Argh.

I’m drowning in paperwork. Things that should have been sorted months ago. Letters that I have no recollection of receiving. Consequences of which I have no understanding. Threats acted on or implied. Trouble coming. I can’t even write it down because that would make it real. I have to sort these things but I do not know how. I cannot overcome the inertia required to make the first move.

It’s not fucking difficult Anickdaler, just pull yourself together and get on with it. Stop being such a pathetic waste of space, drain on society, user and abuser of friends time and generosity. You’re meant to be bloody intelligent and yet you can’t even pick up the phone. How worthless are you? It’s no wonder everyone hates you, it’s more than you deserve.

I’ve been back in the UK barely 36 hours and already I’m failing.

The power of silence

The last week I’ve been out the country. Not in a mentalist detached from reality sense, but in a genuine holiday way. The trip was planned before crisis time but I somewhat extended it as let’s be honest there was nothing to keep me here. I’ve been skiing with friends. I know, someone applying for benefits going skiing, disgusting isn’t it. Don’t tell the Daily Mail! The idea of having friends who are prepared to go on holiday with me is an alien enough concept in itself but they did and it was awesome.

I’m not going to say it was easy and problem free. Spending half an hour hiding in a snow drift in jeans and a t-shirt at midnight is not generally indicative of sanity although I did get a couple of random Irish guys inviting me back to their apartment   Oh, and nearly taking a mini-OD to help me sleep but instead resorting to cutting the world out with music. That, and my desire to help constantly, while probably actually getting in the way, so that people didn’t hate me.

But none of that really matters. Those are blips, slightly erratic and extreme but dealable with and ultimately not particularly damaging. Hell, even if I’d taken the pills, the worst that would have happened would probably been a slight headache the next morning. Instead for a few days I have had peace. Peace from the relentless destruction of myself by me. Quietness of thoughts, no plans to end it, no sadness, no anger, no desolation just life as I feel it should be.

I am a skier with no technique. I’ve never really been taught, and the person who vaguely showed me what to do has never had lessons either. I probably look completely out of control but for some reason it seems to be something I can just do(ish). I’ve never really found any vaguely sporting ability before. I have the hand eye coordination of a deceased gnat, the balance of a … well I’m sure you get the idea. But skiing is different somehow. A strange side effect of the should have been end it all overdose last year is that I am no longer scared of consequences. Death is peaceful, so fuck it and let’s see what happens. This means I will throw myself off mountain sides without considering whether I’m actually capable of it. Consequently I spend a large amount of time on my arse, but do this enough times and eventually you get the hang of it. OK, my idea of getting the hang of it probably differs from everyone elses but it doesn’t matter, I can nigh on keep up with people who’ve been skiing loads more than me and a lack of self preservation means there’s little I won’t try. Actually, I am somewhat off jumping for now after attempting it, flying six foot in the air and landing on my head!

But the point is that when I’m out there, I’m free. It’s somewhat difficult to plot one’s demise while flying down a hillside at 25mph! Self harm is far away from thought while attempting the biggest black run in the area.  Who needs self hatred when you’re shooting through powder up to your knees off-piste? Nothing else matters but getting down that run and up to the top of the next.

But now I’m back home and the problems are already piling back up. I have a psych appt on Tuesday. My lovely GP has left and now I need to go through the process of getting to know a new one. There’s all the paperwork to deal with for the benefits people and the associated fear that I won’t be successful. That I’ll be deemed ok, that this is all there is. And yet, I know there is more. I found it on a mountainside in the south of France!

Can I go again now please?

An anniversary of sorts

A year ago today I should have died. It seems vaguely appropriate that this coincides with me making over 100 posts on this blog. So much has changed and yet so much remains the same. Not really sure what else to say about it, I feel I should make some profound observations on what it’s taught me and how far I’ve come but frankly I don’t feel all that insightful right now. It’s going to be a long old day.

Protected: Why yes, I am 14 or possibly 8. What counts as mature these days anyway?

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There must be summat in the air.

I dunno what it is right now, everyone seems to be struggling so much and I feel so powerless to do anything to help. Even those who’ve seemed to be ok of late can’t cope right now and I don’t know what to do about it. I want to take it all away, make the pain less, solve the problems with a word or a message but I don’t know how. Even my ability to make ‘thoughtful’ comments on blogs has evaporated. Consequently I apologise for the post to follow this. I’m going to password it, password as before but nevertheless I recommend ignoring it.

((Hugs)) to you all.

I nearly made a year.

TRIGGER WARNING: self harm, suicide and emotional bullshit contained within.

I’ve unprotected the last post, there’s no need to hide those feelings anymore, everyone knows.

I want to write…

WARNING: May be triggering. This is password protected because I don’t want people I see every day to know the truth. I don’t want them to feel obliged to help me because I don’t deserve it, I don’t deserve anything.

…but I don’t know what to say or how to say it. I can’t get the words out from where they’re tumbling round inside my brain. THe pressure is building again to the point I want to scream, cry, run away, curl up under my desk and never come back out. I found a sentence I wrote a while ago and never got round to publishing which sums it up in a way;

If despite feeling happy, your brain is telling you it would be a good time to chuck yourself out the window as it’s better to die happy than to let it go bad again?

I have no reason to be down right now. I’m on my course, I may not be enjoying it that much but I’m getting through it and it has the potential to take me to where I think I want to go. I have people who, in moments of unbridled optimism, could even be referred to as friends before pointing out to myself there are no reasons on this earth why people would want to know me.

I’m still self-harming. It’s getting to the stage that between that and natural clumsiness, people who I’ve met for the first time are asking what’s happened to my arms. And I lie, look away, change the subject but deep down they probably know and yet they never ask any further. Even ‘friends’ have stopped asking if I’m ok because they just don’t want to know anymore, don’t want to deal with me.

It’s taking me hours to get out of bed each and every day. In bed I’m safe, nothing can hurt me there, not even me so I wrap myself deeper into my duvet and disappear because I don’t want to be held responsible for myself. I’m my own full time carer and I’m attempting this on top of a second degree and I just can’t do it all. Something has to give and it’s always going to be me because that is all there is.

I’ve still got my escape in crafting. I love to create, it sets my mind free, I can lose myself for hours in it and it’s bliss. But I won’t allow myself to, there’s too much guilt – I should be doing course work or cleaning the flat or anything – so instead I achieve nothing. If money were no object, it’s what I’d do forever. Create and sell my creations at small craft fairs but I can’t begin to convince myself that anyone would be interested. And besides, if it ever actually happened, no doubt I’d fail at that too.

It’s nearly a year since I overdosed – 13 days to go in fact.  I don’t know why I wanted to write that, it seems so real and relevant at the moment.

This post is descending into a series of disconnected paragraphs with none of the smoothness and eloquence I was after. Incidentally, why does every drs/psych letter about me refer to me as at least two of intelligent, eloquent  and insightful? Is this code for ‘knows too much, is a pain in the arse to deal with’? I still haven’t heard anything from the alleged crisis referral that went in just before Christmas. This really shouldn’t surprise me, the system has failed so many times in the past, why would I dare to suspect that this time would be any different?

There’s so much more to say, words that need to come out, feelings too painful to express but it just isn’t working. My mind won’t shape the sentences I feel so for now let’s leave it at that.

Do you always have to be so mean?

Or words to that effect were said to me last night by the same person who a few days previously had asked if I had a mode other than sarcastic. And it hurts, it hurts lots but it’s also made me think. In fact I’ve been brooding on it for most of the intervening hours in which I’ve been conscious  (albeit that hasn’t been that many, I had a NYE party to sleep off). Now don’t get me wrong, I already knew I’m a sarcy cow. I also know that it’s a fine line between that and being plain abusive and that it’s a line I don’t stay on the right side of a lot of the time particularly when tired (as I was last night, see prior NYE party comment). But hell, a lot of the time it’s downright enjoyable to twist peoples words back on them and some people even deserve the abuse. However in this case, the person who said it is one of the last people who’d deserve me being nasty to them and more than that, they’re one of the last people I’d want to be nasty to.

So, why do I do it? I know how it’s going to turn out, I’m going to cause offence, it’s going to cost me friendships and it’s going to cause me pain. It’s done so in the past and I’m damn sure it will do so again unless I change in some sort of way. The sarcasm though is my shield, my protection, it keeps the world away. It’s my entrance to social situations, my confidence booster, my other me. It gets me laughs and I enjoy that, even if these laughs are at other peoples expense. It projects an image of confidence and ease when inside my mind is screaming at me to run away while I still can. And it keeps a distance – if nobody gets to know me, if they don’t get close, then they don’t have the power to hurt me quite as much as I’ve been hurt before.

And over time it’s become me; I am Anickdaler and I am sarcastic. But at times I wish I could turn it off, just for a while and now I find that I no longer know how.

And there goes the decade!

It feels odd to be sitting here writing this on the last day in 2009. This year has been the most difficult of my life and the fact I’ve made it through is nothing short of miraculous and thanks in no small part to the support I’ve received on here. Last New Years eve I was first aiding in York City Centre, picking up those who had enjoyed themselves rather too much. Tonight I’m off to a party at a friends. That in itself shocks me, that I have friends who are prepared, and maybe even want, to spend an evening with me.

Looking back, I wish 2009 had never been. I would like to obliterate this year from existence, to forget all that I have gone through but in some ways that would take away all that I have gained in these last few months. I shouldn’t be here now. Just over 11 months ago I should have died. No two ways about it, and yet here I am. I’m apparently a survivor. A lot of the time I wish I wasn’t, even when I’m up like now I don’t so much want to be alive as much as don’t actively want to be dead. The latter part of January is going to be tough for me,  it’ll be one year on and so much has changed and yet so much remains the same.

I started the year very much in love and I end it very much alone in that sense. These aren’t emotions I’m happy writing about where anyone might stumble on them so I think I should just leave that there for now.

So, onwards to 2010 and whatever that may bring. I’m not one for New Years Resolutions, I think the best I can settle for is I hope it’s an improvement on 2009. I wish all of you the very best for the New Year and the next decade, may it bring if not happiness then progress towards something better.

A hasty apology

I’m still out here and actually doing really rather well given that this includes surviving a family Christmas and a rather more entertaining week skiing! I want to apologise firstly for being such an uncommitted blogger when things are going my way. This blog is meant to be a representation of my life and as such should include the good as well as the bad but when the good is happening I’m less likely to be moping around long enough to actually sit and write something. Nothing’s perfect, each and every day is a battle from the moment I open my eyes to the instant I drift back to sleep but it’s a battle I’m currently winning and for now that’s enough for me

My other apology is more serious. I want to apologise for not commenting on other peoples ramblings and rantings as much as I should. I know a lot of you out there are struggling right now and I should be there to offer support as you have been to me countless times in the past year. So this is just to let you know that I’m still here and still reading and also to offer an open invitation for anyone that needs it to contact me for a chat via email/MSN/Twitter/whatever. I know that probably sounds horribly insincere/somewhat creepy but I do mean it.

Look after yourselves please.