And it all goes back to shit.

If anyone wants the password for the previous post then ask but I warn you that it’s 1500 words of pointless whinging and was written to allow me to sleep.

I don’t know what to do   I’ve started self-harming again which is a real bugger to put it mildly. I’d stopped for 6 months and now it feels so safe to get back into it, the wondering how much damage I can cause without generating too many awkward questions. The temporary distraction then the guilt but at least guilt is an “easy” emotion to deal with.

My first placement allegedly starts tomorrow. I say allegedly because I’m not entirely sure I can do it. I needed something inspirational for it, something to convince me that I’m doing the right thing with my life, that this all isn’t just a big waste of time. Instead I’m in a crap nursing home for people with dementia. The place smells, the staff don’t speak any English and I just don’t think I can face it.

Plus my car failed its MOT this morning. My car was my independence and I’m rather fond of it. I build up deep attachments to anything that is vaguely nice to me, ever if that something is a big lump of orange-painted metal. I now feel like I’ve failed it which I rationally know is insane because what could I have done different? I need my car. Twenty minute drive to placement vs an hour on the bus. Freedom to travel, to escape the Cambridge bubble, to seek space and clear my head all gone.

So it’s back to googling for exit strategies. How did my life come back to this so fast?

Protected: Emotions

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Why is it always so hard?

Damn it all, I’m having a bad day. I know everyone has them and I’m not expecting sympathy more just after a place to rant. I nearly threw my phone full pelt at the wall before it thankfully clicked in that my phone may not appreciate making high speed contact with something quite as strong and unmoving as the wall. I need to get out and do something but I don’t know what, just release all this stress somewhere.

So, despite having occy health clearance, they’ve sent me a letter inviting me to attend an appointment with no explanation of why. This is stressful. I know I have the clearance but I want to have as little to do with them as possible. The more they know, the more damage they can cause. I know I could phone them and see what’s going on but I HATE making phone calls. Besides, if I speak to them they might tell me they’re taking my clearance away…

I’m also coming to a rather unfortunate conclusion about my meds. I like them, they make me happy and as long as I remember to take them we’ve been getting on together just fine. The only thing is that I’ve been noticing recently that I bruise rather more easily than I should and cuts and grazes take an unnaturally long time to heal. Taking up rock climbing should not leave me looking like a victim of a particularly severe case of domestic violence. Now I initially assumed I was just clumsy but my legs are quite literally black and blue all over. My housemate (who has infinitely more common sense than me) asked if it could be a side effect and it turns out that a rare side effect of venlafaxine is poor blood clotting.

Warning: pseudo science mumbo-jumbo follows!

Now, being the unbearable geek that I am, the explanations google was given me weren’t enough so I used and abused my student nurse journal access to read the scientific papers behind the hype. It turns out platelets use serotonin to help with blood clotting but can’t make their own so they need to take it up from the blood stream. Now, one of the effects of venlafaxine is it prevents the uptake of serotonin in the brain. While it initially seems this would be a good thing for the platelets, in a few cases it seems the serotonin receptors on the platelets are sufficiently similar to the ones in the brain that the platelets can’t take up enough serotonin either and blood clotting becomes poor. Now, the papers do emphasise that this alone wouldn’t explain all the symptoms they studied but it is concerning.

Basically, I may have fucked up my blood clotting and the only way to sort it out would probably be to come off my meds. This is all conjecture at the moment, I could just be really accident prone! The thing is I don’t currently have a GP in Cambridge and it will take me a while for me to build up a level of trust with a new one. Plus, I don’t want to come across as an over-paranoid nutter seeing problems where there aren’t any. So, at the moment I’m not taking any action on that one either and hoping that I don’t get stabbed any time soon.

But to be honest, it’s neither of the above that have set me off today (although they may have contributed to me being less forgiving than I usually aim for). Despite studying adult nursing at uni, all branches do the same course in first year which means that the first module is the one on mental health. Fun, fun, fun for all the family… Although, I may have an unfair advantage for our first assignment, 3000 words on “What is Mental Health?”. Do you think I can use myself as the case study

Anywho today we were looking at a scenario that was a tad close to home and the biased, ignorant views of the others in my group really offended me. The way they leapt to assumptions and made judgements based on a few words was painful. Put it this way, if they were running occy health, I’d never have been given clearance and would probably have been locked up or possibly shot for good measure. I tried to argue with them but as I obviously wasn’t too keen on the whole self-disclosure thing given their views, I think I just came across as contrary and deliberately awkward. And yet, these people are in the majority, this is what I’m putting myself into. Is this really what I want? Is it possible to be a good nurse without getting on with a lot of others? Can I rise above all this?

Oh, and my car is due its MOT and I don’t want to act on it because then I’ll have to phone a garage and they’ll almost certainly laugh at me and then try and rip me off as I know less than nothing about cars. And it might fail and then I’d be car-less which would suck.

I don’t want to have borderline personality disorder today. I’d be quite happy being an ignorant fuckwit like most the rest of them. Then none of this would matter.

At long, long last!

I apologise for my extended silences of late both on here and in terms of comments etc. I promise I am still reading what everyone writes. I’ve actually rediscovered having a life (of sorts) and it’s very good! It would be a lie to say everything’s perfect (upsetting someone and then spending half an hour contemplating a railway bridge wasn’t smart) but it’s getting more there than it’s been for a long time.

And as of half an hour ago I actually have my occupational health clearance! This means I’m officially in (we’ll ignore the fact I’ve been going to the course for the last fortnight anyway). And now I’m there, it’ll be a darn sight more difficult to get me out again no matter what happens. The theory bits of the course are great and seem more than doable. I’m more than a little bit nervous about starting placements in a fortnight but I feel in a state to take on whatever it throws at me.

Wish me luck!

Dear cyclists of Cambridge,

As the majority of you seem to be amongst the most incompetent road users I’ve ever had the misfortune to come across, I thought I’d explain some basic road rules to you:

1. Red lights mean stop. For those of you that are red-green colourblind or just looking for an excuse, the red one is the light at the top. When it’s lit up, do NOT go through it. It’s really not that difficult.
2. The pavement is for pedestrians. Those are people without wheels. This means you cannot use it to shortcut round the above mentioned red lights. Unless the pavement has a bike lane, in which case go crazy.
3. Lights. These have a purpose, they’re so you can be seen. Ok, I admit the next bit is fairly advanced science… At night it is dark. In the dark it is hard to see things unless they are lit up. No lights = no visibility = squashed cyclist

Thank you for your understanding in these matters.

Yours in eternal hope of not killing or being killed by one of you,

Ana

Recovery

The depths of depression are akin to drowning in a deep, dark and powerful river. You’re swept away with it, no idea which way is up, blackness everywhere. You attempt to struggle but it’s futile, you don’t know what you’re struggling for. There is nothing else. It’s easier to just be swept away, to surrender to the darkness forever.

But eventually through luck or fate or divine intervention, call it what you will, your head breaks the surface, just for a second. And you see that the blackness isn’t all, that maybe there’s an infinitesimal chance of something more. If you have the strength, the struggle really begins but now it has a sense of direction, some of the futility is gone. But the river is strong, and it’s hold on you is absolute and you’ve been drowning for so long that the energy to fight it is failing.

But let’s imagine you escape that river. You find a reserve of power that you didn’t know you had and you pull yourself from those depths, dripping, exhausted but triumphant. It would be great to pretend that was it. That you’ve won once and for all. The river though is treacherous, it licks around your ankles, calling you back to its embrace.

And besides, when you look around you realise that where you’ve emerged is not really much better than where you’ve been. You’re at the bottom of a deep valley, with steep and deadly sides that seem to reach up forever. The one difference is that if you squint hard at just the right moment, you can see a glimmer of light at the summit of one of those cliffs and it’s incredible, it spells hope. But then it fades again and you wonder if it was just a dream.

So you start to climb those valley sides and you realise that no matter how hard they looked from the base, the reality is a hundred times worse. The rock underfoot is slippery, the hand holds give way at the slightest touch and all the time you can hear the river calling your name, tempting you back to it.

Sometimes on the way up you slip and you find yourself falling again but not always all the way. You find your way barred, things fall on you from the heights and you begin to doubt your reasoning. But occasionally, you catch a glimpse of that light and so slowly you begin again. There are ledges of vague stability where the temptation is to curl up and stay forever but those ledges eventually start to crumble and the climb must go on. Worst of all you find yourself at places where the only way to continue to rise is to fall back to a lower ledge and to start again up a new route. Sometimes the light seems deceptively close and you think you’ve made it but it turns out to be a false horizon, beyond is more cliff stretching upwards perhaps forever.

I’m somewhere on those cliffs. Sometimes the light is near, often it’s so far away as to seem unreachable but I do hope to get there. One day.

Nearly there

I had my meeting of doom with occy health this morning. It was such hard work, I’m drained now. Trying to work out how much to tell them, what details to include and what to omit. No lies, just an edited truth. The good news is I’m not out   However, nor am I entirely in. They want a letter from my GP to confirm I’m stable and that he thinks I’m capable of doing the course. I’ve spoken to my GP already and he’s happy to provide said letter as soon as he gets confirmation from them of exactly what they need.

I’m so, so near.

Other than that I’ve had a bit of a rocky couple of days. The euphoric happiness is giving way to the nagging doubts, the poisonous other side of me that is determined to see me at the very least fail. I’m really hoping this is a result of occy health related stress rather than anything more sinister. The problem is that even though it went as well as I could reasonably expect I’m still sitting here with my mind going down a very bad track.

I’m not ok and I don’t think I ever really will be but I just hope I’m doing what’s going to be the best for me.

Just a quickie

I apologise for my extended absence of late, I am still alive! I’m also sorry for lack of comments etc. on blogs, I was without internet for over a week and when I switched on again I had over 200 posts on my google reader which was a little overwhelming. I promise to catch up at some point soon.

The reason for my silence was firstly a holiday (just with my extended family, nothing too exciting) then moving house. I’m now safely resident in my shiny flat which I love to bits and is wonderful and amazing and awesome. I’m getting on really well with my flat mate and currently have another friend residing on the lounge floor which has been an excuse for much baking of biscuits and late night girly chats. I’m also rediscovering my social life which has been incredible, the realisation that I do still have friends has been quite overwhelming at times.

I am still up but only through a hefty dose of denial. The minute any negative thoughts start creeping in I’m literally shouting them down often through having conversations out loud with myself so that I can no longer herar the creeping doubts. I know it’s not really addressing anything and the issues are still there, probably building up until I reach breaking point but right now I don’t care. I’m coping, I’m having a good time and for now that’s all I want

In other news, I actually don’t strictly know if I’m starting my course in a month or not. I had dared to assume that since I hadn’t heard anything at this late stage, my occy health clearance had been granted and all was well. Of course, that was stupid of me, assume something would be problem free, never going to happen! The uni has know for a month and a half that I haven’t been cleared but neglected to inform me of this fact. I only discovered it when I rang occy health as recommended in the information I received 2 days ago and found out for myself.

Apparently I need to see one of their doctors which is terrifying in itself given my past experiences. However, worse was that they should have been booked up for the next month which would have meant delaying my start as I can’t go on placement without clearance. Thankfully the very lovely receptionist squeezed me in for in a fortnights time. I’m hoping that will be enough, that my mood holds out till at least then and I convince them that I can do this, as I do genuinely believe. However, if one appointment is not enough or if they need more time, I now have a matter of weeks to sort this rather than the months I should have had if the uni had got it’s act together and informed me. This has left me more than a little scared and pissed off, I just hope it works out ok because if not, I won’t know what to do.

Up, up, up and away!

My life seems to have turned around in a way that I wouldm’t have even dreamt was possible a fortnight ago. I’ve gone from suicidally depressed to unstoppably cheerful and found some sort of balance that was lacking for so long. My place to study nursing is pretty much confirmed – I have an invitation to attend a welcome meeting in a few weeks and genuinely can’t wait. It’s like this childish excitement, I want to know my timetable, to buy pretty coloured stationary, to organise and plan and enjoy. I haven’t heard anything at all from occy health and am going to leave it at that. It’ll be harder to get rid of me once I’m already in right…

I also have somewhere to live and someone mad enough to live with me! It’s a 3 bedroom flat over a bookmakers just ouside of town and I love it to bits. It’s so much better than anything I could have dreamed of and amazingly the rent is less than many of the considrably worse properties we looked at. I moved most of my furniture in over the last few days – the flat’s unfurnished to the degree of not even having curtains and it’s really starting to look like home. They’re even letting me take my fish tank!  Give it another fortnight and I should be there full time

Nothing seems like a problem anymore. Things that weeks ago would have caused a complete meltdown no longer seem to matter. We’d bought a couple of settees to go in the flat and due to a very small staircase one of them wouldn’t fit and had to be dumped. That could have been the disaster to end all disasters but to the  new me, it’s not a problem. At least one of them fit so we do have somewhere to sit. Find the good in every situation. I’m even learning to pay attention to my emotions, to walk away before I explode or scream. It may not sound like much but sensing that I’m winding up and getting out before I do something I regret is a massive achievement.

I almost wavered when I started to think that if I feel like this now, I should have felt like this before. Maybe I’ve just been putting on the mentally ill thing, maybe I’m a fraud and a bad person who just enjoys wasting other peoples time. Then I realised that I’m still quirky, odd and more than a little bit mad. I still don’t see things like a “normal” person would. But none of this matters, instead it’s this that makes me me. A unique, lovable individual with a lot to offer.

It’s not perfect, I’m not going to magically stop freaking out in social situations. I’m not going to suddenly stop beating myself up for past errors. I’m not going to stop thinking everybody is judging me. But I can learn to live with it and a lot more besides. And live is what I want to do! So shut up small voice telling me to quit while I’m ahead, I don’t need you.

Be afraid world, I’m very much back!

Fortunately, unfortunately

Did anyone else used to play this as a kid? The game where you go round in a circle and the first person starts a sentence with fortunately and then the next person follows it up with a sentence starting with unfortunately and so on. Well that seems a pretty apt representation of my life at the moment.

I have loads more to say but I’m currently rather overwhelmingly busy in the real world. Should have more time in a fortnight or so.