Baby Steps

I’ve started to take baby steps towards turning my life around, it’s a very slow process but I think I’m getting somewhere. I had a meeting with the Princes Trust last Friday and they are happy to put me on their Enterprise Scheme which is the best result possible. I’m going on a three day business skills course in the middle of Feb to teach me about tax and business plans and the like. Then I get some one on one support to get me up and running and finally a mentor to support and encourage me for the first couple of years. I couldn’t be more excited! If I can turn what I love into a proper profitable business, it would be wonderful. I am struggling with some guilt over it. I have a degree, I should have a respectable high-flying office job, earning thousands. I need to come to terms with crafting being a valid job and that I’m not worth any less for doing it. I think the business training will help me to view it as a proper opportunity, not just a hobby where I occasionally sell stuff.

I’ve also started therapy with someone I feel I have a good rapport with. He specialises in Rational Emotive Behavioural Therapy, which as far as I can tell is like CBT only decent. Thankfully I’m not being limited to the standard NHS six session cure all, which is a good job as we’ve had five sessions already and haven’t got much further than discussing what problems I want help with. It’s hard work but fascinating from a purely scientific viewpoint. As for whether it will help, I think it’s too early to say but he tells me it will and that gives me some faith. This week I told him of the problem of which I do not talk, the event which turned me from a somewhat quirky individual into a deeply damaged one. One day I will find the strength to blog about it, I feel it gives a lot of insight into where my problems started and why they’ve developed as they have. He was the first professional who I feel has taken it seriously and not belittled it or told me it was irrelevant. I’m working one on one with him for an hour a week, he’s technically retired but does one day a week because he enjoys it so much. From next week, he wants me to also join the group he runs in the afternoon. This is a frankly terrifying prospect but he feels it will help me to talk to people who’ve had similar experiences and can relate. Thankfully at the moment there are only two other people in the group so I’m hoping it won’t be too overwhelming and the extra support would be nice.

I’ve even started going to the gym. I was shocked to discover I need to lose a third of my bodyweight to get back to the weight at which I was happy with my figure and healthy. It’s a daunting prospect so I’m trying not to focus on it too much and instead aiming for small improvements in fitness. I’m trying not to blame myself too much for the weight gain, a lot of it is from antipsychotics and not having the motivation to move from the sofa. At the moment I’m doing EA sports on my Wii four times and going to the gym at least twice each week. I’ve also cut down to eating my dinner off a side plate just to get things started. The hardest thing is beating my tendency to  reward exercise with chocolate which is somewhat counter productive. I certainly don’t look any slimmer yet but I am sleeping slightly less and feeling more energised.

Finally, I have forced myself back into my tip of an office. It had got to the stage where I was avoiding it as I couldn’t face the mess. Over the last couple of weeks I’ve been slowly tidying and finally you can see most the surfaces and the majority of the floor. I’m just waiting for some more storage to be delivered so I can finish off. Hopefully I will then be inspired back to crafting which would be kind of useful seen as I want to make a business out of it!

For once it seems things may finally be going my way. I’m treading cautiously though, I know I have a habit of pushing too far too fast and driving myself back into the ground. I also feel more than a little bit guilty, why am I doing so well when so many in the Madosphere are struggling so much. It isn’t fair. I almost didn’t publish this because I don’t want to be seen as looking down on people from my feeling OK position. I’ve been avoiding twitter a bit for similar reasons, I don’t want to shove my new found optimism down peoples throats. I wish I could share this feeling with all of you, maybe we could each have a few hours a day? I think I’m scared, I’ve made being mental so much of my identity that with less of it, I don’t really know who I am. I’m terrified of being cast out from the bit of the internet where I’ve carved myself a comfy niche, not mental enough to be a mental any more. Sorry, I seem to have turned a positive post into a negative which isn’t what I wanted.

Basically, things are slowly changing for the better. I’m not sure where this will lead to but for the first time in years, I’m almost looking forward to finding out.

Frustrations

One of my main aims for this year is to attempt to make something of my craft business. The craft fairs I did in the run up to Christmas gave me more confidence in the things I make and persuaded me to give it a go. It is likely I will never be able to hold down a full time job (look at what attempting university did to me) but neither do I want to do nothing. Crafting means I can work from home and do hours to suit my mood and mental state. It would be wonderful if I could take it far enough to not be benefit dependent any more especially as the way the Government is going, I’ll probably lose them anyway.

The trouble is that while I can create at will, the practicalities of business escape me. I have no concept of tax and how it applies to me. I don’t have a business plan, I wouldn’t know where to begin. I need to get a website up and running but again the complexity eludes me. At the moment I buy things when I want them from my personal bank account and then sell at what I think makes me a reasonable profit. However, I have no spreadsheets to back this up and no way of analysing if it’s really working. Like so much of life, I float on a plane above practical. As has often been said, I’m very bright but have no common sense whatsoever. If it wasn’t for my boyfriend, bills would never get paid and there probably wouldn’t be any real food in the house. If I can’t even manage the basics, how on earth am I supposed to run a business?

The other day, I ended up on the Princes Trust website. I can’t remember how or why I got there and I suppose it’s not really important but I found this. Basically it’s a scheme to help young unemployed people with the practicalities of business. They can provide skills training and ongoing support as well as access to free or discounted accounting software and other things. It read like it could almost have been made for me!  Forcing myself to overcome the doubting voice telling me that there was no point as I’d only fail and be laughed at , I filled in the enquiry form. In it I explained that I had severe mental health problems and had been on disability benefit for several years. I roughly outlined my ideas and my desire to make something of myself. Crucially, I also stated that I have a phobia of phones and would very much appreciate if initial conversations could be carried out by email.

My fear of phones is deep set and somewhat ironic for someone who spent a couple of months working in a call centre in the dim and distant past. Ask me to communicate in writing and I will be vaguely eloquent and present myself with control. Even face to face conversations I will give a good go although eye contact somehow eludes me. Put me on the phone however and I either become incredibly angry or a gibbering idiot. Either way, I use any excuse to terminate the call as soon as is possible.

Yesterday, I was excited to see an email in my inbox responding to my Princes Trust enquiry. It consisted of two sentences.

Thank you for your enquiry to The Prince’s Trust.

Please could you call me on Wednesday to discuss your idea and possibly arrange a meeting.

Fabulous. It made no reference to any of the things I had said in my message and explicitly ignored my desire to email details or at the very least, to meet face to face.

Now I’m a bit stuck. If I could receive business support, opportunities could really start to open up for me and I would love for that to happen. However, the thought of phoning someone I’ve never met, especially regarding something so important makes me feel physically sick. It seems that every time I attempt to move forward, new immovable barriers are put in my path. For a charity that is supposed to support young people with difficulties, I would really have hoped for some understanding. I will probably make the call, albeit at the last possible moment but the odds of it being productive and producing the result I so need are very low. I just wish that for once something could go my way.

I have a thingy

Innuendo aside, I was shocked and delighted the other week to jointly be awarded the TWIM award for Best Personality Disorder blog.

To say I was shocked was an understatement, I don’t think I’ve won anything since the Year 7 award for best performance in science. Thank you to everyone who voted for me and more generally to everyone who takes the time to read and comment on my little piece of the internet. I am in awe that people find what I have to say interesting or even occasionally insightful. I still get a real buzz when I open my email and see a new comment and I don’t think that will ever fade.

Next month I’ll have been blogging here for five years. Admittedly I haven’t been terribly prolific for a lot of that period but the fact I’ve kept coming back shows a commitment and dedication which is sadly lacking in other areas of my life. This was never meant to be a blog about mental illness, in fact I only really wanted a blog because my then boyfriend had one and I thought it was cool. I didn’t have much to say but I’d kept journals irregularly in the past and I quite liked the thought of continuing that in some way. At that point, I’d never even heard of Borderline Personality Disorder and wouldn’t have identified myself as mentally ill.

Over the last five years, I’ve shared a lot of my descent into madness here. I’m not currently brave enough to read my archives, it would be too upsetting. The memories of what I have been through in that time are enough to sometimes physically paralyse me with pain without the addition of more in depth details. I hope that one day I will be able to look back and if not exactly laugh, then be proud of how far I have come.

This blog and the people I have had the fortune to meet through it and the associated twitter account are probably one of the strongest reasons I’m still alive today. The discovery of the Madosphere showed me that I was not alone. The wit and honesty of its members have made me laugh when I was crying and have given me strength when I had none.

Five years ago I couldn’t possibly have imagined my life would take the path it has. Even my worst nightmares wouldn’t have come close to how some of it has been.  I am still here though and finally getting some of the support I have been craving for so long. It’s far too early to say whether it will work but there are new doors opening where before there were brick walls. I don’t know if I’ll still be writing here in another five years. At the moment I don’t really believe I will live to be 30, it’s just too far fetched. While I do exist though, I will continue to write and to tweet and I would be honoured and thrilled if you would continue to read.

 

Driving

I passed my driving test in the summer of my first year at University, I was 20. I took it at 0830 on a Saturday when there was nobody else on the road, I’m convinced that’s the only reason I passed first time. Most driving test faults are for inconveniencing other drivers, if there aren’t any other drivers, you’re pretty safe. The next summer I borrowed my my dad’s car for six weeks while I was doing some geological mapping in the Lake District with then boyfriend. On the last day I had it, I reversed it into a pillar and smashed one of the back lights. He wasn’t best impressed.

Nevertheless, a few years later when my mum upgraded her car, I inherited the old one. When my mum first bought this car, I’d laughed. It was a bright orange (what the manufacturers optimistically called bronze) P reg Nissan Micra, I wouldn’t have been seen dead in it. However, once it was mine, I quickly grew to love it. It was quirky and full of personality. No power steering, manual windows and a tendency to pull to the right. The radio worked, just, and most importantly it was my very own. I even once got out of a parking ticket because they’d called the car ‘dark’ and I argued there was no way anyone would call my car anything other than orange.

It granted my independence, enabled me to work freelance, granted me space and freedom when my relationship broke down. I adored it. When I started nursing at university, I took it with me. It got me to and from placement and enabled me to help out friends. It led to me learning how to change a tire, at midnight during a party while more than a little bit merry.

Unfortunately, as my health deteriorated, my ability to take responsibility for a car stopped. When it failed it’s MOT, my incredible friends rallied round, phoning garages and gluing the steering wheel in order to get it fixed up. The killer blow came when it came to renewing the insurance. Unfortunately I forgot to send the new insurer proof of no claims as I’d lent it to bastard ex and he hadn’t bothered to return it (git) and ultimately the insurance was canceled. It sat unloved in the car park for several months and when I was forced to move, I came to the difficult decision to sell it. I wasn’t well enough to cope with the responsibility and it was getting to the stage that it cost more to maintain than it was possibly worth.
I miss it. It was my baby and I loved it.

Now I am without a car. Boyfriend has one and put me on the insurance for it but it’s too big and powerful and the visibility is crap so I don’t feel safe to drive it. However, with starting to do craft fairs and starting a course a fair way from home it’s getting to the stage when I could maybe do with my own set of wheels. I don’t know if I can though. All my drugs state on the pharmacy label

May cause drowsiness. If affected don’t drive or operate heavy machinery.

I don’t know if I’m affected or not. My drugs do make me sleepy but I take them in the evening so the worst effects are while I sleep. I would hate to have an accident and find my insurance invalid because I was driving under the influence of crazy pills.

The obvious solution would be to ask my psychiatrist. I’m scared though. I don’t want them to take my license away. Rationally a license is no use if I don’t drive but it’s mine and I don’t see why they should be able to take it away from me. Also I know if it’s taken off me, the odds on me ever getting it back are slim and that makes me incredibly sad.

I’ve also massively lost my driving confidence because I haven’t driven in so long. I could never park, even when I took my test and any slight ability I did have has evaporated with time. I suppose it would be possible to take some reminder lessons but again I’m scared they’ll tell me I’m dangerous and take my license again.

I just don’t know what to do. I want the independence but I don’t want to do wrong.

The year that was

So, I’ve survived 2011 relatively intact. The most significant achievement I suppose is that it’s the first year in a long time that I haven’t tried to top myself. It’s sad in a way that I put that down as the highlight of my year but sometimes just surviving is a small miracle in itself. I’m not going to pretend it’s been plain sailing, or that the desire to end it all has gone, but for one whole year I’ve resisted acting on them. Not only that, I’ve avoided A+E visits, ambulance calls and crisis team invasions. I know most people do perfectly well without any of those for their whole lives but to me it’s significant.

The year started with me falling back into depression and slight psychosis. I refused to leave the house as I believed everyone stared at me and judged me and I lost all sense of direction. Things improved significantly with a change of medication and I had a few months where it was pretty good. I wasn’t symptom free but things seemed to fit in the normal sphere of human existence. For a while I even flirted with the idea that I was cured.

In the middle of the year, there was a lot of upheaval with a move halfway across the country and a massive home renovation. It was a chance to live with my boyfriend of a year and it enabled me to start university once again. As the date for university approached, I was full of doubts. I questioned whether I had made the right decision and if I would be able to cope with the course pressures. The course started and initial enjoyment unfortunately didn’t last. A combination of course stress, student finance fuck ups and a car crash lead to me dropping out. It was yet another failure to add to my substantial list.

I fell back into depression. My motivation dropped through the floor and there it’s stayed. I angered my boyfriend through my lack of anything and barely moved from the sofa for weeks. Over the last few weeks though, things have slowly started to look up. My fledgling craft business has started to come to life with a couple of excellent craft fairs which has led me to believe that there may be a future niche there for me to exploit.

Today I met a psychologist through the day hospital. He thinks he can help me particularly with the black and white thinking which is one of my biggest problems. He’s prepared to help me and I start therapy next week. I am investing a lot of hope into it as I really feel it is my last chance to find something to help in the long run. Purely from an academic viewpoint, I am fascinated to see how therapy works. It is something I have been waiting for for a long time.

As for next year, in January I am starting a craft course which potentially will give me further business opportunities. More on that if and when it develops. I hope to grow my craft business further, establishing a website and starting to sell on Etsy. I really hope I can make it work, it would be an ideal “job” as I could work the hours I want and set my own agendas. There’s a lot to come to terms with in terms of tax and benefit implications but I am hoping that with a bit of help I can take it somewhere. I have also been referred to the gym by my doctor which should allow me to exercise on the cheap. I would very much like to get some of my fitness back. In the last 18 months I have put on so much weight through a combination of antipsychotics and lack of motivation and it would be brilliant to shift some of it. It’s an exciting opportunity.

So in conclusion, I am approaching 2012 with cautious optimism. I can’t pretend to be happy with where I am right now but it seems I have the best chance in a while to change that. I would love for this to be the year that my life really turns around. I’ve been ill for so long, surely I deserve for some of that to change.

Day Hospital

I spent my first day at the Day Hospital today. In the morning, there was an art group. Slightly unsurprisingly we were making christmas decorations – in this case paper snowflakes. You know the ones, you fold up paper and then cut artistic holes in it. I have a degree from arguably the best university in the world and I am reduced to activities that wouldn’t stretch your average primary school child. If you want an example of how mental illness completely destroys your life, that’s it there. Sorry, it wasn’t that bad. It doesn’t help that I’m rubbish at cutting things neatly particularly as there were no left handed scissors. I get the impression they’re fairly stretched for resources which is a shame, it’s hard to enjoy art if you don’t have the supplies to do it. I’ve said next week I’m going to take in some paper chains. I love making paper chains!

After lunch was anxiety management. I tend to view self help as patronising bollocks which I’m aware is a bad viewpoint from which to approach it. It just seems a bit like using a plaster to treat a shotgun wound, ie completely ineffective. But as boyfriend said to me when I got home, a plaster is better than nothing.

We were discussing avoidance, something I am often guilty of. Apparently the solution is to approach it in baby steps. For example, if you can’t leave the house, start by standing in the door for a while. Do that for a few times, then move to the doorstep and so on and so forth. For it to work we were told to do at least 90 minutes a day. Like I have the concentration for that! The thing that frustrated me most and it’s what always gets me with self help is some steps are just not considered. In this case it said initially “Don’t get overwhelmed by the vastness of what there is to achieve” or summat like that. The problem is though, I am overwhelmed. That’s the whole reason I’ve got half the problems, if I knew how to not be overwhelmed by it, it wouldn’t be a problem. There’s no explanation of how to tackle it if you do get overwhelmed, just a statement saying don’t do it. It doesn’t work. Things like that get my back up and mean I don’t try to engage with the rest of the exercise which is a pity.

After a break we did a breathing exercise followed by a relaxation technique. I just can’t take this sort of thing seriously. If I try and quiet my mind and concentrate on breathing, my head gets full of extraneous rubbish. It was perfectly pleasant though, as relaxation often is. I just can’t see it working in a crisis situation. If I’ve got the urge to do damage to myself, I can’t imagine stopping to do a breathing exercise and then seeing how I feel. Assuming of course, that I could summon the concentration for and remember the details of said exercise.

I sound really ungrateful don’t I? I don’t mean to, I know I’m lucky that such a service exists at all. Given the cutbacks, I’m fortunate that there is somewhere safe I can go to, at least between the hours 0f 9 and 4, Monday to Friday. During those hours, there will be someone who can talk to me and hopefully help. At the moment, I’m only booked in to do activities on a Monday. I can go in the rest of the time and sit and cross stitch in the coffee area if I want to. There is the option to add other groups, maybe after Christmas. I’ll think about it. It’s good to get out the house. When I’m home all the time it winds my boyfriend up no end. So I am grateful, it’s just frustrating that self help doesn’t really seem to help me.

 

Where hospital failed me

When I was discharged from hospital last year, I wrote a post on the positives of the experience. It seemed churlish at the time to complain, I was admitted completely suicidal and unsafe, I was discharged fairly psychotic but at least functional. However, there are a number of things about my stay that continue to upset and haunt me. Mind have been talking a lot recently about the standards of crisis care so I thought I’d share my feelings on why it didn’t really work for me.

It all comes down to communication. I suppose the main purpose of hospital, certainly in my case, was to keep me safe by physically removing the chance for me to do anything. It could have done so much more. There are few opportunities in mental health services where you are around professionals all the time and while the staff to patient ratios aren’t good, they’re a damn sight better than those in the community. This should lead to plenty of opportunities for talking which may not fix anything in itself but can at least be therapeutic. I’m aware the nurses aren’t trained in psychology, I wasn’t expecting therapy  but they should have a high level of empathy (otherwise why on earth are they doing the job) and the ability to listen.Unfortunately, that was never the case.

It took three days for my lead nurse to introduce herself to me. It’s not that she hadn’t been in the previous days, in fact I don’t know what it was, but apparently I wasn’t worth the time. I’m just a BPD manipulative timewaster, why should she bother talking to me? Worse, that 2 minute conversation was all I had with her the entire 10 days I was an inpatient. The other nurses weren’t any better, I don’t remember having a proper conversation with any of them. At one point I was given a form to fill in detailing my exercise habits. Apparently I was to complete it and then we’d have a discussion about it and see if there were ways to improve my lifestyle. Sounds good. Except for the conversation never happened. I submitted the form and heard no more about it.

I am not good at asking for help, in fact I’ve been known to let things fall apart completely and still not say a word. One day while there, things came to a head. Something deeply upsetting to me was happening in the real world, it’s not relevant what but suffice to say it’s something which deeply distresses me still. I sat and ran it over and over in my head for hours not daring to speak. Eventually something convinced me to head to the nurses office and ask if anyone could spare me five minutes. The nurse in charge sounded deeply frustrated by my request but sat me in  a room on my own and told me someone would see me. Eventually another nurse came in, it was difficult but I shared what was upsetting me. What I wanted and needed was to discuss it, for someone to help me rationalise my fears and to see a way through it. Instead, I was offered 5mg of PRN diazepam to calm me down. No discussion, no advice just the offer of pills. Yes, the diazepam did remove the immediate anxiety but it didn’t go any way towards addressing what was really the matter.

The other thing with hospital, it’s full of ill people. Now that goes without saying, I was one of them, still am one of them. I remember being asked by another patient on my first day what my diagnosis was. The amount of sympathy I got from him and others about the rubbishness of a personality disorder diagnosis was deeply touching. A woman was admitted when I’d been there a few days. She was obviously deeply psychotic and for whatever reason became convinced that I was her daughter and that the staff had imprisoned me and were trying to poison me. At medication time she’d come up behind me and knock the pills from my hand in a bid to ‘protect’ me. In the communal areas, she’d sit beside me and stroke my hair and my hands and tell me how she would always love me. If I tried to move away, she’d burst into tears and grab at me to try and keep me close. I know that none of this was her fault but at the same time it was quite overwhelming and upsetting for someone as fragile as I was. I know that in a way I had to put up with it, she wasn’t harming me and had as much right to the space as I did. I always felt though when she was talking to me that I should contribute, to try and help in some way. I couldn’t though, I didn’t know how, I didn’t know whether to correct her or go along with it. Again, no member of staff did anything to help other than restraining her when she was after my meds. It would have been so helpful if someone had taken me to one side, explained a bit of what was going on and give me some idea how to deal with it.

I’m worried this post sounds like I’m being petty and whinging. It just seems that 18 months later, I’m back where I was before I was hospitalised. I don’t know if there’s anything that could have prevented this but what I do know is what I miss most in everyday life is someone who I could talk to about the deep and dark things in my mind. It seems to me that if that can’t be provided in the intense inpatient setting, it’s unlikely it’ll be managed anywhere else.

 

Make a plan

My parents know about university. Someone out there is watching out for me and told them so that I didn’t need to. It made everything that much easier. They came down to see me yesterday. Apparently I seemed well and in control. That seems odd, I don’t feel any of those things. I’m trapped in a downward spiral at the moment and I’m not sure how to escape it. My psychiatrist is on holiday at the moment which is greatly annoying. I could use some input but I’m not seeing her again until 19th December. That makes me angry because she’s only away for a fortnight so should be able to see me before then. It just proves she only pretends to care although I’m not sure why I should be expecting anything different. Last time I saw her she mentioned maybe attending the day hospital for a while. At the time I laughed but the more I’ve thought about it, the more it seems a plausible temporary option. All I’m doing at the moment is sitting on the sofa staring at a computer screen with the occasional bit of cross stitch thrown in. It’s annoying the boyfriend, he can’t see how I can spend so much time achieving so little. At least the day hospital would get me out the house for a while, give me some space and maybe there will be someone there with some time to discuss my options with me. Unfortunately it means phoning the clinic and attempting to make an appointment to see someone else. This terrifies me, I find it hard to ask for help. I’m worried that if I can manage the coherence to ask for specific support then I’ll be too well to qualify for that support.

In the longer term, I still have no plans. Well, there’s the one plan but people don’t tend to like that one. I know I need to do something, sitting around all day is not good for me but I can’t seem to find the motivation to do anything more. Actually, there is something that I’m considering but I’m scared you’ll laugh at me if I tell you about it. It doesn’t really come under the definition of a ‘proper’ job but would involve crafting in a slightly more money generating way. Even if I went for it, the training doesn’t start until January and then it would take several months to get qualified. I’m beating myself up mentally a lot. I can’t see the point of trying something new, everything I try just turns to disaster.

I’m still awaiting an assessment for psychology. I’ve been told that in the long term this is what will fix me. I remain skeptical but I am desperate to give it a go. I view it as my last option and it worries me that if I can’t engage with it that there will be nothing left. I’m also concerned that I’m putting too much faith in it to fix me and that I’m going to be left disappointed. Maybe I just can’t be fixed.

I don’t know how I’ve managed to become so unwell again. I didn’t really notice it happening. It was only the comments on my last post, with everyone telling me that I’m ill and therefore it’s ok to not always succeed that it started to occur to me. I’ve had enough of being ill, it’s been more than 5 years now and although there have been better times and worse times overall I’ve been really quite unwell for all of that period. It just isn’t fair. I feel like throwing a tantrum, screaming and stamping my feet until it all goes away. Except for it won’t and I’m starting to suspect it never will.

Where now?

I quit uni. It was always going to be the thing that gave when I was no longer able to cope. It’s a shame, there were aspects of the course I really enjoyed and having some focus back in my life was undeniably beneficial. There was just too much pressure though. I couldn’t keep up with the volume of work and the hours that were required. Student finance had fucked up my application leading to the university wanting £5000 off me in fees. I didn’t have five grand to give them and I didn’t have the strength to keep chasing student finance who promised me again and again that it was sorted only to discover yet another hurdle. The car crash really shook me up and left  me unable to think straight, I missed too much to catch up on. There are so many excuses I could site but really it’s just another failure on my part. I am incapable of coping in the real world.

It worries me. If I can’t do a university course with 18 hours a week contact time, how am I ever going to hold down a job. That’s of course assuming that someone would employ me when I have no references and no employment history to speak of. My life is a series of aborted projects. Of things started with the best of intentions and then failed. My psychiatrist says I just haven’t found the right path yet. That’s bollocks. There is no right path. Everything I try is doomed to failure from the start. I am a self fulfilling prophecy of destruction.

I can’t tell my parents. I can’t let them down again. I was always meant to be the one who made something of her life, who was going to support them in their old age. How can I tell them I quit again? They will be so disappointed so I lie to them, tell them how well I’m doing, describe lectures I’ve never attended. The truth will come out eventually though, it always does.

My boyfriend doesn’t mind that I’ve quit university. He doesn’t mind what I do, as long as I do something. The thing is though, I have no idea what. I have run out of suggestions. I’ve tried all the things I thought I might be good at and failed at them all. I am a disgusting waste of space whose biggest achievement is a 2:2 in a subject I have no recollection of.

I’m all out of options. I don’t even have the motivation to craft. I went to a big craft supply fair at the weekend and bought loads of new materials yet they sit in the bags still packed. All I do is sit and stare at a computer screen. I occasionally tweet but even there I feel on the edge of friendship groups. Everyone likes everyone else better than they like me. I am tolerated but barely.

My psychiatrist has run out of options. She says there’s nothing more she can do for me. Psychology may help but there are no guarantees. Besides, my initial referral to psychology was conveniently lost so I missed out on weeks of appointments. A new referral has been made but I will be waiting weeks for an assessment and then untold amounts of time to actually begin therapy. And what if it turns out that therapy is not for me? If I am doomed to be a big mental waste of space for ever more?

In the end there is one solution. There has always only been one solution. I may be able delay it by days, weeks, months or years but in the end it all stops one way. That has been the case for so long, I don’t know why I bother fighting it any more.

Parentals

It took my mum years to believe I was mentally ill. From the moment I initially sought help, I had to put up with a constant stream of objections and ignorance. It started with

Fluoxetine? I’ve found out that’s really prozac. You can’t possibly take that.”

It deteriorated from there. Every stereotyped stigmatising comment out there, I received it.

• Think of all the people in the world worse off than you. They’re not depressed so how can you be?
• Just pull yourself together and get on with it. You’re fine.
• You’ve had a happy childhood, you’ve no reason to be depressed.
• You seem happy today. See, you’re not really depressed.

Plus variations of the same etc, etc, ad infinitum. Then of course, if I ever dared to be happy for more than one day, there was the

You seem much better. Maybe you can stop taking those pills soon?

It was deeply frustrated. As my health continued to deteriorate, she continued to deny it. People in her cozy little world don’t have mental health problems and that was all she was prepared to accept.

After my second suicide attempt, it was increasingly difficult to deny there was a problem. With it came if not complete acceptance, then at least a bit of understanding. She put in an effort to actually listen to me, to push for treatment, to support me and it was wonderful. To actually be able to describe how I was really feeling without having to be afraid the answer would be ignored or belittled.

Over the last year, as I began to show signs of recovery, the acceptance slipped. She was back to her old tricks. Every phone call for the last few months have been full of pressurising rubbish. About how good it is to have the real me back again, how fabulous I must be feeling, how it’s so wonderful how I’m coping. Plus of course, the constant references to cutting down drugs at every tenuous opportunity. It’s so frustrating.

Recently a family friend has been diagnosed with breast cancer. My parents have both been all over her. Taking her to hospital, out for coffee, offering to always be available to help in any way possible. I am in no way implying this is not what she deserves. It must be crushing to be diagnosed with cancer and I’m sure all the support is incredibly important. More than that though, I’m jealous. As petty as it may seem, I want my parents to be like that with me. I bet the friend is not being told to pull herself together or to stop taking her medication if she has a few low-symptom days. Most importantly, my mum seems to be really listening to her, acting on what she wants and I’ve never had that.

Early last week, as those of you who follow me on Twitter are no doubt aware, I was involved in a hit and run on my bike. I was physically ok bar a few cuts and bruises but mentally it has hit me hard. Since then, it has been coming increasingly clear that I am not coping. I have been alternating between tearful and ragey with no rationale. Now, being knocked over would be enough to shake anyone up but it’s more than that. It’s bought to a head problems that have been brewing for a while. The lack of balance in my life, working myself into the ground just to fall further. I am not coping with things as they are. It’s as simple as that. Something somewhere has to give and I feel completely unable to decide what.

I have tried to explain this to my mum. I really need some input and support before I crumble completely. She listens but she doesn’t hear. I mention that I’m struggling at uni and she counters it with me having enjoyed one of the practicals. As if the act of enjoying one small thing is enough to disprove any other problems I may be having. She tells me not to be so silly, that I’m fine. Any protestations to the contrary are countered before they even have the chance to leave my lips. I am well now and that’s all there is to it.

Except for I’m not. Therein lies the problem.