Out In The World

 I'm always anxious when attending any kind of doctor, dentist or optician's appointment. However, I used to find it a lot easier to get through them when they started asking their seemingly endless list of personal questions. They used to be able to look at my age and assume that I was a student, which for many years was correct. I can no longer give myself that label without being a fraud, and lets not get started on how uncomfortable and flustered I feel when they ask if I'm a graduate! Nowadays I seem to choose one of a few responses. What I say usually depends upon the kind of mood I'm in and is based on how confident I'm feeling that day. I might say that I'm a writer which tends to prompt the follow up question of what do you write about? Or who do you write for? Someone once assumed that I wrote manuscripts! Sorry pal I'm not all that showbiz.

I usually feel fairly comfortable saying that I write about mental health. More often than not the conversation will end there, a lot of people clam up and find it awkward to talk about. On some occasions I'm not quite confident enough to say that I'm a 'writer', it sounds strange to me. Yes I write, but can I call myself a 'writer'? It's not my occupation, it's more of a hobby and self-help method for dealing with my past problems, current feelings and experiences with mental illness. Even being honest and saying "I'm a blogger" can cause some people to recoil, as if they think "oh here's another wannabe writer trying to earn a quick buck" or "anyone can create a blog these days, no biggy". You'd be right to think that those are just assumptions I've made, but bloggers do receive that kind of feedback regularly. Journalists and writers often see bloggers as a modern form of competition. I just think it's a fantastic platform to share opinions, help people and potentially launch careers from. On the days I'm really feeling down and feeling particularly useless in the world I'll say I'm un-employed at this time. It's easier and provides an immediate end to that topic of conversation. Companies must love me messing up their records as it's likely that over the years I will chop and change my answer depending upon how I'm feeling. Perhaps one day I'll be able to confidently say that I'm a writer. I'm definitely not saying that bloggers aren't 'writers', if you believe in yourself and are happy to declare yourself as such, good for you! Personally I don't think it matters if your answer varies. So long as you aren't pretending to be a Doctor, attempting fraud or meddling with your taxes...simply answer in the way that makes you feel most comfortable. Afterall, those dentist check-ups are only once a year- don't sweat it!

Bitten In the Butt

It's scary how quickly things can turn around with depression. Despite having to take care of things by myself for a week, I'd been doing pretty well. Ever since we've had Toby (our pup) I've been getting out of the house more than ever before. However, I find it really challenging to take him for a walk by myself. I like to have a route in mind, somewhere with lots of space where I can see if other dog walkers are coming up ahead so I can try to avoid them. I did a few practise runs with Robbie before my solo walks. They went fairly well, one major challenge was driving as I hadn't done any for a while, since my operation at the beginning of October actually.

Surprisingly I didn't have too many blunders during that week. The unexpected trip up came when everyone returned home and we had a full house again. I know that I get anxious during transitions from being alone after being surrounded by people, and also when returning to a full house again. I finally get used to enjoying the space rather than fearing it, then it all returns to a busy chaotic minefield again.

I'd been printing off all of my old blog posts, which turned out to be quite the stack of paper! I'm currently working through them for something I'm working on at the moment. For me it's a strange process, blogging has always been fairly strange for me. I'll write about things that have happened recently and events that happened a long time ago but I've only just processed them. Some posts might have been written weeks ago, others perhaps the day of publishing them. I always check through them one last time before making them 'live'. However, even if I've just read through them all of 30 minutes ago, I couldn't tell you what they say. My short term memory has been shot to pieces by this illness. During some of my lowest times I can recall watching an entire season of a TV programme, but I have no recollection of what happened. I can remember rough plot lines of books I read, but I have no idea who the characters were, what the book cover looked like or even what the title was. I think this is the process of my brain trying to protect itself (bare with me). There are so many 'stressors' (traumatic events, memories, people etc.) that can build up to cause a breakdown or a period of depression. I believe that those 'stressors' take up so much space in my head, so there is little or no room for trivial information to be stored during those times. Even if one of those trivial things is something I have written, something I really ought to be able to remember but I just can't.

As I said, I was reading through old posts I'd written. I felt sad for the person that had been through these things. And I realised it was me! People often tell me that they find it difficult to read some of my posts, that they make them teary eyed at times. For me, I've lived through those moments already, they were hell to experience when they happened and in some cases it has taken me years to be able to even recall all the details of those events. In my mind I've already experienced that trauma, patched myself up and moved on. Imagine my shock when I sunk into a depressed mood over reading about something I've actually experienced, yet the words made me so sad and suddenly re-live it. My movements became very slow, I lost my appetite after being ravenous moments before, all I wanted to do was sleep. I trudged upstairs ready to fall into bed, but I'd misplaced my phone. And somehow I was suddenly losing my breath, feeling flustered, leaning into the door frame of our bathroom clutching at my chest that felt like it was on fire. I was having a HUGE panic attack, over a bloody phone! I know now that it wasn't just over a phone, it was a number of factors. It was not being prepared to feel this saddened and low over something I've already lived through, written about and moved on from. I was being attacked by my past. I was crying on the floor curled up into a ball clutching at my chest. It was all too familiar to the breakdown of February 2014. It felt like nothing had changed, I had fallen to my knees sobbing, howling and not caring about how it must have looked or sounded to other people in the house.

I don't want anyone to run to my aid now. I'm OK now. Over time I have learnt to recover quicker from panic attacks and low periods. A sign of progress! Of course it's alarming to me and anyone else in my life when this happens. It's unexpected for all of us, and yet it shouldn't be. Yes, I've made progress in many areas and some days it may seem like I'm well again. But, I still have an illness,  I am still very, very unwell and need to bare in mind that I can't run a marathon without training for it first! My project (very secret I'm afraid) will not stop because of this incident. I just need to take things slowly and remember that even my own words can hurt me.

Withdrawal

A few weeks ago I was left on my on for the first time in a while. I had a feeling that this week was going to be fairly challenging, but thanks to me miscalculating how much medication I had left it became a whole lot more difficult! As I have established a fairly good understanding with my doctor on how I prefer to treat my depression they are happy for me to have a few months supply of my anti-depressants at a time. This will vary with every patient experiencing depression as it can be risky to leave longer periods in between appointments with your GP depending upon the severity of your depression at various times. When I was feeling particularly bad I had to see my GP every two weeks to check in, but now they and I don't feel as if I'm a risk to my own safety, there is a bit more flexibility with how frequently I have check up appointments.

I'm usually pretty good at keeping an eye on how much medication I have left and ensuring I can either go in for a chat or put in a request for a repeat prescription if supplies are getting low. Unfortunately sometimes life gets in the way and my already confused mind gets turned upside down with things like big events and trips away. When my mind is preoccupied with other concerns things can slip and I end up in a sticky situation! As a result of this I ended up being on about half of the dose of anti-depressants I normally take. Not good. Obviously this can happen to the best of people with any type of medical condition that requires medication. However, you should never decrease your dose of anti-depressants on your own, and you certainly shouldn't quit cold turkey. Ceasing taking medication for depression unassisted can be very similar to quitting hardcore drugs alone, not that I've ever experienced this myself but from what I have experienced I know it's incredibly unpleasant. Even being on a lower dose of medication without being slowly weaned off can cause withdrawal symptoms and side effects.

I often experience what I refer to as 'brain zaps' when I've had a particularly low period and have slept late into the day meaning that I haven't taken my medication at the time I usually would. Even this small discrepancy in when I take medication can cause withdrawal effects. Brain zaps feel like an electric current running over the brain producing a fuzzy sensation, as if you're getting a static shock over and over again inside your skull. Not pleasant. This feeling will continue for a while after taking medication and can often last for an entire day. I can be walking around or sitting still and slightly move my eyes or turn my head and be hit with a wave of fuzzy feelings running over my brain and I'll hear a high pitched noise. If anyone has seen the Hunger Games film when Katniss has been stung by a Trackerjacker and it looks like she's trying to move but gets stuck in one movement and the noise that accompanies it, that's fairly similar to what I experience. Or think of the static noise on a radio when you flick to a frequency that isn't in tune, it puts you on edge and you want to get off that station as fast as possible. I'm stuck on that station for hours.

Other withdrawal side effects can include feeling like you have the flu, nausea and generally feeling very run down and tired. Of course feeling incredibly low accompanies all of this which can be very unsettling if you had previously been doing well. Even if you know that you'll be able to get your prescription in a few days, it can be of little comfort. You still have to go through all of this and those low feelings aren't easily forgotten even if you know they've most likely been induced by a lack of medication or a lower dose than usual.

It does scare me that I've become so dependent upon anti-depressants. It's concerning to know that even though I'm taking something to help me, it can cause harm. I know that some people are against taking medication for depression and prefer to seek alternative treatment. Much like how every experience of depression is different, an individual's treatment and recovery is unique too. I'll never take anti-depressants for the sake of it or use them as a crutch. If I do feel significantly better at some point I will talk to my doctor about decreasing the dose I'm taking. For now it provides a feeling of relief. Taking medication makes me feel like it is a real illness. It's all very well saying depression is a real illness with mental and physical effects, but the dark voices of depression can easily convince a person otherwise.

In Peak Health

Somehow a year has passed since I started my 'year off' from everything. This might sound like a lazy lifestyle, but for me it was well needed and for the most part well deserved. Since I was 16 years old I put an enormous strain on my life by attempting to function normally with every day life and the stresses of education. I was doing this whilst attempting to hide that I was incredibly depressed and anxious on a daily basis. I hid my conditions from my family and friends, not due to fear of rejection or stigma, but instead due to my internal instinct to protect everyone in my life even if that's at my own expense.

Some pressure was lifted when I finally started being honest about how unwell I had become. I thought that I could still cope with the pressures of university, but the reality was that I had become reclusive, scared to leave the house and to interact with others. Despite disengaging with the social aspects of university I was still trying to keep up with my workload and attempting to teach myself an entire statistics module without the assistance of lecturers. All of those factors coupled with my declining physical health lead to a colossal breakdown and finally needing to put my hand up and ask for help.

I left university in April/June of 2014, the whole time was a bit of a mess for me so I can't recall the exact time that I left. I learnt to refer to my time out as a 'gap year'. I certainly wasn't gallivanting around the world and marvelling at new sights and experiences. Instead, I took time for myself attempting to enjoy the smaller things in life again and trying to regain some control over my mental health.

Nowadays my depression is kept at bay for the most part. I still have down days as that's part of the progress of moving towards getting better, it isn't a clean straight line to being on the up. If there was a line graph to show my progress it would show a zig zag darting up and down all over the place. The down points are often influenced by my physical health. For years now I have been plagued with physical illness in various forms. In 2013 I had an operation to remove an ovarian cyst that had grown to the size of a grapefruit, it was incredibly painful and caused me to walk along like an old woman and post-op was even more of a nightmare. Since that operation I have had IBS which is a daily inconvenience and sometimes limits how far I am willing to stray away from the house. During particularly bad flare ups it's unlikely that I will leave the house for around a week or two. I've also been prone to sinus infections since I was 15 years old. They certainly aren't your average cold, sinusitis causes an unbearable amount of pain which is barely touched by painkillers. I've spent many years attempting to convince doctors that something isn't quite right with me, my immune system, something! I get sinusitis at least five times a year, and I lose two weeks or more due to feeling so unwell. The pain is debilitating and has an enormous impact upon my mental health. I am very happy to announce that a doctor finally listened to me. After a few inspections of my nose, blood tests and a CT scan it has become apparent that I have a deviated septum which has been causing a LOT of trouble over the years.

Since I first started writing this blog post things progressed very quickly. In a very quick turn around of a couple of months, thanks to a cancellation I had the operation at the beginning of October. With the exception of a fair bit of pain, things seem to have gone well. I had my post-op check up at the weekend and the surgeon was very happ with his work. I had a lot of queries as I did get a sinus infection immediately after the surgery, unfortunately the surgeon I had doesn't have the best bedside manner and was shaking my hand and ushering me out of the door before I could ask most of my questions. I easily get overwhelmed by dominant personalities, especially those in the medical profession. Hopefully that sinus infection was the last hurrah, so fingers crossed some luck will be thrown my way and I will never get a sinus infection again. So far this year I have tackled my mental health and a few physical illnesses that have been affecting my quality of life for many years. This could be me on the up.