Struggling

It has been a long time since I cried myself to sleep at night, apart from last week when someone said something derogatory about my physical appearance at a party and I felt totally and utterly devastated. Isn’t it strange, one million people can say something complimentary about you and all it takes is one person to say something negative and it can knock you for six. It does me anyway! I am a girl though 🙂

Last night I went to bed and shed a little tear before I drifted off but, for one simple reason: I wanted my Dad. I may be 34 and have my own children and my own life but, when I have had a bad day, I just want my Dad! I don’t like to feel sorry for myself, in the same way that I don’t want to let the death of my parents define me but, things get on top of me easily.

A Disney trip. I wasn’t in the picture as I have a phobia of people dressed up. I was rocking in the corner no doubt!

Particularly at the moment. When I feel stressed, everything is that little bit more defined and each little thing seems so much more difficult: having to call someone, having to do a job in a certain time frame. Yesterday was horrible. My poor little car which I love, failed its MOT in a gargantuan style. £1000 to repair when it cost three quarters of that to buy initially. So, I now have no car and two children to deposit and pick up from school and nursery. Oh, and no blinkin money!

Sounds crazy to say but, I still hope and pray (and kind of wait) for some kind of miracle. Like I am sure in my heart that really everything will be ok and that someone is looking over me and would make something amazing happen. It’s strange that I think this way given the history of my past but, I still wait for it. I wait for it every day. Perhaps I should give up, concentrate on sorting thing practically, like making sure I can pay my mortgage and stop waiting for a miracle. I’m scared that if I ever stop feeling this way, I won’t have something to look forward to. At the same time however, I also feel that the universe is out to get me. Over just a car? The car is one thing in a long line and my resources now are really depleted and I don’t know what to do to pick myself up.

Love this picture, a gorgeous sunny day at Cricket St Thomas

I know I am struggling at the moment because yesterday, I had a really bad panic attack. In Waitrose. The first I have had in ages (as you know). I grabbed a load of things I thought would suffice for my fridge and escaped. It terrifies me that I will never really completely get over the panic attacks and in times that are difficult or stressful, I will always be susceptible to them. That I will never be fixed. It does, however, make me feel better that I can meet with my counsellor and talk about it and she won’t judge me. In fact it is making me feel better already!

On a totally unrelated note, this week, thanks to my gorgeous man, I have also just discovered 24! Tis blinking brilliant it is too! Although, I am not sure it is the cheerful and upbeat content I require to lift me out of this current funk. I know! That was very random but, I wanted you to know 🙂

My Dad in 1952, the same age as my daughter is now.

I just miss my Dad.

As good as it gets…again!

Now! Where did we get to?

The police came to see me at work once. I told the policeman that if I found my Brother first, I was going to kill him! He nodded understandably and scribbled in his note pad but, really I expect he thought that I was an utterly heartless bitch! I wasn’t of course, I was in a place where I felt I was drowning, that I would never come up. No doubt how my Brother felt at the time.
I just kept thinking that he wasn’t at all like the Coppers from The Bill. I expect that this was his most exciting job of the day. To me, it was pretty much the end of my world.

How dare he! How dare he find that things were too much for him and so he could simply decide to run away and leave it all behind. Leave me behind. I had wished that I could run away but, I had responsibilities. He had a responsibility to be my older Brother and stick around. He didn’t run away to forget though, he ran away to disappear forever.

Disney baby!!!

Quite often it starts with something small. Don’t get me wrong, I am not trivialising self harm but in comparison of what was to come, it was much more preferable for me. I know that sounds selfish, I should not be talking about me here but, the self harm never seemed quite so bad as the determination to simply not be here. Perhaps that was because my Dad was still here then and emotionally and subconsciously, I was leaning on him so to speak. It is quite easy to ignore it, long jumpers and tins of razor blades hidden under sofas but, it is always there, always hanging around in the ethos.

He spoke to me about it once, we were probably drunk. As we became older and the age difference seemed less, we had a great relationship. We went clubbing together, drank together and on occasion, I was particularly enamoured of some of his male friends. He wasn’t always as particularly keen on that idea but he humoured me. The infatuation was ordinarily short lived. Most of all we would spend our time playing Trivial Pursuit, listening to music and reciting practically every line from Filthy Rich and Catflap…we still do that now. Those were happy times. We still do exactly the same when we meet up though, like we can retreat to those times when we were children and we probably need that.

My brother was always the intelligent one, he still is!

He said that when he bled, bled away, so did the pain and the frustration and the hurt. I could comprehend that, it made sense to me. It didn’t make sense however, that he would always have to be reminded of those times, that he would always always carry it with him, wherever he chose to go in life. Physically, that reminder would always be there. That part made no sense to me. Says she with the ongoing tattoo sleeve…I know I know!! But, I chose to have forever ink on me. He didn’t choose. No-one would choose that if they could. I respected that he had shared it with me though.

That’s exactly where we are now (but better). Since I was 18 and he told me that he would intentionally cut himself, he has never spoken about his pain. But, he does now. Those times of silence in between were dark. Very dark. Mary Celeste dark!

When he was hospitalised, I remember feeling like I did with my Dad when he was. I could not wait for my Dad to come home but, I was always worried about how our lives would be different. I wanted him to come home but, I was scared about being his carer. He could not walk and he had to be lifted into bed and into his wheelchair. Would I have to wipe his bum? Would I have to give up my life to concentrate on making the rest of his easier? Of course, I would do that and I did to some extent but, it is a scary prospect when you are just obtaining your own freedom in life. Incidentally, although I didn’t have to wipe his bum ( too much), I did have to do his washing and empty his commode which was always an experience. We would joke about whether it had been a sausages and onion gravy day. Thankfully, we learned to space those very far apart!

I never thought this may happen again. This time though it was a time when I had my own family to consider : a husband and a small child to concentrate on, I was also pregnant with another. Plus, I didn’t have my Dad anymore to lean on. Those times were times that I would really rather forget. When I talked to my brother on the phone from his hospital though, it seemed like it was just the two of us in the world. Just as we had to be before, just as we had been left and although these were the darkest times, those times are behind us now and we have a crazy relationship because of it. Crazy is our middle name. Although, technically he has a certificate to prove it :)!

Its not Tarby…but hey 🙂

I can honestly say that I have never been so proud of anyone. Of what he was then and now what he has become is a world so far apart that you would need a wardrobe to get there again! I know that he will never be cured. I know that my beautiful fiance will never be cured but in life there is hope and you cannot have sadness or pain without happiness and love. The world is meant to be full of opposites and I firmly believe that when you are given hardship, one day you will be given back what you gave in a positive reward. I already have now to some extent and so has my Brother: in the recovery that he has achieved. If that isn’t true however, I shall be most annoyed but i will die waiting. If I am proved wrong….hey, who cares..I’ll be dead!!!

As good as it gets!

It’s very easy to blame your future on your past. In truth, it’s how we cope with the life we are dealt and in which way we wish to view it. In some ways, it has been far easier for me being the ‘Strong one’. I would always be the person busily rushing around and getting on with practicalities and quite often, leaving the hurt to be dealt with after, when I had time. I am most definitely no saint and I, like any mother of small children, often has the patience of a turnip! My dealing with the death of my parents however was much easier for me because I didn’t also have to contend with ‘The big Black Shadow’.

Being an outsider to Depression is incredibly hard. In it’s very nature, it remains a fog with no particular shape: cannot be defined or described and if that’s how it is for the sufferer, what bloody hope does any loved one have in dealing with it equally. The only clarity I profess to know is that it has none. There are no questions that you can ask and worst of all, there is absolutely nothing you can do to make it dissipate. I know what you’re thinking, ‘How does she know?’, and you would be right, I am not a first person sufferer but, I bet that my description would be equally as inadequate and informative as my Brother’s. And I have still suffered from it. Once (or twice), it has tried to steal my Brother from me and we have been fighting a tug of war with ‘The Big Black Shadow’ really ever since my Mum died.

My Brother, dressed as toothpaste, if that doesn’t make you smile, nothing will.

He came into the world unusually and that is really how he has continued to live within it. When my Mum found out she was pregnant, it was a bit of a shock. This is the most amazing tit bit of information that a picked on little sister could ever obtain and believe me, I used it many times. The fact that he wasn’t planned… In other words, I reminded him he was an accident. Particularly the time that we were due to all go out to the theatre and he tripped me up, most cleverly ensuring that my chin hit the coffee table on my way down. I was wearing my Minnie Mouse glasses at the time. They never broke. That really would have been the last straw! Stunning blue plastic they were, with Minnie Mouse appendages on the side. I also had them in red. Anyway, we never got to the theatre, we went to the hospital instead and he was disgraced for days. I utterly loved it 🙂 He always managed to bring it back however. Like the time I gently placed our Volvo in car cigarette lighter on his finger when he was being particularly annoying. Burning flesh really is a rather stinky matter!

Anyway, the stinky finger story has made me digress. Don’t be dirty!!
My Brother, again not wanting to be normal, was stuck in the Fallopian tube. Quite firmly stuck apparently and alas, it appeared that he had taken a wrong turn and would have to be removed before he started to grow and caused too much damage. My family wasn’t always unlucky, we had a miracle once. By some miracle, a dirty little batch of germs found their way into my Mum’s breathing tract and she coughed so much over night in hospital the night before the operation that she shot the little blighter right into where he should be. Please understand that these are not the most defined of scientific terms and I understand it wasn’t exactly ‘him’ but, it makes the story that much more descriptive don’t you think?

Isn’t he a cheeky little monkey…

Do I think it would be different if our parents were still here with us? Of course not! Grief and Depression are two very different things. It’s testament to this that my Brother and I experienced exactly the same life events (with a few dodgy girlfriends thrown in for him) and I never became a sufferer. I still have days when I do not want to get out of bed but, that is because I am lonely. I miss them and I miss feeling that there is someone in the world that can love me no matter what I did.
I simply believe that our Mum’s death was his catalyst. It would have arisen at a later date for sure but, in his case, he had a trigger. Most people don’t, I understand that.

It’s a very selfish condition but, so is coping with it as an outsider and trying to understand. I lost count of the times that I told my Brother he should be strong and helping me cope, not adding to my worry. I was thinking about me and how I wasn’t willing to cope with more difficulties in my life but, he just couldn’t comply, he had no control. I know he loves me but, love isn’t always enough. It is to me but, I don’t suffer. I do realise it though. That much I have learned and try to apply now but, it really isn’t easy to comprehend.

When I banged my chin on that coffee table, I knew my Mum would make it feel better. She knew she could make it feel better. I cannot in my wildest dreams imagine how it must feel to know that no amount of Love can cover a wound. I understand in respect of the fact that my Mum and Dad are no longer here and I can never feel that love again, I haven’t for a long time. My forever man suffers too and I have to be supportive and acknowledge the fact that in the rest of our lives together, he will have times where nothing I can say will help but, I wish it would. Yet, my accepting of this, although frustrating will ensure that I am always there for him, completely and wholeheartedly without judgement. As I am for my Brother. It has taken me a while to get there but, the road has been a little rocky. Blimey it has been Rocky…

My Brother and I in Disney. We went every year as a family. I wish we could go together again one day.

To be continued……. I definitely don’t want you to get bored and this story is far more than one solitary blog post believe me. I hope you stick around…

Humbled

Last night I had an utterly amazing message which has really touched me. It did so because it was from someone that I have never met, never spent time with or even met, yet they (she) took the time to write me an absolutely incredible and heartfelt message.

I wanted to say thank you to her and to everyone that has taken their time to let me know that they are enjoying reading my ramblings! I have even had messages from people that have said that my blog has made them think differently about certain things in their life, including everyday occurrences that would normally bother them. I am honestly and wholeheartedly so amazingly over the moon by this. What was started as merely a suggestion, has turned into something so cathartic and quite frankly utterly life changing for me. I am so dramatic!!

I saw this and I liked it.

I have not suffered one panic attack whilst driving since I have started writing. I still feel the initial bubbles sometimes (that’s the only way I can describe them) but, instead of reaching the normal terrifying crescendo, they have merely dissipated. I can then continue on my drive to work whilst listening to Billie Holiday or John 5 in peace, whilst obviously driving competently and completely unlike the stereotype of women drivers at all! (unless I have to reverse park of course)

Although, I have always thought of it as a defence mechanism, I have realised that there is absolutely nothing wrong with using humour to heal and cope, providing it is relevant and appropriate of course. Unlike the time at my Uncles cremation when my Dad moaned at me for being the only one smoking. I informed him I wasn’t!! My Uncle would have laughed, as I would. I was going to say he was just like my Mum in that respect but there was absolutely no chance of entertaining her the time she broke her tooth in half on a KitKat.

Anyway, I wanted to say thank you. I never really felt like I had much to offer and even though I still won’t be running out for lunch with J K Rowling, I want you to know that I am so grateful and I shall always remain just a normal person but, with lots of things to share.

Life can be hard but, how we choose to view it will determine how we continue to exist. I choose to view it with humour.

Mostly, I want to thank one person in particular for making me feel like I could do anything, who always tells me he is proud of me and who, without his encouragement, I would never have got off my lazy backside and written anything. As well as the technical support he has given me, he has only really lost his patience (in regards to this anyway) half a time 😉 Therefore: to my guitar playing, White Falcon wanting, Setzer loving, Zappa crazy and Beefheart bopper man/Fiancé : I love you and I look forward to spending forever with you. With the new life you have given me. A life with hope. Always yours. Me xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Cooey Mr Shifter

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Monthly Archives: May 2014

Struggling

As good as it gets…again!

As good as it gets!

Humbled