Tag: depression

The peculiar significance of treacle

Every year I forget how evocative certain Christmas smells are. Not just the more obvious things like candles and oranges and mincemeat and brandy, but certain specifics. It was black treacle and spices the other day, as I was making gingerbread dough. Suddenly as I counted out the syrupy spoonfuls I was taken back to being stood in front of another cooker, aged maybe 7, stirring the pan dissolving the sugars, with my mother watching. Chain smoking, of course. A knot of emotions expanded inside me as they did then. Excitement for Christmas. Some kind of enjoyment of doing a grown up thing. Delight at wanting to make pretty biscuits. Wanting to get it right and please my mother…. well, the desperate need to get it right, impeccably following the process she had shown me. That meant tenterhooks and anxiety and churning emotions, too often teetering on the edge of me ruining everything again (I thought). One mistake, one deviation from her instructions, her watching would explode into anger, ridicule, accusations and threats. Hours of shouting and violence would follow. And everything, I had made her do, and each time I’d have that sick terror inside that this time it was over and the threats were being fulfilled. Looking back and seeing how little was needed to tip us into that disaster, it’s bizarre. Laying a biscuit onto the baking tray in the “wrong” way (ie not the precise arrangement she required), not getting the bow on a package right fast enough, touching the wrong switch on the oven – even simply letting any of my anxiety show. It sounds almost as if it should be funny. But it isn’t funny when someone has you isolated, under their power and in fear; not in fear of them but in fear of yourself. Because one sure thing to me at the time was that it was my fault.

So, standing there measuring the treacle it all came back. As I’ve been making the biscuits over the last day or so, I keep being catapulted into so many emotions and suddenly reliving snatches of good and bad … And to tell the truth I’ve been pulled into the bad too much. Exhausted.

I’m fighting it, because there’s no way my abuser’s having this Christmas. This Christmas is for God and the present and my fiancé and it’s about all the good we can do and are thankful for today. I speak briefly, quietly to God as I roll the dough, cut, bake , ice, package these cookies. I’m pushing through the dissociation to do all I can to hope for this Christmas and for every flashback find twice as much I’m thankful for today.

Ginny xxx

O Christmas Tree, O Christmas Tree…

I’m going to start to put up the Christmas tree later. Usually I’d be looking forward to this. This year I’m not. I can’t seem to feel any excitement or happiness or hope. it’s very hard to get any creativity going even when I’ve been making presents for people. I feel guilty for not being joyful, as it feels ungrateful for the good people I have around me and most of all ungrateful for God’s gift of the Christ Child to us. Feelings can’t easily be changed but at least if I can’t feel I can try to do, so I’m going to make my preparations for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day and do as many things I can to bring happiness to other people, completing each tiny task with love, out of thanks to God.

So, the tree is going up later. This will be the first time my cat sees the Christmas tree (I did have a foster cat staying with me last year but it was a different cat) so it remains to be seen will her reaction be. Will I find her half way up it or flinging the baubles across the room, I wonder? It’s an artificial tree so hopefully the appeal won’t be as strong as if it were a real tree. Just as well I don’t have a puppy, where this might be the result:

(Not my cartoon – I just stumbled across it and I’m afraid I don’t know who the artist is!)

When do / did you put up your tree?

Ginny xxx

House clearance

The house clearance turned out to be more emotional than I expected. The small local firm that did it were very good. Three guys came in a big van and 2 hours later I was looking at my emptied home. Unfortunately I was also looking at the large patch of hairball sick the cat had left under the bed without my knowledge which the workmen politely didn’t mention. Guess I can always hope they thought it was an unusual pattern in the carpet?! Actually I felt utterly disgusted. How badly had I been living that I could be unaware of a pile of cat sick?! That the damp in the bedroom had taken hold on even the one piece of furniture in that room I wanted to keep?

Clearing through my possessions in the days before the workmen came, as well as the hairball incident, left me with a question. How could I have let my home fill with clutter and hoarding, yet despite this frighteningly surging tide of possessions, I am still without certain much needed items? So many things incomplete? For example, though I’ve been over 2 years in my flat, I have not got the painting done and the walls are still patchy and stained just as they were when I moved in. The same shelves are broken in the cupboards, just as the day I moved in. I still don’t have a table to eat at. Yet I had 14 nail polishes pretty much untouched, baskets of broken jewellery, pieces of ripped paper I might supposedly use in a craft project one day, clothes stuffed tight in cupboards (shamefully hidden and many of them purchased in dissociative or irrational episodes for an identity other than “me”), and cluttering nick nacks covered in a film of dust.

My head was full with disgust at myself, confusion, failure, not knowing who I was. Who, what part of me, unquenchably acquired all these things? I am wholly responsible for it, but frighteningly out of control and unable to connect with who or why.

***

The neighbours must have thought I was moving out with all the bustle.

Despite the exhaustion and disgust I am gradually starting to see that this is a new start. My home is emptier. It is different now. The furniture I have left is not broken. It matches together as much as I can manage. Surfaces are no longer jam-packed. I can see space and calm and bit by bit I am attaining some of the mental quiet I so desperately need and I have been trying to achieve.

This is going to be a home I can make good for my fiancé and I; when we get married please God next autumn our home will be my flat. He has not had a home of his own, at least not one where he feels safe, for a long time. It needs to be different now for both of us. I need to look forward.

Ginny xxx

All in boxes

House clearance day has arrived. I’m waiting for the clearance firm to get here. My anxiety is going through the roof right now (well at least there’ll be more space to get the old sofa out if it does 😜). On the one hand I’m dreading it and very nervous. On the other I’m relieved we are finally doing this and excited that my home will be emptier and calmer.

I’m not sure exactly what it is I’m nervous for, or what I’m dreading. Maybe it’s because I’m coming face to face with how I haven’t coped and the effects of my mental illnesses’ symptoms; coming face to face with the fact I couldn’t do this on my own.

I’m trying to focus on being excited. Recently I saw a documentary about stress which said that a lot of the same chemicals are released in the brain and body when we are excited as when we are nervous. How our brain interprets these biological changes has an impact on whether we feel excited in a positive way, or stressed / nervous. So when we feel nervous about an event, if we tell ourselves we are excited, this may be able to change how we feel to a more positive experience. I’m not sure if this is correct but I’m going to give it a go!

Ginny xxx

House clearance

(So I just wrote this, pressed publish, got confirmation it was published but then it vanished. Aargh. Here we go again. Apologies if it has only vanished for me and you can still see it, in which case this is duplication!)

I’ve just had a house clearance firm come to give me a quote. Years of hoarding, clutter, old and broken furniture, cupboards of near useless and unnecessary items, have all got too much. I’ve tried and failed repeatedly to get through it myself and with my partner R’s amazing help. We can’t manage it. As my physical health has got worse, I can’t manage day to day or keep on top of housework and daily living like this. It’s no nice place for R to spend time either (we are not living together but of course he comes here most days). So it’s time to change this. I got the quote (yikes £££) today and next week it’ll be done. I feel intensely guilty and anxious but also desperate for the resolution.

Ginny xxx

So far beyond the limit

I am so stressed and strained beyond the limit. I’m trying to care for my fiancé. I can’t. He’s yet again been discharged from A&E, this time with DVT having been told he could have a pulmonary embolism at any time. No plan in place. Vascular problems, tumour, hernia, unidentified lump in his stomach, knee operations, diabetes, hips going to need replacing… how much more, how much longer Lord? Why? I’m screaming and crying inside. How much worse he must be feeling. Again and again after every emergency and discharge we are no further forward. All the risk and pressure falls right back on us. I can’t do it. I’ve been overloaded for weeks or months. Way beyond the breaking point. I need it to stop. Already I’m drinking with my medication to try to get knocked out. I cannot cope with yet more emotion and pressure. Cutting, bingeing, purging, everything is worse. I have no mental health support now, nor does he, so what can I do? Time has slowed down. I’m hearing things. I need it to stop. Please God, I want to say I know you will answer and not turn away from us forever. But I can’t see You or hear You or feel You. It’s been a long time that way. Xx

Absence

So many times I have tried to start posting again and been unable to write. Tonight at least I’m going to write something even if it’s rubbish.

I stopped because I felt I was constantly moaning, constantly apologising for the same failings then failing again, constantly sad, ill, unthankful, dissociated… and I’m in about the same place now. Shakier actually. When I started this blog I really didn’t want it to be like that.

Tonight I’m days into yet another period of being half gone, needing to be out of it, but knowing I can’t be too. And it’s twisting inside my chest, pulling me, dragging me, itching, hurting, voices getting louder, so desperately needing to do anything to turn it all off, but I mustn’t and I can’t. And this is rubbish. I can’t even get a tiny part of what’s going on inside, out. I used to cope in bad ways but I can’t even go to those ways now …. and everyone says oh it’s really good, you’re doing really well, but I’m losing my grip and imploding. Despite so so many things that are good or should be good and that makes it even worse.

Exhausted unrest

I am very frustrated that basic activities are taking so much of my strength and taking a massive amount of planning.

Just going out is exhausting. I’m desperately needing more time to rest physically. Also, desperately wanting more time to properly order my home and take care of it. I have had a constant stream of appointments and commitments that I’m struggling through, feeling more and more frustrated by exhaustion, mobility problems, pain I can’t cope with, and anger with myself and unrest about my home being disordered and messy.

There are a couple of friends I really want to spend time with or do things for. I’m scared of taking from others and not giving back. Yet meeting someone, or going to their house, or cooking a meal for them, totally wipe me put afterwards for days after. I think that’s through a mixture of my pain and pushing myself too far physically, and my anxiety and the voices and feeling overwhelmed in a sensory way. Talking, others’ emotions, noise, new places, everything happening around me, can be just too much coming in to cope. Sometimes I think I have sensory processing disorder or at least sensory processing difficulties!

All this leads to despair, being cut off, and being unable to give thanks or try to open my heart to learn gratitude. I need to make a change. I don’t know what.

Ginny xxx

Please plan your crisis 24 hours in advance…?!

WARNING – discussion of suicide, suicidal thoughts, emergency services

Am I expecting too much? I don’t think I am. Yet again I and my friend are being bounced around from service to service when he/we are most in need and so many opportunities for giving help missed. But I’ve certainly been made to feel I am asking too much and am a nasty person and more importantly, yet again my friend is left in avoidable danger.

In my local area, there is a specialist phone line for people in a mental health crisis, accessible via 111. This is a pilot, I believe, which may be rolled out in the rest of the country. According to information published about this crisis line, it is for patients, family, carers, friends and professionals, you can get an assessment of your needs, help, advice and visits, it is available 24/7, every day of the year. It is supposed to help you get more specialist help more quickly than if you have to go to A&E.

I phoned this line today because my friend is suicidal and today is a very “risky” day for him. He has specific plans and whilst there does seem to be a part of him that wants to keep going and not end it today, and I think it’s possible he will get through, I’m very worried about him. He was promised to get help from the crisis home treatment team, but he had one phonecall in which they told him to phone services if he felt worse. They have not assessed him or visited. The community service he was seeing haven’t put anything in place.

I wanted to get advice what to do and how to help my friend. I wanted to raise the alarm that he hadn’t had the agreed support and I was apparently the only person who is going to be with him today. I needed to ask some advice for me on how to cope because I’m getting very near another complete breakdown myself. I don’t know how to avoid me losing it and flipping out again when I want to be helping him.

So I phoned this line. First I was told nobody was available but brief details were taken and I was told I’d be phoned back in a few minutes. 1 hour 20 minutes later, having heard nothing, I phoned again. There was no record of my previous call. “You didn’t speak to me before, how would I know the details?” asked the operator. I went through everything again (painstakingly  spelling every name and number about 6 times…) I was told that I had not been told I would be called back today. Er, yes I was, I was told I would be called back in a few minutes. “Oh no, we have 24 hours to respond.”

But we’re talking about someone potentially about to end their life here. Don’t you think that might necessitate an urgent, even immediate, response?! Isn’t this a crisis line?!

They made no assessment of the situation, would not listen when I tried to tell them the home treatment team input had not been delivered as agreed, gave no advice except for if he attempts to end his life, call an ambulance. What about any support that might stop him getting to that point? What about any professionals putting help in place? At the very least, any advice to me? At the moment I seem to be the only person doing anything today to keep him safe. I have no training, I do not know how to help him, I am ill myself and close to breaking point. I am terrified what is going to happen and whether he’ll still be here in the morning.

I tried to impress the urgency of the situation and that a call at some point within the next 24 hours was not soon enough seeing as he planned to end his life today. The so called crisis line told me that I simply had to calm down, that I had to realise they have plenty of other referrals to deal with, that they are very busy and it is not very nice for me to suggest they aren’t doing anything (not sure how I did that?), and when I insisted on speaking to a manager she continously talked over me and threatened to end the call. I was told that they had told me about plenty of other ways to get support. They had not suggested one single thing.

I would expect more from a crisis line. I would expect immediate response when someone is suicidal. How can it possibly be okay for them to say, sorry we’re too busy? I would expect the promises in their literature about getting assessed, supported and visited by mental health professionals to be fulfilled. There is no mention in the literature that they may do nothing for 24 hours. I would expect professionals to be ensuring my friend’s safety today, not me. I want to be there for him, I want to listen, be a friend, offer comfort and encouragement. I am happy to stay with him when that helps, as I will today. But I should not be the only one doing something to stop him ending his life. Is it really too much to ask? I don’t think so. He has asked for help and so often been turned away. This has been a pattern for him just as it was for me in my care. If harm comes to him today in my opinion it will have been completely preventable. That is not to blame services for the state he is in, but they have failed to provide support they agreed to, could have and should have.

I don’t know why I keep on having some hope in services that they’ll do what they promise. I’ve had enough demonstrations to the contrary. I’ve given up on help for me but I don’t give up so easily for a friend. I suppose it’s natural to have some trust in those we believe are there to help and protect us and that instinct doesn’t disappear quickly even when it’s proven wrong. If I could expect the total absence of support it wouldn’t be so distressing. I’m not looking for sympathy though it probably comes over that way. Just very angry, bitter, lost and scared.

Ginny xxx

Unenchanted April

I have wanted to post but not been able to find what to write. I’m sorry it has been nearly a month. Even this post I started nearly a week ago. I don’t know quite what’s making it so hard to express how I really am.

My friend’s health continued to deteriorate. I was fighting desperately to get him help as the danger he was in increased. Everyone in a position to keep him safe seemed oblivious to tune dangers and I could see how close he was to the edge but with no professional’s help I could not do anything more than what I can as a friend and that is not enough. It’s terrifying to be the only one knowing and believing the risk and I know that sounds like I am very arrogant thinking I know better than the doctors, but time and time again now I’ve known what’s happening or going to happen, the doctors have done nothing, refused even to listen to my concerns, and the thing I’ve known will happen, happens. The toll is greater each time. He has liver damage, blood clots, he’s starving himself, he is barely even drinking anything, there’s much more I wish I could write but it’s too personal to him for me to feel I can share here.

I don’t know how to carry this knowing.

I cannot save him alone. What someone else can give you, or trying to carry on for someone else, will not ultimately be enough to keep you safe or even alive. (I know this from my own darkest times, when I’ve been irretrievably low, hurting myself and planning to end my life, and someone close to me – who didn’t know the half of it – screamed at me, look what everyone is doing for you – why isn’t this enough for you? The answer is a post for another time but I know if he continues it must not be for me, not just for me in any case, so I alone cannot save him.

I can pray. I can try to give comfort. I can try to give compassion. I can try to show I love him and that he’s a good person not as he sees a problem, a burden, someone who frightens people, is bad, is not wanted, is no good. I can try to help him find some ways to build a safe, stable home and life. We can find short times of hope, happiness and laughter together. He has an immense capacity to love others, care for them and about them, to rejoice when they are happy, to fight to help them when they are hurting and share their pain. But none of that can he do towards himself.

He may die. He may end his life. I don’t know how to hold this knowledge and all the feelings that come with it.

****

I have been in crisis myself in the last few weeks and was in hospital for a couple of days. Then I had help from the crisis team at home for a week. When crises come I still flip out and instinctive reactions and thoughts take over along with the hallucinations just as much as they ever did before I had therapy. My “little child” gets out and she really isn’t very nice sometimes. It’s scary. I feel like a failure.

***

I’m realising that my mobility has got a lot worse in the last year. I’m particularly weak physically at the moment. I was diagnosed with POTS a little while ago (a heart, blood pressure and autonomic nervous system disorder). I’ve a lot to learn on how to manage the symptoms. Being very faint, muscle spasms, digestive problems and poor circulation have been hard to deal with this month. I’m now very fortunate to be in touch with a pain clinic at the hospital and there are some good possibilities from what they can offer, so I must be hopeful.

I really will try to post more regularly again and share happier news next time.

God bless you.

Ginny xxx