There has been a long gap since my last blog. The reason is simple. I am ill again, have been readmitted to a psychiatric hospital, my career and whole family life is in jeopardy because of something someone has said about me and therefore, in simple terms, life as I knew it has gone.
To lose one's health is one thing, to lose family, job, housing and future as well is beyond crushing. Right now I have my dogs for company - that is it.
Will this ever improve? Right now I think it will only get worse and for complicated reasons I cannot ask for more support.
I hope that if anyone reads this they will spare a thought and a prayer for me - I thought my life was gradually improving. In fact it could not have gone more profoundly in the opposite direction.
Monday, 25 February 2013
Wednesday, 8 August 2012
Notice, label, leave.
Blogger dashboard has changed again and I am a little confused - a reminder that I've left this too long again. I will keep writing and hope someone is still reading and that it is of some help to them as well as cathartic for me!
It's been 'mixed bag' again. Mixed news about the economy (followers know only too well this is the most prominent and persistent trigger for my anxiety attacks) has produced mixed psychological results for me, perhaps, not surprisingly.
This continues to irritate me as well as producing some shame. It irritates me because, as usual, the media headlines the bad news and fails to balance this with the good news. For example, Mervyn King's pronouncement that the UK economy may grow even less than predicted (if at all) is not balanced out by with a reminder that unemployment has continued to steadily fall and that inflation has also dropped a little. I feel rather ashamed because I continue to interpret any such headlines as a direct threat to me and my family when this is unlikely to be true. I am not an intentionally selfish person but understand it may come across this way.
To add some balance of my own, yesterday I scored 82% on Moodscope, my highest ever score, so good days do occur when I get back on the 'perspective train' and file the irrelevant rubbish exactly where it should go - in the 'Bollocks Box'! Pardon my language if you will?
I still, for the most part, avoid the news. First because it seems unbalanced as I have already mentioned and second, to try and avoid the triggers. Is this running away? Perhaps, a little. But if some things which are largely irrelevant causes a panic attack why go there? The fears still lurk underneath that they are highly relevant and I am burying my head in the proverbial sand. But I needs must trust my therapist that these things need to be noticed for what they are, labelled and left alone. Notice, label, leave.
Easy to say very hard to do. Some bad days have highlighted this again but tomorrow, fellow travellers, is another day.
A final point which may help those of a more spiritual disposition. On the bad days I am returning more and more to the 14th Century Divine, Mother Julian of Norwich, whose most often quoted saying is simply this: 'all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well'. Amen to that on many levels but we all know how difficult it is to trust others, even those who are divinely inspired, when we are anxious and afraid.
Back to notice, label and leave it in the bollocks box. And try again tomorrow. Stay strong fellow travellers.
It's been 'mixed bag' again. Mixed news about the economy (followers know only too well this is the most prominent and persistent trigger for my anxiety attacks) has produced mixed psychological results for me, perhaps, not surprisingly.
This continues to irritate me as well as producing some shame. It irritates me because, as usual, the media headlines the bad news and fails to balance this with the good news. For example, Mervyn King's pronouncement that the UK economy may grow even less than predicted (if at all) is not balanced out by with a reminder that unemployment has continued to steadily fall and that inflation has also dropped a little. I feel rather ashamed because I continue to interpret any such headlines as a direct threat to me and my family when this is unlikely to be true. I am not an intentionally selfish person but understand it may come across this way.
To add some balance of my own, yesterday I scored 82% on Moodscope, my highest ever score, so good days do occur when I get back on the 'perspective train' and file the irrelevant rubbish exactly where it should go - in the 'Bollocks Box'! Pardon my language if you will?
I still, for the most part, avoid the news. First because it seems unbalanced as I have already mentioned and second, to try and avoid the triggers. Is this running away? Perhaps, a little. But if some things which are largely irrelevant causes a panic attack why go there? The fears still lurk underneath that they are highly relevant and I am burying my head in the proverbial sand. But I needs must trust my therapist that these things need to be noticed for what they are, labelled and left alone. Notice, label, leave.
Easy to say very hard to do. Some bad days have highlighted this again but tomorrow, fellow travellers, is another day.
A final point which may help those of a more spiritual disposition. On the bad days I am returning more and more to the 14th Century Divine, Mother Julian of Norwich, whose most often quoted saying is simply this: 'all shall be well and all shall be well and all manner of things shall be well'. Amen to that on many levels but we all know how difficult it is to trust others, even those who are divinely inspired, when we are anxious and afraid.
Back to notice, label and leave it in the bollocks box. And try again tomorrow. Stay strong fellow travellers.
Monday, 11 June 2012
Back to basics
'Facing it, always facing it, that's the way to get through'. So said Joseph Conrad who's life was beset by immense and challenging difficulties. I have been trying to do this very thing as well as holding onto what I wrote about the sun still being behind the clouds when I last blogged a couple of days ago. Mind you, there's been no sunshine today although the ground appears to be thankfully soaking up the water!
Back to basics for me then. Sensible balanced diet (plenty of food rich in tryptophans, that amino acid so essential to enable the body to produce serotonin, the feel good chemical), plenty of exercise and plenty of regular sleep.
To anyone who is reading this who fears losing the momentum of an ongoing, but sometimes halting, recovery, may I recommend this 'back to basics' model. Put it another way - KISS. That is to say, Keep It Simple Stupid'!
Don't be afraid that a bad spell is indicative of a return to emotional free fall and a decline in health from which one cannot recovery. The 'dips' are frightening because there is always a real and honest desire not to return to where one has come from. However, as I am trying to teach myself a dip is only a dip unless we let it become more.
I've been for a run, I've eaten a balanced diet all day (apart from the chocolate and Pinot Grigio, obviously!) and I am looking forward to my duvet. Stay positive fellow travellers!
Back to basics for me then. Sensible balanced diet (plenty of food rich in tryptophans, that amino acid so essential to enable the body to produce serotonin, the feel good chemical), plenty of exercise and plenty of regular sleep.
To anyone who is reading this who fears losing the momentum of an ongoing, but sometimes halting, recovery, may I recommend this 'back to basics' model. Put it another way - KISS. That is to say, Keep It Simple Stupid'!
Don't be afraid that a bad spell is indicative of a return to emotional free fall and a decline in health from which one cannot recovery. The 'dips' are frightening because there is always a real and honest desire not to return to where one has come from. However, as I am trying to teach myself a dip is only a dip unless we let it become more.
I've been for a run, I've eaten a balanced diet all day (apart from the chocolate and Pinot Grigio, obviously!) and I am looking forward to my duvet. Stay positive fellow travellers!
Saturday, 9 June 2012
The sun is still behind the clouds
It's been a little while but not so long as last time - the gap between posts I mean. I sit here feeling rather disappointed to be honest. I have a bad week or so.. All the usual anxieties have returned and they seem to feed off each other as well as being fueled by the excessive and negative media sound bites which seem intent on scaring or exciting to encourage sales and thus generate additional advertising revenue - I know this is how it works because a journalist interviewed me for a project on challenging the stigma associated with mental health issues and I asked her!
For the time being I am going to read back over my last blog and tell myself that for the most part it's sunshine now, emotionally speaking. Even though the clouds still get in the way sometimes it definitely does not mean the sun has gone again. Like any long term recovery one has to embrace the odd bad spell with good humour and positivity and try hard to remind oneself that it's distressing not because it is symptomatic of a declining and re-emerging negative pattern but quite the reverse - it is now relatively unusual thus does it feel rather uncomfortable. My prayer is that some unhelpful recurring symptoms reflect only the inevitability of injury scar tissue not a decline back into poor health. I am going to try hard not to let that happen!
For the time being I am going to read back over my last blog and tell myself that for the most part it's sunshine now, emotionally speaking. Even though the clouds still get in the way sometimes it definitely does not mean the sun has gone again. Like any long term recovery one has to embrace the odd bad spell with good humour and positivity and try hard to remind oneself that it's distressing not because it is symptomatic of a declining and re-emerging negative pattern but quite the reverse - it is now relatively unusual thus does it feel rather uncomfortable. My prayer is that some unhelpful recurring symptoms reflect only the inevitability of injury scar tissue not a decline back into poor health. I am going to try hard not to let that happen!
Thursday, 3 May 2012
No fear of falling
This is, I think, the longest gap in my blog. Each time there is a long break I come back and promise to try harder - it's a good personal discipline and it's just possible, I imagine, that some people may be reading and finding the odd snippet helpful. For this reason I begin, once again, with an apology, an apology for being what, as I now consider myself, as a 'slack blogger'. Don't try saying that after too many drinks!
Rather amusingly it's been so long since I did blog the format here has changed and I am having trouble navigating it!
I am happy to come back to this though because what I have to add at this point is essentially all very positive. I say 'all', perhaps I should more accurately say 'almost all'.
Despite being badly treated by the next most senior people in my 'chain of command', and to be truthful, I mean appallingly treated, I am feeling good, more positive, more in control of my own health, and less likely to seize on a media soundbite and turn it into a future crisis for me and those whom I love, my two sons especially. In other words, at least in this particular respect, I am being more consistently rational and find myself, as a result, more often climbing out into brighter light than descending into emotional darkness. I do have dips along the way, I suspect I always will, but the 'line of best fit - which is, I am told the best mathematical description for a graph that varies but heads, despite the peaks and troughs, in one direction - is upward.
I have, without a shadow of a doubt, been discriminated against outrageously. But such is my new found strength I am able to say it says more about them than it does about me; far more actually. More importantly, I feel more and more confident that despite a few bad days, they are rare and, to quote the I Am Kloot song (much beloved of Gavin and Stacey fans) I have 'No fear of falling'.
My new spaniels are a constant source of fun and joy. My family life is much improved. I feel better about myself. I am physically fit again. It is two and a half years since I took any mental health medication.
My final words of this offering are simply this - if you are one of the faithful souls who do return here from time to time in the hope that maybe I will offer to it, I thank you. If you find some words here that help and encourage every word is worthwhile. If you are still struggling - keep the faith, I am beginning to feel I have emerged into the light and whilst the clouds do still, occasionally, catch me up again I am living proof that it does and will improve and the sunlight does eventually burn the cloud cover off.
Rather amusingly it's been so long since I did blog the format here has changed and I am having trouble navigating it!
I am happy to come back to this though because what I have to add at this point is essentially all very positive. I say 'all', perhaps I should more accurately say 'almost all'.
Despite being badly treated by the next most senior people in my 'chain of command', and to be truthful, I mean appallingly treated, I am feeling good, more positive, more in control of my own health, and less likely to seize on a media soundbite and turn it into a future crisis for me and those whom I love, my two sons especially. In other words, at least in this particular respect, I am being more consistently rational and find myself, as a result, more often climbing out into brighter light than descending into emotional darkness. I do have dips along the way, I suspect I always will, but the 'line of best fit - which is, I am told the best mathematical description for a graph that varies but heads, despite the peaks and troughs, in one direction - is upward.
I have, without a shadow of a doubt, been discriminated against outrageously. But such is my new found strength I am able to say it says more about them than it does about me; far more actually. More importantly, I feel more and more confident that despite a few bad days, they are rare and, to quote the I Am Kloot song (much beloved of Gavin and Stacey fans) I have 'No fear of falling'.
My new spaniels are a constant source of fun and joy. My family life is much improved. I feel better about myself. I am physically fit again. It is two and a half years since I took any mental health medication.
My final words of this offering are simply this - if you are one of the faithful souls who do return here from time to time in the hope that maybe I will offer to it, I thank you. If you find some words here that help and encourage every word is worthwhile. If you are still struggling - keep the faith, I am beginning to feel I have emerged into the light and whilst the clouds do still, occasionally, catch me up again I am living proof that it does and will improve and the sunlight does eventually burn the cloud cover off.
Tuesday, 17 January 2012
Three new friends - one has no tail!
I have been a very poor blogger. I wonder if anyone is still watching and reading. I hope so. If you are please accept my apologies for being so tardy in producing my next offering.
I blogged about my dog dying and that did upset me dreadfully. The house seemed so empty and so I lasted six days without a dog before two new spaniels arrived. Sisters called Lily and Rosy. What a joy they are and now five months old. They cheer me up and already sense, just as Meg my last dog did, when I am low and snuggle up in a way only a dog can manage.
I am still struggling with anxiety. Still manifesting obsessive behaviour. Still deeply troubled by various triggers on the media who, actually, only produce 'sound bites' which are so often accurate and misleading. I still get genuinely frightened.
But I have three new friends, really good friends, companions whom I trust and who take me as I am and yet help steer me back to the right view and perspective on things. My dogs and a new colleague. Without them I wouldn't be managing as I am. There are days when it all comes rushing back intolerably and I fear the worst for me and my two sons but the dogs sit close and my good Christian friend gently but firmly says 'hang on, you know that's untrue or highly unlikely to occur'.
For my two daft and utterly lovable canine companions many strokes and extra biscuits. For my new, and most dear friend, my undying thanks for friendship, calm guidance, reassurance and prayer.
The journey goes on, like the economy (and indeed the weather) some dips along the slow road to recovery (and spring) but it is going on. I am trying to be more positive.
I also hope to blog more often! The picture, by the way, is of my two new spaniels! Enjoy, I do!
I blogged about my dog dying and that did upset me dreadfully. The house seemed so empty and so I lasted six days without a dog before two new spaniels arrived. Sisters called Lily and Rosy. What a joy they are and now five months old. They cheer me up and already sense, just as Meg my last dog did, when I am low and snuggle up in a way only a dog can manage.
I am still struggling with anxiety. Still manifesting obsessive behaviour. Still deeply troubled by various triggers on the media who, actually, only produce 'sound bites' which are so often accurate and misleading. I still get genuinely frightened.
But I have three new friends, really good friends, companions whom I trust and who take me as I am and yet help steer me back to the right view and perspective on things. My dogs and a new colleague. Without them I wouldn't be managing as I am. There are days when it all comes rushing back intolerably and I fear the worst for me and my two sons but the dogs sit close and my good Christian friend gently but firmly says 'hang on, you know that's untrue or highly unlikely to occur'.
For my two daft and utterly lovable canine companions many strokes and extra biscuits. For my new, and most dear friend, my undying thanks for friendship, calm guidance, reassurance and prayer.
The journey goes on, like the economy (and indeed the weather) some dips along the slow road to recovery (and spring) but it is going on. I am trying to be more positive.
I also hope to blog more often! The picture, by the way, is of my two new spaniels! Enjoy, I do!
Wednesday, 7 September 2011
The last piece of toast
My anxiety levels have spiralled again - triggered by what I call 'sound bite journalism', the kind of reporting that gives you a scary statistic without telling you the whole story. It's undoubtedly a technique which sells papers but for those of us whose anxieties are triggered by references to money or statistics and who then mould those references around our own (emotional) experiences to confirm all the bad news we know to be true (especially when it isn't, which is nearly all of the time) it's frightening and depressing. Frightening because, in my case, it makes me believe all of my anxieties are true again and despressing because the anxiety has come back again.
One of my favourite techniques to ease all of this and get some perspective back, to challenge all the negative thinking and see it for what it is, rubbish, is to talk to my dog, make a fuss of her, stroke her ears and watch her sit there and take it all in and wag her tail as if to say, 'do you know what, your worries are unfounded and all will be well'.
Yesterday morning I turned around to give my dog the last piece of my toast as I have done so many times over the years; she wasn't there because she died on Monday. She was the most faithful, loyal, non-judgemental and accepting friend. I'm not really sure what to do with myself - I don't really have the heart to eat all of my breakfast toast.
One of my favourite techniques to ease all of this and get some perspective back, to challenge all the negative thinking and see it for what it is, rubbish, is to talk to my dog, make a fuss of her, stroke her ears and watch her sit there and take it all in and wag her tail as if to say, 'do you know what, your worries are unfounded and all will be well'.
Yesterday morning I turned around to give my dog the last piece of my toast as I have done so many times over the years; she wasn't there because she died on Monday. She was the most faithful, loyal, non-judgemental and accepting friend. I'm not really sure what to do with myself - I don't really have the heart to eat all of my breakfast toast.
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