this is how I write you

This is how I write you

I'm gonna write angry
carve my fucks and cunts
and cocksuckers deep
into the pulp
this is how I write you
with broad strikes
you'd hate anything else
no pretty words
no sad but sweet
I'll write you messy
write you hard
write every cut you made in me
because we loved bloody
this is how I write you
in the wreck of us

you ask what kind of soup i've got

and i tell you and then it's quiet and

then you go and then i realise

that i was supposed to ask you something back

it's funny how things can be the best they've ever been and also 

pretty awful like am I happy is this happy or do I kinda want to die

is my life progressing growing achieveing what I want or am I

slowly eroding

So I know I haven't used this in a long time. But I need to be talking about what's in my head more. Maybe this will help.

The friend who came round for hot chocolate died, by the way. Three months after that. That was actually the last time I saw her. She killed herself.

I was just re-reading the last few posts and saw that and. Yeah. Remembered.

I blame myself. Not entirely, obviously, I know she had plenty of problems, and we weren't that close. But that's kind of why I blame myself. She wanted to be closer. She reached out so many times, and I never made the time to reach out back. She was so lonely. I could have helped. And I didn't. And I try to tell myself not to blame myself, that I wasn't responsible for her, that I might not have made any difference at all. But I still feel guilty. And I miss her.

I'm having a bad-ish day today. Not because of that, though thinking about it hasn't exactly helped. It was just one of those days where you don't want to wake up, because you can't face being conscious, being alive, having to get through another day, distract your brain until you can pass out again. It's never a good sign when the day starts that way, and it's been happening more than I'd like lately.

I've been having to distract my brain constantly, if I stop watching or reading things then I start thinking and my brain spirals downwards until I start to feel panicky because, y'know, everything is terrible forever, nothing is fixable, etc. etc. I've thought a lot about suicide these past few (months? Weeks? I'm not sure - I think months, on and off?) Not intending to do anything about it in the near future kind of way exactly. Just in a 'well, it's inevitable, really' kind of way, an 'it's the only solution, in the end' kind of way. Sort of casually, not like it's a big deal, just...it's gonna happen sooner or later, right? There's no other way out of this. It would be easier.

I don't feel like I'm in danger yet, though. I don't have a plan, I'm not preparing, not researching or acquiring stuff I need, looking up fatal doses of my meds, any of that. It's still in the abstract. I've spent a lot of my life in this place, it's not crisis level yet.

It's still not great, though.

Working is good. (Well, volunteering.) It keeps my mind fully occupied and I feel useful and competent and good things like that. I got to the end of a shift a little while ago after having a little while off and realized that I'd gone 5 hours without thinking about the inevitability of my death, and it made me realize just how much I'd been focussed on it lately.

I suppose I should do something. I've been struggling to do anything at all. Even making myself cook is difficult, even though I get hungry, really hungry, want to eat and eat and eat, but I also don't want to move. I am still eating two meals a day, I have to ;cause of my meds. I'm not leaving the house unless I really have to. Pokemon Go helped for a bit, I went out a couple of times since getting back from my trip to Wales, but my pain levels were really bad for a bit, and since then my ability to do anything has disappeared.

Doing something. I know I could try to get my meds adjusted, but it feels like that won't help, like the problem is me, is my life, I need to make a change, I need to take control of my life and my self care, need to get back on track to achieving things and having a meaningful life. But I don't know how, cause I can't do anything.

I should be applying for jobs. But it scares me so much, and I still don't know that I can do that, not really. I still need time off like every month. What employer would put up with that. But I'm not convinced I'll be able to get ESA, either. I feel like I've fallen into the gap and I'm trapped.

Doing something. I've got that psychiatrist appointment coming up at some point, but they haven't sent the replacement appointment yet, and I'm scared that it won't be helpful anyway. I could try to get in touch and say that I've worsened, but I feel like I'll probably be doing better again, or think I'm doing better, by the time an appointment rolled around, and then I'd feel like a fool, like a fraud.

And if not. I'm scared of them diagnosing me with BPD. That's a whole other post though, I should probably stop rambling and get to bed. This is probably incoherent enough already. I'm not going to come to any useful conclusions tonight, and my meds are making me a little stoned so thinking clearly is getting difficult. Maybe tomorrow will be better.

Night all.

I don't know how to reconcile the man from my childhood who terrified me and treated me and my sisters and my mum like shit, who threatened me and hit me and made me feel like a worthless useless person, who drove me to the point of considering suicide when I was only a fucking kid... with the man who asks about my health and makes me cups of tea and asks if he can send me money because he's worried about me not eating well enough and gets angry at the DWP on my behalf and walks at my pace no matter how slow it is and gives me hugs and tells me to look after myself.  And it's not like the first guy has disappeared, I know he's still there, I know he comes out sometimes, if less often. I know that if I challenged him or made him feel powerless he wouldn't hesitate to threaten me with violence again.

I could deal with this shit better when I didn't think I would ever have his respect or love, not really.  But now he acts like he maybe does actually care about me and I just don't know how to deal with that.  I love him and I hate him and I feel guilty for hating him and guilty for loving him and I don't know how to have both of those emotions about the same person I just don't.

He just sent me a nice e-mail and I'm sitting here weeping.  I don't know how to handle this.

I don't even know how to ask for help handling this.  He's being nice to me.  This should be a good thing. And it is. Kind of. I don't know.

I think maybe I should unplug my landline.  Someone rang this morning again.  So I woke into a panic attack triggered by the sound of the phone ringing, and have been badly anxious all day every since.  This is not the first time this has happened.  It's always stressful when the phone rings, but it's worst when it wakes me up - it's so horrible being jerked awake full of panic and fear, my heart pounding, my chest tight, my whole body full of adrenaline.  I'm back to never being able to answer the phone again anyway, so I might as well unplug it.

Daily Mail helps write DSM V

This Week In Mentalists linked to this story about the Daily Mail concern-trolling Emily Lloyd (an actress with a histry of mental illness) because she was seen in - shock, horror - a mismatched outfit, with a 'downcast' expression.  In my comment I mused on what it might look like if the Daily Mail helped write the DSM V (as clearly they know so much about it and are able to make diagnoses based on nothing but a single out of context image!) - I thought I'd repost it here, and see if anyone has any suggestions for what the criteria for other diagnoses might be?

Major Depressive Episode

A. Five (or more) of the following symptoms have been present during the same 2-week period and represent a change from previous functioning; at least one of the symptoms is either (1) mismatched outfit or (2) looking downcast.

Note: Do not include symptoms that are clearly due to a hangover or severe drug abuse.

(1) looking downcast at least twice in three years, as indicated by either subjective report (e.g., gossip) or observation made by others (e.g.,paparazzi). Note: In children and adolescents, can be blamed on bad parenting.

(2) markedly diminished attendance all, or almost all, A List parties (as indicated by either subjective account or observation made by others)

(3) significant weight loss or weight gain (e.g., an apparent change of more than 5% of body weight since last appearance in magazine)

-

no weight loss or weight gain actually present but could be claimed due to unflattering clothes and bad lighting and three other symptoms are present

(4) diminished number of major film roles nearly every year, or recurrent appearance in tv advertisements

(5) mismatched outfit nearly every time spotted popping to the shops briefly (observable by others, not merely subjective reports in fashion columns)

(6) unshaved legs or lack of make up every time, or nearly every time, or just once but someone got a picture of it, when popping to the shops briefly

(7) acting ‘really depressed’ or ‘unstable’ as reported to the press by ‘close friends’ or family members in need of cash.

(8) diminished interest in doing interviews nearly every day (despite bribes or threats from trashy magazines and newspapers)

(9) being, y’know, a bit odd

Fat

Sign I'm on a downswing #246 - I think I'm fat.

I know people were worried about how much weight I'd lost only a little while ago, so logically speaking I can't be fat, I can't have put that much weight on that quickly.  But I look at my body and I hate it right now. It looks fat and spotty and hairy.  I look down and my tummy looks immense.  I feel huge.

Normally I have both a good self image and I'm against fat-shaming, I'm a proponent of Health At Any Size. But that doesn't stop me from feeling nothing but disgust for my body right now.

Knowing that this is probably crazies doesn't stop me from looking fat and horrible when I look at myself though.  Just have to try to remember this will pass.

Anxiety

I get lonely but it's my own fault. I run away from people. I don't understand why. I just can't cope with people so often.  Talking to people involves either faking being someone or actually genuinely being myself, and both are exhausting.  There are people I love dearly and I know I'm letting them down, I'm not there for them, I don't make the effort to see them as much as I should.  I'm fucking amazed some people are still my friends, I watch them make efforts over and over to see me and reach out to me and I don't know why because I still flake on them all the time.  I can't even cope with fucking fchat conversations half the time.  I will be lonely as fuck but someone messages me and I panic at the thought of having to try and talk to them.  I encourage friendships with people who cover my half of the conversation for me, or who are okay with silences.  I hide when people knock on my door if I'm not expecting someone, or try to peek without them seeing me so I know who they are.

A friend came round the other day - I'd arranged it in optimism, like I so often do - I really like her, I want to know her better, but I've somehow always ended up failing at spending time with her.  So I arranged it, I said come round, we'll have hot chocolate, I'll get the whipped cream and marshmallows you bring the milk, I've already got powder.  And then I forgot about it and she knocked at the door and I just panicked so badly.  I wasn't prepared.  I know damn well if I'd remembered earlier I would have cancelled on her, made up some excuse or other.  I considered pretending I wasn't home, but she opened the door so I had to come to the door, and she came in and sat down and I was just panicking so fucking hard at the prospect of having to interact with her for a socially acceptable amount of time. I was screaming inside my head JUST GET THE FUCK OUT I just wanted her gone. I felt trapped in headlights, y'know?  I sat there and tried to wait it out, when really I just wanted to get rid of her, or failing that just leave myself. Just up and walk out and not come back 'til she was gone.  I hate situations I can't leave. I managed to get through it, she was good at talking and we finally managed to hit on something I could talk about.  She didn't try to stick with the 'so what are you doing nowadays?' thing that so many people ask and I have no fucking clue how to answer.  'oh I'm a cripple now' apparently doesn't cut it if you don't have another conversational topic lined up to move to.  'I like to internet' is also insufficient.

I find myself sitting there in social situations trying to remember how to do conversations.  There are times when it's so natural I don't have to think about it, times when there seem to be so many things to talk about that the topics spill over one another and you can never say all the things you want before ending up somewhere else and the words just flow over one another, but they seem so infrequent nowadays.  Most of the time I have serious trouble trying to figure out how to talk to people and what the fuck to say and I watch other people's conversations trying to analyse them to figure out how I could do it.

I get upset at not having more help with my problems, but if I would just go to the places I've been recommended and ask maybe I would have that help but I just can't make myself do it. I have trouble explaining it to people. I just CAN'T DO IT.  I try to face the idea and I just slide off it and into something else.  I have to be forced into these things and sometimes I can cope with it and sometimes I can't.

My friend contacted me over facebook chat the other day and said her mum did disability advocacy stuff and had offered to help with my benefits stuff if I wanted and I said great thanks that's awesome maybe give me her email address and I'll get in touch (knowing full well I would never be able to manage that just no can't do it nonono), and luckily her mum is kind of insistent and she took over my friend's chat and just started telling me things and asking me stuff and I answered - again with the massive amounts of panic and wanting to end the conversation and run away - I felt really trapped - but I tried to stick with it, and it ended up being really useful, and I asked her some stuff I've needed advice on, and I was really glad it had happened.

Someone used a phrase recently, to sit with your discomfort, to just acknowledge it and feel it and try to stick with whatever you're doing, wherever you're at, through that discomfort, that anxiety or panic or whatever.  They were using it in a non-clinical sense, but it stuck with me, and I've been trying to do that, when I can, trying to stay where I am and not bolt.  I can't always do it, and it only really works in situations that I've been dropped into and then panic, I can't seem to get to the actually stepping up to do the things I'm scared of part.  At least not yet.

I'm starting to wonder whether my problems lie at least as much with anxiety in some form, socially avoidant disorder or something similar, as with the depression/bipolar, but I'm really not sure.  I could really do with some professional help figuring this out. I mean, socially avoidant... I really don't know. Most people would say that's not me at all, I think. But then I know socially confident me is usually hypomanic or drunk me.  And hell, I'm still not even sure whether to classify half of this as anxiety or not. 

I went to the doctor a few years ago when I was really stressed and I'd started having trouble with pain/discomfort/tight feeling in my chest that would last for hours at a time.  He told me I was having panic attacks.  Mind you, he also told me this was 'perfectly normal'.

Most people seem to only consider it a panic attack if it's some completely overwhelming thing that you can't function through, whereas with mine people don't tend to even know it's happening, I don't let it show.  Sometimes I'll have to escape to be on my own, and it can *feel* incredibly overwhelming and horrible, and I often feel like it must be terribly obvious, but other people really don't seem to notice.

Sometimes it's just this sharp pain in my chest, like a breadknife slipped between two ribs, and it'll gradually get worse, my chest will get tighter and tighter, and I'll feel more and more panicky.  I can have just the pain on its own without a huge degree of panic for hours at a time.  The panicky parts tend to be shorter.

Other times I'll have freakouts that I sometimes refer to as panic attacks, where I feel absolutely overwhelmed with BAD and CAN'T COPE and curl up in a ball and need to be held if someone's there.  I don't usually have the stabby chest pain with that, although I sometimes do, and I usually get the very tight chest with them.

But I don't know whether to call the social stuff anxiety or panic attacks or anything though, they're much lower level, I don't tend to get stabby chest pains or anything, I just feel panicked and trapped.  I mostly deal with it by avoiding it and then I'll be okay.  I never know if that counts as anxiety, proper clinical anxiety, or panic or whatever, when it's just, well, anxiety and panic. No physical symptoms. I just CAN'T DO IT. Brain says no.  (Sometimes there's the tight chest and palpitations and stuff, but not always. I tend to stop at the rising panic, it's just too much and I have to make it stop.)

I feel like I'm appropriating terms that don't really belong to me.  I don't know.  At the same time it's these avoidant behaviours that are causing me a lot of trouble.  It's not *just* social stuff though.  I'll get it with things filling out forms, or cleaning the kitchen, or leaving the house.  Sometimes I just can't do things I need to do.

And then I get mad at myself because I must just be lazy.  And I hate myself because everything that's wrong is my fault, it's because I'm lazy and procrastinate and don't do things.  But then I figure if this is just laziness, if this is just my fault, why don't I just stop? Why *can't* I just stop? I want to.  I want to do the things I need to do.  I want to get all those forms filled out.  But I think about it, I try to do it and I just. I can't. Brain just slides away, can't face it.

When I'm not depressed a lot of this gets easier. Which I try to remember, and hold onto as proof that I'm not just lazy.  A lot of the social anxiety stuff sticks around though, the example I gave of my friend that came to visit was slap bang right in the middle of my relatively stable period recently.  But the being able to fill out forms and clean things and so on gets a lot easier.

I really need to talk to someone about this and get some help.  It's been about 9 months I think since my psych assessment and referral for counselling.  I feel like 6 sessions of problem-focussed CBT is really not going to fix all my problems somehow, but it would be a fucking start.  Although despite desperately wanting some help I'm terrified that when it comes around I won't be able to make myself go to the damn appointments.  I have enough trouble making myself go to my regular GP appointments.