schedule of medications, which is the hardest things for us...most of us kick a medical regiment 6 to 12 times before sticking with it, and then it takes a year or more to find a good balance, as I'm sure you know), so this is something you should be discussing with your doctor...trying to find a balance between the "wrapped in cotton" disassociated feeling of being over-medicated, and still experiencing wild swings of being under-medicated...a regimen that works, and that you can stick to (my own regimen, to avoid the over-medicated feeling requires 3 "mood balancing" chemicals, two anti-depressants, one of which that has the main purpose of also balancing my sleep schedule...good and regular sleep is an imperative for us, and two separate "as needed " anti-anxiety medications to assist in control of extremes of the manic end, since a normal antidepressant takes a week or more to build up to effective levels in the bloodstream, and when I need the immediate help, I don't have time for that.)

With a bit of work and cooperation with a good doctor, you should be able to find a mixture that, while it stops extremes of emotions, even when they SHOULD be extreme, it regulates normal standards to the point that you aren't a "lithium zombie", but you no longer have to fear any level of the normal bi-polar "whiplash".

Good luck.

Signed,
20 year survivor, first diagnosed 15 years ago, first acceptance of diagnosis and of treatment 6 years ago...and living "normally" since. Despite a wife who goes through regular bouts of clinical depression, and three teenagers who would give anyone a right to claim insanity defense.
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 18+ | (5.0)
As a fellow writer, may I ask that you find some way to settle? I think MY muse is in that picket line.
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Review of The Appeal  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 18+ | (5.0)
Again, your normal stellar work!
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Review of Gritz  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (5.0)
Love it! Again, that early King taste...maybe a bit of influence by a couple others, though.
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Review of Knock Knock  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
You've done better. Good, but not up to your standards.
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Review of Just $29.95  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 18+ | (4.5)
LOL...
My friend, you have a rather innate ability to handle this sort of material.
And your relation of the effects of sleep deprivation, have you ever experienced them? Because they're pretty close to spot-on.
I'm ex-military (and because of this, due to some chemical testing in the first foray into the desert, also bi-polar), and have extensive first-hand knowledge of the process.
Your timing may be a bit off, but that's really all I could see, off-hand.
The average person, without training or chemical assistance, has a maximum "functional alert time" of about 36 hours. After that staying on focus, or on task, becomes very difficult.
By 48 hours, most begin to experience the onset of hallucinations...swimming black dots, and other "small" visual phenomena, as well as the low level auditory hallucinations (humming in the background, distracting buzzing noises, over-loud ringing of ears).
By 60 hours, normal people are experiencing full-blown LSD style hallucinations. Just like LSD use, for some this is as minor as "breathing walls and seeing music", while for others, this can take on a whole new meaning.
By 72 hours, psychotic break. Reality is no longer reality. You start "seeing things"...shadows that aren't there, or seeing things IN shadows (being certain they are malevolent ghosts, for instance), smelling things, hearing things.
And it accumulates from there.

This is why bi-polars in manic state have their psychotic breaks, why meth users go so crazy while on a bender, why soldiers put in a position where they don't get enough mental rest go off the deep end.

The interesting part of this is...you can stretch this, by getting SOME, but insufficient, rest. But you won't escape it short of 3 hours a day minimum sleep for a short term case (in most cases). You can do the military standard of 5 minutes mental down time for every hour of alert time, for a couple days, and be functional, assuming that there's doss time at the end that lets you "catch up", but when you get past the 3rd day, if it hasn't been the 3 hours per day, you're going to be at about the 60 hour, no rest point, and acceleration will only take a "time out" for the sleep caught after that, until true crash time is available.


When I went through Ranger school, during our "you get the military mandated 5 minutes per hour...dosed out hourly, not as one rest per day" hell week, I remember watching other guys go through things that were hilarious. But at the time, I was so busy dealing with what was happening to me that there wasn't anything funny. I imagine that knowing this is why, for the first and only time during that training, we did not have live ammunition.

Having all of that experience in the area kind of forces an appreciation of how plausible, despite how horrid, this story really is.
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Review of Monster  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: E | (4.0)
Nit-picking: "So take my warning, sleep with your light off if you dare" is an independent sentence. Period before So, capitalize S. Missed a capitalization of "I" in "the time I dread is near", and it should be closed with a period, instead of a comma, allowing the next sentence to be a statement of its own. Comma after "Chuck Norris", as you're linking observations of two different qualities, sight and smell. "it's impossible, it's so much stronger"...missed comma and two apostrophes (It is contracted to "it's". "Its" is for "it owns" as in "its car, its ball").

Aside from that, decent work.
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Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Your narrator sounds quite manic to me, as well as being egomaniacal, and neither are "quick changes", he establishes exactly the same qualities throughout....

The homeless man, though...HE changes, from decrepit homeless man of the type often seen muttering to themselves, momentarily falling under a spotlight, as an actor in his best, and projecting a power undeniable to any who witness.

Also...language, you have to change the rating to 13+ or 18+, or the mods will come down on you over it.
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Review of Change of Heart  Open in new Window.
Review by C Scott Gray Author IconMail Icon
Rated: 13+ | (4.0)
Good story.
If it's true, I'd like to offer some advice...it's not warning advice, or negative advice, or anything of the sort.
What it is is basic long-term relationship advice.
For any relationship to work, both people have to believe they are doing more than their share of the work...and keep doing it, because it means that the other is "getting a break". When you think you're doing ALL the work, or if HE feels that way, it becomes trouble. The one feeling that way has become (or always was) selfish, and is incapable of putting the baby first, much less you.
And you really have to be willing to feel that you're the one doing more, that you're content in that, even if it means that if something makes the other unable to carry "any weight at all", then you have a solid relationship.
I was fortunate enough to have that strong a relationship, until my health issues put me in a position where the best I can do, usually, is a couple hours worth of housework, most days. No trips to the store, no running the kids to various events. Then my wife discovered she wasn't willing to keep on doing more, and decided I was doing "nothing", regardless of visible effects I had on the cleanliness of the house, and preparations of meals, and so on...and it means our relationship is already dead, but we're sticking the last 4 years, to make certain the kids keep the lifestyle they're used to.

So be CERTAIN that both of you are willing to carry that weight...or be aware that eventually you will be carrying all of it, no matter what you try to avoid it.
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