At the weekend the Southbank Centre in London held the #ChangingMindsFest, a weekend long festival dedicated to mental health. I had seen it advertised and thought about going, but that was before I started to become more ill in December and stopped really organising things to do.
As part of A Day In The Life, they invited contributions answering the questions:
"How was your day, what made your mental health better and what made it worse?"
I decided to submit the speech I made at the TUC Mental Health & Austerity event that day, and just found out that it was included. The slideshow played for 36 hours on a loop at the Southbank.
My answer are slides 11 - 24, with a content note for suicide.
Showing posts with label recovery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label recovery. Show all posts
Monday, 8 February 2016
Sunday, 6 October 2013
On activism.
Trigger warning for discussion of suicide, depression, eating disorders, fascism, racism, the police, medication, self harm
We're exhausted. We've either just finished a fifty-hour work week with a conference and a night of drinking at the weekend, or we're struggling to cope with the effect our clinical depression is having on our assignments and attendance at uni, or we're trying to do all of these things at once. We are planning the next protest, the next demo, the next conference, but forget to plan in a meal. We try to take care of one another but never take care of ourselves. We haven't slept properly in months.
We're fed up. We're fed up of explaining to our family why you can't separate the politics from the person. Fed up of being told we should respect members of a party who are literally taking money from those who need it to survive and killing them, fed up of being told to shut up and listen to someone who thinks we shouldn't have the right to control our own bodies, fed up of racist immigration controls and fascists given airtime and just about every decision made at the top, with no thought of those at the bottom. We are angry, so angry, that we don't know what to do with it. Sometimes we collapse, exhausted, in floods of tears, because we cannot for the life of us understand why anyone could do this to another human being. We cry on one another, we support one another, we give one another hope that tomorrow can be better. We miss the release of the razor.
We've been arrested recently, we've been manhandled by the police, thrown mercilessly to the ground by several officers, and peers have the audacity to claim that this was somehow justifiable. We've been banned from protesting on our own campuses. We've been left in a cell mid-panic attack, and released 48 hours later. We're sick of people telling us that there's nothing wrong with the police, and we're sick of the state letting fascists march down our roads. We drag ourselves out of bed and stand as a blockade, trying to deal with the police and the fascists and the voice in our head telling us to kill ourselves. We have a panic attack in the kettle, and the police won't let us out. We go home and sleep for twenty hours.
We're counting the pennies to have enough to buy our medication in England, or we're sitting in Scotland and Northern Ireland feeling sorry for those who don't get them for free. We're hopelessly waiting for the next psychiatrist appointment, we're still at the bottom of the CBT waiting list, we don't know how to explain why we can't eat or sleep and we don't know what to say to our friends who are feeling like this too. We have enough scars between us to tell a hundred stories. We have to leave our medication on the kitchen table or we won't remember to take it, or the thoughts will come back again. Our interactions with people take place via the internet.
We spend weeks looking forward to seeing one another, to spend time with those we love, those who understand. But then we spend too much time awake wanting to die. Or rather, something triggers it, and then suddenly we've spent the cost of two return trips to the UK on a flight home from London because we didn't trust ourselves to be alone in a place with tubes and not try to commit suicide again, all the valium in the world would not shut up the voices inside our heads, and the only way we feel like we can talk about these experiences is through writing a blog on a Sunday night. Or maybe that's just me. And we worry that writing about this will make people concerned. But we don't know what else to do.
We have dysfunctional relationships within our activist circles, mostly because they're our friendship circles too, and our room mates, and half the time we work with one another, too. We have issues with attachment, we have issues with self-worth, we have a fucked up head and we don't know what to do with it, so we hurt one another. Our relationships are unstable, like our health. We can't be there for one another, because it's happening to everyone. We cry alone in our rooms because we don't want to be a burden.
We can't reconcile our feminism with our own bodies. We can't stop ourselves developing eating disorders, but we curse ourselves for not being able to fight it. We restrict, we binge, we purge, but most importantly, we keep it a secret. We all have problems and we don't want to look like we're asking for sympathy, even when we're in tears each night because we had the audacity to allow our bodies to consume food. We can't look at ourselves in the mirror without our lip shaking. We preach body positivity, we deplore body shaming, and we berate ourselves for wishing we were thinner.
We can't escape. We can't escape because even when we have left the demo, even when we have stopped talking about welfare reforms, when we have stopped arguing with Tories, we are left in this world we live in. We are left in this place that condemns us for being ill, that hates us because we are women, that will leave us to die because we are disabled. To separate the politics from the person we recognise that one must be privileged enough to remain unaffected by the politics. We spend every single fucking minute living in this hell of a patriarchal capitalist shit hole that has dragged each and every one of us to the bottom, and is determined to keep us there, no matter how much our arms flail and our hearts ache from the pain of it all. It wants to kill us and it will not stop until we are dead.
We try to keep telling ourselves that we need to be the living breathing reminder for others that there is good in the world, that there is hope, that there is pain but that there is also art, but eventually we break. Eventually, we stop telling ourselves that, and we stop being that person for other people. We want to cling to hope, to live by Andrea Gibson's words that all they knew of hate was that it couldn't beat the love out of me, but one day we stop. We can't do it anymore. We can't keep pretending that we're winning this fight, because we aren't. We're losing. We're broken. They've broken us. All that is left to do is write.
We're exhausted. We've either just finished a fifty-hour work week with a conference and a night of drinking at the weekend, or we're struggling to cope with the effect our clinical depression is having on our assignments and attendance at uni, or we're trying to do all of these things at once. We are planning the next protest, the next demo, the next conference, but forget to plan in a meal. We try to take care of one another but never take care of ourselves. We haven't slept properly in months.
We're fed up. We're fed up of explaining to our family why you can't separate the politics from the person. Fed up of being told we should respect members of a party who are literally taking money from those who need it to survive and killing them, fed up of being told to shut up and listen to someone who thinks we shouldn't have the right to control our own bodies, fed up of racist immigration controls and fascists given airtime and just about every decision made at the top, with no thought of those at the bottom. We are angry, so angry, that we don't know what to do with it. Sometimes we collapse, exhausted, in floods of tears, because we cannot for the life of us understand why anyone could do this to another human being. We cry on one another, we support one another, we give one another hope that tomorrow can be better. We miss the release of the razor.
We've been arrested recently, we've been manhandled by the police, thrown mercilessly to the ground by several officers, and peers have the audacity to claim that this was somehow justifiable. We've been banned from protesting on our own campuses. We've been left in a cell mid-panic attack, and released 48 hours later. We're sick of people telling us that there's nothing wrong with the police, and we're sick of the state letting fascists march down our roads. We drag ourselves out of bed and stand as a blockade, trying to deal with the police and the fascists and the voice in our head telling us to kill ourselves. We have a panic attack in the kettle, and the police won't let us out. We go home and sleep for twenty hours.
We're counting the pennies to have enough to buy our medication in England, or we're sitting in Scotland and Northern Ireland feeling sorry for those who don't get them for free. We're hopelessly waiting for the next psychiatrist appointment, we're still at the bottom of the CBT waiting list, we don't know how to explain why we can't eat or sleep and we don't know what to say to our friends who are feeling like this too. We have enough scars between us to tell a hundred stories. We have to leave our medication on the kitchen table or we won't remember to take it, or the thoughts will come back again. Our interactions with people take place via the internet.
We spend weeks looking forward to seeing one another, to spend time with those we love, those who understand. But then we spend too much time awake wanting to die. Or rather, something triggers it, and then suddenly we've spent the cost of two return trips to the UK on a flight home from London because we didn't trust ourselves to be alone in a place with tubes and not try to commit suicide again, all the valium in the world would not shut up the voices inside our heads, and the only way we feel like we can talk about these experiences is through writing a blog on a Sunday night. Or maybe that's just me. And we worry that writing about this will make people concerned. But we don't know what else to do.
We have dysfunctional relationships within our activist circles, mostly because they're our friendship circles too, and our room mates, and half the time we work with one another, too. We have issues with attachment, we have issues with self-worth, we have a fucked up head and we don't know what to do with it, so we hurt one another. Our relationships are unstable, like our health. We can't be there for one another, because it's happening to everyone. We cry alone in our rooms because we don't want to be a burden.
We can't reconcile our feminism with our own bodies. We can't stop ourselves developing eating disorders, but we curse ourselves for not being able to fight it. We restrict, we binge, we purge, but most importantly, we keep it a secret. We all have problems and we don't want to look like we're asking for sympathy, even when we're in tears each night because we had the audacity to allow our bodies to consume food. We can't look at ourselves in the mirror without our lip shaking. We preach body positivity, we deplore body shaming, and we berate ourselves for wishing we were thinner.
We can't escape. We can't escape because even when we have left the demo, even when we have stopped talking about welfare reforms, when we have stopped arguing with Tories, we are left in this world we live in. We are left in this place that condemns us for being ill, that hates us because we are women, that will leave us to die because we are disabled. To separate the politics from the person we recognise that one must be privileged enough to remain unaffected by the politics. We spend every single fucking minute living in this hell of a patriarchal capitalist shit hole that has dragged each and every one of us to the bottom, and is determined to keep us there, no matter how much our arms flail and our hearts ache from the pain of it all. It wants to kill us and it will not stop until we are dead.
We try to keep telling ourselves that we need to be the living breathing reminder for others that there is good in the world, that there is hope, that there is pain but that there is also art, but eventually we break. Eventually, we stop telling ourselves that, and we stop being that person for other people. We want to cling to hope, to live by Andrea Gibson's words that all they knew of hate was that it couldn't beat the love out of me, but one day we stop. We can't do it anymore. We can't keep pretending that we're winning this fight, because we aren't. We're losing. We're broken. They've broken us. All that is left to do is write.
Wednesday, 13 February 2013
Blogs, by their very nature, are self-indulgent. I discussed this with my friend a few days ago (who I know will not read this because she makes a conscious effort not to read blogs for that very reason), and we both agreed. I mean, they are. Regardless of what you write about (with possibly a few exceptions), most blogs are rather self-indulgent. But that doesn't always mean it's a bad thing.
I'm exhausted. This week I've spent more time meeting with university and disability services staff than I have in class. Granted, I'm not in for very long every week, but that's still a lot of meetings. For someone who has spent the last three months depressed, anxious, suicidal, and keeping herself out of hospital, it has been hard to try to get back into the routine of university. It's only Week 3 and I already feel like I could keel over and sleep for a year. It's the kind of exhaustion that I can feel in my legs, the kind that stops me from making meals and having showers, and the kind that doesn't care about making meals and having showers. I am just too tired. I don't know if it's exhaustion or depression, but I also don't have the energy to care which it is.
We keep talking about self care. We keep talking about taking time out for ourselves whenever we need it, making sure that we are healthy and reasonably happy, in order to best do our jobs and best represent the students we've been elected to work for. But when we do just that, I can't help but feel there is always someone rolling their eyes behind your back. There is always someone quick to point out what you're doing wrong, and whilst I know that is part and parcel of the job (and I fully accept and think it is right that people criticise us- I mean, we need to be held to account), at times when I am not 100% it is difficult to deal with. And unfortunately, I'm rarely at 100%. I haven't been 'at 100%' for the duration of my degree, so far. And I wasn't well during my A Levels. Or my GCSEs.. so the problem is, where is the line? Where does self care begin and end? Should I even be doing what I'm doing in the first place?
I didn't get accepted for a programme I applied for this summer (I'm on the reserve list, but people rarely drop out), and whilst I was initially disappointed, I couldn't help but notice the little thought inside my head that told me, realistically, it would be worse to have been accepted and then not to have been able to take up my place- the regulations note that you have to be 'healthy enough to travel', and considering the programme, it isn't unreasonable. And now I (though it would more likely be my parents) won't be forced into making the choice as to whether I'm 'well' enough to go away for ten weeks.
But I'm still left with what is my life here. I study full time and essentially work part time in three different jobs. Luckily only one has contracted hours (the paid one), but even at that, the one shift I do will wear me out for the rest of the day. The good thing about the student newspaper and, to a lesser extent NUS-USI, is that I work from home and when I can, so I don't notice a 'set' amount of hours, but even things like spending an afternoon trying to catch up on emails or write reports for committees or try in vain to contact the different unions I represent can knock me out entirely.
So what do I do? It is a question I am struggling with a lot. I have decided to spread my third year in university out into three terms- nothing is finalised but I'm hoping that will take off some of the pressure uni-wise, even though it means I won't graduate with my year and I probably will have another year of student loans to take out. I still have to be re-elected as Women's Officer for next year, and next year will be my last. Someone else will take over as News Editor for The Gown come June. But is it enough? Really, is it enough? Or will I have to accept the fact that this is a chronic condition and doesn't appear to be going away any time soon, and try to make the best out of a bad situation? I am doing what I can but I know it is not enough- it isn't up to my standards of what a News Editor or a Women's Officer or full-time student should be doing. Maybe I am spreading myself too thin, and maybe I need to remember occasionally that I came here a year and a half ago to try to do a degree, something I am reminded of every time I have to miss classes to go to conferences or London or when I can't get out of bed in the morning.
This blog is self-indulgent. It is a way in which, as strange as this seems, my best friends, who I don't get to see very often (a mix of oceans between us/everyone has jobs and university and a million other commitments) can sometimes check in with how things are. Because I don't have the energy to contact them and make plans every week, I don't have the energy to reply to Facebook messages and talk about how things have been. I don't know why I decided to start documenting these kinds of things again, but I did, and so I need to try to stick at it. Even if it is self-indulgent. I don't have a therapist anymore and so these things, for the most part, go unsaid. I need to put it somewhere. I need to get it out of my head.
Monday, 4 February 2013
When I was seventeen, my original plan was to go to university and then go to drama school afterwards. I had a life planned out for myself. I knew the barriers I would face, financially, in terms of trying to get through drama school, I knew the bursaries and scholarships I could apply for, I knew the cost of living in London, I had everything sorted. And then things changed.
I left school for a few months, and came back in the middle of May a different person. I had spent the previous few months in a permanent state of depression, effectively left school and decided that everything had changed. And then things changed again.
I decided I wasn't going to go back to school after only being able to sit one of my exams. I had researched my college course and I had secured my audition. I knew what I had to do and although things had changed, I had adapted.
And somehow, whilst on holiday in a small house with my family in the Tuscan hills I remembered how much I loved learning and how I wasn't ready to give it up quite yet. I remembered that nothing was better to me than a book, and that if I felt like that it made sense to go back and fit it into one year. So that's what I did.
I applied for university in September. English or English and Drama were my choices. And then things changed again.
Come May, I decided I wanted to do Politics instead. So I rang the university I'm currently at, and asked them if I could change my course. And they said yes. And then I ended up here.
I did one play at the beginning of first year. I did love it, despite the time commitments while everyone around me in halls could go out every night etc., it didn't matter because I knew I was doing what I wanted to do.
And things changed again. I was ill again and subsequently have missed more university that I can bear thinking about. And somewhere, somehow, I ended up getting involved in my students' union. And in NUSUSI and NUS. I don't quite know how I ended up here, but I did.
I've been thinking a lot about my old 'dreams', or possibly it would be more appropriate to call them 'life plans'. At one point I wanted to be a doctor, at one point a mental health nurse. I wanted to go to art college. I wanted to go to film school I wanted to do everything and even now, I can see myself, as if I was watching some sort of screen, playing out my life in each of those scenarios. I can see every one of them. And it feels strange.
I left school for a few months, and came back in the middle of May a different person. I had spent the previous few months in a permanent state of depression, effectively left school and decided that everything had changed. And then things changed again.
I decided I wasn't going to go back to school after only being able to sit one of my exams. I had researched my college course and I had secured my audition. I knew what I had to do and although things had changed, I had adapted.
And somehow, whilst on holiday in a small house with my family in the Tuscan hills I remembered how much I loved learning and how I wasn't ready to give it up quite yet. I remembered that nothing was better to me than a book, and that if I felt like that it made sense to go back and fit it into one year. So that's what I did.
I applied for university in September. English or English and Drama were my choices. And then things changed again.
Come May, I decided I wanted to do Politics instead. So I rang the university I'm currently at, and asked them if I could change my course. And they said yes. And then I ended up here.
I did one play at the beginning of first year. I did love it, despite the time commitments while everyone around me in halls could go out every night etc., it didn't matter because I knew I was doing what I wanted to do.
And things changed again. I was ill again and subsequently have missed more university that I can bear thinking about. And somewhere, somehow, I ended up getting involved in my students' union. And in NUSUSI and NUS. I don't quite know how I ended up here, but I did.
I've been thinking a lot about my old 'dreams', or possibly it would be more appropriate to call them 'life plans'. At one point I wanted to be a doctor, at one point a mental health nurse. I wanted to go to art college. I wanted to go to film school I wanted to do everything and even now, I can see myself, as if I was watching some sort of screen, playing out my life in each of those scenarios. I can see every one of them. And it feels strange.
Sunday, 27 January 2013
Early morning.
Tonight is one of the fleeting kinds of nights that I have that I remind myself that I am so glad that I am filled with love, and not hate.
I am so glad that I keep looking for the best in people, despite how many times they fuck me over.
I am so glad that I fall in love again and again and again, no matter how many times my heart shatters.
I am so glad that no matter how terrible I am feeling, to a degree, I can almost always understand, or at the very least sympathise, with whatever someone else is going through.
I am so, so, so glad, that I have come home at 2.30am on a Monday morning, not crying tears of sadness, but tears of sympathy.
You will get better, I will get better. Eventually this will all be a bad dream. You deserve to be loved, and so do I. I cannot be that for you and you cannot be that for me, but one day, it will happen.
There are brighter things in this world than empty tunnels, and there are happier things in this life than meaningless days after days. People are what matter and people are what make it worth it.
"The only thing I know is this: I am full of wounds and still standing on my feet." (Nikos Kazantzakis)
I am so glad that I keep looking for the best in people, despite how many times they fuck me over.
I am so glad that I fall in love again and again and again, no matter how many times my heart shatters.
I am so glad that no matter how terrible I am feeling, to a degree, I can almost always understand, or at the very least sympathise, with whatever someone else is going through.
I am so, so, so glad, that I have come home at 2.30am on a Monday morning, not crying tears of sadness, but tears of sympathy.
You will get better, I will get better. Eventually this will all be a bad dream. You deserve to be loved, and so do I. I cannot be that for you and you cannot be that for me, but one day, it will happen.
There are brighter things in this world than empty tunnels, and there are happier things in this life than meaningless days after days. People are what matter and people are what make it worth it.
"The only thing I know is this: I am full of wounds and still standing on my feet." (Nikos Kazantzakis)
Monday, 14 January 2013
Monday.
It's currently exam season. The library is filled with people. There are empty Boojum bags all over the cafe. Coffee sales are at an all time high. Facebook is covered in worried/angsty/stopped-giving-a-fuck-just-let-them-end statuses.
Usually I'd be freaking out along with everyone else. I've never taken exam stress well. Well, at least I don't think I have. I tend to perform well in exams, and even though right now I'd say that I don't think exams stress me out BECAUSE I perform better in them.. I remember having a conversation with my mum about this a few months ago and she stared back at me with disbelief- I'd clearly forgotten how ill I'd been as a result of the pressure last year, and that doesn't surprise me. Your mind blocks things out, at least mine does. It blocks out painful memories, and as cliched as it sounds, it's true. Because I came out of last year with a 2.1, I seemed to have forgotten how bad I was around exam time. This is the same thing that happened with my GCSEs and my A Levels. And of course, I promptly forgot how ill I was during those exams too, because I came out each time with good grades.
Things were so bad last year I considered dropping out of university entirely. Then I told myself to wise up, because it wasn't like I had a part time job or anything I could do for a while.. I'd literally be going from university to nothing- which is what is definitely needed in some cases, but I didn't think I was ill enough to have the only thing I 'do' be therapy. I'm used to being busy all of the time. I just know I wouldn't have been able to do it- although saying that, I do think I should have maybe taken a few gap years before coming to university in the first place.
Because of the new medication and the short term medication I'm on at the minute, my memory is fucked. Short term memory, that is. So I wouldn't be able to revise (psychiatrist's words, not mine- I actually initially thought they helped me revise, just because they cleared my head). So then I decided to try to do essays instead of exams. And for once in their lives, my school were actually relatively good about it all (my school in the university- ever since I've arrived at university I've had to constantly jump through hoops in order to get what I need disability wise, in terms of provisions etc., it's been an absolute fucking joke) and it got sorted pretty quickly. Instead of three exams, I'm writing three essays.
The first two are done, and I've just begun working on the third. I had roughly a week to do each of them, which factored in time for bad days etc., and I knew I'd be alright. And so far, I have been. This is the least stressed-out I've been around exam time, ever. Even though I can't remember specific details of exam times in the past, I know that much. I've so far stayed on schedule, and gotten the first two essays done within the first fortnight, leaving me a week for the third. So technically, everything should be grand.
I'll give you another account of the last three weeks. Whilst everything has stayed on track (to a degree) in terms of my university work, my health is all over the place. I've lost weight, because I keep forgetting to eat- which then makes me scared I'll revert back into old unhealthy habits in regards to food, just because I've remembered what it's like to lose weight. I either sleep little or too much. When I started my newest medication, I couldn't even pour a cup of tea without spilling hot water everywhere, my coordination was so bad. Sometimes I've lay in bed for fourteen hours because I don't have the energy to pull myself up. I've ran back, literally and metaphorically, to ex-boyfriends, because whenever I get lonely and depressed I try to remember where I ever found any source of comfort or affection and try desperately to cling back at it. Each day I've spent in the library, I've had to take some form of tablet to help me concentrate enough to do work, and then worry about the stares I get when I lift out said tablet to take it. Then it makes me sleepy, so I have to have caffeine to make myself wake up. It's a vicious cycle- especially because amidst this, I've forgotten to eat a meal, so my energy levels aren't what they should be. I come home to an empty house (my house mate has caught the horrible virus thing that's going around and now that her exams are over it's understandable she'd rather be at home), turn on the heating, and sit in bed freezing for a few hours before I take more medication and send myself off to sleep. I keep looking down at my hands in disbelief, I just can't see them as my hands any more and I don't know why. And whilst trying to manage this, I'm also trying to do three essays, do what I can for NUSUSI, and battle with my university and students' union in regards to provisions for disabled students amongst other things.
It is exhausting.
But it's half past midnight, and I'm not exhausted, even though I had to get up early today for an appointment, because I think I remembered to have breakfast but I don't think I managed lunch or dinner, and there comes a point where a lack of food gives you an odd manic energy that you can't quite explain. I've told my doctors about this, I'm doing all that I can university wise, and I was a little worried they would try to admit me this morning at my psychiatrist appointment, so the fact that I'm writing this is in itself a good thing- what an odd thing to be proud of on a Monday night.
But it's Monday, and it's over and I should take my tablets soon so that I don't sleep for the entire day tomorrow. I wasn't admitted and I can't make a meeting I really wanted to go to tomorrow morning, but I suppose I can live with that. I have to, I don't have another option.
Friday, 11 January 2013
February 2012 - February 2013.
As most people are aware, I'm open with my mental health problems. Very open, in comparison to most people I know. And whilst it occasionally has it's problems, for the most part I haven't had anything bad come of it- although of course this may change whenever I want to get a 'proper' job and employers start Googling me, but whatever. Anyway.
In the last few weeks, I've had more than a few people come to me (friends, acquaintances, sometimes people I have on Facebook after meeting them once or twice) looking for advice/support on various mental health issues. Anything from where to go in terms of looking for counselling services in their university, to asking how I manage to remember to take medication everyday. It is whenever things like this happen that I remind myself that for all the negativity that comes with being so open about these problems/issues/illnesses/whatever/etc. I have, if it means that people I don't know can ask me about the aforementioned things, it has to be worth it.
And this leads me to the actual point of this post. Almost a year ago (sometime in February, but I can't remember the date- oddly I can never remember the dates of these things) I tried to kill myself again. I took a lot of tablets, and quite frankly it's a miracle my liver managed not only to withstand it, but come out relatively unharmed. I seem to be one of the lucky ones, seeing as after a couple of attempts like this, I haven't seen any long term damage. Then again, I'm still only 20. Seven years isn't a long time, maybe I'll experience future health problems as a result of all of this. But, similarly with my smoking, I don't worry about that sort of stuff right now. Making it from one day to the next is enough, for now.
Right now, unfortunately, I am not in a good enough place to say 'I am glad I did not die'. I know that it is a good thing. But right now, I am not very well. It would be hypocritical to say that I am entirely happy and optimistic about the future, when I am not. I am functioning, to a degree. My stability fluctuates. I have to keep forcing myself to eat because I keep forgetting to be hungry. Sometimes I still need to push myself to get into the shower, to go outside, to leave my room. And I'm attempting to write three essays in the middle of this, too. But no matter.
These things have happened in the past year. They would not have happened, had I been successful.
NUS and NUSUSI have been huge for me. It sounds wanky and cliched, but particularly in the last few months, these organisations have been a lot more for me than 'just' a student movement. The last few months have been terrible university wise, but I was able to try to keep focused on the fact that whilst my degree is apparently my biggest priority, whilst I'm in university I can also contribute to something much bigger and much more important than myself- trying my best to help the millions of other students in the UK and Ireland. I know both organisations have faced their fair share of criticism from all over the place since I've been involved, but despite our differences (whether they be political, or on how best to do x, y or z.. etc.), I know that I amongst a wonderful group of people who are united in the same cause and are throwing every piece of themselves into it. Meeting these people at events and meetings and committees and protests and conferences just makes it feel all the more worthwhile. I feel privileged and blessed to be involved with such wonderful and talented people, and so grateful for the lifelong friends I have made as I've gone along.
I finished my first year of university. I managed to NOT try to kill myself a few more times at the end of the academic year; which was by no means an easy feat. I had my heart broken, and subsequently learnt from it, even though it was easily one of the hardest things I've gone through. I moved into a wonderful flat with a best friend and remembered what it was like to have a home again, once the misery that was halls was over. I became friends with some excellent people, people who now count as best friends, as family. I travelled; I've been over to London a few times, I've been to Bristol, I've been to Berlin. I've discovered some more wonderful writing, some more incredible poetry. My room is covered in postcards and pictures from trips, galleries, museums, little bits of inspiration I've came across, birthday cards. I've found new music to listen to, I've played music with my family, I've taken up practising in the music rooms at uni. I remembered what it was like to be well enough to learn and to read and do all the things that I'd forgotten I could do, because being ill clouded any hope I had of ever feeling like my former self. I've had a visit from a wonderful friend during the summer I met on the Internet a few years ago, and we have become close friends since. I've had drunken nights in ridiculous clubs and hilarious mornings after, I've had days sitting in the sun doing absolutely nothing and nights spent sitting up till 3am playing board games. I've had few, but significant, moments when I am doing nothing, something ordinary and everyday and suddenly feel overwhelming grateful for this life I've been given. I've turned 20; I've made it to my twenties when I thought I would kill myself before I got there. I've embarked on a number of art projects, some completed, some lie unfinished. One is up on my wall. And even though I don't specifically look at it when I'm feeling particularly bad, I know that when I made it I wanted to remind myself that eventually this pain will be in the past. Eventually it will be behind me. I may suffer from health problems for the rest of my life, I may always remain on medication, I may be in therapy for a long time- but the hardest years, the loneliest years, they have to be behind me. They have to be because I can't believe otherwise. I would drive myself crazy- waiting for the next slip up, waiting for the next bout of depression or incident that lands me in hospital. The worst has to be behind me because there is nothing sadder than a 13-year-old child trying to kill herself. The worst has to be behind me because whilst no amount of art or writing that I produce as a result of being ill will ever make it worth it, I have been fortunate enough to meet some incredible people I am lucky enough to call friends. And people make it worth it. Or rather, they make it sufferable.
Above all, I've survived. And I've gotten through. And I'm on the other side, despite how cloudy and uncertain it may be. And in the end, that's what matters.
In the last few weeks, I've had more than a few people come to me (friends, acquaintances, sometimes people I have on Facebook after meeting them once or twice) looking for advice/support on various mental health issues. Anything from where to go in terms of looking for counselling services in their university, to asking how I manage to remember to take medication everyday. It is whenever things like this happen that I remind myself that for all the negativity that comes with being so open about these problems/issues/illnesses/whatever/etc. I have, if it means that people I don't know can ask me about the aforementioned things, it has to be worth it.
And this leads me to the actual point of this post. Almost a year ago (sometime in February, but I can't remember the date- oddly I can never remember the dates of these things) I tried to kill myself again. I took a lot of tablets, and quite frankly it's a miracle my liver managed not only to withstand it, but come out relatively unharmed. I seem to be one of the lucky ones, seeing as after a couple of attempts like this, I haven't seen any long term damage. Then again, I'm still only 20. Seven years isn't a long time, maybe I'll experience future health problems as a result of all of this. But, similarly with my smoking, I don't worry about that sort of stuff right now. Making it from one day to the next is enough, for now.
Right now, unfortunately, I am not in a good enough place to say 'I am glad I did not die'. I know that it is a good thing. But right now, I am not very well. It would be hypocritical to say that I am entirely happy and optimistic about the future, when I am not. I am functioning, to a degree. My stability fluctuates. I have to keep forcing myself to eat because I keep forgetting to be hungry. Sometimes I still need to push myself to get into the shower, to go outside, to leave my room. And I'm attempting to write three essays in the middle of this, too. But no matter.
These things have happened in the past year. They would not have happened, had I been successful.
NUS and NUSUSI have been huge for me. It sounds wanky and cliched, but particularly in the last few months, these organisations have been a lot more for me than 'just' a student movement. The last few months have been terrible university wise, but I was able to try to keep focused on the fact that whilst my degree is apparently my biggest priority, whilst I'm in university I can also contribute to something much bigger and much more important than myself- trying my best to help the millions of other students in the UK and Ireland. I know both organisations have faced their fair share of criticism from all over the place since I've been involved, but despite our differences (whether they be political, or on how best to do x, y or z.. etc.), I know that I amongst a wonderful group of people who are united in the same cause and are throwing every piece of themselves into it. Meeting these people at events and meetings and committees and protests and conferences just makes it feel all the more worthwhile. I feel privileged and blessed to be involved with such wonderful and talented people, and so grateful for the lifelong friends I have made as I've gone along.
I finished my first year of university. I managed to NOT try to kill myself a few more times at the end of the academic year; which was by no means an easy feat. I had my heart broken, and subsequently learnt from it, even though it was easily one of the hardest things I've gone through. I moved into a wonderful flat with a best friend and remembered what it was like to have a home again, once the misery that was halls was over. I became friends with some excellent people, people who now count as best friends, as family. I travelled; I've been over to London a few times, I've been to Bristol, I've been to Berlin. I've discovered some more wonderful writing, some more incredible poetry. My room is covered in postcards and pictures from trips, galleries, museums, little bits of inspiration I've came across, birthday cards. I've found new music to listen to, I've played music with my family, I've taken up practising in the music rooms at uni. I remembered what it was like to be well enough to learn and to read and do all the things that I'd forgotten I could do, because being ill clouded any hope I had of ever feeling like my former self. I've had a visit from a wonderful friend during the summer I met on the Internet a few years ago, and we have become close friends since. I've had drunken nights in ridiculous clubs and hilarious mornings after, I've had days sitting in the sun doing absolutely nothing and nights spent sitting up till 3am playing board games. I've had few, but significant, moments when I am doing nothing, something ordinary and everyday and suddenly feel overwhelming grateful for this life I've been given. I've turned 20; I've made it to my twenties when I thought I would kill myself before I got there. I've embarked on a number of art projects, some completed, some lie unfinished. One is up on my wall. And even though I don't specifically look at it when I'm feeling particularly bad, I know that when I made it I wanted to remind myself that eventually this pain will be in the past. Eventually it will be behind me. I may suffer from health problems for the rest of my life, I may always remain on medication, I may be in therapy for a long time- but the hardest years, the loneliest years, they have to be behind me. They have to be because I can't believe otherwise. I would drive myself crazy- waiting for the next slip up, waiting for the next bout of depression or incident that lands me in hospital. The worst has to be behind me because there is nothing sadder than a 13-year-old child trying to kill herself. The worst has to be behind me because whilst no amount of art or writing that I produce as a result of being ill will ever make it worth it, I have been fortunate enough to meet some incredible people I am lucky enough to call friends. And people make it worth it. Or rather, they make it sufferable.
Above all, I've survived. And I've gotten through. And I'm on the other side, despite how cloudy and uncertain it may be. And in the end, that's what matters.
Thursday, 10 January 2013
It is one of the dark times. I cannot explain and don't have the energy to explain, so this will do it for me.
“Depression is humiliating. It turns intelligent, kind people into zombies who can’t wash a dish or change their socks. It affects the ability to think clearly, to feel anything, to ascribe value to your children, your lifelong passions, your relative good fortune. It scoops out your normal healthy ability to cope with bad days and bad news, and replaces it with an unrecognizable sludge that finds no pleasure, no delight, no point in anything outside of bed. You alienate your friends because you can’t comport yourself socially, you risk your job because you can’t concentrate, you live in moderate squalor because you have no energy to stand up, let alone take out the garbage. You become pathetic and you know it. And you have no capacity to stop the downward plunge. You have no perspective, no emotional reserves, no faith that it will get better. So you feel guilty and ashamed of your inability to deal with life like a regular human, which exacerbates the depression and the isolation. If you’ve never been depressed, thank your lucky stars and back off the folks who take a pill so they can make eye contact with the grocery store cashier. No one on earth would choose the nightmare of depression over an averagely turbulent normal life.
It’s not an incapacity to cope with day to day living in the modern world. It’s an incapacity to function. At all. If you and your loved ones have been spared, every blessing to you. If depression has taken root in you or your loved ones, every blessing to you, too. No one chooses it. No one deserves it. It runs in families, it ruins families. You cannot imagine what it takes to feign normalcy, to show up to work, to make a dentist appointment, to pay bills, to walk your dog, to return library books on time, to keep enough toilet paper on hand, when you are exerting most of your capacity on trying not to kill yourself. Depression is real. Just because you’ve never had it doesn’t make it imaginary. Compassion is also real. And a depressed person may cling desperately to it until they are out of the woods and they may remember your compassion for the rest of their lives as a force greater than their depression. Have a heart. Judge not lest ye be judged.”
“Depression is humiliating. It turns intelligent, kind people into zombies who can’t wash a dish or change their socks. It affects the ability to think clearly, to feel anything, to ascribe value to your children, your lifelong passions, your relative good fortune. It scoops out your normal healthy ability to cope with bad days and bad news, and replaces it with an unrecognizable sludge that finds no pleasure, no delight, no point in anything outside of bed. You alienate your friends because you can’t comport yourself socially, you risk your job because you can’t concentrate, you live in moderate squalor because you have no energy to stand up, let alone take out the garbage. You become pathetic and you know it. And you have no capacity to stop the downward plunge. You have no perspective, no emotional reserves, no faith that it will get better. So you feel guilty and ashamed of your inability to deal with life like a regular human, which exacerbates the depression and the isolation. If you’ve never been depressed, thank your lucky stars and back off the folks who take a pill so they can make eye contact with the grocery store cashier. No one on earth would choose the nightmare of depression over an averagely turbulent normal life.
It’s not an incapacity to cope with day to day living in the modern world. It’s an incapacity to function. At all. If you and your loved ones have been spared, every blessing to you. If depression has taken root in you or your loved ones, every blessing to you, too. No one chooses it. No one deserves it. It runs in families, it ruins families. You cannot imagine what it takes to feign normalcy, to show up to work, to make a dentist appointment, to pay bills, to walk your dog, to return library books on time, to keep enough toilet paper on hand, when you are exerting most of your capacity on trying not to kill yourself. Depression is real. Just because you’ve never had it doesn’t make it imaginary. Compassion is also real. And a depressed person may cling desperately to it until they are out of the woods and they may remember your compassion for the rest of their lives as a force greater than their depression. Have a heart. Judge not lest ye be judged.”
Wednesday, 9 January 2013
I remember the day of my last appointment.
It was snowing, it was cold. It was the year no one made it to my eighteenth birthday party, save the few who managed to trek there. I decided to bring my camera. I needed to document everything, to keep it all, somewhere, I knew my head wasn't enough.
I took photographs. Of the chairs. Of the posters on the walls, of the cup of tea I'd been given, of the waiting room. Of his room. Of the pictures on his walls. Of the drawings done by children that he'd put up. Of the paper he would buy everyday, just to see what 'the other side' were up to. It was snowing and it was grey and it was nine in the morning.
It was cold. I still have the scarf I wore, I got it for a birthday years ago. It was cold and it was grey and I was saying goodbye to a place I had spent an hour every week in since the age of 13. I still can't quite get my head around how I ended up there, what happened. I was a baby. Thirteen is a child.
I needed to remember every detail. At the time, I didn't know how much I would need to remember it all, but I do now. The purple walls and the green carpet, the videos in the waiting room and the crappy TV, the files and the whiteboard and the other things I needed to remember.
I looked so sad when I was eighteen. I was eighteen and hopeless and in love and falling apart and trying to keep myself together long enough to get some A Levels out of me, before it all imploded again in a matter of months.
The things in my bedroom at home haven't changed. The same things are on the walls; the same drawings, the same photographs, the same pictures. It is lonely to think of them now. They seem from someone else's life.
I have spent too much time drunk and scared and looking for something I still haven't quite found. I don't know what it is. I know I haven't found it yet.
Monday, 31 December 2012
2012.
I thought it appropriate to do a rounding up of 2012, a farewell to what was frankly a horrible year and one that I am glad to turn my back on.
What seems most disappointing, however, is the fact that when I think about the year past I tend to think of it in terms of health and relationships- as if they are the only two things that mattered. I think of 2012 in terms of heartbreak and medication, hospitals and awkward mornings after.
It is lucky that this year I decided to properly organise every photo I took into a relevant album with a title and a date- and without having done this, I think I would have forgotten a lot of what happened during the year.
What seems most disappointing, however, is the fact that when I think about the year past I tend to think of it in terms of health and relationships- as if they are the only two things that mattered. I think of 2012 in terms of heartbreak and medication, hospitals and awkward mornings after.
It is lucky that this year I decided to properly organise every photo I took into a relevant album with a title and a date- and without having done this, I think I would have forgotten a lot of what happened during the year.
Here is my year. Ups, downs, and everything in between.
January
Exam time, stress stress stress, blank periods in my mind. An empty Elms, too many Friday nights spent in union, too many Saturdays in Laverys. Cooking my first proper meal and being so proud of myself. Trying to remember to keep choosing health over thin. Becoming friends with Rachel, spending every weekend with Patsy, Emily & Anton. The trip to London, to his other life. Falling in love with Camden, and being in love with love. His Burberry coat, the drive to Essex, seeing Rebecca for the second time in a few months. The vodka, the mess of the night, the hospital and the ambulances. Crying. Coming home, happy to say goodbye to London until the next time.
February
A blur, save for these few photographs. That night in Limelight, the graffiti that reminded me that my failed suicide attempt was a failure to be happy with. The night spent in hospital, the nicest psychiatrist I've ever met, the never ending apparent strength of my liver to withstand all that I threw at it. Counting the tablets in my room, while a party I was holding continued in the next room. The worry in his voice, the lump in my throat in mine. Hallmates returning that night, no one seeing what had changed, what had happened. Telling my mum. The tears and the worry. Always, the tears and the worry.
Falling out of love. The sadness that came with the realisation that we weren't who we used to be, the spooning and the sadness and the vow to stay best friends. Not going to The Maccabees, there were to be no more Toothpaste Kisses.
March
Kathryn's birthday, the sabbatical elections. Meeting Adrianne- just another union political person then, but so much more now. The beginning of what would be my life within NUSUSI. Endless nights in Laverys. The Labour Tory pub crawl, becoming friends with Hannah and Rebecca. St Patrick's Day, watching the rugby and then eating chinese on the pavement; two bottles of wine and waking up on Tyler's sofa the next day confused and hungover as hell. SDLP nights out, Mondays spent in union. Too many morning walks home.
April
SDLP Youth Conference. Joe Hendron, John McCallister, speeches and remembering why we all do this in the first place. Nights in Stiff Kitten. Difficult therapy sessions. Ties cut with my best friend, heart being slowly chipped away at by my former boyfriend. A miserable month. Ambulance, a friend I never realised I had. The beginning of a never ending supply of valium. The smiles by day and lonely, lonely nights.
May
Naomh's post-grad party, my first paid photography job. Meeting Sarah, summer came early to Belfast. House parties, Sketchy. James leaving, more goodbyes- but of the 'see you later' kind, the good kind. Realising how wonderful people can be without them even realising it. Vivian visiting Sarah, deciding to live together and counting down the weeks. Exams finally finishing, stopped caring long ago. Meeting Simon, his 'cultural experience' and the bliss of nights out, rolling home the next afternoon, and doing it all over again. Marina & the Diamonds, sun, constant sun. Having the best fortnight with the most incredible person, and the bittersweet ending that inevitably had to follow.
June
New piercings, always Sketchying. Beer nights in 76 and the horrific hilarious hangovers that followed. Staying in bed all morning talking about poetry and quoting too much John Donne to one another. Saying goodbye to Simon & Paul and the others, the hope that it isn't forever. Cliona's 18th, NUSUSI Women's Conference, my election. Reunion dinner, saying goodbye and good riddance to Elms after my second move. So glad to be away from the poisonous place with so many bad memories. Moving home.
This post is already horrendously long, so I'll save the next six months for another day. It is odd looking back at a year you hated, seeing happy memories.
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