Pages

Sunday 30 May 2010

My favourite rule breaker

She always took her lanyard & name badge off when she took me out, escorting me to the shops, for a walk or even to the hospital canteen.

She always had perfect (fake) nails. I'd sit at her feet if there was no room on the sofa and she'd tickle/scratch the back of my neck.

She used to wear Burberry Weekend perfume, which is a fragrance that comforts me to this day. The memories of her breaking more rules, giving me a hug almost every shift i saw her.

Today i was reminded why i don't got to Hospital Town. Not only are there too many bad memories, people i don't want to be reminded of or ever meet again, but there are a few (literally 3 or 4) people who bring tears to my eyes every time i see them.

I saw her before she spoke to me.

"Hi Su."

She was pushing a wheelchair with an elderly lady clearly from the hospital, as she was still wearing hey lanyard & name badge whilst taking this lady around the supermarket to get her shampoo (which is typically the only reason we were actually there!).

I felt a wave of anxiety take over me and a surge of tears just fighting their way past my eyelashes. Mum looked at me and told me that it was in the past and to "leave it there." I told her that i wasn't going to even bother trying to explain what was going on in my head (and why i was about to burst into tears) but that the reason seeing CaS was upsetting because "she was one of the few staff who gave a shit".

I held it back so much, had i been on my own i would have walked out of the shop there and then and sobbed my heart out in my car. Today i couldn't though. I can't let mum see how much things are really affecting me, like when we bumped into Boss from the farm during lunch.

I'm really starting to struggle in hiding and supressing a heck of a lot of crap. I want to fall apart so badly, but i can't upset mum and i have to make sure Nan gets her 2 week holiday in July, and even after that i can't fall apart because i would still hurt them too much. Mum said it was in the past and to leave it there much i don't think she realises how close things always feel to S ward becoming a reality again. It's not as close as last November but its always a possibility.

Once you've been on the books, you always are.

Wednesday 26 May 2010

Time waiting vs Time seen.

3 appointments so far this week.

Time spent in waiting rooms (and library/randomly wandering around) = 100 minutes

Time spent talking to people in appointments = 95


Thats more time spent waiting that get issues solved! Ok perhaps i should justify that slightly.

Appointment 1, on Monday, was an emergency appointment to sovle a medical issue which i couldn't put up with any longer. Having been told to arrive at 6pm, i guess she was running later than she was when i got the appointment at 4pm, hence why i had to wait 50 minutes to see her. Sadly she had no magical cure and its still driving me mad tonight!!!

Appointment 2 was Terry Pratchett who finally turned up after 30 minutes. I know problems happen like getting blocked in by someone in a hospital car park, but when you know you need to be able to get somewhere later on in the day (i.e to my appointment) then don't park in a place where someone will block you in - or leave a note in your windscreen saying you need to leave at a certain time!)

Appointment 3 was today with M. Not her fault that the girl before my turned up half hour late (having mistaken they fact that her appointment would be between 2.30pm and 3pm - not as she took it to mean - starting anywhere between those 2 times!)
So being the kind, considerate, try-to-please-any/everybody sort of person i am i offered to wait. M said she'd girl the girl 5 mins and i thought it unlikely but came inside to wait anyway. When M reappeared (after the girl's mother had then appeared too) she asked me to wait 20 minutes, so i suggested i'd go to the library. Honestly i am more than happy to walk...... the fact that i've done 3 hours at the gym and haven't eaten a single thing yet today.......more reasons to move and be active is fine with me!

So there you are and i still have one more appointment to go on Friday with K. I'm first on her list at 8am so fingers crossed, unless she gets called to an emergency first thing (knowing my luck this week........) all should be ok & i should be to the gym on time.

I think i must either be A) very overweight or B) making it up because no-one actually seem to be bothered about my lack of food and enthusiam for exercise. So therefore, if it isn't bothering anyone then its absolutely FINE!!!!

Theories to fit

Only 2 more sessions (although thats what he said last week) of seeing TP before the "extended assessment" period is over, and i can legitimately say i've given it a chance.

It became clear to me today that he doesn't know me at all despite trying to suggest he knows whats going on in my head & how i may have felt as a child etc.

This week as we were talking he came out with;

"You must feel very trapped having people around you and watching you instantly"

What the fuck??!!

"I'm on my own most of the day. I don't see mum btween 8.30am & 6pm or D between 8am & 5.30pm!" I replied

"Oh. Well, it must get very lonely being on your own most of the time."



Talk about changing your mind. He just seems to come out with more crap each week, when he's not falling asleep! Not so much of that this week, but then he was 30 minutes late, so we did only have half a session again. But i'm pretty sure he didn't hear anything i said about horses and the way they made me feel when i worked with them.

But i truely don't care anymore. i'm past being upset by the sessions - or maybe my mood has just slipped lower that the upset stage again. I just want it to be over now, i'm fed up with driving for 30 minutes for an appoinment that lasts only that length of time to then drive home for another 30 minutes, especially as its to do something i really don't want to do in the first place.

time to go to the gym before seeing M.

Sunday 23 May 2010

Closed Doors

If a door is closed, do you:

a) walk past a wait for the person to come of of the room
b) knock and wait for a reply
c) knock and barge straight in
or d) barge straight in.


I'm sure you can guess which option my mother chose this morning at 7.45am. what has particularly caused the stress though is i was semi-clad (nickers only) standing on the scales. The fact that i was on the scales is not such a problem, but how much of my stomach she saw........

Well i'm praying not very much as I had a lot of my back to her. Fortunately i had a small-as-possible (for the size of the wound) waterproof plaster (so transparent edging) over the latest sutures, but she doesn't know about any of the other recent scars from sutures and she still hasn't seen the burn scar from october last year.

I haven't crossed her path again yet, and am currently downstairs trying not to eat a whole packet of cereal bars (145 calories a bar) and anything else. I think my weight is up from yesterday (don't know, didn't trust mum not to barge in again after earlier) after a horrible day of eating, even though it was just under the RDA for calories, it still feels like a binge. And to make matters worse we're going out to Sunday lunch today because of a meeting D's going to which is about 40 mins from home. I know i don't have to go, but it just causes more upset if i say no, plus now i'm not sure i can trust myself to stay at home and not overeat. For some reason its fine during the week, i have much more control, but at the weekends things just go to pot, completely.

Saturday 22 May 2010

"Do you know what 'Slothenly' means?"

Mum, right now i'd rather be knocked unconconsious, "cut up like a god damn virginia ham" (to quote Lisa from Girl Interrupted), doing something distructive to distract from the hell that is my thoughts and my mind. etc etc. But because i'm so stressed about hurting you (and nan), i'm not. I'm bottling it all inside instead - which means it will probably come back and bite me in the arse later somewhere along the lines.

I don't give a shit right now about anything - certainly not the fact that i haven't had a shower today - no matter how "digusting" that is to you!

Sorry.

No chance to say good bye?

I found out a little while ago over lunch time conversations in the garden that F has retired.

Another trusted person gone. Its been a while since i had anyone leave - last person was Dr PJ, who left me heartbroken. F's departure isn't quite as devastating but it means the surgery are no longer doing blood tests. Which will mean having to go to the local hospital.

I trust F with my scars, she's seen them increase over the years, but she's also seen the ones on my arms stop increasing and fade to one colour. She's struggled to find my veins when they've disappeared due to a BMI of 13.

It takes years to build up that trust and let someone touch my arms. Other than then, no-one really does touch my arms.

I'm sat in the garden with Mum and D but the tears are building, time to make my excuses and run away inside.....

Friday 21 May 2010

Knee Deep

As i sat in a cafe today, after 2 hours of gym classes, i realised as i cried & drank my diet coke, just how deep i am back into the world of anorexia.

I keep telling myself i can't possibly be the A word, due to my size & weight (spare me the lectures i know the criteria for EDs) and that i am simply on a diet - like every other woman at the gym.

But sitting, crying because i can't order more than a diet coke, despite having giving output at the gym worth around 1000 calories (2 high impact classes on a friday morning, which i was complimented on during the 1st and 2nd for my "form" and effort) kind of says it all really. I couldn't even bring myself to ask what their special salad was - having discounted the goats cheese salad (too high calorie - even though i adore goats cheese) and the ham salad (haven't eaten meat since the ED started in 2006).

K says that it is better than ways i could be dealing with stuff right now. She almost praised me on the phone the other day for holding it together. But is dropping a fair amount of weight in a couple of weeks holding it together? From a BMI of 24.2, to 22.2?

Maybe it is better than crashing my car, ending up with a Hb of 4.3 or an OD resulting in seizures. It doesn't seem to get across whats going on in my head. But i'm too scared of hurting the little family i have, which is why i have to stay in control enough that i know what i'm doing, which means coping in my own way. I'm still a long way off underweight, so i just cope my body can continue, after all it has enough body fat to keep it going!

Wednesday 19 May 2010

Post No. 200 - Moodscape

The BBC has quite a reasonable website called Headroom, which i had a look around after noticing that programme on the TV guide.

so for post number 200, i give you my Moodscape - an animation which expresses my current feelings.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/headroom/moodscape/view/7frbcx

have a go - make your own -me? i'm off to the Mood Spa now.

BBC4 - Sectioned 9pm

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00sg94v

caught my eye in the TV guide for tonight.

Think i'll record it rather than watch with other around - plus it clashes with more cheerful programmes....

Heartbreaking dreams

Last nights dream was both heartbreaking but kind of comforting at the same time. I think it was probably caused by my brief visit on monday, to drop off some clothes to sell at the 2nd hand uniform shop. Needless to say lots of tears before i'd even driven off the campus (i was there for less than 5 minutes) and for the rest of the day.


I turned up and parked in the school grounds at the bottom end of the campus and my best friend from school was there too. After a while the whole school seemed to gather around my car. It seemed they were doing registration in the carpark these days. After all the students departed, one of my old tutors came over to us.

"Why have 2 of my favourite students not come over to say hello?"

Her voice was as warm, comforting & mothering as it ever was. I felt like i wanted to cry just on hearing her voice.

She picked up so many pieces when she was my tutor. I can recall one occassion when i had admitted harming to someone and the school had decided to call my mother. Obviously i was distraught and terrified. Mrs H took me down to the school medical centre and stayed with me until my mum arrived. For half an hour she sat with me while i cried, stroking my hair & trying to calm my fears. Every time i heard a car, i sat bolt up right, paralysed with the fear of what was going to happen next. I don't recall anything other than a trip to the doctors/nurse (probably J) happening that time. But these are the kind of memories that are etched in my mind, and i guess in some ways in my body via the scars too. Back to the dream......

She ask my friend and i if we wanted to go back and see her classroom, revisit the buildings. My friend then seemed to disappear and it was just me and Mrs H. She took me into an older building (Not the actual building, the room in my dream doesn't actually exist in the school) where she let me move through slowly as my mind was taken back to times of fleeing lessons and returning to this room to cry and hide. She asked me if i remembered this place. How could i forget?

I wanted to simply sit and cry yet again, because this felt a safe place to be able to curl up and cry. She stayed with me there while i wandered around this old wooden room - wooden floor boards, beams. It was a room in the top of the building, an attic room with a couple of old sky lights, meaning the light inside the room itself was limited and dim. Dark and safe.

She showed me a card she had kept that she had wanted to give me years ago when i was a student. It was a mothers day card, with a difference. If was FROM a mother - her as a mother figure towards me. The card was flowery but sincere, not too mushy. To me, signed from her - a gurdian mother figure.


There were other parts to the dream but not significant and nothing that will remain with me for the rest of the day like that memory will. When i woke this morning, remembering the memories of the night, i was torn between wanting to go back to sleep & go back to that place, or wake up and move away from those memories before my heart shattered with the pain that i also felt. I couldn't face going back there.

Tuesday 18 May 2010

Signs of a bad shrink

In todays session examples were given as follows by Terry Pratchett:

  1. Doing up of flies, obviously having seen he had forgotten to do so after returning from a bathroom break between clients. Good job i avoid eye contact, sadly i still have ears!
  2. Falling asleep. Identified by closing of eye, nodding of head, turning off of heating, shifting position constantly etc etc. Sadly the lack of eye contact worked in his favour here - he probably thought i didn't notice a lot of the time, because i can't kep eye contact (or look in that general direction).

I have 2 theories about the sleeping thing. 1 is that he is genuinely crap. The other is that he was tricking me & because he thought that i thought he was asleep, he knew i would talk (because i thought he wasn't listening) more openly.

However we (unsuprisingly) didn't talk about anything new, covered the same old crap & i listened to the same old psychobable - even if there was less of it due to the napping, it was still the same old stuff.

And i left feeling just a shit, and cried all the way home yet again. Next question is how honest should i be when K calls me tomorrow morning?

Sunday 16 May 2010

Yay!! they've screwed up again!!

Once again MH services are not at all popular here!

While Mum and D were away they got a letter from the local CMHT, presumably to do with the carers appointment they were told they would get, which mum opened this morning.....

"We're sorry you couldn't attend your appointment....."

"what appointment?" was the remark from all 3 of us.

According to the letter they were given one on the 23rd April! The fact that no letter even arrived or there was no phone call to check they were going etc etc - well thats probably totally irrelavent to the CMHT.




Sorry but all i can think is YAY!!! - maybe mum will join me in the very little trust i have of these people now!

Saturday 15 May 2010

What happened to you?

I bumped into a MH nurse who worked on the PICU when i was down there. Actually at the time she was a mature student nurse. I recall her being so kind & caring, warm and comforting, so i decided not to shy away and avoid her but to say hello.

We talked while she packed & paid for her shopping and continued talking as we walked to our cars. But she wasn't anything like i remember, and now works for the crisis team having qualified. There was no warmth, less compassion, more synicism, firmness and detachment. Is this what happens 6 years after qualifying, or has she just been working with all the other miserable jobs worths at my local MH unit?

She was one of the first to offer me comfort when i was upset, yet now it was as though it was all in my head - Ok, so mental health issues are in your head, but you know what i mean - as though i made it up, and was using my past as a sofa. She was saying about how i had learnt certain behaviours and now depended on them, even if this was subconsciously. Maybe i do or maybe things have changed in the last 6 years and she doesn't know me anymore.

I hope i'm not the person she knew 6 years ago and i hope she's not really turned into the cold person she came across as.

Friday 7 May 2010

Putting my skills to use

After seeing susie today she & J (who popped in to get something from the treatment room while i was there - twice!) told me that me medical skils are wasted. Susie said she could tell the difference between the doctors care & my own. She asked me whether i had thought about getting into nursing. I mentioned to her about my dreams of being a paramedic, but commented how i didn't think anyone would touch me with my mental health history. She told me i wouldn't know unless i tried.

I have various thoughts on this - firstly it brings back nightmare memories of working as a HCA on a hospital ward - admittedly i didn't have any support, despite never having done anything like that before. When i turned up the manager didn't even know i was starting, so i was thrown in the deepest end possible. Anyway i lastest 2 months before what could have been a fatal breakdown (and goodness knows how it wasn't - or rather it wasn't for me, but it was for the car!). So i don't think i'd want to work on a ward again, but maybe a healthcare assistant in a general practice while i find my feet and get my life on track.

What i was really day dreaming about was being a specialist self harm nurse, so to speak - although i think i just invented that job title! I can seem to find out any info on whether i would be allowed to use my skills as an HCA - so without going the full nursing degree.

Trouble is as soon as i start looking at things like Uni and degrees i get in a state and start crying. Because most uni courses want A levels which i don't have. Which is why nursing, or medicine as susie suggested seems so far out of the question and from a couple of years time it will be the same for paramedic qualifications too. This generally means i get totally dispondant and give up on any idea of it at all.

Who am i kidding? no-one is going to touch me with a barge pole, no matter how good my medical/nursing/emergency care skills are.

Wednesday 5 May 2010

Fall out

I'm seeing the fall out - or perhaps my brain has actually fallen out.

Confessed to the harm injuries to my first class instructor, who was a little worried but when i told her i'd completed a weeks worth of classes without ripping the stitches out and that i was kind of taking it easy she relaxed a little.

The brain was fine with aerobics but then i know the routine well after a month of it. Body Balance is slower so was easier to follow and i chose to do a strength card in the gym for half hour, with half an hour break which didn't actualy seem to help my brain. I just seemed to lose it in LBT. I lost concentration, could get the right lead leg and was starting to get a little pissed off.

i stumbled around tescos for half an hour (probably longer) trying to figure out what i could eat, and came away with a sugar free jelly, bag of mandarin & 2 boxes of porridge oats, which were on offer.

Somehow now its 5pm....... I know i didn't leave the gym until 1.40pm (i got there at 9.15am, perhaps i should just live there!) D will be home soon..... i think i've got lost this afternoon......i don't know where i went though.......

How the hell am i going to make it though college tomorrow?

Tuesday 4 May 2010

5 more reasons

It became clear that an appointment with K, after the one with Terry Pratchett, wasn't going to stop me from the battle with me against my subconscious.

Terry Pratchett..... i don't really remember. I was freezing cold, shivering by the end. Having waited 30 minutes before someone decided they would check to see if he was actually free. Stupid CMHT. Started off talking about my emotional attachment to mum. Now other that living under the same roof, physically i don't rely on her too much, emotionally neither - other than the fact i feel more comfortable & safer living here, knowing she is coming home at about 6pm each day. I actually think he came to the conclusion that mum needs more help on that issue than me. But then if i do things that worry/scare her how can she be expected not to worry! At one point he told me i was answering the question fairly openly but with respect to what happened not how i felt, and asked me if i realised i was doing that. He asked me what happened - I told him - had he said "how did you feel specifically....?" well that's obviously a different question!

We then drifted onto self harm, when/how it started etc etc. i told him the "first cut" story & things seemed to end shortly after that. I think i may have glazed over and slipped into a parallel universe, because when i looked at the clock it was 2.40pm (having finally started at 1.45pm, instead of 1.10pm) I slightly too scared to ask what happened, just in case i said something i shouldn't have or didn't mean to - if i don't mention it again maybe he won't bring it up.

Although i think there will be a different topic of conversation in 2 weeks time, as K is planning to call him & let him know exactly how these sessions are affecting me after. I did tell him i was distressed although i neglected to mention that i had to be sewn up by a GP last week after. This is the bit of information that K feels he should know.

K thinks i should give my subconscious a name like "Little Susie", "Baby Susie" or "Less mature Susie" - personally i prefer the "the demon". She said i should be......i can't remember the word she used - but basically she said something along the lines of that fact that i should be pleased that someone is finally taking me seriously. That remark made me wonder - what have her thoughts been all along? Has she long thought that the severe self harm, when i haven't really been in control, was something more than self harm? Has she been left feeling like she was totally helpless in what she could do for me because she isn't a psych or higher up the ranks? (despite being probably the most powerful at the surgery - trust me, her word is God down at that place!) She thinks my subconscious is out to get me, whichever way i look at it. Either i battle it out and keep going for as long as i can before i end up losing total control and not knowing what I'm doing - or i end up harming in an attempt to do something to cause damage before i get to a state where i don't recall what I'm doing.

I was giving K examples of incidents, most recently being November last year. I don't recall taking most of the tablet the packets and blood tests said i took. Before then with the burn on my stomach, K said it looked like a result of repeated applications of the chemical (re-reading my diary it was a week before i sought medical help from J & K), however from my memory, i can recall about 2 occasions and maybe a couple of vague ones - but that could be how it might have happened in my mind when trying to think about it.

I did, eventually, show her todays injury & was surprised when she agreed to let me see to it myself - after going and getting me some sterile sutures. Although this was perhaps one that i should have got help with - i had an injury like this previously which ended up with me being carted of in an ambulance. Fingers crossed I've sorted it though. Just have to be careful at the gym tomorrow, again.

As usual she spent more than the 12 minute appointment slot with me, but that's not too bad being last on her list - even if it does mean the receptionists have locked me in yet again!

I seem to be holding together which is good because the doctors (sister practice in the next village) closes in 10 minutes. Now i'm just shattered, yet despite that i can't shift that murky cloud with is hanging above my head, waiting to open up and let the tears flow. Although right now i almost feel cried out & too tired for anymore. I think my head has gone on lock down again, emotions and feelings are off limit, finger & brain connection is starting to fade too.

K said she wasn't surprised of my reactions to this. I still feel after so many years of talking, psychs, therapy, CPNs etc etc that i should be able to deal with it and get a grip, yet instead i'm losing my grip again. Maybe i should get some books out of the library on the subconscious as K suggested. Anyone any recommendations?

Sunday 2 May 2010

PTSD

can you develop PTSD from hospital admitions? or are the just all mixed in wih the crap thats going round in my head?

 
design by suckmylolly.com