“Tinnitus Truths”

I’ll just mention Jack that whereas it is now a beautiful gated park of 150 residences, set in 84 acres of wooded grassland, it was from 1902 until 1999 a Mental Hospital - a sinister place, where they pioneered such drastic treatments as insulin induced coma-therapy, lobotomy, and Electro Convulsive Therapy.
It was flattened in 1999 and rebuilt as a residential park, consisting of two bedroom town houses, up to luxuary apartments and palacial mansions.
I would choose to live nowhere else.
A few more pics:




Many unmarried mothers were kept here for years, for shameing their families.

 

The backstory sounds awful, but it is scenic.

 

Yea - just thought I’d cheer you up...x

 

Autumn is beautiful with all the colors changing on the trees. The weather is beautiful because it's neither hot nor cold. But the beauty of autumn comes from the fact that it is the season of dying. Not death--that's winter, but slowly dying, leaf by leaf. And the leaves are more beautiful as they die. The poets knew this when they used the seasons to represent the stages of life.

With a little planning and a lot of luck (or maybe it's a lot of planning and a little luck) the autumn of life can be as beautiful as the red and gold of the season. More than just a last hurrah, it can have it's own beauty, not less than spring or summer, just different, though maybe more appreciated because it is the beginning of the end.

Your park is beautiful @Jazzer. I could walk there everyday and hopefully there would be rustling leaves and twittering birds (the next best thing to silence) and I would be like Thoreau who called walking in the woods "sanative."

 

I love the way you wrote that piece SM, referring as you did to the poets and the seasons.
As I’d never read any Thoreau I googled him.
What an interesting guy.

I’m afraid I don’t read much these days - Tinnitus has spoilt it for me to an extent.

I was a pretty weird depressive little kid, struggling to relate to anybody much because of an isolating childhood.
I figured it must be lovely just to live in an American forest area.
(I’ve always been intrigued by the American West, in Art, Literature and film.)
No worry about being able to relate to anybody.
At 16 I read a lovely trilogy about pioneer life by Conrad Richter, called:
The Trees - The Fields - The Town.
The only problem was Sayward Luckett’s family had to survive by hunting and fishing, and I love critters and knew I could never do that.
You don’t mention what part of the States you are from SM.
Can I ask?

 

It was around this time of year I found my love for the Grateful Dead. Makes me nostalgic thinking about listening to their music for the first time in high school, but also sad I will never be able to see the new incarnations of the bands. Can't have the good without the bad I guess....

 

“The Greatful Dead”
What a name to conjure with
- under the circumstances....x

 

There are moments which mark your life. Moments when you realize nothing will ever be the same and time is divided into two parts, before this, and after this...

 

@Jazzer
I live on the east coast and in my younger days I used to go camping with friends along the Appalachian Trail. I didn't walk the trail. (I was a city girl and could not have done that.) But I would camp along it and do little hikes just to commune with nature. I've been to points in New York, Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Vermont--all very beautiful in the early autumn.

In retrospect, I'm glad the camping my friends introduced me to was just light hiking instead of trying to walk the whole trail. I've read Bill Bryson's book A Walk in the Woods about his attempt to walk the whole thing and it doesn't sound like fun. It sounds grueling. Instead of walking my feet off, I was able to enjoy the scenery and lounge around in a lean-to by a pond. Better memories I think.

 

@Jack Straw
I miss going to shows so much. I could get some of the music at nugs.net or even for free on youtube but I don't because it just makes me feel bad that I can't go--that I can never go. I want to hear the shows, but I want to be dancing at the foot of the stage with the music loud and the whole atmosphere charged. There's nothing else like it in the world.

I listened to a little of Bob Weir & Wolf Bros on youtube at "moderate volume" It's good. It makes me want to yell "Bobbyyyy!" (Picture Marlon Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire.) Anyways I'll post it on the music thread. Maybe we can get some enjoyment out of it.

 

@SugarMagnolia I couldn’t agree more.
Mega heroic treks would not appeal to me either.
Such a shame that we have now been cast in a role where ‘heroism’ is the only byword for survival.
Obviously, distraction is now essential, and keeping each other company, as we do on here, is such a nice help.

 

Thanks Jazzer, I'll look forward to that!

 

So true.
Divorce.
A close death.
Loss of a career.
A severe trauma.
A life changing illness.

 

Tinnitus has changed me in many ways, Dave. I do my best to stay hopeful that it may, one day, be gone. However, I am a realist and have done my homework and much research on tinnitus, enough to know that this may very well be "as good as it gets." I am prepared to keep up the good fight, though.

~To that one soul reading this. I know you’re tired, you’re fed up, you’re so close to breaking but there’s strength within you even when you feel weak. Keep fighting ~

 

My own attitude is similar Ems.
Within the first ten seconds of severe Tinnitus I knew that this would now be my life.

I was kicked in the teeth three quarters of a century ago, and that injury lasted for ever, though I learnt to understand it, and to survive it’s impact.

I don’t consider myself a pessimist, but a realist.
I am not hopeful of a cure, merely observant of the possibility, however unlikely. (Realism)

Now that my ‘quiet’ has been destroyed I feel that I largely live for others.
To care for my lovely wife and family, and to help people where I can.

For whatever reason - I still choose to be here.
Take care Ems,
Dave x

 

You are a good person and a wonderful family man, Dave.

I am happy that you choose to be be here.

 

Thank you Ema - and I am so pleased that you are here for the rest of us.
And another person that I would never want to be without is our @glynis ,
thinking of you just now babe,
Love
Dave x
Jazzer

PS - a quick. {{{{{{{{{{ “HUG” }}}}}}}}}}

 

~If you have been brutally broken, but still have the courage to be gentle to others then you deserve a love deeper than the ocean itself ~

 

@emmalee
I believe a ‘broken’ experience makes you choose to be kind.
Whenever I have hurt somebody, I have truly regretted it.

 

@Jazzer

I believe that you are a truly compassionate man, Dave.❤️ Most everyone here is the same, even though it doesn't always appear to be the case.

Dealing with the day to day struggles of tinnitus can bring a person to their knees. Thankfully we have this forum, it is our soft spot to land, a place to seek out understanding and not be judged harshly if we appear weak.

I am grateful for this place and even more grateful for the friends that I have found here. This thread is very important. It is a wonderful corner of the forum, a calm place to come and express our individual thoughts and truths.

 

When I had an idea for this thread I hoped it would stay a more reflective place than the general ‘cut and thrust’ of no-man’s-land, and so it has turned out.
Mind you - I do know that I can ‘cut and thrust’ sometimes.
Let’s face it I’m just a ‘human bean.’

“If somebody treads on my toes,
behind my back, I won’t take it
lying down....etc....”

 

Yes you are Dave, and a very fine one at that.

 

Scary.

 

I can’t seem to reply to your last message, I’m just letting you know I’m not ignoring you Emma haha

 

“Jcb would never ignore Emma !”

(you heard if here first - folks)

 

I know you're not Jcb.

Try again.

 

He better not, lol!

 

“Hahahahahahaha......I Love It”

You two crack me up!

One time when you disappeared for a week or so,
I accused him of eloping with you......hahaha xx

 

Received your message but can’t reply I don’t know what’s up haha I was only chatting nonsense anyway Emma as per usual

 

I think it's fixed, I am so technically challenged....

Nonsense you say? Never ~.~