00:21 – Terrified of the wrong side winning

“Do you know what I’m really terrified of? The wrong side winning. It’s as though my mind has split in two and I have no control over it. And the thing is, I’m beginning to get confused about which side is right and which is wrong.”

(Victoria Leatham)

 

That quote above couldn’t be more true right now. My mind is split in two and it is driving me mad, it’s tormenting me constantly, it’s trying so hard to pull me backwards and make me fall with an almighty bang. I have two things going on inside my head right now and the voices keep cropping up as well, making sure that my head is constantly busy.

Over the past couple of weeks I have been finding it incredibly difficult to watch television. I feel as though everything I watch is trying to trigger me, like the programmes are being deliberately controlled by someone to make sure just about anything I try to watch either leaves me feeling panicky or in floods of tears. There are two reasons for this, one is that I can’t seem to watch anything even a tiny bit upsetting or I end up in these moments of intense sadness and tears. The other is because there have been so many alleged cases of historical sexual abuse by soap stars and TV presenters reported recently that I feel as though every time I see a news report it is trying to fuck my head up. I start to wonder if this is a deliberate attempt to see if watching TV could send me properly bonkers.

I don’t know if this will make any sense, but some of the men accused I associate with happy childhood memories of seeing them in kids TV programs and others I have kind of grown up with as TV soap stars. And because my childhood wasn’t always happy as I was abused myself for a large part of it, when I see these news reports this noise starts up in my head just of laughter, a sick laughter that goes on and on until I switch the TV off. It’s not good enough just to put it on standby, it must be switched off at the wall. When I see/hear these reports I feel as though the evil laughter in my head is just one final way of reminding me that even the innocent happy memories of my childhood can be tarnished so easily.

One part of me reacts to it all angrily – very angrily – and I find myself sitting here thinking that all men are complete wankers, that I will never have another relationship because at the age of 31 I’ve had so many bad experiences with men that I genuinely do not believe I could ever trust one again. Even in the last week I have seen yet again just how much they can leave me feeling dirty and ashamed. I got talking to a guy online and after a few nights talking online he asked if he could have my number. Like a fucking idiot I gave it to him and he called me for a chat. It was pretty awkward at first as I sort of clammed up and didn’t feel like I had much to say for myself – I fucking hate phone conversations, they make me feel really anxious when it’s someone I don’t know. But I stuck with it as I’d had my medication and waited to see if I would calm down a bit and be able to chat away to him. Eventually I did start to calm and we talked about loads of different things. It was him who said he had just seen someone posting one of those stupid sick jokes that always go round when the media report that well known people have been arrested on rape or abuse charges. He asked me what I thought of it and as I’d already been honest about my mental health problems I figured I’d try telling him the truth. So I told him I hated hearing about it all as it triggered a lot of memories from times I had been abused. He sounded a bit sad when I said that and asked me what had happened. I didn’t go into great detail about the adult experiences but told him I’d been abused by an older cousin throughout my childhood. He began to ask a lot of questions and I thought it was just his way of asking to understand what I’d gone through, he sounded like he was asking it in a caring sort of way, and even though it felt a bit weird to be having such a deep conversation with someone who was still a stranger it also felt nice to be able to be open from the start with someone. He began to ask more details – how old was I when it first happened? What did he make me do to him? What did he do to me? How did he get me to keep it a secret? I answered the first couple of questions feeling OK but the more questions he asked the more I started to feel a bit uncomfortable. I could hear his breathing going funny when I was talking. At one point I thought he had fallen asleep as the breathing became so loud. And then it dawned on me what he was doing on the other end of the phone. I didn’t want to believe it but I couldn’t ignore it, I had to ask him what he was doing? Why was he breathing like that? Had he fallen asleep? How I wish he had fallen asleep because I was completely unprepared for his upfront answer that he was “getting off”, what did I think he’d do if I started “talking like that”?

I hung up immediately and burst into tears, went over to the wall and stood there banging my head against it over and over until the tears stopped. I had allowed it to happen. I was to blame. I made him aroused by telling him about some of my most painful experiences. I felt so stupid. So fucking stupid. But it is just another incident to remind me that apart from my Dad and my brother, I must look at every man like he has the potential to hurt me even if it starts making my head go crazy. I’ve been getting these rushes of ideas going through my head, things that could land me in serious trouble if I were to act on them, like carrying some kind of weapon so that if I ever get caught off guard I’d be protected. But obviously that is highly illegal in this country. Usually when I am in some type of depressive or paranoid episode I prefer to go out during the night when nobody is around. The dark makes me feel safe and protected, the day time busy-ness makes me paranoid and anxious. But this time it’s different, the daytime busy-ness protects me and keeps me safe. At night time I am vulnerable and terrified. I might not be allowed to carry any type of weapon to protect myself but I do let one of the dogs off his lead and walk with it wrapped tightly around my hand, I hold the thick metal end tightly as images rush through my head telling me to make sure I’m ‘ready’ if anyone tries to hurt me in any way. Thankfully there is only one walk a day that I have to do when it’s dark but it is getting harder and harder because I have to stay so alert to anyone else whose around. I can’t relax, my heart beats so fast I can hear it in my chest and I keep one of the dogs next to me at all times because I know they will bark like mad if anyone approaches us, especially in the dark.

When I’m not thinking of all possible scenarios whereby a man could hurt me I am thinking about all the possible ways I could hurt myself. It’s not enough just having these violent thoughts towards potential ‘abusers’ – my thoughts race off in another direction telling me that I clearly deserve to be hurt and abused because it’s happened to me by so many men at various ages throughout my life. I must attract it somehow. They must be able to tell just by looking at me that by slipping something into a drink or by acting all caring and sweet to get me into a conversation with them that they’ll be able to make me do things for their perverted pleasures. They must just be able to tell by looking at me that they’ll be able to use me for what they want then fuck off and leave me to pick up the pieces. I told my support worker at Rape Crisis all of this on Wednesday and she told me it’s not uncommon for women who have been abused in some way to go on to have a string of abusive relationships or experiences. I think the sick fuckers can smell vulnerability and just have to try their luck. So yeah, along with the thoughts of wanting to castrate every man who has ever hurt me there are also a lot of thoughts and urges to self harm. I want to see the rivers of blood trickling out of me, I want to grab a blade and cut and cut and cut. But I don’t want to go to A&E, my legs are still in an absolute mess from the last self harm episode, I’ve got an area on one of the cuts where I think I’ve done some kind of nerve damage as there is a bit about the size of a 50p which is completely numb, I can’t feel a thing when I press down on it, even with something sharp.

It terrifies me to have thoughts about hurting other people and I have to keep telling myself over and over that I’m just being overly alert and that it IS safe to keep going outside. I know I would never act on them unless I was put into an extremely threatening position by someone. But then one part of my head screams so loudly that I deserve for another man to hurt me, I deserve to be used and abused and left even more broken than I am just now. And that just feeds the images and the urges to self harm again, because I believe I deserve to be cut, scarred and to look as disgusting as I do. I should look even more disgusting than I do now, I should be covered from head to toe in self mutilated wounds. Then no-one would ever want to come near me again. By making myself less and less attractive I can protect myself, or so the racing thoughts and occasional voices blurt out to me.

What was the quote I started with again?

“Do you know what I’m really terrified of? The wrong side winning. It’s as though my mind has split in two and I have no control over it. And the thing is, I’m beginning to get confused about which side is right and which is wrong.”

Which is the wrong side? I guess it’s the thoughts of hurting someone. I can’t control the thoughts, but I can control my actions. I think. And like the quote says, I truly am terrified of this side winning.

So which is the right side? I wish there was a side which believed that one day I will recover from all of this and achieve some things with my life. I wish I could believe there is a right side and it is going to be a place where if not happy, I’m at least content. But I don’t believe that is going to happen so instead I have to wonder if the right side is actually all these thoughts and encouraging voices telling me to hurt myself? Hurting myself feels right. It’s what I do. It makes me focus on a different kind of pain, a physical ache feels so much better than an emotional one. After all, I can see what is causing my pain when I can see that I’m covered in stitches and the variety of wounds all at various stages of healing.

I simply do not believe that I am ever going to escape these intrusive thoughts or escape from the self harming behaviours. I have been self harming for 17/18 years now. The voices have come and gone so many times I’ve lost count over the past 4 years or so. Feeling different in every way from every one I know has been a part of my life for too long now, and whilst I may have avoided any psych hospital admissions for over a year, my head is still very messed up. I don’t feel in control, I feel like something dark and sinister is controlling me, something that only gives me very occasional glimpses of feeling normal or even the tiniest glimpse of happiness, and then snatches them away from me… coming back every single time to ensure they can torment me a little bit more.

I still have so much more to say but I think I better end this post now, it’s got pretty long and the more I write the more messed up my head gets. I was also going to mention that whilst I did go to see my support worker on Wednesday, I phoned up with an excuse not to see CPN#2 on Friday. I think I just didn’t want to take the chance of opening up and all of the above pouring out because I already know what her response will be. It will be the usual bollocks about how I “will get better” and “will get through this” I just need to “learn coping techniques” that will work for me and then my life will somehow miraculously be cured of any mentalness. Plus there is the risk if you mention even having violent thoughts towards others – even if you know you wouldn’t act on them – that they still might get concerned enough to start assessing if you could really be a risk to others. And I’m not… well so long as no one tries to hurt me I’m not. Isn’t that a complete contradiction? I don’t want anyone to hurt me yet the only way I know to cope is to hurt myself? It might not make a great deal of sense to anyone apart from me.

On that note I think it is time for bed. I might try and write some more tomorrow if I feel like I can write something that makes a bit more sense. I don’t know if any of the 2500 words I’ve just written even make any sense at all. But my medication is kicking in and I need to try and sleep… I’m sure I’ve been writing this for over an hour now.

Goodnight folks, and I hope you’re all having a good weekend xx

19:09 – A surprise phone call

Today has actually been quite a busy day for me and I’m feeling pretty shattered after yet another crappy night’s sleep. I met my Mum and my Gran at 12.30 and we went for lunch as my Gran was going back home tonight. It was nice to have spent a bit of time with my Gran this time as I haven’t seen her since Christmas and didn’t get much time to talk to her as all the other family members were around and I was also really struggling with anxiety so didn’t really stay for that long.

However, I painted on the fake smile last night and went for dinner with them and done the same today for lunch. As I was saying my goodbyes my phone started ringing – private number – usually they get ignored… But something made me answer it and I was surprised to hear temporary CPN #2 from last year on the phone. She said she was back working in my area again (probably temporary again but I don’t know for sure yet) and asked me if I would like to meet up with her tomorrow. I’m not sure where the call came from – maybe lovely social worker who hasn’t been able to support me asked her, maybe Mr Psychiatrist contacted the CMHT to find out what was going on, maybe A&E contacted the CMHT, maybe it was just sheer coincidence… but yeah she called to offer me an appointment tomorrow which I agreed to go along to.

After lunch I had to head off to my appointment with lovely support worker from rape crisis and we had a good long session today. We talked about everything we possibly could regarding the self harming on Wednesday… I told her that I had no regrets this time and felt like I could potentially do it again quite easily. We spoke about my appointment with Mr Psychiatrist, about my trip to A&E and then about CPN #2 getting in touch. I have decided that whilst I will go to the appointment at the CMHT tomorrow I will also tell her the truth which is that I haven’t found working with any of the 3 cpn’s I’ve worked with over the past year helpful or beneficial. They don’t have the time to try and help me with graded exposure for the agoraphobia. They don’t care or get in touch if I’ve self harmed and gone to A&E as according to cpn #3 they know it’s a coping mechanism so they don’t need to get involved. They only ever seem to want to talk about “positive” things I could do with my life, they never seem to want to hear about the shit. And there is a lot of shit. And there is not much “positive” so it ends up just frustrating me.

I will ask her tomorrow what involvement she is going to have with me and will tell her that I would rather try and do structured work with the psychologist once she is back. I think that would be more beneficial in the long term if I could really properly learn coping skills for moments of intense anxiety or horrible flashbacks or evil voices. So maybe cpn #2 will just be someone to touch base with once a week or something to let them know I’m still alive. CPN #2 was the nicest out of the 3 cpn’s by far but she was also the one who kept trying to push all the positive things on me like starting the college course so that’s going to be fun tomorrow telling her I’ve fucked that up now. Part of me doesn’t even want to go to the appointment with her, I don’t think she can say anything I haven’t heard before, I don’t think she can offer me help in the times of crisis which is when I need help and well… I don’t want to start “working” with her and bringing up painful emotions if I’m only going to be seeing her for like a month or something. Anyway, I guess I wait and see what she says tomorrow. I must remember to go into A&E at some point whilst I’m at the hospital and have my wound check done.

So overall it was a good and productive session with support worker today but I felt pretty tired by the end of it, I’ve been feeling pretty drained all day from lack of sleep but we also did lots of talking. Then after that appointment I had to take Charlie dog to the vets for a vaccination and a little check up. Everything is fine with him, he is doing well and has put a bit of weight back on as well, he’s now 9.1kg and should be around 10kg so he’s getting there

After the vets I took the dogs a walk and then had to go to the supermarket. It seemed really noisy and everything sounded weird, like as though it was distorted somehow. I couldn’t concentrate and there were too many people and I started getting all anxious so I just grabbed dog food and then came home.

Mood wise I’m not entirely sure how I feel tonight. My head is noisy, male voice keeps offering “helpful” suggestions on how to next hurt myself. I’m trying to ignore it but quite simply I can’t. I don’t know if I’ll cut again tonight or not, if I do I will have to keep it superficial and not on my legs, I don’t want the A&E nurse tomorrow to see any fresh wounds. I find myself flicking my lighter a lot today…. heating the metal around the top of it then pressing it against my arms. It hurts a lot and yeah it leaves a sore mark for a while but it won’t lead to me needing more stitches and I can hide it easier. I have so many suggestions from male voice and ideas of my own on things I can do that will hurt but not require A&E and I feel as though I’m on a bit of a mission now to tick them all off the list one by one (and to see what other methods apart from cutting and burning give me that feeling of a release).

Before I start getting in to all that shit again I’m going to go and watch some TV. My head is properly pickled at the moment… just bursting full of ideas, thoughts and voices… all bad ones of course. But they seem like good ideas at the time, I guess that’s why we do them… we know we’ll regret it in the long term but when you’re in “that moment” you would pretty much do anything to make all those head crazies just leave you alone. I’m sad in a way that I don’t have any regrets over self harming yesterday but I also know that male voice is right, I haven’t done enough damage yet, I deserve much more pain and head fuckery before I’ll have done enough to make him happy. He’s right, I do deserve to hurt… I just wish he would fuck off with all these violent ideas and images… I am 99% sure I would never act on them if they involved hurting another person but there is that 1% of me that can’t help but wonder if this is all a build up to me totally losing the plot again. This little saying (below) very much reflects how I feel about everything right now… And I hope everything doesn’t keep going downhill but right now I have no idea what way I’m heading and I’m not even sure if I care…

00:05 – Need sleep. Need to cut. But need no regrets?

Today I had an appointment with my support worker from Rape Crisis. I nearly didn’t go to it as my sleeping is still utterly shit and I seem to have well and truly fallen into a pattern of falling asleep somewhere between 3 and 5am then waking up again between 7 and 9am, leaving me feeling pretty shattered. But I decided to go along to it and we spent the hour talking about the self-harm-that-hasn’t-happened-yet-but-I-know-is-likely-to-happen-pretty-soon.

I should probably put a trigger warning in here, this post talks about self harm and is a little bit graphic in places.

I talked about my reasons why I don’t actually want to do it but how I know that the thoughts surrounding doing it are getting faster, more frequent, more graphic, more persuading. I could throw the blades in the bin, but it would only take me two minutes to acquire more. I talked through a typical self harm episode with my support worker, how the build up to doing it is so intense, there are so many thoughts and emotions all dancing around encouraging me, making me think of that feeling of complete numbness and total release, it’s almost like the feeling a junkie gets knowing the hit, the rush, is going to happen any time soon. In a way I can’t wait for it just to happen and for it to engulf me and submerge me all at once.

But then there is this little irritating thought that reminds me of the hatred that I feel towards my scars, the loathing I have for them and how much they affect my self confidence. That’s the long term consequences. Then there is the short term consequences which (usually) involves a trip to A&E. By the time I’ve got to A&E a couple of hours after self harming I am sitting there in shock at the damage I’ve done to myself. I find it really hard to go into the A&E department and be able to speak. The anxiety makes it very hard to get my words out and then there is the sitting in the waiting room knowing that you are going to be called through to the doctor and have to admit to self harming. Having to expose the old scars and the new wounds. Not knowing if you are going to be judged or treated kindly. The mixture of both hope and dread about seeing a nurse/doctor that you’ve see before (for the same reasons). In a way you want to see someone who you know has treated you before and done it nicely, on the other hand you don’t want them to see that you are still doing this same shit to your body.

And if I’m in a situation whereby I don’t know the nurse or doctor on duty (I live in a rural area with a small local hospital so have met most of the A&E staff) but if it’s someone I haven’t met before and I am in a room alone with one or two of them with them assessing my wounds I tend to clam up with anxiety. I can’t speak and I start looking frantically around the room making escape plans in my head. I get scared of the questions they ask me in case they think I am lying – for example – they ask me if I still want to hurt myself and I shake my head to say no but I’m also shaking with anxiety, not speaking, eyes searching all round the room, unable to have eye contact with them… well then I fear they are going to be looking at me and thinking I’m crazy and not be able to just walk straight back out the door. I don’t often feel like I’m in control of a lot of things in my life so the fear of losing my control scares me… a lot.

Most of the time I regret self harming in the days afterwards, sometimes the regret starts within hours of doing it. Fucking hell sometimes within minutes I’m regretting it. But whilst I’m in the act of doing it it’s almost like being transported to a different world – a different headspace – where I feel no physical pain from it and become almost entranced by the blood, the depth, the severity. It’s like how can I be doing this yet not feel it? So in a sense it almost doesn’t even seem real because if I can’t feel any pain then how can I really be doing it?

After my appointment with my support worker I came home – still completely confused, still with these urges to cut, still with the same debate going on inside my head making me remember all the unwanted consequences that come along with doing it. And whilst there are loads more reasons for not doing it than doing it I still know that I will do it. It always wins in the end and the feelings of release it gives me is like an addiction that I must feed every few months (at the moment) – it builds and builds until I can’t take it any more and eventually it will become the only thought in my head until I can’t take stand hearing it one more time and so, I begin to cut. It’s been part of my life as a coping mechanism on and off over the past 17 years of my life. 17 out of my 31 years spent harming my body. That’s more than half my life. Hmm.

So that’s been my day. I am seeing my support worker again on Tuesday and am hoping to see my social worker towards the end of next week to touch base.

It’s after midnight now and despite taking my meds just after 10pm I don’t feel even slightly sleepy so it looks like another night of being awake til fuck knows when. I’ve just taken some extra Diazepam but I doubt they’ll do anything. Tomorrow I’m hoping to find some concentration as I still haven’t written a single post for my course’s weekly debates. But with a mind that is already in a constant debate with itself ‘to cut or not to cut?’ it’s hard to focus on anything else. Especially when you feel like a zombie from the lack of sleep and large doses of Quetiapine. Speaking of Quetiapine makes me think of the voices, I’ve heard snippets of some pretty funny conversations this week, one or two which have made me just roll my eyes in a kind of WTF confused sort of way… and another couple which have actually made me LOL. They are funny things voices; sometimes pure evil, sometimes pure genius, sometimes just hilarious.

Anyway… if I don’t sleep well tonight then I think I may treat myself to a bottle of wine tomorrow night, if I drink alone in the house where the heating is up full blast it is pretty much guaranteed that I’ll fall asleep in front of the TV. Then again alcohol would be something that would likely fuel the self harm thoughts and urges. It’s a no win situation, I should just get it bloody over and done with and hope the usual pattern follows where I don’t think about doing it again for another month or two. But it is impossible to do without the regrets that follow.

Oh well. I guess we’ll see what tomorrow brings. Come what may… (and all that jazz).

19:25 – It’s all muddled up

Voices, thoughts and ideas have all been racing through my head since I woke up this morning. I didn’t sleep very well last night even though I took my medication properly. I’ve been feeling pretty messed up all day today and because my head has been all over the place I’ve just stayed in using the excuse of having to do some studying so I didn’t need to go out anywhere other than to walk the dogs. Of course I didn’t actually get any studying done at all because my concentration is completely gone and I don’t know how to get it back.

My head feels very muddled at the moment. I don’t know how to describe it but it’s kind of like I know something is going to happen but I don’t know when or what. I have this sensation of some kind of impending doom but I don’t have specific details of what it is that I’m afraid is going to happen. But it feels like something bad. Taking my medication last night and again this morning has quietened the direct commands and instructions but my thoughts are still racing around really fast, jumping from one thing to the next and then onto something else like I can’t seem to stay focused on just one thing. So as everything chops and changes I get nothing done, the voices make no sense because they aren’t speaking in full sentences just a few words then stopping. Things aren’t connecting properly and I’m left with a completely pickled brain.

I don’t know if I prefer it more the way things have been over the past few days when I wasn’t taking my meds properly but was seeing and hearing things much more clearly or if I prefer this slowed down speed but all totally mixed up. I think (well I know because they told me) that the chitter chatter voices are angry with me for saying too much on here and for saying too much to lovely support worker yesterday. I try to make a deal with them that I won’t say anything more about what they ask of me on here or to anyone. I promise them I will keep it all private then after some amount of mocking and warnings and telling me I’m a failure and how I betrayed them until they finally quieten down again. Then as soon as my head quietens with voices my thoughts and all these ideas start whirling round one after the other after the other.

So needless to say today I have achieved nothing. Zero. Zilch.

Blah it’s all such a mess. And right now these feelings of some kind of impending doom that I’m having are actually quite unfamiliar to me because usually when I feel like something bad is going to happen it’s more like a pressure cooker that builds up over the hours, days and/or weeks until the lid finally blows. But it doesn’t feel like that, it feels massively confusing while everything is going fast and not making sense. Then things go slow but leave me depressed, tearful, filled with dread – about what I don’t know.

It’s just all muddled up and my mind is crazy. But the craziness begins to speak the truth, just a truth I’ve never realised before, but then people say that the truth is craziness and what does that do? Muddle me up even more. I am so confused and nothing is making much sense at the moment.

What I need is some proper quiet time for my brain to just relax, but I really think that is asking for the impossible at the moment.

22:03 – Feel like my head is about to explode

Today has been one hard day and my head is a mess. I didn’t get to bed til gone 2am then was up again just before 8am to start off Charlie dog’s medication for the day (and to take my own). I was pretty emotional and just sat here going through my little one’s memory box, crying into his little blanket, looking at my scan photos and my photos of my baby. Really can’t quite believe that six years have passed. People say time heals but I really don’t think it does.

I went and bought some flowers and met my Mum to go to the cemetery. On the way there I asked her how my cousin’s wedding had been and could feel my eyes welling up as she told me all the emotional moments: the father of the bride speech, the wedding vows, describing my cousin’s dress… I wished I hadn’t asked because it made me feel so sad I wasn’t there to see it all for myself.

We got to the cemetery and tried to make his headstone all pretty with nice flowers. There may be more now if his Dad went up later in the afternoon. I hope he did.

My little man’s headstone

After we had put our flowers into the little pots Mum started to talk about how different life would be if little Lewis was here, how she didn’t think my mental health would ever have got so bad if things had just turned out differently. And I kind of think she might be right. I’ve been so empty and lost over the past six years. Even more so in the past four years since my relationship with his Dad ended and my Bipolar diagnosis being made. On the one hand I really hope my little boy looks over me from Heaven and on the other I hope he never sees me when I’m doing bad things to myself and feeling so depressed and traumatised all the time.

Mum took me for a hot chocolate after we left the cemetery and most of the talk was again about my cousin’s wedding. Don’t get me wrong it was nice to hear how happy my cousin was and hear how family members I haven’t seen in years are doing. It just hurt because I felt so left out from it all even though it’s all my own fault for not having the strength to fight this fucking agoraphobia. Even after it ruining my quality of life for so many years I’m still too pathetic and weak to overcome it. That’s what really felt shitty.

Once I got back home I got the dogs and headed off to the vets so Charlie could get a check up and have the cannula taken out his paw. He was jumping about with what looked like excitement as we went in and all the staff started making a fuss of him and saying how he had certainly sprung back to life. But when we went into the consultation room I asked the vet if she could just check his stomach because it had looked pretty flat on Saturday and seemed a little bit swollen again. But I wasn’t too concerned because he’d been going to the toilet normally and not passed any blood or anything so it seemed that everything inside him was working properly. But she took his temperature and I could see her face starting to look a little worried, it was sky high again after being back to normal on Saturday. So she did an ultrasound over his tummy and could see pockets of fluid everywhere. It looked like his tummy was full of bubbles.

She said she couldn’t tell on the ultrasound what the fluid was, it could be that because he just wouldn’t rest yesterday and kept running around at his usual crazy speed that he’s burst a couple of internal stitches again and something is leaking or it could be that he’s started to bleed into his gut again. As she spoke she must have seen the worry on my face as the vet nurse who was also in the room started to give me a cuddle. The vet said he would need to stay with them tonight and would be operated on first thing tomorrow morning. That’s going to be three operations in seven days, major surgery that we didn’t know if he’d survive on Tuesday then reopened to repair burst stitches and a hernia on Friday and now reopened again tomorrow to see what this fluid is. I was really fighting back the tears and they asked if I was OK. I mumbled that it was my little boy’s anniversary today and my head was feeling pretty pickled and now I was so worried about Charlie again. Is he strong enough to get through all of these operations? Are they going to be able to repair the affected gastro-intestinal organs that are so damaged? The answer is that no one knows. So of course I am terrified all over again that I’m going to lose him. It really does feel like one step forwards and two steps back.

When I left the vets I went to best friend’s house for a couple of hours. I couldn’t come home because I was having really bad thoughts going round in my head, I felt that same pressure cooker feeling that I felt a few weeks ago when I ended up self harming pretty badly. And I didn’t want to do that. I didn’t want to tarnish my little one’s anniversary by cutting over and over until I needed stitches again. So even though I am now 8 days behind with my university work I tried to do the sensible thing and go somewhere I could talk, somewhere I knew the kids would distract me for a little while and somewhere where I couldn’t start hurting myself. I came home around 7pm and for the past two and a half hours I’ve just sat here staring blankly into space, my thoughts racing around too fast and to be honest it feels like my head is about to explode. I feel so stressed and worried and emotional. I keep bursting into tears and I’m not even sure exactly what I’m crying about.

I guess it’s about everything. Today has been extremely hard and I am shattered but I know I’m not going to sleep tonight. I still have two Nitrazepam left that lovely GP gave me last week and could take them and see if they help me get off to sleep. I doubt they will though, it doesn’t matter how much I try to medicate myself, everything in my head is just going way too fast and too erratically for medication to do much good. I have to try and prepare myself for another tough few days ahead but I am truly struggling to know where I’m going to get the strength from. I find it hard enough to function properly on the various medications that I take and when you throw in sleep deprivation and racing thoughts and worries (the outcome of which I have absolutely no control over) it makes it very very hard to keep on going.

I know that self harming isn’t the answer and yet I keep thinking over and over of that feeling of everything starting to release… that moment when I have finished cutting and just sit with my eyes closed for a few minutes feeling like all of the worries have rushed out of my system… it’s hard to describe it in words… I guess if you do it then you’ll know what I mean.

I can’t lie. My head is absolutely pickled tonight. I can’t slow my thoughts down so I have no choice but to let them race around until sheer exhaustion kicks in and I can get some rest. I guess it’s going to be another long night.

23:07 – You have to say hello before you can say goodbye

I heard a quote today which has been ringing in my ears ever since. The quote was “you have to say hello before you can say goodbye” and when I heard it my eyes instantly filled up.

Is that why it’s so incredibly difficult to accept the loss of my little boy? Is that why almost six years on I still can’t deal with it, and why every year as it approaches his anniversary I start to think constantly about ending my life here on Earth to go and be with him? Is it so impossible to even think about saying goodbye because I never properly got to say hello? And I’ve been thinking for hours and hours – did I say hello? I think that I did, I’m sure I remember saying those four words “hello my little man” through my tears as I cuddled him. But what if I didn’t? What if I never said hello?

This is making me feel so upset and anxious and emotional and yes I’m crying again. Because I can’t remember if those words came out my mouth and I have no idea why it matters so much to me but it’s just upsetting me so much.

I don’t have anything else to say. I just needed to write that down.

OK, take a breath. Stop the tears.

This weekend, what have I done? Nothing really. I’ve had a very boring weekend, although I did finally go back to A&E and got my stitches out after noticing one had actually gone completely under the skin so it was a bit uncomfortable getting that one out but the others were fine.

My Dad said he was going to come down to my flat tomorrow to start painting the skirting boards and lay the new flooring in my bathroom and hallway (or at least get the flooring cut properly to size then lay it next weekend. Tomorrow I officially start my next two university course modules but my thoughts are swinging between being completely blank and numb to racing fast and feeling completely unstable.

Sometimes I just don’t understand who I am, what I am or why I’m here. I really don’t. And it confuses the hell out of me. I wish life could make more sense. I just wish it could just be straightforward for once.

20:01 – The plotting and planning continues…

Yesterday I was supposed to go back to A&E to have my stitches removed but I couldn’t face it. I told myself one extra day wouldn’t matter and I would definitely go today as I had an appointment with new CPN this morning and the mental health team is in the same grounds as the hospital.

However I woke up this morning alarm beeping at 8am and just lay there thinking for the next hour or so. My appointment was for 10am and as the clock ticked on I continued just lying there, telling myself I would get up and start getting ready soon, but just like yesterday it didn’t happen. I didn’t go to the appointment and didn’t go to A&E to have the stitches out either. I can’t really see how an extra few days would cause any problems with the healing of the wounds…

To be honest I was thinking of just taking them out myself but they are very tight against the skin and I can’t really get into them properly even with tweezers and just a little blade, so I guess I’m going to have to go and have them taken out at some point.

So what have I done for the last two days? More planning. More plotting. Pretty much every minute I’ve been awake in the last couple of days I’ve either been completely caught up in dealing with voices – comments, instructions, filling up my head with the crazy laughter – and when the voices haven’t been distracting me I’ve still been gathering ideas “just in case”.

I’m supposed to be starting my next two university modules on Monday. I’ve received confirmation that I’m enrolled onto them but I just don’t see how I’m going to manage to do the work. My head is so so busy, fast moving thoughts, disruptions to my thoughts when the chitter chatter starts up… how the fuck am I supposed to find the concentration to study? But at the same time I don’t want to drop out of something again or fail at something again. But I can’t lie, things aren’t good just now. In fact they’re very very hard. And I am struggling a lot.

Sorry for such a negative post, I’m away to see if a couple of bottles of wine are enough to let me escape, at least for this evening. I just can’t help but wonder if this is always going to be it, if I’m just going to be this mess for the rest of my life. The periods of stability vs instability are so unpredictable, I hate never knowing how long a depressive episode is going to last or how many different medications I will need to swallow down to try and have a head free from hearing voices.

I refuse point blank to even consider a hospital admission because it doesn’t provide any form of therapy that might help me to feel better, the shocking lack of compassion of the nurses in our acute psychiatric ward is enough to make anyone go from feeling low to full blown suicidal. And don’t even get me started on the boredom, the fellow patients, the arguments, the way you can walk in voluntarily and told it’s just to keep you safe for a few days then as soon as you want to leave you are suddenly detained under the mental health act.

No. Hospital is a definite no no. Never again. And I can’t even go and have some stitches taken out at the hospital because I’m so convinced they will see right through my lies when I say I’m OK and I don’t trust them not to take control away from me. So I have to just hang on and hang on until I get a moment where I feel like I can paint on a fake smile, breathe calmly and just go in and get the bloody things out.

Hmmz. I’m confused. Very confused. I keep hearing the words “choose this path” and I’m not sure where “that” path will take me. Anyway, I’m sure whatever path I’m destined to walk along will be the one I’ll take. For now I need to drink think long and hard about what direction to start walking in and pray for some strength to get through this or find a way to make it all go away… permanently.

15:43 – Loud whispers in my head

After my last blog post on Wednesday I went to my appointment with my support worker. It was a good session with plenty of talking and listening however I had a few moments during it where she was trying to tell me why something we were talking about was not my fault, cue the giggle and a loud whisper in my head

“she’s talking shit, you fucking deserved it alright” 

Then I’d lose my concentration for a moment and forget what we were talking about. She’d go back to talking about why this particular incident wasn’t my fault and start asking me if I had a child standing in front of me telling me that these things were happening to them would I blame them? Would I say “sorry but yes you’re right, it was your fault” ??

I shook my head and said no, of course not. That a child is never to blame. But then I tried to explain that for me it is easier to believe I was abused because I did something bad to deserve it than to try and comprehend that I was innocent. Innocent up to and during the point when someone who was supposed to love me as family became evil and twisted enough to do those things to me when I was just a child. And then, of course, if you are abused again as an adult, then it is even easier to say “it was my fault, I deserved it, I was bad” than to accept I could actually just have been that unlucky for it to happen by more than one person.

But support worker said at the end of the session that she did see a little glimpse of progress, as for the first time, I opened my mind to accept there could have been other reasons why I was abused other than simply because I was bad or deserved it. And whilst I might not really believe those other reasons right now, I can accept they are plausible ones. (Well for other people anyway).

So Wednesday was a bit of a hectic day with seeing lovely GP and seeing support worker and I had lots of thoughts swirling around my head for the remainder of the day.

Thursday, Friday and Saturday have passed in a bit of a haze. I’ve been taking the increased dose of 750 mg Quetiapine for 4 days now and other than my mouth being dry and feeling slightly clumsy and a bit disconnected at times I’ve not really noticed any other side effects. Unfortunately the urges to self harm just don’t seem to want to calm down and they are pretty much constant. I think I have fought the fight against doing it for long enough now, it is obvious the only way they are going to stop is if I act on them. But I so don’t want to end up needing stitches or anything so if I do it then I need to try and release all these crazy head urges superficially.

Sorry, a bit of a pointless ramble seems to be what I needed to write down. My thoughts feel all choppy, quickly going from one to another to another. It’s hard to stay focused or concentrate when your thoughts drift so fast. There is no way I will be able to do my part time university course if I can’t control my thoughts. And I only have about a week or so before I start back. I need to get my head together.

I just don’t know how to do it.

23:17 – An emotional rollercoaster today

Today has passed at a snail pace. Every time I thought another couple of hours must have passed I would check the clock and it would really only be about half an hour that had passed. The only times that time has moved so slowly have been when I’ve been in hospital.

My thoughts began to spin out of control mid afternoon. I became very irritable and my best friend kept phoning and I kept hitting the phone onto silent, I just couldn’t answer it. I’m not sure why, I think it was because I was sure she would know there was something wrong and then start insisting I go out and talk to her or play with the kids to distract myself.

And you know what was crazy? Right there in that moment I didn’t want to be distracted, I wanted to feel every single horrible emotion, I wanted to feel them one by one and see how much damage it would do to actually sit and listen to everything in my head rather than try and escape it. So I sat and cried. I paced the room. I flicked through TV programmes. I took the dogs several short walks. I washed some clothes. I hoovered. I smoked a ridiculous amount of cigarettes.

I tried to make food but realised the few items in my fridge had gone out of date yesterday so I called for some Chinese food as it was the only place open. Started eating it then thought I was going to be sick with each big wave of anxiety that overcame me. That reminds me, a psychologist I saw once upon a time once said to me the best thing you can do is start eating something when you feel anxiety coming on because one of the very first things that happens physiologically when we become anxious is our mouth’s become dry so if you start to eat something (even some chewing gum just to produce saliva) somehow tricked your body into a state of confusion: you can’t be relaxed enough to eat and in fight or flight panic mode, so theoretically you should start to calm down (or give into the anxiety and dump the plate of food like I did). I don’t know if it works or if it’s just some old wives tale, I do know when I’m very anxious the last thing on my mind is sitting eating a nice plate of food when my stomach is churning, when I’m having hot flushes and my heart is palpitating like crazy and I have the overwhelming urge to escape.

So who knows… maybe it does work…

This state of anxiety and irritability/restlessness carried on through to the early evening despite me taking some Diazepam to try and calm down a bit. By this point the repetitive voice in my head was “cut”… followed by the obligatory giggle. It made me feel really quite distressed because I couldn’t make it stop and when it won’t stop I start panicking that it’s not “my voice” or “my thought” it’s one that’s out of my control again. I decided to not even fight it and went to my little hiding place and took out two brand new stanley knife/box cutter blades. I sat pushing the flat side of the metal against various parts of my arms and legs, then I turned the blade on it’s side and ran it across my skin (but without applying any pressure at all) just to get the memories to rush into my head of how it feels when I do push down deep and actually cut. And the more time the blades spent in my hands the more the anxiety began to build up thinking about having to go to A&E if I allowed myself to cut to the my usual level.

I put the blades back and guess what? I cried again. AGAIN. I lay here on the sofa a snotty sobbing mess holding a cushion tightly against me then sat up and just rocked myself until all the intense emotions seemed like they were finally leaving.

So it has been a pretty rotten day but one that is now almost over. It’s about 10.45pm just now and I’ve taken my medication and night time Diazepam. I’ve just been out giving the dogs their last walk of the night and I am now sitting here feeling totally drained. My head hurts from all the crying, my eyes are puffy from all the crying and my mind is emotionally shattered from all the crying.

The only person I have spoken to all day was the delivery driver who dropped my Chinese food off and that was just to mutter the words “thank you”.

I don’t know what stopped me from cutting today, mostly it was the complete state of fear I seem to be experiencing whenever I think of anything hospital related at the moment, but also because I got a text message from my Mum saying that my Aunt and Uncle and Grandma are all coming to visit tomorrow and asking me if I’d like to join them for dinner. I eventually text back saying yes I would go. Some time ago I wrote a post saying that my Aunt had sadly been diagnosed with Ovarian Cancer, well that is her just finished 6 months (I think?) of Chemotherapy as well as having had surgery to do a complete hysterectomy and removal of various lymph nodes and things that are also in that area. And due to the fucking agoraphobia and not being able to get to Big Scary City where my Aunt lives this is actually going to be the first time I will have seen her since her diagnosis. So if she can have gone through all of that and feel well enough to travel the couple of hours to my parents house for the night then I’m sure I can battle my head demons for a couple of hours and try to enjoy a meal with them. Plus it’s been ages since I last saw my little Grandma and I do miss her a lot. And she’s getting old now, I think she’s about 88 bless her.

So, as I was saying, getting that message to say they were coming was another thing that seemed to stop me from cutting. Even though the wound would have been somewhere they would never have seen, this is the first year for quite a while where I’m actually going to have something that I can talk about during dinner. And I didn’t want to be sitting there with a sore arm or leg knowing that there were a load of stitches just under my clothes. One advantage of doing this University course is that it gives people something to talk to me about and takes the attention away from my mental health. Every time I have to see people that I haven’t seen in a while I always get asked what I’m doing with my life and this time I’ll be able to tell them about my course and what I’ve been learning and where I hope it will lead. Even if the voice in my head is laughing at every sentence that comes out my mouth and starts mocking me I am determined I will get through one meal and actually have my family thinking I’m not a completely lost cause after all. I want them to finally hear about something positive in my life and not be like “oh she’s STILL not well” even if I don’t entirely have much belief in myself about the course, I still want to be able to say the words that I’m doing something with my life.

The only bit I’m not looking forward to is hearing about all of my cousin’s wedding plans or all the little stories about her little toddler. Baby type talk is a big trigger. The wedding that is too far away for me to go to because of the stupid agoraphobia but one that every single member of our families will be at, apart from me. That topic of conversation is also likely to be one that would make me feel quite anxious and upset.

OK I think it’s time for bed now. Please let tomorrow be a better day and run smoothly with no embarrassing anxiety attacks or similar mentalisms. I just want to be able to cope for a couple of hours, take part in their conversation, enjoy a meal with them and then come home again.

Simple as that.

(Nothing is ever simple, I should know that by now)

Goodnight folks x

16:08 – Struggling. Again.

I forgot to mention in my last post that I shouldn’t be so stressed about Christmas as things had changed around a bit for this year. For the past couple of years I have spent Christmas morning with best friend and my little ‘nephews’ so she didn’t need to give them their presents alone and so I didn’t have to spend Christmas morning alone. This has proved to be both a good and bad thing. Good because I do enjoy watching the little ones opening all their presents and the big smiles on their faces; bad because it’s like I’m being tortured minute-by-minute as each present they unwrap just makes me all the more aware that I am never going to get these moments as a Mummy to my little boy… Never going to see his little face all excited seeing Santa had come… And it hurts a lot that I will never ever be able to change that.

In February it will be six years since my little boy was born an angel and went off to Heaven, I truly thought it would get easier, but it just doesn’t. And Christmas is supposed to be that time of year when families all get together and it’s like every family event that takes place reminds me that someone very special is always going to be missing

Anyway, best friend phoned on Wednesday to tell me that her ex had phoned and asked if he could have the boys for Christmas this year. She was reluctant at first but in the end decided to agree. So the plan was for the boys to go to their Dad’s on Thursday and stay until the 26th, so they will love it as they will get all their presents from Santa on Christmas Day at their Dad’s then the next day will be back home and get all the presents that Santa has left there – so two Christmas Day’s in a row – I’m sure they will be spoiled rotten from everyone! So as it was all a bit sudden as the boys Dad was getting them the very next day and then when they come back their grandparents want to spend the day with them opening their presents back home so I decided I would just take mine out to them on Wednesday night. They both loved their toys and gave me big cuddles and kisses which was nice In a way I’m glad it all turned out this way because it is one less thing to stress about on Christmas Day, although it also means that I’ll be waking up and spending Christmas morning alone which isn’t so nice…

After that I came home shattered and wrote my last blog post which was all about whether or not I would manage to sleep in my bed for the first time in ten months due to this huge psychological barrier I have built around my bedroom. And well, the sleeping in a bed thing is slowly beginning to happen. The first night I took my laptop through with me and lay on the bed and watched a film. When it finished I decided I was going to try to get into the bed properly and close my eyes, but as I was getting undressed I started to feel the anxiety building up inside of me. I didn’t want to feel the anxiety and I was so tired after a few days of moving every item of furniture in my flat back and forth between rooms. So the first night resulted in me coming back through to the living room and lying on the sofa, trying to just breathe my way through the panicking feelings and after a while I calmed down and fell asleep.

I woke up in the middle of the night freezing cold as I had no blanket and realised both my little dogs were lying on top of my blanket, curled up and sound asleep. So I got up and went through to the bedroom, tried to make no big deal of it and just climb in and get snuggled up. I hoped I would go straight back to sleep but it was as if someone suddenly flicked a switch and I found myself wide awake and thoughts beginning to race through my head. Short but fast flashes went through my head of all the bad moments that had taken place in that room and after about an hour of this I was just getting myself into a mess so I got back up and went back to the sofa.

At this point I decided to take some Diazepam to try and just calm myself down. I couldn’t get back to sleep so decided to put another film on with the hope that if I picked one that you really need to concentrate on, that my brain would just give up and let me sleep instead. I got about ten minutes into the film and was yawning again so I made one last attempt at going and lying on the bed and watching the film. At some point I fell asleep although it was only for a couple of hours until the postman knocked the door and woke me up at 8.30am. So the first night wasn’t a very great success.

The second night (Thursday night) was very similar to the first night except I decided to take some Diazepam about half an hour before I wanted to try and sleep to see if I could take the edge off the anxiety a little. I thought this was working as again I lay on the bed and began watching a film and I felt OK. But as soon as the film finished and there was silence again I felt the overwhelming urge to escape out of the bedroom and run back to the sofa where I sat up most of the night watching crap on TV until finally being so exhausted around 4 or 5am and deciding I would just go and lie on the bed and put yet another film on. And again I didn’t manage to get into the bed but did get 3 or 4 hours sleep laying on top of it before hearing the post come through and that was me back up again for the day.

Yesterday (Friday) I was getting very tired after only having about 6-8 hours sleep in the previous 48 hours and my lovely Mum came to help me make the little finishing touches to my bedroom – hanging my new curtains and new light-shade – then she took me to the supermarket and bought me some food in after noticing my fridge was empty. The supermarket was a nightmare with so many people in doing Christmas shopping. I could feel myself becoming so irritable as it was taking forever to dodge trolleys and having people banging in to me and then the queues at the checkout’s were just crazy. It took the best part of an hour just to get two bags of shopping and I left the supermarket feeling so stressed out there was probably steam coming out my ears!!

Finally around 7pm I sat down and had some dinner, watched some TV for a few hours and then before I knew it it was midnight so I took my medication and then took the dogs out for their bedtime walk. When I got back home I tucked the dogs up in their big blanket. They have been so good and seem quite happy to sleep in a different room to me, I think so long as they’re together and nice and warm they are happy

Then I took my laptop through to the bedroom to put yet another film on. When it finished I was really struggling to keep my eyes open so I closed them and just laid there. I remembered something that the lovely social worker I used to work with often said to me, it was about letting the thoughts run through your head and not fighting them, not trying to stop them, just being aware of them and letting them run until they pass. I guess in a kind of mindful manner. And I tried very very hard to do this but the thoughts got me into such an anxious mess again and for the third night in a row they won and I was up and down all night long.

Today (Saturday) I am getting really exhausted now but I’m going to keep trying to sleep in my bed. Eventually the exhaustion will take over and when that point comes I will be like a small child on the program Supernanny who has to be taken repeatedly back to their own bed until that point finally comes where they fall asleep in it and remain asleep all night. I am determined not to let myself lay down at all on the sofa just in case I fall asleep. I know any sleep is probably better than none but I am adamant that when that severe exhaustion takes over it will be my bed that I sleep in, not the sofa. I have to overcome this and keep fighting it.

There was something else that I wanted to talk about that was probably a lot more important than rambling on for about 500 words about where and when I’ve slept… my brain is a bit pickled just now… Anyway I wanted to talk/moan about the CMHT (community mental health team). Now they have recognised and identified that Christmas is a particularly hard time of year for me and new CPN said at our last appointment that she was going to give me an appointment for Monday (Christmas Eve) and the following Monday (New Year’s Eve) so I had weekly support and on the days before the ‘big’ days that are likely to be in some way triggering for me. But I got a phone call on Monday saying new CPN had phoned in sick and now no-one has called me back all week so I don’t have an appointment now on Monday and I’m worried about how I will cope if I have to get through the Christmas and New Year week’s with no support. I can’t even see my support worker from Rape Crisis because they are closed now til the 7th of January. The CMHT know this is the time of year I am most likely to harm myself or end up being admitted to hospital and they say they will help to make sure that doesn’t happen this year and then they don’t contact me to offer me any form of support. Even if new CPN is still off sick it would be nice if someone made contact with me even if it was just to ask me if I thought I would be OK over Christmas with no appointments. But of course that didn’t happen.

Anyway I have rambled on for long enough. I’m tired, my head is a little noisy, I’m feeling quite alone and unsupported from a ‘professional’ point of view but then my lovely Mum has been trying so hard to support me. And I am so extremely grateful to her, she has helped me so much and tried so hard these past couple of weeks to help me get my flat looking presentable again and make my environment a happier place to be… but it’s the ‘mental’ things I’m struggling with and find them hard to talk to my parents or friends about. Plus I feel massively guilty to talk about how much I still want to self harm badly when I’ve got someone who is doing everything they can to make things better and a little less stressful for me. How can I still want to do all these bad things when someone is trying so hard to make things good for me? It doesn’t make sense. I am still doing the blood letting stuff with syringes but I think it’s the pain I need to feel rather than the blood I need to see as it isn’t giving the same feelings of release as it was a week or two ago.

Fuck. I really wish I could be a better daughter to them.

I really do.