Trinity

The Trinity is one God who exists simultaneously in three persons. 

Each is coequal, copowerful, and coeternal with the other. 

Each person--Father, Son and Holy Spirit--is not the other. 

Without either there is no God. All comprise the one God

So I have come to understand that there are three parts to me now.  

There is the manic me where I have so much energy I have no idea what to do with it, so I start redecorating at 2am or cleaning my kitchen at 3am.  I go out for walks, I talk at 90 miles an hour unable to stop myself, I spend too much money, I don't look after myself properly, only eat if it's something I don't have to cook (McDonalds here I come)... I just keep moving, never stopping, sleep only happening ever few night and only for a few hours.  I socialise all the time, with different sets of people so no one can see what is happening.  I try and be out of the house for as long as possible.  I also tend to drive too fast.  I can put myself in dangerous situations like getting drunk and walking home at 3am down unlit roads.  I just don't care, life is just there for the grabbing to hell with everything else.  I wash a little bit more than when I'm depressed but not by much.  Once i've been like this for a while I start getting ratty and rude when people are  not as fast as me and are slow and annoying

There is depressed me where everything makes me anxious, where I don't like to get out of bed, where I sleep all the time.  I don't eat, I don't interact with people, I don't do much of anything.  Just lay in bed.  I don't wash, I don't change my clothes, I only munch on little things.  Anything that means I don't have to get out of bed.  I hate the phone going, I hate being on the internet, I will avoid life as much as I can and if people do notice and start calling/texting me I just get really frustrated and hid even further into my bed.  

Then there is 'normal' me.  This is the me I'm not sure about.  This is the me I don't think I have ever got to know.  I've always been either manic or depressed, never anything in between.  Now there is this third person in my life and I'm not sure what to do with her.  When I am her life is copable.  Nothing is overwhelming, I can deal with stress and pressure as if they are nothing.  I go out and be with people without upsetting them or me.  I don't want to hurt myself, in fact I don't know why i would want to hurt myself when I am this person.  This person turns up for a little while before moving into one of the other two.

So I am now trying to balance my life with these three people.  I know I have to keep taking my meds so that these three people can try and coexist in a way that does not disrupt my life as the other two have.  I'm just not sure this is what I want.  This 'normal' me is a stranger to me and I don't know if it's someone I want to let into my life.  I don't trust people normally so how the hell do I trust this one.  I know it's me, but it's not me.  All three of these people are me whilst at the same time not being me.  It's so confusing.

I haven't been taking my meds either.  I just don't see the point.  I'm not convinced I'm any better off now than I was before.  At least before I had a job (not always easy but I was getting there with it), I had a Boyfriend, I had money, I had a life... now I'm just a rollercoaster that is going extremely fast and just about staying on it's track, just one wrong move and it's all over.  I wish I could go back to the beginning of October and do it all over again.  Make different moves and most of all not confide in the person I thought was a friend who then screwed me over.

I should mention that it doesn't really bother me that they told management that I had mental health issues and what I had been doing... what bothers me is the fact that the person made it sound like I had attempted suicide many times and that I was cutting myself constantly, and they started telling other people around college.  Making it all sound ALOT worse than it actually was/is.  I can never forgive her that.  I can forgive her for trying to get me help.   

The is a Rollercoaster.

Every woman, every man

Life is in your hand

Take a look and make a stand

and pray that you will, pray that you will

Make the most of burning toast

Watch the wheels of the roller-coaster

Doctor, doctor I feel much older

Don't you know that the jokes are all on you

Rollercoaster - Let Loose

So I've been on my meds for quite a while now.  For a little while there I felt amazing.  I wasn't manic, I wasn't depressed.  I was productive and happy and glad to be alive.  I slept well (my normal 6 hours), I did course work, I went out, I talked to people, I socialised... it was amazing.

I got a letter from work during this time asking me to come in for a meeting about returning to work.  So I went along, put some ideas forward for reasonable adjustments.  They weren't really interested in what I had to say.  Two days later I got a letter to say that they were thinking about releasing me from my contract.  I went to another meeting and put my view across and the fact they should talk to my psychiatric doctor about whether I should return to work or not and not base it on the GPs letter that was 3 months ago.  The look on their faces were priceless, I will never forget the look of  'Oh crap' on their face.  I also said that I wanted their thoughts on my ideas of 'reasonable adjustments' because it really shouldn't be just me coming up with ideas, it should be a dialogue between us, but they refused to have that conversation.  I pretty much think they want rid of me, but as I point out, although the GPs letter said that [in Dec] I was incapable of work in any format but I should be able to return to my duties with a phased return but this could take months.... again work was not happy that I pointed this out.  I walked out of that meeting on a high.  Even if i don't keep the job at least I know that I made them think about things.  If I don't go back to work I will be taking them to tribunal.  I have worked out that the benefits I get due to being released from work due to mental health issues is quite a bit more than I am currently getting.

One of the real positives out of that whole fiasco is the fact I talked to the crisis team, my CPN, CAB, ACAS and a friend.  I put my hands out for people to catch me and they did.  When I talked to my CPN after all this happened she was impressed with what I had done.  Show's that asking for help is not a bad thing.  She was impressed with how well I was looking and how nice it was that I was being positive.

Then it happened.  The shoe fell.  Everything got on top of me.  I think I put too much pressure on myself to continue doing well with the course work, to keep being happy, to do the quilt, to go out socialising and to eat and drink.  I went to bed a few nights ago, and although I didn't cry, I did find my blade and I started cutting into my skin and it felt amazing.  Every time I do it I forget just how amazing if feels and how great I feel.  It is a drug to me.  The next day I discovered that I had lost out at my PIP application so that is going to tribunal as well.  So another night was spent cutting.

Now I have shut myself off from people.  I've only left the house if me mother has demanded it of me.  Like when she locked herself out of the house, when she took me to the doctors (I have conjunctivitis), took me to the garden centre so I can start on my vegetable patch.  Other than that I have not talked to anyone.  My phone is on silent so I can miss calls, I've not been on face book, I've not gone socialising... nothing except sit at home watching TV, read or sleep.

I also did another stupid thing. I got hold of a friend of mine whom I know has carried a flame for me for a great many years, since we went on a date where I fell asleep on him due to having just worked (and been awake for) a 24 hour shift.  I had been home 2 hours before going on a date to the cinema.  Anyway, I knew he has always had a thing for me.  So the other night I was talking to him.  Telling him how I regretted that I never gave us a chance back then.  I told him about the bipolar and the self harming and suicide attempts and he didn't flinch.  We kept talking and before I know it were sexting.  It wasn't doing anything for me but I kept it up (excuse the pun)  for him, leading him to believe that maybe we could start (a long distance) relationship.  The next morning I felt awful because I don't feel that way about him, I never have.  It was so wrong of me to do that to him and now I don't know what to do.  He has text me every day since until today I told him to leave me alone.  I don't know why I did it.

I'm still cutting.  I know I should phone my CPN or my friend but I can't.  I realised that with the issues at work it was easy for me to contact people because it was something I could talk about, it was a problem that needed to be sorted.  When I'm feeling down, shutting myself off, there isn't anything I can do about it.  It's not a problem I can talk about because there is nothing to be fixed.  It's just part of who I am.  How do I talk about that!!!!!

Woah!

You're days you say they're way too long, 
and your nights you can't sleep at all

And you're not sure what you're looking for, 
but you don't want to no more

And you're not sure what you're waiting for 
but you don't want to no more

But we all bleed the same way as you do
 And we all have the same things to go through

Hold on.... if you feel like letting go 
Hold on... it gets better than you know.

Hold On: Good Charlotte

So yesterday I woke up and felt okay.  As the day went on some felt wrong, felt off.  I knew what I needed to do.  I wrote letters to me Mam and me Sister, and off I went for a walk to find a railway track.  I walked around for a fecking hour looking for one.  When I finally did there were these huge fences I could get over.  I then found a gate but couldn't open the padlock (my locking picking skills suck these days!).  So I sat down on a fallen tree and I broke.  When I couldn't get to the tracks I just couldn't decide what to do, find other tracks or go home.  I was stuck, my brain wouldn't function, I was paralysed.  Couldn't do anything.  It was a strange sensation I just stopped, blacked out.  I know when the police were talking to me I finally felt how cold it was and started shaking.  So a coat was given to me and a cup of tea.   I was disturbed my a police woman.  At that point I started crying asking them to just leave me alone.  Next thing I know there were 6 policeman and woman there.  I wouldn't talk to them to begin with, I wouldn't look at them. I just told them to leave me alone.  Eventually they got me into the car (I was cooperating) and they took me home.  Of course they couldn't leave me because of what I might have done.  So they called the paramedic in since they could access stuff that the police couldn't.  They looked for my medication and I admitted that I had been cutting for two days.  So, voluntarily, I went to the hospital... I voluntarily but I got the feeling I didn't really have a choice.

At the hospital I had to see the CMHT on duty who told me I had to see the psychiatrist. which was going to be in a few hours when the night shift started.  I told them I wouldn't stay that long since it was only 7pm.  I was told that I could leave, but the police would be called and I would be taken to a psychiatric hospital. No choice in the matter.  While I was cooperating I still had some control over the situation!  So I stayed, although every part of my body was telling me to leave.

So I chatted to the psychiatrist who was pushing for me to admit myself.  I told him my suicidal feelings had past (which was sort of true) but I'm more than likely going to cut myself again.  He said he could live with that since they are technically superficial, I don't need hospital treatment and they never get infected.  So he called a friend of mine to see if they could pick me up, unbeknown to me, he was having a. carefully worded, conversation about what had happened and her thoughts on it.  She said that if they hospitalised me it would be the worse thing they could do with me, especially since I was saying I didn't want me mother to be called.  So begrudgingly and because my friend said she would be on the phone to me when I got home and visit the next day they allowed me to go home.  NB did you know hospitals have an account with taxis to help patients get home if they have no money with them!  I didn't, do now.  I didn't cut I just went straight to bed after talking for two hours about random crap with me friend on the phone.  Still didn't sleep but I felt quite calm.

Today my friend came over and I told her what had happened and there were parts of the story that made us laugh, like I didn't know where the railway tracks actually where and spent a long time looking for them, not being able to get to the tracks because of a huge fuck of fence and forgotten lock picking skills.  She said that with everything I have going on it's surprising I haven't had some sort of mini break down already.  She told me off for not giving her a call or let her know what was going on.  If I could call people when I get like this life would be so much easier.

To be honest I really hadn't thought about it as such, it just happened.  I just found myself writing letter and going out to find the railway tracks.  That was it.   I was asked a lot why I felt like this, what had happened and truth be told I have no idea.  I haven't been abused, I haven't had bad relationships, I haven't been raped... nothing like that, I'm just broken.  I just get into crappy feelings/moods.  I can never put into words how I'm feeling, it's the same when I start cutting.  I can't put into words why I do it or what triggers it.  I just know it's time to do it.  It's the right thing to do.

Looking back on the events I'm not scared exactly  but it was an eye opener to how ill I have gotten.  I have to start facing up to things if I want to have some resemblance of a stable life.  I know that for the rest of my life I will have ups and downs but if I can get the right medication and the right life style should help me to keep stable but right now it's not happening.  I really don't believe that the medication is working.  Apart from feeling like part of me is missing I don't really feel much different from before I started taking it.  My normal psychiatrist told me it might not be until I get to the 400mg mark that I'd feel anything definite but I'm still a good month away from that.  It's such a long time in my world at the moment.  It really doesn't help that I sit in the house all day every day, I do try and go out for a walk every day but it depends if I can face it, and then evenings I only go out if I can face it, but a lot of the time I just can't.  So I'm on my own for a great length of time.  Now I love my own company, I love being on my own, but there are times when I get ill that having another person about would not go a miss.  Just to talk crap with or sit and watch TV or play some games.  It's not about talking about how I feel, it's just having another person there.  I think if there had been someone in the flat with me, I'm not convinced yesterday would happen, but I don't know that for sure.  It still could have, I just don't know.

I came so close to being hospitalised/sectioned.  I was very fortunate that I wasn't but I was close.  The choice was almost taken out of my hands, my brain managed to kick in and take control to let me go home, and it does freak me out a bit.  I don't want to be hospitalised either voluntarily or via sectioning I have to be more careful in the future, either plan things properly or talk to people before I get to that point.  I never want to be sectioned/hospitalised ever!

I gave in

Sweet and divine

Razor of mine

Sweet and divine

Razorblade shine

Day after day

Cutting away

Day after day

But anyway

Wake up it's time

We need to find a better place to hide

Make up your mind

I need to know I need to know tonight

Razors: Foo Fighters

Well after thinking about it for a few weeks now I finally gave in and I had a cutting session.  It felt so good.  I really needed it.  I know I have to tell my CPN but I really don't want to, I want it to be mine, I don't want to have to share this.  I hate the fact I am meant to report everything to the CPN and Pdoc.  My moods, my thoughts, my feelings... but they never really seem to hear me.  They sit there, making notes on the computer and then I go on my way.

But to cut was a truly calming experience and I am hoping that it means I get some sleep tonight I usually do manage after a cutting session but I can't guarantee it. I do feel better for it though, but as always when I start I have a hard time to stop.  I just want to keep cutting until it all just stops.  I know I should go to some support groups but I just can't leave the flat all that often.  When I try and leave I do believe that something bad is going to happen.  I can;t tell you what but I know it's going to happen. So I stay at home where it's safe.  I don't like people coming into the flat either.  I tolerate my mother because if she know how ill I am she would never leave me along ever!  There is one other person I don't mind having in the flat but that's because he'll quite happily sit there not talking and just watch TV or work on his laptop without talking about anything.

Cutting is so therapeutic and everyone tells me I need to stop.  It's the reason I'm not at work at the moment, it's the reason I don't have sex but I don't care I like it.  I want to keep this  for myself, so that I can cope.  I don't know how to make myself feel better without it, I don't know how to cope with life without it so why do people want to take it away from me.  I don't want it gone, I want to keep it.  It's the one thing that makes me feel better.

People are telling me that it's not good to cut, that in the long run it won't do me any favours and if I hear it often enough I almost believe them.  Then the need arises, something inside me tells me that to cut will be a great idea and that it would make me feel better.  That something never lies to me.  It does make me feel better so if something is making me feel better and helping me to cope with this curse called 'my life', why should I give it up.

This curse doesn't not get any easier, the meds and seeing the CPN and Pdoc is meant to make me feel better, help me turn my curse into a gift but it never happens.  I get the help, I do the steps but it never gets any better.  I was trying to tell that to someone to day and all they did was shout at me and told me to buck up and fight.  I don't want to any more, I am too tried, too fed up and so bored of living with mental illness that giving in is a very comforting idea.

It's been 5 weeks since diagnosis and nothing has got better.

Slow Motion Car Crash

So I've crashed, but it has been a slow come down.  I could see this happening, I could feel it happen and there was fuck all I could do about it.  I would rather have the quick crash, which could happen almost over night.  At least I couldn't see it coming, that way I would just go with it.  Of course it's bad when I'm down because I can get suicidal (thoughts and actual), I can start cutting, I pull away from everyone and push people away, I don't want to get out of bed, I sleep all the time.

However, this time I am down, I have pushed people away, I have been thinking about suicide and cutting, I don't want to get out of bed but I don't sleep. I get maybe an hour or two a night.  But it makes me tired for the rest of the day.  So I don't do anything, which makes me worse, but I don't sleep.  It's a vicious cycle.  I really want to cut at the moment, and the only think that stops me is by having a drink.  But I'm not meant to drink until I settle into the medication.  I tried to talk to the CPN about it but she wasn't in the mood to listen, and certainly didn't ask any questions.  I don't really get on with her, I miss my old CPN but I was living in a different area and I think he's retired now.  He was the best thing I have ever come across when dealing with my mental health.  I wish he was here now.

I know the meds are meant to be a good thing, that over time they will balance me out but right now I do wonder why I bother to take them.  For example, if I take seven times longer to crash does that mean that the down time will be seven times longer and to come up takes seven times longer.  If that's the case I won't cope with it.  My down periods are already around 3-4 months taking 7 times longer is just horrifying.  I couldn't deal with that.  I rely on the hyper moods to help me through.  It's during these times I create support networks and friends.  Then I crash and people know what's up and keep an eye on me.

That won't happen this time, one 1 person from work has made any sort of contact with me.  I haven't talk to any of my 'friends' in over 10 days and no one has noticed.  No, that's a lie, 1 person has but he doesn't do well on his own and his girlfriend on the other side of the world for the next month.  When he's on his own he depends on me for support.  Which, as the Muppet I am, I keep giving him.  This time I told him to grow a pair, learn to be on his own and leave me the fuck alone.  Which he has.  Other than that no one has noticed I'm not around.  I know it's been Christmas and new year but no one has got in touch.  Maybe I don't have the friends I think I have.

I'm also crying at every strong emotion, happy, sad, angry, confusion, frustration etc.  I'm watching TV and I cry.  Something wonderful happens and I cry, I watch Russell Howards Good News and I cry.  It's insane and I don't like it.

I don't know.  I am so confused about everything. How I feel? How I want to act? What this new me is going to be like.  However, I'm still debating weather this is all worth it.  Perhaps I should just give it all up and go back to the way I was.  Lose my job and see if I find something else, or just give up entirely.

Decision making sucks!

Christmas and Family

I do like Christmas.   Not the commercial side of it, but the spending time with the family, seeing friends and using it as a way of relaxing and enjoying spending time together.

However, this year, I don't know if it's because I'm in the wrong head space or what but I did not enjoy it this year.  I mean spending time with the niece and nephew is wonderful but the only thing that was talked about was my sister's family, her pregnancy (yep I'm going to be an aunt again), what the niece and nephew are up to, what her husband is up to and how his job is going, where they are at with selling their house, what me Mam is up to, even what my uncle is up to.   Not once was I asked how work was, Mam has asked me not to tell my sister about my Bipolar, I'm not allowed to talk about it at all.  I can't talk about work as I've been to work in a month, but my sister doesn't know any of this.  I actually forgot to take me medication to me Mam's and had to rush home to get it, but again I was not allowed to tell anyone why I had to disappeared.  When I did take the meds, I had to do it in front of my sister and my brother in law because there is not privacy to take it anywhere else.   It wasn't talked about, it wasn't mentioned.

I know I haven't told me Mam just how ill I have been this year.  She has no idea I attempted suicide in May, or that I planned it again in August.  She has no idea that I have cut myself so much this year that I've actually got scars.

I'm meant to tell my family this as they need to know what my moods are to help me deal with it, but I can't tell them.  Me mam is just one of those people where you just don't talk about mental illness.  If I had cancer or broken a leg she would be happy to tell other people and get support.  Because it's Bipolar we don't talk about it, we don't mention it to anyone.

So it was an odd Christmas for me.  I also had to double my dose of lamotrigine to 50mgs yesterday so we'll see what that does.  I'm still not sleeping too well.  Only a couple hours a night, the rest of the time all I manage to do is doze.  But still fully aware of what is happening around me.  I'm really tired, but not feeling depressed nor an I hyper.  I'm too tired to do anything.

In better news CD and I are talking again and hoping to meet up.  He's feeling better but I don't know how I feel at the moment.  I want to see him, and I have missed him but I wonder if he is the right person for me.  He needs someone who's supportive and I need someone who's supportive.  If we keep getting ill at the same time it's never going to work.  If we get ill at different times it won't matter so much as we can support each other.  The medication is also making me horney so I don't know if I want to see him because I want the sex.

Everything is so confusing and I don't know how I feel about a lot of things.  I don't know if the medication is a good thing because I don't feel like I'm me.  Without the extreme moods I feel like most of me doesn't exist.  I don't know who I am without the swings.  At some point I have to go back to work as I'm having money issues and without a full months pay I'm screwed.

In some ways having a diagnosis of Bipolar has been like a weight lifted from my shoulders, the mood swings I've gone through and the horror I've been through is not my fault.  It's not something I could control it's all part and parcel of being bipolar.  But now I have this diagnosis and I'm not sure what I should do.  I have to change my life style I'm sure of it, but I don't know what I should do.

I have many people who said that I can talk to them about stuff but none of them are bipolar, and not sure what to say or how to help me.  Someone asked me what they could do to help me and the truth is I have no idea.  I don't understand myself, I'm not sure I know who I am any more.  I know I don't really want to cut and I don't want to commit suicide so these are good things but other than that I don't know anything.  Having spent years trying to learn who I am I have to start again.  At 35 years of age and feeling so alone I'm not sure I can.

This is week 3 since diagnosis.

Fail!

Well, shit! I've had to go back on meds. Work have told me either I sort out my mood swings or I won't have a job any more. So yesterday I went to the doctors and explained to them what's been happening including the self harming and planning to take my own life. They have me on citilopram  (20mgs) with looking to double that in two weeks. I am also on the waiting list for a CPN (community psychiatric nurse) and further therapy. So that'll be fun. It's not what I want but I need to to keep my job so I can get my qualification so I can get a new job.

And on top of all this I need to have a converaation with CD about what I've been doind and what is happening. I doubt he'll stick around. I'll be single again before two much longer.

The doctor says I need to create a support system for myself which is a lot easier to say than do. I move too much and I don't let people in close enough to see what's going on and to say help is near impossible. But I know that without a support system I don't get better so what do I do? Any support groups near me only meet during the day and I can't afford time of work. I'm in this situation that a number of people I know are in. We manage (just) to keep down a full time job but when we need a bit of support there is nothing because we are working full time and there are no groups for out of work hours so we keep going. We hit crisis and then we have to take time of work, we loose money, and then we get into debt and things start spiralling out of control so I ask again. What am i meant to do?

I hate being ill enough to fuck up work but not ill enough to get any real support. I don't know what the answer is or what I can do about it but it plays on my mind and makes me worse as a result. I should be reducing my stress levels not increasing them.

The mental health system  (like a lot of systems in this country) is fucked.

Well that esculated quickly.

I know I was struggling to keep the depression under control but I was doing it. I felt like crap but I went out, I was social, I was nice to people.

I had two weeks holiday from work and I was broke ao I couldn't go anywhere or do anything. All my normal groups got cancelles due to school holidays or illness. This meant I was sitting home alone all day every day. The guy from christmas was also having a hard time and was trying to talk to me about it. I couldn't cope. I took a painkiller/alcohol concotion (once) and I started cutting myself (almoat daily for one week, but kept on going for a few more weeks). It felt fantastic and I still don't regret a thing. It made me feel better.

At my Friday gaming group there is a new guy who has started and he makes me laugh. He makes me feel good about myself. He flirts with me and I like it. It doesn't scare me.... except I don't know if he's flirting because he's that sort of guy or because he likes me. He asked for my number having only known me for two weeks and, shocked myself I gave it to him! We are now facebook fruends and have spent the weekend chatting.  I'm trying to rearrange things so i have the petrol to see him on Friday.... and every friday. I don't want ti be that sort of person and I don't know if my feeling are real or a biproduct of the depressive state I am experiencing. After three weeks (two of them knowing this guy) I have stopped cutting. After our first meeting I reduced the cutting, even the number of cuts when i did.

I wish I wasn't so screwed up so I could enjoy this more. I should stop worring and enjoy what I can for as long as I can.

Ruby

"No antibiotic can save us now

We are the virus that we talk about

It's like a bullet in the head

It's an S.O.S"

S.O.S - Take That

So it's been a while and I have to say that the place I am now is now where I had hoped I would be.  A few months back I moved into a small flat on my own. I love being on my own more than anything else in the world I love it.  I love the freedom, I love the isolation of it.  However, the problem I am coming across is that my health is not good at the moment.

Apart from the joys of depression which I must battle with each and every day of my life I am now suffering from something that is causing Chronic Fatigue.  It started before I moved into my own place, must be about two years ago.  I started to need more than my four hours sleep.  It crept up on me slowly but surely until about I year ago I noticed that unless I have eight hours sleep a night I was really tired.  I remember commenting on it at work and how I couldn't understand how people functioned on having to loose so much time to sleep. How did anyone get anything done? This made my colleagues laugh and that was that.  However, that eight hours turned into ten, into twelve, into fourteen until its now at a point where I set an alarm so I don't sleep more than ten hours.  As tired as I am all the time I still have things to do and spending over half the day asleep does not help matters.  I went to the doctor about this and he was baffled so has sent me to many specialist, and now waiting to see a Chronic Fatigue specialist.  The words ME/CFS are being banded about. I have researched what these are and I'm not really excited about this diagnosis but if it's what I've got, I will have to deal with it.... I suppose.

Work is driving me crazy nuts.  As a teacher, I want the best for my students and want them to flourish, but regardless what I do, what I put into place, the powers that be just destroy everything. It makes me wonder what the point is to plan and prepare anything if they are going to screw everything up anyway.  I am currently looking for new work, especially if I have ME/CFS as there is no flexability in my work hours and we don't get normal school holidays.  It means that I have LONG stresful terams and it's not doing me any favours.  I have learnt that it doesn't matter what it right for my students as long as the director gets her own way regardless how right or wrong that is.  I can't leave as they have me over a barrel, I have no teaching quals, they can't afford to send me on my teaching quals so as a result I can't get another teaching job. I can't even get a job on the same salary I am now, and I need this salary so I can continue to live on my own.  So I'm screwed, so now I refuse to get upset at work, refuse to fight any more. I will just bow down to the powers and let them destroy my class and blame me for doing it.  After all what's the point in caring.

I am also cutting again, and it feels great.  This time this blog is the only place I will admit this is what I am doing.  I have realised that there is no one in my life I can trust this too. They want me to stop or they freak out and start smothering me or trying to force me to stop or want to check on me every single day and I don't want that.  I just want to cut and enjoy it and all that it brings.  I honestly don't care where it ends up.  I have missed my friend and embarrass his return with joy.  I savour each moment and each feeling it offers me. 

I. Hate titles

So I started to feel better after my cut-a-thon so I told a couple of people I trust about what I had done. I though it would make me feel better it didn't I now feel worse than I did before. I am now cutting more, I think about it constantly and the fact I can't cut for most of the day it puts me in a bad mood.

So what happened to me in the course of a few hours has not helped my mood in any way shape or form.

I had a dermatologist appointment at 4pm. Didn't get seen until 4.45. At this point I know that I won't make the team meeting at 5pm which will get me into trouble as I missed last month's due to a dermatologist appointment. As a result if I missed today's I will get slapped with a non compliance/disciplinary. I get out at 5 from the hospital so I bombed it over to work for two minutes of the meeting. Not amused. There are other people who have missed way more meetings than me and yet they got off scott free (the one-rule-for-me-one-rule-for-you syndrome at.wirk is out of hand). So I now wasted such petrol its crazy.

The doctor basically admitted to me that me has no idea what is wrong with my skin. He was surprised when I told him the original location (which I have many times). He scratched his head and told me he would refer me to a different department and couldn't understand why I had been reffered to him. He recommended things which if he.bothered to read my notes he would have know the doctors had done everyone of.thise things. So he gave me some antihistamines which the doctor gave me at the beginning of my issues ten months ago. I told him they don't work but he gave them to me anyway. Git.

I have also lost my annual leave because some idiot decided to turn my sick days (which we don't get paid for) into annual days. So I have basically been forced into taking annual leave back in October. I am exhausted. I need some time off. I think I am getting my teaching quals then get a job in a location that actually gives a fuck about their staff although that seems to be a think of the past. These days it's all about squeezing the last drop of blood and sweat out of their staff. To hell with anything else.

Everything pisses me off at the moment and I can't cope with it. I know what I'm doing tonight.

He's back!

Speak to me friend.
Whisper...
I'll listen.
I know, I know you've been locked
out of sight
all these years, like me
My friend...

You there my friend
Come let me hold you.
Now, with a sigh, you grow warm in my hand.
My friend!
My clever friend...
Rest now, my friends.
Soon, I'll unfold you.
Soon you'll know splendours
You never have dreamed
all you days,
my lucky friends
'Til now your shine was merely silver.
Friends, you shall drip rubies, you'll soon drip precious... rubies

I finally worked it out.  It doesn't matter how much I fight the depression, it doesn't matter how hard I try to keep myself well and a part of 'normal' society, the depression will always win because I will always get screwed over.  I will always get dragged down and I will always be pathetic, always there for people to walk over me and let me know just how worthless I am, so it really doesn't matter. I don't need to fight. I just let the depression take over and let it take me.  It doesn't matter.

For the first time in four years I cut. It was amazing. I have missed him. I will have more.... and who the fuck care, I sure as hell don't.

I'm back!

Sometimes
I feel like going down and so disconnected
Somehow
I know that I am haunted to be wanted
I've been watching
I've been waiting
In the shadows for my time
I've been searching
I've been living
For tomorrows all my life

In the Shadows by The Rasmus 

I am not in a good place right now.  I don't know what's going on in my head, I wish I could just scratch the surface because I swear if I could do that then I'd be able to sort myself out... although I wonder if I would.  I talk about the fact I'm on the edge, I know the crash is coming, I can feel it within me trying to push its way out.  I try and tell myself that it won't come and that it will only come if I talk about it or admit to it.

It's coming. Although I'm not crying right now I have had tears falling most of the night.  I can't imagine how I'm going to be at work tomorrow.  Part of me tells me I'm tired and that's all it is, the logical part of me says it's not because I've been sleeping well this week and there is no way I can be tired.

I want my razor.  I want to feel it slice through my skin.  I want that comfort.  I want to know that somehow I can find comfort.  Comfort from what I don't know.  I know that this has been coming for a while.  I know I should have planned for it.  But I haven't and now I'm alone apart from my blog.   I wish I wasn't living with Mam, then I could cry, I could get high, I could cut, I could go for my midnight walks.  I just don't want to be here where Mam could find me, could see the tears.  She would ask what's wrong.  I have absolutely no idea what is wrong.

That's bollocks I know what's wrong.  I have a chemical imbalance in my brain.  Just as I have to take medication to keep my asthma under control, I have to do the same with the depression.  I spent a session with a client talking about depression and the fact in many ways its no different that asthma or diabetes.  I know this, but the thought of going back to the doctors and asking for pills is just too much.  I know that this is the time I need to fight it, I know this, I honestly do.  I just can't. I really just can't.  I have a job I love, that I never want to loose, I have a new niece or nephew on the way, I have an amazing family who love me... I have things to fight for.

I just can't.  How do I find the energy for something that almost killed me last time (and still surprised it didn't).

Help me find the Vulcan me.

"I'll keep you my dirty little secret

Dirty Little Secret

Don't tell anyone or 

you'll be just another regret

Just another regret

Hope that you can keep it

My dirty little secret

Who has to know?"

Dirty Little Secret: The All American Rejects

Long term readers of my blog (either this one or blog-city) will know that emotions are a complete mystery to me and it's only in the past few years that I have taken that step to discover what they are and how they inpact my life.

I thought I was beginning to make sense of them and then G came into my life.  He's a new member of staff and I must admit, here in the safety of the anonymous blog, that he is cute and if I could I'd go for him.  However he is married with two children so he is off limits.  I'm fine with this. I really am.  Until he starts flirting with me.  Touching me in little ways, teasing me, staring at me.

The other day we were playing in the snow with our students and he rugby tackled me into the snow and sat on me stopping me from moving, he then covered me in snow.  We stared at each other and I sware to God if it wasn't for the fact we were at work, for the fact he's married we would have kissed.

I have to be careful.  Emotions are a mystery and something I'm not so great at controlling any more.  I have lost my vulcan-ness.  Something I miss grately.  I'm not sure life with emotions is all that it's cracked up to me.  I really want to go back to vulcan-ness then G would not be an issue.

It's all made worse by the fact I'm sorta seeing someone at the moment J.  I don't have the feelings for him that I have for G. It's driving me crazy.  J is everything I thought I wanted in a partner.  We are so alike it's lovely, I can completely geek out with him, it's awesome.  But I feel no romantic attachment to him.  G on the other hand he makes me laugh, when he touches me my skin feels as though it's on fire. Just thinking about him now just makes me shiver.

I want to be a vulcan where things like this don't matter.  I won't act upon my emotions, I won't brake up a family that's not me.  I don't ever want that to be me.  I want to be vulcan. I don't want to feel like this.  I had my issues when I was a vulcan but at least emotions were not too big an issue.  If I could be stable as I am not but with the emotional cut off that I had, I'd be content.

I'm beginning to crack.  Something I hate doing in front of people more than anything else in the world, is to cry.  To cry in front of someone is showing weakness, vulnerability and it's just plain wrong.  The other day at work I don't know what happened but I was sitting in a meeting and this wave of darkness hit me and permeated within every cell of my being, digging and sinking toward my soul.   After the meeting I went to my classroom it was empty.  I focused on packing up for the night.  My boss came in and asked if I was all right.  It started before I could stop it I started crying.  She hugged me and it just got harder.  So I pushed her away and told her not too.  I told her some bullshit about how I felt I was failing in my job, I was overwhelmed with the paper work and she fell for it hook line and sinker.  How can I tell someone who just weeks earlier I was telling that I am more stable now than I have ever been that I'm cracking.

To be fair I have told her but I'm not sure she believes me.  I wrote her a letter.  I couldn't tell her in words how I was feeling but I could write it.  When I handed her the letter there were rules.  No talking about it.  No acknowledgement of the letter.  No feedback.  Nothing.  She went and sent me a video in response.  But she read the letter so she should have some idea of how I am feeling and yet I stood in my classroom and she believed what I was telling her.

The whole time I was talking I had the song "I'm not okay, I'm not O-fucking-kay"  I just wish someone could see the cracks that are appearing.  The high I've been on, which I always suspected, was temporary and fake.  I was in hiding.  This time though I haven't got support.  I don't have the Vulcan-ness to protect me and I can't cut as my mother would notice.  I can't get high.  My mother would notice.  So what the hell do I do.

Oh sweet Vulcan. Come back. I'm so sorry I got rid of you. Please come back. Be part of me again. Save me. Keep me safe. Let me not listen to others. I want to back so much. Protect me again.

emotions

We've had an emotional day in community today.  One of our team members left, and it's brought on a lot of tears by people, baring me.  I haven't cried once.  In fact I don't feel anything.  It's part of life that people come and go. I accept that so I feel nothing, however I have made some flippant comments that have upset a number of people on community.  I have been more flippant that I would have normally been, and I think that's my way of showing my feelings.

I'm upset that this person has left, and it will leave a huge hole in community, and I will miss my head nuggles, however I don't want to cry about it as I know that she will go on to live a wonderful life.  Better than my life will ever be.  Why should I be upset that she's left?  Why should I cry because everyone else is?  However interestingly because I'm not crying no one is checking to see if I'm okay, they are all coming to me for comfort.  So I am taking comfort in the pills and the alcohol and the karaoke tonight!!

dang!

I suspect that last night has become the beginning of the end for me.  Last night I did something I am not proud of, but still it was something that I needed to do.  Last night I started to cry, I don't know what brought the tears, but they came from the depth of my soul.  They came from a place where the darkness lives.  I cried like I haven't done in a very long time.  Tears of pain, tears of utter sadness.  It was uncontrollable and unstoppable.  I don't know what triggered it.  The only reason I stopped though is because I started scratching.  The joy and comfort that offered me was unreal.  It was amazing!  I kept going until my hand started weeping.

This morning, as you can imagine, my hand is swollen and very sore.  The weeping sections of my hand have started to scab over.  Which means I need to cover up which is annoying.  It's so painful this morning, it's unreal.  I don't ever remember the pain being this bad.

I hate the fact that I did it, but it was the only way the tears were going to stop!!!!

Stupid, stupid me!!!!

How stupid could I be
A simpleton could see
That you're no good for me
But you're the only one I see
Stupid: Sarah McLachlan

So I'm not exactly proud of myself, but at the same time I am.  I haven't been coping at all well lately and I know that.  However, last night I drank a fair bit and I took three of my painkillers.  Not enough for me to get completely off my face but just enough that I could buzz away quite happily for the night.  I know I'm on a dangerous path here, but I don't know what else to do.  I don't trust anyone to talk to, I don't want to go back for counselling because I just don't have anything to talk about.  I don't know what's going on in my head and why I'm feeling like this.  I just know that last  night I felt quite happy for a while.

Still need to sleep though.

A good session

I had a fantastic session with my CPN last Thursday. Usually I just sit there, vaguely talking about things, he gets me to think a little but we don't really do anything much. That all changed this week. Changed completely.

I sat there and talked about my concoction that I take. We talked about how dangerous it is, the damage I could be doing to myself. We also talked about the possibility that I might be addicted. This is something myself that I have struggled with. I plan when I do it, I plan it carefully. I buy the pills, I buy the alcohol. I can't seam to stop myself.

We talked about what it was to be an addict, what it meant, and how it would affect me. We talked about how I felt when I took my concoction and we also talked about how much control I had over it.

My CPN came to the conclusion that although what I was doing was wrong, I had enough control, I wasn't doing it regularly enough and that I knew what I was doing enough that he didn't need to interfere in some way or other to stop me.

In truth although the dosage I take is high, and I could be doing a lot of damage to myself, I do not do it everyday, I do not do it at work, I only do it when I'm at home and I can have a day to recover. I am very careful. I make sure I do this unsafe deed in a safe way.

It felt so good being able to talk about it. No one else knows, well actually there are some people who do know, but they don't know the extent of it. My CPN does. He knows how many times I've done it over the past couple of months. When I stopped cutting, I started on the concoction. I look forward to that time during the week (or weekend) when I can take my concoction and block everything out. I do wish I could get the same feeling with something else but I can't.

To talk about it was so good, to talk through my concerns and my joys of 'The Concoction'. For me to know that someone else knows and doesn't look down on me. I walked out of that meeting feeling great. Why can't I feel like that normally!!

Oh shite!

I have found myself planning my time around the best time for me to get 'stoned' on my little concoction... even though last Friday I got it wrong and I became very ill and remember very little I still want it, I want to be that way again. I'm trying to plan the best time to do it, when The Boys are out, when I don't have to get up early the next day, trying to find the best time to do it so I can be alone and no one will find out. I need to get the pills and I need to get the alcohol but planning all this I am.

I remember back in Uni I started cutting then went on to the P&A concoction, then when I started coming out of it I cut again and then I stop. Neither of these are right, I know that, you know that, we all know that but here I am unable to stop. I need them to just block everything out for a while, so that I can dream, so that I can sleep, so that I don't need to feel.

Screwing up all over again.

Friday night wasn't good for me and I don't know why. I had an exceptionally good week at work, the most positive I've had in many a month in fact. Still I did my thing except I did it wrong. I got the combination wrong. I got to the point I couldn't stand, I couldn't walk. Had I found someone in that state I would have called for an ambulance but I hid out, I stayed in my room. I think I slept a couple of hours in the bathroom... well I say slept, I get very tired but I never actually sleep. It's hard to describe the state I was in. I collapsed twice in my bedroom and I have jarred my neck and shoulders. They hurt so much.

I couldn't think straight, I doubt I could have talked straight. I certainly could stand up and I had real issues with walking, at most I could crawl. I enjoyed the feeling of no control, it wasn't until sometime Saturday I realised just how dangerous the state I was in was. Anything could have happened, what if I had fallen down the stairs, what if I had decided to go for a walk. Anything could have happened and there was no one around to help me.

I paid for it on Saturday not being able to eat or drink until late into the evening, I was very dehydrated and had problems with light. Today I feel better, I managed to eat something and have spent sometimes outside in the sun. However I'm thinking that I can't do that again, certainly not while I'm on my own. It could have gone so badly wrong. I could have been so ill or worse but I couldn't help myself. I needed something, anything to help me with stuff that's going on in head. To stop me feeling what I'm feeling.

Today I'm find apart from sore shoulders and neck, but it's my own stupid fault, I just need to come up with a really good reason for why I'm in so much pain that sounds plausible. No one knows what I'm doing at the moment except my CPN, and he's on holiday at the moment so I can't talk to him but I don't know who else I should talk to, who else I should tell. If I tell anyone they'll become worried about me and freak out. I couldn't handle that at all! The looks I'd get, the concern on their face etc.

What have I done? What am I doing here? What am I doing to myself? Why can't I stop?

I'm in trouble!

"The past is done It's gone forever is done Don't tell me my pain is pleasure You, you haven't got a clue Oh, I wanna cry but I don't make a sound I'm your child and your child is feeling down Everybodys toxic in this town" Robbie Williams: Toxic
I know I shouldn't have done it, but I'm just feeling so bad! I've not talked to anyone in over 30 hours. I've not seen anyone within 30 hours. I've been completely on my own. Last night I couldn't handle how I was feeling, there was no one around. I tried everyone but there was nothing, not one person about. Everyone has their own lives. So I bought a BIG bottle of orange bacardi breezer, drank that to myself and then took some of my old pain killers. I know they make me buzz along side the alcohol. No one around to notice, no one around to stop me.