Processing

It’s been a good couple of weeks now since I started to feel better.

It makes me hopeful that this is going to be a sustained upturn – not just a blip in the other direction from usual.

It is SO GOOD to be feeling more stable.

It’s also made me realise that I have an awful lot of scars (metaphorical and literal) to process from over the last couple of years.

When I was in the thick of it, I think that every day was so damned difficult that I didn’t really have the mental space to reflect, analyse and come to terms with what has been.

Now, I do.

Now, rather than just needing someone to sit next to me and hold my hand and not say anything, I feel like I need to talk and talk and talk.

Tom’s had a tough week this week with something that may just be normal teasing, or may be bullying. But one of the things he told me about made my heart skip a beat – because I thought it was going to relate to his mental mother.

It didn’t – but it made me realise that I have an awful lot of talking to do about how my illness has affected my children.

At some point, they’re going to realise that the scars I wear are not cat scratches, and I need to work out in advance how I’m going to deal with that.

I need to do a lot of talking about the suicide attempts. I’m finally in a place where I’m so thankful that I didn’t succeed, but – without wishing to sound melodramatic – I think I have a bit of residual PTSD around them. Certainly, now I’m not consumed with the awfulness of the here and now, I’m thinking a lot more about how horrific those times were and realising that I need some help processing the thoughts surrounding them.

I also have a whole lot of guilt to deal with. I’ve sent Ian, my family and my friends to hell and back because of this illness, and while I’m beginning to accept that it wasn’t my fault, I still feel this desperate need to overcompensate and pay back everything that everyone has done for me.

I suppose these are things that I’ll deal with in psychotherapy, when that eventually happens.

For now, though, I’m so grateful to God that he’s reached down into the pit, sat with me while I couldn’t get out, and then shown me how to begin the big climb back to daylight.

Even at my sickest – even though I committed the unforgivable sin of attempting to kill myself – I never doubted he was with me.

My longing to die was not because I had lost my faith in him, but because I wanted so desperately to leave this life and enter eternity with him.

I know I went about that in the wrong way.

And for that, I am so, so glad that we have a God who forgives.

 

A fragile okay

As the Easter weekend draws in, I’m in reflective mood.

Last Easter – last Good Friday – I fell apart.

I was all set to end my life, and if Ian and Lindsey hadn’t intervened, I would have done.

This year, I’m okay.

Would I say I’m well? To be honest, not entirely. It’s been a tough week of too much work, not enough time, too many other commitments. As a result, my anxiety has been through the roof. I’ve hardly slept; I’ve felt sick and shaky with palpitations and an enormous sense of dread, of the thought that everything was about to come crashing down around me. I’ve been snappy and irritable and tearful at times.

But while I’m not where I want to be mentally, I’m not where I was.

I don’t know whether it’s healthy to read back over these blog posts; maybe not. But I have been, recently, and they’ve shocked me – even though I wrote them myself.

In the darkest times, I thought I was a fraud, putting it on, making a meal of things. I thought I should just be able to pull myself together.

Reading back, I don’t see that. I see someone who was very, very unwell. Someone who is extremely lucky to be here today.

This Easter, I’m in a different place.

I haven’t achieved the sortedness I long for – but I’m feeling more okay with that.

The person I want to be – the person who’s outgoing and gregarious, always ‘up,’ who can talk to anyone without squirming inside, who thrives on being with other people, who takes everything in her stride – that’s not me. Even if I recover 100 per cent, it’s not going to be me. Never has been, never will be.

I’m an introvert, a worrier, too serious, too melancholy, too needy. I’m impatient, I have a temper, I’m ultimately self-serving and sinful.

But that’s not depression. That’s me – and I need to come to terms with me. I haven’t yet; I’ve been deeply uncomfortable with me since as far back as I can remember. But I’m a work in progress.

And I am in a different place.

I’m looking forward to Easter this year. I’m looking forward to time spent with my family, and with my church family. I’m not planning, as I was last year, my route around the local shops after the Good Friday service to buy enough tablets to kill myself.

So I’m feeling reflective – and thankful.

Thankful for the medication that has helped to level things out a bit.

Thankful for Ian and the children, who give me a reason to live.

Thankful that God has been at work in the things I’ve messed up, and provided work that is compatible with my mental health.

Thankful for my friends who have unfailingly been there even though they could have run a mile.

Thankful that I feel now that I can ride out the downs and keep looking towards the ups.

And most of all, thankful to the Lord, who has, again and again, pulled me out of the pit.

Acceptance

One of the things we talked about on Tuesday, at my psychology review, was acceptance – the A part of ACT.

We were making a crisis plan for those times when all I can think of is taking my life, listing reasons why I shouldn’t and strategies for stopping myself.

One of the strategies for stopping myself was acceptance.

It sounds strange, listing acceptance of my illness as a reason not to kill myself. More often, I see it as a reason to just do it.

But it kind of made sense.

The thinking behind it is that I just need to accept that this is the way it is. That at times, things are going to feel so black that I’m going to want to commit suicide.

But I don’t have to.

It was actually a powerful thing to acknowledge.

Over the past few weeks, since having my meds changed, I’ve felt better. Not 100 per cent; far from it. But noticeably better than I have for a while.

But even though I’m feeling more together overall, the suicidal thoughts are never far away. There have still been days this week when I’ve gone to bed formulating a plan to kill, or at least hurt, myself.

The telling thing is that I haven’t done it. By the time I’ve woken up in the morning, that moment has passed, and the idea of putting blade to skin or swallowing four packets of tablets is far away.

I think this is what acceptance means.

It’s what my previous psych said: ‘You need to accept that you are always going to have these feelings.’

At the time, that seemed so negative, so overwhelming. I couldn’t see a way of living with thoughts so strong and destructive.

But I realise now that that’s exactly what I *am* doing.

And it’s okay. They are intense and frightening and compelling, but I haven’t acted on them and I’ve got through them.

My psychologist, for all that she probably thinks I’m nuts (okay, I am, but…), has been very accepting of my faith, and asked me on Tuesday what part my spirituality could play in my crisis plan.

It occurred to me at that point that the psychological strategy of acceptance of my suicidal thoughts, of the fact that depression is part of me, of the likelihood that I’m never going to be entirely free of it, is the same as acceptance of God’s plan.

He is doing this for a reason. He hasn’t healed me for a reason. He has helped me survive suicide attempts and resist trying again for a reason.

I don’t know what the reason is yet. It may simply be to make me more humble, less proud, more aware of my great need for salvation. It may be that at some point, I’ll be able to use my experiences to help someone else struggling with mental health. Maybe my beautiful daughter will grown up to be plagued with mental health problems, and I – unlike my own mother – will be able to help her with them from the position of someone who understands what it’s like. Who knows, one day, maybe I’ll write that bestselling YA novel about living with depression, self-harm and suicidal thoughts.

But even though I don’t yet know what it is, I know there is a reason. There is a plan.

So there are two things I need to accept.

1. I am ill, it’s not going away. It might be better; it might not. I may struggle with depression for the rest of my life. But I’ve got this far. I can keep going.
2. This whole ‘mess’ is not a mess, but is God’s plan and purpose.

I’m praying tonight not for healing, but for the grace to accept that this is how it is. It’s not always going to be pretty. But God knows best, and I’m in his hands.

What’s real and what’s illness?

It’s so hard to separate out what’s real and what is depression talking.

My friends are ignoring me. Or is that just my perception?

My children are worse behaved than anyone else’s. Is it my fault, or are they actually just normal kids?

My house is a tip. Is it because I’m a domestic slut, or is it just a typical family-of-four home?

I feel judged by everyone at church. Is that true – or is it my own heightened awareness of my sin?

My husband is sick of me and wants out. Or is he sick of the illness and desperate to make things better?

I am lonely and lost and forgotten and unlikeable and worthless. I don’t want to be here any more, and everyone would be better off without me.

Is that depression?

I think not.

It’s real and true.

It’s not my illness – it’s the fact of me being me.

Someone who just sucks and saps and drains.

It’s real.

 

50 reasons why I hate myself

1. I’m fat.
2. I’m a rubbish mother.
3. I don’t help with homework.
4. My house is a mess.
5. I’m covered in scars.
6. Every day, I feel like killing myself.
7. I don’t pray enough.
8. I don’t read my Bible enough.
9. I hate playing with my children.
10. I need time alone and get ratty if I don’t get it.
11. I’m lazy.
12. I’m needy and burdensome.
13. I take take take all the time and never give.
14. I’m impatient.
15. I say I trust in God but I don’t feel him with me.
16. I’m hopeless at praying and reading the Bible with the children.
17. I don’t call my mum enough.
18. I have no contact with my father but take his money.
19. I waste money on stuff I don’t need.
20. I sin and sin and sin and sin.
21. I’m ugly.
22. I have no real friends.
23. People dread seeing me.
24. I don’t like having sex.
25. I’m scared of Australia.
26. I don’t iron.
27. I leave my clothes pegs on the line overnight.
28. I get so tired.
29. I’m a rubbish driver.
30. I nag.
31. I hate being touched because it might lead to sex.
32. I stay up late when Ian wants to sleep, and go to bed early when he wants me to stay up.
33. I keep praying for God to take my life.
34. I keep fantasising about jumping off that motorway bridge.
35. I’m a terrible friend.
36. I’m self-obsessed.
37. I want to self-harm so much.
38. I can’t go into the chemist without wanting to buy enough tablets to wipe myself out.
39. My kids are known to social services because of me.
40. I drink too much because it numbs the feelings.
41. I don’t feel that God cares.
42. I don’t think he listens to me.
43. I’m married to a non-Christian and that means I’m not a proper Christian.
44. I want to go to sleep and never wake up.
45. I want to die.
46. I want to die.
47. I want to die.
48. I want to die.
49. I don’t know how to do it but
50. I want to die.

So confused

I just don’t know what I’m doing with myself.

I don’t know whether the things I’m thinking are real or are illness.

I’m absolutely full of self-doubt and self-loathing and the feeling that everyone else loathes me too. I’m no good for or to anyone.

I should pick up the phone and call the CPN but I don’t want to listen to her telling me that I’m brave, I’m strong, I’m doing well when I know I’m not.

My head is a mess and I’m so tired of it all.

Trying

I’m trying so very hard at the moment. Trying to get myself sorted out. I’ve got myself back on Weight Watchers at last; I was honest with the psych last week about how bad things have been and have had my meds increased; I’m pushing through when my ‘passengers’ are trying to drag me down with negative thinking and focusing on what’s important to me.

I think everyone would say that I seem much ‘better’ at the moment. I’m trying to smile when I don’t feel like it, talk to people when my brain is telling me to run away, socialise when I’m sure no one actually wants to be with me, work when I just want to sleep.

But it all feels like a front.

It’s all very well ignoring the negative thinking and carrying on with life as normal, but inside I still feel hopeless, worthless, nothing and no one.

Even though I’m not acting on the instincts to isolate myself, to hurt myself, they’re still there. It’s exhausting trying not to listen to them. Absolutely exhausting.

I’m still having a complete crisis of confidence about church.

About my ‘work’ there – because how can someone as broken and sinful as me, a suicide survivor, scarred inside and out, married to a non-Christian, have any right or authority to be involved in children’s work?

About my responsibility for my children, when I’m the only parent involved in discipling them and am doing such an awful job of it.

And about just being there in general, when I feel so intensely that I don’t fit in, that I’m not a proper, sorted Christian, a good representative of the church, a good witness to the Lord, but someone who has messed up her life in just about every way imaginable.

I’ve always felt on the fringes because I don’t have a husband to take to church, and my mental health has made me feel even more excluded.

I’m trying to ignore the voices that are saying, ‘Quit everything you do there, before you’re pushed; stop going and find somewhere else where no one knows what a screw-up you are. And you know what, you can’t possibly be forgiven for what you’ve done.’ But they’re eating away at me all the time.

I so, so need to talk to someone about all this, but I don’t know where to go. The obvious answer is to take it to God, and I’m praying so hard for answers, for guidance.

But I need a real-life ear and shoulder, too. I need someone to tell me honestly if my fears are grounded in truth, if I should just step away from everything I’m involved in, or if it’s my paranoia getting the better of me.

Everyone else seems so together, and I’m still in bits. I feel like my finger is constantly hovering over the self-destruct button, and if the voices get any louder I know I’m going to do something that I’ll end up regretting.

If only trying was enough.