Sorry for not updating the blog for so long, but there hasn't been very much new in my life and I know nobody wants to read a page about a guy who sits around all day and plays video games :-) But a whole lot of things have happened and I'm excited to have an opportunity to share this with you; and away we go!



I had a vivid dream last night probably stirred up by something my mom said to me the day before. She was talking about how she has problems driving on the expressway by herself. She never knows which exit to take, and sometimes ends up miles past where she should have exited. Anyways, in the dream she was driving and I was in the passanger seat. We were heading South on Mopac (a street in Austin: I guess my subconcious still thinks I live there) and traveling in the left lane. My mom exited on a left hand exit a long time before the proper exit she should have taken. She then tried to slow down because there was a light in front of us and it was red. She then slammed on the breaks and the car started to spin out of control and ended up making a 720 degree spin, finally stopping right behind a truck. I'll have to ask my new psychologist what he thinks about this dream.



I fired my old psychologist, Dr Taylor. I didn't like him from the start. On the first day he handed me a sheet which summed up in one page the entire book "Feeling Good"; the cognative psychology handbook. Cognative psychologists believe that distorted thinking patterns cause the feelings of worthlesness and hoplessness, and that the cure is to write down whatever thought is bugging you; identify which pattern of distorted thinking you're using and then write down a challange the negative thought. Sort of like giving yourself a written affirmation every time you think that you suck or that you're worthless. His handout, entitled "Common Unrealistic Beliefs" has a list of sentences that you should make sure to challange if you catch yourself feeling that way. For example




Demand for approval: I must be loved, approved of and respected by the significant people in my life, and if not, it's awful.




Perfectionsim: There is a right, perfect solution to every problem and I must find it, so I have to be certain and be in control



So, I figured, this guy wants to do cognative psychology with me. Well I've tried that and it doesn't work for me too well. As you'll recall, I'm bipolar, and the cause of my depressions are chemical, not due to flawed cognitions. I read "Feeling Good" and it ended up with me feeling frustrated. The sessions with Dr. Taylor were tedious. We would talk about what I did durring the last week and what I planned to do in the next few weeks. Since I had so little going on in my life, I'd run out of things to say 10 minutes into the session and we'd spend the rest of the session chatting about current events. I'm sure he thought that was OK because I had been very disturbed by the events of 9/11/01 and I had become manic watching the news a few times shortly afterwords. Another thing that drove me crazy about Dr. Taylor is that he would always refer to items of interest in my life as "pieces". For example, when I was interested in attending Torah study with my dad at Temple Shaary Tzedek, he called that my "bible study piece". I'd get so irritated with him saying that, that I'd tune out for 10 minutes after I said it, wanting to get up and leave. Once, I shit my pants right before the session (I have a spinal cord injury, as you'll recall) and after a moderate attempt at cleanup, I sat in his office feeling crusty shit all over my legs. I thought he might ask if I want to cancel the session, but he didn't. I guess I should have been more assertive. The last straw for me was the last session, when I couldn't get a straight answer out of the man as to weather or not marijuana should be legalized. We talked about it for at least 80% of the session, and he just gave me the party line about the effects of pot on people's motivation, etc. Having strong feelings on the issue (contribute to NORML) I wrote him off, got a referral from my best friend's dad, and moved on.


Things are very promising with my new therapist, Dr. Donneson. He has years of clinical experience, and he did his post doctoral clinical work at Harvard. He sometimes teaches at MSU. He uses a psychoanalytic approach, but without the hypnosis and other mumbo jumbo. He really seems to have an understanding of the issues I'm dealing with right now. I took in my computer and showed him all the pieces of the website. To my delight, he told me that he'd looked at the Twisted Texas Tour and even jumped off on some of the links, including the world sex guide (an online listing of reviews of prostitues by johns). He asked me today where he could find the Pork Rind Porn. I hope he enjoys the visit!



I have officially been accepted to Michigan State University to study Audiology and Speech Sciences with the goal of becoming a Speech Therapist. I am taking classes this summer to knock out the requirements for one of the classes. I'm taking Linguistics and Developmental Psychology.



I also volunteered at the MSU Artificial Language Lab. This is an amazing place, where they help people so severely disabled that they can't speak and can only move one part of their body to speak. I may do some programming for them. I told the director, Dr. Eulenberg, that I could code Visual Basic, which isn't too far from the truth, as I am a cracker jack Lotus Notes Programmer.



The latest development is that I'm learning to play bridge, and have become my father's bridge partner. I'm still not too good at it, but I really like it, and I can see how bridge is really superior to spades and hearts and euchre.



Well folks, that's all for now, I promise to write more frequenty, at least next time I have a wierd dream!