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[quietlyhere]

What if I am a spector

What if I died long ago

And I haunt this house,

kept lingering by those

who ever held me in their hearts

And I drift through memories,

and I watch over them,

and always I am tethered here.

Never anything new

but for that which I witness,

just out of reach

Trapped by love

and regret

and vain hope

[quietlyhere]

16th November 2019, 5.40am

So yeah this is just something I'm thinking about right now at this time on a saturday morning having not yet slept a wink... so like, bear with me

And sometimes I kind of drop stuff like this in therapy but it always gets breezed by because I guess she thinks it's better to talk about things that are personal to me or something? Or maybe I'm the one who breezes past it, idk. But write it out to see if it's anything near sense, yeah?

I'm a girl. Well, a woman I suppose. A cis lady. And I grew up in a western society with progressive parents and all that good stuff, but that... didn't stop society getting at me?

Getting at me? What am I getting at

I don't want to get too broad on this, because believe me I could, so I'm trying to clutch back at what exactly I was thinking about.

I have a brother older than me by 3 years. He's never been huge, but he's always been bigger than me. My dad is like a fitness kind of guy - not like he obsesses over it or anything but he genuinely likes going to the gym, it's like a mental health practice for him. And my mum, she's always kind of been tough? She grew up as the bolshier sister and ended up hanging out with tougher crowds from preteen onwards, like the cool girl in school who smokes with the older boys who you're little bit afraid of?

Anyway. Then there's me. I've always been little. I'm the youngest, I'm still the shortest now we're all fully grown adults, and as a kid I was small and blonde and shy. I wasn't brave or bolshy or any sort of physical presence.

And I felt needy. Growing up, I always felt like it was me creating problems, letting the team down, being too timid. When I think of young me, I think she was a wimp. I can still remember the way it felt whenever I had to be taken into special consideration, feeling like I was an issue to be worked around. My brother can't do this because I'm too wimpy to go too and it has to be fair. Someone has to miss out because they're looking after lil girly me.

I've always kind of been a picky eater. I don't deny it; I still am now. But looking back, I know that lots of kids are picky the way I was when I was young. It's not that abnormal. Yet mealtimes were made to seem - or so it felt at the time - like I was being difficult on purpose. Like I was doing it out of spite? Nah dude, I just fuckin hate mushrooms!! Of course I know my parents did it all right: they were, after all, literally just trying to get their child to eat something that didn't come in a Happy Meal. The childs needs the broccolis, I know it. But still that feeling is there.

Even now, when for example I just want to quietly get on with something like a chore or whatever: If I'm not alone, I get this insecure feeling like I'm not keeping pace with everyone else, like I'm not doing it the way I should, the quickest or simplest way. Since these days I am indeed a grown ass lady, I can occasionally remind myself that I am just doing this thing the way that is best for me... but sometimes that bad feeling wins, and I get anxious, and I feel immobilised by it.

And what I've realised, over the years, is that this is a very common way to feel... among women. Particularly those raised as girls.

Because bitch u kno it dat partriarchy!!!!

We're little, we're made to be little because little is how a little girl should be. If you're physically big as a young girl, you're not a proper little girl. If you have a big energy as a young girl, you're not a proper little girl. Little madam, probably.

I think I was naturally little. All-round. Then I was especially so because of my family circumstances (those mentioned both in and out of this post). And then I existed in the wider world, and I was supposed to be little, but I was supposed to maybe secretly be big or something but still look little and in my closer community I was sweet but too shy and how would I ever function in this modern nineties world when I'm like this and I need to be bigger and I don't want that because I think I'm a little but I should look big and little at the same time and feel mostly little energy but big on the inside like I'm some sort of TARDIS girl and the bigs have to protect me because I am too little but it feels like they shouldn't have to do that so I will be a big but I am not naturally a big so I will be a little in big clothing

Am I even making sense probs not lolll

As I said, I really could go much wider on this, particularly on the topic of the contradictions within societal expectations for women. But that's not what this is.

This is me just thinking about what all this does to a person.

When you're raised with a so-called feminine energy (little), and then pushed to a world in which, in order to survive, you allegedly must forever adapt to so-called masculine energy (big)... you're essentially encouraged to develop a mask in order to cope. Just to cope. With life.

That feeling of shame I would get, that feeling of being a burden on the people around me, is a result of feeling like one has failed at keeping that mask on. Like letting your little show through at the wrong moment is a weakness. And so many women feel this way, on whatever level, conscious of it or not, fighting or embracing it, and it echoes out upon fragile masculinity, and it... like it is just weird, right?

God, I really wanted to be concise on this, but bitch we all been knew I'd lose the thread. I have no idea now if I have made the original point I was thinking about but... I should sleep.

[quietlyhere]

15th August 2019, 1.20am

Current mood - for a good few weeks, or maybe months - is just kinda: ??????????

Like, I ain’t bad? I don’t feel good, though, I think. I dunno? I dunno.

Situation ch-ch-ch-ch-changes

Mum having major (m a j o r) troubles at work. Starts working from home more. When formal proceedings start, formally at home. Just... at home all the time.

So of course let’s rennovate! Kitchens and bathrooms and flooring, oh my! You can’t control an element of your life that you’re usually big boss of? Control other shit! Builders and plumbers and decorators. Except no, because I guess some stereotypes do exist for a reason (particularly in an entirely male workforce... JUSTSAYING LOL) and shit takes fooorreeevvveeer

So that’s kinda just more troubles and more doodoo and now there are panic attacks and shitty mental health uh-ohhhh who saw this comingggg (please do not raise your hands)

Visitors. Of course. Always visitors, in my house, in my room. But that’s okay, because I can escape to the empty box room--

OOPS YOU THOUGHT

Brother is back!

And heeeee’ssss more anxious than ever!!!! [finger guns]

Brother - who has been living in another continent for several years - kind of suddenly has things go tits-up for him (of course not really suddenly, because these things are rarely ever really sudden) and he has to come home, to a place we all know isn’t great for him, with no money, no job, and with a request for anti-anxiety meds.

He’s not doing great, and the tits-up happenings are something I can’t do anything about to help him, and it’s just sO FUCKING frustrating because now we’ve seen how he can be happy and healthy and he was doing it and it’s like he thinks it’s all gone now and I just want to help him and also help my mum and gaaaAAAAaahhhhh

Plus my dear ol’ Da is on the same anti-depressants as me so there’s a bonding experience for ya. He’s only on half my dosage though, what an absolute liiiiggghhttweiiggghhttt

So we’re a household full of a mental demics.

And it’s weird. Because...

Why’s it weird?

It’s weird I guess because I was finally sort of starting to feel like I might be able to function like a human again. I had my space, and my headspace, and I could kind of breathe enough to get some oxygen back to my brain. And then I didn’t, and I couldn’t. But... it was just there? So why not?

My head feels full. I had more thoughts about this but there’s a headache a-coming, as has happened a lot since all these changes.

IDK. I just want to help them.

But I also want to help me.

[quietlyhere]

16th May 2018, 11.50pm.

‘Mental Health Awareness Week’, innit.

Corrie with a suicide storyline, people posting about it on social media, constant stories on how men need to talk more about personal stuff (it’s true, they do - but here’s me, throwing stones in a glass house). Now I have yet another family member struggling with some form of depression.

It’s... good. I guess? Not good that it happens, of course, but that it’s now talked about.

It’s just that it all feels a little late for me.

So now, when it’s talked about, it’s... maybe a little triggering, somehow? I don’t know. It’s like it brings me back to myself. And I don’t want that. I spend my life avoiding myself. I go to therapy once a week, and I face myself there, and usually I cry, and afterwards I feel exhausted in every sense of the word. The rest of the time, I have headphones in to drown out the noise of my own brain. I still can’t deal with that noise for more than that allotted time.

I like that people talk about it; I love people not making the same mistake I did. I really do encourage it, and I want to help people, and I like being the voice of someone who understands. In fact, a lot of the time I wish people would ask me for help, or at least realise that I can understand. I just also wish that I didn’t then have to deal with my own overactive brain.

I don’t know. That’s all, I guess.

[quietlyhere]

5th February 2018, 6.20am.

Tonight I found my copy of the album The Suburbs by Arcade Fire. I wasn't looking for it; in fact I'd thought of it recently and decided that I'd listened through the whole thing so many times that I probably still needed some time before going back to it. But I stumbled across it tonight, and I haven't felt such a pure moment of... I don't even know, just being pleased? in such a long time that I stuck it on my iTunes without a second thought. Shuffle seemed to know to drop it in at exact right moment, the exact right song as I got into bed.

It's funny, because I don't look at Arcade Fire and feel like they represent me, or that they are outstandingly musically talented or anything. To be honest, I sometimes think they're a little preachy. I understand when other people say they aren't fans.

But The Suburbs was something different for me.

I never knew Arcade Fire, really, until I was at a festival where they were headlining. I wasn't feeling 100% and all my friends had gone off to see an act that was too many people in a tent thrashing around to drum and bass or something - which of course I felt guilty and embarrassed about not being able to join in on, despite now knowing that the enclosed space alone probably would have given me a panic attack. So I was ill, left alone in the camp, and feeling a bit sorry for myself. Deciding not to let me ruin my own time, I pulled myself up and got walking to the main stage area.

Now, it had been a long weekend. That night was our second to last, it was my first festival, I'd had my purse stolen, and I was feeling frustrated and abandoned by my friends (foreshadowing for years later I guess, I really don't know how I didn't see all that coming). I may have also been a little bit high, mostly through no fault of my own.

So little old me, on my lonesome, took place standing quite far back from the stage. The sun had mostly set, so it was soft and purple, and there didn't seem to be quite the crowd that other main stage acts had gathered despite them being headliners (probably most people were crammed in that tent with my friends) but the vibe was good. There were small groups or couples of people around me that I considered talking to, but for whatever reason, I didn't.

Then on they came, however many of them there were, and the first song started up. 'Ready To Start' - I can still listen to that song now and be brought back to that moment.

And it was just what I needed. I don't remember the rest of the set list, don't know which song was played next or after that. I just remember that it felt like I was being perfectly targeted by these songs, and they were all for me, in that place in my life I was in right then.

I think it was either during or just after college, the years that were probably the roughest for me in terms of mental health. I was numbed almost entirely for two years. I listened to music as noise to drown out my brain. Emotional music - anything from raw rock music for expression to warm soul music for healing - none of it really did anything. It was just old stuff I used to like, to act as white noise.

Arcade Fire - but specifically the Suburbs album, which I think had just come out that year so it was most of the set - came in with music that provided noise, with the number of them each having their own instruments and Regine running between different ones and adding backing in French, but noise that felt like closing your eyes and sinking into something clearer. Because, to me, their lyrics weren't really offering emotion: it felt more like logic. It felt like thinking through the 'why's and starting to figure out where I'd been, inside my head, this whole time.

It offered an insight into youth, a relatively uncomplicated youth with suburban privilege and no real reason to have any problems, but struggling. Struggling not to be unhappy, not to feel trapped, not to feel all the struggle of the world.

It wasn't a perfect fit. I didn't grow up in suburban America (or Canada), I didn't ride my bike around town with my friends, I wasn't particularly surrounded by a nuanced allusion to the American dream. But when they talk about wanting freedom and meant it as freedom from, perhaps, suburban oppression... I wanted freedom from myself. And it worked together, because the place where I grew up acted as - and still does - a symbol for how I ended up with that brain. When they mention finding where they belong, it works literally for me, as well as being about getting to the point where I can work with my mental health, where my own brain stops being my enemy. Even 'We Used To Wait' potentially being a slightly preachy song about modern day laziness and reliance on technology, I hear it and think about how I used to write and read and how depression has harmed my brain so much that it's nearly impossible for me now. The yearning for a simpler time is just me yearning for a time when my brain was more simple - aka, when it could actually function.

Aaaaaanyway! I could decode this shit for days. But I won't.

Arcade Fire's last album, Everything Now, wasn't great, in my opinion, but they don't fail to hit the nail on the head every once in a while; it's almost annoying to still identify with them like this, years on from that festival. The song 'Creature Comfort' mostly lays it all out too much for me, almost boringly so... But then it gets to the bridge.

"On and on, I don't know what I want, on and on, I don't know if I want it"

[quietlyhere]

22nd October 2017, 5am.

I always wanted to be Hufflepuff.

Near 100% of the time I get Gryffindor. Which is good for me, merchandise wise, because who suits yellow and black? Bees and Batman, and no one else. I’m good with some nice crimson and gold tones.

And bravery is all well and good, sure. Be the hero of the story or whatever. Fine.

But what about kindness? I want to be kind. I want to be loyal and earn trust and look out for others. I want to be human and make mistakes, maybe not always do the right thing, but I want to know when I don’t and learn and grow from it.

Hufflepuffs are great friends. They don’t need to form cliques or grow close through adversity. They’re just good people you want in your lives.

Why can’t that be me?

[quietlyhere]

18th October 2017, 6.45am

So, I guess that gap is a positive sign. Means that I didn't need to post on here because I had a real life qualified professional to talk to. Which means that this return is probably a bad sign. Good news is: she was effective enough to make it clear to me that I am allowed to now be angry at her. When did that last post say I started therapy? February? So from then to the end of August, I went nearly every Monday afternoon (I think I missed maybe 3?) to see her for an hour. So that's something like... 25 hours, maybe? Ok. Somewhere near the start of those hours, we were speaking about my past attempts at counselling and she was shocked to hear that none of them ever tried to follow up with me after I suddenly stopped going. I dismissed it, as of course I always do, but mentally added them to the list of people who let me down without me even realising it at the time. Skip ahead to August. My therapist knows I'm going to America in September for a few weeks, but I guess both of us (she had said "see you next week" the previous appointment) blank out on the fact that the last Monday in August is a bank holiday. I go to the office, realise my mistake when nobody answers the door (which tbf had happened several times before - faulty buzzer or something) and call her. No answer. She always turns her phone off in anticipation of our appointments, or if she's in another, so I am unsurprised. I send her a text, say I'll loiter around town (because the office is a good hour's journey from my house) just in case, then wait. Eventually I give up and begin to head home, and on the way, receive a text message from her, apologising for the confusion and saying she'll see me next week. I guess I should also mention here that the end of August had been kind of tough. At my therapist's repeated request I had finally gone to get blood tests (I hate needles) which led to mixed feelings on worrying I had some sort of horrible disease and - as I think I've spoken about on here before - actually kind of wanting a physical excuse. Kind of a lot, actually. So when the test results came back completely normal, I was once again at a loss. I really could have used that appointment. But, the mistake had been mutual, a simple mix up. Whatever, get over it. Thing is, the next week I would be in America. I had already told her this, although given no specific dates. So I texted her back, told her not to worry about the mix up, but reminded her of my trip and - importantly - texted her the specific dates of my departure and return. No response. Figured she'd gotten the message, had the information; it didn't necessarily warrant a reply anyway. I do that shit all the time to people, read the message and don't reply if the reply would just be "ok". Two and a bit weeks later, back in the UK. Reeling from such a full-on trip and all the Socialising and the consistently Doing Things, I revert a little. I just need a rest. No people, no activities, no thinking. A week later I figure I should try getting back into at least attempting to be a human. I open the text conversation with my therapist, look at the last message with no reply. I'm still in a bit of a weird place, mood wise. I don't know. I figure my wallet could probably do with another week or two off, particularly after that trip to America; besides, I had kind of been feeling lately like there wasn't much more ground left to cover with this in whole therapy thing anyway. It often felt like she and I were both waiting for me to have this breakthrough that just wasn't happening, some kind of way to get to the next stage. So maybe not going for a week or two more meant letting things build up again, better for a breakthrough. Or something. But then... She doesn't contact me either. I think I've now missed five or six appointments, and... zilch. Not a word from my therapist. She has the date of my return, right there in her phone, if she thought of me or even accidentally opened my chat window she'd see the dates right there. Even if she didn't, she knows I was only going for about two weeks. 25 weeks of same day same time same person, she can't have just not noticed that I'm not there. And she knows - she knows very well! - how hard it is for me to make first contact, or to reach out when I'm not made to feel wanted, or to not immediately accept another loss. Like, part of me knows it's my job to get myself booked in and get myself there and get myself well. Like I know this sounds silly and like I should just get over myself and call. But she was the one who told me that it was the professional's duty of care to follow up on people! She was the one who had been trying to get me to let myself feel anger, not to illegitimize my own feelings! I don't know. Maybe I'll realise how petty I'm being in a few days and be embarrassed by this. But right now, I feel shitty and angry and abandoned. And the one person I should be able to talk to about that is the reason I feel this way.

[quietlyhere]

20th January 2017, 10.30pm.

Today, for the sake of context in case I ever look back at these posts in future, was the day that President Donald Trump was inaugurated. Not directly relevant, but still, I just thought I’d point that out.

Anyway, meanwhile across the Atlantic...

I booked an initial assessment for psychotherapy. It’s not until February, so I have a few weeks of stewing and fretting about it, but this is something I’ve wanted to do for a long time. My grandad left all his grandchildren some money in his will and, while obviously I don’t love that this is where I’m spending it, and I certainly don’t love the reason I have this money, I know I’m super lucky to be in this position. Being able to afford this alleviates so much stress and anxiety and I mean it literally just makes it possible. I’m pretty sure my grandad would be pleased about that.

CBT, counselling, medications... none of it has worked for me so far. I’ve spent the last few years just drifting, twisting in the wind about what to do next, trying to run away from my own brain, trying to ignore it, knowing that I can’t live like this but not being able to figure out how to live with it.

I’m not looking for a fix here. I’ve reached a point where I think this might just be me, that I will always have depression. I only want to know how to not be constantly depressed so that I can start crafting some sort of a life.

I’ve booked it. Next step is getting to that date. Then after that, getting there, getting through the referral, figuring out the logistics of the process. What comes after that... I don’t know. But today I made a positive step forward. I have to keep reminding myself of that. I am trying to move forward.

[quietlyhere]

17th December 2016, 6.30pm.

I miss my Grandad.

I don’t really have anyone to talk to that didn’t know him, anyone that I can just say that to without it becoming a whole thing... so I’ll say it here. I miss him. 

I don’t know. I’m still not ready to write about him or my relationship with him or how I’ve felt about his death, but it’s his birthday today (or would have been? I mean, the fact that he’s dead doesn’t negate the fact that he was once born so I don’t really know how that works) soooo yeah. It’s my birthday in four days and I’ve spent my entire life sharing the birthday weekend with him (since Jesus went and claimed the one after... and also my mum’s is the 26th) so it’s just... I don’t know. It’s not nice. Last year it was only a month exactly after he’d died so I was still in shock or whatever. I don’t really remember it, to be honest. This year, however...

Yeah.

I just miss him.

[quietlyhere]

27th June 2016, 1am.

So, a thing happened the other day. In fact, it was a couple of weeks ago at this point and it’s a really silly thing to keep dwelling on (which hey I shouldn’t say because that’s invalidating my own feelings so shut up me) but I was just thinking about it, so... here we go.

We have people over at our house all the time, like my mum is always volunteering us to be hosts for birthday parties or events or whatever. Which... is a whole other thing, by the way. But it’s relevant here because it’s relevant to mention that we had already been hosting foreign visitors, and I’d given up my room (as I always do for visitors - at this point it’s more of a guest room with all my stuff in it) for them, and I just... I don’t know, wasn’t really in the mood for visitors (as much as I love the people who were here).

Then I was informed, the evening prior, that we were hosting a birthday party (originally I’d been told they were going out for it, and I had been looking forward to an evening on my own at home). That night I can barely sleep, for no apparent reason, and then in the morning I have to immediately face the people who are staying here. Which, again, I love them; it’s just that I’m not a morning person as it is and I’d had a bad night and I hate seeing anyone before I’ve even managed to go to the toilet in the morning. I was also greeted by a note from my mother telling me to set up for the party and

Well anyway the reason I’m including all of this is to explain - mostly to myself - why I was in a high state of anxiety that night. Pretending to be happy takes it out of me at the best of times, you know.

Fast forward to later, when everyone is a few too many drinks in (self and two teens excluded) and the 50-ish year old birthday boy is blowing out the candles on his cake. 

Now, it’s no secret that I don’t like having my picture taken. Like, I hate it. Mostly it’s become a “this is how we get to you” thing, like a joke I guess? Except they think it’s like if I called my dad “old”, which he’ll act irritated about but doesn’t really mind; whereas really it’s more like if I commented on my dad gaining weight, which is something that he’s actually genuinely self-conscious about. I don’t really have a version of “old” (I’m short but whatever, I’m bad at maths but so is everyone like anything bad you’ve got to say about me, I’ve said worse to myself) so I guess they go for what they can.

So the birthday boy drunkenly says “For my birthday wish, I want you to have your picture taken with me”. I let him know that I rather wouldn’t, but in my head I’m like... fine, whatever. You’re drunk. Take a picture and be done with it.

Of course, my initial “no” is picked up on by the whole room, a room full of 10 drunk adults plus. Everyone starts loudly making their piece and looking at me, and - okay, I have to admit - I am a person who, the more someone puts pressure on me to do something, the less I will want to do it. So I argue a little, but realistically I know I’m not going to get to leave the room without taking this picture.

Which... I don’t know, maybe that’s what got to me? High anxiety, plus a sudden inescapable situation, everyone staring at me and shouting in my general direction. That sounds a lot more logical than it felt.

Then birthday boy shifts a seat closer and wraps an arm around my neck. It’s supposed to be a friendly gesture, an “it’s okay, it’s just a picture” gesture, a pose for the camera... but it feels like a vice, his weight against me, trapped and starting to panic.

Like, really starting to panic.

My heart rate gets faster, my muscles go tense, my eyes start to tear up. I try so, so hard to stay calm and I think to myself that the only way to escape without making everything worse at this point is to just get this damn picture taken. 

So I blink, and look around. It really was only 12 people, but suddenly it was a wall to keep me trapped in, a human barricade with their phones pointed at me, and right in my only possible path of escape, my mother with her iPad, her voice clearest above the rest.

She’s always been the worst offender for me. My mum is the face of my hatred of having my picture taken, for as long as I can remember, she’s been the worse at forcing the issue, the worse at handling it, no matter how many times I try to explain to her. There’s a lot about these anxiety-type things that she’s never been able to understand, but again, that’s a Whole Other Thing.

(Disclaimer: I love my mother dearly and I do not take her for granted, rest assured)

I don’t know which camera to look at, and my eyes skim the group for an ally, for someone to recognise that I’m not okay. But no-one reacts. I push for a smile, and when the crowd still orders me to smile, I say that I AM, and to my ears it sounds distorted and wrong but they all laugh, like I’m putting on a Bit and isn’t it so funny that she struggles so much against such a simple process, ha ha ha, look as she tries to pull his arm away from her neck, as she mockingly puts on a fake smile except I’m not trying to be funny, I’m on the verge of a panic attack and I’m simply finding it a little difficult to smile about that!!!!

I guess I manage to hold a face for the camera and soon enough the arm unwraps itself. Everyone is still looking at me, maybe waiting for a closing act to the Bit I’ve apparently been doing. I can’t think of a funny way to end it so I shout “STOP LOOKING AT ME”, and it feels like the words of a woman gripping to the edge of herself but, of course, everyone laughs and goes along with the Bit. I’m grateful for it.

The group dissipates and I sit quietly for a while, not wanting to make myself obvious by rushing out of the room to cry, which is what I really want to do.

Nobody notices, and I am grateful.

I saw the picture the next day, posted without a second thought - despite always claiming that she always checks with me before posting anything of me - on my mother’s Facebook. I look fine on it. Not stressed, or panicky. I even look less uncomfortable in it that I do in most pictures where I’m genuinely trying to smile.

I don’t know. I guess I’m way too good at faking it at this point. That’s probably very telling, but whatever. I’m grateful for it.

[quietlyhere]

24th April 2016, 12am.

I often wish I wasn’t so reasonable.

I know that sounds fucking stupid and martyr-ish but I just mean... like, I’ll feel annoyed or irritated about something and I immediately rationalise it away. Even if I later go back to thinking about why I was annoyed, and realise that it was a perfectly acceptable thing to be annoyed about, I’ll only dismiss the feeling again, like “no you’re being irrational now - stop dwelling on silly things”. But then of course I’ll still feel bad, then doubly bad for “being silly about it”.

I’m explaining this badly, because even right now, I’m thinking that this is a stupid thing to be bothered about. Vicious bloody cycle!

I just give people excuses. I try to see it from their point of view and rationalise the situation, and subjectively, it seems like the very sensible thing to do. Yet in doing so, I end up invalidating my own feelings. I train myself to think that I don’t deserve to feel angry or jealous or disappointed simply because there’s a good enough reason, or even a reason at all, that this situation arose.

Okay.

So. My mum has been struggling with her dad’s death, and to add to it all, she’s lately become less and less happy with work and so more and more disillusioned with the way her life is going. It’s all a perfectly understandable situation.

The other day, she said to me something along the lines of “I wish I could live your life for a while”.

Okay. So like. That’s totally understandable!! I am not working right now and I am living in her house for very little rent and I sleep a lot and I do not appear to have very many stresses in my life. That’s the freeloader dream, or whatever! Imagine going from like a 60hr a week job to doing fuck all every day! That’d be amazing!!!

And yet

How fucking dare she? How could she look at a person who has been severely depressed for so long and think that that’s a totally cool, perfectly acceptable, throwaway comment? Does she think that I chose this? Does she not hear me when I say that I am genuinely trying? I want to work. I want to earn money and get out of here and build my own life and be a human being. I’m twenty-fucking-three years old! I want to be in a place where achievements count as promotions or successful relationships, not where I have to feel like a trooper for taking a shower or going to the shop to buy milk. 

It’s not a good life, it’s not a stress-free life, and it’s certainly not a happy life. It’s not a life at all. And to say something like that to me shows a basic misunderstanding of a situation that I thought she understood more than anyone. And it’s infuriating, and upsetting, and

Totally understandable.

It’s totally understandable that she’d feel that way and I can’t hold it against her.

I think I said something like “you’d probably get bored” and just moved on.

[quietlyhere]

17th April 2016, 12am.

So... I guess I’ll finally write about my thing with doctors. 

I’ve been thinking about this a lot lately, because I was looking online the other day for how to go about switching GP and it seems like the woman I’m about to write about isn’t working locally any more. Let’s hope, for the good of everyone, that she’s retired completely.

But anyway.

I think I was probably around 14 or 15 years old when I... became depressive? I don’t know. Obviously there’s not really a sudden, definite “oh no, I’m sad now” moment, and of course, at that age, I put any changes in myself down to puberty. 

(Insert here a whole thing about how I’m pretty sure the two are linked for me anyway, in a chemical sense, but that’s for another time)

So yeah. I figured that whatever was happening was normal, that I was simply riding that crazy teen coaster to adulthood, or whatever. It wasn’t until I was about... 17, I think(??? Or 16? I don’t know) that I finally stopped and thought, no, this isn’t right. Puberty makes you sleep a lot but I’m tired in a whole new way. Hormones make you have mood swings but my mood seems to have gotten stuck at the bottom. Teenagers are stereotypically lazy but I am at a whole new level of apathetic mental stagnation. 

Praise be the fact that I am of a Google generation, because I don’t know what I would have done if I couldn’t just look this stuff up online. Gone into the library, checked through the set of Encyclopedia Britannica for the word “sad”? 

As it was, I ended up on an online quiz and tested pretty highly for depression. But, as much as I always love a overly simplistic personality test, I wasn’t an idiot. A bunch of arbitrary questions without context couldn’t give me a real diagnosis, so I researched it and read up on first-hand accounts and, ultimately, found myself on the NHS Choices website. They said the same thing most of the other sites had said, of course, but they said it in an NHS voice. “Talk to your doctor if you have any questions”.

I called and made the appointment myself, for the first time in my life (this was back when making a doctor’s appointment was as simple as that) and they gave me a time and a place to be and that was that.

Obviously I was nervous. I don’t like going to the doctor’s office anyway because I can never seem to explain myself properly, and I get nervous under the pressure of having one person’s full attention, specifically a person who is making notes on you that you can’t see. So I kind of practiced a little, made sure I knew what I wanted to ask. I was only going in to talk, like the website told me to, and I didn’t want to waste anybody’s time. 

It took a lot for me to go to that appointment. I was so scared of finally revealing to someone what had been going on inside my head, of exposing a part of myself that I had at that point already kept hidden for several years. I think, too, that someone else - my mum or my dad - was home, for some reason, when I was leaving to go to the appointment and so, to add to it all, I had to lie and pretend I was fine. I feel sick even now remembering the way I felt that day.

But I got there. I got to the office, I spoke to the receptionist without bursting into tears, I sat quietly in the waiting room and watched a kid play with the little block set they have there. I readied myself for what I was about to say, and when my name was called, I stood up and even managed to smile at the nurse who showed me to the right room.

Now, I don’t remember exactly what was said, verbatim. I mean, it was like 6 or 7 years ago. But what I do remember, vividly, is saying the words that I’d internally practiced over and over again:  “I just wanted to talk to you today because I have some questions about depression”.

That was it. Those are the exact words I said.

Immediately, this doctor - obviously I’m not going to say her real name, but let’s call her Dr C - went into diagnosis mode. Which is fair enough, sure; people generally go into a doctor’s office for diagnosis, which generally leads to a prognosis, which generally includes a prescription (spoiler alert: that is where we are headed) and then people can be better. That’s good healthcare!

But that’s not what I wanted. I responded to her questions because I was thrown by her dismissal of my practiced opening statement, and then I told her again that I really just wanted to talk about it, that I’d been on the NHS website and I--

She cut me off. 

She didn’t have any emotion on her face. I remember that vividly too. She went back into asking probing questions, no sense of empathy, like I was wasting her time by being yet another whiny teenager or something.

It was like a punch in the gut. I’d been so nervous to talk, tried so hard to overcome those nerves, prepared with what I needed to say. Yet Dr C simply cut me off and moved along, followed through the motions of filling out a form with my flustered answers and then

and then

handed me a prescription for anti-depressants.

At some point I had started crying. I guess she thought it was the nature of the questions, and it was, but it was also her. Now, I’ve cried in a doctor’s office before. I’ve sobbed at stupid embarrassing stuff and, every time, they’ve patiently let me get a hold of myself, given me access to their box of tissues, waited until I was ready to move on. Good old Dr C did not give a shit. No, she just handed me that prescription and bid me adieu.

I wasn’t even in there 5 minutes.

I was in shock. I slipped into the bathroom, tried to breathe, cleaned myself up a bit, and walked back out across the waiting room. I went and got the prescription, silently waited in the pharmacy while they filled it out, then walked back home. I think I actually started crying again at some point while walking home, so when I got back into the house, I remember pretending to desperately need to loo so that I could run upstairs without showing my face and hide in a locked room.

 So. Yeah.

I didn’t even mention the word depression to a single person for another 3 years after that.

And I never took those pills. I read up on them soon after, because of course Dr C didn’t really explain what they were, and they weren’t anything particularly strong. But they stood for something that I wasn’t ready for. 

Aaaannd of course Dr C never followed up with me on any of this, despite being one of my brother’s doctors and knowing my mother. Which was a good thing for me, obviously, but objectively just makes you wonder how a woman with zero bedside manner and zero heart managed to become a partner at a GPs office.

Anyway, I have more doctor-wary stories but this is long and this was the main one I felt like I should write about. Aaand I did. So bye.

[quietlyhere]

20th November 2015, 8:20pm.

If I had stayed on my uni course I would have graduated yesterday. And it would have been in one of my favourite buildings in one of my favourite towns. And I would have met David Bradley (who was the guest speaker). And I might have had a job offer, or at least a promising Apprenticeship, or some sort of career prospects. And I might have still had friends. And I might have found some stability.

Instead I am sorting through old pictures of my grandad, who passed away three days ago. 

All I feel is bitter and numb.

[quietlyhere]

10th September 2015, 7:30pm.

I forgot this existed.

I mean, I didn’t completely forget. I remember making the blog and occasionally using it, but I didn’t think I’d used it this much. It’s horrible reading it back. It’s really, really awful.

I can’t believe that was two years ago; it feels so recent. Although, having said that, there’s a weird sort of mist around the memories. I remember it all, of course, but it took me a second to remember the unnamed people and the classes and stuff. I guess that sort of shows what state of mind I was in then.

A lot has happened since then.

I still have Depression. Honestly, it feels like it’s something I’m always going to have to live with. I am, understandably, not amazingly happy about that. But I’m trying really hard to... you know, keep on keepin’ on.

Um, so I can’t be bothered updating everything in detail, so let’s go for the cliffsnotes version.

Failed out of uni 

Forced to admit Depression to parents

Moved back home and spent a while, just... not being a person

Basically lost all my friends?

Dark times there is no denying

Ummm... I can’t remember

Jobhunting

God, what have I even been doing for the past two years?

Just a lot of unsuccessful job hunting, working at places for free to get experience

Earlier this year I went to America for six weeks, pretty much just to not be in the same place anymore

(The whole experience was just not as fulfilling as I feel I may have led people to believe)

Now I’m back to jobhunting

That is very much cliffsnotes because the start of that - the dropping out, the losing all my friends - was very convoluted and messy and maybe I’ll go into it one day, but today is not that day.

I’m not taking meds for Depression any more. I tried so many different kinds and they all just made me lethargic and made my hair fall out and made my weight fluctuate like crazy, and they did not help at all. 

I tried some more counselling, I tried some Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (which, I discovered, my Dad has also been through, as he’s struggled with Depression a lot in his life... so that’s a thing) I tried out a load of hobbies and sports and distraction techniques. None of it has worked for me.

I think my parents think I’m better. Although... I think they’re probably second-guessing that now I’m back to job-hunting and (since I’d much rather do it online) that means a lot of staying inside the house and being on my laptop and not doing much else. I’m refusing to go back on jsa because it makes me want to actually throw myself out the window of their offices, so I am very poor and fast running out of money.

All I’m focusing on now is getting a job and saving up some money. Hopefully I’ll be able to get to a point soon enough where I can move out (because as much as I love my parents and they are like my best friends, I am nearly 23 and I have just reached that point).

After that, it’s all about routine to keep me stable and trying to find little bit of happiness and light where I can.

I am making a real effort to be optimistic.

[quietlyhere]

13th October 2013, 2am.

I watched that episode of Glee to commemorate Cory Monteith. I haven't watched Glee in a long time but, I don't know, I did use to watch it, and I guess Cory was a figure in my life and I kind of needed that closure or whatever.

Anyway, even though it was about saying goodbye to Finn, the character, all I could think of was Cory, the person, and the circumstances around his death.

I tried not to pay attention to the press around it, but from what I understand, it was related to his recent struggles with his addiction, and as far as I can tell, that addiction may have stemmed from depression? I don't know.

Anyway. Maybe I got triggered or something? I don't know how that stuff works but I kind of feel like I'm in this box and someone closed it and I'm sort of suffocating a little bit and. God, I don't know. Lately it's like I can't forget that I'm sad, even for a little while.

I want to go back to denial because, they're wrong, admitting it doesn't help.

It feels like nothing is happening.

[quietlyhere]

11th August 2013, 7:30pm.

I am so tired.

I am so stressed, and so very tired. I have so much to do, but I just don't seem to have the energy for it. All I want to do is sleep forever.

I'm so, so tired.

[quietlyhere]

7th August 2013, 2:30am.

Here is a list of facts:

I have Depression

I am trying my best to combat it

I am following advice from doctors and counselors and regularly taking medication

it is not getting better

Here is a list of decisions:

I decided that, since it is not getting better, I am no longer going to be able to keep it a secret

I decided to tell my parents this summer

I made that decision about two months ago

I decided against this not soon after

Here is a list of context:

Ridiculously behind on Uni work

Brother accused of four counts of possession of Class A drugs and one count of intent to sell

Brother finally openly admits drug addiction

Dog gets sick

Dog dies 

Actually, dog dies in a situation eerily close to what it was like when my grandmother died

(Dog, by the way, who had been a part of my family for over half my life, who was my - dumb as it sounds - best friend and only non-professional who ever helped with my depression)

Dad hit hard by dog death

Mum stressed beyond belief about brother and dog and dad and new job and friends

Brother in scarily familiar state of Depression

(Brother tries to describe panic attack to me, act like it's all news)

Mum's mood all over the place; not eating properly

Mum's best friend's dad (v close family friends) dying of cancer

Trying to act fine about dead dog

Totally not fine 

About anything

Practiced in the art of Faking Okay

Too good, in fact; too much expected of me

Unable to complete Uni work due to Depression (why work for a future you don't want?)

And through an incapability of approaching it openly since my parents think all my work is done since I told them that since I lied to them since

Since I can't tell them they have two children with Depression, one with a drug problem/conviction, and one with suicidal thoughts

Here is a list of consequences:

Uni work not done

Going to fail out of uni (debt/ jobless/ prospectless/ let everyone down/ even less reason to live/ let's ignore how pathetic that sounds)

Heading to brother's court sesh next week. Family fun time.

Fingers crossed I manage to keep it together enough to keep my family together.

Then? I don't know.

Take it from there.