A Little Progress

My last post was a bit bleak and showed a lot of my frustrations for my situation. Thankfully things have slightly improved since then, which in relative terms is a big improvement. The regression of my health due to moving was really weighing on me and sending me down the dark path mentally. I was lost at to what to do, but had one thought that was founded in desperate times calling for desperate measures.

Towards the end of August I decided to try some things to help my health as napping twice a day and full night sleep and yet still feeling ill and exhausted was breaking me.

I decided to test my non-eating thing I did in hospital as it’s the only time in the last 7 years I really have felt like I had energy and focus.

I didn’t eat for 24 hours but drank plenty, and I felt so much better in mind and body. The difference was quite incredible. Since then I’ve skipped breakfast and not needed my midday nap. I still need my afternoon one and a full 9-10 hours at night, but there is something here that I do feel needs further investigation.

I stated in the previous post that I have been seeing the CFS specialist in Bristol. She agreed to take my case on but in letter to me and my doctor, stated that I still don’t completely fall into the bracket of what they deal with. I’m happy to be with them and we’re focusing on pacing and sleep related things for now. Comments from the specialist in a letter to myself and the doctor suggested that further investigation might be useful. However, after trying to stick with the doctors I was previously with, instead of changing because I’ve moved, they decided not to keep me on so I had to change, even though it would have helped so much to keep a doctor that knew the circumstance. I’m yet to make an appointment and pluck up the confidence in them that they might actually be supportive. I’m really going to try hard to do it this coming week.

Another thing that has really helped is that I take sleeping tablets to help recover when over exerting myself. This is more effective than my one hour nap in the afternoon. I will usually take it about 1pm and be asleep for three hours. This helps me get a quick fix when beyond exhausted and ill. Although, I have become a bit too reliant on them as after a two week break at family I over spent on energy and have on average used my extreme nap about every three days instead of once a week as intended.

The two main theories with this seem to be either some allergy situation or something relating to blood-flow i.e my stomach and brain do not get enough blood and therefore nutrients, oxygen etc. Both these theories could explain why I have stomach issues, brain fog, fatigue and why over the years things have been slowly getting worse.

They are just theories, but it’s nice to have a little focus back from the not eating in the mornings. I still get tired very quickly and it takes ages to recover from spending energy, but to have some back is refreshing. The only issue is once again I’m not balanced and now I have this new energy I straight away want to use it to ‘achieve’ and do things when actually I should be resting and pacing it as the specialist is trying to teach me. I’m a very slow learner though.

One other thing that I should mention is the curious restricted feeling/ache in my chest on the lower left side of my heart. I started to have it every so often about six months ago, but its frequency and intensity has increased over time and I feel it more when I do push my energy levels. It’s one that I need to bring up with the Dr.

New Accommodation and CFS Specialist

On the 20^th of June I moved house. My old accommodation was supported accommodation and thanks to the environment being quiet I’ve been able to balance the health very well for the past year. I was able to sleep well and this stayed of a lot of my sickness. As always it is slowly requiring more sleep to do things, but it was being balanced.

However, moving into somewhere new has been a bit of a mess. I ended up paying more than I thought I was going to in this new place and even though I can afford it the extra money was meant to go to free up debts. I should have paid more attention to the contract but for various reasons my brain wasn’t paying attention and I had gone into overly trusting Steven mode. I’ve learned not to do this too often as it causes problems but slipped back into. Trusting people is good, but not if it’s going to have a negative effect on you. And that’s the mistake I keep making in life.

This financial change caused a lot of stress and frustration as it constantly feels like I’m being financially penalised because of my health. I even stopped paying some of the bills/money for where I’m living now. Some of what I have to pay is for support but it’s not needed as all I need is an environment that I can rest and get my naps. And with that not being provided I felt it was wrong to be paying that money. However, morality rarely comes into these things so after a meeting with my care coordinator, my previous housing officer and the owner of the care business that owns the house I was pressured into paying that money. This was done without any real justification as to how it actually benefits me paying that money. Of course they said all the right things and how I can use the paid support as time to help me and they’ll use that time to help me. But deep down I knew it was just words and would just have to pay it and accept once again that this is just the way it is. And I was right. There hasn’t been a use of the time I’m supposed to have to help me, but just clean the house. I’ve come to terms with this now, but for the first month of living here it was hard to accept.

There are various processes underway of possibly finding somewhere else to stay but I forget that actually accommodation is very limited and a lot of it is actually most likely worse than I have now. Also that it’s very expensive no matter what accommodation I’m in and that I’m lucky to get housing benefits because of my sickness. It’s all relative I guess, but I think about what I could have been earning if I was healthy and what accommodation I could have had and surely I should be able to have that. I know that’s silly and have to keep accepting things and being thankful for what I do have and not angry for what I don’t have. Not easy at times.

In terms of my health, my sleep is regularly disturbed in the new accommodation and this was causing a lot of struggles for the first few weeks. Because I wasn’t getting enough sleep I was feeling nausea's and very nearly sick on a few occasions. The depression hit back and the anxiety was slowly creeping in too. If I don’t stick to the routine my body then goes to the other extreme and I can’t sleep at all. Everything gets very scary when this happens and is what led to me ending up in hospital last year for two months. My body and mind just break and I don’t ever want to be in that state again. The only thing that fixes me is rest and lots of sleep. I wasn’t getting it in this new house so stayed at my parents house while they were away the second week in July. I was able to get the naps I needed and felt relatively okay because I was able to spend a week recovering.

During all this upheaval I made sure I let my care coordinator know what was going on but there was no real way anyone could help. This adds to the depression as it all feels so hopeless at times. The fragile tightrope walk of my health is harder and harder as the months and years go on and I’m at a stage now where even the slightest disruptions for a few days can create very big problems. It’s hard trying to make people see that and accept it. I don’t expect them to understand, but see this is how it is for me. It’s hard not feeling like I’m being a fussy git, or to show people that I’m not being a hypochondriac.     

Even after staying at my parents house and recovering a bit it was back to disturbed sleeps when I was back at my new place and once again found myself getting very ill. I had to find something that could reset my sleep and make sure I was getting enough. I took a big risk and decided it was time to try some sleeping tablets. So on Thursday of last week 4^th of aug I skipped my midday nap and then at 2pm took a couple of sleeping tablets. This knocked me out for three hours. The risk came in not being able to then sleep at night and make things worse. Luckily I was able to sleep and got my usual 11-9ish sleep. I felt a lot better and was very relieved it worked. I think now I’m going to do this once a week and it will allow me to keep myself from getting very ill.

I’ve also had a meeting with a CFS/ME specialist in Bristol. This took place on the 8^th of Aug and was reasonably beneficial. It was a consultancy meeting and we discussed all that’s been going on over the last 6-7 years and more so what’s been happening recently. She said I definitely fit into some of the CFS criteria but the feeling relatively okay after sleeps and the vomiting don’t really match the pattern of CFS/ME. She said usually it feels like you’ve had no sleep. The problem is I talked too much about how I do feel fine if I do get the massive amount of sleep I need. I didn’t clarify enough that if I don’t get that, then yes I do absolutely feel like I’ve had no sleep and am totally drained of all energy and fatigued beyond belief. I’ve taken notes and will make sure I tell her this is the case when I see her again in a couple of weeks. As for the vomiting that’s the really strange one. The fact I now start vomiting after a short period of time when not getting my naps is not part of the CFS/ME bracket so she said she’d speak to her co-worker and see if he had any ideas at why this is happening. 

Time To Slow Down Even More

This is a post I put on facebook recently and covers most of what is going on with health at the moment.

Just a random 'explaining' post about things that are going on in the life of Steven (mostly for those in Scotland, but applies to all and explains my lack of contact or visits). I hate posting about what can be seen as negative things going on in my life as they can come across as complaining, but I feel strongly the following post needed to be shared. (doing it via facebook seemed the most efficient way of getting the message out).

Long story short- its the health stuff, which also has a negative impact on money stuff. The health has been getting slowly worse over the years and i've been very very fortunate to cram in a lot while I could. However I can now barely make it through the day without two naps and a good 9/10 hour sleep at night. Whatever is going on with the cfs it has got to the point where I have to be very strict with myself or I get even more ill both physically and mentally. It's an absolute 'insert own level of bad word' to accept but I do accept it.

All this said it means for those, even at a relatively close distance i'm not the friend I once was or want to be. Friendships work two ways and I can barley be a friend anymore at least not the way I was or want to be. I just don't have as much energy or concentration or the emotional control not to get upset, even when doing simple things like writing emails to people. Skype seems to be a good medium, well once I can afford the internet in my place of residence. Once I do have it i'll let people know my skype so perhaps we can keep in touch that way.

For those in Scotland I'm not able to show you how much I love and value your friendships by coming and visiting and giving you hugs the way I want. At least not for now. Things can change and i'm going to try and be strict over the next 6 months in the hope I can gain back some energy, but for now I can't come up. I have a number of things planned (have been for a long while), mostly book related, that are going to use up a lot of effort, but I can't take on anything else or add to my future schedule.

Despite the heartache this causes me I am in good spirits! I have been blessed with so much and learned not to take the simplest things for granted. People have it a lot worse than I do so I will always try to honour what I do have and not complain about what I don't have. I have been beyond fortunate to make new friends here in England that look after me and show me the same kindness like so many special souls that I have met over the years have.

I am waiting on a referral to a cfs specialist in Bristol and doing little social things and book related things when I can to keep me feeling sane and productive. I have no doubts that every experience I have is important and that even though I feel trapped a lot of the time I have gained a greater love for each human on this planet, even though ironically I barely have the energy to show that love by being there for people the way I used to.

Please know that I am happy and still believe there are exciting things ahead for the future. I just have to take it at a snails pace. I may not be successful in the eyes of a materialistic world, but I consider myself infinitely successful because I have such loving friends and family.

One Year From The Breakdown

I have been meaning to do an update on this blog for a number of weeks and it is ironic that I’m doing it on the second worst physical health day since I left hospital in July (the worst was yesterday). The world is swaying and moving in all sorts of directions while I sit very still at my desk. I don’t know what it is about the exhaustion, fatigue and not getting enough sleep that causes this level of brain/sensory malfunction and nausea- wow I feel like I'm going to puke everywhere- but all I can do is keep it under control with lots and lots of lying down. Sleep would be better than just laying down, but when I am at this level of over-exhaustion, sleep actually becomes difficult and leads to this level of illness being very hard to temper- hence the actual breakdown a year ago when I lost control of the balance.

It seems to be this time of year that tips the balance (mostly from the clock change), but it is also just a number of coincidences (like the work/move situation last year) that have led to me being active when I should be resting. I regret absolutely nothing of the past week, as these choices are mine to make and I had a lot of fun with people I care deeply for. However, now I must live with the consequences and do my best to rest up so I can function more than just being in bed almost all day. In a few days, as long as I behave, all will be relatively okay again.
   Fortunately I have just been able to nod off for a thirty minute nap and this is a huge win for getting my health back to a level I can cope with. Eventually the sleep will get back under control it just takes time for whatever goes on with my brain/stomach/body chemistry to settle down. 

That’s an update of physical health as of this period of time, but so many wonderful things have happened since leaving hospital and I have been able to balance things very well by being strict on what I do. I have been able to have trips to Scotland and been able to spend time with my family. I started a social group here in Gloucester to try and make some friends and not feel so lonely, and it actually has worked out better than I could have hoped. I have met some lovely people and feel very fortunate to know them. I have continued my writing as best I can, and on Saturday the 7^th of May (5 days from now) a novella of mine will be published.
   I feel greatly blessed by the good things in my life and have learned to accept the challenges of this fragile health balance. Ultimately, I cannot regret or get angry at my health problems any more as in so many cases it is because of my health that I have met such incredible people.  

  

Of course all of the goodness and adventures have to be offset by lots of sleep and naps, but I have been able to do this over the last 10 months thanks to the support network I have. However, as I have mentioned in previous posts the health stuff is ever so slowly getting worse. I do need longer to recover from exertions and have only been able to maintain activity without getting too ill by napping twice a day for 45 mins to an hour each time and getting 9-10 hours sleep. Without that the fatigue and sickness takes over, like they have this weekend after a week of only having one nap a day. It is so silly that such a simple thing has such painful consequences, but that is the nature of whatever is going on with my body. It is hard for one who has such an active mind and desire to accomplish so much in life to rest and do nothing, but as I say I can do this because of all the good people and things I have in my life.

There are lots of exciting adventures ahead, but they will have to be taken at an ever slowing pace, but I have learned to accept this, and am so thankful for the help I’ve received on this journey. I owe so much to so many wonderful, kind and loving people.

Mental Health Discussion and Update On The Last 10 Months

(Potential triggers, but mostly a casual discussion)

In regards to my mental health (anxiety and depression for me), it is still a struggle at times, but only on rare occasions. This is mainly due to the safety net of my support network, as I know I can rest when I need to without fear of all I’m trying to build collapsing around me. However, a lot of the ability to deal with the mental health has come from my own developing perspectives and attitudes (a lot of them were discussed in previous posts before my break down).

One of the main difficulties with mental health is that triggers can be physical and mental and they are also interconnected and feed off each other:

I can suddenly have depressed and/or anxious thoughts (the mental) and this trigger physical things like a change in brain-chemistry, tiredness, increase in heart rate, etc. This then makes the thoughts worse, which can make the physical worse, and so on.

Or,

It can start as a physical- I can be tired, or experience something in the physical world around me that triggers a mental reaction, or randomly have a spike in brain chemicals, etc and this cause the depressive and anxious thoughts (the mental). The thoughts that appear can then make me more tired, change brain chemistry, and make the mental worse, and so on.

To stop the cycle (or break it) I do my best to know what the starting trigger was, whether physical or mental. It helps me rationalise what is happening and see the reality i.e. it’s just a random spike, or it’s the fact I’m not sleeping and tiredness making me feel down etc etc etc

I can then go through my own positive thought repetitions and thought stopping phrases: for me (everyone's different) this keeps the anxiety and depression at bay. What has really helped is focusing on the reality and the truth:

With my depression, all the mental triggers, and thoughts following a physical trigger, are lies, such as, ‘I’m not good enough,’ ‘I’m living a pointless life,’ ‘I will never achieve my goals,’ ‘I’m worthless,’ ‘I’m pathetic’ etc (these are some of the more mild examples), but the truth and reality is the opposite. So any time such thoughts creep in I counter them with, ‘I am good enough,’ ‘My life is beautiful,’ ‘I will achieve my goals in time,’ ‘I’m a good person,’ ‘I have value to so many people,’ etc.
   With practice, a lot of will power, and time, it has worked for me. I have learned to see the wonderful truths about myself that my depression tries to kill, even with the health struggles triggering and amplifying the depression.

With the Anxiety it is very much the same for me. Whether a physical or mental trigger, I become afraid of something that 9.9/10 times isn’t actually going to do me any harm. However, my mind has created pathways to tell me it’s scary and dangerous, and this can easily create dramatic physical and mental responses.
   I have employed the same efforts to see the reality when I have had anxiety struggles in the past. I do my best to see the lies. I often put myself into the fray of my triggers to de-programme the irrational thoughts. I have learned to do it slowly and carefully, and repeat the process over and over and in time have broken a lot of the triggers that cause me my anxiety. I’ve even found telling myself I don’t have anxiety or fear help stop the triggers. By believing I’m not afraid of things, I actually stop being afraid of things.

That said, sometimes the impulse is too strong and requires a lot more time and help to break the triggers. I’m just commenting on how certain things have helped me. Everyone is different so we have to find our own ways of coping and beating the challenges we face. However, the more we share the different ways, and try the different ways, the better chance of finding one way that works to help us in our specific difficulties.

I think that’s most of what has gone on with the mental health side of things over the last 10 months. If you struggle with your own mental or physical health please always seek help and never stop seeking help. You are stronger than you know and an important individual that can touch the lives of others and have a good life even with these challenges. It may not be the life you hoped for, but it can still be beautiful in its own way. Never give up on hope, and realise that sometimes you have to create that hope yourself, or hold on to the hope of others. I often have to draw on the hope of others. 

And with all that said, I need to rest and hopefully sleep. Much love to you all.


Here's a link about CFS if you want to learn more about the condition.
http://www.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/chronic-fatigue-syndrome/print.html

Mental Health Hospital (continuation of last post- Medication...)

Note: This is a pretty intense post and I hope people keep an open mind and don’t think too harshly of me for some of my actions. Also it’s a long post, but there’s a lot here that people can learn from. It will hopefully help you see how easy it is for mental health to spiral out of control and why it’s so important to be understanding.

On arrival I was introduced to a few people and shown the room I’d be staying in. I don’t really remember much about that first introduction, but I was impressed by the niceness of the ward. I stayed in my room and pretty much crashed out. Again I don’t really remember much except that I didn’t do much at all. I pretty much stayed in my bed for two weeks I think.

   I was mostly in hospital because of the mental health, but my physical health was terrible as well. They weighed me in the first few days and I was eight stone. This was because I had barely eaten and was being sick a lot. I knew I had probably lost weight, but I hadn’t realised it was so bad. For those first two weeks I was able to rest and do nothing and therefore able to sleep loads. That, plus being empty of most emotions, allowed the anxieties to vanish, even though I’m not exactly sure how it worked. Over the first two weeks I managed to get my appetite back and eat a bit, but I was very very depressed. There just felt like no hope at all, but I tried to get better and get my health sorted. I do remember each day was a massive effort. This was a mixture of depression and the physical health and fatigued. I remember having to crawl to the shower and spend nearly an hour trying to wash.

   Eventually the initial exhaustion wore off and I was back to a relatively okay state. I had managed to put weight back on and by the end of the second week I was socialising on the ward with the other patients and staff. Despite appearing a bit better I still had no hope for the future and every time I thought about the future I couldn’t see any chance for improvement, or more specifically- the time and effort it was going to take to try and achieve my goals was more than I could give. Such patience and balance just goes against who I am and who I want to be. I’ve tried over the past five years to be that way and it just didn’t work. So this pattern of trying, and it not working, had rooted itself in my head so I was convinced it was never going to get better. It’s just a natural mental response to the pattern I guess. When there’s a pattern that occurs so many times you expect it to stay the same. This became a barrier and I was convinced there was no point. It led to overwhelming suicidal thoughts, yet again, and I tried to fight it but couldn’t. Plus I was feeling numb to everything else and the past barriers of family and friends, which usually kept the extreme depression at bay, was completely gone. I won’t say what I did, but it was pretty disturbing. I wish I was stronger and could share a story of complete triumph and resilience, but with my mental and physical health so battered at that point in time it was just too easy for me to break under the pressures of my depression.

Once again I felt no regret or remorse. In hindsight this should really have been a sign that something far deeper than the initial health and anxiety problems were going on. I was too messed up to see what was going on, and even though I was in a mental health hospital it was far too complex for the staff to see the big picture that was going on. Especially when they had so many other patience to deal with; and there’s also the fact they didn’t know me well enough to see how messed up and uncharacteristic the detached behaviour was. I could never fault them. The nurses are/were incredible. I couldn’t have asked for better support or care, and I owe them more than I can ever repay.

   At the end of the day, it’s my own responsibility to make my choices and keep my behaviour in check. However, it was too late to see the consequence of all the years of building up walls and defences, and after the Sertraline overdose I think I finally switched that logic/emotion balance I’ve spoken of so often to the logic extreme. I think to protect myself from various other emotional pains over the years I’d built up the walls and this was effecting my ability to feel remorse or guilt for my actions. The problem was I no longer had any emotional attachment to the world around me and it was getting worse day by day.

I was put on watch for 24 hours and then once again I tried to fix my behaviour. It lasted a few days, but once again the same pattern of despair was there. I did my best though and pushed through as I was waiting for the endoscopy. The endoscopy happened and it came back as everything fine. This was a complete shock to me. I couldn’t understand how this could be when I felt the way I felt in my throat and stomach. It was like someone had told me the colour purple was actually red. My mind caved in on itself and I stopped eating and just wanted all the confusion and pain to end. I was just beyond fed up. I lay in bed for two days in my own head, listening to music and audiobooks too. At the end of the two days my mind tried to understand how the endoscopy could have come back as normal. But being so mentally messed up by this point my mind invented a really wakkadoodle theory that I believed a hundred percent.

   The theory goes something a bit like this- That I had experienced everything I needed to over my life and because I couldn’t actually help anyone the way I wanted, or even myself, I had nothing left to give this world. My mind said that was okay though as I had done so well under such pressures at I’d experienced and it was now time for me to move on to the next stage of my existence through not eating. Writing it down now seems very strange, but at the time I completely believed it. I also believed that this experience was not real. I had become so detached that the only way my mind could understand things was to see this life like a test and like a computer game. That this environment and experience was a fictitious construct designed to teach me all that I needed to learn before death, and I had reached that point and time. The learning I had achieved had needed to be a spectrum of emotion (how I was as a child/teen) to the complete opposite of logic and no emotion (how I’ve been changing since the health struggles to the extreme I now was). When this thought took root I believed it and continued to resist food and took minimal drink.

   I also felt true to myself and who I wanted to be for the first time in a long time. I felt that the last five years of trying to be balanced and patient and having to make sure I didn’t do too much was just not me as a person. I’m the type of person who wants to be busy and active and achieve things but I couldn’t do it the way I wanted because of my limitations, and I just don’t/didn’t feel I’m being true to me and who I want to be by being this way.

    I planned to let myself fade to nothing, as I had done all that was required, and soon the pain would be over with one last test of not eating. After a few days it became a struggle to put up with everyone’s constant effort to get me to eat or drink more, but I continued to resist. I actually also felt a lot lot better in regards to my health and I didn’t feel sluggish and fatigued the way I have for the last five years. It was actually wonderful to be able to spend a whole day being pretty active and not feel completely drained or need to nap. People continued to try and encourage me to eat and after a while I realised I couldn’t resist much longer so decided to leave the hospital and find somewhere peaceful and quiet to just fade away.   

   I climbed/jumped the back fence and made my way to the train station. I got the first train that arrived and it took me to Cardiff. On this journey I decided it would be nice to find a beach. Once I was in Cardiff I saw Swansea had a beach so made my way there by train. I went to the beach and just lay down and listened to an audiobook. The hours passed in emptiness and eventually evening came. I booked myself into a bed and breakfast and lay on the bed there. As I lay there my mind thought about what I was doing. My thoughts told me I was making it too easy on myself and that after all the hardship I had experienced it was cowardly and wrong of me to run away and make it easy on myself. This thought took root and I switched my phone on and decided to make my way back to the hospital. After a train journey and taxi trip I eventually made it back to the hospital at 1am and I went straight to bed.

The next day I was still empty and felt no remorse even though I had put my family and friends through hell. I still couldn’t wrap my head around eating food so resisted this still, thinking that in time I would still fade away.  At some point over the next couple of days I had an appointment with my doctor and nurses. The doctor told me I would be discharged in a few days if I didn’t start eating and engaging in getting better. He said I wasn’t trying to get better and need to change. I was a bit confused as deep down I knew there was a lot of messed up things going on in my mind as I tried to deal with my circumstances. Discharging me seemed like the worse thing to do, but I could see his point. That same evening I tried to push myself to eat, but it felt like a failure if I did and I couldn’t do it. I lay in my bed and tried to understand why I was so messed up and doing what I was doing. The why was the most important thing, because if I could figure that out maybe I could fix it.

   It took many hours of fighting various contradictory ways of thinking and thought patterns, but eventually I thought about something I’ve mentioned in a previous post. I thought about my emotions and how I didn’t feel them anymore. That my emotions were the strongest barrier against the depression because I would project how my family would feel if I wasn’t around and that was always the strongest barrier. I realised that until I got that back I was still going to feel empty and not part of this world and want to give into the depression.  

   I clung to this thought and realised I had to get my emotions back somehow. Eventually I fell asleep. The next day I thought more about tapping back into my emotions and realised the idea of a punch bag and allowing myself to vent might be a good start. This also gave me thoughts of trying to fight and accept my circumstances again so I thought about eating. I realised the hospital wouldn’t let me attempt my venting unless I was healthier. I spoke to a couple of nurses and explained my theory and willingness to try this. They agreed it was certainly worth a try. So digging deep, and fighting against the feelings that I was failing some kind of test, I began eating again.

I took it slow and within a day began to feel sluggish and sick again. This was frustrating as it had been so nice not to feel this way for the ten days I hadn’t eaten. Granted, towards the end of those ten days I was feeling weak, but it had been nice not to feel sick and tired. I fought against the urge to not eat and just napped when I needed to and accepted the mild nausea. The desires to fight grew some more and I clung onto the idea that it was better to eat and feel sick etc than let the depression win. It was also hard though because the whole point in me controlling my emotions and being logical over the years etc was so the sickness and exhaustion that came from expressing negative emotions like sadness, guilt etc wouldn’t happen. I had to use the same thought, ‘that it better to feel the emotions and be sick etc than to be detached and giving into the depression.’

   The first real instance of letting myself express and feel my emotions was when my parents came to visit a few days later. What they said was harsh and fare, but full of love. I focused on resisting the automatic response of blocking my negative emotions and letting myself feel guilty and sad for what I had done, and rightly so. I was able to cry and express some sorrow after they left. The next day I did feel very sick and this was annoying as it reminded me why I had tried to limit and control those emotions in the first place. It’s so much easier not to feel those negative emotions, but has obviously gone too far and it has caused some very disturbing problems. With this done I did start to feel more rooted and connected to things around me for some reason, and because of that I now have some idea of how to go about unravelling the really messed up stuff that developed since the Sertraline overdose. If I can get some more of that emotional attachment sorted I can go back to perhaps figuring out the other health stuff as that is obviously still there at the end of the day.

  

(Written 28-6-15) I didn’t get to use the punch bag, it just never happened, but I have been letting myself feel more of those negative emotions and it has helped root me back to people and life, and connected/anchored me to the things that are important. It’s not been easy though, as I’ve felt more anxious since feeling these emotions, more tired, more sick and not sleeping as well as I was. This makes me want to slip back to the detachment, but I have to make I don’t. The most important thing at this stage is making sure I rest enough so I can feel better and not slip back to detachment to protect myself, because that’s a worse outcome then the sickness. But I just find it so hard to rest. It’s been about a week and a half of letting more of the emotions out and I’m not feeling physically well, but emotionally more connected. For example today (28-06-15) my brother, his wife, kids and my nana came to my parents and we had a family day. Yesterday I was very apprehensive, as I hadn’t seen them since before my trip to Swansea and I know I had hurt them very much. I made sure I didn’t suppress that guilt and remorse and once again let myself have a cry. The actual day, today, was nice and important as at several points I was sad for what I had put them through, and all that I nearly gave up. That happiness from being with members of my family was always so important to me and on the positive side, I felt that happiness while being able to see my nana, parents and brother and his family. The more time I spend with my parents and family the more I will be able to feel the reality of what I put them through and then be able to feel the emotions I need to and focus on letting them out. In time I’ll hopefully get back to a point I can let that guilt go in a healthy way, but if it keeps me rooted to this life then I’ll always hold onto it in some form or another.       

And that is all the mental and physical health stuff that has happened in the last couple of months. Right now it’s time to try and enjoy the positives of making it through, but embrace the negatives and experience them for what they are, and realise that even negative emotions have their place, which I think I’ll discuss at a later point. So as I was saying, time to focus on the future and the positives. One positive experience here has finding motivation in my writing again and this can be read in my other blog.

   The most positive thing to come from all this is that I now have a support network that understands my health issues; financial support; and a foundation to build upon. This is thanks to my family and the hospital staff, and one nurse in particular who went above and beyond the call of duty to help me out. I owe her and everyone so much. Ultimately, my life has been saved by these people and the staff at the hospital. They gave me the care I needed and the environment that helped me eventually figure out why I felt so detached, and the theory to help it.      

I’m now due to move into my new place (29-6-15) and will have by the time this is posted. I have a new support network with some lovely people and I’m looking forward to building relationships with them. I’ve spent a night in my new home a week before I moved in and it was more difficult than I thought it would be, but I managed to control the anxieties and apprehension of being back in the big bad world. It’s currently the night before I move and I’m both looking forward to moving and not looking forward to moving. But at the end of the day I’m ready as I’ll ever be. It’s going to be hard to leave though, as I’ve made some amazing connections to both patients and staff. I also feel I have a place here because now that I’m a bit better I’ve been able to spend time listening to people and supporting them in little but meaningful ways. I know that when I leave here I’m going to lose that feeling and have to find a new environment where I can find that feeling of contributing to the lives of others in a positive way, but that will come in time. 

(1-7-15) I’ve been in my new house for two days and although some of the anxieties and depression have crept in I’m doing okay. It’s been a busy couple of days and I’m very tired, but once the foundation is sorted it will be time to look for some voluntary work to build up my confidence and find an environment in which I can feel like I’m contributing. 

Medication And The Effects Of Sertraline

18ish/4/15 to 7/5/15

I haven’t written anything in 6/7 weeks due to a lot of problems, but I’ll get to that in another post. I’m having to go back and update things and explain everything fully. The first of which is the effects of the medication, Sertraline, which leads to all that’s happened since.

   The effects from days one: Very spaced out and unable to focus on day one. Day two was like everything had slowed down and I felt in complete control and mellow to everything, this was a nice feeling. The next day this wore off and I had been unable to sleep so was feeling horrible and struggling to stop being sick. Felt very nauseas, even with the anti-sickness medication. Started to get strange feelings on the left side of my face and very heavy on my forehead a lot of the time, like I could fall over from the weight- I’m not sure how much was tiredness or direct side effects.

   On day seven some of those effects listed above had gone. This might be because I slept for about four hours in total, which was an hour more than the previous night. There is a slight increase in heart rate/intensity.

   Day eight very depressed in the morning. Heart rate very intense all day. I phoned the doctor and was told to stop taking for a couple of days then one every other day. Later the tranquil feeling came back and I felt very spaced out.

   The above was written at the time. The following was written on the 13/6/15 in which I’ve tried to recall the order of things that happened.

  The next day, after stopping the Sertraline, I still had a very rapid and strong heartbeat and mixed moods. I lost the peaceful feeling by the next day, but think I still had a fast heartbeat which was getting painful. I actually can’t remember if I kept the medication going or completely stopped it. All I know is I was having the mood swings and by Sunday night I was still not sleeping. I was massively depressed and fed up with all the pain and hopelessness, while also being affected by the medication. I’m sad to say I finally broke again. I took all the Sertraline and sleeping tablets in the hope that I would die. Because of the drugs I don’t remember the next 24 hours but ended up in hospital, although was apparently conscious and talking etc.      

Side Note: Before the overdose the medication clearly had an adverse affect on me, but has not put me off trying other types. I think I got very unlucky with the side effects of the medication, and I encourage people who notice side effects they feel aren’t right to contact their doctor immediately and not to always push through, but perhaps try other medication or methods instead.   

Overdosing again was such a terrible choice, obviously, but in my defence, when in such states the future just looked/looks so hopeless and too hard, especially for a person as weak as I am. The strangest part with the overdose is that I felt no remorse afterwards. In fact I barely felt anything inside. I knew I should feel bad but there was nothing. I had lost my emotions completely, or especially ones I didn’t want to feel i.e guilt, remorse, empathy, and regret. They just weren’t there. Even the anxiety settled down and was replaced by emptiness.

   Over the next couple of days I tried to get better and sort my head out for my families sake, but I couldn’t. One of the toughest things to comprehend was breaking the promise to myself last time, that I wouldn’t try to end my life again. When such a vow is broken it shatters reality a bit, as I question how I can come back from that and I didn’t/don’t know how to come back from it. At the end of those two days I realised I was empty inside and there was something deeply deeply wrong with me. I was still having suicidal thoughts and didn’t know how to stop them anymore. I was afraid I was going to do something so spoke to the doctor. They made an appointment with the mental health crisis team and they came to see me. After a long discussion they suggested I go to the mental health hospital and have the support and help there in a secure environment. I agreed this was for the best. They took me to the hospital and I felt nothing as we were going there. I just knew that for my safety I needed some serious help.

I have been there since the 6/5/15 and will write about the experiences, continued mistakes on my part, and the rays of light amongst it all in the next post.

Recent Experience: Smiling

The acceptance of my situation is very up and down at the moment. One moment I’m all like, okay, I can do this, then the next I’m in a fit of depression wishing I didn’t exist. Every time I do try and fight against the mental and physical health problems I find one of them flaring up and I become over powered. It hasn’t helped that I’m not sleeping or eating, and constantly being sick (Since writing this I've been able to eat a bit better which I'm happy about). I’m trying to get these on track but there’s a lot of factors mixed up together and I’m trying to figure out what is causing what (that’s bad English but you get my meaning I’m sure).

   It’s very hard to know if it’s the physical health, or mental health, or medication that's doing certain things to me. My current objective is to figure this out. I do think I’m starting to get some insight into why I’m so messed up and a lot of it I confess is psychological, at least when it comes to anxieties and panic-attacks, but I’ll probably talk more about that in a following post. That said, I still have a suspicion there are some physical things not accounted for properly, but I guess mental health is a lot to do with chemicals and therefore, physiological. All of that aside, today’s post is about a peculiar experience I had a couple of days ago.

   I was feeling very fatigued and despairing, but decided to literally force a massive smile on my face for a long time. It sounds very silly, but I thought that maybe forcing a positive aura or persona might help in some way. After all, I’ve lost the balance I tried so hard to maintain over the years and it’s tipped negatively, so why not tip it back with the opposing force.

   I’ll confess I’m struggling to know what’s right, whether balance and control is best, or to try and fight with positivity. As I’m about to show, I still think balance and control is best, but I’m starting to see there is a lot more room for expression of all emotions than I’ve sometimes believed.

   So I began my smiling test and it was very challenging. Maintaining a smile for what ended up being hours was hard work. During this time I did have some dramatic changes. For one I did feel a lot happier. It grew and grew and by the time I settled to sleep for the night I was in a strange but beautifully tranquil state. I also noticed that a lot of the tension and horrible stomach feelings had vanished. I was trying not to get ahead of myself and think that suddenly I had found a way to fix myself but it certainly felt like it. I fell asleep in this state, but within an hour I was awake again, wide awake, and unable to get back to sleep without medication to help me.

   On waking up the following morning I felt really depressed and sick. I was so tired and scatter brained that the hope I had from the night before was snuffed out. I tried to get it back but was too exhausted. However, from my little experiment I now value the expression of emotion a little more and the impact it can have on the mental health side of things. As I said, I still think it needs to be balanced but I’m going to try and do a bit better at channelling all my emotions.

   With this experience I’m just starting to wonder more and more if there has been underlying stress and tension which I feel I have contained, but are in fact building up in my subconscious. I’m not sure though, as I think there are a number of contributing factors here: these include being under a lot of anxiety and stress because of doing more than I should (relatively speaking), because the move to Scotland failed and I don’t know what to do now, because of money worries and the feelings of lack of independence and purpose, and because of the ongoing health struggles.

   It’s all just tipped the balance I had and I’m struggling to see how to get it back, or even make something of myself with my life. And, yes, I have to learn to chill out, relax and not expect too much from myself, but it’s easier said than done. It's important to note here that I'm expressing how I've been feeling openly and honestly and do not mean to be negative. I would prefer to always say happy things, but this blog is about fighting for the light while living with the dark. The smiling test was my way to try and fight, and in a way it worked, as I've learned from it.  

   So, to go back for a second, I’m currently unsure how to approach the emotional side of things, and the physical, and the mental. It’s so complex that just thinking about it is probably causing more stress on my system. I do think I’m getting some understanding of my current inability to cope though. It’s partly because I feel so hopeless and lost. I would love to take up a new hobbie, or get a job would be preferable, but I'm struggling to think of one, and anything I do think of will impact my health. I’m also starting to think on a subconscious level that I’m sabotaging myself because I feel trying to cope is too hard, which is what actually makes it too hard (There are some curiously powerful links between self-belief, wants, acceptance, failures, expectations and many other things). Today has a reasonably good day, but finding the motivation to do anything is proving extremely hard. And then at times I know I should be doing nothing and resting so I can heal, and this also is extremely hard.

What’s pushing me forward the most right now is my family. I want to get better for their sake so I’m not such a burden; I have a few mantras’ I’m using which have helped today. I’ll try to keep using them each day and heal as best I can, but I know I have to want to heal and I think that’s what the smiling test has shown me. It showed me that through the positive I can feel better. I just have to do it in a less extreme way than I did a couple of days ago. And with all that said, maybe today I’m feeling better because the medication (Sertraline) is balancing things out, who knows.

   Hindsight Note: it’s been three days since this experience and it’s most certainly the medication that made me have the tranquil state. The smiling would have contributed and that positivity did help my stomach and eating, and still is, but having experienced the same feeling on and off I now know it has to be the medication.

   Speaking of the medication, I guess it has helped me with the panic-attacks. They were out of control, but with all the varying side effects of the medication I’m hoping some balance occurs soon. Sure I like the tranquil feeling when it washes over me, but it’s false and not worth the manic depressive states. They say it can take weeks for the Sertraline to get into the system properly and when it does it will hopefully give me a sense of consistent control. I've just realised I'm not even sure I know what it is the medication is actually meant to do. I always just say I hope it will help. I guess it's meant to help my mental state, which I'm assuming is balance and stopping the anxiety. If it does that then I'll be delighted! I just don't want the panic-attacks anymore.

   I’ll do a brief post about the medication next time and talk about how I feel. And just for the fun of it I'll also give a list of the effects it has seemed to have had on me so far. Then at some point I will continue other discussion points, but who knows when that will actually happen :).

Education: I short presentation I found that encourages smiling :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6-bQqqRVtM

Fun: Don’t ask why I remembered this, but this was one of my favourite things to watch back in the day, yes I was a cool thirteen year old. This is a random one I’ve picked.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n0AaK9Br5Jw