A Bit Of A Whirl

The last few days seem to have been a bit of a whirl.  

We had my children with us at the weekend and it was lovely. I got to see my eldest (pregnant) daughter for the first time this year.  I'm really impressed with her positive outlook regarding the pregnancy. She's completely drained of energy and is forever being sick, but still she keeps smiling. I'm very proud.

I spent time playing darts with my eldest son on Saturday night. We have a playroom at home, in which we have a dartboard.  He's a good player and I really enjoyed the time spent with him.  He tends not to let his emotions show but being his dad, I generally know when he's happy - and he was happy on Saturday.

I'm really struggling to sleep at the moment. I feel a bit like I'm back where I was a fortnight ago, before I started taking the prescribed sleeping medication.  A side effect of the depression medication is insomnia. I've been taking it for over a week now and have probably had 2 nights where I've slept through.  I feel like I'm slipping and look forward to discussing this with my GP this coming week.

On the plus side, I had a call from the counselling people today. They're going to see me tomorrow to asses my needs.  I feel worried about this because now that the depression medication has properly kicked in, I feel kind of numb when it comes to emotions.  I'll just be honest about how I feel and see how it goes.

My friend visited me yesterday. He drove all the way from Blackpool to spend a few hours with me at the local pub. We played pool and chatted for ages. He just wanted to make sure I was ok. I felt so humbled by this gesture and I will forever be grateful to him for that.

Speaking of grateful, I have just remembered I told myself I'd do 5 things a day that I was grateful for.

1. I am grateful for my son waking up happy this morning. We had such a lovely time together before I took him to school today.
2. I am grateful for bending and stretching. I've done a lot of that today whilst painting a wall.
3. I am grateful for people wanting my opinion. I've been to school today in my capacity as a governor to meet a prospective new governor and it was very good.

I'm done. My head is too fuzzy tonight.  

Goodbye

Positivity

I can't remember why I didn't write a post on Wednesday. But I do know why I didn't write one yesterday - I was absolutely off my tits.

The medication that my GP has prescribed made me feel so.... weird. But the weirdness came in waves. I was like a zombie then perfectly lucid. Tired, dizzy and clamping my jaw shut so much I was worried I was going to damage my teeth.  I woke up in the night in that exact state of jaw clamping and I can tell you - that took some thinking through at 4am.  Why is my jaw so tight? Relax - relax.... Then a few minutes later - it's tight again.  Most bizarre indeed. It still happens now and I'm worried it's going to become habitual, rather than as a consequence of the medication I'm on.

I have been back to see my GP again this morning.  In fact - we spoke about this very blog.  She made a note of the address and has promised to read it.  That's a bit odd for me, knowing that she's going to read these words, but I'll try and not let it change what I write, or how I write (sorry for the swear words!)

This blog is a release for me.  Once I've got an appointment to speak to someone professionally, I'm sure my need to update this will subside, just like my need to visit the counsellor did once I knew I was "better" all those years ago.

I need to try and be positive about things. Taking inspiration from Gemma's "The Attitude of Gratitude" Facebook group, I will try and find ten things a day for which I am grateful.

1. Our kitchen is a mess and I need to clean it. I am grateful that we have a lovely kitchen, in which we can prepare food to feed ourselves and those we love.
2. I am going to Wales this afternoon to collect my children for the weekend.  I am grateful to have a reliable car to get us there and back safely.
3. Today, we will see my eldest daughter for the first time since before Christmas. She is pregnant.  I am grateful for the gift of life. 
4. I am grateful that we have been able to book a weekend away at Clover Spa in April. It's a naturist hotel and one of the few places where I feel completely relaxed.
5. I am grateful for the love and support that my wife has, and continues to show me. It means everything. 
6. I am grateful for my GP. She has gone above and beyond anything I could have expected. She has taken so much time to listen to me, to get to know me and to understand me. I am very grateful indeed.
7. I am grateful for my technology skills. I have successfully built a multi room audio system using Raspberry Pi's. 
8. I am grateful to the post lady who has just delivered a letter from the counselling service asking me to ring a number to make an appointment. I will do exactly that right now - hang on a minute, please......
9. I am grateful for telephone answering machines. Without them, I wouldn't have been able to leave a message for the counselling people to ring me back.
10. I am grateful for Bluetooth. I will have an earpiece in my ear hole as I drive to and from Wales this afternoon. Hopefully, I will use it to speak to the counselling people!

That's enough gratitude for one day. With hindsight, I think I'll carry on doing five things a day. Ten seems like too many, once it's all written down.

Anyways, I am going to go and clean the kitchen and start to prepare tonight's meal.

Until next time...

Numb

Numb is exactly how I feel right now. Maybe spaced out, too. I was all for deleting this blog last night. Thought it was a load of old bollocks and no use to me.

I've finished making the structure for a bar counter at home. It's genuinely really good, but I can't get excited about it. I just need to go and buy a worktop from a local timber merchants and it's as good as done. I've not gone today because I cannot remember if my wife wanted a rounded edge to it or not.  I'm hoping to be able to get it bought, cut and fitted tomorrow. 

I'm sitting here in a t-shirt and shorts and my feet are freezing cold. Why always the feet? I know they're an extremity, but so are hands, and mine never feel cold indoors.

I think I may have aggravated my tinnitus earlier on, whilst cutting a bolt with a saw. I walked all round the house, looking for the source of the sound of water rushing out of a pipe. I put my fingers in my ears when I couldn't find it and discovered that the noise was in my head. That noise has gone now, but my right ear is having a good old ring, still.

Right, I'm going to finish my 4th brew (LOVE brews), have a shower and go and get my son from school. Then home, and make a chilli for tea.

Stay tuned for another uneventful episode coming soon.... 

Hurdles

I did it. I just took a tablet.

Today, my wife, son and I went for  a walk to the shops. I was desperate to get out for some fresh air, so off we went. On the way there and on the way back, I was snappy and irritable. I kept barking at my son and generally giving him no space to have a nice time.  I wasn't aware I'd behaved like this - it took my wife to tell me.

At first, I resisted and was adamant that I wasn't behaving irrationally.  I took time and analysed what I'd said and how I'd said it and quickly came to the conclusion that I need to take the tablets.

So I did.  Let's see how this pans out then.....

Uncle Excitements

When I visited my GP yesterday, she spent such a long time talking to me about coping with my illness. I talked to her about losing my mum when I was 13. She told me that she is a practising Christian and she is able to use her religion to diffuse anger and overcome adverse situations.  I told her I used to be an altar boy when I was younger but said that I had long since given up on my religion.  My mum was 2nd only to the pope in terms of being dead religious. She did so much for and with the church, I can't even begin to compile a list.  So - how can someone who gives so much be taken away from her husband, 6 year old daughter and 13 year old son? How is that fair? It's a fucking despicable way to treat someone who has given so much. And, whilst not exclusively, that is a major contributing factor to me renouncing my religion. 

I still have anger. I am snappy. Short tempered, short fused. Call it what you will. We spoke for a long time, and, once again with reluctance but also with assurances that it's for the best, my GP prescribed me some anti-depressants. Now this - frightens me. I've never taken recreational, mind-altering drugs and even though these are legal and prescribed, that's how I see them.  They are designed to increase the levels of serotonin in my brain and make me generally be a bit more laid back and happier. On the face of it, that is a good thing, but the thought of taking them really scares me. Honestly - I'm not even sure I'm going to.  I should, I know I should, but right now, I'm battling with myself over whether or not I can. 

Acceptance

I've got depression.
I'm suffering with depression.
I've been diagnosed with depression.
I'm depressed.
What do you say, when you choose to tell people?
Who do you tell?
If you don't tell people - why not?
Are you ashamed?
Are you embarrassed?
Are you a failure because you're not strong enough to deal with it?
Will people think less of you?
Will my wife think I'm less of a man because of this? 

And there we have a selection of what's in my head right now. 

Any road up, my GP prescribed me some tablets to help me sleep. She was very apprehensive about doing so, but based on just how little sleep I've been getting she (and I) thought it was the right thing to do.  

If ever I have a headache, or a hangover or anything that makes people reach for the paracetamol - I don't. I always try and address the underlying reason. More often than not, my headache will be down to dehydration - so i drink lots of water.   Basically - I'm generally not a "tablety" kind of person, so the prospect of potentially being prescribed medication for anything like this doesn't always sit comfortably with me.

In addition to that, she advised me that I could only take this medication for a week at most because they can be very addictive. 

The first time of taking one, within half an hour, I felt drunk. Like, when you drink a lot - quickly, and you get that buzz - it was that. It was followed shortly after by six whole hours sleep. Bliss. I only ever took half a tablet at a time, partly because I was a tad apprehensive of the effects of them, and partly because I didn't want to become addicted to them.  

I visited my ace GP again yesterday as it's been a week since I first got the sleeping tablets and I can confirm I am not an addict.  Go me.  However, I can completely understand how some people could become addicted to the relief that they give.  My GP talked to me and asked how I was and, as ever, I was honest. I feel the same. I have the same low moments and whilst the sleep situation is better now - I am anxious about whether or not it will continue now that I'm not allowed to take tablets anymore to help me.

I took myself off in to the local wilderness and spent a couple of hours taking photographs of stuff this week. I know it sounds dead wanky, but I enjoy doing stuff like that, and one of the things that my GP told me to do was to do things that I enjoy. So I did.

I think I am now at the stage where I have accepted that I have an illness. I'm mad, me. 

New Year - Old Me

Towards the end of 2016, I became increasingly aware that I wasn't getting enough sleep.  I did my best to self manage this by trying to change when, where and how long I slept for, but nothing seemed to work. Between the morning of the 4th January 2017, and the morning of the 6th January, I estimate I had no more than 4 hours sleep. It literally felt like the lack of sleep was killing me.  I admitted defeat, and made an appointment with my GP surgery.

The Doctor who saw me was quite remarkable. I hadn't seen her before but, you know when you can just tell someone really cares about what they do - well, that was her.  She listened to me pleading for help with my sleep pattern. I explained how I've worked crazy shifts for over 13 years and generally, I've been ok with my sleeping.

She went on to ask me all kinds of questions about lifestyle, drink, drugs, etc.,  the usual stuff.  She then asked me if it was ok if she asked some very personal questions. I'm a very honest and open person, so I said it was fine.  The questions she asked me, or rather, the answers I gave to the questions she asked me - shook me to my core.   I'd barely got over accepting that I'd given the answers I had, when she said to me "I think you're suffering with severe anxiety and depression".  I was floored. 

That's not me. I'm not the type of person who suffers with depression. I'm stronger than that. I'm able to manage me.  All this and more was flooding my train of thought as my doctor was talking to me.  It's hard, but sometimes, just pausing and taking a step back to look at yourself is tremendously important. Only then can you really see what's happening - and to me - it was depression.

FFWD

An AWFUL lot has happened between me being broken in 2003, and the present day in 2017.  Almost all of it good, too!

I am remarried to the most incredible woman anyone could possibly have. She is my best best friend, soulmate and confidante.  We have a 9 year old son and he is an utter joy to be around. He adores his older (half) brothers and sisters and they feel the same way about him, too. I still get to see my older children (who now live a 3 hour round trip away) in between working.

Ok, so almost all of it was good, that is true. Let me explain a bit more. I have worked for the same firm for almost 24 years. For the last 18 months, the big "R" has been looming.  Redundancy.  As is the case in a lot of areas, our jobs are going to India, for it is deemed that they can do them cheaper and more efficiently.  Cheaper - undoubtedly, more efficiently - utter bollocks.  They are marvellous at following a set process - who isn't? But once that process deviates from the "norm", they're screwed.  In the last 6 months, several attempts have been made to permanently remove our positions and set them sail for India. It IS happening soon - it's just a question of when.

For several years, I've been a School Governor, most recently being elected to serve as Vice Chair of Governors, which is something I am very proud of.  About a month ago, our Chair of Governors had to step down for personal reasons. Given that I am Vice Chair, the natural process is that I am, albeit on an interim basis, the Chair of Governors.  Now that position is not one that I seek to have. I have specifically excluded myself from being nominated over the last few years - despite pleas from my peers.  That weighs very heavy on my shoulders. Very heavy.

Closer to the current day, yet further, and I was chatting with my eldest daughter who is now 20.  She mentioned in passing that she was pregnant.  Pregnant! My little girl - pregnant.  It is no exaggeration to say that my world almost stopped spinning. Everything went in to slow motion and became blurry.  

Now that I've typed those words, I've just realised - that was the beginning.

Staring At A Blank Page

This is what I've been doing for the last thirty minutes or so.  Occasionally, I'll throw a load of words down, then delete them and start over again.

It's difficult to know where to start really.  There isn't a specific place or time when things started going wrong for me.  When I say me, I don't mean me, I mean the other me; the other me in my head.  I sound like an absolute lunatic now, let me try and clarify things for you.  I'm not clinically "mad".  I have been diagnosed as suffering from severe depression and anxiety.  There, I said it.  Maybe now I can move on.

Thirteen years ago, I split up from my first wife.  Not being with her was the single best thing that could have happened to me at that time.  The extended ramifications, less so.  She is the mother of four of my children, and all of a sudden, I wasn't living with them any more. I wasn't there for them every single day of their lives, like I had been up to that point. The getting them up, washed, dressed and fed before school. The listening to them read before bed. The hearing them cry in the night when they were unwell, and fetching them medicine to make them feel better. For all these things and so many more - I wasn't there any more.

I did continue to see them regularly, however. After we split up, I rented a place locally to them, so was able to have them to stay once a week, fitting in around work.

Why is any of this relevant, I hear you ask.  Well, because within months of leaving them (not her), I began to have what I now believe to be a breakdown of sorts.

I found myself sitting in work, and noticing tears rolling down my face for no apparent reason.  It happened day after day and got to the stage where I was genuinely freaked out.  I visited my GP, who was a close family friend and knew of my circumstances, and he immediately referred me to a counselling service.  I visited the most relaxed, caring woman you could ever wish to meet. She sat there, listening whilst I cried and sobbed my way through the first 3 or 4 hour long weekly sessions.  After a few months, the crying eased off, and eventually, I knew I was better. Bizarrely, she pinpointed the root cause of my anxiety as being the death of my beautiful mum, back in the late 1980's.  I never grieved for her death, opting instead to be strong for everyone else.  I was 13.  The whole moving out and not living with the four human beings I loved more than anything was too much, and - it broke me.