Kitt O’Malley

Category: Mental Health

  • Shout Out to MHA

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    Forgot to mention and thank Mental Health Association of Orange County (MHAOC) the organization partnering with and hosting NAMI’s Peer-to-Peer course. Value and Philosophy of MHAOC The Mental Health Association of Orange County provides all of its services within the context of a psychosocial rehabilitation philosophy. Our philosophy holds as its primary goal the elimination of…

  • Review of Eye-locks and Other Fearsome Things: Learning to Love as a Bipolar Aspie

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    I greatly enjoyed reading and highly recommend Ellen Stockdale Wolfe’s autobiographical story of love alongside psychological and neurological growth: Eye-locks and Other Fearsome Things: Learning to Love as a Bipolar Aspie. In her memoir, Ms. Stockdale Wolfe writes of her struggle with Asperger’s and Bipolar Disorder with psychotic features. Her autobiography traces her growth in her ability to love deeply and…

  • Why Being a Hermit Doesn’t Work

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    Research shows that support groups improve outcomes. Great article summarizing the research. Thanks, WiL (Writing into the Light)

  • NAMI Peer-to-Peer Week Two

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    As I attended my second week of NAMI Peer-to-Peer, my 14-year-old son and nephew painted our family room wall a beautiful shade of light green sage. Thank you, boys! Job well done. The room is already more restful with the new color on a wall. NAMI Peer-to-Peer is a peer-led course in which those of…

  • Sh*t Forgot My Meds Last Night

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    Last night, in the midst of a change in routine, I forgot to take my night-time medication. When I saw that my pill-box still contained last night’s medication this morning, I took a partial night-time dose of divalproex sodium this morning. My current night-time dos is 1000 mg. This morning I took 750 mg; one…

  • Exhausted Again

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    As could be expected, I am exhausted. Have run out of juice. A couple (few?) weeks of hypomania and overstimulation, and now I’m dragging and headachey. Got what I wanted done today. Before I picked up my nephew at the airport late this afternoon, I uploaded a bunch of photos from my iCloud account to…

  • NAMI Peer-to-Peer

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    This past Wednesday I attended my first of ten NAMI (National Alliance for Mental Illness) Peer-to-Peer sessions. Since I am brain dead after excessively tweeting (yes, I’ve been hypomanic), here is my tweet about it from Wednesday night: “Just got home from 1st NAMI Peer to Peer class. Weird after over 30 years of therapy,…

  • Brain Slog Today

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    Okay, now as the result of overstimulating myself into hypomania and over-work by obsessively and excessively engaging in social media and spreading myself too thin –> I’m totally exhausted, have a headache, and I’m experiencing serious BRAIN SLOG. That’s the only way I can now describe my seeming inability to do what I should be able…

  • Pregnancy, Breastfeeding, & Medication

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    This post is inspired by #medsandmotherhood week at STIGMAMA.COM, most specifically, this article: Pump and Dump, by Walker Karraa, PhD #medsandmotherhood. Before becoming pregnant with my son, I thoroughly surveyed the medical research about antidepressant use in pregnancy and during lactation. Since I had a history of severe depression and suicidal ideation dating back to…

  • Women, Stigma, and Mental Illness

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    Why is it that we as a society seem to accept depression in women more readily than other mental illnesses? We seem to find it acceptable when a woman harms herself, turns her pain, frustration, and anger inward; yet, should she lash out at those making demands of her, such as her children, she is seen as…