A friend I've never met

I'm part of the list serve at www.psychdog.org and have met some very wonderful people over there. They have been a great support and a great inspiration for me while I've been working with Paige. A good number of them are "unstable." They are working through life situations or medical imbalances while dealing with their own mental illnesses. I don't know many of them very well, in reality, but they are people that I've come to feel close to because we share similar stories. One that I really look up to as a service dog team - we'll call them WonderHandler & SuperPoodle (you know who you are if you're reading this) - recently tried to commit suicide by overdose. It's taken me quite a while to come up with a reaction to this event. I finally managed to open the emails and read the updates today. I'm not sure why it took me so long; maybe I just really didn't want to believe that it could happen to somebody who was so stable seeming. I knew that WonderHandler had her up and downs like the rest of us but this felt heavily out of left field for me. Happily, her husband and SuperPoodle took really good care of her. SuperPoodle was with her in the hospital the whole time and did a fantastic job. He made sure that she stayed awake right after the overdose. He cuddled her and helped with her anxiety. He helped heal her with a ball that caused a smile. *Finally, just now, I'm getting tears in my eyes* I can only hope that Paige can do similar for me on the day that I need it.

Our small community almost lost a valued member. I'm so glad that you're still with us WonderHandler and I'm going to hug SuperPoodle so hard on the day that I meet him for everything that he helped you through.

It is another event in my life that leaves me wondering if I'm actually sick enough to be working with Paige. I've never tried suicide. I've never seriously self harmed because I was scared about what my Parents would do. I hurt but I didn't really want anybody to know because then I would have had to explain it. I'm not as "sick" as others. I've been taking Paige to work with me for the last few weeks. Actually, Paige goes with me everywhere as long as it doesn't involve a bus. I've noticed a difference in myself while I'm out with her. She makes me smile and laugh. She makes me feel calm and confident. I'm starting to smile with my eyes again. The one where you get smile lines around your eyes and you get a twinkle. I lost that smile over a year ago. I don't know why. But it's coming back. She's such good medicine for anxiety. I've always had a bit of anxiety while out of my "safe spots" but as of late, the level of anxiety was getting much higher and the "safe spots" were becoming fewer. I was getting scared that I was going to end up house bound out of fear of the anxiety. But going out with Paige is easy. I feel comfortable and invincible. The dog has a downside: I end up talking to way more people, even if I don't want to.

Most of them are just crazy curious about Paige. She's not a sight dog, I'm not in a wheel chair, why in the world would I have a dog? But I look at what I've just written and I know that Paige is the right medicine for me. Hopefully, with Paige and the "actual" medicine, I won't end up putting up posts like WonderHandler has lately. Prior to Paige, there was a few times where Nick actually told me that he was scared that one day he would come home and find me in the bath tub, bled out. I never even told him which way I would go, but he got it dead on. Now I have one more thing to live for and one more support to rely on: Paige and everything that she has brought into my life (that includes all of my support through HopeHeels - yes, we're officially off the ground - and all my list serve friends, including WonderHandler).

Really, the point to the post was the first 2 paragraphs. The rest of it is just a small look into my mixed up thoughts - I'm sorry if the brain spew that happened there jumps around and doesn't make much sense. Welcome to my head.