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ANNA MAGDALENA CHRISTIANSON,

MS, CPSS, ETS, CPRP

Age: 60

Resides in: Berrien Springs, MI

Occupation: Psychiatric rehabilitation practitioner and peer-support specialist at Riverwood Center, Berrien County Mental Health Authority

Marital status: Married 38 years, with two children

FROM TEMPLE:

Anna feels that her life really began in her 50s, when she began working as a rehabilitation specialist. She largely deals with clients who have severe mental illness. Fortunately for Anna, she has a boss who is aware of her Asperger’s syndrome and who coaches her when she needs it. Anna draws inspiration from classical music more than from other people. She feels music at the core of her being, and it inspires emotions within her she would not be able to experience otherwise. At the end of her chapter, Anna writes that some people might consider her job to be a “dead-end job” but that it has been perfect for her. It has allowed her to grow and “blossom” at an amazing rate.

ANNA’S INTRODUCTION

Since July 2008, I have worked for the Berrien County Mental Health Authority as a psychiatric rehabilitation practitioner and certified peer-support specialist at the Riverwood Center. I work both one on one and in group settings with individuals with severe mental illness, facilitating their recovery. I oversee a number of recovery- and wellness-orientated workshops and classes. I do benefits counseling, housing, and sometimes employment. I am also an advocate for the mentally ill and sometimes speak publicly on mental illness and my own experience with a severe mental illness.

I consider myself fortunate to work where I do and to have an understanding supervisor, who gives me the freedom to be myself. I work on a number of committees, both at work and on the state level, and I have grown both professionally and personally as a result. I am able to incorporate several of my likes into the work I do, namely literature research and review and curriculum development. One aspect of work I am not fond of is documentation, because I find writing so difficult and intimidating. I feel awkward and sometimes have trouble finding the right words.

I have experienced some interpersonal problems at work. In the past, I had difficulty understanding the role of a coworker and made some terrific blunders. I have said things I ought not to and misunderstood what was said to me. The social aspects of life have always presented a problem, but I am working hard to “be nice.”

I’ve been such a free, stubborn spirit for so long, that I have had some difficulty at work adjusting to supervision. After 3 years of employment, I just learned that one asks one’s supervisor if one may take time off. I thought one just told. This has been a struggle to learn and remember.

Lars, my son, lives in Napa Valley and is pursuing a degree in computer science. He’s researching topics such as augmented reality and human-machine interfaces. He would like to bring cutting-edge technology, such as head-up (transparent) displays and intuitive input interfaces, into everyday use. He supports himself and his education by working as a janitor. He’s a union steward and a classified senate vice president at the college at which he works. (As he explained it to me, the union is the negotiating body at the school. The senate is a governance body. He represents the nonteaching staff.)

Else, my daughter, is an artist and an integral part of the Sebastopol alternative art community in California. She is currently working with colored pencil on birch panels. Else is also a costume designer and art director for an indie rock band called Baby Seal Club. With a group of friends, she formed a large community garden, which provides her with quite a bit of her own food.

Growing up, Else took it upon herself to teach me about social cues. “You didn’t have special ed,” she quipped. “You had children.” She used to tell me in the grocery store, “Mom, don’t point—it’s rude!”

It is important to note that both of my children believe they were profoundly affected by my experience with bipolar disorder, anxiety, and an autism spectrum disorder. Lars has told me that he is now in the finishing stages of working through childhood issues. He believes that the biggest impediment to a more healthy childhood was the almost complete lack of information on how to deal with both his and my symptoms and idiosyncrasies. He also has an autism spectrum disorder, although he feels he is now “without symptoms.”

CHILDHOOD AND YOUNG ADULT YEARS

With the exception of Stanley, my twin brother, I am the eldest of five children. Becky and Barbara are 1½ and 2½ years younger. John is 10 years younger. I tended to play mostly with Becky. Stanley and Barbara played together, as I recollect. Since John was so much younger, he was like “an only child.”

I remember playing with Stanley’s trucks in the sandbox and in the dirt. I colored and painted, read books, put together puzzles, and played with dolls. I made rose petal perfume and covered myself in mud. I pretended to be a pioneer and an Indian. One magical Iowa day, I played all by myself with little rocks in the dirt by the side of the road. Every summer, I designed a new handwriting style to use during the coming school year. I rode my bike, executed insects with Becky (by hanging them or decapitating them), played in the haymow (piles of hay) in the barn, and made forts. I watched cartoons and Shirley Temple movies at the neighbor’s house. I was fascinated with exploration.

But I was not a happy child.

I Was Taught Manners and Punctuality

I was brought up in a conservative Christian home. I attended the Seventh-day Adventist church, was baptized when I was 12 (and took it very seriously), and attended private Seventh-day Adventist schools. As kids, we were expected to obey and were taught manners and to say “please,” “thank you,” and “excuse me.” I was taught to be neat and clean. While I did not always keep my room straight as a child—I shared it with my two sisters—my drawers were always ship-shape. I was taught to let my mother know where I would be and when I would be home. “How come you trust Anna?” Becky queried. Because I was always where I said I’d be, and I was punctual in returning home. I was given chores and was expected to help clean the house every Friday afternoon in preparation for the Sabbath. I played “sink the saucers” (washed the dishes), ironed, and was expected to keep my room clean. Every Friday, I dusted the living room. It was all I had time for on Friday, because I felt compelled to dust everything—every book, shelf, rung, furniture leg, figurine, and picture frame. I also had other irregular jobs, like sweeping the walk or helping my mother can fruit in the summertime.

Early on, I was taught to know the difference between right and wrong and to always tell the truth. I was also taught to respect adults and refer to them by title. My parents emphasized the importance of generosity. One winter, I gave my sister, Becky, my favorite coat as a nice gesture. Later on, I found out that the one I kept for myself was actually her favorite!

When I was 10, my little brother, John, was born. It was my responsibility to help my mother care for him. I protected him as best as I could from Becky, who used to try and bribe him to do things for her. When he was 2 years old, I saved his life by plucking him from a stream—he was sliding down toward a precipice and a waterfall. I saved my mother once, too. We were tubing in rough water, and she fell off into the rapids. I grabbed her and pulled her over to the riverbank, sputtering and thrashing. She had never learned to swim.

I Was Educated to Value Art and Music

I was raised to value art and music, the accoutrements of “culture.” We were the only family I knew that attended classical music concerts and visited art museums. As a child, I once invited my friend, Suzanne, to accompany us to a Sunday afternoon concert at Redlands University. She declined. Growing up, the only music I listened to was on the classical music radio station out of Los Angeles. I remember lying on the carpet by the radio in the evening, listening to someone playing the piano. When I was 10, I started taking piano lessons. We all took music lessons, but the piano became my instrument. Sometimes, when I practiced, Becky would stand behind me with a paring knife at my back. She told me that if I moved, she’d stab me. While she may not have done it intentionally, she was clumsy enough to do so accidentally. I was afraid.

I was taught to value the natural world. Every Saturday afternoon, we went to the country. We often went camping—to the beach, the mountains, or the desert. We were free, then, or at least I was. We collected rocks, shells, insects, and flowers. I knew the names of things then. My father thought I would become an entomologist. Close. I did graduate work in entomology, I just didn’t complete the thesis.

Teen and Young Adult Years

On the Sabbath, I went to work at the hospital with my dad. Sometimes I was scared of my mother’s driving. Going to summer camp was a source of discomfort. I was afraid of my cousins. I was also afraid of a girl named Ann, as well as older children. I lay awake for hours at night. My mother chewed too loud.

When I was 17, I discovered the lutenist Julian Bream and Elizabethan music on a record I got from Smiley Library. I played that record nonstop for a year. Becky hated it. Therefore, she hated me. My mother thought it was because Becky was jealous of me, because I was the eldest. That did not make any sense. Last year, Becky told me it was because of Julian Bream and the lute. I was very, very much “into” the Renaissance and Baroque periods then, particularly the arts. I also loved the Beatles.

I do not know if my parents suspected that I was different. My mother has only said, “You were all different.” She did note, however, that I seemed “high-strung” and only relaxed when we spent the day in the mountains. I also seemed content when I was little to play by myself and would ignore the others around me. I did not act like I needed much attention and did not seek it; therefore, I did not get a whole lot. My mother had her hands full with my siblings. I had a temper, and my mother has told me how mortified she was when I’d throw myself on the ground and kick and scream.

When I was 17, we were seeing a family counselor for a problem with another sibling. It was this specialist who alerted my parents that I was the one who really needed help. I don’t know what she saw, other than an extremely depressed, withdrawn adolescent. I began seeing a psychologist and, later, a psychiatrist. Neither one helped me, nor did the medications prescribed for me. I talked very little, and I had begun acting out, even though I had always been reasonably well behaved. One afternoon, while home alone, I smashed two-thirds of the windows in the house and then took off for the local cemetery. I don’t know why I did it. My condition was diagnosed as an adjustment disorder.

Anxiety and Bipolar Disorder

I later received diagnoses of bipolar disorder and an anxiety disorder. My mother has asked me, “What could I have done differently?” And I’ve told her, quite honestly, “Nothing,” for I know of nothing that could have changed my life. I was unhappy as a child. I had a suicide plan when I was 9. My mother has told me that I didn’t seem happy at home. I preferred school. My only explanation is that perhaps school was more organized and predictable and less personal. Perhaps there were not as many emotions floating around.

I did not connect with people well. I do not remember ever doing so, actually, except for an isolated occasion when I was 20, when I was doing hashish with a girl named Jenny. I still do not connect. This lack of emotional reciprocity—if that is what it is—has been my greatest discomfort. I was loved as a child. I was my paternal grandfather’s favorite grandchild. Yet, I never felt love.

SCHOOL EXPERIENCES

I was taught to value learning and education. My family was educated, and there was never any question that we would all continue on in school.

I attended morning kindergarten with Stanley. Apparently, I clung to him—that’s what the grade card said at the end of the year. “Ann does not cling to Stanley as much.” I don’t think that was literal. I don’t recall being comfortable in kindergarten, though. I was 5 and in a foreign place. One day, Stanley was sick and I had to go to school alone. Most of the way, I had to walk by myself because my mother had to stay with the other children. I was scared, and I cried. Ann, the girl I was afraid of, told me to rub spit on my eyes and then no one would be able to tell that I had been crying. It didn’t work. The teacher immediately asked me what was wrong.

In 1st and 2nd grades, I was in a two-room school with four grades per room. I don’t remember the number of students in my room, maybe a dozen. I absolutely adored my teacher, Mrs Addison. And she liked me—all my teachers liked me. I felt like a teacher’s pet, and maybe I was. I was quiet, well behaved, and a natural student. I took school very seriously. On the first day of school in the 1st grade, I met Suzanne. She became my best friend until she went to Loma Linda Academy in the 10th grade. I think she and I were teacher’s pets together. Maybe.

My favorite color was blue. “What’s your favorite color?” “Blue.” That’s because Suzanne’s favorite color was blue. In actuality, I really didn’t have a favorite color, but everyone always thought it was blue. Suzanne and I, never, ever, once fought or argued or had the tiniest hint of a disagreement. I think I just went along with whatever she wanted. Or maybe she was just as agreeable as I was. I don’t know. I was appalled at my sisters and their relationships. Suzanne’s little sister Roxy was Barbara’s off-and-on best friend. They alternately loved and hated each other. I never understood it. Becky was the same. They also had a lot more friends than I did. I really only had one. But, I also had no one who disliked me.

I don’t recall ever inviting Suzanne over to my house. I went to hers maybe twice, and I was extremely uncomfortable. In the summertime, sometimes I’d go over to her grandmother’s. We’d play Indians with stick spears in the tall grass. Sometimes we were animals—Suzanne’s idea. Sometimes we played with little green World War II soldiers.

In 3rd grade, the school moved to a brand new location, and we only had two grades to a room. Well, 3rd grade actually had its own room, I think because the class was “large.” After a time, the five smartest students were moved into the 4th/5th grade room, not sure why. It was Stanley, Mark, Albert, Suzanne, and me. We were still in the 3rd grade. But one afternoon before we were moved, I was copying something off of the blackboard before going out to recess. My teacher, Miss Biggs, was standing in the way. I very politely said, “Hey, kid. I can’t see through you.” She made me put my head down on my desk. I didn’t understand. Other people said things like that. Even adults. They said, “You make a better door than a window.” I said the very same thing. My mother told me Miss Biggs was shocked, and she made me go back after school to apologize. I didn’t understand why.

In 6th grade, I came home from school every day and immediately sat at the wall-mounted desk my dad had made me and did homework. All evening, I would do homework. I loved it. I was in Mr Larsen’s room. I liked him. Of course, I liked most of my teachers. All except Miss Biggs. She thought that if parents did their jobs right, children would come to school and be perfect little angels.

I Became a Stranger in a Strange Land in 11th Grade

In 11th grade, I moved to Loma Linda Academy, because Redlands Junior Academy only went to the 10th grade. I was lost. It was much bigger, and there were crowds of students I didn’t know—and never would. I knew a few people, but not well. Of course, some of my classmates from Redlands also moved to Loma Linda. It didn’t matter. I was still a stranger in a strange land. This was the year it really hit me that I was alien, that I didn’t fit. I was a wallflower and was unable to connect with people. I was the island that John Donne said no man was. This is the year I really began falling apart, the year I began my descent into hell.

Academically, I did well at the academy. I was, in fact, one of the two brightest students, according to one of my teachers. The other was my friend, Joy. I was among the popular girls at school. I was quite nice looking and dressed very well. I was also very disturbed and “different,” but “different” in a good way. It was, after all, the late 1960s. Perhaps my quirks even added to the intrigue that was me.

When I was 7 and asked what I wanted to be when I grew up (not that the thought had ever crossed my mind), I said, “an artist.” I was very good. I could look at something and draw it. Reproduce it. I had an artistic gift. When I graduated from the Academy, I moved to the dorm at La Sierra College (now University) and became a music and art major. I didn’t last the semester. I ended the year in the psychiatric unit of Loma Linda University Hospital. I was there 3 months. I’d pretty much stopped talking. And that’s when the death of my music and my art began. Fortunately, I had never been more than a reluctant artist, anyway.

I Did Well Academically

In 1995, I finally graduated from Andrews University with a bachelor of science in zoology, with a biomedical emphasis. When Lars started school, I went back to school myself, first taking drawing and printmaking classes. Else accompanied me to class—she is now quite a fine artist. Once Else was in school and I was feeling more confident, I began taking more classes. My goal was to get into medical school. But I still was not “all right.” I still talked little, and I kept ending up in the hospital. At one point, I had so many electroconvulsive treatments that I forgot everything except how to use the restroom. Else had to teach me everything I had lost.

I managed to get through school by sitting in the very front row, in the center, immediately before the teacher. This way I was, to my mind, virtually the only student in the class. I never offered any response, but then I had never responded in class. I took copious notes and did very well. I made no friends and rarely spoke to anyone.

I went to Michigan State University in 2000 to complete a master’s in entomology. I was still having major difficulties, so after completing the class work and my research, I came home. I just wasn’t able to complete the thesis, so I never graduated.

I have recently been accepted into the online master’s program in psychiatric rehabilitation, leadership track, at the University of Medicine and Dentistry in New Jersey. I’m scheduled to begin classes soon.

Social Aspects of School Were difficult

Calculus and physics—and classes with really uninteresting teachers—were my difficult subjects. But what was most difficult about school was the social aspect, particularly communication. Perhaps that’s why I was so very quiet. It got so I just didn’t have anything to say. Another great difficulty was creating—making something up. I have an extremely difficult time writing creatively. I’m best with literature reviews. There, the ideas are already present for me. I have difficulty putting things into my own words, so sometimes I find it almost impossible not to plagiarize. I shall never write a novel. I would never be able to think of a plot and then flesh it out. I have a similar difficulty with art. I have to have something concrete in front of me. I have trouble just “drawing from my head”—drawing something imaginary. If I do, the quality is inevitably very poor and quite juvenile. The same was true with music, back when I played. I had to have music in front of me. I couldn’t play “by ear.”

Just about everything else came to me easily. I particularly liked diagramming sentences, algebra, geometry, aesthetics, biochemistry, and neurochemistry.

MENTORS

Nancy Magi showed up in my life as my 11th-grade English teacher at Loma Linda Academy. She was young and pretty, and she took an interest in me. I liked her. I think all the students did. In 12th grade, I was her “reader.” Somehow, she became my friend. I remember accompanying her to the beach one sweltering summer day, wearing my navy blue wool pea jacket. Sometimes I went on picnics in the mountains with her and her husband, Enn. Even though she was my friend, I remember feeling very, very awkward and alien. When I moved away, she kept in touch.

Shirley Macaulay came along when I was at college in La Sierra. Her son, Doug, was in one of my music classes, and somehow I ended up at her house for dinner occasionally. Shirley took an interest in me. She probably took an interest in everyone, but she was very kind to me. She’s remained a very dear friend. Often, when she visited her daughter, Diane, in Ann Arbor, we would get together. I remember when I was living in a house in downtown Riverside, and life was very black, I sat in a booth at a diner one night with Shirley. She talked to me and tried to understand me. She was very supportive.

I was quite disturbed at the times when I met Nancy and Shirley. Enn was a child psychiatrist, in residency, when I first met Nancy. Shirley was, I think, a school psychologist. Maybe this helps explain why they took an interest in me.

Employment as a Teenager

When I was 14, I volunteered as a candy striper at the old Loma Linda University Hospital. I remember delivering mail to the patients and taking stool samples to the lab. I liked the work. I was with Debbie Picard, a friend, so she was the one who spoke with the patients. I just ran errands.

When I was 16, I assisted the accountant, Mr Dale, in the business office at Loma Linda Academy. I helped with the bookkeeping, particularly the entry of the accounts receivable. I had studied bookkeeping in school the previous year, and I worked alone.

Babysitting as a teenager was awkward for me and rather traumatic. I hated it. I didn’t have a clue as to what to do with children, much less their parents. One summer, I babysat for the Liu family up the street. There were two little girls. They were cute, but alien. One day, Dr Liu was home in his study while I watched the girls. I was so, so uncomfortable. The girls ran through the house, and I didn’t stop them. I just watched. One little girl bumped a vase, and it fell to the floor and shattered. I stood and watched as Dr Liu came out and cleaned up the pieces. I have no idea why they didn’t hire a more competent sitter.

Another summer, I watched two very homely children, a little boy and his baby brother. For some reason, I was boiling a pan of water—to heat up a bottle, perhaps? And I boiled the water dry. Confrontation has always been very difficult for me, and I was afraid to tell the mother what I’d done. So I stuck the pan in the very back corner of the cupboard and hoped nobody would notice.

During the summer between 11th and 12th grades, I worked in a lingerie department. This would classify as a “worst job,” except it did not last as long as the babysitting did. I had no clue what to do in this job. I was no help to the few customers I encountered. I had no words and poor conversation skills.

I also worked in the back of a pharmacy, weighing and packaging medicinal herbs. I worked for my father, and I worked alone. My father told me to measure each package an ounce over the desired weight—rather like the “baker’s dozen,” which really appealed to me morally. I liked this job.

EMPLOYMENT AS AN ADULT

I Love My Present Job

My present job is the best job I’ve had. I am much older, at an entirely different place in my life, and I’m doing very well. My life basically began in my 50s, when I “woke up” from the long nightmare of severe mental illness. I talk and laugh and smile. I whistle when I work. And I like people, although I still do not connect. This, however, I see as an advantage. In my work, a risk is that one may become too emotionally involved. I do not run this risk. I do not take my clients home with me, so to speak.

In my work as a psychiatric rehabilitation practitioner and peer-support specialist I help individuals with severe mental illnesses. I facilitate workshops and teach classes on recovery, WRAP (Wellness Recovery Action Plan), PATH (Personal Action Toward Health), money basics, financial management, life issues, and stress management/relaxation, which I love. I connect people to needed resources, such as food, housing, and benefits. I work with individuals in crisis. I mentor. I advocate. I listen and share my recovery story.

The people I work for—the individuals with severe mental illnesses—really seem to like me. They miss me when I’m absent from work. I seem to be able to establish a good rapport and a positive relationship with them easily. This work is within my realm of expertise, and I am an expert in recovery, which is what this whole job is about.

I Was Helped by an Understanding Boss and Toastmasters

My job has allowed me to grow personally and has given me needed freedoms to do my work. Some time earlier, I had become a member of the public-speaking group Toastmasters, and there I became comfortable speaking in front of groups. This is a skill I use constantly in my work. My supervisor is aware of my autism spectrum disorder, has done reading on the disorder, and works with me when I encounter problems, such as saying or doing something inappropriate. I am very fortunate to have a very kind and understanding supervisor. She has added to the pleasure of the job.

It’s interesting—I work with people and interact with them, often one on one, much of the day. And, I am comfortable doing so, unlike earlier in my life. I don’t know what has happened to change this. It’s like I’ve suddenly blossomed, the proverbial “late bloomer.”

RELATIONSHIPS

My mother says that I was a cuddly baby and that I was extremely shy. She relates the story of how I came home from the first day of 1st grade, boasting that I’d made a new friend. However, despite the fact that Suzanne was my “best friend,” I was remarkably unattached. I had no more reaction to her than I would have had if she had been a stranger. When we were 20, her entire family died, one by one. And while I was quite fond of her father—he used to take me and Suzanne to Catalina Island on his boat on the weekends—I felt nothing when they died.