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

00:50 – Feeling seriously low tonight

I went to my appointment this afternoon with CPN#2 (maybe I should think of a better name for her – but there has been 3 cpn’s I’ve worked with over the past year and she was number 2 so cpn#2 seems like the best suited name for her). It was actually nice to see her again and I managed to tell her most of the things I wanted to including not finding having a CPN helpful, the frustration about the lack of consistent appointments through the CMHT and the frustration of people coming and going and coming and going and never being able to move forwards with anyone. She told me she is there on a temporary basis but will be there for a minimum of three months and that she would like to work with me on a weekly basis alongside psychology when it re-starts.

I basically brought her up to date with where I’m at with everything in my life at the moment and told her about the self harming and how much I’ve fucked up my uni course. I told her I’ve been feeling pretty unsupported again lately apart from lovely support worker at rape crisis. She did tell me that lovely social worker who I was supposed to be seeing until psychologist returns is actually off on long term sick leave – it would have been nice if someone from the CMHT had decided to tell me that rather than me just sitting here thinking I’d been forgotten about. I hope she gets better soon.

After my appointment I went along to the A&E department to have my wound checked and a dressing change, everything looks like it’s healing well and the stitches are nice and neat. I almost felt OK for a little while when I got home – maybe because it had been lovely and sunny all afternoon and maybe because I’d got some of my frustrations out… but yeah I felt OK for a little while but as the afternoon went into evening my mood has taken a serious dip. I’m sitting here with a clean blade and really badly want to do some damage to myself. I don’t want to go to A&E though, so this time I really do need to be in control of it and keep it reasonably superficial, but sometimes that really is easier said than done.

My head feels really fuzzy like I can’t think straight, I don’t know what I want, I’m irritable and restless, I took my medication about an hour ago and my thoughts seem to be getting worse and worse. Lots of images in my head of what I’d like to do to myself but genuinely fighting back simply because I’m too tired for one, and for two I *know* I won’t be able to keep the cutting under control. Yet I can’t put the blade away. I keep it sitting next to me and occasionally pick it up and do some scratches on my skin then put it back down again. I hate this, I hate this frame of mind when you so badly want to do something really bad… something worse than self harming but you don’t even know what’s making you feel that way. The voices are a constant source of negativity and keep the stream of negative thoughts flowing.

Head just feels a total mess. Need to take slightly more than normal amounts of medication to try and sedate myself. Really scared I’m going to do something stupid tonight if I can’t get myself off to sleep soon. This favourite quote of mine does a pretty good job of summing up how I feel right now…

23:37 – It’s not going good at all

[Warning - Graphic Descriptions of Self Harm in Post]

It’s just getting worse. Worse and worse. I feel really low and the only thought revolving around my head is to cut myself. I want to make it clear that I am NOT suicidal, I do NOT want to die, I just can’t distract myself from the constant flashes in front of my eyes of me doing something harmful to myself (or other people which is very out of character for me). The constant thoughts are about cutting mostly.

I sent an email to rape crisis support worker tonight and basically sent her the stuff I’ve written on here for the past couple of nights. She knows I write a blog but she isn’t very technical minded so I’m not worried about her coming across my ramblings here.

I have taken too much medication this evening but it was sort of by accident. Well it wasn’t really an accident at all, it was more a case of realising I’d forgotten to take ANY medication today so around 8pm I just took my full day and full night’s tablets in one. I thought maybe a big surge of medication in my system might make everything feel much less fucked up but I just feel a little groggy… This could be a good thing as it might mean I will sleep tonight. It would help a lot if I could get a full 7 or 8 hours uninterrupted sleep.

Back to the self harming. The cutting. Male voice is very prominent and has insulted every single thing I’ve done today. He has a broad Scottish accent and whilst I haven’t seen him I have an idea of what he might look like from how he talks and certain little quirks that he has. I am a bit scared of this next impending self harm episode because he wants me to leave marks that will be even harder to explain, he wants me to draw certain symbols into my flesh with blades, he wants me to cut so deep I can truly see the inside of my body… not just some yellow globule like bits of flesh but proper muscle, bone and tendon. I’m not going to lie, that does actually scare me a little. I am well aware that it doesn’t take that much of a slip of the hand to do permanent irreversible damage but the urges, the orders, the ideas… they are all sucking me in.

I’ve done so well to have only had a couple of slip ups in the past year and I most certainly do not ever want to re-visit the place I was in a few years ago. I’m genuinely terrified of the psych hospital and genuinely scared of how I would react if I was ever faced with that situation again.

Anyway… I’m sorry it’s not been a more cheery post… I did send an email to my support worker at rape crisis earlier and she replied saying all nice and supportive things but male voice just laughed loudly throughout the whole time I was trying to read. He knows he’s going to win and I know he’s going to win. The only plan I can have is to somehow try and very much limit the damage so it’s only one more scar to deal with… if he has it his way I won’t even be able to see the flesh on my limbs he wants that much of my ugliness cut away.

I wonder how many hours/days/weeks it will take before I reach the point of doing ANYTHING to shut him up once and for all.

21:02 – Don’t know

Didn’t go to see support worker today. Head has been in a mess all night. Trying absolutely everything I can think of to calm and quiet it down. Around 4pm it did quieten down for a while and whilst I really wanted to use the peace to get some sleep I decided to pop up and see my mum for an hour seeing as I didn’t see her yesterday when I promised I would. Very soon after leaving ‘male voice’ woke up and started his shit.

So I……

Don’t know why I didn’t go and see support worker today.

Don’t know when I’ll next see her as she’s off all next week.

Don’t know when/if I’ll get to see social worker.

Don’t know if I’m coming or going.

Don’t know how I feel.

00:02 – Truth be known, I’m struggling… a lot

[Warning - there is a graphic description of sexual violence in this post]

Since my last post in the early hours of Friday morning I have been quite busy but also, if I’m honest, struggling. On Friday afternoon I went to see my Mum for a little while and to see best friend. We were all going out on the Saturday night for best friend’s birthday and I was trying on my outfit I was planning to wear out up at Mum’s. Seeing their eyes quickly scanning the extent of the scarring on my body felt horrible but then they both started telling me how proud of me they were that I was now being trusted with a month of medication again and how proud they were that I’d stayed out of hospital for so long. They were nice about the scars but I felt utterly hideous and very uncomfortable with them on show so quickly got covered up again.

Saturday night we all went out. All the girls had short tight dresses on – I on the other hand had my legs fully covered and my arms fully covered. I felt a bit out of place so took just a couple of diazepam whilst we were all getting ready at best friend’s house followed by at least four pretty strong vodkas. By the time we got to the first pub around 10.30pm I was feeling a little tipsy… by the time we left the last pub and began to head home at 2am I was very drunk. But it was a strange kind of drunk, I just couldn’t seem to relax properly all night. I couldn’t get hyper-alert-suspicious-paranoid-brain to shut up. I didn’t join in on the dancefloor, I didn’t let a single person buy me a drink, every guy who got within a couple of feet of me I quickly walked away from. I tried to join in with the laughs but my head was somewhere else all night and all I seemed to do was watch the clock and count down the minutes until I could get the hell out of there and back to my safe little house.

Sunday I felt absolutely awful all day. It seems I’m at that age where hangovers don’t feel too bad when you first wake up but as the hours pass you feel worse and worse, not any better. So yeah, Sunday was pretty much spent lazing around doing nothing. I know alcohol is a depressant but this weird state of mind has been on the go since Wednesday when lovely GP decided to trust me with a month’s worth of medication. Every time I open my cupboard door I hear ‘male voice’ telling me I’ve got them there for a reason and it’s not to prove how responsible I can be with them. But then I hear Mum and best friend in my head, telling me how proud they are of me and I hate myself for even giving the tiniest bit of attention to ‘male voice’.

But ‘male voice’ has been very much present over the past week mostly being insulting telling me things like I’m a dirty whore who deserves to be raped again… a stream of laughter by him every time someone said I looked nice on Saturday night… telling me it would be a good idea to take all of those Diazepam and just fucking knock myself out… telling me me I’ve not made my body ugly enough for him yet and to get a blade back to my skin. He’s angry with me that I walked past the DIY store today and didn’t go in and replace my empty box of blades and it is all I keep hearing from him tonight that I WILL go buy more tomorrow or else I’m going to make him so mad that he will have me [insert warning here to very graphic horrible instructions] “cut my tits off” or his other favourite is “someone’s gonna rape you [between the legs] with the sharpest knife I can find” . Pretty fucked up I know but that is the way he speaks, that’s his vocabulary, that’s his way of showing me he is in control, not me. He is particularly violent in his threats and comments and I am not a violent person, but he says things in ways that flash images in front of my eyes of either me mutilating my body badly or hurting someone else. I’ve never really hurt someone else, I’ve had a few bitch fights, hair pulling and that kinda shit… I’ve punched a couple of people in anger… but I’ve never really properly hurt someone to the point where I could do them permanent damage. And I can’t imagine me ever doing something like that but the things he is saying to me scare me, I can’t deny it.

So with all this going on in my head and his voice talking far too much I haven’t been able to sleep again. I stayed up all of Sunday night, all day yesterday until I finally took a handful (not an overdose) of diazepam this morning around 11am and at finally around 1pm I fell asleep until 4pm. I had promised best friend and her kids that I would go out and see them today now they are back from their dad’s, I promised Mum I would go for a walk with the dogs with her and maybe go for some lunch or coffee or something. Neither of those things happened and other than going out a few times today with the dogs I have done absolutely nothing.

I am very very much at crunch time with regards to my part time university course. I have failed the 20% part of the module. The essay part makes up the other 80%. Normally the lowest pass mark of an essay is 40% but because this is only making up 80% the pass mark is 60%. If I was able to spend the remainder of the week studying like crazy there’s a chance I could throw some sort of an essay together but I have an appointment with my rape crisis support worker tomorrow and then it’s best friend’s actual birthday on Thursday. And to be completely honest I have lost all motivation. I’ve lost interest. But then I’ve lost interest in everything over these past few days.

My head feels like it’s going a bit mental again and I am lacking in strength to fight back. All I seem able to do is lie on the sofa or in bed and battle back and forth with the intrusive voices and crazy thoughts. I feel like I have all this invisible pressure around me: be responsible with the medication, prove to them all I can do this, keeping mum and best friend proud of me, keeping ‘male voice’ happy, knowing I’m probably going to be kicked off the uni course and fail at yet another thing.

I am shattered right now. It’s midnight and I pray I can sleep through the night. I need a little bit of energy back, it all feels like it’s been zapped out of me. I am so scared I’m going to let everyone down… things feel slippery yet I don’t know why. I have no plans to take the medication to hurt myself but the self harm urges (cutting) seem to be getting stronger again. If only to shut him up. And not even the remembrance of the major regrets I had after doing it a few weeks ago are enough to keep me certain I won’t do it again… I think in all likeliness I will give in… because I’m weak… pathetic and weak.

Why oh why can life never just be straightforward? Why does it always have to end up mental again in the end?

21:25 – Trying out sandplay/sandtray therapy

Today I actually dragged myself off the sofa and got some things done. I can now tick off my list:

• Bought Easter card for parents
• Bought and posted Easter card for my Gran
• Bought and took Easter eggs to best friends kids
• Returned book to best friend that I borrowed
• Paid a cheque into the bank
• Put clean clothes on
• Went to appointment with support worker
• Dogs have had 3 walks so far today in between all of the above

The only things left to tick off my list is:

• A shower
• Studying
• Read university emails
• Send email to personal tutor to explain how much I’m struggling

So I got a few things done today and I guess I feel glad. The only thing to write about today that is of any interest is my appointment with my support worker (that I see through Rape Crisis). We talked for a while and I told her about the continual urges to self harm despite the regrets I have about doing it last week. I told her I wished I’d just got the proper stitches put in because my wound is very painful where the deepest part is still healing. We talked about some other things – one which I will write about on here at some point soon but right now I’m still trying to make sense of it myself. The first half hour of the appointment we touched on quite a few things, but for some reason my eyes kept on diverting to a tray on the table that was full of sand. Also on the table were loads of little miniature toys like animals and people and scary looking things and happy looking things. Support worker told me it was for something called sandplay (or was it sand tray?) therapy and asked me if I’d like to try it. I told her I felt a bit silly as it looked like something for young children to play with but she encouraged me to try it so I did.

She left me alone in the room for about ten minutes and I sat there and stared at the sand. I didn’t know what type of “scene” or “picture” I wanted to create. I felt stupid and like I couldn’t do it properly because I don’t have the creative imagination of a young child. So I just sat there swirling my fingers in the sand for a couple of minutes then decided to have a look at all of the miniatures. I found some gates, like the kind a kid would use if they were playing with toy farm animals and created a gated in corner of one side of the tray. I picked up a miniature toy wolf but it had three heads and had an evil look about it, and at either side of the wolf I put lions which were roaring and also evil looking. They all went in behind the gate.

Then at the other side of the sand tray I put a miniature Church minister holding a Bible and lying by his feet a little baby with a blue nappy on. But I started burying the baby into the sand until only his head was visible. I surrounded him with pretty things, little crystals and pretty buttons.

I thought that was all I could do. There were no other miniatures that I wanted to put in my scene but where the two empty corners were I dug all the sand out of them to make a big hill in the middle so one side of the tray miniatures wouldn’t be able to see the other sides miniatures. But then in the empty space I found three miniatures that were just little heads with faces on and hands held up. The first head I left sitting up properly, the second falling down into the sand, the third face deep and underneath the sand.

Then I told support worker I was finished and she came back in. We talked a little about why I picked each object – the wolf felt like inside my head – the three different heads on it, like me with my head but the voices as well. It looked angry – a lot of the time the voices are angry. I wanted them gated in because I feel like I have to hold things back all the time and constantly try to prevent those I’m close too seeing me interact with the voices and look totally bonkers.

The church minister looked kind and I believe in Heaven and believe my little boy is there. The baby figure I guess was representative of my little one, why I buried him under the sand (apart from his head) I don’t really know. Maybe because we had him buried. I don’t know.

The falling faces – guess they reflect how I feel – like I’m constantly falling downwards and it is so difficult to lift my head up high when inside I feel as though I’m trapped in some sort of cycle of always ending up falling flat on my face, head first, head deeply buried in some sort of shit that I don’t want to be buried in.

So yeah it felt a bit weird doing it and I don’t know if I’ll ask to do it again but I can see how it would be helpful if someone was having trouble saying the words out loud or expressing their feelings and emotions or experiences through creating visual scenes rather than talking. This evening I have been thinking that maybe there are some memories that I have suppressed so much that maybe expressing my memories of them in a sand play session would be easier. I don’t know. Even though some things are incredibly painful to think about there are some specific details of some memories that I don’t seem to want to share with anyone. I’ve had plenty of opportunities to from the wide range of professionals I’ve seen over the past few years but some little details I have always kept to myself. Shame maybe. I don’t know.

I have another appointment with my support worker next Wednesday. I also need to try and see lovely GP next Wednesday rather than just handing in a prescription request again but it’s a case of waiting until Wednesday morning then seeing if I can get an appointment on the day and that might be a bit hard as they are closed for a couple of days over the Easter bank holiday weekend so there will probably be loads of people trying to get same day appointments on Wednesday. Maybe I’ll just hand in a prescription request again this month but see if I can make an appointment to see her next month. Surely she can’t be completely booked up for the next month.

I also need to get an appointment with my social worker but I’m guessing she will be off tomorrow and Monday so will try and contact her next week sometime.

So that’s been my day. Best friend said she is going to pop by tomorrow morning and that I’ve to be up and showered and dressed for 10.30am and meet her for a cuppa, but the way my sleep is at the moment I have no idea what time I’ll end up falling asleep then waking back up. I could fall asleep at 12 and be awake again by 3am and that will be me up all day and night. I could fall asleep at 3am and be awake again a few hours later. I could be up until 6 or 7am and asleep when she calls at 10.30. I have absolutely no regular sleep patterns at all just now but I won’t start moaning about that again…

If I don’t post back before then I hope you all enjoy your Easter bank holiday weekend and get lots of choccy eggs

15:33 – Just a little moan about life

In the last five days since I last posted nothing much has changed.

I still feel miserable, I still want to self harm again, I’m too tired to actually do it though. Also I’m beginning to wish I had just let them put proper sutures in last week, but because I was so anxious and wanted out of the hospital asap I asked them just to use lots of skin closures. And they have closed the wounds quite well but because one of them was pretty deep it is so painful where it is obviously still healing under the actual cut. I’ve never had pain in a self harm wound 8 days after doing it when I’ve had prope stitches in, but I don’t think it’s infected or anything, I think it’s just taking a good bit longer to start healing.

Anyway… what else can I moan about…

My sleeping. It remains completely shit and I am absolutely exhausted.

I still haven’t done any of my course work for this university module, in fact I haven’t even looked at my uni emails in about two weeks now.

So yeah… I just plod on through each day, doing very little, making sure the dogs are fed, walked and happy… other than that I’ve been caring about very little else.

The good news of this week is I have now cleared the remaining £50 that was left on the balance of Charlie dog’s vet bill – so I’ve cleared all the excess and the insurance company paid all the rest of the rather large bill.

Hmm what else? Oh my parents have returned from their holiday now so knowing they are just a phone call away again helps a little bit.

Like I say I’m just too tired to feel any enthusiasm for anything. It’s been weeks of this nonsense now and it’s really starting to get to me. I feel on the edge of tears all the time because I just feel so drained.

Yesterday I met up with best friend and my two little ‘nephews’ which was nice as it had been weeks since I last saw them. We went about an hour away from home (even with a fair few Diazepam the anxiety was still pretty bad on the way there) but by the time we got to our destination and I saw it was nice and quiet I managed to stay relatively calm. The kids are of course a great distraction – every time my head would start going into crazy mode they would start asking for something and I’d be pulled back into the moment. First of all we let the kids burn off some energy in the soft play area for about an hour. They are only 2 and 4 so they loved playing in the ball pool and going up and down all the slides and stuff. After that we went for some lunch and then before heading home the kids wanted to play in the outdoor swing park for a while. It was so cold and the snow was on and off all day but I think it probably did me good to get out of the house for a 3 or 4 hours.

Well it’s almost 3.30pm and I need to go and collect my prescription. Not really got any plans for the next few days – just an appointment with my support worker tomorrow afternoon and that’s about it. Think I might go to the parents on Sunday seeing as it’s Easter and enjoy a nice home cooked meal there. That reminds me, I need to go buy my little ‘nephews’ (best friends kids) an Easter egg each. Also I have no food in the house. I think whether I like it or not I’m going to have to face a supermarket today. Blah… I’m just totally not in the mood to be going outside at all but I need my medication so I guess I don’t really have much choice.

Mood wise things are in the ‘crap’ category. Voices are ‘very vocal’. Thoughts are no longer racing, they are slow… too slow… so slow I can’t connect anything together right…

Sorry for all the moaning… hopefully next time I post will be a happier/more positive rambling… who knows…

00:31 – A little dose of the head crazies going on

Today I’ve had that same sense of ‘blah’ about me that I had yesterday. I have spent the day in my pyjamas and only changed into clothes to walk the dogs and to go and pick up my weekly prescription. I looked a right mess when I went into the chemist, hair not brushed and all hanging in a greasy mess. No make up. Wearing the same clothes I wore yesterday. Don’t even think I had brushed my teeth at that point. But I really didn’t care.

I finally dragged myself in for a shower this evening and ended up getting my dressings soaked so had to change them. One of the wounds started bleeding again but it stopped after a while and still seems to have stopped so I think it’ll be OK.

What is really annoying me is that I have a massive sense of regret about self harming yesterday and my leg is actually quite sore as well; and yet for some reason I keep thinking about doing it again. I actually threw out the rest of the blades in the box yesterday after I cut so there were none in the house but yeah, the urge to go and buy more tomorrow is there. I don’t think I will though, the feelings of regret outweigh the desires to do it again.

I had hoped that I would maybe get to meet up with my social worker either tomorrow or Friday but I still haven’t heard back from her so I have a feeling that isn’t going to happen which is a little bit annoying because I have a query about my benefits and I find it really difficult to phone and talk to these people so had hoped she could have called them for me. Maybe I’ll hear from her tomorrow and get to see her on Friday… be optimistic!

The only thing I have to do tomorrow is take one of my little dogs to the vets for his annual vaccination. I still haven’t heard anything from my insurance company about how much of Charlie dog’s bill they are going to pay, although they did say it takes about 3-4 weeks to process a claim. And I also wrote on the form for them to deal directly with the vets so maybe they won’t even write to me. I don’t know. I’ll ask the vets tomorrow if they have heard anything or received any payments.

I’m also getting pretty fed up with this stupid sleeping pattern that’s been going on for a good couple of weeks now. I’m not getting to sleep before 3am most nights then waking back up between 6am and 8am then I take my morning Quetiapine dose and spend the rest of the morning feeling like a total zombie because I feel so tired. Then I seem to wake up a bit as the day goes on and by this time of night – midnight – I should be ready to go straight to sleep but instead I’m wide awake. It sucks.

I guess I’ll go find a DVD to put on and see if I can get some sleep in a couple of hours and try to distract myself away from all these urges to do bad things to myself… it’s hard though… when you feel like you have a little demon sitting on your shoulder whispering in your ear “just one more time, just a little deeper, you know you deserve it”. It’s irritating, annoying and soothing all at once. I know that probably sounds a bit nonsensical but that’s how it feels.

Off topic, I have been having a somewhat mixed day with one of my voices. He has been talking quite a lot today about rainbows and rain puddles. It has made for some interesting (and occasionally quite funny) little rambles inside my head as he has been telling me absolutely everything he likes and dislikes – in very specific details – about the existence of both rainbows and puddles. Strange but mostly amusing. But then, the exact same voice would change his tone and start on at me again about how I’ve failed to start serving God properly, I have let my mission to find a faith slide away and he has made it quite clear he isn’t very happy about that and it is something that I must try harder with. So yeah, occasionally annoying but I suppose it’s helped a bit to distract from those little demon thoughts that just want me to hurt myself.

Definitely got a dose of the head crazies going on…

Goodnight folks x

 

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).

20:52 – Meeting with support worker and social worker

Well today I went along as planned to an appointment with my social worker and support worker. I was very anxious beforehand, I don’t know why, but taking a small amount of Diazepam helped a little. It was good for them to meet each other and we chatted about a few things like what they should do if they have concerns and what I should do in situations where my crisis plan would be useful and the possible triggers that doing this work with my rape crisis support worker could have and if they did trigger me then making sure it didn’t destabilise me too much mentally. There was nothing too heavy talked about and it was all over and done with in about 45 minutes so it was easier to sit through than I expected it to be. We pretty much ended it with a verbal agreement that I’d see my social worker every couple of weeks until the psychologist returns and I can start more ‘structured work’ and I’ll carry on seeing my support worker every 1-2 weeks and I gave permission for them to share information if needed so we can all work together.

There was only one thing which was said at the meeting which *searches for the right word* … surprised? me. My social worker said at one point that I have attachment issues. I’ve never heard her say that before, well not in those words anyway. And it didn’t as such annoy me but it played on my mind for a while afterwards because, in my head, someone who has attachment issues is needy and possessive and jealous and has turbulent relationships. And whilst I can admit that the first year I worked with my social worker I probably did feel quite dependent on her in a lot of ways… since not seeing her so much over the past couple of years and since having a string of people starting to work with me and then leaving I now have the opposite problem. I find it harder and harder to trust people so in general I spend a lot more time on my own and have done for some time now. I make excuses to leave friends and family’s houses early. I don’t like people being in my house for too long, it starts making me feel agitated. So yeah, I’m left a little bit confused by what she meant by me having attachment issues, I’m not overly bothered about it just confused as right now I feel like the most unattached person on the planet!

I’ve arranged another appointment with my support worker for next Thursday and hope to touch base again with my social worker the following week. That’s all I need, just someone I know and trust and who knows my mental health to touch base with until the psychologist starts back. I’m really trying just to ask for the bare minimum so that my social worker can see that I know seeing her is just a temporary thing until the psychologist is able to work with me again. That way it means she doesn’t have to make any commitments to me that she might not be able to stick to, I know I have someone to touch base with and I have the support of my support worker for the ‘other’ stuff that I’m trying to work through.

So yeah, we’ll see how things go.

I’ve been taking my medication properly again for a few days now and am happy to say that the constant stream of chitter chatter has actually been very quiet today. I am still hearing the occasional sentence which is usually telling me to do something but it doesn’t have the same weight to it so it’s easier to ignore. I am still having huge problems with my concentration and am still no further forward with my studying, just adding more and more days onto me getting further and further behind. My tutor emailed me on Tuesday asking if I was OK and I still haven’t replied to her, because I don’t know what to say. I think I’m somehow still hanging onto the hope that I will suddenly get my concentration back and get myself back up to speed and everything will turn out OK. But with the more days that pass the more unrealistic that is starting to become. I will try and compose a reply to her tomorrow.

Anyways it’s getting close to 9pm now and I’ve some washing to hang up then there’s a program on TV I wanted to watch and then it will be medication and dog walking time. I’m going to try and get some studying done tomorrow but it’s just so hard to focus at the moment. I’m not even writing proper notes when I try and study, I just write word for word what is on the screen onto my notepad. None of it goes in, half the stuff I’ve written down I have no clue what it actually means. So yeah, not so good. And this is an important week as it is the start of our online sociology debates and we have to contribute to the debate forum boards over the next four weeks as 20% of the module mark comes from these posts and then the other 80% comes from an essay due in May. How can I debate what I don’t understand? Argh.

Right I guess it’s time to say goodnight, fingers crossed for a good day tomorrow.